* * * * *
One race is, after all, very much like another. Yet the afternoon wore on without any appreciable abatement in the popular enthusiasm. And it was not without its memorable features. The Bandsmen's Race crowned one of the participators in undying fame. This popular hero broke an oar half-way through the race, and rising to his feet promptly sprang overboard.
His spectacular action plunged the remainder of the crew in hopeless confusion, and he himself was rescued with difficulty in a half-drowned state of collapse by the Umpire's boat. Yet for some occult reason no feat of gallantry in action would have won him such universal commendation on the Lower-deck. "Nobby Clark—'im as jumped overboard in the Bandsmen's Race" was thereafter his designation among his fellows.
The last race—the All-comers—did not justify universal expectation. The treble-banked launch was indeed coxed by the Chief Boatswain's Mate. A "Funny-party" in the stern, composed of a clown, a nigger and a stout seaman in female attire, added their exhortations to the "Chief Buffer's" impassioned utterances. But the Flagship's galley, pulling eight oars, with the coxswain perched hazardously out over the stern, won the three-mile tussle, and won it well.
As the Quartermaster of the Morning Watch had foretold, a breeze sprang up towards the close of the day. It blew from the southward and carried down the lines a medley of hilarious sounds.
A drifter hove in sight, shaping course for the Fleet Flagship. She was crowded to suffocation with singing, cheering sailor-men, and secured to her stumpy bowsprit was a silver cock. As she approached the stern of the Flagship, however, the uproar subsided, and the densely thronged drifter was white with upturned, expectant faces.
A solitary figure was walking up and down the quarterdeck of the Battleship. He paused a moment, suddenly stepped right aft to the rail, and smilingly clapped his hands, applauding the trophy in the bows of the drifter. The last rays of the setting sun caught on the broad gold bands that ringed his sleeve almost from cuff to elbow.
A wild tumult of frantic cheering burst out almost like an explosion from every throat still capable of emitting sound. There was gratitude and passionate loyalty in the demonstration, and it continued long after the figure on the quarterdeck had turned away and the drifter had resumed her noisy, triumphant tour of the Fleet.
"That's what I likes about 'im," whispered a bearded seaman hoarsely, as they swung off on their new course. "'E's that 'Uman!" He jerked his head astern in the direction of the mighty Battleship on whose vast quarterdeck the man who bore a share of the Destiny of Europe on his shoulders was still pacing thoughtfully up and down.
[1] Arguing.