Chapter 19

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_ CHAPTER NINETEEN.

As Bo'sun Strake reached the deck, he came suddenly upon the first lieutenant, and touched his hat.

"Where have you been, my man?"

"Down below, sir."

"I said where have you been, my man?" said the lieutenant, sternly.

"Young gentlemen's quarters, sir."

"What was going on there?"

The bo'sun hesitated, but the lieutenant's eyes fixed him, and he said, unwillingly--

"A fight, sir."

"Humph! The new midshipman--Mr Belton?"

"Yes, sir."

"Got well thrashed, I suppose?"

"No, sir; not he," cried the bo'sun, eagerly.

"Who was it with?"

"Tall young gent, sir, as brought us off in the boat yesterday."

"That will do."

"Hope he won't mast-head the dear boy for this," muttered Barney, as he went aft, found the captain's servant, and asked to see his master.

In a few minutes he was summoned, and found Captain Belton writing.

"Well, Strake; what is it?"

"I had a message, your honour, to take to the young gentlemen's berth."

"Yes; to Mr Belton. Is he here?"

"No, your honour; he's there."

"Well, is he coming?"

"If you say he's to come, sir, he'll come; but he don't look fit."

"Why? Fighting?"

"Yes, sir."

"And been beaten?"

"Beaten, your honour? Well, beggin' your pardon, sir, I'm surprised at you. My boy Panny-mar give it to his man pretty tidy last night, but he's nothing to that young gent below yonder."

"Indeed!" said the captain, frowning.

"Yes, sir, indeed. He do look lovely."

"Who has my son been fighting with?"

"Young gent as was in charge of the boat as brought Sir Thomas and us aboard, sir."

"That will do, Strake."

The bo'sun touched his forehead, and backed out of the cabin.

"So soon!" muttered Captain Belton; and, taking his hat, he went on deck to encounter the first lieutenant directly.

"I find that my son has been fighting in the midshipmen's mess, Mr Bracy," he said. "Please bear in mind that he is Mr Belton, a midshipman in his Majesty's service, and that I wish that no favour should be shown to him on account of his being nearly related to me."

"Trust me for that, Captain Belton," said the lieutenant. "If I made any exception at all, it would be to bear a little more severely upon him."

"And in this case?"

"Well, sir, in this case, from what I understand, he has incapacitated our senior midshipman for duty."

"I am sorry," said the captain.

"I am glad," said the first lieutenant.

"Eh?"

"Cut his comb, sir. Good, gentlemanly-looking fellow, who understands his duty, but a sad bully, I fear."

"Oh! And you will punish--er--them both?"

"Punish, sir?" said the lieutenant; "oh dear, no. I don't mean to hear anything about it, sir. But I congratulate you upon the stuff of which your son is made."

"Thank you, Mr Bracy," said the captain, as they touched their hats to each other most ceremoniously, and the captain went back to his cabin.

For the next week all was confusion on deck, alow and aloft. The captain stayed at the hotel ashore so as to be handy, and the first lieutenant ruled supreme.

The riggers were still busy, and the crew hard at work getting in stores, water, and provisions, including fresh meat and vegetables. Coops and pens were stowed forward, and chaos was the order of the day.

Syd became thoroughly well accustomed to the middies' berth, for he was obliged to keep down all day, mostly in company with Terry, but they kept apart as much as possible, and Syd was old enough to feel that it was a very hollow truce between them.

But as soon as it was dark he was up on deck, where it was not long before he found out that he was the object of attention of the men, who were not slow to show their admiration for the young fellow who had so soon displayed his mettle by thrashing the bully of the mess.

The bo'sun was to answer for a good deal of this, and so it was, that go where he would there was a smile for him, and an eagerness on the part of the crew to answer questions or perform any little bit of service.

This was all very pleasant, and life on board began to look less black, although it really was life in the dark.

"But, never mind, Roy," he would say, in allusion to his nocturnal life; "keeps people from seeing what a face I've got. Don't look so bad to-day, does it?"

"Bad? no. It's all right."

"Oh, is it? I suppose it about matches Terry's, and his is a pretty sight."

During his week Syd was always expecting to be summoned by his father or the first lieutenant, but he encountered neither; they seemed to have forgotten his existence. So he read below a great deal of light, cheerful, edifying matter upon navigation--good yawning stuff, with plenty of geometry in it and mathematical calculations, seeing little of his messmates, who were on the whole pretty busy.

