White Jacket | Page 5

his Sawney stare, like a
Scotchman in London; his--"_cry your merry, noble seignors!_" He is
wholly nonplussed, and confounded. And when, to crown all, the First
Lieutenant, whose business it is to welcome all new-corners, and assign
them their quarters: when this officer--none of the most bland or
amiable either--gives him number after number to
recollect--246--139--478--351--the poor fellow feels like decamping.
Study, then, your mathematics, and cultivate all your memories, oh ye!
who think of cruising in men-of-war.

CHAPTER IV
.
JACK CHASE.
The first night out of port was a clear, moonlight one; the frigate
gliding though the water, with all her batteries.
It was my Quarter Watch in the top; and there I reclined on the best
possible terms with my top-mates. Whatever the other seamen might
have been, these were a noble set of tars, and well worthy an
introduction to the reader. First and foremost was Jack Chase, our
noble First Captain of the Top. He was a Briton, and a true- blue; tall
and well-knit, with a clear open eye, a fine broad brow, and an
abounding nut-brown beard. No man ever had a better heart or a bolder.
He was loved by the seamen and admired by the officers; and even
when the Captain spoke to him, it was with a slight air of respect. Jack
was a frank and charming man.
No one could be better company in forecastle or saloon; no man told
such stories, sang such songs, or with greater alacrity sprang to his duty.
Indeed, there was only one thing wanting about him; and that was a
finger of his left hand, which finger he had lost at the great battle of
Navarino.
He had a high conceit of his profession as a seaman; and being deeply
versed in all things pertaining to a man-of-war, was universally
regarded as an oracle. The main-top, over which he presided, was a sort

of oracle of Delphi; to which many pilgrims ascended, to have their
perplexities or differences settled.
There was such an abounding air of good sense and good feeling about
the man, that he who could not love him, would thereby pronounce
himself a knave. I thanked my sweet stars, that kind fortune had placed
me near him, though under him, in the frigate; and from the outset Jack
and I were fast friends.
Wherever you may be now rolling over the blue billows, dear Jack!
take my best love along with you; and God bless you, wherever you go!
Jack was a gentleman. What though his hand was hard, so was not his
heart, too often the case with soft palms. His manners were easy and
free; none of the boisterousness, so common to tars; and he had a polite,
courteous way of saluting you, if it were only to borrow your knife.
Jack had read all the verses of Byron, and all the romances of Scott. He
talked of Rob Roy, Don Juan, and Pelham; Macbeth and Ulysses; but,
above all things, was an ardent admirer of Camoens. Parts of the Lusiad,
he could recite in the original. Where he had obtained his wonderful
accomplishments, it is not for me, his humble subordinate, to say.
Enough, that those accomplishments were so various; the languages he
could converse in, so numerous; that he more than furnished an
example of that saying of Charles the Fifth--_ he who speaks five
languages is as good as five men_. But Jack, he was better than a
hundred common mortals; Jack was a whole phalanx, an entire army;
Jack was a thousand strong; Jack would have done honour to the Queen
of England's drawing-room; Jack must have been a by-blow of some
British Admiral of the Blue. A finer specimen of the island race of
Englishmen could not have been picked out of Westminster Abbey of a
coronation day.
His whole demeanor was in strong contrast to that of one of the
Captains of the fore-top. This man, though a good seaman, furnished an
example of those insufferable Britons, who, while preferring other
countries to their own as places of residence; still, overflow with all the
pompousness of national and individual vanity combined. "When I was
on board the Audacious"-- for a long time, was almost the invariable
exordium to the fore- top Captain's most cursory remarks. It is often the
custom of men-of-war's-men, when they deem anything to be going on
wrong aboard ship to refer to last cruise when of course everything was

done _ship-shape and Bristol fashion_. And by referring to the
_Audacious_--an expressive name by the way--the fore-top Captain
meant a ship in the English navy, in which he had had the honour of
serving. So continual were his allusions to this craft with the amiable
name, that at last, the