“You see, gentlemen,” he said, “we never had a chance to get within touch of the Spanish mongrels. I don’t want to brag, but with a fair start there aren’t one of our chaps here as wouldn’t take a good grip of his cutlass and go for any three of them; eh, messmates?”
“In an or’nary way, Joe,” said Harry Briggs.
“Well, this is an or’nary way, messmate.”
“Nay; I call this a ’stror’nary one.”
“Well, speak out, messmate, and say what you mean.”
“Well, same as you do, Joe, only I put it a little different. Win or lose, I’d go in for tackling three of them in an or’nary way, but I says this is a ’stror’nary one, and you may put me down for six, and if I get the worst of it, well, that’ll be a bit of bad luck. But anyhow I’d try.”
“And so say all of us,” came from the rest.
“Well,” said Joe, laughing, “I never knew afore that I was the most modest chap in our crew.”
“Oh, I have no doubt about your courage, my lads,” said the doctor, “nor that my nephew here, though he is a boy, will fight like a man; but if we are to do any good we must work with method against such great odds. So now, Cross, let us hear what you propose to do.”
“Try again, sir—in the dark—and play a bit artful.”