re's some'at
queer i' the wind!" I _thought_ he gave rather a weather-look aloft,
comin' on deck i' the morning! I'll bet a week's grog the chap's
desarted from the king's flag, mates! Well, ye know, hereupon I
couldn't do no less nor shove in my oar, so I takes word from all hands
not to blow the gaff,[A] an' then gives 'em the whole yarn to the very
day, about the Green Hand--for somehow or another, I was always a
yarning sort of a customer. As soon as they heard it was a love consarn,
not a man but swore to keep a stopper on his jaw; only, at findin' out
he was a leftenant in the Royal Navy, all hands was for touching hats
when they went past.

[Footnote A: Let out the secret.]

Hows'ever, things went on till we'd crossed the line a good while; the
leftenant was making his way with the girl at every chance. But as for
the old fellow, I didn't see he was a fathom the nearer with _him_;
though, as the naboob had never clapt eyes on him to know him like,
'twain't much matter before heaving in sight o' port. The captain of the
Indyman was a rum old-fashioned codger, all for plain sailing and old
ways--I shouldn't say overmuch of a smart seaman. He read the sarvice
every Sunday, rigged the church an' all that, if it was anything short
of a reef-taups'l breeze. 'Twas queer enough, ye may think, to hear the
old boy drawling out, "As 'twas in the beginning,"--then, in the one
key, "Haul aft the mainsheet,"--"is now and ever shall be,"--"Small pull
with the weather-brace,"--"Amen,"--"Well the mainyard,"--"The Lord be
with you,--Taups'l yard well!" As for the first orficer, he was a
dandy, know-nothing young blade, as wanted to show off before the
ladies; and the second was afraid to call the nose on his face his own,
except in his watch; the third was a good seaman, but ye may fancy the
craft stood often a poor chance of being well handled.

'Twas one arternoon watch, off the west coast of Africay, as hot a day
as I mind on, we lost the breeze with a swell, and just as it got down
smooth, land was made out, low upon the starboard bow, to the
south-east. The captain was turned in sick below, and the first orficer
on deck. I was at the wheel, and I hears him say to the second how the
land-breeze would come off at night. A little after, up comes Leftenant
Collins, in his black wig and his 'long-shore hat, an' begins to squint
over the starn to nor'west'ard, "Jacobs, my lad," whispers he to me,
"how d'ye like the looks o' thin