CHAPTER VI.

JACK TAKES A LESSON IN DISCIPLINE.

On the following day, Spriggs was released from confinement; having served out his twenty-four hours upon bread and water. He was ordered to resume his duties as cook of the mess. He looked at Jack with an evil eye: but, as our hero was under the powerful protection of three old men-of-war’s men, he behaved tolerably well; and Jack, willing to forgive him, treated him as handsomely as though nothing had happened to disturb their friendly relations.

“Just keep an eye to windward, my lad,” said Blinks after supper. “Spriggs looks as though he meant mischief.”

“Thank you, I will,” replied Jack; “though I am willing to let by-gones go for nothing.”

“Spriggs isn’t: so just keep your weather-eye wide open.”

“Do you think he will attempt to whip me?”

“Not he; he has got enough of that: but he’ll upset a pot of hot tea in your lap, or do some dirty trick of that sort.”

“I’ll look out for him.”

“Just keep right up stiff into the wind, and we’ll see you through if he attempts to fool you.”

Jack paid no apparent attention to Spriggs, though he kept a close watch upon all his movements. When the hammocks were piped down at night, he observed that his enemy kept a sharp eye upon him, and he had no doubt he intended mischief. He mentioned his suspicions to Blinks, whose hammock was slung next to his own.

“All right: he’s got your bearings, and he means to cut you down.”

“I don’t see that I can help myself, unless I keep awake all night.”

“Yes, you can: we’ll rig a dummy for you.”

Blinks explained his plan; and, with the assistance of his other friends, they deposited four twenty-four-pound shot in Jack’s hammock. Another shot was slung over the hook, in such a manner that the ropeyarn which held it in position would be severed when the revengeful villain cut the lanyard of the hammock. Bob Rushington then stowed himself away under the lee of the mainmast, and Jack occupied his hammock. All these preparations had been very carefully conducted, so as to avoid the keen scrutiny of the master-at-arms and the ship’s corporals, who form the active police of a man-of-war; but it is more than probable that one of the latter officers knew all about the proceedings, and was quite willing that Spriggs should be “sarved out” in his own coin.

The conspirators kept themselves wide awake, though they were careful to avoid an open breach of discipline. The lights were all put out, so that nothing could be seen; and silence reigned upon the decks of the Ohio, on which were berthed not less than a thousand men. Jack was nervous and expectant. Four bells--ten o’clock--struck; and he began to be very sleepy, and impatient for the trap to be sprung. At five bells, he began to think that he had mistaken the purpose of his malignant enemy; and he was just going to sleep, when down thundered the cannon-balls upon the deck, rolling off into the scuppers with a noise like the mutterings of a distant tempest. At the same time, a heavy groan saluted the ears of the aroused sleepers, as well as of the ingenious conspirators who had plotted and executed the mischief.

“What’s the row?” demanded Blinks, as innocently as though he had just awakened from the slumber of innocence itself. “Who’s hurt?”

“Oh, my foot!” groaned the sufferer, who appeared to be unable to retreat from his position.

“What’s the matter with your foot?” asked Rushington, who had come forward from the mainmast to ascertain the issue of the plot.

“It’s smashed to a jelly!” groaned Spriggs, whose tones were readily recognized by the occupants of the hammocks in the vicinity.

“How did you do it? Did you roll out of your hammock? I heard an awful fall of something out here just now,” added Rushington, whose voice seemed to melt with sympathy for the afflicted cook of the mess.

Spriggs made no reply to these direct questions; for we doubt not his conscience was as sore as his foot. One of the ship’s corporals on duty upon the berth-deck presently appeared, and demanded the cause of the disturbance.

“Spriggs has tumbled out of his hammock,” replied Rushington. “The ship gave a lee-lurch, and pitched him out.”

“Oh, my foot!” groaned Spriggs.

“I don’t exactly see how you could smash your foot tumbling out of a hammock,” added the ship’s corporal. “There aren’t a very heavy sea runnin’ just here alongside the wharf, nuther.”

“I didn’t fall out of the hammock,” said Spriggs in savage tones.

