I explained.
‘The clothes may prove useful,’ said he. He pointed to the convict’s mattress on deck and said, ‘Has that been your bed?’
‘Yes, dear.’
He tossed his hands and looked at me with a face of sorrow and love, then put the parcel into my bunk and the mattress on top of it.
‘They’ll give me the captain’s cabin,’ said he, ‘and you must be near me. I couldn’t rest to think of you sleeping down here. The men’ll be filling these cabins; they’ll sleep in bowlines over the side sooner than occupy the prisoners’ quarters, though many of them’ll have to live down there all the same. Come with me on deck. I must see what’s doing.’
‘Be careful how you address me, Tom. I must be thought a boy whilst I am in this ship.’
We went out, and he locked the door after him and gave me the key. He shouted to the convicts, some of whom seemed to be dancing, others playing at leap-frog, whilst others again ran in and out of the pantry and cabins hallooing like madmen: ‘Let no man enter that berth! My friend occupies it, and that’s enough!’ He then passed his arm through mine, and we walked to the steps of the hatch that led into the cuddy.
I never could have imagined such a scene as this interior presented. Most of the tall, thin sheets of looking-glass had been shivered. The doors of the cabins lay open, and the decks were covered with the tossed and tumbled contents of rifled drawers, lockers, and boxes. The convicts had found good booty in these cabins. Here had slept the captain, the two mates, the military officers, and the surgeon-superintendent, and one or two spare berths aft had been filled with certain valuable consignments to Sydney, to which port the ship was to have proceeded after discharging her cargo of criminals at Hobart Town.
The place was crowded with the felons. They stood two and three deep at the table, which, as you will remember, I and my associate had prepared for breakfast. One of the aftermost berths had been used as a cabin larder; here the prisoners had found plenty to eat and drink. The table was strewn with tins of meat, pots of preserves, bottles of beer, biscuits, bones of ham, and so forth. The fellows bawled to one another to pass this and that; to hand the ale along; to sling that bottle of sherry across. They knocked the heads off the bottles and, after emptying them, threw them on the deck.
The drink had mounted into the heads of many, and the din of their shouts, songs, and laughter, their filthy language and hideous raillery, would have drowned the noise of a thunderstorm. Here and there lay portions of convicts’ clothes torn into shreds. Many of the felons were dressed in plundered apparel. A man at the foot of the table wore the doctor’s naval coat; others the clothes which had belonged to Lieutenant Chimmo and Captain Barrett. A few had attired themselves in the uniforms of these officers, one in a tunic, another in the trousers, a third in a military cloak. One fellow who ran past us had the subaltern’s sword strapped to his hip.