Part 1

TOUGH YARNS;

A SERIES

OF

NAVAL TALES AND SKETCHES

TO PLEASE ALL HANDS,

From the Swabs on the Shoulders down to the Swabs in the Head.

_BY THE OLD SAILOR_, AUTHOR OF “GREENWICH HOSPITAL,” ETC.

IN TWO VOLUMES.

VOL. I.

_PHILADELPHIA_: E. L. CAREY & A. HART.

_BALTIMORE_: CAREY, HART & Co.

_BOSTON_: WILLIAM D. TICKNOR. 1835.

E. G. DORSEY, PRINTER, _12 Library Street_.

TO

CAPTAIN MARRYATT, R. N.

AUTHOR OF

‘_The King’s Own_,’ ‘_Newton Foster_,’ ‘_Peter Simple_,’ _etc._, _etc._

THESE PAGES ARE DEDICATED

BY

_THE OLD SAILOR_.

CONTENTS OF VOL. I.

PAGE

_Greenwich Hospital_, 9

_Tom Brookes_, 145

_Daddy Davy, the Negro_, 159

PREFACE.

Once more I present myself before the Public in a Book; and whatever all hands may think of it, I can assure them it is no joke to keep one’s brains like a winch, continually spinning yarns. However, as my “GREENWICH HOSPITAL” met with a favourable reception, I have been induced to try another launch--and--here I am at the service of my readers.

_THE OLD SAILOR._

TOUGH YARNS.

GREENWICH HOSPITAL,

The grand depository of human fragments,--the snug harbour for _docked_ remnants,--Greenwich Hospital! Who is there that has stood upon that fine terrace, when the calm of evening has shed its influence on the spirit, and nature’s pencil intermingling light and shade has graced the landscape with its various tints, without feeling delighted at the spectacle? No sound is heard to break the stillness of the hour, save when the sea-boy trills his plaintive ditty, studious to grace the turnings of his song, for it was his mother taught it him, and her he strives to imitate. To him the tide rolls on unheeded; he sees not the tall mast, the drooping sail; ah, no! his heart is in the cottage where he knew his first affection, when with a smile of infantile delight he drew his nourishment from that fond bosom lately bedewed with tears at parting.

Who is there that has not exulted in the scene, when the proud ship has spread her canvass to the breeze to carry forth the produce of our country to distant lands? or when returning to her own home-shores, laden with the luxuries of foreign climes, the gallant tars have

“Hailed each well-known object with delight!”

Ay, there they stand! the veterans of the ocean, bidding defiance to care and sorrow, full of mirth and jollity although they are moored in _tiers_. They are critics too, _deep_ critics; but they cannot fancy the steam vessel with a chimney for a mast, and fifty yards of smoke for a pendant. These are the men that Smollett pictured,--the Jack Rattlins and the Tom Pipes of former years. Ay, those were _rattling_ days and _piping_ times! There is no place upon earth, except Greenwich, in which we can now meet with them, or find the weather-roll or lee-lurch to perfection. They are all thorough-bred, and a thorough-bred seaman is one of the drollest compounds in existence; a mixture of all that is ludicrous and grave,--of undaunted courage and silly fear. I do not mean the every-day sailor, but the bold, daring, intrepid man-of-war’s man; he who in the heat of action primed his wit and his gun together, without a fear of either missing fire.

