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Updated: May 17, 2025
"Why, they took him down to the cock-pit, as they called the midshipmen's berth on the lower deck, where we're going now," replied the Captain, leading the way down the companion and an interminable series of other ladders afterwards, as if they were descending to the kelson, the space getting all the narrower and darker as they went down. "They took him below to die!"
That half of it that was nearer to the Park held the tennis-court and the cock-pit and the lodgings of the Duke of Monmouth and others nearer Westminster, and the other half the Horse Guards and the barracks: and that nearer the river held, to the south the Stone Gallery, the Privy Garden, the Bowling Green and a great number of lodgings amongst which were those of the King and of his brother and Prince Rupert, and of the Queen too, as well as of their more immediate attendants and this part contained what was left of the old York House; to the north was another court surrounded by lodgings, the Wood-Yard, the two courts called Scotland Yard, and the clock-house at the extremity, nearest Charing Cross.
Here we beheld a kind of cock-pit, around which a great many people, seeming of all ranks, but chiefly of the lower, were gathered, and in it we saw a dog destroy a great many rats in a very small period; and when the dog had destroyed the rats, we saw a fight between a dog and a bear, then a fight between two dogs, then . . . .
The first-lieutenant is missing; you will find him in the cock-pit they have just finished taking up the arteries of his right arm, which has been amputated; and the Scotch surgeon's assistant, who for many months bewailed the want of practice, and who, for having openly expressed his wishes on that subject, had received a sound thrashing from the exasperated midshipmen, is now complimenting the fainting man upon the excellent stump that they have made for him: while fifty others, dying or wounded, with as much variety as Homer's heroes, whose blood, trickling from them in several rivulets, pours into one general lake at the lowest level of the deck, are anxiously waiting their turn, and distract the purser's steward by their loud calls, in every direction at the same time for the tin-pot of water, with which he is relieving their agonising thirst.
Upon this information I crawled down to the cock-pit, and acquainted Thompson with the affair, who, providing himself with bandages, etc, necessary for the occasion, went up to assist Mr. Morgan in the reduction of the dislocation.
The boys slept until nearly breakfast time, and were just dressed when Mr. Armstrong came for them and took them to the midshipmen's berth, where they were received with a warmth and heartiness which quite surprised them. The midshipmen and mates pressed forward to shake hands with them, and the stiflingly close little cock-pit was the scene of an ovation.
A man previously wounded was killed in the cock-pit where he had been taken for surgical aid.
I was astonished at its burning in such mighty depths of snow; but Gwenny said that the wicked men had been three days hard at work, clearing, as it were, a cock-pit, for their fire to have its way. And now they had a mighty pile, which must have covered five land-yards square, heaped up to a goodly height, and eager to take fire. In this I saw great obstacle to what I wished to manage.
This was what Madame Bonaventure beheld from the roof of the cock-pit, and a very pretty sight she thought it.
At the lower end of the room, under the Visitors' Gallery, are seats whereon weary brokers may repose after the brunt of battle. In the centre of the upper end of the vast apartment is a long oval cock-pit if it may be so called of two or three degrees, with a table in the lowest circle.
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