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Updated: April 30, 2025
But I must make sail again. I was three hours with Seraphina before her father came home, and during that time I never was quietly at an anchor for above a minute. I was on my knees, vowing and swearing, kissing her feet and kissing her hand, till at last I got to her lips, working my way up as regularly as one who gets in at the hawsehole and crawls aft to the cabin windows.
What with a contrary wind and tide, it was not until past ten o'clock that we glided into the little bay, and, shortening sail as noiselessly as possible, let down the anchor by hand to avoid the rattling of the chain through the hawsehole, which, in the stillness of the night, would have certainly reached the keen ears of the blacks, were there any in the neighbourhood, and caused them to shift their quarters.
I was on my knees, vowing and swearing, kissing her feet, and kissing her hand, till at last I got to her lips, working my way up as regularly as one who gets in at the hawsehole and crawls aft to the cabin windows.
It is a pity, though, that no chance is yet afforded in our service in the present day, as used to be the case in the past, when many an admiral `crept through the hawsehole, as the saying was, for respectable young fellows of good education and bright abilities to look any higher; but, it is to be hoped that the day will come, as father's old friend Captain Mordaunt said only the other day when talking to us both under the old mulberry-tree in our garden, when this state of things will be changed, and a boy who enters the service as I did on board one of our training-ships, will, as Bonaparte said the conscript carried a field-marshal's baton in his knapsack, keep snugly stowed away an admiral's cocked hat in his ditty box!
At last she stopped; at last the cable rattled through the hawsehole; and then, careless of the chance of lurking Spaniard or Carib, an instinctive cheer burst from every throat. Poor fellows! Amyas had much ado to prevent them going on shore at once, dark as it was, by reminding them that it wanted but two hours of day. "Never were two such long hours," said one young lad, fidgeting up and down.
From this it fell out we were the only passengers; the Captain, McMurtrie, was a silent, absorbed man, with the Glascow or Gaelic accent; the mates ignorant rough seafarers, come in through the hawsehole; and the Master and I were cast upon each other's company. THE NONESUCH carried a fair wind out of the Clyde, and for near upon a week we enjoyed bright weather and a sense of progress.
Crawl in at the cabin windows and don't bother about the hawsehole. I mean you see," added the sailor, seeing by the blank look on his face that Allison did not understand his nautical language, "aboard ship we take rank in this way: First the captain, then the mates, then the captain's dog, and lastly the foremast-hands. And I suppose it must be the same in the army."
Well there was the devil, making a grab here and a grab there, and the slushy chain just slipping through his claws, and at whiles a bight of chain would spring clear and rap him in the eye. But the chain gave such a Yank when it came-to, that the big link carried away, and oh, roll and go, out it went through the hawsehole, in a shower of bright sparks, carrying the devil with it.
A few strokes of the axes were heard, and then the cable flew out of the hawsehole in a blaze of fire, from the violence of the friction, and disappeared under a huge wave, which struck us on the chess-tree, and deluged us with water fore and aft. But we were now on the other tack, and the ship regained her way and we had evidently increased our distance from the land.
At length, when they heard the cable slipping through the hawsehole, they could stand it no longer, but sprang up the side in a body. Of course they were met by men well prepared. As they were armed only with cutlasses, the pirates quickly overcame them, and threw them into the sea. All further attempt at concealment was now abandoned.
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