The real tar has a language peculiarly his own, and his figures of speech are perfect _stopper_-knots to the understanding of a landsman. If he speaks of his ship, his eloquence surpasses the orations of a Demosthenes, and he revels in the luxuriance of metaphor. The same powers of elocution, with precisely the same terms, are applied to his wife, and it is a matter of doubt as to which engrosses the greatest portion of his affection,--to him they are both _lady-ships_. Hear him expatiate on his _little barkey_, as he calls his wooden island, though she may carry a hundred-and-fifty guns and a crew of a thousand men. “Oh! she’s the _fleetest_ of the _fleet_; sits on the water like a duck; stands under her canvass as stiff as a crutch; and turns to windward like a witch!” Of his wife he observes, “What a clean run from stem to starn! She carries her t’gall’nt sails through every breeze, and in working hank for hank never misses stays!” He will point to the bows of his ship, and swear she is as sharp as a wedge, never stops at a sea, but goes smack through all. He looks at his wife, admires her head-gear, and out-riggers, her braces and bow-lines; compares her eyes to dolphin-strikers, boasts of her fancy and fashion-pieces, and declares that she darts along with all the grace of a _bonnetta_. When he parts with his wife to go on a cruise, no tear moistens his cheek, no tremulous agitation does discredit to his manhood: there is the honest pressure of the hand, the fervent kiss, and then he claps on the topsail-halliards, or walks round at the capstan to the lively sounds of music. But when he quits his ship, the being he has rigged with his own fingers, that has stood under him in many a dark and trying hour, whilst the wild waves have dashed over them with relentless fury, then--then--the scuppers of his heart are unplugged and overflow with the soft droppings of sensibility. How often has he stood upon that deck and eyed the swelling sails, lest the breezes of heaven should

“Visit their face too roughly!”

How many hours has he stood at that helm and watched her coming up and falling off! and when the roaring billows have threatened to ingulf her in the bubbling foam of the dark waters, he has eased her to the sea with all the tender anxiety that a mother feels for her first-born child. With what pride has he beheld her top the mountain wave and climb the rolling swell, while every groan of labour that she gave carried a taut strain upon his own heart-strings!

Place confidence in what he says, and he will use no deception; doubt his word, and he will indulge you with some of the purest rhodomontade that ingenious fancy can invent. He will swear that he had a messmate who knew the man in the moon, and on one occasion went hand-over-hand up a rainbow to pay him a visit. He himself was once powder-monkey in the Volcano bomb, and he will tell you a story of his falling asleep in the mortar at the bombardment of Toulon, and his _body_ being discharged from its mouth instead of a _carcass_. With all the precision of an engineer, he will describe his evolutions in the air when they fired him off, and the manner in which he was saved from being dashed to pieces in his fall. All this he repeats without a smile upon his countenance, and he expects you to believe it: but you may soon balance the account, for tell him what absurdity you will, he receives it with the utmost credulity and is convinced of its truth. His courage is undoubted, for he will stand on the deck undismayed amidst the blood and slaughter of battle; yet on shore, he is seized with indescribable apprehensions at the sight of a coffin. The wailings of distress find a ready passport to his heart; but to disguise the real motives which prompt immediate aid, he swears that the object of his charity does not deserve a copper, yet gives a pound with only this provision,--that the individual relieved does not bother him about gratitude. You may know him from a thousand; for though in his dress conspicuously neat, and his standing and running rigging in exact order, yet they are arranged with a certain careless ease, as if he had but just come down from reefing topsails. The truck at the mast-head does not sit better than his tarpaulin hat, neither does the shoe upon the pea of the anchor fit tighter than his long quartered pumps. Grog is his ambrosia, his _necktar_; and he takes it cold, without sugar, that he may have the full smack of the rum.

And these are the characters at Greenwich Hospital, who after fighting the battles of their country are honoured with a palace. Oh, it was a proud display of national gratitude to such brave defenders! England has been compared to a huge marine animal, whose ports were its mouths, and whose navy formed its claws. What then is Greenwich but a receptacle for superannuated claws? I dearly love to get amongst them,--nearly two thousand shattered emblems of Britain’s triumphs,--the returned stores of our naval glory. Ay, there they are with their snug little cabins, like turtles under their shells. But let us enter the

Painted Wall,

formerly the refectory for the pensioners, but now devoted to the commemoration of their gallant achievements. There are the portraits of the heroes of the olden time, whose memorials cannot perish; and there too is old Van Tromp, the Dutchman, who is honoured with a distinguished place amongst the brave of England’s pride.

Here the old _blades_ are a _cut_ above the common; the small iron-bound officers who attend on visiters and point out the well-remembered features of commanders long since numbered with the dead.

