e was always ready to crack a joke
and "carry on" when there was any skylarking about, besides willing to
lend a hand at any time on a pinch. Jorrocks told me "to mind and be
good friends with Pat," if it were only for the sake of the pannikin of
hot coffee which it was in his power to dispense in the early morning
when turning out on watch in the cold.

"Ah, you were not born yesterday, Jorrocks!" I said, when he imparted
this valuable bit of information to me, as one of the state secrets of
the fo'c's'le.

"No, Mister Leigh," he answered, with a meaning wink; "I've not been to
sea, twenty year more or less, for nothing, I tell you."

The steward--to complete the list of those on board--was a flabby half-
and-half sort of Welshman, hailing from Cardiff but brought up in
London; and, as he was a close ally of the first mate, I need hardly say
he was no favourite either of my friend Jorrocks, or with the crew
generally--all the hands thinking that he skimped the provisions when
serving them out, in deference to Mr Macdougall's prejudices in the way
of stinginess!

The _Esmeralda_, therefore, carried twenty-seven souls in all of living
freight, including the skipper and my valuable self, besides her
thousand tons of coal or so of cargo; we on board representing a little
world within ourselves, with our interests identical so long as the
voyage lasted.

While Jorrocks and I were talking in the waist of the ship to leeward, I
observed the first mate, Mr Macdougall--who had the forenoon watch, and
was in charge of the vessel for the time--approach close to the break of
the poop, and stop in his walk up and down the deck once or twice, as if
he were on the point of hailing us to know what we were palavering
about; but something seemed to change his intention, so he refrained
from calling out, as I expected, although he glowered down on Jorrocks
and I, with a frown on his freckly sandy-haired face, "as if he could
eat us both up without salt," as the boatswain said, on my pointing out
the mate's proximity.

I believe Mr Macdougall took a dislike to me from the first; and the
skipper's apparent favour did not subsequently tend to make him
appreciate me any the better, I could see later on.

That very day, shortly before noon, when Captain Billings came out of
his cabin with his sextant, and found me all ready for him with mine, in
obedience to his order, I heard Mr Macdougall utter a covert sneer
behind the skipper's