Page:Morley roberts--Blue Peter--sea yarns.djvu/184

168 still wallowed in the scuppers, for he had hit the rail with his head and given it a most tremendous and effectual thump. After a minute or two he stirred and spat out a mouthful of salt water. He also shook his head and rubbed it. Then he sat up and said—

"Well, I'm damned! What has happened?"

He shook his head again, and suddenly jumped to his feet. The miracle happened, and they all heard it. Tom Ruddle in the old days had the very finest foretopsail-yard ahoy voice that ever rang across the wastes of ocean. It came back to him now.

"Ain't you dogs got that topsail stowed yet?" he roared in accents that made the second mate on the yard shake in his rubber boots. "Oh, you slabsided gang of loafers, oh, you sojers, dig in and do something or before you know I'll be up there and boot you off the yard."

The entire crowd on the yard was so paralysed by what they heard that they turned and looked at him, and very promptly lost all that they had gained the last bout. To see a minister suddenly become a seaman and use such language was enough to scare them into loosing the jackstay and tumbling overboard.