I attempted to convey something of this interest to the captain of an American battleship, who was my host for the day. We were sitting in his cabin; and the talk had ranged from the Yukon to Brooklyn Yard, and was what a certain weekly paper would call “Mainly About People.”
I hinted at my interest in the men not without diffidence, because to ask the captain of a man-of-war if you can go and look at his ship’s company as a matter of curiosity is tantamount to demanding leave of a stranger to go and smoke a pipe in his nursery while his children are being bathed. A mess deck is an intimate place.
“Want to see the men?” he echoed, and thrust on his cap. “I’ll show ’em to you.” He was a mighty man possessing volcanic energy and a voice designed to carry orders through a gale. “Come right along.”
We plunged straightway into the seething life of the mess-deck and living spaces of the great ship, the captain leading; and as we threaded a path forward, men stepped aside, stood quietly to attention until we passed, and resumed their tasks or leisure. Workshops, kitchens, laundry, bakeries, dental surgery, sick bay, mess-rooms, round we went in a swift, slightly bewildering rush, while the “owner” jerked explanations over his shoulder. He displayed a familiarity with the details of it all that was to say the least of it interesting to one of another navy, whose captains claim to be not indifferent “ships’ husbands.”
Our whirlwind tour carried us into a speckless electric bakery piled high with fragrant loaves. The captain had flung open and closed the door of an oven secured by an ingenious but rather complicated latch. As we emerged I commented on his evident familiarity with the internal fitting of his ship’s bakery. “Built her,” he explained, and plunged, doffing his cap, into the sick bay. There were over a thousand men on board, and about half a dozen of them had found their way here.
“Well, T——,” said the captain, addressing by name an able seaman of a stature well-nigh equalling his own, “how’s that hand getting on?”
The man stood up and met his captain’s eyes without embarrassment; just, in fact, as one citizen regards another.
“Nicely, thank you, sir,” he replied.
“Hit your man in a softer place next time,” said the captain, and the seaman laughed, nursing his bandaged hand.
“I will, surely,” he said. A chuckle ran round the sick bay. I had the sensation of a stranger left trying to fathom a family joke.