, staggered on the
stage in a feigned state of intoxication. The truthfulness of the
representation was much heightened by the roll of the ship.

"The Commodore," "Old Luff," "The Mayor," and "Gin and Sugar Sall,"
were played to admiration, and received great applause. But at the
first appearance of that universal favourite, Jack Chase, in the
chivalric character of _Percy Royal-Mast_, the whole audience
simultaneously rose to their feet, and greeted hire with three hearty
cheers, that almost took the main-top-sail aback.

Matchless Jack, _in full fig_, bowed again and again, with true
quarter-deck grace and self possession; and when five or six untwisted
strands of rope and bunches of oakum were thrown to him, as substitutes
for bouquets, he took them one by one, and gallantly hung them from the
buttons of his jacket.

"Hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!--go on! go on!--stop hollering--hurrah!--go
on!--stop hollering--hurrah!" was now heard on all sides, till at last,
seeing no end to the enthusiasm of his ardent admirers, Matchless Jack
stepped forward, and, with his lips moving in pantomime, plunged into
the thick of the part. Silence soon followed, but was fifty times
broken by uncontrollable bursts of applause. At length, when that
heart-thrilling scene came on, where Percy Royal-Mast rescues fifteen
oppressed sailors from the watch-house, in the teeth of a posse of
constables, the audience leaped to their feet, overturned the capstan
bars, and to a man hurled their hats on the stage in a delirium of
delight. Ah Jack, that was a ten-stroke indeed!

The commotion was now terrific; all discipline seemed gone for ever;
the Lieutenants ran in among the men, the Captain darted from his
cabin, and the Commodore nervously questioned the armed sentry at his
door as to what the deuce _the people_ were about. In the midst of all
this, the trumpet of the officer-of-the-deck, commanding the
top-gallant sails to be taken in, was almost completely drowned. A
black squall was coming down on the weather-bow, and the boat-swain's
mates bellowed themselves hoarse at the main-hatchway. There is no
knowing what would have ensued, had not the bass drum suddenly been
heard, calling all hands to quarters, a summons not to be withstood.
The sailors pricked their ears at it, as horses at the sound of a
cracking whip, and confusedly stumbled up the ladders to their
stations. The next moment all was silent but the wind, howling like a
thousand dev