by James Hannay (uncredited).
Originally published in Household Words (Bradbury & Evans) vol.2 #39 (21 Dec 1850).
If there be any fire, above all fires, in which one ought to be able to see pleasant "figures," it is a Christmas fire. So I will just plant myself opposite my log, and look for some pleasant images of memory, to recal Christmas at sea.
"Lash up hammocks!" The pipe of the boatswain's mate thrills shrilly through the lower-deck some winter morning, at four o'clock. You begin to be gradually aware that you are an officer in Her Majesty's service once more; that you belong to the "Bustard;" and that you have got the morning watch. Of the last fact, the quartermaster makes you most thoroughly aware, by routing away at the "nettles" of your hammock (very much like a boy routing out a blackbird's nest); and so does the young gentleman you are to relieve, who, having called the lieutenant of the next watch, glides alongside you, and says, "Be quick up, Charley. I'm very sleepy."
"Is it cold?"
"Infernally!"
You temporise for five minutes. You think about Lord Nelson. At last you hear "Watch to muster!" You have to muster that watch. Out you jump, fling yourself into blanket trousers and a tremendous coat, and run up on deck. The watch are gathering aft; the quartermaster brings a lantern; you produce your watch-bill, and commence calling over the names. If you are a man of idle habits, your watch-bill is probably in an incorrect state. Among the main-top-men you come to the name "Tomkins." "Tomkins!" you cry. No answer. "Tomkins!" (with indignation). A voice answers "Dead." There is a kind of solemnity about that, which touches you rather poetically. But the lieutenant of your watch is affected by it in a more homely way, and indulges in a growl. However, a man's watch-bills, and quarter-bills, and division-lists, can't be always right. I remember that my friend Childers, of the "Rhinoceros," who had no division-list at all, used to bring up a copy of "Thomson's Seasons," which looked rather like one, and by judiciously asking the men what their names were, first, and then roaring them out, afterwards, rubbed on very well.
You glance round the ship. The rigging is glittering with icicles, and looks like a tremendous chandelier. We suppose you to be at anchor somewhere. Halifax is a very good place for a winter scene,—a very hospitable place, and capital quarters for salmon. Or, what do you say to Athens? It sounds too warm for a jolly Christmas; but, in reality, it is sometimes terribly cold. There is a wind that comes down from Russia as biting and peremptory as an ukase.
But at present we are in the "Bustard." She was a line-of-battle ship; and I will tell you, first, how they pass Christmas in a line-of-battle ship. The "Bustard" was a credit to the profession; for she could sail right off at once, directly after she was launched, and was not repaired above twice in four years! We had a very pleasant Christinas in her, at anchor, in Vourla Bay, near the entrance of the Gulf of Smyrna. We had been looking after "British interests" in Smyrna, that autumn, and had protected two balls, a masquerade, and several dinners at the consul's.
"It's getting near Christmas," said the lieutenant of the watch to me after we had set the men to work holystoning, that morning.
"Very true, Sir," I said, as if he had made a striking observation.
"Are you cold, Mr. Topples?"
"Very, sir," I answered; for my
'Blue-veined feet unsandalled were,'
like Geraldine's, in 'Christabel.' They always made us keep the morning-watch barefoot in that precious "Bustard."
"Ah, you'd better walk about, then. Just lift that hammock-cloth over me," said the lieutenant, composing himself in the nettings. "Thank you."
There was considerable discussion in the "Bustard," how Christmas should be kept that year. Should the ward-room ask the gun-room and Captain to dinner? or the Captain ask them? The last was impossible. Captain Barbell expected every man to do his duty—and to ask him. So we plucked up courage. We were an ambitious gun-room mess. One of that mess was a duke's son. It was notorious that we had Madeira, while the ward-room drank mere port. We invited the ward-room, and Captain Barbell. With a condescension which is the true charm of greatness, Captain Barbell accepted. I shall never forget my emotions when I saw him enter our mess-room, as if he had been a gentleman—(I mean, of course, as if he had been only an ordinary gentleman), and ask twice for soup!
It was a brilliant preparation that we had made to receive him. The tiller (which traverses the gun-room) was wrapped round with flags. The standards of every nation hung gracefully blended around in waves of colour. Eagles and trio-headed eagles swung together, as if they never pecked at each other,—never laid bullets instead of jolly edible eggs—never fed on blood, or turned men into sausages! The mess looked like a menagerie. The British lion lay down with every conceivable animal. Friend Jonathan's stars helped the Turkish crescent to make a night of it; and the laurel which they all fight for (and which grows so impartially in every country,—why should poor Daphne be made to back the Furies?) glittered tranquilly and green among them all.
