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Meanwhile the party at the shipyard had been thrown into a state of unwonted excitement by an incident which at one moment threatened to have a tragic termination.
The haze of heat and twilight blurred shapes and colours, but the fine old houses of the historic "Mall," the tower of the church, and the tall elms and taller chimneys of the breweries, which divide with torpedo boats the credit of being the staple industries of Chiswick, stood out all black against the evening sky; the clashing of the rivetters had ceased in the shipyard, but the river was cheerfully noisy; many eights were practising between the island and the Surrey bank, coaches were shouting at them, a tug was taking a couple of deal-loaded barges to a woodwharf with much puffing and whistling, and bathers, sheltered by the eyot willows, were keeping up loud and breathless conversations.
Having, with great assiduity and industry, fortified and put the said port in a state of defense, he completed in the shipyard and then launched, a moderate-sized ship, armed and equipped another belonging to private persons then in the port, both of which he equipped with yards and rigging all inside of forty days.
When, in 1704, Peter the Great founded his beloved Admiralty, as the first building on the mainland then designed for such purposes as this, and not for residence, it was simply a shipyard, open to the Neva, and inclosed on three sides by low wooden structures, surrounded by stone-faced earthworks, moats, and palisades.
The cliffs of Moher, the windy wilds of Connemara, lough Neagh with submerged petrified city, the Giant's Causeway, Fort Camden and Fort Carlisle, the Golden Vale of Tipperary, the islands of Aran, the pastures of royal Meath, Brigid's elm in Kildare, the Queen's Island shipyard in Belfast, the Salmon Leap, the lakes of Killarney. Abroad? Under what guidance, following what signs?
"Work!" said he, waving me haughtily away with the shears; "we don't work here. This is a newspaper office." I went, abashed. I tried the Express next. This time I had the editor pointed out to me. He was just coming through the business office. At the door I stopped him and preferred my request. He looked me over, a lad fresh from the shipyard, with horny hands and a rough coat, and asked:
It was at this stage of affairs, namely, when the skeleton framework of the cutter had been completely set up, and Leslie was preparing to commence the task of planking-up, that, upon emerging from the tent one morning after breakfast to wend his way down to the shipyard, he was amazed to see a cloud of smoke rising from the now partially dismembered hull of the brig, followed, even as he gazed incredulously, by an outburst of flame.
By the regular shipyard charges it ought not to have been a centime over twenty-five hundred francs-" "If you take the word of those alongshore sharks against mine the other began thickly. "Save yourself the trouble of further lying," Duncan went on coldly. "I looked it up. I got Flaubin before the Governor himself, and the old rascal confessed to sixteen hundred overcharge.
In the fulness of his delight Johnson resolved that the day should be a regular fete day; and accordingly on the morning in question the shipyard was gaily dressed with flags of more than one nationality which were hoisted upon poles hastily set up for the purpose; and all hands, clean shaven, and dressed in their best, prepared to assist in the ceremony.
This craft now proved to be English built, having been turned out of a Shoreham shipyard, and originally registered under the name of the Virginia; but how she had come to get into the hands of the individuals from whom we took her there was nothing to show.