At breakfast the fish which the pilot had brought aboard as a kindly offering during the night were eaten, curried. This mode of serving them displeased the Saloon. The steward, affecting to be in a philosophic doze in his lair, could not fail to have heard such scathing remarks as these:
“The nicest fish I’ve had down here.”
“Yes, spoiled.”
“Wasted.”
“Why the devil must they go and camouflage it?”
“If it had been high we’d have had it neat.”
“Must have curry and rice on Monday morning. Mustn’t go outside the routine.”
“Well, you see, if they started on the wrong note on Monday they wouldn’t be able to pick up the tune for the rest of the week.”
“O, it’s easy. Steak, steak, steak.”
We hurried our breakfast amid these criticisms, as the port authority was expected. Towards nine o’clock, all hands being assembled amidships, his launch came to the foot of the gangway. Eight sailors in white uniform rowed this launch. He divested himself of his sword, came up, and went inside Hosea’s quarters to “talk things over”; whereupon, the parade broke up. The next event was, we changed our mooring. As we passed to the new tether, which was among several tramps as ladylike as ourselves, I had my first experience of the groaning, screeching and gasping noise which the machinery of a dredger can make, as its buckets come round on the endless chain and empty themselves into the barge alongside. I wonder these contrivances were not introduced during the Passchendaele operations. They would have served two purposes, that of keeping a good depth of water for the infantry to swim through; and that of demoralizing the enemy.