Gil the Gunner | Page 7

of about fifty unhappy, thin-looking men in white flannel jackets,
sitting about or leaning over the bulwarks, smoking and watching the
dock quay where stood a group of slatternly-looking women, staring
wearily at the ship; and now and then one of them would wave a hand
or a handkerchief to the men in white flannel, a salute as often as not
evoking no response, though sometimes a man would take off his ugly
blue woollen forage-cap by the red worsted tuft at the top, give it a
twist, and put it on again.
"This cannot be the detachment," I thought, and then, thinking that the
best way to know was to ask, I said to the nearest man--
"Would you mind telling me whether you belong to Captain Brace's
detachment?"
"What?"
A surly, half-insolent question in reply to mine, which I repeated.
"I dunno nothing about no 'tachments," he growled.
"Well, are you in the service, and going out to India?" I said.
"I've took the shilling, and I'm going out to cholera borgus, if that's
what you mean. Don't bother!"

"You'll get yourself in for it directly, mate," growled another of the
men. "Can't you see the gent's a horficer?"
I felt better at this, but I was damped down directly, for my man I had
spoken to growled out--
"Horficer? Well, all I can say is as he don't look it."
As the man turned away to rest his arms on the bulwark and refill his
pipe, the second man saluted me.
"Yes, it's all right, sir. We're just down from Warley barracks, and we
are going out as part of Captain Brace's draft."
I saluted and walked away, feeling in no wise proud of the men who
would be partly under my charge. Physically, they were well-made
fellows enough, but there was neither romance nor sentiment about
them, and in the midst of all the bustle and confusion on board, with the
decks literally swarming, I began to feel horribly lonely and depressed,
and a sensation of home-sickness was coming on fast, till I told myself
it was all nonsense, the home for which I was sickening was only the
kind of school which for many months past I had been longing to leave,
and that I should in all probability soon meet father, mother, and sister,
as well as begin my career as a man.
Just then my attention was taken up by an angry encounter. Three men
were brought on board, almost dragged, and thrown down, and it did
not need a second thought to grasp the fact that they were sailors who
had been spending their advance-money at one of the public-houses
which swarmed about the docks.
All at once one of them, as he lay upon the deck, began to sing, and this
brought out a smart-looking officer in uniform.
"Here, get these pigs below," he cried angrily; and half a dozen of the
sailors crossed to one side, returned with a coil of rope, fastened it
round the waist of one of the last-comers, and then seizing him, trotted
forward, dragging him along the deck to an open hatchway, where he

was unceremoniously lowered down; one sailor followed to unfasten
the rope, which was hauled up, and the other men were hauled to the
hatchway and lowered in turn.
"That's the way to serve them," said the officer to me sharply. "Some
time before they get drunk again."
He nodded shortly and went aft, while, feeling disgusted with the rough
scene, I made my way aft too, and came upon quite a crowd of people,
evidently friends of the passengers, bidding good-bye, many of them
with tears.
"This is cheerful," I thought, and then by an absurd change of feeling, I
was hurt because there was no one to bid good-bye to me.
"Confound it all, sir, do get out of the way, please!" said another officer
sharply.
I gave him a resentful look, and backed out of his way into somebody
else's, sending a man who was carrying part of a passenger's luggage
staggering, so that he caught the corner of a trunk sharply against an
officer's shoulder, with anything but a pleasant result for the burdened
man, who recovered himself, and hurried to the cabin stairs, while, after
apologising to the officer, I followed the man, meaning to go up on the
poop deck.
But the staircase was full of people, and I dived under to go below and
find my cabin, which I now resentfully remembered was not mine.
"Never mind, I'll go and sit down till dinnertime," I thought. "I suppose
there will be some dinner some time."
I went along by the row of cabin doors, and found that I was on the port
instead of the starboard side;