I told him.
“Ah! Hawkesley! yes, that is the name. I remember now. Captain Vernon told me that although you have never been to sea as yet you are not altogether a greenhorn. What can you do?”
“I can hand, reef, and steer, box the compass, pull an oar, or sail a boat; and I know the name and place of every spar, sail, and rope throughout the ship.”
“Aha! say you so? Then you will prove indeed a valuable acquisition. What is the name of this rope?”
“The main-topgallant clewline,” I answered, casting my eye aloft to note the “lead” of the rope.
“Right!” he replied with a smile. “And you have the true nautical pronunciation also, I perceive. Mr Johnson,”—to a master’s mate who happened to be passing at the moment—“this is Mr Hawkesley. Kindly take him under your wing and induct him into his quarters in the midshipmen’s berth, if you please. Don’t stop to stow away your things just now, Mr Hawkesley,” he continued. “I shall have an errand for you in a few minutes.”
“Very well, sir,” I replied. And following my new acquaintance, I first saw to the hoisting in of my traps, and then with them descended to the place which was to be my home for so many months to come.
This was a tolerably roomy but very indifferently lighted cabin on the lower or orlop deck, access to which was gained by the descent of a very steep ladder. The furniture was of the most meagre description, consisting only of a very solid deal table, two equally solid forms or stools, and a couple of arm-chairs, one at each end of the table, all securely lashed down to the deck. There was a shelf with a ledge along its front edge, and divisions to form lockers, extending across the after-end of the berth; and under this hung three small book-cases, (which I was given to understand were private property) and a mirror six inches long by four inches wide, before which the “young gentlemen”—four in number, including myself—and the two master’s mates had to perform their toilets as best they could. The fore and after bulkheads of the apartment were furnished with stout hooks to which to suspend our hammocks, which, by the by, when slung, left, I noticed, but a very small space on either side of the table; and depending from a beam overhead there hung a common horn lantern containing the most attenuated candle I ever saw—a veritable “purser’s dip.” This lantern, which was suspended over the centre of the table, afforded, except at meal-times or other special occasions, the sole illumination of the place. Although the ship was new, and the berth had only been occupied a few days, it was already pervaded by a very powerful odour of paint and stale tobacco-smoke, which made me anxious to quit the place with the least possible delay.
Merely selecting a position, therefore, for my chest, and leaving to the wretched lad, whom adverse fortune had made the attendant of the place, the task of lashing it down, I hastened on deck again, and presenting myself once more before the first lieutenant, announced that I was now ready to execute any commission with which he might be pleased to intrust me.
“Very well,” said he. “I want you to take the gig and proceed on board the Saint George with this letter for the first lieutenant of that ship. Wait for an answer, and if he gives you a parcel be very careful how you handle it, as it will contain articles of a very fragile character which must on no account be damaged or broken.”