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Although the hammocks were not stowed, and the hammock-cloths had that empty and undressed look which is so common to a man-of-war in the night, it was apparent that the ship had an upper deck, with quarter-deck and forecastle batteries; or, in other words, that she was a frigate.
The band struck up "Yankee Doodle," the ladies were in ecstacy, and began to caper round the quarter-deck. "La! Jemima," said Deborah, "what have you done to the western side of your gown? it is all over white." This was soon brushed off, but the expression was never forgotten in the ship, and always ludicrously applied.
I heard him mutter to himself as if uttering his thoughts aloud, as I turned away with another touch of my cap and left the quarter-deck to fulfil my errand. "He's like those monkeys at the Rock too artful to speak. Keeps his tripping lines too taut for that!"
As you say, you would be woefully out of place in such a position. You would be wasted. But upon your own quarter-deck, with a good crew of thoroughly disciplined men to back you up, and the authority of the King's commission to give you confidence, you would soon make a name and a place for yourself.
"Are any of the hands on shore?" "More than half of 'em, sir." Nothing more was said; and in a few minutes Gascoyne was slowly pacing the quarter-deck of his little vessel in earnest consultation with his first mate. There seemed to be some difference of opinion between the captain and his officer; for their words, which, at first were low, at length became audible.
Not only was Seymour angry with Howard, but Hawkins and Frobisher were at daggers drawn with Drake; and Sir Martin if contemporary, affidavits can be trusted did not scruple to heap the most virulent abuse upon Sir Francis, calling him, in language better fitted for the forecastle than the quarter-deck, a thief and a coward, for appropriating the ransom for Don Pedro Valdez in which both Frobisher and Hawkins claimed at least an equal share with himself.
They were prepared to use him very roughly, when the lieutenant on the quarter-deck called up to them to let him remain as he was. He then crept towards me, and, taking me by the hand, bade me "put my trust in Cot." And looking at Thompson, who sat by us trembling, with a pale visage; told him there were two more rings for his feet, and he should be glad to find him in such good company.
But the runaway was reminded, by this question, that he had been talking rather imprudently, and he left his companion for more genial associates. Perth still stood on the quarter-deck, waiting the action of the principal, who had sent the head steward to overhaul the state-room of the delinquent.
All the widows brought lawsuits against all the rest, and every will had a firm of lawyers on the quarter-deck as long as your arm. They tell me it was one of the biggest turns-to that ever was seen, bar Tichborne; the Lord Chamberlain himself was floored, and so was the Lord Chancellor, and all that time the Dream lay rotting up by Glebe Point.
The ship's davits were empty, both her gigs having been lowered to facilitate the transfer of the plunder to the brigantine; her long-boat also was in the water, as already stated, but there were two fine cutters lying bottom up over the quarter-deck, their sterns resting on the break of the poop and their bows-on the gallows.
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