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Updated: June 13, 2025
On his knees upon the deck aft, shoving his holystone to and fro laboriously and unhandily along the planks where the accident with the tar-pot had left its stain, the Dago still broke into little meaningless smiles. For him, at any rate, the narrow scope between the stem and stern of the Anna Maria was not the world.
Short in stature and huge in frame, the mass of him, even in that half-darkness of the fo'c'sle, showed somehow majestic and powerful. "The mate came after 'im about somethin' or other," he said in his deep, slow tones. "That's right," said another seaman. "It was about spillin' some tar on the deck, an' now the Dago's got to stop up this arternoon an' holystone it clean in his watch below."
First came a dog; then Miss Williams, with a candle; then Jack; then another dog; and finally, Mrs. Wotton, with her candle in one hand and another dog under her arm. Jack was with us for three weeks; and as I made him holystone the whole place down twice a week until the boards were like a quarter deck, we got something out of him in return for his lodging.
And still I was sure the schooner was slowly drifting. My head was like to burst, and my tongue was like a lump of holystone in my mouth. Well, one morning, I had just, as I thought, lain down on the deck to breathe my last, hoping I should die before I went quite mad with thirst, when all at once the fog lifted, like the foot of a sail. I sprung to my feet.
Now to get an occasional chance at them he is fairly quiet." "So this is your trained crew, is it, captain?" said a grizzled old skipper of the party. "What ails that fellow down in the scuppers with a prayer-book?" He pointed to a man who with one hand was rubbing a small holystone in a corner where a large one would not go.
I have seen oakum stuff placed about in different parts of the ship, so that the sailors might not be idle in the snatches between the frequent squalls upon crossing the equator. The ``Philadelphia Catechism'' is ``Six days shalt thou labor and do all thou art able, And on the seventh, holystone the decks and scrape the cable.
She found in the old sea dog a ready companion, and he rattled along in his whimsical, uncouth language, spinning endless yarns of a "Hadmiral as prayed to a paint pot" and "cleaned his bloomin' teeth wi' holystone," until the girl unconsciously resumed her brisk, tireless step and found herself laughing merrily in spite of her disease of mind.
It was the last entry under that particular handwriting, and read as follows: June 21, 19 . Took an observation at noon, and find that we are in 20-48 S., 178-4 W. At this rate should lift Tuvana-tholo early this afternoon. All hands well and looking forward to the fun at Tuvana. Bent a new flying jib this morning and had the king and Tabu-Tabu holystone the deck.
Few men could have resisted the appeal of that long slim boat with the water lapping invitingly against her clinker-built sides. The brasswork in her gleamed in the sun like jewels set in ivory, for the woodwork was as near the whiteness of ivory as holystone and sharkskin could make it.
A very `dewy' eve it was, too, if dampness made it so; but if one did feel wet and miserable, as I confess I was, the remembrance it brought back to my mind of my mother's house-cleaning at home being almost too vivid to be pleasant, still, everybody on board had the satisfaction of knowing that the ship was as smart as holystone and sand could make her, from upper deck to keelson, I verily believe!
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