They added together the three periods of sleep, and wrote down as a beginning of their summary:
Time in hammock during 48 hours = 7 hrs. 25 mins.
They stared at that.
Then John said, rather hopelessly, “Oh, well, it’s getting on for four hours’ sleep a day. I believe some K.C.’s, when the House and the Courts are sitting, do with less than that.”
“But when they are on duty they are not in an engine-room or a boiler-room—not in that temperature—not standing all the time.”
“No.... I dare say we shall get some sleep in between—in the Smoking Casemate or on the Gunroom settee. I can sleep through any noise.”
Ten hours of watch-keeping in twenty-four seems not terrible, but two facts throw light upon its meaning. First: the Service, which does not pamper, allotted eight hours in twenty-four to stokers—trained men, inured to the task. Second: “Watch and watch”—twelve hours in twenty-four—was ordered as a severe punishment to midshipmen on the Upper Deck in harbour, not in the Engine-room depths at sea.
Moreover, ten hours of watch-keeping did not mean only ten hours of work. The engineering midshipman not on watch at the time attended Divisions and Quarters. He took charge of the stokers during Dog Watch Evolutions. He wrote up his log-book, a slight task; worked sights from time to time; and each week completed an Engineering sketch.
Aggett was careful that the sketches should not be too easy. He demanded scale-drawings of machines in pen and ink, coloured, and with dimensions. Perfect accuracy was essential. It was necessary to know every detail of construction and working, and to be prepared to support Aggett’s searching cross-examination. John’s first weekly sketch occupied thirty-two of his spare hours.
They found, too, that in addition to their engineering duties they were required to attend the guns. The four midshipmen remaining on the Upper Deck were not enough, the executive officers declared. So, whenever “General Quarters” was sounded—and at that time it was sounded once and sometimes twice a day—John or Driss, whichever was not in the Engine-room, went to a gun for the long hours of the gun-practices. Time after time the hours which were theirs for rest or sketching were occupied in this manner; they standing—and they seemed now always to be standing—not in the Engine-room but on the sighting platform.