Mr. Midshipman Easy

by Frederick Marryat

  CHAPTER TEN.

  SHOWING HOW JACK TRANSGRESSES AGAINST HIS OWN PHILOSOPHY.

  When Jack Easy had gained the deck, he found the sun shining gaily, asoft air blowing from the shore, and the whole of the rigging and everypart of the ship loaded with the shirts, trousers, and jackets of theseamen, which had been wetted during the heavy gale, and were nowhanging up to dry; all the wet sails were also spread on the booms ortriced up in the rigging, and the ship was slowly forging through theblue water. The captain and first lieutenant were standing on thegangway in converse, and the majority of the officers were with theirquadrants and sextants ascertaining the latitude at noon. The deckswere white and clean, the sweepers had just laid by their brooms, andthe men were busy coiling down the ropes. It was a scene ofcheerfulness, activity, and order, which lightened his heart after thefour days of suffering, close air, and confinement, from which he hadjust emerged.

  The captain, who perceived him, beckoned to him, asked him kindly how hefelt: the first lieutenant also smiled upon him, and many of theofficers, as well as his messmates, congratulated him upon his recovery.

  The captain's steward came up to him, touched his hat, and requested thepleasure of his company to dinner in the cabin. Jack was the essence ofpoliteness, took off his hat, and accepted the invitation. Jack wasstanding on a rope which a seaman was coiling down; the man touched hishat and requested he would be so kind as to take his foot off. Jacktook his hat off his head in return, and his foot off the rope. Themaster touched his hat, and reported twelve o'clock to the firstlieutenant--the first lieutenant touched his hat, and reported twelveo'clock to the captain--the captain touched his hat, and told the firstlieutenant to make it so. The officer of the watch touched his hat, andasked the captain whether they should pipe to dinner--the captaintouched his hat and said, "If you please."

  The midshipman received his orders, and touched his hat, which he gaveto the head boatswain's mate, who touched his hat, and then the callswhistled cheerily.

  "Well," thought Jack, "politeness seems to be the order of the day, andevery one has an equal respect for the other." Jack stayed on deck; hepeeped through the ports, which were open, and looked down into the deepblue wave; he cast his eyes aloft, and watched the tall spars sweepingand tracing with their points, as it were, a small portion of the clearsky, as they acted in obedience to the motion of the vessel; he lookedforward at the range of carronades which lined the sides of the deck,and then he proceeded to climb one of the carronades, and lean over thehammocks to gaze on the distant land.

  "Young gentleman, get off those hammocks," cried the master, who wasofficer of the watch, in a surly tone.

  Jack looked round.

  "Do you hear me, sir? I'm speaking to you," said the master again.

  Jack felt very indignant, and he thought that politeness was not quiteso general as he supposed.

  It happened that Captain Wilson was upon deck.

  "Come here, Mr Easy," said the captain; "it is a rule in the service,that no one gets on the hammocks, unless in case of emergency--I neverdo--nor the first lieutenant--nor any of the officers or men--therefore,upon the principle of equality, you must not do it either."

  "Cerainly not, sir," replied Jack, "but still I do not see why thatofficer in the shining hat should be so angry, and not speak to me as ifI were a gentleman, as well as himself."

  "I have already explained that to you, Mr Easy."

  "Oh, yes, I recollect now, it's zeal; but this zeal appears to me to bethe only unpleasant thing in the service. It's a pity, as you said,that the service cannot do without it."

  Captain Wilson laughed, and walked away; and shortly afterwards, as heturned up and down the deck with the master, he hinted to him that heshould not speak so sharply to a lad who had committed such a triflingerror through ignorance. Now Mr Smallsole, the master, who was a surlysort of a personage, and did not like even a hint of disapprobation ofhis conduct, although very regardless of the feeling of others,determined to pay this off on Jack, the very first convenientopportunity. Jack dined in the cabin, and was very much pleased to findthat every one drank wine with him, and that everybody at the captain'stable appeared to be on an equality. Before the dessert had been on thetable five minutes, Jack became loquacious on his favourite topic; allthe company stared with surprise at such an unheard-of doctrine beingbroached on board of a man-of-war; the captain argued the point, so asto controvert, without too much offending, Jack's notions, laughing thewhole time that the conversation was carried on.

