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Updated: May 17, 2025
He had lively wit, good temper, reckless generosity, and manners, which, while he was under restraint, might pass well in society. But all these availed him nothing. He was so well acquainted with the turf, the gaming-table, the cock-pit, and every worse rendezvous of folly and dissipation, that his mother's fortune was spent before he was twenty-one, and he was soon in debt and in distress.
I had had a glimpse through the spy- glass, and thought I recognized Mr. Snider. We hauled the tender alongside, and Spook got in it to begin the towing. Just as he did so, and as I was standing outside the cock-pit, there came a sound above my head as if the air had been split open. "Wh-wh-whi-i-i-i-ing whip!" The sail of the "Hoppergrass" shivered and the halliards rattled.
I must confess, however, that this is the only place in which I have ever found the Englishman without the Scot. Cock-fighting is carried on to a great extent here, and is indulged in by the natives, high and low. On market-days, vast numbers of natives may be seen wending their way to the cock-pit attached to each market or bazaar, with one of the celebrated Malay game-cocks under their arms.
Several men who were sick below, leaving their hammocks, employed themselves in bringing up powder, while the acting purser, Mr John Colman, who might with propriety have remained to assist the surgeons in the cock-pit, appeared on deck with a brace of pistols in his belt and a broadsword in his hand, encouraging the crew by every means in his power.
As I knew where the purser's steward's room was, having seen it when down in the cock-pit with the Trotters, I went down immediately. "Mr Purser's Steward," said I, "let me have a cocked hat and a dirk immediately." "Very good, sir," replied he, and he wrote an order upon a slip of paper, which he handed to me.
"Next dawn, when I got to the Cock-pit, and saw their champion, why, he was a boy! a boy like a girl! one of these pretty pink and white things, all eyes and legs and a silly smile. 'I am David, says he. 'Then go back to Jesse, says I, pretty short. 'I don't fight with kids.... And that afternoon I sent him a bottle of milk with my compliments."
Bleed the boys, thought I, what can that be for? at all events, the surgeon appears to be the proper person to perform that operation. This last incomprehensible remark drove me off the deck, and I retreated to the cock-pit, where I found Mrs Trotter. "Oh, my dear!" said she, "I am glad you are come, as I wish to put your clothes in order. Have you a list of them where is your key?"
A large, boisterous painting in the hotel represents his impressions of the village arena in his youth; and ancient gamesters, gray-headed now, like to stroll in and contemplate their own portraits grouped around the cock-pit in all the hot blood of betting days and in the green dress-coats of 1840.
On rainy days, when it was unreasonable and useless to attempt to fly, he wandered around the sheds where the winged horses took their repose. He could not resist it: he entered, and mounted his own machine, settling himself in his cock-pit and handling the controls, holding mysterious conferences with his faithful steed. In the air, he had a higher power of resistance than the most robust men.
After pacing up and down several times, he spoke to the first lieutenant. "As I have had some experience in dressing wounds, although, of course, I should wish to see the fight on deck, I may be of assistance to the doctor. With your leave I will go into the cock-pit and offer to help him." The first lieutenant looked at him hard, suspecting the reasons.
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