Chapter 14 - Page 2

good behaviour. If I hear any more of your washy compounds, I'll put
you ashore, and let you run naked a summer or two with the monkeys and
ouran-outangs."

"I endeavour, on all proper occasions, to render myself agreeable to you,
Captain Truck, and to all those with whom I have the happiness to sail,"
returned the steward; "but the coffee, sir, cannot be very good, sir, in
such weater, sir. I do diwine that the wind must blow away its flavour,
for I am ready to confess it has not been as odorous as it usually is,
when I have had the honour to prepare it. As for Africa, sir, I flatter
myself, Captain Truck, that you esteem me too highly to believe I am
suited to consort or besort with the ill-formed and inedicated men who
inhabit that wild country. I misremember whether my ancestors came from
this part of the world or not; but if they did, sir, my habits and
profession entirely unqualify me for their company, I hope. I know I am
only a poor steward, sir, but you'll please to recollect that your great
Mr. Vattel was nothing but a cook."

"D--n the fellow, Leach; I believe it is this conceit that has spoiled
the coffee the last day or two! Do you suppose it can be true that a great
writer like this man could really be no better than a cook, or was that
Englishman roasting me, by way of showing how cooking is done ashore? If
it were not for the testimony of the ladies, I might believe it; but they
would not share in such an indecent trick. What are you lying-by for, sir?
go to your pantry and remember that the gale is broken, and we shall all
sit down to table this morning, as keen-set as a party of your brethren
ashore here, who had a broiled baby for breakfast."

Saunders, who _ex-officio_ might be said to be trained in similar
lectures, went pouting to his work, taking care to expend a proper part of
his spleen on Mr. Toast, who, quite as a matter of course, suffered in
proportion as his superior was made to feel, in his own person, the weight
of Captain Truck's authority. It is perhaps fortunate that nature points
out this easy and self-evident mode of relief, else would the rude habits
of a ship sometimes render the relations between him who orders and him
whose duty it is to obey, too nearly approaching to the intolerable.

The captain's squalls, however, were of short duration and on the present
occasion he was soon in even a better humour than common, as every minute
gave the cheering assurance, that the tempest was fast drawing to a close.
He had finished his third cigar, and was actually issuing his orders to
turn the reef out of the foresail, and to set the main-top-sail
close-reefed, when most of the passengers appeared on deck, for the first
time that