Chapter 15 - Page 2

shown me the pattern, after which he
intended to make my pantaloons; but I improved upon it, and bade him
have a slit on the outside of each leg, at the foot, to button up with a
row of six brass bell buttons; for a grown-up cousin of mine, who was a
great sportsman, used to wear a beautiful pair of pantaloons, made
precisely in that way.

And these were the very pair I now had at sea; the sailors made a great
deal of fun of them, and were all the time calling on each other to
"ftoig" them; and they would ask me to lend them a button or two, by way
of a joke; and then they would ask me if I was not a soldier. Showing
very plainly that they had no idea that my pantaloons were a very
genteel pair, made in the height of the sporting fashion, and copied
from my cousin's, who was a young man of fortune and drove a tilbury.

When my pantaloons ripped and tore, as I have said, I did my best to
mend and patch them; but not being much of a sempstress, the more I
patched the more they parted; because I put my patches on, without
heeding the joints of the legs, which only irritated my poor pants the
more, and put them out of temper.

Nor must I forget my boots, which were almost new when I left home. They
had been my Sunday boots, and fitted me to a charm. I never had had a
pair of boots that I liked better; I used to turn my toes out when I
walked in them, unless it was night time, when no one could see me, and
I had something else to think of; and I used to keep looking at them
during church; so that I lost a good deal of the sermon. In a word, they
were a beautiful pair of boots. But all this only unfitted them the more
for sea-service; as I soon discovered. They had very high heels, which
were all the time tripping me in the rigging, and several times came
near pitching me overboard; and the salt water made them shrink in such
a manner, that they pinched me terribly about the instep; and I was
obliged to gash them cruelly, which went to my very heart. The legs were
quite long, coming a good way up toward my knees, and the edges were
mounted with red morocco. The sailors used to call them my "gaff-
topsail-boots." And sometimes they used to call me "Boots," and
sometimes "Buttons," on account of the ornaments on my pantaloons and
shooting-jacket.

At last, I took their advice, and "razeed" them, as they phrased it.
That is, I amputated the legs, and shaved off the heels to the bare
soles; which, however, did not much improve them, for it made my feet
feel flat as flounders, and besides, brought me down in the world, and
made me slip and slide about the decks, as I used to at home, when I
wore straps on the ice.

As for my tarpaulin hat, it was