You are all of two classes--those who
sicken in soul and leave after one trip, and those who make another trip
and are lost."
"Lost? How?"
Hungerford pressed his fingers hard on my breastbone, looked at me
enigmatically from under his well-hung brows, and replied: "Brains put
out to seed, morals put out to vegetate--that's 'lost.'"
"What about fifth officers?"
"Fifth officers work like navvies, and haven't time for foolishness.
They've got to walk the bridge, and practise the boats, and be
responsible for luggage--and here I am talking to you like an infallible
undergraduate, while the lascars are in endless confusion with a
half-dozen pieces of baggage, and the first officer foams because I'm not
there to set them right. I leave you to your dreams. Good-bye."
Hungerford was younger than myself, but he knew the world, and I was
flattered by these uncommon remarks, because he talked to no one else on
the ship in the same way. He never sought to make friends, had a thorough
contempt for social trifling, and shrugged his shoulders at the "swagger"
of some of the other officers. I think he longed for a different kind of
sea-life, so accustomed had he been to adventurous and hardy ways.
Pages:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25