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We lost one of our number the other day, and I have no doubt the purser’s clerk will let you take what you require out of his kit if you give him a bill on your paymaster.”
In the meanwhile the purser went to his cabin, mixed some strong punch, and made some sherbet. “Now,” said he to me, “when you show him the cockpit, hand him into my cabin.” The Pacha admired the ship and the guns, and said it was the largest vessel he had seen. He spoke a little broken English. At length we came to the purser’s cabin which was neatly fitted up and well lighted.
Unfortunately, without considering the consequences, a few buckets of water were thrown on the flaming tar, which made it spread more. At length the engine was set to work, and beds and blankets from the purser’s store-room surcharged with water soon got it under. These last were of the greatest service in smothering the flame, and were more effectual in saving the ship than the engine.
We had fought on nearly empty stomachs. At the time we began the action it was dinner time, i.e. twelve o’clock; a small proportion of cheese had been given out and half allowance of grog. During the latter part of the action the captain, who was lying on a cot in the purser’s cabin, sent for me. On entering the cockpit I found fourteen men waiting amputation of either an arm or a leg.
After cruising till the mids declared they were ennuiéd of seeing the Havannah, the dry Tortugas, Cape Antonio, and the low land near Mississippi so often, and that they had worn their chemises twice over and had only soiled sheets for table-cloths; that they were obliged to get one of the marines to pipe-clay their stockings and the collar of their shirts when they were asked to dine in the cabin; that it was a horrible, hard case to eat biscuits filled with bargemen and purser’s lice; that the water was full of jenny jumps—all these miseries, concluded they, ought to be made known to the admiral, and that if he did not order the squadron in again he ought to be tried by a court of mids and reduced to the humble rank of a cockpitsman and feed off bargemen for a month.
She proved a Spanish privateer of six guns and forty men, with a number of sheep on board, but the mids declared they were more like purser’s lanterns. When killed, one of them weighed only fifteen pounds. Nothing further occurred during the remainder of our passage to Jamaica, where we anchored two days after with our prizes.
She was a most tender and attentive nurse. It was a month before I was sufficiently strong to go on board, and nearly another before I could resume my duty. I was so reduced that I was literally a walking skeleton, or, if my reader pleases, the shadow of a ghost, and, had a purser’s candle been placed within me, I might have made a tolerably good substitute for the flag-ship’s top light.
If either of the midshipmen that have been killed is about my size, I should be glad to rig myself out with a suit from his chest, for my appearance at present is rather undignified for a British officer. I should also be glad if the purser’s clerk would issue a couple of suits for my two men.
On the home station bargemen are scarcely known; it is only in warm climates where they abound. Another most destructive insect to the biscuit is the weevil, called by the mids purser’s l——e. While walking down Fore Street one morning with one of my messmates we came up with two well-dressed females, when he exclaimed, “By Job! what a well-built little frigate she is to the left!
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