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One day he went on deck, and actually gave me the following very intelligible order: "Mr What's-his-name, have the goodness to what-do-ye-call-'em the the thingumbob." "Ay, ay, my lord!" said I. "Afterguard, haul taut the weather main-brace!" This was exactly what he meant. He was very particular and captious when not properly addressed.
When his back was turned from them the sailors indulged in grins and back-slappings and other rough demonstrations of their knowledge that the "afterguard" were not on agreeable terms. This prankish mood of the crew was shown in their efforts to make Dinshaw uncomfortable.
Of social distinction, beyond the division of afterguard from fo'c'sle, he seemed to possess little idea, save for a vague echo, caught from the man Harbutt, about the Rich People; and as to sex, beyond a queer instinctive delicacy and a tenderness due to her weakness and the memory of how he had found her, she might just as well have been a man, or a child like himself.
Nearly all the afterguard slept on the upper deck that night, and, but for the dismal roar of the swell breaking on the rocks and the heavy rolling of the "Terra Nova," we spent quite a comfortable night. Dr. Atkinson and Brewster had been left ashore with the gear, but they got no sleep because all night the terns flew round crying and protesting against their intrusion.
The number of officers carried would have been a good crew for the ship, the complete afterguard comprising captain, four mates, four harpooners or boat-steerers, carpenter, cooper, steward and cook. All these worthies were on deck and working with might and main at the preparations, so that the incompetence of the crowd forrard was little hindrance.
I found him in the empty starboard forecastle and called him out. He came, with a bad look in his eyes. "'Put your knife on the water tank alongside my gun, I said, 'and come aft where there's a clear space. We'll find out who runs this ship, you or the afterguard. "'That sounds fair, he said; 'but how about the after clap? This is not my proposition. "'You mean darbies? There'll be none.
"How what do you mean, boatswain?" I demanded sharply. "Well, Mr Blackburn," he returned, "what I means is that if we don't find the wrack the chaps'll be so disapp'inted that, in their rage, they may rise upon us, the afterguard, and try to take the ship from us." "What good would that do them?" I demanded.
It but serves to show how stupid they must be. I feel sorry for Henry, the training-ship boy. He is more my own kind, and some day he will make a henchman of the afterguard and a mate like Mr. Pike. In the meantime, along with Buckwheat, the other boy who berths in the 'midship-house with him, he suffers the same hardship as the men.
"There now," said the first lieutenant, "I am sure that you must feel better already; you never could have had any appetite. Now, captain of the afterguard, bring a piece of old canvas and some sand here, and clean his teeth nicely." The captain of the afterguard came forward, and putting the boy's head between his knees, scrubbed his teeth well with the sand and canvas for two or three minutes.
In the daytime the afterguard were never idle; there is always plenty to do in a sailing ship, and when not attending to their special duties the scientists were kept working at everything that helped the show along.
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