Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 3, 2025
Its contents could not fail to be saturated with salt-water, for the barrel was not water-tight; but the ex-cook could dry them in the sun, and render them, if not palatable, at least eatable. The biscuit-barrel was soon fished up out of the water, and placed high and dry upon the little raft.
It is a misfortune a fatal one perhaps to put yourself in my power, in such a house as this." "But, my dear sir, what is likely to happen to me?" The features of the ex-cook were convulsed with fury; he was in that mad state of rage in which a man has no control over himself.
After that we'll splice together in a better sort o' way." The ex-cook, obedient to the injunctions of the seaman, seized hold of the end of rope thrown to him, and made it fast to one of the spars which comprised his singular craft; while at the same time Ben busied himself in tying the other end to the piece of handspike erected upon his own.
Our miserly and dirty ex-cook had an old pair of trousers that some one had given to him; after he had long worn them himself, with one of the sorely decayed legs he hired a man to carry his heavy load a whole day; a second man carried it the next day for the other leg, and what remained of the old garment, without the buttons, procured the labour of another man for the third day.
Then all the food so procured would be put together and shared in common. As usual, there was among them an individual who held them together the originator of the idea. He was a fat, ruddy-faced alcoholic ex-cook, who had never held a job for long because he loved whiskey so much. Besides being the presiding genius of the gang, he also did all the cooking. He loved to cook.
It was but the work of a minute to secure this keg, and attach it by a strong cord to the piece of timber on which the ex-cook was seated astride. But for this unexpected supply of water Snowball might probably have yielded to despair. Without water to drink he could not have reckoned on a long lease of life, either for himself or his protege.
Tantaine paused for a moment, and then slowly added, "Such tactics usually succeed unless a man has some secret enemy, who would take advantage of his knowledge, to do him an injury by obtaining irrefragable proofs of his complicity." The ex-cook easily perceived the threat that was hidden under these words. "They know something," muttered he, "and I must find out what it is."
Since the hour in which the two rafts became separated from each other, the reader is acquainted, in all its minute details, with the history of the lesser: how it joined issue with the embarkation that carried the ex-cook and his protege; how the union with the latter produced a cross between the two, afterwards yclept the Catamaran; with all the particulars of the Catamaran's voyage, up to the time when she became moored alongside the carcass of the cachalot; and for several days after.
The absence of the captain, with five others who had accompanied him in his gig, has been explained. The ex-cook, the English sailor and sailor-boy, with the cabin passenger, Lilly Lalee, have also been accounted for; but there were several others aboard the big raft, on its first starting "to sea," that were no longer to be seen amidst the crowd still occupying this ungainly embarkation.
The commander of the squad who guards prisoners on the way to Paris, and who "starves them along the road to speculate on them," is an ex-cook of Agen, having become a gendarme; he makes them travel forty leagues extra, "purposely to glorify himself," and "let all Agen see that he has government money to spend, and that he can put citizens in irons."
Word Of The Day
Others Looking