CHAPTER XXVIII
DIRTY WEATHER
At eight bells the Captain came on deck again, glancing once more somewhat anxiously astern. Not a cloud was to be seen in the moonlit sky, and the breeze that had blown so steadily, though so softly, for weeks, was sinking gradually, dying out, as it were, in a succession of gentle, peaceful sighs. Eugène, with the weather-wisdom of a man who had been but a few months at sea, rather inclined to think they might be becalmed. The crew did not trouble themselves about the matter. Every rag the brigantine could show was already set, and if a sail flapped idly against the mast, it soon drew again as before, to propel them smoothly on their course.
Moreover, a topic had been lately broached on the forecastle, of engrossing interest to every man before the mast. It affected no less delicate a subject than the beauty of ‘The Bashful Maid’ herself, as typified by her figure-head. This work of art had unfortunately suffered a slight defacement in one of their late exploits, nearly the whole of its nose having been carried away by an untoward musket-shot. Such a loss had been replaced forthwith by the ship’s carpenter, who supplied his idol with a far straighter, severer, and more classical feature than was ever yet beheld on the human countenance. Its proportions were proclaimed perfect by the whole crew; but though the artist’s execution was universally approved, his florid style of colouring originated many conflicting opinions and much loud discussion on the first principles of imitative art. The carpenter was a man of decided ideas, and made large use of a certain red paint nearly approaching vermilion in his flesh tints. ‘The Bashful Maid’s’ nose, therefore, bloomed with a hue as rosy as her cheeks, and these, until toned down by wind and weather, had been an honest scarlet. None of the critics ventured to dispute the position that the carpenter’s theory was sound. Slap-Jack, indeed, with a lively recollection of her wan face when he took leave of his Alice, suggested that for his part he liked them “a little less gaudy about the gills”; but this heresy was ignominiously coughed down at once. It was merely a question as to whether the paint was, or was not, laid on a trifle too thick, and each man argued according to his own experience of the real human subject.
All the older hands (particularly Bottle-Jack, who protested vehemently that the figure-head of ‘The Bashful Maid,’ so far from being a representation of feminine beauty, was in fact an elevated ideal of that seductive quality, a very model to be imitated, though hardly possible to be approached) were in favour of red noses, as adding warmth and expression to the female face. Their wives, their sweethearts, their sisters, their mothers, their grandmothers, all had red noses, and were careful to keep up the colouring by the use of comforting stimulants.
“What,” said the principal speaker, “was the pints of a figur’-head, as laid down in the song? and no man on this deck was a-goin’ to set up his opinion again that, he should think! Wasn’t ’em this here?—
‘Eyes as black as sloes,
Cheeks like any rose.’
And if the song was played out further, which it might or it might not, d’ye see, wouldn’t the poet have naturally added—
‘With a corresponding nose?’”