“That ’ere, sir, on your right, is the battle of Trafflygar,” said a short thickset man, apparently between sixty and seventy years of age. His countenance was one of mild benevolence, and yet there was a daring in his look that told at once a tale of unsubdued and noble intrepidity; whilst the deep bronze upon his skin was finely contrasted with the silky white locks that hung straggling on his brow.--“That ’ere, sir, is the battle of Trafflygar, in which I had the honour to be one.”

“Were you with Nelson?” inquired I.

“I was, your honour,” he replied, “and those were the proudest days of my life. I was with him when he bore up out of the line off Cape St. Vincent, and saved old Jarvis from disgrace. I was one of the boarders, too, when we took the Saint Joseph,--there’s the picture, there in the middle of the hall;--and I was with him in that ship there,--the Victory,--though it arn’t a bit like her,--and stationed on the quarter-deck at Trafflygar.”

This was spoken with such an air of triumph, that the old man’s features were lighted up with animation; it called to his remembrance scenes in which he had shared the glory of the day and saved his country. His eye sparkled with delight, as if he again saw the British ensign floating in the breeze as the proud signal for conquest; or was labouring at the oar with his darling chief, like a tutelar deity of old, guiding the boat through the yielding element, and leading on to some daring and desperate enterprise.

“I don’t like the picture,” said I; “the perspective is bad, and the ship is too long and flat; besides the colour is unnatural.”

“Why, as for the matter of the _prospective_, sir,” replied the veteran, “that’s just what his present Majesty, God bless him! obsarved when he came to look at it; and for the colour, says the king, says he, ‘why the painter must have thought he’d been cooking, for he’s shoved the Victory into the hottest of the fire and done her brown;’ it was too bad, your honour, to singe her in that ’ere fashion, like a _goose_. Mayhap, your honour arn’t seen them there paintings of the battle at a place they call Exeter Hall, in the Strand. Now they are some-ut ship-shape, and the _heat_ of the engagement _warms_ a fellow’s heart to look at. An ould tar of the name of Huggins painted ’em, and I’m sure it’s right enough, for he’s made the Victory _hugging_ the enemy just as a bear would a baby. I could stand and look at them pictures for hours, till I fancied myself once more in the midst of it, measuring out fathoms of smoke and giving ’em full weight of metal. The Victory has just fell aboard the French Redhotable and the Golision, as they calls it, gives each of ’em a _lust_ different ways that looked so natural-like, that I felt myself getting a heel to port in the ould Victory as I looked at her. Then there’s the gale o’wind arter the battle; why, blow my ould wig, but you may feel the breeze and shake yourself from the spray. God bless his Majesty!--for they are the king’s, your honour;--long may he live to view ’em, and long may Huggins _hug_ to windward under royal favour! I went to see him,--not the king, your honour, but Muster Huggins, and when he found I was ‘the Old Sailor,’ what gave some account of the life of a man-of-war’s man in ‘Greenwich Hospital,’ he whips out his old quid, flings it into the fire, and we sported a fresh bit o’bacca on the strength of it.--That was a welcome worthy a great man, and he could’nt ha’ done more for the king, though I arn’t quite sure that his Majesty does chaw his pig-tail.”

There certainly was ample scope for the remarks of my old friend, and I could not but consider the picture a complete failure. “And so you were at Trafalgar,” said I.

