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"I ain't got twenty pounds," ses Sam. "'Ow much 'ave you got?" ses his pal. Sam felt in 'is pockets, and the docker came up and stood watching while he counted it. Altogether it was nine pounds fourteen shillings and tuppence. "P'r'aps you've got some more at 'ome," ses his pal. "Not a farthing," ses Sam, which was true as far as the farthing went.
As we steered north-west, still amid the ice-floes, the 'Dudley Docker' got jammed between two masses while attempting to make a short cut. The old adage about a short cut being the longest way round is often as true in the Antarctic as it is in the peaceful countryside. The 'James Caird' got a line aboard the 'Dudley Docker', and after some hauling the boat was brought clear of the ice again.
Also, as a more personal note, I named the three ship's boats, in which we ultimately escaped from the grip of the ice, after the three principal donors to the Expedition the 'James Caird', the 'Stancomb Wills' and the 'Dudley Docker'. The two last-named are still on the desolate sandy spit of Elephant Island, where under their shelter twenty-two of my comrades eked out a bare existence for four and a half months.
The wind shifted from the south to the south-west, and the shortage of oars became a serious matter. The 'James Caird', being the heaviest boat, had to keep a full complement of rowers, while the 'Dudley Docker' and the 'Stancomb Wills' went short and took turns using the odd oar.
It is evident that there must exist some gigantic basin into which the Rebecca, the Docker, and the Hull, and very likely several more further east, must flow.
It was touching to see that girl, Lady Madeleine, looking at the docker or the shirtmaker, with her restless greenish eyes, as though she realised for the first time what hideous bond it is the one true commonalty that crushes the human family together! Well! and what had he seen? Nothing, certainly, of which he had not had ample information before.
Firstly, industry and commerce are world-wide; the remotest countries are bound together by economic ties; invisible cords link the Belgian iron worker with the London docker and the Clyde shipwright, the Californian fruit grower with the Malay tin miner and the German dye worker.
In a despatch to Governor Sir G. Gipps, dated 5th October, 1841, Lord Stanley says, "Contrasting the accounts of the Aborigines given by Mr. Docker with those given by Mr. Mackay, and the different terms on which those gentlemen appear to be with them in the same vicinity, I cannot divest myself of the apprehension that the fault in this case lies with the colonists rather than with the natives.
I called the 'Dudley Docker' alongside and found the condition of the people there was no better than in the 'James Caird'. Obviously we must make land quickly, and I decided to run for Elephant Island. The wind had shifted fair for that rocky isle, then about one hundred miles away, and the pack that separated us from Hope Bay had closed up during the night from the south.
He was a fairly intelligent type of laborer, who obtained a more or less precarious livelihood as a docker. As a rule, he worked hard enough four or five hours a day when things were brisk, and, in slack periods when money was scarce, he spent the best part of his day in bed. He had one room in a large tenement house, where the friends found him partially dressed and reading a sporting paper.
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