. The oilskin man, however, remained on the weather side of the
poop at the head of the ladder, whence he had a good look-out ahead,
clear of all intervening obstacles, and from which post he proceeded to
direct the steering of the ship by waving his arms this way and that as
if he were an animated windmill

The first mate interpreted as quickly these signals for the benefit of
Adams, passing on the words of warning they conveyed, "Hard up!" or
"Down helm!" or "Steady!" as the case might be. These frequent and
often contradictory orders were necessary, when, owing to some
unexpected bend in the river, the Silver Queen would luff up suddenly
and shoot her head athwart stream hard a-port, or else try to "take the
bit between her teeth," and sheer into the shore on the starboard hand
as if she wanted to run up high and dry on the mud, loth to leave her
native land.

She required good steering.

Aye, and careful watching too, on the part of the helmsman; for, in
addition to the natural turnings and windings of the channel-way, which
were many, the Thames curving about and twisting itself into the shape
of a corkscrew between London Bridge and the Nore, the tug had besides
continually to alter her course, thus, naturally, making us change ours
too, as the tow-rope slackening one moment would cause the ship's bows
to fall off, and then tightening like a fiddle-string the next instant
her head would be jerked back again viciously into its former position,
right astern of the little vessel at whose mercy we were, as if she
insisted on the Silver Queen following obediently in her wake.

This eccentric mode of procedure, however, must not be altogether
ascribed to any contrariness of disposition on the part of the gallant
tug, which, in spite of occasional stoppages and frequent alterations of
course, yet towed us along steadily down the river--a pigmy pulling a
giant. Such a monster we seemed, lumbering behind her as she panted and
puffed huge volumes of black smoke from her tall striped funnel, with
much creaking of her engines and groaning of her poor strained timbers,
and the measured rhythmical beat of her paddle-floats on the surface of
the water, that sounded as if she were "spanking" it out of spite.

No, it wasn't the fault of the little, dirty, toiling tug, whose daily
drudgery did not give her time to look after her toilet and study her
personal appearance like those bigger craft she had always tacked on to
her