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The ship was very quiet, for the heat was so intense that beyond washing down decks the crew had done nothing since sunrise, and the watch were lying down under the topgallant foc's'le, smoking and mending clothes. On the main-hatch was Warner's whaleboat, and sitting around her were the savage crew, chewing betel-nut and expectorating the scarlet juice in every direction. Mr.
A big sea has got home. Her stern flies up in the lather of a freed screw, and her deck from poop to the break of the foc's'le goes under in gray-green water level as a mill-race except where it spouts up above the donkey-engine and the stored derrick-booms. Forward there is nothing but this glare; aft, the interrupted wake drives far to leeward, a cut kite-string dropped across the seas.
His last visit was to the men's shelter which he had established under the management of his former "organ man," Mr. Jupe. It was a bare place, a shed which had been a stable and was now floored and ceiled. Beds resembling the bunks in the foc's'le of a ship lined the walls. When these were full the lodgers lay on the ground. A blanket only was provided.
But before then, and while it was still daylight, and Rawlings was below, and the Greek on the poop, Barry and the second mate were standing on the topgallant foc's'le, looking up and apparently scrutinising the condition of things aloft. Barry was speaking. "Watch me to-night. When you see me rise from the table after supper is over, I'll collar Rawlings, and you must tackle the Greek.
Double grog was going on the least excuse; there was duff on odd days, as, for instance, if the squire heard it was any man's birthday; and always a barrel of apples standing broached in the waist, for anyone to help himself that had a fancy. "Never knew good to come of it yet," the captain said to Doctor Livesey. "Spoil foc's'le hands, make devils. That's my belief."
Her stern came high out of the water, so that her screws were visible. She dipped her foc's'le clean under the breaking sea; and so she rode during some terrible minutes.
I could hear people tumbling up from the cabin and the foc's'le; and, slipping in an instant outside my barrel, I dived behind the fore-sail, made a double towards the stern, and came out upon the open deck in time to join Hunter and Dr. Livesey in the rush for the weather bow. There all hands were already congregated. A belt of fog had lifted almost simultaneously with the appearance of the moon.
Double grog was going on the least excuse; there was duff on odd days, as, for instance, if the squire heard it was any man's birthday, and always a barrel of apples standing broached in the waist, for any one to help himself that had a fancy. "Never knew good come of it yet," the captain said to Dr. Livesey. "Spoil foc's'le hands, make devils. That's my belief."
Coir-coloured cargo bales are stacked round both masts, and her decks are crammed and double-crammed with dark-skinned passengers from the foc's'le where they interfere with the crew to the stern where they hamper the wheel. The funnel is painted blue on yellow, giving her a holiday air, a little out of keeping with the yellow and black cholera flag at her main.
I could hear people tumbling up from the cabin and the foc's'le; and slipping in an instant outside my barrel, I dived behind the foresail, made a double towards the stern, and came out upon the open deck in time to join Hunter and Doctor Livesey in the rush for the weather bow. There all hands were already congregated.
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