We walked leisurely along the quays. Will’s ship lay in a corner at a distance, and he was for enthusiastically pressing forward to arrive at her. His ardent pace kept him ahead, and he often turned to invite us to come on. But I was listening to Captain Butler and was in no great hurry. At last we came to Will’s ship, the Childe Harold. Oh, my great God, when I think of it! When I think of standing beside Captain Butler and looking at that ship with my cousin at my elbow calling my attention to points of her with a young sailor’s pride!
She was a very handsome vessel of her kind, and a big ship according to the burden of those days. Though she was receiving cargo fast, her sides towered high above the wall; she had been newly coppered, and her metal glanced sunnily upon the soup-like water she floated on. Captain Butler took my hand, and we followed Will up the gangway plank and gained the ship’s deck. A man with a beard stood at the yawn of the great main hatch; Will touched his cap and whispered that he was the mate of the ship. Captain Butler went up and shook hands with him and rejoined us, saying that he had made the man’s acquaintance at Callao. A quantity of cases were being swung over the rail, and as they were lowered down the hatch I heard a noise of voices below—calls and yells, and the kind of language you expect to hear arising from the hold of a ship that is populous with lumpers. Will took us into the cuddy, which you will now call the saloon; a fine cabin under the poop-deck, with some sleeping berths on either hand. He then walked us forward to show us the apprentices’ quarters.
The ship had what is known as a topgallant forecastle, on either hand of which was a wing of cabin, a sort of deck-house, entered by a door that slid in grooves. The apprentices lived in the wing on the left, or port, or larboard side, as the expression then was.
‘How many of you are there?’ asked Captain Butler.
‘Three,’ answered my cousin.
The place was empty, and I entered it and looked about me to gather whether there was anything I could purchase to render the coarse, rude abode a little more hospitable to the sight.
‘This won’t be like being at home, Will?’ said I.
‘It will be seeing life, though, and starting on a career,’ he answered.
‘These are very snug quarters,’ said Captain Butler. ‘What sort of a forecastle have you, Johnstone?’
My cousin led us into a large, wooden cave. It was very gloomy here. We had to lift our feet high to enter the door. The huge windlass stood, a great mass of reddened timber and grinning ironwork, in front of the entrance to this forecastle; abaft it rose the trunk of the foremast, and behind, again, the solid square of the galley, or kitchen; the thick shrouds descended on both sides; and, though it was a bright day, the shadows of these things lay in a twilight upon the forecastle entrance, and I needed to stand awhile and accustom my eyes to the gloom before I could see.