  It will be observed, that this day may be considered as the first inwhich Jack really made his appearance on board, and it also was on thisfirst day that Jack made known, at the captain's table, his verypeculiar notions. If the company at the captain's table, whichconsisted of the second lieutenant, purser, Mr Jolliffe, and one of themidshipmen, were astonished at such heterodox opinions being started inthe presence of the captain, they were equally astonished at the cool,good-humoured ridicule with which they were received by Captain Wilson.The report of Jack's boldness, and every word and opinion that he haduttered (of course much magnified) was cirulated that evening throughthe whole ship; it was canvassed in the gun-room by the officers, it wasdescanted upon by the midshipmen as they walked the deck; the captain'ssteward held a levee abreast of the ship's funnel, in which he narratedthis new doctrine. The sergeant of marines gave his opinion in hisberth that it was damnable. The boatswain talked over the matter withthe other warrant officers, till the grog was all gone, and thendismissed it as too dry a subject: and it was the general opinion of theship's company, that as soon as they arrived at Gibraltar Bay, our herowould bid adieu to the service, either by being sentenced to death by acourt-martial, or by being dismissed, and towed on shore on a grating.Others, who had more of the wisdom of the serpent, and who had beeninformed by Mr Sawbridge that our hero was a lad who would inherit alarge property, argued differently, and considered that Captain Wilsonhad very good reason for being so lenient--and among them was the secondlieutenant. There were but four who were well inclined towards Jack--towit, the captain, the first lieutenant, Mr Jolliffe, the one-eyedmaster's mate, and Mephistopheles, the black, who, having heard thatJack had uttered such sentiments, loved him with all his heart and soul.

  We have referred to the second lieutenant, Mr Asper. This young manhad a very high respect for birth, and particularly for money, of whichhe had very little. He was the son of an eminent merchant who, duringthe time that he was a midshipman, had allowed him a much larger sum forhis expenses than was necessary or proper; and, during his career, hefound that his full pocket procured him consequence, not only among hisown messmates, but also with many of the officers of the ships that hesailed in. A man who is able and willing to pay a large tavern billwill always find followers--that is, to the tavern; and lieutenants didnot disdain to dine, walk arm in arm, and be "hail fellow well met" witha midshipman, at whose expense they lived during the time they were onshore. Mr Asper had just received his commission and appointment, whenhis father became a bankrupt, and the fountain was dried up from whichhe had drawn such liberal supplies. Since that, Mr Asper had felt thathis consequence was gone: he could no longer talk about the servicebeing a bore, or that he should give it up; he could no longer obtainthat deference paid to his purse, and not to himself; and he hadcontracted very expensive habits, without having any longer the means ofgratifying them. It was therefore no wonder that he imbibed a greatrespect for money; and, as he could no longer find the means himself, hewas glad to pick up anybody else at whose cost he could indulge in thatextravagance and expense to which he had been so long accustomed, andstill sighed for. Now, Mr Asper knew that our hero was well suppliedwith money, as he had obtained from the waiter the amount of the billpaid at the Fountain, and he had been waiting for Jack's appearance ondeck to become his very dearest and most intimate friend. Theconversation in the cabin made him feel assured that Jack would requireand be grateful for support, and he had take
n the opportunity of a walkwith Mr Sawbridge, to offer to take Jack in his watch. Whether it wasthat Mr Sawbridge saw through the design of Mr Asper, or whether heimagined that our hero would be better pleased with him than with themaster, considering his harshness of deportment; or with himself, whocould not, as first lieutenant, overlook any remission of duty, theoffer was accepted, and Jack Easy was ordered, as he now entered uponhis duties, to keep watch under Lieutenant Asper.

  But not only was this the first day that Jack may be said to haveappeared in the service, but it was the first day in which he hadentered the midshipman's berth, and was made acquainted with hismessmates.

  We have already mentioned Mr Jolliffe, the master's mate, but we mustintroduce him more particularly. Nature is sometimes extremelyarbitrary, and never did she show herself more so than in insisting thatMr Jolliffe should have the most sinister expression of countenancethat ever had been looked upon.

  He had suffered martyrdom with the small-pox, which probably hadcontracted his lineaments: his face was not only deeply pitted, butscarred, with this cruel disorder. One eye had been lost, and alleyebrows had disappeared--and the contrast between the dull, sightlessopaque orb on one side of his face, and the brilliant, piercing littleball on the other, was almost terrifying. His nose had been eaten awayby the disease till it formed a sharp but irregular point: part of themuscles of the chin were contracted, and it was drawn in with unnaturalseams and puckers. He was tall, gaunt, and thin, seldom smiled, andwhen he did, the smile produced a still further distortion.

  Mr Jolliffe was the son of a warrant officer. He did not contract thisdisease until he had been sent out to the West Indies, where it sweptaway hundreds. He had now been long in the service, with little or nochance of promotion. He had suffered from indigence, from reflectionsupon his humble birth, from sarcasms on his appearance. Every contumelyhad been heaped upon him at one time or another, in the ships in whichhe served; among a crowd he had found himself desolate--and now,although no one dared treat him to his face with disrespect, he was onlyrespected in the service from a knowledge of his utility and exemplaryperformance of his duties--he had no friends or even companions. Formany years he had retired within himself, he had improved by reading andstudy, had felt all the philanthropy of a Christian, and extended ittowards others. Silent and reserved, he seldom spoke in the berth,unless his authority, as caterer, was called for; all respected MrJolliffe, but no one liked, as a companion, one at whose appearance thevery dogs would bark. At the same time every one acknowledged hiscorrect behaviour in every point, his sense of justice, his forbearance,his kindness, and his good sense. With him life was indeed apilgrimage, and he wended his way in all Christian charity and allChristian zeal.

