forth on the night. Coffee, fish, cheese, foul clothing, vermin of
miscellaneous sorts, paraffin oil, sulphurous coke, steaming leather,
engine oil--all combined their various scents into one marvellous
compound which struck the senses like a blow that stunned almost every
faculty. Oh, ladies, have pity on the hardly entreated! Once or twice
Ferrier was obliged to go on deck from the fetid kennel, and he left a
man to watch the sufferer. The shrill wind seemed sweet to the taste and
scent, the savage howl of tearing squalls was better than the creak of
dirty timbers and the noise of clashing fish-boxes; but the young man
always returned to his post and tried his best to cheer the maimed
sailor.

"Does the rolling hurt you badly, my man?"

"Oh! you're over kind to moither yourself about me, sir. She du give me
a twist now and then, but, Lord's sake, what was it like before you
come! I doan't fare to know about heaven, but I should say, speakin' in
my way, this is like heaven, if I remember yesterday."

"Have you ever been hurt before?"

"Little things, sir--crushed fingers, sprained foot, bruises when you
tumbles, say runnin' round with the trawl warp. But we doan't a-seem to
care for them so much. We're bred to patience, you see; and you're
bound to act up to your breedin'. That is it, sir; bred to patience."

"And has no doctor been out here yet?"

"What could he du? He can't fare to feel like us. When it comes a breeze
he wants a doctor hisself, and how would that suit?"