At night, though, he began to acquire a little practical seamanship, calling upon the bo'sun, a most willing teacher, to impart all he could take in, in these brief lessons, about the masts, yards, sails, stays, and ropes. He went aloft, and being eager and quick, picked up a vast amount of information of a useful kind, Barney knowing nothing that was not of utility.

"Never had no time for being polished, Master Syd," he would say, "but lor me, what a treat it is to get back among the hemp and canvas! I never used to think when I was splicing a graft on a tree that I should come to splicing 'board ship again. When are you coming on deck again in the day-time?"

"Not till I look decent, Barney."

"Beg pardon, sir."

"Bo'sun, then."

"Thankye, sir."

The week had passed, and the next day the ship was clear of its dockyard artisans. Shipwrights, riggers, and the rest of them had gone, and leaving the painting to be done by his crew during calms, the captain received his orders, the frigate was unmoored, and Syd watched from one of the little windows the receding waves, becoming more and more conscious of the fact that there was wind at work and tide in motion.

The time went on, and he knew that there was the land on one side and a verdant island on the other, but somehow he did not admire them, and when Roylance came to him in high glee to call him to dinner, with the announcement that there were roast chickens and roast leg of pork as a wind-up before coming down to biscuit and salt junk, Syd said he would not come.

"But chickens, man--chickens roast."

"Don't care for roast chickens," said Syd.

"Roast pork then, and sage and onions."

"Oh, I say, don't!" cried Syd, with a shudder.

"Well, I must go, or I shan't get a morsel," cried Roylance, and he hurried away.

"How horrible!" thought the boy. "I do believe I'm going to be sea-sick, just like any other stupid person who goes a voyage for the first time."

Before evening the frigate had passed high chalk bluffs on the left, and on the right a wide bay, with soft yellow sandy shore. Then there was chalk to right and the open channel to left; then long ranges of limestone cliffs, dotted with sea-birds, and then evening and the land growing distant, the waves rising and falling, and as he went to his hammock that night Syd uttered a groan.

"What's the matter, lad?" cried Roylance, who was below.

"Bad," said Syd, laconically.

"Nonsense! make a bold fight of it."

"Fight?" cried Syd; "why Baby Jenks could thrash me now. How long shall I be ill?"

"Well, if it gets rough, as it promises to, I dare say you'll have a week of it."

"A week?" groaned Syd.

Then some time after, to himself, between bad paroxysms of misery--

"Never mind," he said; "by the time I am able to go on deck again I shall look fit to be seen."

It was about a couple of hours later, when the frigate had got beyond a great point which jutted out into the sea, and began to stretch away for the ocean, that Syd awakened to the fact that the vessel seemed to be having a game with him. She glided up and up, bearing him tenderly and gently as it were up to the top of a hill of water, and then, after holding him there for a moment, she dived down and left him, with a horrible sensation of falling that grew worse as the wind increased, and the _Sirius_ heeled over.

"I wonder whether, if I made a good brave effort, I could master this giddy weak sensation," thought the boy. "I'll try."

He made his effort--a good, bold, brave effort--and then he lay down and did not try to make any more efforts for a week, when after passing through what seemed to be endless misery, during which he lay helplessly in his hammock, listening to the creaking of the ship's timbers and the rumble that went on overhead, and often thinking that the ship was diving down into the sea never to come up again, he was aroused by a gruff voice, which sounded like Barney Strake's. It was very dark, and he felt too ill to open his eyes, but he spoke and said--

"Is that you, bo'sun?"

"Ay, ay, my lad; me it is. Come, rouse and bit."

"I couldn't, Barney," said Syd, feebly. "The very thought of a bit of anything makes me feel worse."

"Yah! not it; and I didn't mean eat; I meant turn out, have a good wash, and dress, and come on deck."

"I should die if I tried."

"Die, lad? What, you? Any one would think you was ill."

"I am, horribly."

"Yah! nonsense! On'y squirmy. Weather's calming down now, and you'll be all right."

"No, Barney; never any more," sighed Syd. "I say."

"Ay, my lad. What is it?"

"Will they bury me at sea, Barney?"

"Haw--haw--haw!" laughed the bo'sun. "He thinks he's going to die! Why, Master Syd, I did think you had a better heart."

"You don't know how ill I am," said the boy, feebly.

"Yes I do, zackly. I've seen lots bad like you, on'y it arn't bad, but doing you good."

