"There's cut and run," cried the sailor, thrusting all the money into
his breeches pocket. "That's what you'll learn to do, my joker, before
you've been two cruises to sea."
In the meantime the gentleman in the plaid cloak, who was seated by me,
smoked his cigar without saying a word. I commenced a conversation with
him relative to my profession, and asked him whether it was not very
difficult to learn. "Larn," cried the sailor, interrupting us, "no; it
may be difficult for such chaps as me before the mast to larn; but you,
I presume, is a reefer, and they an't got much to larn, 'cause why, they
pipe-clays their weekly accounts, and walks up and down with their hands
in their pockets. You must larn to chaw baccy, drink grog, and call the
cat a beggar, and then you knows all a midshipman's expected to know
nowadays. Ar'n't I right, sir?" said the sailor, appealing to the
gentleman in a plaid cloak. "I axes you, because I see you're a sailor
by the cut of your jib. Beg pardon, sir," continued he, touching his
hat, "hope no offence."
"I am afraid that you have nearly hit the mark, my good fellow," replied
the gentleman.
The drunken fellow then entered into conversation with him, stating that
he had been paid off from the _Audacious_ at Portsmouth, and had come up
to London to spend his money with his messmates, but that yesterday he
had discovered that a Jew at Portsmouth had sold him a seal as gold, for
fifteen shillings, which proved to be copper, and that he was going
back to Portsmouth to give the Jew a couple of black eyes for his
rascality, and that when he had done that he was to return to his
messmates, who had promised to drink success to the expedition at the
Cock and Bottle, St Martin's Lane, until he should return.
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