Pyecroft, drinking deeply.
"I'd like to know 'ow it looked from 'is side o' the deck."
"How will this do?" I said. "'_Once clear of the land, like Voltaire's
Habakkuk_------"'
"One o' their new commerce-destroyers, I suppose," Mr. Pyecroft
interjected.
"'--_each man seemed veritably capable of all--to do according to his
will. The boats, dismantled and forlorn, are lowered upon the planking.
One cries "Aid me!" flourishing at the same time the weapons of his
business. A dozen launch themselves upon him in the orgasm of zeal
misdirected. He beats them off with the howlings of dogs. He has lost a
hammer. This ferocious outcry signifies that only. Eight men seek the
utensil, colliding on the way with some many others which, seated in the
stern of the boat, tear up and scatter upon the planking the ironwork
which impedes their brutal efforts. Elsewhere, one detaches from on high
wood, canvas, iron bolts, coal-dust--what do I know_?'"
"That's where 'e's comin' the bloomin' _onjeuew_. 'E knows a lot, reely."
"'_They descend thundering upon the planking, and the spectacle cannot
reproduce itself. In my capacity of valet to the captain, whom I have well
and beautifully plied with drink since the rising of the sun (behold me
also, Ganymede!) I pass throughout observing, it may be not a little. They
ask orders. There is none to give them. One sits upon the edge of the
vessel and chants interminably the lugubrious "Roule Britannia"--to endure
how lomg_?'"
"That was me! On'y 'twas 'A Life on the Ocean Wave'--which I hate more
than any stinkin' tune I know, havin' dragged too many nasty little guns
to it.
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