“This is Jerry Vincent, an old shipmate of mine, nephew,” observed my uncle, as he placed a chair for the old man. “He can tell you more curious things than most people when he has a mind. Can you not, Jerry?”
Our guest nodded, and his eyes twinkled curiously.
“Sarvant, missus; sarvant, all,” said he, pulling a lock of his hair and putting his tarpaulin hat under the seat which had been offered him. “Why, old ship, I’ve seen some rum things in the course of my life, and I don’t forget them, like some does,” he remarked, smoothing down his hair with his long, rough, bony hand.
I told him that I should much like to hear some of his adventures, but he did not become loquacious till my aunt had served him out three or four cups of tea, into which she poured, as if it was a usual thing, a few drops of cordial, a proceeding which always made the old man’s eyes twinkle cheerily. During the course of conversation, I found that Jerry Vincent was not only peculiar in his appearance but in his habits also. He never by any chance, from choice, slept in a bed. When at sea, a caulk on a locker was the only rest he took, and most of his nights, in summer, were passed under the thwarts of his boat. My uncle told a story of him, to the effect that one cold winter’s night he had gone to sleep under his boat, which had been hauled up and turned over on the beach, and that when he awoke in the morning his dog had been frozen to death, while he was only a little stiff in the neck. At all events, it was evident that he was a very hardy old man.
“There are many like to hear my yarns,” he observed. “Now, for example, there was a gentleman down here from Lunnon, and he used to go out in my boat off to Spithead, and sometimes across to the Wight. One day I thought I would try one of my yarns on him, so I spun it off the reel. He said, when I had finished, that it was a very good one, though it was very short, and when he stepped out of the boat he tipped me half-a-crown. The next day I took him out again, and spun him another yarn rather tougher than the first, and he gave me three shillings. Ho, ho, thought I to myself. If you pay according to the toughness of a yarn, I’ll give you something worth your money. Well, the third day down he came, and said he wanted to go across to Cowes, if the tide would suit, and I told him it would; and now, I thought, here’s a fine time for spinning a long yarn. I’ll give you a tough one, and no mistake. Well, I spun away, and my eye if it didn’t beat the two others hollow! We had a pretty quick run to the Wight and back, and just before I landed him, ‘I hope you liked the story, sir,’ says I. ‘Very much,’ says he. ‘And by the by, I should pay you for it. Here’s a couple of shillings.’ I looked at the coin with disdain. ‘Pardon, sir,’ says I; ‘that story’s worth five shillings if it’s worth a penny, and I can take nothing less.’
“‘Are you in earnest, my man?’ says he. ‘Yes, sir,’ says I; ‘the story, if written down, would be worth ten times the money.’
“‘Then you are an extortionate old scoundrel, without a scrap of a conscience,’ says he. ‘Hard words, sir,’ says I; ‘but it can’t be helped. We poor fellows must submit to great people.’ But all I could say wouldn’t do. He vowed that he would never give me anything again, and what is more, he never did, and never again would take my boat.”
“Served you right too, old ship,” said my uncle. “You learned by that, I hope, that moderation is the best policy. But heave ahead. You are not to charge us at the rate of a shilling a fathom for your yarns, remember that.”
Old Jerry cocked his eye with a knowing wink, and began. “Well then, one morning after I had been sleeping up at my uncle’s, for some reason or other—it might have been that I’d had a drop too much the night afore, but I can’t say, as it’s some time ago—I don’t score those things down in my log, d’ye see—I was going down the street with my boat-hook in my hand—I know that I had the boat-hook because I took it up with me. It was rather dusky, so to speak, because the sun wasn’t up, nor would be for some hours to come, when, as I was passing a house with a deep porch before the door, what should I see but a big pair of fiery eyes glaring out at me like hot coals from a grate in a dark room. Never in all my life did I see such fierce red sparklers, but I never was a man to be daunted at anything, not I, so I gripped my boat-hook firmly in both hands and walked towards it. I wasn’t given to fancy things, and I had never seen any imps of Satan, or Satan himself, and never wished to see them, so I thought this might be a dog or a cat, maybe, troubled with sore eyes, which made them look red. On I marched, therefore, as steady as a judge or a grenadier on parade, when, just as I got near the door, a dark shaggy form rose up right before me, the eyes glowing redder and hotter than ever. It grew, and it grew, and grew, every moment getting taller and bigger, till it reached right up to the top of the house. I kept looking at it, thinking when it would have done growing; but as for running away, even if I had had any fancy for running, I knew that it would have come after me and would overhaul and gobble me up, in a quarter less no time, so I stood where I was, considering what would happen next. At last, thinks I to myself, you are not going to look at me in that way whatever you are; so, shutting my eyes, for I couldn’t for the life of me bear its glare any longer, I made a desperate dash at it with my boat-hook. You should have heard the hullabaloo there was, and I found the boat-hook dragged right out of my hands. I opened my eyes just in time to see the monster, big as he was, bolt right through the door, carrying my boat-hook with him. I rushed after him to try and get it back, for it was a new ash one I had bought but a few days before, and I did not want to lose it, but I only knocked my head a hard rap against the door, and though I looked about everywhere I never could find it from that day to this; and that, mates, mind you, is the circumstantial and voracious way Jerry Vincent lost his boat-hook.” And the old man gave one of his comical and expressive winks, and a pull at the glass of swisell which my uncle had placed by his side.
“Don’t you all acknowledge that that story was well worth half-a-crown to a Lonnoner, seeing as how it was quite new, and he could never have heard it afore? Of course you’ll all agree with me, now, to my mind, those Lonnoners are generally such know-nothing sort of chaps, though they think themselves so wise that they never will believe what you tell ’em. They are just like the old lady whose nevy had just come from sea. When he told her that he’d seen flying-fish scores of times, she said he was trying to hoax her, and wouldn’t listen to him, but when he said he’d been up the Red Sea, and that the water there was the colour of a soldier’s coat, she said that she had no doubt about that, and that she was glad to listen to him when he spoke the truth. But,” continued Jerry, who had now got into his talkative vein, “what I have been telling you is as nothing to what happened to me soon after then. I had been ill for some time, and could not tell what was the matter with me, when I happened one day to go to Portsdown fair. I thought the walk would do me good, and I wanted to see some of the fun going on. Well, after I had been to see the beasts and the raree shows, and the tumblers, and theatres, and conjurers, and taken a turn in a roundabout, on a wooden horse, which I found more easy to ride than a real one, because, do ye see, the wooden one never kicks, while, to speak the truth, whenever I’ve got on a regular-built animal, he to a certainty has shied up his stern and sent me over his bows, sometimes right into a hedge, or a ditch, or a pond, or through a window, into a shop, or parlour, I happened to catch sight of a man standing at the end of an outlandish sort of a cart or a van, painted all over with red and yellow, and blue and gold, with a sort of a Chinaman’s temple at one end of it.