The Marine Superintendent, dear old Daddy Hewitt — now long since passed beyond — put me on the carpet, and gave me the darndest dressing down I ever had in my life; but before making his final decision, he insisted on my giving him full and complete details. Thinking that as I had the order of the boot anyway, it was of little consequence how I told it, or how he received it, I simply told it in my own words, neither hiding nor elaborating anything. I suppose I enthused a bit towards the end, for I noticed that he kept putting his hand up and rubbing his old grey beard — not that I paid much attention — until, just as I had finished, he went off into a roar of laughter. My dejected spirits immediately shot up, and I thought, “Come, it isn’t so bad if he can laugh,” and in the end it wasn’t. He picked up my resignation which was lying in front of him, tore it in half, and growled out, “Get out of here, and back on board your ship.”
I was taken out of the Australian Line as it was not thought advisable for me to go back until things had simmered down a bit. As a matter of fact, in effect, I got slight promotion, through being transferred to the Atlantic, but before finishing with Australia I must just give this example of the wonderful Australian hospitality we experienced whilst in Sydney.
These boys and I had been across the harbour to Rosecutter’s Bay (sic), and had decided to have a ramble along the cliffside, catching lizards, crabs, and so forth, when I suddenly realised that I had left my good watch in the boat, and with one of the boys, who volunteered to come with me, went off back. The other two went on, Watson, of course, one of them. Roach and I sat there on the gunwhale of the boat dangling our feet in the water, for half an hour or so, when we suddenly heard hails and yells from Watson and Freke who suddenly appeared bounding down the cliff with two men in pursuit. Roach and I shoved the boat off, turned her round stern on, hoisted the mainsail, and stood waiting, up to our knees in water. When the two men saw this manњuvre, and that evidently these boys were from the boat, they stopped. Watson and Freke tore across the beach and into the water. We all tumbled on board and sheeted home.
They were in convulsions of laughter, and could hardly explain, when I asked them with some annoyance, what on earth they had been up to. If there was any possible mischief to be got into, trust Watson to be in it. His story was that they were returning to the boat along the top of a cliff, when they came to a fence that reached right to the edge. In the fence was a gate. The only alternative to returning the way they had come, was to open the gate and walk into what proved to be a garden. They walked in, and the path led them up to a house. Around the house was the invariable wide, sun screened veranda. On this veranda was a tea table, tea already made and the table all set out with cakes, fruit, and all the etceteras that appeal to the heart of a hungry boy. With inconceivable cheek, Watson planted himself in a chair and invited Freke to a cup of tea. Freke, although he should have known better, sat down, and they both sailed in to a downright good tuck in. In the middle of it, Watson, who was facing the hall of the house, noticed in the shadows, a lady and two gentlemen, calmly standing watching the whole proceeding. “Cave!” yelled Watson, and made his exit. The two gentlemen, who proved to be father and son, came running out, and called to them to stop. As Watson emphatically said, “We were not doing any stopping.”
“Well,” I said, “of course, you are for it this time.”
Although they had only duck pants and soft shirts on, their badge cap must have given them away. Anyway, they were the only midshipmen in Sydney at that time, and I think everyone on board the Medic was far too well-known for them not to have been spotted. I decided there was only one thing to do, and that was to get back as soon as we could next day and make full apologies, for although it might only be a joke, played on the spur of the moment, if it got into cold print it would look beastly. So next day back to the beach we went, and, in a weak moment, I gave way to their entreaties that I should go up and make peace for them.
I went up, and the lady of the house came to the door. I commenced “I’ve come to apologise for the outrageous behaviour of those two young midshipmen yesterday.” I got no further. Here you have the true Australian.
“Oh, don’t say a word about it,” she said. I thought those two boys were off the Medic. We thoroughly enjoyed the joke. We called them to come back. We wanted them to join us — but they wouldn’t”
“No,” I said, “they told me you had called them, but, as they put it, ‘they were not stopping.’ You see they are not used to your Australian ways. In England such a thing would not be looked upon in the light of a joke, by any means.”
Nothing would satisfy her but that I should bring the boys up to the house, and she would give them tea, right there and then. I could have hugged her.
I went back to the boys, pulling a long face, and said that nothing but their personal attendance and an abject apology would meet the case. “Come on, now,” I said, “and take your medicine.” They came, a most dejected looking pair. And their blank amazement was really well worth seeing, when Mrs. Penrose, the dear old motherly soul, almost threw her arms around them. She gave them all they could eat, and far more than was good for them. From that hour, her place was open house to every officer and midshipman on board, particularly the midshipmen. Parties and picnics, afloat and ashore, during the remainder of the time we were in Sydney, and very loth they were to leave it.
Poor old Watson!
When in Cape Town, we both tried to join the S.A. Light Horse. We couldn’t get a scrap of help, and unless we left the ship, they would not look at us. We tried all we knew how, to get the Powers to use their influence with the White Star Line, to sign us off, but there was nothing doing, and as I couldn’t afford to burn my boats, we went home. Having got home, the glamour of war, to me, had faded to a certain extent, and in any case, I realised I had got to stick at sea, and stick to the company, if I was going to do any good at all. Watson was younger and went back — and he stayed there. Shot in action on the Tugela River.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
GREYHOUNDS OF THE ATLANTIC
With the exception of one other voyage to Australia, which, as a matter of fact, although promotion at the time, was actually a punishment voyage, for a certain scrape I got into, the whole of my twenty years with the White Star Line, was spent on the Atlantic service: fifteen in the mail boats, and if ever there was a kill or cure, it was a Western Ocean mail boat in winter time.
In those days, although the ships were much smaller, everything was devoted to making a passage, with the result that the ship was driven smashing through everything and anything in the way of weather, pretty well regardless of damage done. Those ships were stronger in proportion than the mammoths of today.
I have seen a big modern liner push a plate in, where the old time ship would have just bumped and bounced off without a scrap of damage. Three times in the old Majestic I have seen the look-out cage, situated half way up the fore-lowermast, and built of steel, flattened in against the mast, but little or no damage on deck.
The officers’ quarters were situated on the fore deck, and formed a kind of breakwater to the saloon. Immense nets were spread from the fore part of our quarters to the after part of the fo’c’sle to break up the seas as they came thundering on board. The ports with their inch-thick glass, were protected in bad weather with thick oak shutters with small two-inch bulls-eyes let into them. Notwithstanding these precautions, one afternoon, for instance, we shipped a sea, or, to be more correct, we drove into and under a sea, that dropped on top of us; and the first thing it touched was the nets. These it tore to pieces, and struck the fore part of our place with such force that although built of steel, and of immense strength, the fore part was completely bent in. The glass bull’s eye was driven through the inner port, and a piece of this glass actually took a cup out of the hand of an officer sitting at the table having afternoon tea, leaving the handle in his hand. Any meal in those circumstances, was a series of gymnastics, and although not amusing at the time, very often became the subject of an interesting yarn when swapping lies with kindred spirits, later on.