"No, Barney; you don't know," said Syd, a little more forcibly.

"Why, you haven't been so bad as my Pan-y-mar was till I cured him."

"Did you cure him?" said Syd, beginning to take more interest in the bo'sun's words.

"Ay, my lad, in quarter of an hour."

"Do you think you could cure me, Barney? I don't want to die just yet."

"On'y hark at him."

"But do you think you could cure me?"

"Course I could, my lad; but I mustn't. You've get the doctor to see you. Don't he do you no good?"

"No, Barney; he only laughed at me--like you did."

"'Nough to make him, lad. You're not bad."

"I tell you I am," cried Syd, angrily. "What did you give Pan?"

"I didn't give him nothin', sir. I only showed him a rope's-end, and I says to him, 'Now look ye here, Pan-y-mar,' I says, 'if you aren't dressed and up and doing in quarter hour, here's your dose.'"

"Oh!" moaned Syd.

"And he never wanted to take it, Master Syd, for he was up on deck 'fore I said, and he haven't been bad since."

"How could you be such a brute, Barney?"

"Brute, lad? Why, it was a kindness. If I might serve you the same--"

"It would kill me," said Syd, angrily; and somehow his voice grew stronger.

"Kill yer! You'd take a deal more killing than you think for."

"No, I shouldn't. I'm nearly dead now."

"Nay, lad; you're as lively as a heel in fresh water. Capen sent me down to see how you was."

"He hasn't been to see me, Barney."

"Course he arn't, lad. Had enough to do looking arter the ship, for we've had a reg'lar snorer these last few days. Don't know when I've seen a rougher sea. Been quite a treat to a man who has been ashore so long. See how the frigate behaved?"

"Did she, Barney?"

"Loverly. There, get up; and I'll go and tell the skipper you're all right again."

"But I tell you I'm not. I'm very, very bad."

"Not you, Master Syd."

"I am, I tell you."

"Not you, lad. Nothing the matter with you;" and Barney winked to himself.

"Look here," cried Syd, passionately, as he jumped up in his hammock, "you're a stupid, obstinate old fool, so be off with you."

"And you're a midshipman, that's what you are, Master Syd, as thinks he's got the mumble-dumbles horrid bad, when it's fancy all the time."

"Do you want me to hit you, Barney?" cried Syd, angrily.

"Hit me? I should like you to do it, sir. Do you know I'm bo'sun of this here ship?"

"I don't care what you are," cried Syd. "You're an unfeeling brute. An ugly old idiot, that's what you are."

"Oh! am I, sir? Well, what do you call yerself--all yaller and huddled up like a sick monkey in a hurricane. Why, I'd make a better boy out of a ship's paddy and a worn-out swab."

Syd hit out at him with all his might, striking the bo'sun in the chest, but overbalancing himself so that he rolled out of the hammock, and would have fallen had not Barney caught him in his arms and planted him on the deck.

"Hoorray! Well done, Master Syd; now then, on with these here stockings, and jump into your breeches. I'll help you. On'y want a good wash and a breath o' fresh air, and then--look here, I'll get the cook to let you have a basin o' soup, and you'll be as right as a marlin-spike in a ball o' tow."

Syd was too weak to make much opposition. He had awakened to the fact after his fit of passion that he really was not so bad as he thought. The ship was not dancing about, and there was a bright ray of sunshine cutting the darkness outside the place where he lay, and once or twice he had inhaled a breath of sweet, balmy, summer-like air. Then, too, his head did not swim so much in an erect position, and he let Barney go on talking in his rough, good-humoured fashion, and help him on with some clothes; bring him a bowl of water in which he had a good wash; and when at last he was dressed and sitting back weak and helpless on the locker, the bo'sun said--

"Now, I was going to say have a whiff o' fresh air first, my lad; but you are a bit pulled down for want o' wittals. I'll speak to the cook now, and seeing who you are, I dessay he'll rig you up a mess of slops as 'll do you no end o' good."

"I couldn't touch anything, Barney."

"Yah, lad! you dunno. Said you couldn't get up, and here you are. Think I can't manage you. Here, have another hit out at me."

"Oh, Barney, I am so sorry."

"Sorry be hanged, lad! I'm glad. You won't know yourself another hour."

"But--but I'm going to be sick again, Barney," gasped the invalid.

"That's a moral impossibility, my lad, as I werry well know. You sit still while I fetch you something to put in your empty locker. Didn't know I was such a doctor, did yer?"

