CHAPTER VI
I had the honour of dining on the Flagship next night, and so contagious is the naval spirit that I went there, as it were, annoyed and uneasy over the matter of the misread signal. One cannot regard an Admiral in the exercise of his duty as a mere human. It is in his power to make you get up an anchor by hand if he thinks you are slack; he can stop your coaling and bid you man and arm boats in the middle of the grimy mess; he can make you repeat a certain business till you are sick and dizzy; or he can raise you to high honour by signalling: ‘Well done, So-and-so. Evolution creditably performed.’ He blocks up all the horizon when he appears on it. At six miles off, across the windy blue, the spirit may move him to chat with you, and if your best signalman have not his best telescope at his best eye, and the Admiral be forced to repeat his remarks, you will hear about it at closer range.
THE ISOLATION OF AN ADMIRAL
The loneliness of a Captain is society beside the isolation of an Admiral. He goes up on the after-bridge, and moves some £10,000,000 worth of iron and steel at his pleasure. No man can stop him, few dare even suggest. Then comes the sea, as it did round the Orkneys, and a little roaring ‘roost’ marked with a few hair-lines on the chart—a tide-rip racing between ledges—buffets his stately galleons, and drives them lightly out of all formation. One never connects a clergyman with St. Paul; but one cannot look at an Admiral without speculating on our apostolic Succession of the Sea. With these powers were clothed Nelson and the rest—‘Admirals all.’ And this particular piece of flesh and blood is of the same order, and rank, and breed, and responsibility—the Admiral in command of the Channel Fleet. And now it is peace. (‘Yes, I have enjoyed my visit very much, thank you, sir.’) But if War came to-morrow? What would he do? How would he think? What does he think about now? He would go up on the bridge with the Flag-Lieutenant, and the ships would be cleared for action. (‘No, I’ve never seen a Temperley transporter at work.’) And then—and then . . . .?
It was a strange dinner for one guest at least—with its flowers and crystal and quiet conversation; the band playing on deck, and the lights of the Fleet twinkling all down the Bay.
There was a Prince in it who was also a Flag-Captain, and he set one thinking; and there were Commanders and Lieutenants in it, and it was all very pretty and gracious; but between me and the menu rose a vision of last year’s play-war—a battleship cleared for action, naked and grim, like a man swimming with a knife between his teeth—a wet and streaming hull thundering through heavy, rain-hammered seas.
DINNER IN A GUN-ROOM
‘Well, now you’ve done that,’ said Twenty-One, ‘suppose you come and dine in a Gun-room.’ (We have none on the cruiser, being all ward-room, with a cabin apiece.) ‘I’ll chaperon you to the best disciplined Gun-room in the Fleet. We’ll show you.’
So we went, Twenty-One and me, to another huge battleship, precisely like the Admiral’s; but this time Captains, Commanders, and Lieutenants were invisible, or showed only as superior luminaries far along the decks. We dealt with nothing above the rank of Sub-Lieutenant, and the greetings of that grade are cordial and warm. Down below—it was twice the size of our ward-room—we found their Gun-room, which differs in appointments and fittings from everything Marryat conceived, but I think the old unquenchable spirit persists. Of the twenty odd inhabitants, a dozen at least were Midshipmen, and therefore, as Twenty-One explained, ‘didn’t count.’ They talked among themselves in subdued eager whispers, dropping in to the meal as they came off duty. The senior Sub-Lieutenant (quite nineteen years old) was responsible for the justly vaunted discipline; and it is no small thing to reduce to silence boys of sixteen to eighteen, all full of natural and acquired deviltry. But it was done according to the custom of the Navy and the etiquette of the Gun-room, whose laws change not.
MIDSHIPMEN