THE STEAM SERVICE.
“Life is but a kittle cast.”—BURNS.
THE JACK OF HEARTS.
THE time is not yet come—but come it will—when the masts of our Royal Navy shall be unshipped, and huge unsightly chimneys be erected in their place. The trident will be taken out of the hand of Neptune, and replaced by the effigy of a red hot poker; the Union Jack will look like a smoke-jack; and Lambtons, Russels, and Adairs, will be made Admirals of the Black; the forecastle will be called the Newcastle, and the cockpit will be termed the coal-pit; a man-of-war’s tender will be nothing but a Shields’ collier: first lieutenants will have to attend lectures on the steam-engine, and midshipmen must take lessons as climbing boys in the art of sweeping flues. In short, the good old tune of “Rule Britannia,” will give way to “Polly put the Kettle on;” while the Victory, the Majestic, and the Thunderer of Great Britain will “paddle in the burn,” like the Harlequin, the Dart, and the Magnet of Margate.
It will be well for our song writers to bear a wary eye to the Fleet, if they would prosper as Marine Poets. Some sea Gurney may get a seat at the Admiralty Board, and then farewell, a long farewell, to the old ocean imagery; marine metaphor will require a new figure-head. Flowing sheets, snowy wings, and the old comparison of a ship to a bird, will become obsolete and out of date! Poetical topsails will be taken aback, and all such things as reefs and double reefs will be shaken out of song. For my own part, I cannot be sufficiently thankful that I have not sought a Helicon of salt water; or canvassed the Nine Muses as a writer for their Marine Library; or made Pegasus a sea-horse, when sea-horses as well as land-horses are equally likely to be superseded by steam. After such a consummation, when the sea service, like the tea service, will depend chiefly on boiling water, it is very doubtful whether the Fleet will be worthy of anything but plain prose. I have tried to adapt some of our popular blue ballads to the boiler, and Dibdin certainly does not steam quite so well as a potato. However, if his Sea Songs are to be in immortal use, they will have to be revised and corrected in future editions thus:—
I steamed from the Downs in the Nancy,
My jib how she smoked through the breeze.
She’s a vessel as tight to my fancy
As ever boil’d through the salt seas.
* * * * * *
When up the flue the sailor goes
And ventures on the pot,
The landsman, he no better knows,
But thinks hard is his lot.
Bold Jack with smiles each danger meets,
Weighs anchor, lights the log;
Trims up the fire, picks out the slates,
And drinks his can of grog.
* * * * * *
Go patter to lubbers and swabs, do you see,
’Bout danger, and fear, and the like;
But a Boulton and Watt and good Wall’s-end give me;
And it an’t to a little I’ll strike.
Though the tempest our chimney smack smooth shall down smite,
And shiver each bundle of wood;
Clear the wreck, stir the fire, and stow everything tight,
And boiling a gallop we’ll scud.
I have cooked Stevens’s, or rather Incledon’s Storm in the same way; but the pathos does not seem any the tenderer for stewing.
Hark, the boatswain hoarsely bawling,
By shovel, tongs, and poker stand;
Down the scuttle quick be hauling,
Down your bellows, hand, boys, hand;
Now it freshens,—blow like blazes;
Now unto the coal-hole go;
Stir, boys, stir, don’t mind black faces,
Up your ashes nimbly throw.
Ply your bellows, raise the wind, boys,
See the valve is clear of course;
Let the paddles spin, don’t mind, boys,
Though the weather should be worse.
Fore and aft a proper draft get,
Oil the engines, see all clear;
Hands up, each a sack of coal get,
Man the boiler, cheer, lads, cheer.
Now the dreadful thunder’s roaring,
Peal on peal contending clash;
On our heads fierce rain falls pouring,
In our eyes the paddles splash.
One wide water all around us,
All above one smoke-black sky:
Different deaths at once surround us;
Hark! what means that dreadful cry?
ALL UP.
The funnel’s gone! cries ev’ry tongue out,
The engineer’s washed off the deck:
A leak beneath the coal-hole’s sprung out
Call all hands to clear the wreck.
Quick, some coal, some nubbly pieces;
Come, my hearts, be stout and bold;
Plumb the boiler, speed decreases,
Four feet water getting cold.
While o’er the ship wild waves are beating,
We for wives or children mourn;
Alas! from hence there’s no retreating;
Alas! to them there’s no return.
The fire is out—we’ve burst the bellows,
The tinder-box is swamped below;
Heaven have mercy on poor fellows,
For only that can serve us now!
Devoutly do I hope that the kettle, though a great vocalist, will never thus appropriate the old Sea Songs of England. In the words of an old Greenwich pensioner—“Steamin and biling does very well for Urn Bay, and the likes;” but the craft does not look regular and shipshape to the eye of a tar who has sailed with Duncan, Howe, and Jarvis—and who would rather even go without port than have it through a funnel.
FOR CORK.