It was a lather--a rich, creamy lather!
"We took it very easy--that gun-practice. We did it in a complimentary
'Jenny-'ave-another-cup-o' tea' style, an' the crew was strictly ordered
not to rupture 'emselves with unnecessary exertion. This isn't our custom
in the Navy when we're _in puris naturalibus_, as you might say. But we
wasn't so then. We was impromptu. An' Antonio was busy fetchin' splits for
the old man, and the old man was wastin' 'em down the ventilators. There
must 'ave been four inches in the bilges, I should think--wardroom whisky-
an'-soda.
"Then I thought I might as well bear a hand as look pretty. So I let my
_bundoop_ go at fifteen 'undred--sightin' very particular. There was a
sort of 'appy little belch like--no more, I give you my word--an' the
shell trundled out maybe fifty feet an' dropped into the deep Atlantic.
"'Government powder, Sir!' sings out our Gunnery Jack to the bridge,
laughin' horrid sarcastic; an' then, of course, we all laughs, which we
are not encouraged to do _in puris naturalibus_. Then, of course, I saw
what our Gunnery Jack 'ad been after with his subcutaneous details in the
magazines all the mornin' watch. He had redooced the charges to a minimum,
as you might say. But it made me feel a trifle faint an' sickish
notwithstanding this spit-in-the-eye business. Every time such transpired,
our Gunnery Lootenant would say somethin' sarcastic about Government
stores, an' the old man fair howled.
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