“Terrible! terrible! You never heard of such a sad fellow as that among sailors, did you?”
“I can hardly tell at the moment. Fall in with the humour of sailors, and they are a good-tempered, honest-hearted set of fellows. A true-hearted sailor loves his country, never forsakes a messmate in danger or trouble, and would rather snap his cable than break his word. I will tell you a laughable account that I have just read about a sailor paying his debts. The account is this:—‘I ought to add, for the honour of Jack, that the bumboat-women, landladies, and all others who had trusted him, were duly remunerated before the remainder of his money was spent. Many of these creditors had come round from Chatham for this purpose. I believe there was but one exception to their being all honestly and liberally paid. There was one fellow who made an objection to his account in rather a Joe Miller sort of style. I am not sure whether Joe was before him, but he certainly stuck to his point with the gravity of an original: this was a Dutchman, who had entered for our service. Having built rather largely upon his anticipated pay, he had made his visits to the bumboat-woman rather often; so that, besides the score for loaves of bread, red-herrings, sausages, and pounds of sugar, there appeared upon his account a considerable number of dittos. Now, he acknowledged to all the above-named articles, and paid for them fairly, but he declared most forcibly that he had never had any dittos, nor could he be brought to understand what the word meant by all the logic of the bumboat-woman, or those who advocated her cause.’”
“Poor Jack did not know what ditto meant.”
“Well, now let us go on board ship together. I will tell you something that will a little surprise you.”
“What is it? what is it?”
“It is the opinion of an officer, as brave and as well-informed as any in the British navy, that it is an excellent thing to have on board ship a monkey.”
“A monkey! Why, he would be so full of his antics as to set the blue-jackets laughing at him; and then, he would be always in mischief.”
“For these very reasons Captain Hall recommends that Mr. Pug should be received as one of the crew. He well knows the advantage of light hearts and good humour on board ship, and thinks that few things are more likely to afford mirth to the blue-jackets than the comical tricks of a monkey! If Mr. Pug cannot be taught to weigh anchor, reef a sail, or pull a rope, he can grin and chatter at those who do these things, and thereby keep them in a good temper.”
“Very good, Mr. Pug; and now, while you run up the ropes we shall, perhaps, hear something more about ships.”
“I have a few pictures of ships, which I will show you. See! here is a ship in the time of King Alfred.”