Chapter 2

HOMEWARD BOUND.

"All hands up anchor! Man the capstan!"

"High die! my lads, we're homeward bound!"

Homeward bound!--harmonious sound! Were you _ever_ homeward
bound?--No?--Quick! take the wings of the morning, or the sails
of a ship, and fly to the uttermost parts of the earth. There,
tarry a year or two; and then let the gruffest of boatswains, his
lungs all goose-skin, shout forth those magical words, and you'll
swear "the harp of Orpheus were not more enchanting."

All was ready; boats hoisted in, stun' sail gear rove, messenger
passed, capstan-bars in their places, accommodation-ladder below;
and in glorious spirits, we sat down to dinner. In the ward-room,
the lieutenants were passing round their oldest port, and
pledging their friends; in the steerage, the _middies_ were busy
raising loans to liquidate the demands of their laundress, or
else--in the navy phrase--preparing to pay their creditors _with
a flying fore-topsail_. On the poop, the captain was looking to
windward; and in his grand, inaccessible cabin, the high and
mighty commodore sat silent and stately, as the statue of Jupiter
in Dodona.

We were all arrayed in our best, and our bravest; like strips of
blue sky, lay the pure blue collars of our frocks upon our
shoulders; and our pumps were so springy and playful, that we
danced up and down as we dined.

It was on the gun-deck that our dinners were spread; all along
between the guns; and there, as we cross-legged sat, you would
have thought a hundred farm-yards and meadows were nigh. Such a
cackling of ducks, chickens, and ganders; such a lowing of oxen,
and bleating of lambkins, penned up here and there along the
deck, to provide sea repasts for the officers. More rural than
naval were the sounds; continually reminding each mother's son of
the old paternal homestead in the green old clime; the old
arching elms; the hill where we gambolled; and down by the barley
banks of the stream where we bathed.

"All hands up anchor!"

When that order was given, how we sprang to the bars, and heaved
round that capstan; every man a Goliath, every tendon a hawser!--
round and round--round, round it spun like a sphere, keeping time
with our feet to the time of the fifer, till the cable was
straight up and down, and the ship with her nose in the water.

"Heave and pall! unship your bars, and make sail!"

It was done: barmen, nipper-men, tierers, veerers, idlers and
all, scrambled up the ladder to the braces and halyards; while
like monkeys in Palm-trees, the sail-loosers ran out on those
broad boughs, our yards; and down fell the sails like white
clouds from the ether--topsails,