“Ay, and a glorious day it was, too, for Old England,” replied the tar. “Never shall I forget the enthusiasm which animated every breast, as we bore down to engage; it was indeed a noble sight, and so your honour would have said, if you had but have seen the winged giants of the deep as they marched majestically before the breeze, all ready to hurl their thunders at the foe. But the best scenes were at the quarters, where the bold captains of each gun stood cool and undaunted, waiting for the word: but for the matter o’ that, every soul, fore and aft, seemed to be actuated by one and the same spirit. ‘Look there, Ben,’ said Sam Windsail, pointing out of the port-hole at the Royal Sovereign, just entering into action, ‘look there, my Briton; see how she moves along, like a Phœnix in the midst of fire,--there’s a sight would do any body’s heart good. I’d bet my grog, (and that’s the _lick-sir_ of life) I say I’d bet my grog agen a marine’s button, that old Colly’s having a desperate bowse at his breeches; he’s clapping on a taut hand, I’ll be bound for him.’ Just then the Sovereign hauled up a little, and opened her fire. ‘Didn’t I say so,’ continued Sam; ‘look at that! my eyes but he makes ’em sheer agen! Well behaved my sons of thunder! The old gemman knows the French are fond of dancing, so he’s giving them a few _balls_ and _routs_! Ay, ay, we shall be at it presently, never fear; our old chap arn’t the boy to be long idle, but then, d’ye mind, he never does things by _halves_; so he loves close _quarters_, and as he is rather _near_ with his cartridges, why he doesn’t like to throw a shot away. Howsomever, he’ll go it directly, like a doctor’s written orders,--this powder and these pills to be taken immediately,--eh, Ben? Next comes funny-section, or flay-bottomy, as the surgeons call it:--my eyes, there goes old Colly’s breeches agen, he’ll make a breach in the enemy’s line directly; ay, he’s a right arnest sallymander.’ By this time, your honour, we’d got within gun-shot, and the enemy opened a tremendous fire upon the leading ships of our division, which played up old Scratch upon the fokstle, poop, and main-deck; for as we bore down nearly stem on, and there was but a light breeze, they raked us fore and aft.

“But I should have told you, sir, that just before going into action, the admiral walked round the quarters attended by the captain and, I thinks, Mr. Quillem, the first leftenant, but I won’t be sure. The gunner, Mr. Rivers, was along with ’em, I know, and a worthy old gemman he was; his son, a midshipman, was stationed on the same deck with us,--a fine spirited youth, with his light hair flowing about his ears and his little laughing eyes,--up to all manner of mischief. Well, round they came, and the hero seemed proud of his men; he stopped occasionally to speak to one and to another, and his keen eye saw in a moment if any thing wasn’t ship-shape. His countenance was rather stern, but there was a look of confidence that told us at once the day was our own;--nay, for the matter o’ that, Sam Windsail began to reckon what he should buy for Poll with his prize-money.

“When they reached the quarters where young Rivers was stationed, Nelson looked at the son and then at the father, as much as to say, ‘he’s a fine youth, you ought to be proud of him,’ as no doubt the old gemman was, for he knew his gallant boy would do his duty. But still the tender solicitude of a parent’s heart is not to be repressed, however it may be concealed; and as he followed the admiral, his head was frequently turned back to take another look at his child, and perhaps he thought ‘mayhap it may be the last.’ Well, as I was saying before, the enemy’s balls began to rattle into us like hail-stones through a gooseberry bush, and many a poor fellow was laid low. ‘Arrah, bad manners to ’em, what do they mane by that?’ cried Tim Doyle, as a whole shoal of shot travelled in one another’s wake, and swept the entire range of the deck. ‘Come, don’t be skulking down there, Jack Noggin,’ continued Tim, ‘but lay hoult of the tackle-fall.’ Jack never moved. ‘Och bother, don’t you mane to get up?’ But poor Jack’s glass was run, his cable was parted; so we launched his hull out at the port, stock and fluke.

“Mayhap you never saw a battle, sir. It is no child’s play, take my word for it. But the worst time is just before engaging, when silence reigns fore and aft, and a poor fellow douses his jacket without knowing whether he shall ever clap his rigging on agen. Then it is that home with all its sweet remembrances clings round the heart. Parents, or wife, or children, become doubly dear, and the fond ties of kindred are linked by stronger bonds. Howsomever, as soon as the first shot is fired, and we get within a sort of shake-hands distance of the enemy, every other thought gives way to a steady discharge of duty.

