By this time they had finished their coffee, and Martyn, rising, said: “Mr. Tarleton, I shall be glad if you will go along the main-deck and see that the men are making themselves comfortable; to-morrow we will divide them into watches and tell them off to their stations and get things into working order.”
Accordingly, in the morning the crew were divided into two watches, and the boat’s crews told off, and then the work of getting the powder and small ammunition on board began; the latter did not take long, as it was already in a flat into which it had been discharged three days before from the coaster that had brought it from Liverpool. The flat had therefore only to be towed alongside and the cases swung on board and lowered into a portion of the hold that had been divided off from the rest by thick bulkheads to form a magazine. The ammunition and powder were all on board and stowed away, the ship was washed down, and the men piped to dinner by eight bells. The officers went down and divided the men into messes, examined the food, and saw that everything was comfortable.
“More room here than there was on board the Surf, Dick,” Horace said as he stopped a moment on his rounds to speak to the young sailor.
“Yes, sir, one can stand upright here. But the Surf was a good boat too.”
After dinner the men were told off to their various duties and divided into crews for the guns, when these should be in place. The first lieutenant (for it was agreed that they should be called lieutenants and not mates) and Horace took the starboard watch, Tarleton and the boatswain the port watch. The men were formed up, inspected, and put through cutlass drill for an hour, after which the watches by turns were exercised in setting sail, reefing, lowering, and furling, so that each man should know his place and duty. Then they were dismissed.
“They will be a first-rate crew when they have worked together for a few days,” Martyn said. “I could not wish for a smarter set of men. If we meet anything about our own size I shall have no fear of giving a good account of her. I have no opinion whatever of the Turks as sailors; they are good soldiers, and have always proved themselves so, but more lubberly sailors never went to sea.”
“Well, we are not likely to meet anything else,” Horace said.
“I don’t know, lad. The Greeks at the best of times are pirates at heart, and just at present they are not at all likely to be particular who they lay hands on. I saw in the paper only yesterday, they had attacked and plundered an Austrian craft, and it is probable that they may have done the same to a dozen others, only as a rule they scuttle any ship they may seize and nothing is ever known about her. Ships can’t be too careful when they are in Greek waters, and a vessel wrecked on any of the islands is looked upon as a lawful prize. There is no fear of our being taken by surprise by the Turks, but I shall take precious good care that we are never caught napping when we are anchored anywhere in the Greek Archipelago. After dinner, Horace, I will go ashore with you in the gig. I don’t think it likely your father will be down by the night coach, as he would only get your letter this morning, but he may come; at any rate you have got to wait now at the Falcon till he turns up.”