So, for these seven weeks, all of us first-class boys who were near the end of our term had to go to the Excellent every day to go through a course of gunnery; and were sent out to sea in sections in the Blazer or Handy, or some other gunboat attached to the gunnery school, so as to gain some sort of preliminary insight into the ways of the big breech-loading guns used in the armour-clads of to-day, as well as being made acquainted with their lesser satellites quick-firing and machine-guns.
We did not leave our old ship altogether yet, though; for we used to take our dinners with us when we went away from her of a morning, returning back to the Saint Vincent of a night to sleep, when we would retail all of our experiences to our comrades who had remained behind.
At last the day came, a day I shall remember all my life, when Mick and I, for we both went away together even as we had joined on the same day, left the Saint Vincent for good and all.
One forenoon, just before ‘cooks to their messes’ sounded, and prior to our dispersing after the usual assembly for ‘divisions’ on the upper deck, the captain ordered Mick and myself, with some half a dozen other first-class boys belonging to the starboard watch and a like number from the port, to step out of the ranks; when, telling us we were drafted to the guardship for service with the fleet, he addressed a few kindly words of advice to us as to our future conduct and then dismissed us to our dinner, telling us we were to pack up our gear and leave the ship early in the afternoon.
He sent for me soon after I had disposed of the ‘two spuds and a Jonah,’ which composed the meal of the day, and on my going to his cabin he spoke to me very nicely, saying that I might write to him should I ever need help in getting on in the service, and that he would always, as he had previously promised, ‘keep an eye on me’!
“Faith,” said Mick, on my telling him this, “it’ll be moighty onplisint fur ye, Tom, me bhoy; thet gimblet oye ov his sames to go roight thro’ an’ thro’ me, begorrah, if he ivver onst looks at me sure!”