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- CHAPTER XXX.
A PEEP THROUGH A PORT-HOLE AT THE SUBTERRANEAN PARTS OF A MAN-OF-WAR.
While now running rapidly away from the bitter coast of Patagonia,
battling with the night-watches—still cold—as best we may; come under
the lee of my white-jacket, reader, while I tell of the less painful
sights to be seen in a frigate.
A hint has already been conveyed concerning the subterranean depths of
the Neversink’s hold. But there is no time here to speak of the
_spirit-room_, a cellar down in the after-hold, where the sailor’s
“grog” is kept; nor of the _cabletiers_, where the great hawsers and
chains are piled, as you see them at a large ship-chandler’s on shore;
nor of the grocer’s vaults, where tierces of sugar, molasses, vinegar,
rice, and flour are snugly stowed; nor of the _sail-room_, full as a
sail-maker’s loft ashore—piled up with great top-sails and
top-gallant-sails, all ready-folded in their places, like so many white
vests in a gentleman’s wardrobe; nor of the copper and copper-fastened
_magazine_, closely packed with kegs of powder, great-gun and small-arm
cartridges; nor of the immense _shot-lockers_, or subterranean
arsenals, full as a bushel of apples with twenty-four-pound balls; nor
of the _bread-room_, a large apartment, tinned all round within to keep
out the mice, where the hard biscuit destined for the consumption of
five hundred men on a long voyage is stowed away by the cubic yard; nor
of the vast iron tanks for fresh water in the hold, like the reservoir
lakes at Fairmount, in Philadelphia; nor of the _paint-room_, where the
kegs of white-lead, and casks of linseed oil, and all sorts of pots and
brushes, are kept; nor of the _armoror’s smithy_, where the ship’s
forges and anvils may be heard ringing at times; I say I have no time
to speak of these things, and many more places of note.
But there is one very extensive warehouse among the rest that needs
special mention—_the ship’s Yeoman’s storeroom_. In the Neversink it
was down in the ship’s basement, beneath the berth-deck, and you went
to it by way of the _Fore-passage_, a very dim, devious corridor,
indeed. Entering—say at noonday—you find yourself in a gloomy
apartment, lit by a solitary lamp. On one side are shelves, filled with
balls of _marline, ratlin-stuf, seizing-stuff, spun-yarn_, and numerous
twines of assorted sizes. In another direction you see large cases
containing heaps of articles, reminding one of a shoemaker’s
furnishing-store—wooden _serving-mallets, fids, toggles_, and
_heavers:_ iron _prickers_ and _marling-spikes;_ in a third quarter you
see a sort of hardware shop—shelves piled with all manner of hooks,
bolts, nails, screws, and _thimbles;_ and, in still another direction,
you see a block-maker’s store, heaped up with lignum-vitae sheeves and
wheels.
Through low arches in the bulkhead beyond, you peep in upon distant
vaults and catacombs, obscurely lighted in the far end, and showing
immense coils of new ropes, and other bulky articles, stowed in tiers,
all savouring of tar.
But by far the most curious department of these mysterious store-rooms
is the armoury, where the spikes, cutlasses, pistols, and belts,
forming the arms of the boarders in time of action, are hung against
the walls, and suspended in thick rows from the beams overhead. Here,
too, are to be seen scores of Colt’s patent revolvers, which, though
furnished with but one tube, multiply the fatal bullets, as the naval
cat-o’-nine-tails, with a cannibal cruelty, in one blow nine times
multiplies a culprit’s lashes; so that when a sailor is ordered one
dozen lashes, the sentence should read one hundred and eight. All these
arms are kept in the brightest order, wearing a fine polish, and may
truly be said to _reflect_ credit on the Yeoman and his mates.
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