Читать книгу Round the Galley Fire онлайн

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“‘Hallo, shipmate!’ I sings out, seeing him making for the cabin door, ‘where are you bound to? Aren’t you happy where you are?’

“‘I’m going to lie down on one of the lockers,’ says he. ‘I feel half froze, and I shall be sick presently.’

“‘You may be half froze and sick too,’ says I, ‘but smother me, Mr. Bailiff, if you shall use the cabin.’

“‘Not use the cabin?’ says he, gaping at me, and talking as if there was something in his swaller; ‘d’ye mean to keep me on deck all night?’

“‘Don’t ask no questions,’ says I. ‘You’re here by French leave. Nobody wants you. If I had my way you’d be towing astern, with your neck in a bowline; and if all the rest o’ your tribe and the blooming ’tornies you sarve were tailed on in your wake, I’d be willing to woyage round the world, and never grumble if we took years in reaching home.’

“I was in a passion, which rose my woice, and the skipper, hearing me, comes over.

“‘Hallo, bailiff!’ says he, cheerfully; ‘not drowned yet, my lad? What d’ye think o’ the weather?’