“Didn’t you? Then maybe you can tell how it happened.”

“I don’t know what it was: somebody dropped a shot on my foot.”

“What were you doing here?” demanded the officer of police.

Spriggs declined to answer this question; and the unpitying official, for some reason or other, did not press the question, but ordered the sufferer to come with him to the hospital, and have the injured member examined.

“I can’t walk,” sighed Spriggs, as he attempted to rise. “My foot is smashed to a jelly, I tell you!”

“If that’s so, Spriggs, I reckon you’d better stick to your hammock another time, and not go skylarking about decks at this hour of the night,” added Rushington, whose advice was certainly good and well meant. “If you can’t walk, we will carry you to the sick-bay.”

The ship’s corporal and the seamen picked up the discomfited conspirator, and bore him to the hospital. As soon as they had disappeared, Blinks carefully concealed the ropeyarn by which the cannon-ball had been suspended; and, having repaired as well as he could the damage to Jack’s hammock, they all turned in, and slept without further disturbance.

Spriggs was confined to the sick-bay for a week; and it was a month before he could walk without limping. On his return to the mess, he seemed to be satisfied, and treated his companions with proper respect and consideration. When he came back, Jack was taking his turn as cook of the mess; a position in which each man in succession serves for one week. He felt that his predecessor in office had been amply “sarved out;” and, though he did not like the man, he wished to be at peace with him. He treated him respectfully and kindly, and used every means in his power to conciliate him. His efforts were not in vain; for, before our hero left the receiving-ship, Spriggs had forgiven, and perhaps forgotten, the past: at any rate, they were on as good terms as two persons not mutually respecting each other could be.

Jack had not seen Mr. Bankhead since they had parted on the deck of the Ohio; for the latter had gone to Philadelphia, where his ship was fitting out: but our sailor-boy had written to him in regard to his future prospects, and, in his letter, had taken occasion to mention his three friends who had desired him to intercede for them. He had received a favorable reply, and for several weeks had been impatiently waiting to be summoned to a more active field of labor.

At the time of which we write, there was a deficiency of seamen at the navy-yards of Philadelphia and Washington, and drafts were occasionally made on those at Charlestown and Portsmouth. After Jack and his friends had waited till their patience was nearly exhausted, they were delighted to hear that Lieutenant Bankhead, first-lieutenant and executive officer of the United States steam sloop-of-war Harrisburg, was upon the spar-deck, and would immediately draft a number of seamen for his ship.

“Now, my breezy little reefer, your time has come,” said Tom Longstone, as the word was passed along among the men: “Mr. Bankhead is on deck.”

“I will run up and see him,” replied Jack hastily, as he started to execute his purpose.

“Avast, there, avast! Belay everything!” exclaimed Tom, as he grasped his _protégé_ by the arm, and detained him.

“What’s the matter, Tom!” demanded Jack, rather surprised at the conduct of his friend.

“Don’t be in a hurry: just moor your hulk alongside of Old Tom on this mess-chest, my sentimental little skipper, and let us overhaul this matter a little.”

“But Mr. Bankhead is on deck, Tom; and I want to see him.”

“All right, Jack: so he is. If he wasn’t, I wouldn’t say a word. Mr. Bankhead is first-lieutenant and executive officer of the sloop-of-war Harrisburg. Now, my lively little pap-consumer, what are you?”

“What am I? What am I? Why, I’m an ordinary seaman in the navy, and hope soon to be drafted into the Harrisburg.”

“Precisely so; but you don’t know no more nor a marine. Are you goin’ for to go for to throw yourself into the arms of Mr. Bankhead, just as though he was your fust cousin, and you’d been off on a long v’y’ge?”

“He will be very glad to take me by the hand,” said Jack, rather mystified at this representation of his own insignificance.

“Jack, don’t you stick your flipper out to Mr. Bankhead any more’n you’d put your leg into the maw of a ground shark,” continued Tom earnestly.

“Why not?” demanded Jack, who thought Tom’s suspicions were an insult to his friend, and a reflection upon his sincerity.

