"Aye, aye sir!" shouted the hands, on his pausing here as if waiting for
their answer. "Aye, aye, sir!"

"All right then; ye understand me, I see. That will do the watch."

Whereupon, half of them went back into the forecastle to finish their
tea, while the remainder took their stations about the ship, remaining
on deck until their span of duty was out, the whole lot having been
divided into two groups, styled respectively the port and starboard
watches, under charge of Mr Mackay and the second mate, Mr Saunders--
Tom Jerrold and I being in the port watch with the first mate; while Sam
Weeks and Matthews, who was like the fifth wheel of a coach as "third
mate," a very anomalous position on board-ship, mustered with the
starbowlines under Mr Saunders.

Counting in Captain Gillespie, with the three mates, us apprentices, the
boatswain, sailmaker Adams and carpenter Gregory--the three latter all
"old hands," having sailed several voyages previously together in the
ship--the steward Pedro Carvalho, Ching Wang our cook, Billy the boy,
our "second-class apprentice," and the eighteen fresh men who had come
aboard with the Chinaman at Gravesend, our crew mustered all told some
thirty-one hands; and, to complete the description of the vessel and her
belongings, the Silver Queen was a sharp-bowed, full-rigged ship, with a
tremendous bilge, built for carrying a goodish cargo, which consisted,
as I believe I mentioned before, mainly of Manchester goods and
Birmingham hardware, besides a private speculation of our captain
consisting of a peculiarly novel consignment of Dundee marmalade, packed
up in tins like those used for preserved meats and such like dainties.

About this marmalade I shall have something to say by and by; but I
think I had better go on with my yarn in proper ship-shape fashion,
narrating events in the order in which they occurred--merely stating, in
order to give a full account of all concerning us, that, in addition to
the particulars of our cargo as already detailed, we had sundry items of
live freight in the shape of some pigs, which were stowed in the long-
boat on top of the deck-house; three cats, two belonging to the
Portuguese steward and messing in the cuddy, while the third was a
vagrant Tom that had strayed on board in the docks, and making friends
with the carpenter Gregory, or "old chips" as he was generally called,
was allowed to take up his quarters in the forepeak, migrating to the
cook's