But, before we went to dinner—just as the "Roast Beef of Old England" was played, and Captain Barbell marched out of his cabin, looking very like the roast beef in question, raw—we all visited the lower deck where the sea-men were beginning the evening. There, on the little tables, suspended by their polished bars, stood plum-puddings. Perhaps there were a couple to each mess—looking very like a pair of terrestrial and celestial globes. How the coppers ever hold these puddings, I mean some day to inquire, when I have found out who wrote "Junius," why Ovid was banished from Rome, and some easier questions. These coppers had boiled a lake of cocoa that morning; had swallowed and boiled masses of junk, sparkling with lumps of salt; how they managed to hold the puddings, and to make them so good, I don't know, just now. Each pudding was decorated, perhaps with a paper ornament, perhaps with a sprig from some bush. Each "great globe itself" vanished that night! I could feel no doubt of their destiny when I saw the expression of the biggest fellow in the ship—the captain of the forecastle—as, like incense before the shrine of Neptune, his pudding sent up an awful steam before his weather-beaten face!
We returned to the gun-room. Captain Barbell took the place of honour. He gave a little grim smile as he saw the Sauterne. There was no Sauterne in his time—when he was a youngster. And yet he seemed to like it! He paused, startled at the sparkling Burgundy also—but he managed to swallow it! The duke's son asked him to take wine. There was a sensation. The captain nodded ("Homer sometimes nods"), and a thrill went through the mess. Meanwhile, the commander chatted with the senior mate; my messmate Riverby got confidential with the gunnery lieutenant, and found out that they were related through the Selbys, of Blocksey; and a few youngsters made desperate attempts to shatter the sobriety of the boatswain.
The boatswain! He was one of our guests. He always dines with the officers (generally with the Captain) on Christmas Day. It is the aloe-blossoming of his life. It is his Lord Mayor's Day. With a yellow waistcoat as large as the mizen-topsail,—with a blue coat quite new and creasy, that seems to have been kept in a glass-case, for show, all the year—he takes his seat. He is asked to take wine. In olden days, he would have said, "No, thank 'ee, Sir—I'll take a potato!" Now he says, "My respects," and tops off the glass at a draught. Brave old boatswain—descendant of the sea-kings—if I ever look with anything but respect on even thy most trenchant peculiarities,—may I remain as ignorant of seamanship as are the dandies who "look down" on blue.
The dinner passed off. Little Pipp, a youngster, got maudlin, and cried at the sight of some preserved pears, which reminded him of home. Several fellows became sentimental, and wondered whether their relatives in England were "keeping it up." I also grew tender as I thought about—no matter! I imitated Cleopatra, and dropped a pearl into my wine!
Then, you know, there was no misletoe. And if there had been, you couldn't have embraced old Barbell under it! You couldn't well salute. We might have saluted the Admiral, had he been there—tenderly, from the jaws of a nine-pounder--so we talked about England, and each speculated which of his pretty cousins was being kissed by an ugly cousin at that moment. The time wore on—the bell struck—and as you turned away from the circle chatting about home, and gazed out of the ports—you heard the water go booming by, wave after wave telling its watchman's cry—and far away shone the black Asiatic coast, with the light in a mountaineer's cottage quivering here and there—and not lighted in honour of Christ's day!
At last, Captain Barbell rose, and bowed, and sailed out in a stately manner. We broke into groups. The fiddle was heard going on the lower deck. Singing began on the fore-castle, and we were soon informed how—
"The sea looked black and dark all round,"
in the commencement of some naval epic; how
"Four jolly sailors, so stout and so strong,"
accomplished some feat in remote times; or of the adventures of a merchant ship of Liverpool, which thrashed a pirate, with a jolly chorus, wishing—
"Success to the gallant Liverpool ship,
With all her gallant crew!"
I have not always had so lively a Christmas Day as that in the "Bustard." I once spent it in a gale of wind, in the brig "Roarer," when we had nothing in the mess but some woodcocks, which we had shot in Albania, and which the caterer could not carve, having got drunk, before dinner began, on ship's rum. once spent it in prison, in Spain, for having made a row, with some other youngsters, at a bull-fight. Another time, I spent it in a whaler which had had a bad whale season; likewise in a galleot, where there were plenty of Dutchmen and very little "Hollands."
But, I have usually found that one may be very happy on that occasion, on that merry element where the moonlight seems to like to fall so richly—and which buries you, and thousands of you, and spares men the sight of their brothers' groans! Yes, indeed. I have found that one may have a very pleasant Christmas, at Sea.