“Yes, sir.”
“Pooh! the case is clear—we need not talk about it any longer. A clear case, Mr Farmer. Mr Rattlin has charge of the forecastle—he descries a vessel ahead—he takes upon himself to order the helm hard a-port, and we run over and sink her accordingly. He is responsible, clearly.”
“Clearly,” was the answering echo from all the rejectors of responsibility.
“Mr Rattlin, I am sorry for you. I once thought you a promising young man; but, since your desertion at Aniana—we must not mince matters now—you have become quite an altered character. You seem to have lost all zeal for the service. Zeal for the service is a thing that ought not to be lost; for a young gentleman without zeal for the service is a young gentleman, surely—you understand me—who is not zealous in the performance of his duty. I think I have made myself tolerably clear. Do you think, sir, I should hold now the responsible commission I do hold under his Majesty, if I had been without zeal for the service? I am sorry that I have a painful duty to perform. I must place you under an arrest, till I know what may be the port admiral’s pleasure concerning this unpleasant business; for—for the loss of the Mary Anne of London you are clearly responsible.”
“Clearly” (omnes rursus).
“Had you sung out hard a-starboard, instead of hard a-port, the case might have been different.”
“Clearly.”
“Go down below to your berth, and consider yourself a prisoner. The young gentlemen in his Majesty’s service are not permitted to run down West Indiamen with impunity.”
“Clearly.”
In these kind of capstan-head court-martials, at which captains will sometimes administer reefers’ law, “Woe to the weakest!” A defence was quite a work of superfluity; so, consoling myself with the vast responsibility with which, all at once, I found myself invested, I went and turned in, anathematising every created thing above an inch high and a foot below the same dimensions. However, in a very sound sleep I soon forgot everything—even the horrible scene I had just witnessed.