“All right; but I am taking you in my own ship to watch over you and not to pet you. I expect that you, as the captain’s son, will be an example to the other apprentices, and mind that the first thing that you’ve got to learn is to obey orders without any questioning. ‘Obey orders and break owners’ is a downright good maxim.”
“Why, Mr. Poynter told me the same in different words. He said obedience was the thing which was most necessary to me.”
“Yes, lad, and he’s right. Now I have never found you disobedient, and Aunt Fanny says that though you do get into scrapes you are a biddable boy; but you will have many orders given you which are disagreeable to obey, and which seem foolish. Never question them, but obey at once. You will have to obey Willie, now he is second mate, as well as myself and the chief officer. But here is Harris’s shop. Come in and we will look after your kit.”
Mr. Harris, who had known my father for many years, was delighted to see him, and still more pleased when he found that he was to receive a liberal order for my outfit.
It was amusing to see the various things that he said were absolutely necessary for a young gentleman on going to sea, and which, as Willie said, would, if we had taken them all, have freighted the brig; but my father soon put much on one side. Among the chiefest of my delights in Mr. Harris’s shop, after the all-important orders had been given for my jackets of navy blue with brass buttons and my suit of oilskins and south-wester all complete, was the choosing of a telescope ornamented with flags of Marryat’s code and a quadrant, which my father said Willie would have to teach me to use as soon as we got to sea.
From Mr. Harris’s shop we made our way to the house on the quayside; and there Aunt Fanny was waiting to welcome us, and had dinner ready, for which I was well prepared by the drive on the top of the coach from Clifton. But my eagerness to see as much as possible of the Petrel kept me running to the window of the room, which was on the first floor,—the ground floor being used as offices and sample-rooms,—to have a look at her.
My aunt said, “You will see enough of her, Frank; sit still now and eat your dinner. I daresay many a time while you are away you will wish yourself in this old house, and long to have as good a meal as you are now neglecting.”
“Perhaps so, aunt; but I do want to see the Petrel. There is all her cargo coming on shore; and oh, there are such a lot of tusks of ivory.—Father, mayn’t I go and look at them?”
“Directly, my boy. Willie, you must go and relieve Mr. Hammond [the chief officer]; and be careful how you check the things as they are landed. All the ivory is to go to Messrs. King, and I am going to see if they will advance their price on the oil and rubber. Let Jack Adams take charge of Frank, and teach him something of the masts and rigging.”
“O father, I know all the names of the masts, yards, and sails, and can tie lots of sailors’ knots.”