“Just one, sir; she’d clear out all the others in a brace o’ shakes. She wouldn’t stand none o’ that nonsense. Why, bless yer ’art, there was one had got a golden pestle and mortar—”
“Gently, Dick! gently!” said the midshipman.
“It’s a fack, sir, and as sure as I stand here; and she was a bruising up betel-nuts for him to chew, and another was mixing up lime, and another spreading leaves, whilst—there, I dursn’t hardly tell you this here, because you won’t believe it.”
“Let it off gently, Dick,” said the middy, “and we’ll try and bear it.”
“Well, sir, hang me if one of his wives—the oldest and ugliest of ’em—wasn’t sitting there holden a golden spittoon ready for him to use whenever he wanted.”
There was another roar of laughter, and Dick exclaimed,—
“There, you ask Sergeant Lund if every word a’most I’ve said ain’t quite true,”—which, with the exception of Dick’s embellishment about the handsome sailors and soldiers, proved to be the case.