"In bow!"
"Way enough! Oars!"
The bow stood up, boat-hook in hand.
He tried to do so very gracefully—too gracefully in fact; for in reaching out to catch on, he lost his balance. He was fished out after a time; and so Jack and his merry men got up the side.
Our young hero made his report very sadly; but Sturdy only laughed.
"I merely sent you," he said, "to give you experience. Sailors are just like babies, you know, and want a lot of watching to keep them out of mischief."
"That's true," said Reikie. "Why, I remember once when in the old gunboat Rattler, on the coast of Africa, having ten men down with sickness all in one day. I thought we were struck with cholera till I made inquiry, and found it was 'pine-apple ailment.' They had all been on shore at Zanzibar, and pine-apples were cheap. Well, Sturdy, would you believe, one man told me that 'sure, he'd only eaten nine!'"
* * * * *
In two months' time the Gurnet was at anchor at Constantinople. This was Jack's first visit to the capital of the Turk, but it wasn't to be his last by any means.
Just one little story here concerning Paddy O'Rayne.