“Why, you little monkey, you are as green as a horse-mackerel! You don’t know no more nor a land-lubber!”

“Mr. Bankhead has seen the time when he was glad to obey my orders,” replied Jack smartly.

“Ha, ha, ha!” laughed Tom, taking off his cap, and pitching it down upon the mess-table; while Blinks and Rushington roared till their sides ached at the self-sufficiency of the young sailor.

“Well, you may laugh as much as you please; but says he, ‘Jack, you are skipper, and I will obey your orders. What shall I do?’ says he. ‘Knot these reef-points in the foresail,’ says I; and he did it.”

“All that may be, my noisy little boatman; but things is changed since you and Mr. Bankhead went on your last cruise. I s’pose you think he’ll take you into the cabin, rig you out in long togs, and mess you with the wardroom officers.”

“I don’t expect anything of that sort, Tom: I don’t want him to do anything of that kind. I am willing to do my duty like any other fellow on board.”

“So much the better, my darling; for Mr. Bankhead is too sensible a man for to make a baby of you. He aren’t a-going to feed you with warm milk. If he’s your friend, he’s going to make a man of you.”

“I expect to fare just like my mess-mates,--no better, no worse; but I expect he will treat me like a Christian.”

“He’ll do that, my jolly little beef-eater; but if you go sticking your flipper out to him, just like as if you was a wardroom officer, I’ll bet a month’s wages he won’t know you. Don’t you do it, Jack. You hain’t been thirty years in the navy, my precious little infant: you never saw Cape Horn; you never went up the Mediterranean; you never walked around a capstan board a man-o’-war. You don’t know no more about discipline nor a heathen do about Watts’s Hymns.”

“What shall I do?” asked Jack, not a little puzzled by this exemplification of man-of-war discipline; and perhaps he was disposed to inquire if there was any use in having a friend in the wardroom, if he was not to be permitted to know him.

“What shall you do? There, now my sweet little bone-cracker, them’s the most sensible words you’ve spoken for half an hour. What shall you do? That’s just what the publiken wanted to know when he smote his breast. He smote his breast bekase he wanted to know. He didn’t spile his shirt-bosom for nothin’, Jack. What shall you do, my blating little lamb?”

“Yes, Tom; what shall I do?” asked Jack, highly amused as well as deeply edified by the profound remarks of the old blue-jacket. “And, if you don’t answer me pretty soon, I shall begin to think you are nothing but an old blower.”

“Vast heavin’, Jack: respect my bald head, and never let that little tongue of yourn unkile anything that sounds like a nick-name. It’s a bad practice, and nothin’ but lubbers and marines ever does such things,” replied Tom sagely.

Jack had his doubts upon this point, though he did not venture to express them, but again pressed his question.

“What shall you do, my little snivelling milksop?--what shall you do?”

“Yes; what shall I do, Tom? That’s what I want to know; and, if you don’t answer pretty soon, the boatswain’s whistle will cut short your yarn, as it did yesterday.”

“I’ll tell you, Jack. Just throw your ear-ports wide open, and belay that frisky little tongue of yourn, and I’ll tell you in less time than it would take a monkey to run up the main-to-gallant-mast backstay.”

“Blaze away, Tom!” replied Jack impatiently.

“Ay, ay, my lad: here goes. When you’re mustered, and Mr. Bankhead goes round lookin’ at every man from keel to truck, and gazin’ down into his peepers as though he’d lost his jack-knife down them,--I say, my oily little butter-chops, don’t you do so much as wink at him. I say, Jack, you mustn’t know Mr. Bankhead from Adam’s great-grandfather. If he wants to know you, he’ll tell you on’t. If he wants to shake hands with you, he will send the ship’s cook to let you know it three weeks aforehand, so’t you can be all ready for the honor that’s in store for you. Mind that, Jack; and you’ve larnt a lesson that’ll make a seaman of you.”

And just then the “people” were mustered, and Jack and his friends tumbled up on the spar-deck to undergo the scrutiny of the executive officer of the Harrisburg.