Read The Ionian Mission for Free Online Page B

and inclination for a little music, would welcome his company in the cabin. Which he is a-tuning of his old fiddle this minute, sir.'

Chapter Two

    At a broad table on the Worcester's quarterdeck sat her first lieutenant, with the Captain's clerk, the surgeon, the purser, the bosun, and her other standing officers on either side of him. Over to starboard stood a vague heap of men, most of them poorly clothed, most of them looking lost and miserable, all of them smelling of soap, the receiving-ship having scrubbed them until they shone; but a few seemed quite at home, and when Mr Pullings called out 'Next' one of these stepped up to the table and touched his knuckles to his forehead and stood there swaying gently, a middle-aged man in loose trousers and a torn blue jacket with metal buttons, a bright red handkerchief round his neck. He looked horribly dissipated and he had certainly been fighting the night before; Pullings gazed at him with great satisfaction and said, 'Well, Phelps, are you come to add to our burden?'
       'That's right, sir,' said Phelps, and then very rapidly to the clerk, 'Ebenezer Phelps, born at Dock in sixty-nine, dwelling at Gorham's Rents, Dock, thirty-four years at sea, last ship Wheel 'em Along , sheet-anchor man.'
       'And before that Circe and Venerable ,' said Pullings. 'And a damned bad character from both. Rate him able. Phelps, you had better take a caulk below, before the Captain sees you. Next.'
       A powerful bosun's mate led up a pale knock-kneed man in breeches and part of what was once a coachman's greatcoat: his name was William Old.
       'What was your trade, Old?' asked Pullings kindly.
       'I don't like to boast,' said Old, gathering confidence, 'but I was a trifler.' There was a momentary hush; the clerk looked up from his book with a frown; the bosun's mate whispered 'Mind your luff, mate,' in a hoarse growl, and Old added, 'Not a sadware man, sir, nor a hollow-ware man, but a trifler, a journeyman trifler. But the whole pewter trade, sadware and all, is gone to the dogs, and—'
       'Have you ever been to sea?' asked Pullings.
       'I once went to Margate, sir.'
       'Rate him landman, if he passes the Doctor,' said Pullings. 'He may be some use as armourer's crew. Next.'
       'Oh sir,' cried the journeyman trifler, about to be led off by the bosun's mate, 'Oh sir, if you please: may I have my bounty now, your honour? My wife is waiting there on the quay, with the children.'
       'Explain to him about the ticket, Jobling,' said Pullings to the bosun's mate. 'Next.'
       Now it was the turn of the pressed men, several right seamen among them, some taken far out in the offing from homeward-bound merchant ships by Mowett in the barge, others captured ashore by the gang. The first of them, a man called Yeats, looked more like a prosperous gardener, which indeed he was, as he explained to the lieutenant: a nurseryman. He had half an acre under glass—his business going well—would be ruined if he were pressed—his wife did not understand the trade, and she was expecting. His extreme distress was evident; so was his sincerity.
       'What is that anchor doing on your hand?' asked Pullings, pointing to the mark, tattooed blue and red. 'You have been to sea: do not deny it.'
       Yes, he had been to sea when he was a boy, five months in Hermione , sick almost all the time, and when she was paid off here in Hamoaze he had walked inland as far as ever he could and had never come near the shore again until Thursday, when the press-gang took him as he was crossing the bridge to visit an important customer at Saltash. His business would be ruined if he did not go home.
       'Well, I am sorry for it, Yeats,' said Pullings. 'But the law is the law: any man that has used the sea may be pressed.' In cases like this some officers would make observations about the necessity for manning the fleet, about serving—preserving—the country, even about patriotism, for the general