“Well, d’ye see, close upon our quarter came the Trimmer-rare, 98, and as we hauled up a little, we brought our larboard broadside to bear upon the great Spanish four-decker;--there, that’s she in the picture showing her galleries, just by the Victory’s starn:--so we brought our broadside to bear, and oh, if you had but have seen the eager looks of the men as they pointed their guns, determined to make every shot tell,--and a famous mark she was, too, looming out of the water like Beachy-head in a fog. ‘Stand by,’ says Sam Windsail, looking along the sight with the match in his hand; ‘stand by, my boy; so, so,--elevate her breech a bit,--that will do. Now, then, for the Santizzy-mama-Trinny-daddy, and I lay my life I knock day-light through his ribs. Fire!’ and the barking irons gave mouth with all their thunder. A few minutes afterward, and slap we poured another raking broadside into the Spaniard, and then fell aboard a French seventy-four.

“Well, there, d’ye see, we lay, rubbing together with the muzzles of the lower deckers touching one another. When our guns were run in for loading, the ports were instantly occupied by the small-arm men, and several attempts were made to board the enemy. At this time one of the Frenchmen kept thrusting at us with a boarding-pike, and pricked Tim Doyle in the face. ‘Och, the divil’s cure to you,’ bawled Tim; ‘what do you mane by poking at me in that way. A joke’s a joke, but poking a stick in a fellow’s eye is no joke, any how; be aisey then, darlint, and mind your civility.’ As soon as we had fired, in came the pike agen, and Tim got another taste of it. ‘Och bother,’ said Tim, ‘if that’s your tratement of a neighbour, the divil wouldn’t live next door to yes! But faith, I’ll make you come out o’ that, and may be you’ll be after just paying me a visit.’ So he catches hold of a boat-hook that was triced up in a-midships, and watching his opportunity, he hooked Johnny Crapeau by the collar and lugged him out of one port-hole in at the other, without allowing him time to bid his shipmates good-by. ‘Is it me you’d be poking at, ye blackguard?’ said Tim, giving him a thump with his fist. ‘Is it Tim ye wanted to spit like a cock-sparrow or a tom-tit? Arrah, swate bad luck to yes,--sit down and make yer life aisey; by the powers there’ll be a pair o’ ye presently.’ But Tim was disappointed, for they let down the lower deck ports for fear we should board them through the port-holes.

“Soon after, both ships dropped aboard the Trimmer-rare; and then we ploughed up the Frenchman’s decks with our shot, whilst she lay grinding and groaning in betwixt us. It was just now that young Rivers was struck, and his leg knocked away; but his spirit remained unsubdued, and as they took him down to the cock-pit, he cheered with all his might, and shortly after the hero himself was conveyed below. At first, the news of his being wounded seemed to stagnate all hands, and each stood looking at the other in fearful anxiety; but in a few minutes, resolution again returned, the shots were rammed home with redoubled strength, though at times the men would struggle with their feelings, and give vent to their grief and indignation. At every opportunity inquiries were made, and when the news of his death reached our quarters,--‘He’s gone!’ said Sam, ‘his anchor’s a-weigh, and the blessed spirits are towing him to immortality.’

“But who is there, your honour, that remembers Nelson now? Even the car that carried his body to its last moorings has been broken up as useless lumber, though I did hear that a gemman offered two thousand guineas for it. Some parts are down in the store-rooms, and some has been burnt for fire-wood. There’s his picture and his statue to be sure, but I think they should have spared the car. Nelson was strict to his duty, and made all hands perform theirs; and when he punished one man, it was that he might not have to punish twenty, and every soul fore and aft knew what they had to do. The brave, the generous, the humane Collingwood too,--there’s his picture, your honour, he is almost forgotten. Collingwood detested flogging; and when any captain came to him with a complaint of being short-handed through desertion, he would stand and hitch up his breeches, saying, ‘Use your men better, sir; use your men better, and then they wouldn’t leave you. My men, sir, never run; because they know they cannot get better treatment elsewhere.’ He was also an avowed enemy to impressment, being well convinced that the British navy might be manned with volunteers, if Jack’s peculiarities were only managed with kindness. But they are gone, sir, they are gone, and their authority is over; yet there are a few rough knots who can remember them,--ay, and cherish the remembrance in their hearts.