l Mr. Jermyn came to me. I would tell him that I wished to go home,
that I was not going to be a common sailor, but a trusted messenger,
with a lot more to the same tune, meaning, really, that I hated this job
of washing decks like poison. I dare say, if the truth were known, the
sudden change in my fortunes had made me a little homesick. But even so,
I was skulking work which had been given to me. What was worse, I was
being dishonest. For I was pretending to do the work, even when I took
least trouble with it. At last I took it into my head to wet the whole
floor with water, meaning to do no more to it. While I was doing this
the mate came into the cabin.

"Look here," he said. "I've been watching you. You ain't working. You're
skulking. You ain't trying to wash that deck. You're making believe,
thinking I won't know any different. Don't answer me. I know what you're
doing. Now then. You go over every bit of that deck which you've just
slopped at. Do it over. I'm going to stand here till it's done."

It was in my mind to be rebellious; but this man did not look like a
good man to rebel from. He was a big grim sailor with a length of rope
in his hand. He called it his "manrope." "You see my manrope," he said.
"His name's Mogador Jack. He likes little skulks like you." Afterwards
I learned that a manrope is the rope rail at a ship's gangway, or
(sometimes) a length of rope in the gangway-side for boatmen to catch as
they came alongside the ship. I did not like the look of Mogador Jack,
so I went at my scrubbing with all my strength, keeping my thoughts
to myself. My knees felt very sore. My back ached with the continual
bending down. I had had no food that morning, either, that was another
thing. "Spell, oh," said the man at last. "Straighten your back a bit.
Empty your bucket over the side. No. Not through the sternport. Carry
in on deck. Empty it there. Then fill it again. Lively, too. It'll be
breakfast time before you've done. You've got to have this cabin ready
by eight bells."

I will not tell you how I finished the deck. I will say only this, that
at the end I began to take a sort of pride or pleasure in making the
planks white. Afterwards, I always found that there is this pleasure in
manual work. There is always pleasure of a sort in doing anything
that is not very easy. "There," the mate said. "Now lay the table for
breakfast. You'll find the things in them lockers. Lay for three places.
Don't break the ship