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"Our good old boatswain, Wilmuth, seemed to linger on the words with a feeling akin to grief at parting with an old shipmate, and as the last man reached the deck, he touched his hat and in a sad sort of way reported, 'All up, sir, to the first lieutenant, who in his turn reported, 'Officers and men all on deck, sir, to the commodore, who thereupon gave an order to the chaplain to go on with the services.
But these paroxysms seldom occurred, and in them my big-hearted shipmate vented the bile which more calm-tempered individuals get rid of by a continual pettishness at trivial annoyances. No one ever saw Toby laugh—I mean in the hearty abandonment of broad-mouthed mirth.
"Watch and watch I've stood wi' ye," she said, goin' "watch and watch, but I'm no good to see the lights nor to grip the wheel longer. The sight's gone and the strength, Matt. Watchmate, bunkmate, and shipmate I've been to ye, but ye're in smooth water now ... and no longer ye'll need me." A daughter to stand by you she'd be. All my money I'd give for one such.
Sharp as must have been his annoyance, Silver had the strength of mind to hide it. "Yes, sir," said he, "this is the spot, to be sure, and very prettily drawed out. Who might have done that, I wonder? The pirates were too ignorant, I reckon. Ay, here it is: 'Captain Kidd's Anchorage' just the name my shipmate called it.
"By jingo, he seems to be somewhat of a Tartar," exclaimed the midshipman called Duff, with a half-doubtful expression of countenance, as if his new shipmate was practising on his credulity. "Not a bit of it," was the rejoinder. "Let me tell you, that you'll soon find that your slack captains are the worst to sail with.
Hereupon Adam set on his periwig and fell to pacing slowly to and fro, his feet soundless upon the rich carpet, viewing me now and then like one that ponders some problem. "Aye, Martin I am so vastly rich!" he sighed. "I am a baronet, shipmate!" he nodded dolefully. "And what is worse, I own many rich manors and countless broad acres besides divers castles, mansions, houses and the like.
In such a scene as I have described I found the family of my poor shipmate. I easily made myself known. They had no doubt of the truth of my story, and gave me a kind though tearful welcome.
"Let be," I groaned, "I'm a dead man!" "Then here's that shall make ye quick," says this fellow Penfeather, dangling a great key before my swimming eyes. "Here's freedom from your devil's trap and a plaguy time I've had to come by it." "Then for the love o' God let me out," I groaned. "Easy all, shipmate!" says he, turning the key upon his finger. Now a bargain's a bargain, you'll agree?"
"D'ye hear it, Martin, did ye hear it? Shoot the poor rogues d'ye say? Sink me, but I will so if Fortune be so kind. Yonder's short shrift and quick dispatch for me, shipmate, and then the women! Think of my Lady Joan writhing in their clutches. Hark'ee to the lewd rogues 'tis women now hark to 'em!"
And here again their vile song burst forth with much the same obscenity as I had once heard sung by Abnegation Mings in a wood, and the which I will not here transcribe. "Well, shipmate," says Adam, glancing up from his papers, "last of all, there's yourself!
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