  In all societies, however small they may be, provided that they do butamount to half a dozen, you will invariably meet with a bully. And itis also generally the case that you will find one of that society who ismore or less the butt. You will discover this even in occasionalmeetings, such as a dinner-party, the major part of which have never metbefore.

  Previous to the removal of the cloth, the bully will have shown himselfby his dictatorial manner, and will also have selected the one upon whomhe imagines that he can best practise. In a midshipman's berth thisfact has become almost proverbial, although now perhaps it is notattended with that disagreeable despotism which was permitted at thetime that our hero entered the service.

  The bully of the midshipman's berth of H.M. sloop _Harpy_ was a youngman about seventeen, with light, curly hair, and florid countenance, theson of the clerk in the dockyard at Plymouth, and his name was Vigors.

  The butt was a pudding-face Tartar-physiognomied boy of fifteen, whoseintellects, with fostering, if not great, might at least have beenrespectable, had he not lost all confidence in his own powers from theconstant jeers and mockeries of those who had a greater fluency ofspeech without perhaps so much real power of mind. Although slow, whathe learned he invariably retained. This lad's name was Gossett. Hisfather was a wealthy yeoman of Lynn, in Norfolk. There were at the timebut three other midshipmen in the ship, of whom it can only be said thatthey were like midshipmen in general, with little appetite for learning,but good appetites for dinner, hating everything like work, fond ofeverything like fun, fighting _a l'outrance_ one minute, and swornfriends the next--with general principles of honour and justice, butwhich were occasionally warped according to circumstances; with all thevirtues and vices so heterogeneously jumbled and heaped together, thatit was almost impossible to ascribe any action to its true motive, andto ascertain to what point their vice was softened down into almost avirtue, and their virtues from mere excess degenerated into vice. Theirnames were O'Connor, Mills, and Gascoigne. The other shipmates of ourhero it will be better to introduce as they appear on the stage.

  After Jack had dined in the cabin he followed his messmates Jolliffe andGascoigne down into the midshipmen's berth.

  "I say, Easy," observed Gascoigne, "you are a devilish free and easysort of a fellow, to tell the captain that you considered yourself asgreat a man as he was."

  "I beg your pardon," replied Jack, "I did not argue individually, butgenerally, upon the principles of the rights of man."

  "Well," replied Gascoigne, "it's the first time I ever heard a middy dosuch a bold thing; take care your rights of man don't get you in thewrong box--there's no arguing on board of a man-of-war. The captaintook it amazingly easy, but you'd better not broach that subject toooften."

  "Gascoigne gives you very good advice, Mr Easy," observed Jolliffe;"allowing that your ideas are correct, which it appears to me they arenot, or at least impossible to be acted upon, there is such a thing asprudence, and however much this question may be canvassed on shore, inhis Majesty's service it is not only dangerous in itself, but will bevery prejudicial to you."

  "Man is a free agent," replied Easy.

  "I'll be shot if a midshipman is," replied Gascoigne, laughing, "andthat you'll soon find."

  "And yet it was the expectation of finding that equality that I wasinduced to come to sea."

  "On the first of April, I presume," replied Gascoigne. "But are youreally serious?"

  Hereupon Jack entered into a long argument, to which Jolliffe andGascoigne listened without interruption, and Mesty with admiration: atthe end of it, Gascoigne laughed heartily and Jolliffe sighed.

  "From whence did you learn all this?" inquired Jolliffe.

  "From my father, who is a great philosopher, and has constantly upheldthese opinions."

  "And did your father wish you to go to sea?"

  "No, he was opposed to it," replied Jack, "but of course he could notcombat my rights and free-will."

  "Mr Easy, as a friend," replied Jolliffe, "I request that you would asmuch as possible keep your opinions to yourself: I shall have anopportunity of talking to you on the subject, and will then explain toyou my reasons."

  As soon as Mr Jolliffe had ceased, down came Mr Vigors and O'Connor,who had heard the news of Jack's heresy.

  "You do not know Mr Vigors and Mr O'Connor," said Jolliffe to Easy.

  Jack, who was the essence of politeness, rose and bowed, at which theothers took their seats, without returning the salutation. Vigors had,from what he had heard and now seen of Easy, thought he had somebodyelse to play upon, and without ceremony he commenced.

