The water was as smooth as glass, and when
it was broad daylight, the men hung listlessly over the sides of the
boats, looking at the corals below, and watching the fish as they glided
between.
"I can't say, Mr Simple," said Mr Chucks to me in an under tone, "that I
think well of this expedition; and I have an idea that some of us will
lose the number of our mess. After a calm comes a storm; and how quiet
is everything now! But I'll take off my great coat, for the sun is hot
already. Coxswain, give me my jacket."
Mr Chucks had put on his great coat, but not his jacket underneath,
which he had left on one of the guns on the main deck, all ready to
change as soon as the heavy dew had gone off. The coxswain handed him
the jacket, and Mr Chucks threw off his great coat to put it on; but
when it was opened it proved, that by mistake he had taken away the
jacket, surmounted by two small epaulettes, belonging to Captain
Kearney, which the captain's steward, who had taken it out to brush, had
also laid upon the same gun.
"By all the nobility of England!" cried Mr Chucks, "I have taken away
the captain's jacket by mistake. Here's a pretty mess! if I put on my
great coat I shall be dead with sweating; if I put on no jacket I shall
be roasted brown; but if I put on the captain's jacket I shall be
considered disrespectful."
The men in the boats tittered; and Mr Phillott, who was in the launch
next to us, turned round to see what was the matter; O'Brien was sitting
in the stern-sheets of the launch with the first lieutenant, and I
leaned over and told them.
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