Modern Humour [antikvár]

False Colours w. w. jacobs 'Of course, there is a deal of bullying done at sea at times,' said the night/watchman thorg'-itfully. 'The men call it bullying an' the officers call it discipline, but it's the same thir g under another name. Still, it's fair in a way. It gets passed on fiom one co another. Everybody aboard a'most has got somebody to bully, except, perhaps, the boy; he 'as the worst of it, unless he can manage to get the ship's cat by itself occasionally. 'I don't think sailor'•men mind being bullied. I never 'eard of its putting one oiT'is feed yet, and that *s the main thing, arter all's said and done. 'Fust officers are often worse than skippers. In the fust place, they know they ain't skippers, an' that alone is enough to put 'em in a bad temper, especially if they've *ad their certifikit a good many years and can't get a vacancy. 'I remember, a good many years ago now, I was lying at Calcutta one time in the Peewit, as fine a barque as you'd wish to see, an' we 'ad a fust mate there as was a disgrace to 'is sects. A nasty, bullying, violent man, who used to call the hands names as tiiey didn't know the meanings of and what was no use looking in the dictionary for. 'There was one chap aboard, Bill Cousins, as he used to make a partickler mark of Bill 'ad the misfortin to 'ave red 'air, and the way the mate used to throw that in 'is face was disgraceful. Fortunately for us all, the skipper was a very decent sort of man, so that the mate was only at 'is worst when he wasn't by. 'We was sitting in the fo'c's'le at tea one arternoon, when Bill Cousins came down, an' we see at once 'e'd 'ad a turn with the mate. He sat all by hisself for some time, simmer/ ing, an then he broke out: "One o' these days I '11 swing for 'im; mark my words." 3