“If that is all,” said one of his companions, for middies are not ceremonious, “there is no fear of you, Bullen: your modesty will never stand in your way!”
“I hope not,” answered Bullen, “nor any thing else, if I can help it. At any rate, I should be sorry to be quite so soft a one as Armstrong! Only think,” he continued, turning to Ormond, “only think of that foolish fellow Armstrong! One of the old-wigs asked him (saw he was soft, I suppose) the simplest question in the world, just to try him. Well, old-wig stares him in the face, and looking devilish knowing, says, ‘Suppose yourself, Sir, in a gale of wind on a lee shore, the ship in great danger of going on the rocks, when, the wind suddenly shifting, you are taken all aback, what, Sir, would you do in this critical juncture?’ Instead of answering, ‘Clap on sail, and put out to sea,’ poor Armstrong took it for granted he should not have been asked the question if it were not a puzzler, and was so confounded, that he looked like a fool, and had not a word to say, till the old-wigs themselves were all obliged to laugh out.”
At this moment Bullen was sent for to attend the said old-wigs, as he called them; and though he still tried to bluster, he coloured to the very roots of his hair at the awful summons. On his return, however, he came laughing and swaggering, and bolting into the midst of the still standing group, he seized a button of Ormond’s coat with one hand, and of Edmund’s with the other, and began to tell his story.
“Have you passed? have you passed?” cried many voices.
“Have I passed!” repeated Bullen. “There is no difficulty in passing.”
“I thought it was very difficult, a short time since,” observed Ormond.
“Well, well—so it may be to some: I found no difficulty, however. But listen till I tell you the fun. They thought they had got another Armstrong to deal with, I suppose; for one of the old fellows, looking as wise as Solomon, and as pompous as the grand Mogul, turned his eyes full on me, and began. I felt mine inclined to take a peep at my shoe-buckles; but, mustering all my courage, I raised them, stared straight in his face, clenched my teeth, drew my heels together, thus, and stood firm.
“‘Well, Sir!’ said old-wig, ‘hitherto you have answered well.’—This was encouraging. ‘Now,’ he continued, ‘suppose yourself on a lee shore, under a heavy press of sail, the wind blowing such a gale that, in short, it is impossible to save the ship, what, Sir, would you do?’
“‘Why, let her go ashore and be d——d!’ I replied. Then, thinking I had been too rough, I added, with a bow, that I should never take the liberty of saving a ship which his lordship judged it impossible to save. He smiled, and said I had a fine bold spirit, just fit for a brave British tar! So I sailed out of port with flying colours, but no pennant, faith: I heard nothing of my commission.