“Maybe,” said Briant, “ye’ll have to remain that time whether ye object or not.”
“By no means, Paddy,” retorted Gurney; “I could swum off to sea and be drownded if I liked.”
“No ye couldn’t, avic,” said Briant.
“Why not?” demanded Gurney.
“’Cause ye haven’t the pluck,” replied Phil.
“I’ll pluck the nose off yer face,” said Gurney, in affected anger.
“No ye won’t,” cried Phil, “’cause av ye do I’ll spile the soup by heavin’ it all over ye.”
“Oh!” exclaimed Gurney, with a look of horror, “listen to him, messmates, he calls it ‘soup’—the nasty kettle o’ dirty water! Well, well, it’s lucky we hain’t got nothin’ better to compare it with.”
“But, I say, lads,” interposed Jim Scroggles, seriously, “wot’ll we do if it comes on to blow a gale and blows away all our purvisions?”
“Ay, boys,” cried Dick Barnes, “that ’ere’s the question, as Hamlet remarked to his grandfather’s ghost; wot is to come on us supposin’ it comes on to blow sich a snorin’ gale as’ll blow the whole sandbank away, carryin’ us and our prog overboard along with it?”