Chapter 73

NIGHT AND DAY GAMBLING IN A MAN-OF-WAR.

Mention has been made that the game of draughts, or checkers, was
permitted to be played on board the Neversink. At the present
time, while there was little or no shipwork to be done, and all
hands, in high spirits, were sailing homeward over the warm
smooth sea of the tropics; so numerous became the players,
scattered about the decks, that our First Lieutenant used
ironically to say that it was a pity they were not tesselated
with squares of white and black marble, for the express benefit
and convenience of the players. Had this gentleman had his way,
our checker-boards would very soon have been pitched out of the
ports. But the Captain--usually lenient in some things--permitted
them, and so Mr. Bridewell was fain to hold his peace.

But, although this one game was allowable in the frigate, all
kinds of gambling were strictly interdicted, under the penalty of
the gangway; nor were cards or dice tolerated in any way whatever.
This regulation was indispensable, for, of all human beings,
man-of-war's-men are perhaps the most inclined to gambling. The
reason must be obvious to any one who reflects upon their condition
on shipboard. And gambling--the most mischievous of vices anywhere--in
a man-of-war operates still more perniciously than on shore. But quite
as often as the law against smuggling spirits is transgressed by the
unscrupulous sailors, the statutes against cards and dice are evaded.

Sable night, which, since the beginning of the world, has winked and
looked on at so many deeds of iniquity--night is the time usually
selected for their operations by man-of-war gamblers. The place
pitched upon is generally the berth-deck, where the hammocks are
swung, and which is lighted so stintedly as not to disturb the
sleeping seamen with any obtruding glare. In so spacious an area the
two lanterns swinging from the stanchions diffuse a subdued
illumination, like a night-taper in the apartment of some invalid.
Owing to their position, also, these lanterns are far from shedding
an impartial light, however dim, but fling long angular rays here and
there, like burglar's dark-lanterns in the fifty-acre vaults of the
West India Docks on the Thames.

It may well be imagined, therefore, how well adapted is this
mysterious and subterranean Hall of Eblis to the clandestine
proceedings of gamblers, especially as the hammocks not only hang
thickly, but many of them swing very low, within two feet of the
floor, thus forming innumerable little canvas glens, grottoes,
nooks, corners, and crannies, where a good deal of wickedness may
be practiced by the wary with considerable impunity.

Now the master-at-arms, assisted by his mates, the ship's