Chapter 79

HOW MAN-OF-WAR'S-MEN DIE AT SEA.

Shenly, my sick mess-mate, was a middle-aged, handsome, intelligent
seaman, whom some hard calamity, or perhaps some unfortunate excess,
must have driven into the Navy. He told me he had a wife and two
children in Portsmouth, in the state of New Hampshire. Upon being
examined by Cuticle, the surgeon, he was, on purely scientific grounds,
reprimanded by that functionary for not having previously appeared
before him. He was immediately consigned to one of the invalid cots as
a serious case. His complaint was of long standing; a pulmonary one,
now attended with general prostration.

The same evening he grew so much worse, that according to man-of-war
usage, we, his mess-mates, were officially notified that we must take
turns at sitting up with him through the night. We at once made our
arrangements, allotting two hours for a watch. Not till the third night
did my own turn come round. During the day preceding, it was stated at
the mess that our poor mess-mate was run down completely; the surgeon
had given him up.

At four bells (two o'clock in the morning), I went down to
relieve one of my mess-mates at the sick man's cot. The profound
quietude of the calm pervaded the entire frigate through all her
decks. The watch on duty were dozing on the carronade-slides, far
above the sick-bay; and the watch below were fast asleep in their
hammocks, on the same deck with the invalid.

Groping my way under these two hundred sleepers, I en-tered the
hospital. A dim lamp was burning on the table, which was screwed
down to the floor. This light shed dreary shadows over the white-
washed walls of the place, making it look look a whited sepulchre
underground. The wind-sail had collapsed, and lay motionless on
the deck. The low groans of the sick were the only sounds to be
heard; and as I advanced, some of them rolled upon me their
sleepless, silent, tormented eyes.

"Fan him, and keep his forehead wet with this sponge," whispered
my mess-mate, whom I came to relieve, as I drew near to Shenly's
cot, "and wash the foam from his mouth; nothing more can be done
for him. If he dies before your watch is out, call the Surgeon's
steward; he sleeps in that hammock," pointing it out. "Good-bye,
good-bye, mess-mate," he then whispered, stooping over the sick
man; and so saying, he left the place.

Shenly was lying on his back. His eyes were closed, forming two
dark-blue pits in his face; his breath was coming and going with
a slow, long-drawn, mechanical precision. It was the mere
foundering hull of a man that was before me; and though it
presented the well-known features of my mess-mate, yet I knew
that the living soul of Shenly never