H.M.S Part 17

said the old Captain. "But even like this, I'm not going to give in or stop trying."

One of the balers dropped his cap and leaned sideways across the stern-sheets. "Tell 'em the truth, sir," he said. "I know, and both you officers know. If we had sails and oars too and a fair wind, we couldn't make land under a week. We'll not live three days in this cold and on this ration, and there's no traffic here. For Gawd's sake stop shammin', an' let's take our medicine quiet."

The Chief Mate swore and started to rise, but the Captain checked him.

"One moment, Mr Johnson," he said, and turned to the ex-baler: "Listen now, my lad; it's not that you're afraid, it's just that you haven't got guts, that's your trouble. I'm an old man and I've got to die soon anyhow, so it oughtn't to matter to me. But I tell _you_ that I'm going to work till I freeze stiff on this job, and I'll never stop trying if every one of you does. It's true, there isn't much chance for us, but there _is_ a chance, and I won't let go of it. If we were told to come this route, it means some one else may be told to use it. There may be a s.h.i.+p just over the horizon now. I tell you, I don't want some one to pick me up drifting about and say, 'They haven't been dead an hour yet; if they'd used a bit more pluck they'd have pulled through. No, by G.o.d, the man that sank my s.h.i.+p thinks he's finished me, but as long as I can lift a hand I'll try to beat him.

I'll sail s.h.i.+ps yet in his dirty German teeth, and I'll take you with me in my fo'c'sle. Now get on and bale till your watch is up."

The man reached forward to the floating cap and without a word continued to use it, ladling the icy water overside in pitifully small quant.i.ties.

The white-bearded captain subsided again beside the Chief Mate.

The _Upavon_ was still rolling heavily as her Captain came on the bridge for the morning watch. She rolled a little uneasily now, and there was a suspicion of a "top" to the seas as they lifted her. The Captain glowered at the crescent moon--having lost none of his ill-humour in the night,--while the Sub-Lieutenant nervously turned over the watch to him.

"And we're to turn east at six, and the First Lieutenant said to be careful to log all alterations----"

The Captain dismissed him abruptly and turned away. As if he didn't know his own orders! Nice thing to be told them by a young cub like that! He would alter round just when he liked, of course. d.a.m.n the rain! He'd alter course now and run down before the wind. If those young beggars thought he was going to spend the next two hours facing the rain, they were very much mistaken. Why, when he'd been their age he'd faced more rain than they were ever likely to meet, so--he spoke an order, and the s.h.i.+p came slowly round through ten points of the compa.s.s.

"Steady, now. How's her head? South? All right; put that in the log--time, four-twenty...."

It was six-thirty, and the dawn and two cups of cocoa had removed a good deal of the Captain's temper. He lit a cigarette and faced to windward to look at the coming weather.

"M'm," he soliloquised; "and it's going to breeze up a bit too.

There'll be some breaking seas by noon."

As he was turning to continue his pacing of the bridge, he started and fumbled for his binoculars. He stared a while to windward, and then, without lowering the gla.s.ses, spoke--

"Starboard fifteen, quartermaster.... Steady, now.... Steer for that white boat on the port bow,--see it?... _Messenger!_ go down and tell the First Lieutenant I want him; and call the surgeon, too."

A MAXIM.

When the foe is pressing and the sh.e.l.ls come down In a stream like maxim fire, When the long grey ranks seem to thicken all the while, And they stamp on the last of the wire, When all along the line comes a whisper on the wind That you hear through the drumming of the guns: "They are through over there and the right is in the air,"

"And there isn't any end to the Huns."

Then keep along a-shooting till you can't shoot more, And hit 'em with a shovel on the head.

Don't forget a lot of folk have beaten them before, And a Hun'll never hurt you if he's dead.

If you're in a hole and your hopes begin to fail, If you're in a losing fight, Think a bit of Jonah in the belly of the whale, _'Cause-he-got-out-all-right_.

FROM A FAR COUNTRY.

Announced by the jangling of the curtain that he had almost brought down with his heavy suit-case, a cheerful curly-haired officer entered noisily and dropped into one of the Wardroom arm-chairs. He stretched his legs out and, lighting a cigarette, leaned back luxuriously.

"Well?" said a chorus of voices, "_well_--how's London?"

The curly-haired one smiled reminiscently. "Still standing, still standing," he replied. "No place for you though, I'm afraid. You're none of you good-looking enough to pa.s.s as Yanks or Colonials."

"Oh, cut it out. Tell us what it's like. You know, you're the first one to go there from us for a year, and we want to know."

"What? all about it? All right; chuck a cup of tea across and I'll give you the special correspondent's sob-stuff. _Aah!_ that's better; this train-travelling has given me a mouth like--I won't say what.

Well, I'll try and tell you what I thought of it and the people that live there. I may say at once that they are civilised to the extent that they'll take English money without complaining about it, and--_all_ right, I'll get on.

"Well, you know how I went off laden with meat and other cards till I was bulging, and how I reckoned to find people looking hungry at me as if they were reckoning what I'd boil down to in a stock-pot? Well, I've got all these cards still--didn't need 'em. I'd usually left them in my other coat when I got started on meals, and as they've got the trick of camouflaging fish and eggs till you don't know what you're eating, it wasn't worth hunting 'em out. All London seems to live on eggs, and where the deuce they all come from I don't know; they must be using up dumps of them. Oh, and another thing, I'd forgotten that in London they don't grow electric lighters on every bulkhead, and it was lucky I had a few matches with me. The first day I was stopped by fellers wanting a light off my cigarette just three times in a dog-watch, but the other days I didn't get asked at all--I'd lost the country-cousin look, I s'pose. Men? Yes, there's a fair sprinkling there still, but nothing under forty, I should say. Yes, there seem to be crowds of women.

