"Eh! I was thinkin' about a gentleman as came from this Mission vessel aboard of us. He saw our twelve o'clock haul, and he says, 'Bad breeze last night, my man. Did you work through it?' Well, there was nothing much of a wind—just enough to make us reef her; so I answers, and he says, 'I suppose this is your night's work. Now, what is your share?' So I said my share would likely be tenpence. Well, he gives a reg'lar screech; and then I reckoned up the price of all the lot as well as I could guess, and he screeched again. 'Why,' says he, 'old Mother Baubo, that keeps the shop in my district at home, would charge me eight shillings for that turbot, four-and-six for that, eightpence for each of those sixty haddocks, and nobody knows what for the rest.' Now, I've thought of that gentleman and his screech many a time since, and when I felt the light a-comin' to my eyes here, I thought again. Do you think I shall die, sir? Excuse me."
"Die! No. Fact is, I'm too good-natured a doctor. I shall have to stop you from talking. Die! We'll make a man of you, and send you on board soon. Go on, I can stay another five minutes." "Well, sir, when I thought of death, I thought what people would say if they knew how much I got for risking this smash. That night I was over the rail on to the trawl-beam twice; I was at the pumps an hour; I pulled and hauled with both arms raw, and the snow freezing with the salt as soon as it came on my ulcers, and then I got the smash. And all for about eightpence. And that screeching gentleman told me as how his Mother Baubo, as he calls her, drives a broom and two horses, or a horse and two brooms—I'm mixed. No, 'twas a land-oh and two horses, and a broom and one horse. And I gets eightpence for a-many hours and a smash. I never mind the fellows that tells us on Sundays when we're ashore to rise and assirk our rights or something, but there's a bit wrong somewhere, sir. It don't seem the thing."
"Well, you see people would say you needn't be a fisherman; you weren't forced to come."
"But I was, sir. I knew no more what I was coming to than a babe, and once you're here, you stays here." "Well, never mind for the present, my man. Why, you're a regular lawyer, you rascal; I shall have to mind my p's and q's with you. Now don't talk any more, or you'll fidget, and that won't do your back any good. Will you have bread and milk, or beef-tea and toast, you luxurious person? And I must be your valet."
"I don't know about vally, sir. It's vally enough for me. To think as I should have a gentleman waitin' on me as if he was a cabin-boy! Anything you like, sir. The sight of you makes me better."
The man's tears were flowing; he was weak, poor fellow, and wanting in the item of well-bred reticence. Lewis fed one patient, trimmed the other's bed, put on a woollen helmet, sou'-wester, two pairs of gloves, and the trusty Russian coat; then he was slung into the boat like a bundle of clothes; landed springily on a thole, and departed over seas not much bigger than an ordinary two-storey house. It was quite moderate weather, and the sprightly young savant had lost that feeling which makes you try to double yourself into knots when you watch a wave gradually shutting away the outer world and preparing to fold its livid gloom about you. "What would the Cowes fellows say to this, I wonder?" thought the irreverent young pioneer. Then he chuckled over the thought of the reckless Seadogs who march in nautical raiment on the pier. Those wild, rollicking Seadogs! How the North Sea men would envy them and their dower of dauntlessness! The Seadog takes his frugal lunch at the club; he begins with a sole, and no doubt he casts a patronizing thought towards the other Seadogs who trawled for the delicate fish. They are not so like seamen in appearance as is the Cowes Seadog; they do not wear shiny buttons; the polish on their boots is scarcely brilliant; they wear unclean jumpers, and flannel trousers fit to make an aesthetic Seadog faint with emotion of various sorts. No! they are not pattern Seadogs at all—those North Sea workers. Would that they could learn a lesson from the hardy Cowes Rover. Well, the Rover tries a cutlet after his fish, then he has cheese and a grape or two, and he tops up his frugal meal with a pint of British Imperial. A shilling cigar brings his lunch up to just sixteen shillings—as much as a North Sea amateur could earn in a week of luck—and then he prepares to face the terrors of the Deep. Does he tremble? Do the thoughts of the Past arise in his soul? Nay, the Seadog of Cowes is no man to be the prey of womanish tremors; he goes gaily like a true Mariner to confront the elements. The boat is ready, and four gallant salts are resting on their oars; the Seadog steps recklessly on board and looks at the weather. Ha! there is a sea of at least two inches high running, and that frail boat must traverse that wild space. No matter! The man who would blench at even two hundred yards of water, with waves even three inches high is totally, unworthy of the name of a British Seadog! One thought of friends and mother dear; one last look at the Club where that sole was served, and then, with all the ferocious determination of his conquering race, the Seadog bids the men give way. It is an awful sight! Four strokes, and the bow man receives as nearly as possible half a pint of water on his jersey! Steady! No shirking, my sons of the sea-kings. Twenty strokes more—the peril is past; and the Seadog bounds on to the deck of his stout vessel. He is saved. A basket with a turbot is in the stern-sheets; that turbot will form part of the Seadog's humble evening meal. It cost a guinea, and the North Sea amateurs, who received two shillings of that amount, would doubtless rejoice could they know that they risked their lives in a tearing August gale to provide for the wants of a brother Seadog.
By the time Lewis had finished his heroic reverie, he was nicely sheeted with ice, for the spray froze as it fell, and he was alongside of the smack that he wanted—which was more to the purpose. In a few minutes he was engaged in dealing with a prosaic, crushed foot. A heavy boat had jammed his patient against the iron side of the steam-carrier. The man was stoical, like the rest of his mates, but he was in torture, for the bones were all huddled into a twisted mass—a gruesome thing, ladies, and a common thing, too, if you would but think it. Ferrier had to use the knife first, for the accident was not so recent as he could have wished; then for near half an hour he was working like some clever conjurer, while the vessel heaved slowly, and the reek of the cabin coiled rankly round him. What a picture! That man, the pride of his university, the rising hope of the Royal Society, the professor whom students would have idolized, was bending his superb head over a poor, groaning sailorman, and performing a hard operation amid air that was merely volatile sewage! A few men looked on; they are kind, but they all suffer so much that the suffering of others is watched with passive callousness.
"Brandy now, my man. This is your first and last drink, and you may make it a good one. Don't give him any more, skipper, even if you have it on board. You know why? Ah! the colour's coming back again. Now, my lad, we're going to make your bed up on the cabin floor. Hand me a flannel; and you, my man, some water out of the kettle. Now for a clean place. I'll set up as a housemaid when I go ashore."
"Excuse me, sir, but if you thinks you're goin' to be let to scrub that ar plank, sir, you're mistaken. I'm skipper here, and I'll do that jest to show you how we thinks of your politeness, mister. Hand over that scrubber."
"All right, you obstinate mule; of course you'll have your own way. Let me see his mattress, then. Won't do! Which of you durst come with the boat, and I'll send a cocoanut-fibre one for him?"