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THE DIFFICULTY WITH THE 'TORREADOR'S'
In the half-deck differences, sometimes leading to fisticuffs, were of daily occurrence; but, considering that we were boys, drawn from all parts, each with his town or county's claim to urge, we dwelt very happily together. Though our barque was Scotch, we were only two strong, and at times it was very difficult to keep our end up, and impress our Southron shipmates with a proper sense of our national importance. The voice of reason was not always pacific, and on these occasions we could but do our best. Our Jones (of Yorkshire) was of a quarrelsome nature; most of our bickers were of his seeking, and to him our strained relations with the 'Torreador's' was mainly due.
The Torreador had berthed next to us at Mission Wharf, and by the unwritten laws of the sea and the customs of the port of San Francisco, her crew should have fraternised with us; from the mates (who could exchange views on the sizes of rope and the chances of promotion) down to the younger apprentices (who should have visited one another to 'swap' ship's biscuit). With other ships matters might have been arranged, but the Torreador was a crack ship, and flew the blue ensign, even on week-days; her captain was an F.R.A.S., and her boys (whose parents paid heavy premiums for the glitter) wore brass buttons to everyday work, and were rated as midshipmen, no less! The day after her arrival some of them were leaning over the rail looking at our barque, and acquaintance might have been made then and there, but Jones (who fancied himself a wit) spoiled the chances of an understanding by asking them if the stewardess had aired their socks properly that morning. Such a question aroused great indignation, and for over a fortnight we were 'low bounders,' and they 'kid-glove sailors.'
Matters went ill between us, and our ships were too close together to ignore one another altogether. The 'Torreador's' contented themselves with looking smarter and more aggressively clean than ever, and with casting supercilious glances all over us when they saw us chipping and scraping the rust off our vessel's topside—(they never got such jobs to do, as their Old Man was too busy cramming them up with "Sumners" and "Deviation Curves"). We replied by making stage asides to one another on the methods of 'coddling sickly sailors,' and Jones even went the length of arraying himself in a huge paper collar when he was put over-side to paint ship. A brilliant idea, he thought it, until the Mate noticed him, and made his ears tingle till sundown.
The 'Torreador's' kept a gangway watch, and one of his duties seemed to be to cross the deck at intervals and inspect our barque, crew, and equipment in a lofty manner. He would even (if his Mate—the Chief Officer, they called him—wasn't looking) put his hands in his beckets and his tongue in his cheek. At first we greeted his appearance with exaggerated respect; we would stand to attention and salute him in style; but latterly, his frequent appearances (particularly as he always seemed to be there when our Mate was recounting our misdeeds, and explaining what lazy, loafing, ignorant, and 'sodgering' creatures he had to handle) got on our nerves.
Matters went on in this way for over a week, and everybody was getting tired of it; not only on our ship, for one day we caught a 'Torreador' openly admiring our collection of sharks' tails which we had nailed to the jib-boom. When he found himself observed he blushed and went about some business, before we had a chance to ask him aboard to see the sharks' backbones—fashioned into fearsome walking-sticks. Up town we met them occasionally, but no one seemed inclined to talk, and a 'barley' was as far away as ever. If we went to the Institute they were to be seen lolling all over the sofas in the billiard-room, smoking cigarettes, when, as everyone knows, a briar pipe is the only thing that goes decently with a brass-bound cap, tilted at the right angle. They did not seem to make many friends, and their talk among themselves was of matters that most apprentices ignore. One night Jones heard them rotting about 'Great Circle sailing,' and 'ice to the south'ard of the Horn,' and subjects like that, when, properly, they ought to be criticising their Old Man, and saying what an utter duffer of a Second Mate they had. Jones was wonderfully indignant at such talk, and couldn't sleep at night for thinking of all the fine sarcastic remarks he might have made, if he had thought of them at the time.
