Jack in the Forecastle | Page 7

was no tedious ceremony or fastidious refinement witnessed on these occasions. At twelve o'clock the orders were promptly given, "Call the watch! Hold the reel! Pump ship! Get your dinners!" With never-failing alacrity the watch was called, the log thrown, and the ship pumped. When these duties were performed, a bustle was seen about the camboose, or large cooking stove, in which the meals were prepared. In pleasant weather it was usual for the sailors to take their meals on deck; but no table was arranged, no table-cloth was spread, no knives and forks or spoons were provided, no plates of any description were furnished, or glass tumblers or earthen mugs. The preliminary arrangements were of the simplest description.
The signal being given, the cook hastily transferred from his boilers whatever food he had prepared, into a wooden vessel, called a kid, resembling in size and appearance a peck measure. The kid with its contents was deposited on the spot selected; a bag or box, containing ship's biscuits was then produced, dinner was ready, and all hands, nothing loth, gathered around the kid and commenced operations.
The usual fare was salt beef and bread, varied at stated times or according to circumstances; and this has probably for centuries been the standing dish for the forecastle in English and American ships. On this passage, the Sunday dinner varied from the usual routine by the addition of fresh meat. Every Sabbath morning a sheep, the finest and fattest of the flock, was missing from the pens. Portions of the animal, however, would appear a few hours afterwards in the shape of a luscious sea-pie for the sailors, and in various inviting shapes during the following week to the inmates of the cabin. This loss of property was recorded by Mr. Thompson in the ship's log-book, with his accustomed accuracy, and with Spartan brevity. The language he invariably used was, "A sheep died this day."
Among the crew of the Dolphin were two weather-beaten tars, who were as careless of their costumes as of their characters. They recked little how ridiculously they looked, excepting in one respect. They could each boast of a magnificent head of hair, which they allowed to grow to a great length on the back of the head, where it was collected and fashioned into enormous queues, which, when permitted to hang down, reached to the small of their backs, and gave them the appearance of Chinese mandarins, or Turkish pachas of a single tail. These tails were their pets the only ornaments about their persons for which they manifested any interest. This pride in their queues was the weak point in their characters. Every Sunday they performed on each other the operation of manipulating the pendulous ornaments, straightening them out like magnified marlinspikes, and binding them with ribbons or rope-yarns, tastily fastened at the extremity by a double bow knot.
Queues, in those days, were worn on the land as well as on the sea, and were as highly prized by the owners. On the land, they were harmless enough, perhaps, and seldom ungratefully interfered with the comfort of their benefactors or lured them into scrapes. On shipboard the case was different, and they sometimes proved not only superfluous but troublesome.
On our homeward passage a case occurred which illustrated the absurdity of wearing a queue at sea a fashion which has been obsolete for many years. A gale of wind occurred on the coast, and the crew were ordered aloft to reef the fore-topsail. Jim Bilton, with his queue snugly clubbed and tucked away beneath his pea-jacket, was first on the yard, and passed the weather ear- ring; but, unfortunately, the standing rigging had recently been tarred, and his queue, escaping from bondage, was blown about, the sport of the wind, and after flapping against the yard, took a "round turn" over the lift, and stuck fast. Jim was in an awkward position. He could not immediately disengage his queue, and he could not willingly or conveniently leave it aloft. All hands but himself were promptly on deck, and ready to sway up the yard. The mate shouted to him in the full strength of his lungs to "Bear a hand and lay in off the yard," and unjustly berated him as a "lubber," while the poor fellow was tugging away, and working with might and main, to disengage his tail from the lift, in which he at length succeeded, but not without the aid of his jackknife.
I was greatly troubled during this passage by the impure character of the water. I had been taught to place a high value on water as a beverage; but when we had been three weeks at sea, and had entered the warm latitudes, on knocking a bung from one of the water casks on the