Fables | Page 4

get into soundings for once. What is this good? I made a mutiny, and I been a gentleman o' fortune; well, but by all stories, you ain't no such saint. I'm a man that keeps company very easy; even by your own account, you ain't, and to my certain knowledge you're a devil to haze. Which is which? Which is good, and which bad? Ah, you tell me that! Here we are in stays, and you may lay to it!"
"We're none of us perfect," replied the Captain. "That's a fact of religion, my man. All I can say is, I try to do my duty; and if you try to do yours, I can't compliment you on your success."
"And so you was the judge, was you?" said Silver, derisively.
"I would be both judge and hangman for you, my man, and never turn a hair," returned the Captain. "But I get beyond that: it mayn't be sound theology, but it's common sense, that what is good is useful too - or there and thereabout, for I don't set up to be a thinker. Now, where would a story go to if there were no virtuous characters?"
"If you go to that," replied Silver, "where would a story begin, if there wasn't no villains?"
"Well, that's pretty much my thought," said Captain Smollett. "The Author has to get a story; that's what he wants; and to get a story, and to have a man like the doctor (say) given a proper chance, he has to put in men like you and Hands. But he's on the right side; and you mind your eye ! You're not through this story yet; there's trouble coming for you."
"What'll you bet?" asked John.
"Much I care if there ain't," returned the Captain. "I'm glad enough to be Alexander Smollett, bad as he is; and I thank my stars upon my knees that I'm not Silver. But there's the ink-bottle opening. To quarters!"
And indeed the Author was just then beginning to write the words:

CHAPTER XXXIII
.

II. - THE SINKING SHIP.
"SIR," said the first lieutenant, bursting into the Captain's cabin, "the ship is going down."
"Very well, Mr. Spoker," said the Captain; "but that is no reason for going about half-shaved. Exercise your mind a moment, Mr. Spoker, and you will see that to the philosophic eye there is nothing new in our position: the ship (if she is to go down at all) may be said to have been going down since she was launched."
"She is settling fast," said the first lieutenant, as he returned from shaving.
"Fast, Mr. Spoker?" asked the Captain. "The expression is a strange one, for time (if you will think of it) is only relative."
"Sir," said the lieutenant, "I think it is scarcely worth while to embark in such a discussion when we shall all be in Davy Jones's Locker in ten minutes."
"By parity of reasoning," returned the Captain gently, "it would never be worth while to begin any inquiry of importance; the odds are always overwhelming that we must die before we shall have brought it to an end. You have not considered, Mr. Spoker, the situation of man," said the Captain, smiling, and shaking his head.
"I am much more engaged in considering the position of the ship," said Mr. Spoker.
"Spoken like a good officer," replied the Captain, laying his hand on the lieutenant's shoulder.
On deck they found the men had broken into the spirit-room, and were fast getting drunk.
"My men," said the Captain, "there is no sense in this. The ship is going down, you will tell me, in ten minutes: well, and what then? To the philosophic eye, there is nothing new in our position. All our lives long, we may have been about to break a blood-vessel or to be struck by lightning, not merely in ten minutes, but in ten seconds; and that has not prevented us from eating dinner, no, nor from putting money in the Savings Bank. I assure you, with my hand on my heart, I fail to comprehend your attitude."
The men were already too far gone to pay much heed.
"This is a very painful sight, Mr. Spoker," said the Captain.
"And yet to the philosophic eye, or whatever it is," replied the first lieutenant, "they may be said to have been getting drunk since they came aboard."
"I do not know if you always follow my thought, Mr. Spoker," returned the Captain gently. "But let us proceed."
In the powder magazine they found an old salt smoking his pipe.
"Good God," cried the Captain, "what are you about?"
"Well, sir," said the old salt, apologetically, "they told me as she were going down."
"And suppose she were?" said the Captain. "To the philosophic eye, there would be nothing new in our position. Life, my old shipmate, life, at any moment and in any view, is