The Life of a Celebrated Buccaneer

  CHAPTER XII.

  On the mainmast of the Ship of State, high up above the domes andminarets of the Buccaneer's chief city, he had placed his crow's nest orlook-out tub, where the look-out man was stationed. This man had, as amatter of course, the usual number of eyes; but one was an official eye,the vision of which was peculiar; for it could see into far distantlands if so inclined; but if not, there could be no eye more blind, notbeing able to discover what was going on under the nose placed by natureto its immediate front.

  Then the Buccaneer had wonderful inventions, by which he couldcommunicate with all his foreign relations and receive in turn whatinformation it was their pleasure to give.

  The way the Buccaneer filled up appointments on board of his Ship ofState was peculiar to himself. Adaptability, or knowledge of theparticular department, was of little or no consideration in his eyes. Ifthe hole to be filled was a round one, he took a square man and jammedhim into it, and left him to fit in as best he could. This might appeardifficult, and even detrimental to outsiders, but to those accustomed tothe peculiar system, things soon settled down and worked pretty well.

  He had a distinct objection to anything new. Change had to be broughtabout slowly and by degrees. If there was any haste in the matter, hestarted up at once, took fright and cried out "revolution!" and then anynecessary reform was thrust back and considerably delayed. He lovedpatchwork. His Ship of State was patched. His Church Hulk was patched,though of course this was not admitted by the generality of her crew,who declared that the order they sailed by had come down withoutinterruption from the fountain-head; but there were differences ofopinion as to this even on board the Church Ship, and sometimes evenheated discussions took place on other matters when charity, andbrotherly love, were either sent below, or kicked over the ship's sidefor the time being.

  The Buccaneer loved to mend and mend, not from any love of economy, forhis public expenditure far exceeded that of any of his neighbours, andhe gloried in the fact. If some article of his own manufacture wantedrepairing he would not take any of his own material, but he would borrowor buy from his neighbours, and clap on over his own product somethingpeculiar to other people. It was nothing to him whether the thing suitedor not, he still held on the even tenor of his way with a doggednessthat was in him almost a virtue, because it overcame so manydifficulties. In course of time he became famed as the very best tinkerthat the world had ever produced; and this trade he guarded with ajealous care and kept it entirely to himself.

  Then the way he had of relieving his watches was peculiar. He had noregular shifts, but when one of the watches displeased him he justkicked them over the ship's side and sent the whole crew about theirbusiness, and a fresh lot had to be selected by the people on shore. Itwas also another peculiarity of his that whenever the most learned, andwisest of his sons, could not solve some difficult question of State, heappealed at once to the most ignorant, and generally abided by theirdecision. On such occasions his old coxswain took the helm and generallybrought him successfully out of his difficulties.

  During the time the crew were on shore soliciting the suffrages of thepeople they were ready to promise almost anything, if they were onlysent on board in charge, but memories were often proved to be veryshort. The crew often abused each other soundly, making use at timeseven of very bad language. This was in a measure to be attributed tothose who managed to creep on board amongst the crew, who had not allthe characteristics of gentlemen; and also to the establishment amongstthe Buccaneer's people of a new university called Billingsgate, thelanguage and manners taught at his two ancient seats of learning notbeing strong enough for the necessities of the age. There were alwaysOjabberaways on board, and some of these had neither the refinement ofmanner, nor the delicacy of feelings peculiar to the thorough bredgentleman.

  At one time the old Ship of State was the scene of polished debate andpointed epigram, while the satire was delicate and keen; but now thingshad materially changed and the language too often descended to grosspersonal abuse.