“You young blackguard! I’ve a great mind—”
“To do what, Mr Farmer?” said Captain Reud, interposing.
Now I can assure the reader, twenty-five years ago, when we had nearly cleared the seas of every enemy, and the British pennant was really a whip, which had flogged every opponent of the ocean, the “young gentlemen” were sometimes flogged too, and more often called young blackguards than by any other title of honour. All this is altered for the better now. We don’t abuse each other, or flog among ourselves so much—and, the next war, I make no doubt, what we have spared to ourselves we shall bestow upon our enemies. I mention this, that the reader may not suppose that I am coarse in depicting the occasional looseness of the naval manners of the times.
“To punish him for staying out all night without leave.”
“That’s a great fault, certainly,” said the captain, slily. “Pray, Mr Rattlin, what induced you to commit it?”
“Please, sir, I wasn’t induced at all. I was regularly blown out, and now I am as regularly blown—.”
“Come, sir, I’ll be your friend, and not permit you to finish your sentence. If it’s a fair question, Mr Rattlin, may I presume to ask where you slept last night?”
“With the two Misses O’Tooles,” said I; for really the young ladies were uppermost in my thoughts.
“You young reprobate! What, with both?” said the captain, grinning.
“Yes sir,” for I now began to feel myself safe; “and Mr and Mrs O’Toole, and Mr Cornelius O’Toole, who has red hair, and Mr Phelim O’Toole, who has a black eye,—and the poultry, and the pigs, and the boat’s crew.”