The strenuous training and habit of early responsibility may convert them into men before their time; but they still manage to retain their boyish instincts, and when they are off duty these generally appear uppermost. At times they are noisy, riotous, and altogether irrepressible; but when it comes to work they are very much all there.
II.
'Ain't got a fill o' bacca abart yer, 'ave yer?' asked Joshua Billings, A.B., producing an abbreviated, blackened, and very foul clay pipe from the lining of his cap and gazing at it pensively. It was twelve-forty-five P.M., the middle of the dinner-hour, and Joshua, having just assimilated his tot of navy rum, was at peace with himself and the world in general.
'Sorry,' Martin answered, 'I ain't got nothin' but fags.'
'Fags!' the able seaman growled. 'Why you young blokes smokes nothin' but them things I dunno. They tastes like smokin' 'ay. W'en I fu'st jined I takes up me pun' o' bacca reg'lar, an' I done it ever since. It's got some taste abart it. Fags! S'welp me, I dunno wot th' blessed navy's comin' to!'
Martin looked rather sheepish.
Billings grinned. 'Seein' as 'ow you ain't got no bacca, then I s'pose I've got ter use me own,' he went on, producing a well-filled pouch from the waistband of his trousers, and proceeding to ram some coarse, dark tobacco into his pipe. 'I never believes in usin' me own s'long as I kin git a fill orf another bloke. Got a match?'
The ordinary seaman handed a box across, and his companion lit up.
'Comin' ashore along o' me this arternoon?' Joshua asked, puffing out a cloud of smoke with a satisfied grunt.
Martin thought for a moment. For an ordinary seaman to be asked to go ashore with a man of Billings's age was undoubtedly a great honour; but, at the same time, he was rather doubtful as to what might happen. Joshua, on his own statement, had an unquenchable thirst for malt liquor, and always felt 'dizzy like' outside public-houses, and Martin had no wish to join him in a carouse, with the prospect of ending the afternoon under the supervision of the local constabulary.