‘Upon my word and honour, sir, I am rather proud of that.’
‘And well you may be,’ said Stephen, his eyes dwelling on the little ships drawn all round the triangle. ‘And pray, what in sea-language is meant by a ship?’
‘She must have three square-rigged masts, sir,’ they told him kindly, ‘and a bowsprit; and the masts must be in three – lower, top and topgallant – for we never call a polacre a ship.’
‘Don’t you, though?’ said Stephen.
‘Oh no, sir,’ they cried earnestly, ‘nor a cat. Nor a xebec; for although you may think xebecs have a bowsprit, it is really only a sorts of woolded boomkin.’
‘I shall take particular notice of that,’ said Stephen. ‘I suppose you grow used to living here,’ he observed, rising cautiously to his feet. ‘At first it must seem a little confined.’
‘Oh, sir,’ said Mowett, ‘think not meanly of this humble seat,
Whence spring the guardians ‘of the British fleet! Revere the sacred spot, however low, Which formed to martial acts an Hawke! An Howe !’
‘Pay no attention to him, sir,’ cried Babbington, anxiously. ‘He means no disrespect, I do assure you, sir. It is only his disgusting way.’
‘Tush, tush,’ said Stephen. ‘Let us see the rest of the
– of the vessel, the conveyance.’
They went for’ard and passed another marine sentry; and groping his way along the dim space between two gratings, Stephen stumbled over something soft that clanked and called out angrily, ‘Can’t you see where you’re a-coming to, you grass-combing bugger?’
‘Now then, Wilson, you stow your gob,’ cried Mowett. ‘That’s one of the men in the bilboes
– lying in irons,’ he explained. ‘Never mind him, sir.’ –
‘What is he lying in irons for?’
‘For being rude, sir,’ said Mowett, with a certain primness.
‘Come, now, here’s a fair-sized room, although it is so low. For the inferior officers, I take it?’
‘No, sir. This is where the hands mess and sleep.’
‘And the rest of them downstairs again, I presume.’
‘There is no downstairs from here, sir. Below us is the hold, with only a bit of a platform as an orlop.’
‘How many men are there?’
‘Counting the marines, seventy-seven, sir.’
‘Then they cannot all sleep here: it is physically impossible.’
‘With respect, sir, they do. Each man has fourteen inches to sling his hammock, and they sling ’em fore and aft:
now, the midship beam is twenty-five foot ten, which gives twenty-two places – you can see the numbers written up here.’
‘A man cannot lie in fourteen inches.’
‘No, sir, not very comfortably. But he can in eight and twenty; for, do you see, in a two-watch ship at any one time about half the men are on deck for their watch, which leaves all their places free.’
‘Even in twenty-eight inches, two foot four, a man must be touching his neighbour.’
‘Why, sir, it is tolerably close, to be sure; but it gets them all in out of the weather. We have four ranges, as
you see: from the bulkhead to this beam; and so to this one; then to the beam with the lantern hanging in front of it; and the last between that and the for’ard bulkhead, by the galley. The carpenter and the bosun have their cabins up there. The first range and part of the next is for the marines; then come the seamen, three and a half ranges of them. So with an average of twenty hammocks to a row, we get them all in, in spite of the mast.’
‘But it must be a continuous carpet of bodies, when even half the men are lying there.’
‘Why, so it is, sir.’
‘Where are the windows?’
‘We have nothing like what you would call windows,’ said Mowett, shaking his head.
‘There are the hatches and gratings overhead, but of course they are mostly covered up when it blows.’
‘And the sick-quarters?’
‘We have none of them either, sir, rightly speaking. But sick men have cots slung right up against the for’ard bulkhead on the starboard side, by the galley; and they are indulged in the use of the round-house.’
‘What is that?’
‘Well, it is not really a round-house, more like a little row-port: not like in a frigate or a ship of the line. But it serves.’
‘What for?’
‘I hardly know how to explain, sir,’ said Mowett, blushing. ‘A necessary-house.’
‘A jakes? A privy?’