  "So, my chap, you are come on board to raise a mutiny here with yourequality--you came off scot free at the captain's table; but it won'tdo, I can tell you, even in the midshipman's berth some must knockunder, and you are one of them."

  "If, sir," replied Easy, "you mean by knock under, that I must submit, Ican assure you that you are mistaken. Upon the same principle that Iwould never play the tyrant to those weaker than myself, so will Iresent oppression if attempted."

  "Damme, but he's a regular sea lawyer already: however, my boy, we'llsoon put your mettle to the proof."

  "Am I then to infer that I am not on an equality with my messmates?"replied
Jack, looking at Jolliffe. The latter was about to answer him,but Vigors interrupted.

  "Yes, you are on an equality as far as this--that you have an equalright to the berth, if you are not knocked out of it for insolence toyour masters; that you have an equal share to pay for the thingspurchased for the mess, and an equal right to have your share, providedyou can get it; you have an equal right to talk, provided you are nottold to hold your tongue. The fact is, you have an equal right withevery one else to do as you can, get what you can, and say what you can,always provided that you can do it; for here the weakest goes to thewall, and that is midshipmen's berth equality. Now, do you understandall that; or will you wait for a practical illustration?"

  "I am then to infer that the equality here is as much destroyed as iteven will be among savages, where the strong oppress the weak, and theonly law is club law--in fact, much the same as it is at a public orlarge school on shore?"

  "I suspect you are right for once. You were at a public school: how didthey treat you there?"

  "As you propose treating people here--`the weakest went to the wall.'"

  "Well, then, a nod's as good as a wink to a blind horse, that's all, myhearty," said Vigors.

  But the hands being turned up, "Shorten sail" put an end to thealtercation for the present.

  As our hero had not yet received orders to go to his duty, he remainedbelow with Mesty.

  "By de powers, Massa Easy, but I lub you with my hole soul," said Mesty."By Jasus, you really tark fine, Massa Easy; dat Mr Vigor--nebber carefor him, wouldn't you lik him--and sure you would," continued the black,feeling the muscle of Jack's arm. "By the soul of my fader, I'd bet myweek's allowance on you anyhow. Nebber be 'fraid, Massa Easy."

  "I am not afraid," replied Jack; "I've thrashed bigger fellows than he;"and Jack's assertion was true. Mr Bonnycastle never interfered in afair fight, and took no notice of black eyes, provided the lessons werewell said. Jack had fought and fought again, until he was a very goodbruiser, and although not so tall as Vigors, he was much better builtfor fighting. A knowing Westminster boy would have bet his half-crownupon Jack, had he seen him and his anticipated adversary.

  The constant battles which Jack was obliged to fight at school had beenbrought forward by Jack against his father's arguments in favour ofequality, but they had been overruled by Mr Easy's pointing out thatthe combats of _boys_ had nothing to do with the rights of man.

  As soon as the watch was called, Vigors, O'Connor, Gossett, andGascoigne, came down from the berth. Vigors, who was strongest in theberth, except Jolliffe, had successively had his superiorityacknowledged, and, when on deck, he had talked of Easy's impertinence,and his intention of bringing him to his senses. The others, therefore,came down to see the fun.

  "Well, Mr Easy," observed Vigors, as he came into the berth, "you takeafter your name, at all events; I suppose you intend to eat the king'sprovision, and do nothing."

  Jack's mettle was already up.

  "You will oblige me, sir, by minding your own business," replied Jack.

  "You impudent blackguard, if you say another word I'll give you a goodthrashing, and knock some of your equality out of you."

  "Indeed," replied Jack, who almost fancied himself back at MrBonnycastle's; "we'll try that."

  Whereupon Jack very coolly divested himself of his upper garments,neckerchief, and shirt, much to the surprise of Mr Vigors, who littlecontemplated such a proof of decision and confidence, and still more tothe delight of the other midshipmen, who would have forfeited a week'sallowance to see Vigors well thrashed. Vigors, however, knew that hehad gone too far to retreat; he therefore prepared for action; and, whenready, the whole party went out into the steerage to settle thebusiness.

  Vigors had gained his assumed authority more by bullying than fighting;others had submitted to him without a sufficient trial; Jack, on thecontrary, had won his way up in school by hard and scientific combat:the result, therefore, may easily be imagined. In less than a quarterof an hour Vigors, beaten dead, with his eyes closed, and three teethout, gave in; while Jack, after a basin of water, looked as fresh asever, with the exception of a few trifling scratches.

  The news of this victory was soon through the ship; and before Jack hadresumed his clothes, it had been told confidentially by Sawbridge to thecaptain.

  "So soon!" said Captain Wilson, laughing; "I expected that amidshipman's berth would do wonders; but I did not expect this, yetawhile. This victory is the first severe blow to Mr Easy's equality,and will be more valuable than twenty defeats. Let him now go to hisduty: he will soon find his level."