A Floating Home

by Cyril Ionides; J. B. Atkins

When the match-lining was finished we covered most of it with three-ply wood in panels. We panelled the owner’s cabin and the spare cabin with birch. We made the spare cabin to serve also as a drying-room, letting the back of the saloon fireplace into this cabin through the bulkhead. The fireplace, a handsome brass yacht stove, was bought second-hand from a yacht-breaker. Round the walls of the dining-cabin we placed a dado of varnished wood, and enamelled the cabin white everywhere else except on the ceiling (our furniture hatch), which we panelled. We panelled the saloon walls and ceiling with oak, and enamelled the window-frames and the uprights between them white. Throughout the ship where there was no panelling we put white enamel, making the whole interior very light. In every available place we built cupboards and shelves; not an inch of space was wasted.

We arranged the bath like the baths in a liner. It is supplied with hot salt water, and the fresh water is used in a huge basin. The sea water is heated in a closed-in copper by a six-headed Primus oilstove, and a hot bath can be had in half an hour. From the copper, which is opposite the bathroom across the passage, the water is siphoned into the bath, and if the siphon be ‘broken’ it can be started again by the pump which empties the bath. Cold sea water from a tank on deck (when we are high and dry we must have this) is supplied to the bathroom by a hose which can be diverted to the copper when that has to be filled.

It may seem complicated, but it is not really, for the children understand the system perfectly, and thoroughly enjoy playing with the waterworks. Sam Prawle never grasped it, and bestowed on it his customary formula about any device he could not understand: ‘That fare to me to be a kind of a patent.’ It may be added here, in anticipation of events, that an appeal for help has sometimes reached us from a guest in the bathroom. On the first appeal the Skipper or the Mate goes to the rescue; but if a second appeal comes from the same person one of the children is sent as a protest on behalf of the simplicity of the waterworks.

The keelson is the backbone of the ship. Ours is about sixty-five feet long, roughly a foot square, and studded with boltheads. Right aft in the boys’ cabin it is under the floor, but it is above the floor everywhere else. In the lobby it forms the bottom of the shelves; in the saloon it is covered with narrow polished maple planks; in the dining-cabin it becomes a seat; farther forward it is a platform for the copper; in the doorway into the owner’s cabin it is a nuisance; in the kitchen it forms the bottom shelf for crockery; right forward it is useful as a seat under the forehatch or as a first step up to the hatch. In the saloon it is most useful to stand on for looking out of the windows.

We lost almost a day’s work over a wedding. Harry’s brother married the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. E. Pegrom. Mr. Pegrom, a platelayer on the line, asked me to give him a cheque in exchange for twenty-five shillings. And in the list of presents published in the local paper the twenty-five shillings duly appeared in the form of ‘Mr. and Mrs. E. Pegrom: cheque.’ In our part of the world a banking account is regarded as a sign of wealth and also as something mysterious requiring a high degree of financial intelligence for its management.

I tried hard one day to persuade Sam Prawle to open an account. I met him on his way to the post-office to buy a money order for six pounds to pay for varnish and paint. I pointed out that a cheque would cost a penny instead of sixpence, and was also a safer medium. I explained that keeping a banking account was perfectly simple, as all he had to do was to keep paying in cheques as he received them and paying out cheques to the people from whom he bought his goods, always keeping something in the bank. After describing the process several times, I asked him if he understood.

‘Well, sir, that fare to me as haow that’s like a water-breaker. Yaou keep a paourin’ of the water in and a drawin’ of it off agin.’

I thought I had gained my point, as he understood so well, and referred to the subject again a few days later.

‘Well, yaou see, sir, I ’ave to work ’ard for my money, and I reckon a drawin’ of cheques makes that too easy to git riddy of it agin.’