When our barque, by discharge of cargo, was risen in the water, we were put to send the royal-yards down on deck, and took it as a great relief from our unsailorly harbour jobs. The 'Torreador's,' with envious eyes, watched us reeving off the yard ropes. They had a Naval Reserve crew aboard to do these things, and their seamanship was mostly with a model mast in the half-deck. They followed all the operations with interest, and when Hansen and Eccles got the main royal yard on deck, in record time, they looked sorry that they weren't at the doing.
"Sumners" and "Deviation Curves" are all very well in their way, but a seamanlike job aloft, on a bright morning, is something stirring to begin the day with. A clear head to find one's way, and a sharp hand to unbend the gear and get the yard canted for lowering; then, with a glance at the fore (where fumblers are in difficulties with their lifts), the prideful hail to the deck, "All clear, aloft! Lower away!"
No wonder the 'Torreador's' were not satisfied with their model mast!
Some days later we got another chance to show them how things were done aloft, and even if we were not so smart at it as we might have been, still it was a fairly creditable operation for some boys and a sailorman. Our main topgal'nmast was found to be 'sprung' at the heel, and one fine morning we turned-to to send the yard and mast down. This was rather a big job for us who had never handled but royal-yards before; but under the able instructions of the Mate and Bo'sun, we did our work without any serious digression from the standards of seamanship. The Mate wondered what was making us so uncommon smart and attentive, but when he caught sight of the 'Torreador's' watching our operations with eager eyes, he understood, and even spurred us on by shouting, "Mister!" (the boys of the Torreador were thus addressed by their Officers) "Mister Hansen, please lay out 'n the topsl-yard, 'n unhook that bloody brace!"
At dusk the 'Torreador's' had stiff necks with looking aloft so much, and when we knocked off, with the yard and mast on deck, and the gear stopped-up, they went below and hid their elaborate model mast under a bunk in the half-deck.
Soon after this a better feeling began. Eccles met one of the 'Torreador's' up-town, and an acquaintance was made. They spent the evening together, and he learned that the other chap came from near his place. [It was really about fifty miles from there, but what's a fifty miles when one is fourteen thousand miles from home?] The next evening two of them came across. "To see the ship," they said. They brought briar pipes with them, which was rather more than we could reasonably have expected. Thereafter nightly visits were the rule, and we became as thick as thieves. We took them to our bosom, and told them of many fresh ways to rob the store-room, though they had no need to go plundering, theirs being a well-found ship. We even went the length of elaborating a concerted and, as we afterwards found, unworkable scheme to get even with a certain policeman who had caught our Munro a clip on the arm with his club when that youngster was singing "Rule Britannia" along the Water Front at half-past midnight. In the evenings our respective commanders could be seen leaning across their poop rails, engaged in genial conversation, addressing one another as "Captain" in the middle of each sentence with true nautical punctiliousness.
Once the 'Torreador's' Old Man seemed to be propounding his views on the training of apprentices with great earnestness. What he said we could not hear, but our Old Man replied that he had work enough "—— to get the young 'sodgers' to learn to splice a rope, cross a royal-yard, and steer the ship decently, let alone the trouble of keeping them out of the store-room," and that he'd "—— nae doot but they'd learn navigation —— in guid time!"
The elder boys went picnicing on the Sundays to Cliff House or Saucilito; the second voyagers played team billiards together at the Institute, and proposed one another to sing at the impromptu concerts; while the young ones—those who had only been a dog-watch at sea—made themselves sick smoking black tobacco and talking 'ship-talk' in the half-deck.
Thus we fraternised in earnest, and when the Torreador left for Port Costa to load for home we bent our best ensign (though it was on a week-day), and cheered her out of the berth.
Next week a Norwegian barque took up her vacant place. She had come out from Swansea in ninety-eight days, and was an object of interest for a while. Soon, though, we grew tired of the daily hammering of 'stock-fish' before breakfast, and the sight of her Mate starting the windmill pump when the afternoon breeze came away. We longed for the time when we, too, would tow up to Port Costa, for we had a little matter of a race for ship's gigs to settle with the 'Torreador's' and were only waiting for our Captains to take it up and put silk hats on the issue.