Perhaps there are actually more, or it may be that the shortage of men makes 'em look more; but there do seem to be heaps of them. It just made me marvel, too, at the extraordinary lack of imagination the women have.

They still wear devilish short skirts, and yet there isn't one in forty of 'em that has a foot and ankle that one could call it decent to show.

You'd think they'd see one another's defects and get wise, but they don't. I suppose that now the secret's out about their legs, they reckon it's too late to hide the truth and they face it out; but I'm surprised the young ones don't camouflage themselves a bit and get a fair start.

Theatres? Yes; I went through the list, revues and all. I read Arnold Bennett's account of a music-hall--you know the book? Yes, I read it in the train going down. Well, I gathered from his description that things had flashed up a bit since the dear dead days of nineteen-sixteen, and that I would find myself in a hall of dazzling Eastern et-ceteras; but, my word! it was like tea at the Vicarage. I don't know what revue Arnold Bennett found, but I guess I missed it. It's true, I saw one perfectly _reckless_ lieutenant drop a programme out of a box into the orchestra; but as the orchestra didn't notice it, and I doubt if the lieutenant did either, it could hardly be put down to riotous conduct induced by drink and sensual music. Oh, I noticed one thing--all the theatre programmes had directions printed as to what to do in case of air-raids during the performance. They had it printed small and sandwiched in between the _hats by Suzanne_ and _dresses by c.o.x_ announcements. I liked that. It was British and dignified. I'd like to have sent some copies to Hindenburg. News? Yes, I heard a whole lot, but it was mostly denied in the papers next morning. It's a queer town for rumours. I think they all live too close together, and they get hysterical or something--like in that Frenchman's book, you know, the 'Psychology of Crowds,' or something like that. They weren't worrying much about the war, though. I stopped to look at the tape-messages in the club, and there was an eight-line chit on the board mentioning that the Hun was coming on like a gale o' wind towards Paris, while the rest of the board had eight full-length columns on the latest Old Bailey case, and there was another column coming through on the machine with a crowd waiting for more. No, I'm _not_ trying to be cynical. I read 'em all, but I hadn't quite got the London sense of proportion in two days, and it worried me that there was no more war news coming.

"Cost? Yes, _rather_. I've spent whole heaps of bullion, and I'll have to ask the Pay for an advance now. It's quite easy; you just exist and the cash trickles off you. There's not so much of the old 'men in uniform free' or 'half-price to officers' going now. There aren't many civilians left, and I guess _they're_ just taking in one another's was.h.i.+ng. Everything that isn't a necessity is double price at least, and I believe the shopkeepers would like to make breathing a luxury too. On the whole, I'm glad I only had a few days there. The air's so foul, you know. Mixture of scent and petrol, I think. Oh but, by the way, I saw a hansom--a real hansom--in Regent Street. Quite a neat well-kept one, too. No, nothing new in the way of dresses. Just the same as nineteen-sixteen, as far as I could see. There may have been some good-looking faces among the thousands in the West-end streets, but they were cancelled by the awful legs underneath. I wonder they ever manage to get married. Well, I saw thousands of that kind of female--more than one ever saw before; but I met some others who squared things up in my mind. Ten hours a day and clean the car herself for one, and oxyacetyline welding eight hours and overtime for another at two-five a week. Doing it to win the War, and not because they wanted to or liked it. Made me feel small to be on leave when I talked to 'em. And then, as I was leaving the hotel, a whole crowd of Swiss porters and servants, that had been fairly coming the Field-Marshal over me for three days, came oiling round me for tips, and pocketed the cash without a word when they got it; and--and--while they were doing it, a Scotch corporal walked past the taxi with three wound-stripes on his arm and four notches on his bayonet hilt. It's all a bit too puzzling for me. As soon as I got settled in one impression, I'd get jolted out of it by another. Heigho! I'm not sorry to have gone there to look, and I'm not sorry to be back." He rose, and moving across the Wardroom, flung open the door of his tiny cabin and pa.s.sed in. His voice sounded hollow through the thin part.i.tion.

"Hi! outside there--some shaving water _eck dum_," and then a contented murmur--"Lord! but it's good to be home again."

THE CRISIS.

When the Spartan heroes tried To hold the broken gate, When--roaring like the rising tide-- The Persian hors.e.m.e.n charged and died In foaming waves of hate.

When with armour hacked and torn They gripped their s.h.i.+elds of bra.s.s, And hailed the G.o.ds that light the morn With battle-cry of hope forlorn, "We shall not let them pa.s.s."

While they combed their hair for death Before the Persian line, They spoke awhile with easy breath, "What think ye the Athenian saith In Athens as they dine?"

"Doth he repent that we alone Are here to hold the way, That he must reap what he hath sown-- That only valour may atone The fault of yesterday?"

"Is he content that thou and I-- Three hundred men in line-- Should show him thus how man may try To stay the foemen pa.s.sing by To Athens, where they dine?"

"Ah! now the clas.h.i.+ng cymbal rings, The mighty host is nigh; Let Athens talk of pa.s.sing things-- But here, three hundred Spartan kings Shall greet the fame the Persian brings To men about to die."

A SEA CHANTY.

There's a whistle of the wind in the rigging overhead, And the tune is as plain as can be.

"Hey! down below there. D'you know it's going to blow there, All across the cold North Sea?"

And along comes the gale from the locker in the North By the Storm-King's hand set free, And the wind and the snow and the sleet come forth, Let loose to the cold North Sea.

Tumble out the oilskins, the seas are running white, There's a wet watch due for me, For we're heading to the east, and a long wet night As we drive at the cold North Sea.

See the water foaming as the waves go by Like the tide on the sands of Dee; Hear the gale a-piping in the halliards high To the tune of the cold North Sea.