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Blunt, or Miss Effingham, or Mademoiselle Viefville will confirm what I tell you, I think; especially the latter, for he was her countryman." Hereupon Captain Truck began to stuff in the oakum again, for the calm countenance of Mr.
He and Bell rubbed him vigorously with oakum steeped in spirits of wine, and they saw signs of returning consciousness; but the unfortunate man was in a state of complete prostration, and could not speak a word. His tongue stuck to his palate as if frozen. The doctor searched his pockets, but they were empty. He left Bell to continue the friction, and rejoined Hatteras.
"We've sprung a fearful leak, sir," he exclaimed; "it's my belief that the oakum is washed out of the seams, for already the water is rising above the ballast." "Then hasten with your crew, search out where the worst leaks exist, and strive to stop them," said the admiral, calmly; "man the pumps, and let others be told off with buckets to bale out the water.
We had manufactured an ample supply of sailcloth, which, with the addition of the sail saved from the old craft, would be sufficient. Cordage and blocks had been made, and the masts and spars were already put up. The fibres of several plants served as oakum for caulking the planks; and two or three resinous trees afforded pitch for the seams, as also for paying over the outside.
All that he saw deepened his melancholy; the soldiers starting out vaguely from barracks, not knowing what to do, but free for a time, and hoping, a little heavily, for some adventure to break the military monotony of their lives; the shopgirls, also in hope of something to "take them out of themselves" pathetic desire of escape from the little prison, where the soul sits, picking its oakum sometimes, in its cell of flesh! young men making for the parks, workmen for the public houses, an old woman, in a cap, peering out of an upper window in Prince's Gate; Italians with an organ, and a monkey that looked as if it were dying of nostalgia; women hurrying whither? with anxious faces, and bodies whose very shapes, and whose every movement, suggested, rather proclaimed, worry.
I was well fed; kept workin' hard at an honest job, pickin' oakum; the gaol was warm, and I never went to bed by night or got up o' mornin's worried over the question o' how I was goin' to get the swag to pay my rent.
And the mate had the sailors get out the boat, and he took the oakum and a big bucket of oil, and he was rowed away to the wreck, that was about a quarter of a mile away by that time and shining in the moonlight. And Captain Solomon saw the boat come near the wreck and make fast under her stern, and he saw the mate go on board.
We put on short duck frocks, and taking a small bucket of tar and a bunch of oakum in our hands we went aloft, one at the main royal-mast-head and the other at the fore, and began tarring down. This is an important operation, and is usually done about once in six months in vessels upon a long voyage.
When filled, they are then rubbed over with pitch, or what is known as marine glue, a composition of shellac and caoutchouc. It will not be necessary for you to do all this, however. Oakum is often used for packing goods also. I dare say if you hunt around in the barn you will find a little lying about somewhere. But, bless me, you young rogues! Here you are all this time in your wet clothes.
It might have been a week after our glimpse of Lord Lovely, that Harry, who had been expecting a letter, which, he told me, might possibly alter his plans, one afternoon came bounding on board the ship, and sprang down the hatchway into the between-decks, where, in perfect solitude, I was engaged picking oakum; at which business the mate had set me, for want of any thing better.
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