Barney stepped out of the door, and went straight for the galley, leaving Syd leaning back in a corner feeling deathly sick, the perspiration standing cold upon his brow, and with an intense longing to lie down once more, and in profound ignorance of what will can do for a sea-sick patient after a certain amount of succumbing.

The threat of the rope's-end had finished Pan's bout. Something else was going to act as a specific for Syd's.

He had been seated there a few minutes when there was a light step, and a little figure appeared surmounted by the comically withered countenance of Jenkins.

"Hallo, Belton!" he cried. "Up again. Better?"

"No; I feel very ill."

"Never mind. You do look mouldy, though. Can I get you anything?"

"No; I couldn't touch a bit."

"Couldn't you? Keep your head to the wind, lad, and get well. Old Mike Terry's getting horrid saucy again, so look sharp and bung him up."

The little fellow popped up on deck, and took the news, with the effect that Bolton came and said a word of congratulation, and he was followed by Roylance.

"Oh, I am glad, old fellow," cried the latter. "You've had a nasty bout. But, I say, your eyes are all right again, and the swelling's gone from your lip."

"Has it?" said Syd, feebly, as if nothing mattered now.

"Yes; you'll very soon come round. We've run down with a rush before that nor'-easter, and we're getting into lovely summer weather. Coming on deck?"

"Too weak."

"Not you. Do you good. But I must go back on deck. Regular drill on."

He hurried away, and Syd was leaning back utterly prostrated, when there was another step, and he opened his eyes to see that the figure which darkened the door was that of Terry, who came into the low dark place, and stood looking down at his late antagonist with a sneering contemptuous smile which was increased to a laugh.

"What a poor miserable beggar!" he said, as if talking to himself. "Talk about the sailor's sick parrot. Ha, ha, ha!"

A faint tinge of colour began to dawn in Syd's face. "Well," said Terry; "what are you staring at?"

Syd made no reply, only kept his eyes fixed on his enemy, and panted slightly.

"Hadn't you better go and ask your father to put you ashore somewhere, miss?" sneered Terry. "You ought to be sent home in a Bath chair."

Syd made no reply, and Terry, who under his assumed nonchalant sneering aspect was simmering with rage at the sight of his conqueror, went on glorying in the chance to trample on a fallen enemy, and trying to work him up to do something which would give him an excuse for delivering a blow.

"_I_ can't think what officers are about to bring such miserable sickly objects on board the King's ships to upset and annoy everybody with their miserable long-shore ways. It's a scandal to the service."

Still Syd made no answer, and emboldened by the silence Terry went on.

"If I had my way I'd just take every contemptible sick monkey who laid up, haul him on deck, make fast a rope to his ankle, and souse him overboard a few times. That would cure them."

Syd closed his eyes, for he was giddy; but his breast rose and fell as if he were suffering from some emotion.

"Filling the ship up with a pack of swabs who, because they are sons of captains, are indulged and nursed, and the whole place is turned into a hospital. Why don't you go into the cabin?"

"Because I don't choose," cried Syd, suddenly starting up with his face flushing, his eyes bright, and the passion that was in him sending the blood coursing through his veins.

Terry started back in astonishment.

"I'm not going into the cabin, because I am going to stop here in the midshipmen's berth to teach the bully of the mess how to behave himself like a gentleman."

"What?"

"And not like the domineering cur and coward he is."

"Coward?"

"Yes, to come and talk to me like this; you know I'm weak and ill."

"What? Why, you miserable contemptible cub, say another word and I'll rub your nose on the planks till you beg my pardon."

"Another word, and a dozen other words, Bully Terry. Touch me, coward! I can't help myself now; but if you lay a finger on me, I'll get well and give you such a thrashing as the last shall be like nothing to it. You've got one of my marks still on your ugly nose. Now, touch me if you dare."

"Why, hullo, Master Syd; that you?" said Barney, in his loudest voice, as he entered the place with a basin full of some steaming compound.

"Ha--ha--ha!" laughed Terry. "Here's the nurse come with the baby's pap. Did you put some sugar in it, old woman?"

"Nay, sir; no sugar," said Barney, touching his hat; "but there's plenty of good solid beef-stock in it, the cook says; stuff as 'll rouse up Mr Belton's muscles, and make 'em 'tiff as hemp-rope. Like to try 'em again in a fortnight's time?"

"You insolent scoundrel! how dare you! Do you forget that you are speaking to your officer?"

