We got on board the wreck as carefully as we had quitted the house, and I, being delegated to descend to the Captain’s cabin and steal one of the flannel powder cartridges, was soon creeping by the snoring Captain with my booty secured. It took but a moment to ram home the charge and pack it over with pockets full of wadding; and then Harry, our gunner, touched it off. As the old brig shook with the report, Alfred jumped to the bell, and the way that clanged was splendid.
“Boys,” said Drake, who was shaking with the fun, “can’t you see old topgallant sail down below springing up in his berth with a lurch and cracking his head against the beams, and our dignified fresh tute jerking those long, thin legs out of bed, and wondering what’s about to happen this fine morning, and old Clump and Juno groaning out ‘O de Lord!’ and knocking their black pates together as they both try to get out of bed at the same instant. How jolly!”
An immense red bandanna handkerchief at that moment popped above the companionway—then a hearty, weather-marked face we well knew—then a portion of an ample East Indian nightshirt, which threw up a pair of arms and fired off a couple of boarding-pistols. The discharge was followed by a stentorian “Three cheers for the great and glorious battle won this day!—hip! hip! hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!” in which we fellows joined with a yell.
“Ah! you young rascals have got before me this morning, but this afternoon it will be my turn—mine and Mr Clare’s, you roystering middies!” and the Captain popped down again to finish his toilet.
We were soon joined by the Captain, and a little while after by Mr Clare, who was in the best of spirits, complimented us on our display of zeal and patriotism, and touched off the old gun once himself—“for practice,” he said.
“But,” continued the jolly old Captain, having taken Mr Clare’s arm, “suppose we visit Ethiopia and see if a hot breakfast is not waiting for us there. These boys would rather stay here and load this cannon.”
“No sir, no sir!” replied Harry, “we must load our own personal guns, for we mean to make our report this afternoon.”
Laughing over that threat to our tutors, we went with them to breakfast, which we found ready as soon as our morning prayers were read. Clump brought in the dishes—Clump in uniform—and I never saw a funnier figure in my life. The coat was once my grandfather’s—a colonel of West India Militia, I believe. Now my grandfather had been a rather short man, but very broad and stout, particularly round the stomach. Old Clump was tall and thin as a spectre, so the epaulettes fell over his shoulders, the waist flapped loosely eight inches above his trousers, and the short swallow-tails did not sufficiently cover the spot which the venerable darky usually placed on the chair to hide a patch, the bigness of a frying-pan and of a different material from the breeches themselves, that Juno’s affectionate care had strengthened her liege lord’s garments with—which garments, far more pastoral than military, and forced by suspenders as near the coat as Clump’s anatomy otherwise would allow, failed by three inches of woollen stocking to meet his shoes. When you think how comical the excellent, old, white-woolled darky appeared, remember, too, that he was perfectly unconscious, until our laughter startled him, that he was not becomingly attired.
As our irrepressible appreciation of the fun was shouted out, Clump did not realise at first that he was its cause, but when he did all the pride and alacrity died from his face in an instant. In a bewildered, palsied way he put down the dish he carried, and, heaving a sad sigh, drew himself up until the rheumatic spine must have twinged, and, fixing his eyes on some point far above our head, stood in motionless dignity.
Even Mr Clare had laughed, but, recovering equanimity immediately that he saw how deeply Clump was wounded, he said: