Snarleyyow | Page 3

pity, as the more you curtailed his proportions, the better looking the cur would have
been. But his ears, although not cut, were torn to ribbons by the various encounters with
dogs on shore, arising from the acidity of his temper. His tail had lost its hair from an
inveterate mange, and reminded you of the same appendage to a rat. Many parts of his
body were bared from the same disease. He carried his head and tail low, and had a
villanous sour look. To the eye of a casual observer, there was not one redeeming quality
that would warrant his keep; to those who knew him well, there were a thousand reasons
why he should be hanged. He followed his master with the greatest precision and
exactitude, walking aft as he walked aft, and walking forward with the same regular
motion, turning when his master turned, and moreover, turning in the same direction; and,
like his master, he appeared to be not a little nipped with the cold, and, as well as he, in a
state of profound meditation. The name of this uncouth animal was very appropriate to
his appearance, and to his temper. It was Snarleyyow.
At last, Mr Vanslyperken gave vent to his pent-up feelings. "I can't, I won't stand this any
longer," muttered the lieutenant, as he took his six strides forward. At this first sound of
his master's voice the dog pricked up the remnants of his ears, and they both turned aft.
"She has been now fooling me for six years;" and as he concluded this sentence, Mr
Vanslyperken and Snarleyyow had reached the taffrail, and the dog raised his tail to the
half cock.
They turned, and Mr Vanslyperken paused a moment or two, and compressed his thin
lips--the dog did the same. "I will have an answer, by all that's blue!" was the ejaculation
of the next six strides. The lieutenant stopped again, and the dog looked up in his master's
face; but it appeared as if the current of his master's thoughts was changed, for the current
of keen air reminded Mr Vanslyperken that he had not yet had his breakfast.
The lieutenant leant over the hatchway, took his battered speaking-trumpet from under
his arm, and putting it to his mouth, the deck reverberated with, "Pass the word for
Smallbones forward." The dog put himself in a baying attitude, with his forefeet on the
coamings of the hatchway, and enforced his master's orders with a deep-toned and
measured bow, wow, wow.
Smallbones soon made his appearance, rising from the hatchway like a ghost; a thin,
shambling personage, apparently about twenty years old--a pale, cadaverous face, high
cheek-bones, goggle eyes, with lank hair very thinly sown upon a head, which, like bad
soil, would return but a scanty harvest. He looked like Famine's eldest son just arriving to
years of discretion. His long lanky legs were pulled so far through his trousers, that his
bare feet, and half way up to his knees, were exposed to the chilling blast. The sleeves of
his jacket were so short, that four inches of bone above his wrist were bared to view--hat
he had none--his ears were very large, and the rims of them red with cold, and his neck
was so immeasurably long and thin, that his head appeared to topple for want of support.
When he had come on deck, he stood with one hand raised to his forehead, touching his
hair instead of his hat, and the other occupied with a half-roasted red-herring. "Yes, sir,"
said Smallbones, standing before his master.

"Be quick!"--commenced the lieutenant; but here his attention was directed to the
red-herring by Snarleyyow, who raised his head and snuffed at its fumes. Among other
disqualifications of the animal, be it observed, that he had no nose except for a
red-herring, or a post by the way side. Mr Vanslyperken discontinued his orders, took his
hand out of his great coat pocket, wiped the drop from off his nose, and then roared out,
"How dare you appear on the quarter-deck of a king's ship, sir, with a red-herring in your
fist?"
"If you please, sir," replied Smallbones, "if I were to come for to go to leave it in the
galley, I shouldn't find it when I went back."
"What do I care for that, sir? It's contrary to all the rules and regulations of the service.
Now, sir, hear me--"
"O Lord, sir! let me off this time, it's only a soldier," replied Smallbones, deprecatingly;
but Snarleyyow's appetite had been very much sharpened by his morning's walk; it rose
with the smell of the herring, so he rose on his hind legs, snapped the herring out of
Smallbones' hand, bolted forward by the lee gangway, and would soon