‘Just so, sir.’
‘But what do the other men do? Have they chamber-pots?’
‘Oh no, sir, Heavens above! They go up the hatch there and along to the heads – little places on either side of the stem.’
‘Out of doors?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘But what happens in inclement weather?’
‘They still go to the heads, sir.’
‘And they sleep forty or fifty together down here, with no windows? Well, if ever a man with the gaol-fever, or the plague, or the cholera morbus, sets foot in this apartment, God help you all.’
‘Amen, sir,’ said Mowett, quite aghast at Stephen’s immovable, convincing certainty.
‘That is an engaging young fellow,’ said Stephen, walking into the cabin.
‘Young Mowctt? I am happy to hear you say so,’ said Jack, who was looking worn and harried. ‘Nothing pleasanter than good shipmates. May I offer you a whet? Our seaman’s drink, that we call grog – are you acquainted with it? It goes down gratefully enough, at sea. Simpkin, bring us some grog. Damn that fellow- he is as slow as Beelzebub Simpkin! Light along that grog. God rot the flaming son of a bitch. Ah, there you are. I needed that,’ he said, putting down his glass. ‘Such a tedious damned morning. Each watch has to have just the same proportions of skilled hands in the various stations, and so on. Endless discussion. And,’ said he, hitching himself a little closer to Stephen’s ear, ‘I blundered into one of those unhappy gaffes… I picked up the list and read off Flaherty, Lynch, Sullivan, Michael Kelly, Joseph Kelly, Sheridan and Aloysius Burke
– those chaps that took the bounty at Liverpool – and I said “More of these damned Irish Papists; at this rate half the starboard watch will be made up of them, and we shall not be able to get by for beads” – meaning it pleasantly, you know. But then I noticed a damned frigid kind of a chill and I said to myself, ‘Why, Jack, you damned fool, Dillon is from Ireland, and he takes it as a national reflexion.” Whereas I had not meant anything so
illiberal as a national reflexion, of course; only that I hated Papists. So I tried to put it right by a few well-turned flings against the Pope; but perhaps they were not as clever as I thought for they did not seem to answer.’
And do you hate Papists, so?’ asked Stephen.
‘Oh, yes: and I hate paper-work. But the Papists are a very wicked crew, too, you know, with confession and all that,’ said Jack. ‘And they tried to blow up Parliament. Lord, how we used to keep up the Fifth of November. One of my very best friends – you would not believe how kind -was so upset when her mother married one that she took to mathematics and Hebrew directly – aleph, beth – though she was the prettiest girl for miles around – taught me navigation – splendid headpiece, bless her. She told me quantities of things about the Papists: I forget it all now, but they are certainly a very wicked crew.
There is no trusting them. Look at the rebellion they have just had.’
‘But my dear sir, the United Irishmen were primarily Protestants – their leaders were Protestants. Wolfe Tone and Napper Tandy were Protestants. The Emmets, the O’Connors, Simon Butler, Hamilton Rowan, Lord Edward Fitzgerald were Protestants. And the whole idea of the club was to unite Protestant and Catholic and Presbyterian Irishmen.
The Protestants it was who took the initiative.’
‘Oh? Well, I don’t know much about it, as you see – I thought it was the Papists. I was on the West Indies station at the time. But after a great deal of this damned paper-work I am quite ready to hate Papists and Protestants, too, and Anabaptists and Methodies. And Jews. No – I don’t give a damn. But what really vexes me is that I should have got across Dillon’s hawse like that; as I was saying, there is nothing pleasanter than good shipmates.
He has a
time of it, doing a first lieutenant’s duty and keeping a watch – new ship – new ship’s company – new captain
– and I particularly wished to ease him in. Without there is a good understanding between the officers a ship cannot be happy: and a happy ship is your only good fighting ship
– you should hear Nelson on that point: and I do assure you it is profoundly true. He will be dining with us, and I should take it very kindly if you would, as it were. . . ah, Mr Dillon, come and join us in a glass of grog.’