For nine years the world had been convulsed with war; ships had burned and men had bled from Manila to Panama, west about and east about. It was hard to believe that he was living now in a world where men did not fire cannons at each other on sight. Cogshill’s next remark had a bearing on this last thought.
“National ships of the French, Batavian, and Italian Republics will be saluted with the honours due to foreign ships of war,” he said.
Buckland whistled at that, as well he might. It meant that England had recognised the existence of the red republics against which she had fought for so long. Yesterday it had been almost treason to speak the word ‘republic’. Now a captain could use it casually in an official statement.
“And what happens to us, sir?” asked Buckland.
“That’s what we must wait to hear,” said Cogshill. “But the navy is to be reduced to peacetime establishment. That means that nine ships out of ten will be paid off.”
“Holy Moses!” said Bush.
Now the next ship ahead was cheering, the sound coming shrilly through the air.
“Call the hands,” said Cogshill. “They must be told.”
The ship’s company of the Renown rejoiced to hear the news. They cheered as wildly as did the crews of the other ships. For them it meant the approaching end of savage discipline and incredible hardship. Freedom, liberty, a return to their homes. Bush looked down at the sea of ecstatic faces and wondered what the news implied for him. Freedom and liberty, possibly; but they meant life on a lieutenant’s half pay. That was something he had never experienced; in his earliest youth he had entered the navy as a midshipman—the peacetime navy which he could hardly remember—and during the nine years of the war he had only known two short intervals of leave. He was not too sure that he cared for the novel prospects that the future held out to him.
He glanced up at the flagship and turned to bellow at the signal midshipman.