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- tuckers, and who stood making sly faces behind his back—was received by
all the Lieutenants in a body, their hats in their hands, and making a
prodigious scraping and bowing, as if they had just graduated at a
French dancing-school. Meanwhile, preserving an erect, inflexible, and
ram-rod carriage, and slightly touching his chapeau, the Captain made
his ceremonious way to the cabin, disappearing behind the scenes, like
the pasteboard ghost in Hamlet.
But these ceremonies are nothing to those in homage of the Commodore’s
arrival, even should he depart and arrive twenty times a day. Upon such
occasions, the whole marine guard, except the sentries on duty, are
marshalled on the quarter-deck, presenting arms as the Commodore passes
them; while their commanding officer gives the military salute with his
sword, as if making masonic signs. Meanwhile, the boatswain himself—not
a _boatswain’s mate_—is keeping up a persevering whistling with his
silver pipe; for the Commodore is never greeted with the rude whistle
of a boatswain’s subaltern; _that_ would be positively insulting. All
the Lieutenants and Midshipmen, besides the Captain himself, are drawn
up in a phalanx, and off hat together; and the _side-boys_, whose
number is now increased to ten or twelve, make an imposing display at
the gangway; while the whole brass band, elevated upon the poop, strike
up “See! the Conquering Hero Comes!” At least, this was the tune that
our Captain always hinted, by a gesture, to the captain of the band,
whenever the Commodore arrived from shore.
It conveyed a complimentary appreciation, on the Captain’s part, of the
Commodore’s heroism during the late war.
To return to the gig. As I did not relish the idea of being a sort of
body-servant to Captain Claret—since his gig-men were often called upon
to scrub his cabin floor, and perform other duties for him—I made it my
particular business to get rid of my appointment in his boat as soon as
possible, and the next day after receiving it, succeeded in procuring a
substitute, who was glad of the chance to fill the position I so much
undervalued.
And thus, with our counterlikes and dislikes, most of us
men-of-war’s-men harmoniously dove-tail into each other, and, by our
very points of opposition, unite in a clever whole, like the parts of a
Chinese puzzle. But as, in a Chinese puzzle, many pieces are hard to
place, so there are some unfortunate fellows who can never slip into
their proper angles, and thus the whole puzzle becomes a puzzle indeed,
which is the precise condition of the greatest puzzle in the world—this
man-of-war world itself.
CHAPTER XL.
SOME OF THE CEREMONIES IN A MAN-OF-WAR UNNECESSARY AND INJURIOUS.
The ceremonials of a man-of-war, some of which have been described in
the preceding chapter, may merit a reflection or two.
The general usages of the American Navy are founded upon the usages
that prevailed in the navy of monarchical England more than a century
ago; nor have they been materially altered since. And while both
England and America have become greatly liberalised in the interval;
while shore pomp in high places has come to be regarded by the more
intelligent masses of men as belonging to the absurd, ridiculous, and
mock-heroic; while that most truly august of all the majesties of
earth, the President of the United States, may be seen entering his
residence with his umbrella under his arm, and no brass band or
military guard at his heels, and unostentatiously taking his seat by
the side of the meanest citizen in a public conveyance; while this is
the case, there still lingers in American men-of-war all the stilted
etiquette and childish parade of the old-fashioned Spanish court of
Madrid. Indeed, so far as the things that meet the eye are concerned,
an American Commodore is by far a greater man than the President of
twenty millions of freemen.
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