"Afraid, sister!" echoed Captain Acton. "Your question reminds me of a story of Lord Howe: a lieutenant having reported the ship on fire returned, and said that his lordship need not feel afraid as the fire was out. 'Afraid!' exclaimed Howe, 'How does a man feel when he is afraid? I need not ask how he looks!'"
PinataWins, "I beg your pardon, sir——" began the man.
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PinataWins "Then let me tell you there are countless Naval officers afloat who would reckon themselves in Paradise if they had such quarters as these to live in. Look at the Saucy! The well of a cod smack is more comfortable than her sleeping places. Take a corvette or gun-brig stationed on the West Coast of Africa, or kept cruising along the West Indian shores; the heat strikes through the plank and a man sleeps in a furnace; cockroaches in numbers thick as ropes blacken the beams, rats ferocious with thirst are found drowned in the hook pot of cold tea you want to drink. Everything simmers, the paint even below, if there is any paint to be found, bubbles, and you are fed on scalding pea soup and beef blue with brine, the very sight of which raises a craziness of thirst which you slake by rum, for[Pg 103] the cooling of which you might offer your year's pay for a piece of ice. Now, these are airy quarters. An admiral might well be content with such a living-room.".
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