And Geordie retreated with the bottle to his corner, and took a long drink of a poisonous compound which contained as much insanity in it as a small lunatic asylum. He came back to the bar presently, and told the barman that he was a millionaire.
'I own half Newcastle and a lot of Bourke Street, Melbourne, and a baker's dozen of ships, and lumps of London!' said Geordie.
'Lend me a thousand pounds till to-morrow,' said the barman.
'I like you—hic—I'll do it,' said Geordie; and with that he fell headlong and forgot his wealth. They dragged him outside on the verandah, and let him lie in the cool of the evening. He was picked up there two hours later by Jack Braby and some of the starboard watch, and taken on board.
'He let on he was a millionaire,' said the barman contemptuously.
Braby shook his head.
'Ah, he's liable to allow that when he's full, sir,' said Braby.
But that fatal bottle kept Geordie Potts wholly insensible till they were outside the Heads again and on their way to England with the smoke of the tugboat far astern. And presently the second mate, Mr. Brose, who was a very rough sort of dog and had sweated his way up to his present exalted rank from that of a fore-mast hand, hauled Geordie out by the collar of his coat and had him brought to by means of a bucketful of nice Bass's Strait water. Geordie gasped like a dying dolphin, but came to rapidly.
'I'll teach you to get drunk, you swab,' said Brose. 'Take those wet things off and turn to.'
And Geordie obeyed like a child in the presence of force majeure.