"No, sir. Beg pardon, sir."

"It is not granted. Leave this place, sir, and go on deck."

"Don't do anything of the kind, Strake," cried Syd, who was calming down. "You are waiting on me."

"Do you hear me, sir?" roared Terry again.

"I can," said Syd, coolly, "and a wretchedly unpleasant voice it is. Go and bray somewhere else, donkey. Let's see, it was the ass that tried to kick the sick--"

"Lion," interrupted Terry, with a sneer. "Are you a sick lion?"

"It would be precious vain to say yes," said Syd; "but I'll own to being the sick lion if you'll own to being the beast who hoisted his heels."

"Bah!" ejaculated Terry, and he turned and stalked out of the place.

"Felt as if I should have liked to go at him again," cried Syd, fiercely.

Barney winked to himself.

"He'll give me one for that, sir. Now then, just you try a spoonful o' this; 'tain't too hot. Not a nyste sort o' young gen'leman, is he?"

"No, Barney," said Syd, taking the spoon.

"His pap was a bit sour p'raps when he was young, eh, Master Syd?"

"An overbearing bully!" cried Syd. "Only wait till I get strong again."

"And then you'll give it to him again, sir?"

"I don't want to quarrel or fight with anybody," said Syd, speaking quickly and excitedly, between the spoonfuls of strong soup he was swallowing.

"Course you don't, sir; you never was a quarrelsome young gent."

"But he is beyond bearing."

"That's true, sir; so he is. Only I mustn't say so. Lor', how I have seen young gents fight afore now; but when it's been all over, they've shook hands as if they'd found out who was strongest, and there's been an end on it."

"Yes, Barney."

"But this young gen'leman, sir, don't seem to take his beating kindly. Hauls down his colours, and you sends your orficer aboard to take possession--puts, as you may say, your right hand in, but he wouldn't take it."

"No, Barney," said Syd, as the bo'sun winked again to himself, "he wouldn't shake hands."

"No, sir; he wouldn't. I see it all, and thought I ought to stop it, but I knowed from the first you'd lick him; and it strikes me werry hard, Mr Syd, sir, that you'll have to do all that there bit o' work over again."

"But I'm weak now, and he may lick me, Barney," said Syd, who was making a peculiar noise now with the spoon he held--a noise which sounded like the word _soup_.

"Weak? not you, sir. Feels a bit down, but you'll soon forget that. I wouldn't try to bring it on again, sir," said Barney, watching his young master all the while.

"Bring it on? No," cried Sydney. "I tell you I hate fighting. I don't like being hurt."

"Course not, sir."

"And I don't like hurting any one."

"Well, sir, strikes me that's foolish, 'cause there's no harm in hurtin' a thing like him. Do him good, I say. You see, Master Syd, there's young gents as grows into good skippers, and there's young gents as grows into tyrants, and worries the men till they mutinies, and there's hangings and court-martials--leastwise, court-martials comes first. Now, Mr Terry, sir, unless he's tamed down and taught better, 's one o' the sort as makes bad skippers, and the more he's licked the better he'll be."

"I shall never like him," said Syd, whose spoon was scraping the bottom of the basin now.

"No, sir; I s'pose not," said Barney, with a dry grin beginning to spread over his countenance. "Nobody could; but I dare say his mother thinks he's a werry nyste boy, and kisses and cuddles him, and calls him dear."

"Yes, I suppose so, Barney."

"And a pretty dear too; eh, Master Syd?"

"Yes, Barney. What are you laughing at?"

"You, sir," cried the bos'un. "Hooray! he's took it all, and said he couldn't touch a drop."

"Well, I thought I couldn't, Barney; but Mr Terry roused me up, and I feel better now."

"Nay, sir; play fair."

"What do you mean?"

"Give a man his doo. It was me roused you up."

"So it was, Barney. I'm a deal better."

"You're quite well, says Doctor Barney Strake, and that's me. Say, Master Syd, what do they call that they gives a doctor wrorped up in paper?"

"His fee."

"Then, sir, that's just what you owes me, who says to you now--just you go on deck and breathe the fresh wind, for this here place would a'most stuffocate a goose."

"Yes, I'll try and get on deck now," said Syd.

"And try means do. Hooray, sir, I'm going to tell the captain as you're quite well, thankye, now, Amen."

"Not quite well, Barney."

"Ay, but you are, sir. But I say, Master Syd."

"What?"

"You never said your grace." _

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