a
railroad, and he kept us all pretty straight; from his fiat there was
no appeal.

But it was not thus when the turn came to others among us. Then it was
_look out for squalls_. The business of dining became a bore, and
digestion was seriously impaired by the unamiable discourse we had over
our _salt horse_.

I sometimes thought that the junks of lean pork--which were boiled in
their own bristles, and looked gaunt and grim, like pickled chins of
half-famished, unwashed Cossacks--had something to do with creating the
bristling bitterness at times prevailing in our mess. The men tore off
the tough hide from their pork, as if they were Indians scalping
Christians.

Some cursed the cook for a rogue, who kept from us our butter and
cheese, in order to make away with it himself in an underhand manner;
selling it at a premium to other messes, and thus accumulating a
princely fortune at our expense. Others anthematised him for his
slovenliness, casting hypercritical glances into their pots and pans,
and scraping them with their knives. Then he would be railed at for his
miserable "duffs," and other shortcoming preparations.

Marking all this from the beginning, I, White-Jacket, was sorely
troubled with the idea, that, in the course of time, my own turn would
come round to undergo the same objurgations. How to escape, I knew not.
However, when the dreaded period arrived, I received the keys of office
(the keys of the mess-chest) with a resigned temper, and offered up a
devout ejaculation for fortitude under the trial. I resolved, please
Heaven, to approve myself an unexceptionable caterer, and the most
impartial of stewards.

The first day there was "_duff_" to make--a business which devolved
upon the mess-cooks, though the boiling of it pertained to Old Coffee
and his deputies. I made up my mind to lay myself out on that _duff_;
to centre all my energies upon it; to put the very soul of art into it,
and achieve an unrivalled _duff_--a _duff_ that should put out of
conceit all other _duffs_, and for ever make my administration
memorable.

From the proper functionary the flour was obtained, and the raisins;
the beef-fat, or "_slush_," from Old Coffee; and the requisite supply
of water from the scuttle-butt. I then went among the various cooks, to
compare their receipts for making "duffs:" and having well weighed them
all, and gathered from each a choice item to make an original receipt
of my own, with due deliberation