One day, a wag on the forecastle, as we heard through the marine sentry, took a good rise out of this slow-going individual.
“Hi, Downy!” said he, seeing him creeping forward, with his eyes bent down, counting the planks, apparently. “Chips, the carpenter’s mate, wants to see you, sonny.”
“See me?” repeated the other, wonderingly. “What does he want to see me for?”
“Why,” said the other, “he wants to measure you for your coffin. He says you’re more’n half dead already, cos you crawls about like a cripple. Only you’re so bloomin’ lazy, you’d die out and out at once and be chucked overboard comfortable like!”
Downy did not make any reply to this, which was an acknowledgment of his having the worst of it, as he was generally credited with possessing the gift of the gab and not easily silenced.
Another queer old stick came to the sick bay complaining of being ill, notwithstanding that he looked hale and hearty.
“What’s the matter with you?” asked Dr Nettleby, in his sharp, incisive manner, which had not grown any milder from his sojourn in the China Sea and an attack of liver complaint. “You seem all right, my man.”
“I’ve got overhand knots in my gaffs, sir.”
“What on earth do you mean?” cried the doctor, puzzled by the name of this new disease.
“Overhand knots in your gaffs—why, you must be drunk!”