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"`The ghost of Mr Carcass be hanged! he is quiet enough in his cabin, poor man. What are all you fools thinking about? says the lieutenant. `Be off for'ard with you. "`He is there, sir! he is there! It is the bo'sun's ghost, we all sung out, one after the other, none of us feeling inclined to go near him. "`Blockheads! cried the lieutenant, beginning to get angry.
Now, as I drew nigh to the ship, the men crowded upon a little platform which they had built in the superstructure somewhat below the broken head of the mizzen, and here they received me with loud cheers and very open arms, and were so eager to get me out of the bo'sun's chair, that they cut the lashings, being too impatient to cast them loose.
Now the bo'sun had seen my stroke, and so sprang upon the t'gallant rail, and peered over; but gave back on the instant, shouting to me to run and call the other watch, for that the sea was full of the monsters swimming off to the ship, and at that I was away at a run, and when I had waked the men, I raced aft to the cabin and did likewise with the second mate, and so returned in a minute, bearing the bo'sun's cutlass, my own cut-and-thrust, and the lantern that hung always in the saloon.
Now, George, who was on the bo'sun's other side, whispered that there was another face, not unlike to a woman's, and, indeed, so soon as I perceived it, I saw that the tree had a second excrescence, most strangely after the face of a woman. Then the bo'sun cried out with an oath, at the strangeness of the thing, and I felt the arm, which I held, shake somewhat, as it might be with a deep emotion.
Then, when all was ready, this woman, whoever she was, had gone forward to the bo'sun's locker, where she had set fire to half a dozen of those fumigating chemical candles which she had brought in her box. The candles at once sputtered out immense volumes of evil smelling smoke.
Now Jim, you're up a tree; you're within an hour of being pressed into the Navy. How'd ye like to be a ship's boy, hey, and get tickled up by a bo'sun's rope-end?" "I shouldn't like it at all," I answered. "You'll like it a jolly sight less than that," said he, "and it's what you'll probably be. We're ten miles from home. The cutter's in the road. The frigates will be on us in half-an-hour.
I took it down from the hook where it was hanging, and was trying to snuff it, when all of a sudden the door of Mr Carcass's cabin opened with a bang like a clap of thunder, and, as I'm a living man, I heard the bo'sun's voice, for you may be sure I knew it well, shout out: "`Sentry, give us a light, will ye!
"Man overboard!" It rang in Felix Thurstan's ears like the sound of a bell. He gazed about him in dismay, wondering what had happened. The first intimation he received of the accident was that sudden sharp cry from the bo'sun's mate. Almost before he had fully taken it in, in all its meaning, another voice, farther aft, took up the cry once more in an altered form: "A lady! a lady!
It happened in this wise: My father, Bob Riddle, was bo'sun's mate of the old `Goliath, of eighty guns, and as in those days two or three women were allowed on board line-of-battle ships to attend to the sick, and to wash and mend clothes, provided the captains did not object; so my mother, Nancy Riddle, who loved her husband in a way which made her ready to go through fire and water for his sake, got leave to accompany him to sea.
I really believe I could see a tear in the old bo'sun's eye as he wished me farewell with the rest of them, the crew manning the rigging to give me a hearty cheer and "send off" that could be heard across the Mersey.
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