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- 9105
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- 2026-01-30T20:48:36.274Z
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- start_line
- 9037
- text
- fierce a republican, and, by so doing, chastise his censoriousness.
“Braganza! _bragger_ it is,” he replied; “and a bragger, indeed. See
that feather in his cap! See how he struts in that coat! He may well
wear a green one, top-mates—he’s a green-looking swab at the best.”
“Hush, Jonathan,” said I; “there’s the _First Duff_ looking up. Be
still! the Emperor will hear you;” and I put my hand on his mouth.
“Take your hand away, White-Jacket,” he cried; “there’s no law up aloft
here. I say, you Emperor—you greenhorn in the green coat, there—look
you, you can’t raise a pair of whiskers yet; and see what a pair of
homeward-bounders I have on my jowls! _Don Pedro_, eh? What’s that,
after all, but plain Peter—reckoned a shabby name in my country. Damn
me, White-Jacket, I wouldn’t call my dog Peter!”
“Clap a stopper on your jaw-tackle, will you?” cried Ringbolt, the
sailor on the other side of him. “You’ll be getting us all into darbies
for this.”
“I won’t trice up my red rag for nobody,” retorted Jonathan. “So you
had better take a round turn with yours, Ringbolt, and let me alone, or
I’ll fetch you such a swat over your figure-head, you’ll think a Long
Wharf truck-horse kicked you with all four shoes on one hoof! You
Emperor—you counter-jumping son of a gun—cock your weather eye up aloft
here, and see your betters! I say, top-mates, he ain’t any Emperor at
all—I’m the rightful Emperor. Yes, by the Commodore’s boots! they stole
me out of my cradle here in the palace of Rio, and put that green-horn
in my place. Ay, you timber-head, you, I’m Don Pedro II., and by good
rights you ought to be a main-top-man here, with your fist in a
tar-bucket! Look you, I say, that crown of yours ought to be on my
head; or, if you don’t believe _that_, just heave it into the ring
once, and see who’s the best man.”
“What’s this hurra’s nest here aloft?” cried Jack Chase, coming up the
t’-gallant rigging from the top-sail yard. “Can’t you behave yourself,
royal-yard-men, when an Emperor’s on board?”
“It’s this here Jonathan,” answered Ringbolt; “he’s been blackguarding
the young nob in the green coat, there. He says Don Pedro stole his
hat.”
“How?”
“Crown, he means, noble Jack,” said a top-man.
“Jonathan don’t call himself an Emperor, does he?” asked Jack.
“Yes,” cried Jonathan; “that greenhorn, standing there by the
Commodore, is sailing under false colours; he’s an impostor, I say; he
wears my crown.”
“Ha! ha!” laughed Jack, now seeing into the joke, and willing to humour
it; “though I’m born a Briton, boys, yet, by the mast! these Don Pedros
are all Perkin Warbecks. But I say, Jonathan, my lad, don’t pipe your
eye now about the loss of your crown; for, look you, we all wear
crowns, from our cradles to our graves, and though in _double-darbies_
in the _brig_, the Commodore himself can’t unking us.”
“A riddle, noble Jack.”
“Not a bit; every man who has a sole to his foot has a crown to his
head. Here’s mine;” and so saying, Jack, removing his tarpaulin,
exhibited a bald spot, just about the bigness of a crown-piece, on the
summit of his curly and classical head.
- title
- Chunk 3