Still from care and thinking free,
Is a sailor’s life at sea.
Before he reached the third line Dicky’s courage, and his voice too, returned and he sang like some sweet-throated bird the next verse:—
When the ship, d’ye see, becomes a wreck,
And landsmen hoist the boat, sir,
The sailor scorns to quit the deck
While there’s a single plank afloat, sir.
Captain Forrester, leaning his head on his hand, listened to the song that carried him back to his midshipman days, and watched the boy whose young fresh voice echoed through the low-pitched cabin. Dicky was unmistakably a child of the people, but his honest face, his bright, intelligent eyes, and his clean though ragged attire made him a prepossessing little fellow.
“You may go now,” said Captain Forrester to Jack Bell, and meanwhile giving Dicky a bright shilling, “but do not forget what I have told you, and also that you have got off very well. As for that lad, take him to his mother and tell her to keep him at home until he has cut his wisdom teeth.”
“Thank ye kindly, sir,” answered Jack. “I’ll not forget your orders, sir, and as long as I live I’ll not forget your kindness, sir.” And, with a parting salute, Jack returned to the custody of the waiting master-at-arms.