Judge — August 22, 1885 — page 4: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

A GHOST ON A MAN-OF-WAR. Jack Servenmalet and his Companions have Sultry Night After a sultry d not long ago, Jack | Servenmalet and the carpenter’s mate were | pacing up and down on the port side of the | deck of the big man-of-war at the foot of West ‘Twenty-sixth Street, talking of old times while the second-class apprentice, with his | head on the scupper block was sleeping | against the bulwarks. In the forward cabin in the poop one of the lieutenants sat by his table reading a blanket-sheet evening ps per by the light of a student’s lamp. He nodded now and then, as the night deepened and an occasional breath of wind floated down from some place, no one could tell where, and final- ly being wholly overcome by the soothing in- fluences, he laid one hand, with paper in it in the open port, rested his head on the back of his chair and thus went off fast asleep. On shore people noticed that the little gusts of wind made whirligigs that danced along the streets throwing dust and bits of paper into the air. Jack and the carpenter's mate also felt the breezes that drifted abont, coming first over one rail and then over the other, fanning the bronzed cheeks of the ilors, and Jack said: “These 'ere cat's paws is what a sweet- heart 0’ mine told me oncet was seffers. ck,’ says she, ‘they’s the seffers as comes from the angel’s wings what’s floatin’ around sailor men takin’ care on em,’ she says, which it were a wery proper sentiment for her as didn’t know that a rain squall with lots of hghtning was a brewin.”” “Maybe they is from angels arter all,” | said the carpenter's mate. ‘* Leastways it | are allurs on such nights as these when sper- | rits comes back to the places as they used to know on when they was in the flesh, I mind when I was in the merchant service, The mate, which his name was Ezckel and the old man called him Zeke, was cdicated in Liverpool packets and never had no man- ners. He used to pound the man reglar three times a day. One day we was stowin the foretopsail in a gale of wind off the Horn. Dick Johnson as was in the bunt did somethin’ or nuther, and the mate he ran up the riggin’ and jumped on him. Dick he tumbled over the yard and fell ker- slump ondeck. Just afore he died he cursed Zeke and the ship with the blood a bubblin’ over his lips. Sich curses as them sticks, and the men all said as it was sure that Dick *ud come back and haunt the ship. THE JUDGE. very wide, 5 ‘The lad, like all the bright and intell | minutes later, te immediat deck. HL an Adventure on a ' uid: “Whatever it it began to creep penter’s mate. and erceping on a too late for that, be run, they both s they had. were going to <oTwarn’t three days afore Jim Sykes Bristol Hen, as was Dick’s chums, standin’ by the spanker shect ‘cause w shift of wind suddint-like and had to jibe her over, and the mate was standin’ on the lee rail.” ‘Aye, aye, sir!’ says Jim, and lets go the sheet and the spanker boom knocked the mate into kingdom come and busted itself agin the mizzen riggin’ afore you could say Jack Robinson. th that the old man and the second mate was out on deck. ‘ What did you let that ‘ere sheet go for?’ says the Captain, gatherin’ a pump brake. ‘You told me to, sir,’ says Jir “What? ’ says the Captain. ‘Taxes pardin’ sir, but you sticks your head outen the door thar and you says wery distinct for to let go that ’ere sheet, and we does it.’ ‘True for | it,’ says Bristol. Then the old man what never hadn’t sticked hished outen the cabin, he knows and we all knows that Dick come back.” The two men walked up and down the | deck in silence for some time, the sound of their steps being very distinct after the car- poner mate had aie talking. It was nard to tell which had been most affected by the story of the revenge taken by Dick’s ghost, for both were silent for half an hour, | and then another breath of air came whirl- ing slowly down, stirring the windsail that hung limp over a hatchway and causing Jack to mutter something about ‘ more angel wings a-flutterin’,” while he tried to laugh in a sickly way, and then glanced sharply into the mizzen rigging. ‘They were walking aft then, but at once started forward and had taken five or six steps when the windsail was inflated for a moment by another breath of air, and then a slight rustle was heard in the direction of the cabin. ‘The men stopped and looked around. They saw nothing and were about to start on, when the noise was repeated and the long pennant that had dropped from the mizzen truck suddenly seemed to rise directly up in line with the mast. Jack glanced aloft and saw this unusual movement, and he was just going to call the attention of the car- penters mate to it when a more decided rustling was heard, and then something white and without shape rolled in over the port rail, It dropped to the deck, where it remained quiet. Just then the second-class | apprentice woke up, and opening his eyes | the aj nt, and Zz plain the cause of the y followed the appearance of the strang | fetched him one between the eyes, | their feet | but I yparition, new race of American naval seamen, was ts singled ont by the lieutenant, three wild commotion which apparition on “T thought I must have been dreaming when I woke up, sir, and saw what looked like the rail just forward of the mizzen rigging. the deck, never making the least noise and there stopped and quivered as if it was afraid of something. tai see anything, I looked around ‘They were both staring at it very hi end then on the other like landlubbers marking time. is sir, I don’t know, but after a minute or two cross the deck right Mter creeping a little gether and turned a somerset n, and laughed just as it did before. carpenter’s mate visibly. both started as if to get a caps wee girl, dressed all in white, drop over It floated gently to ‘To make sure whether tJuck and the carpenter's mate. ‘dand standing first on one foot ds Jack and the car- ws it gathered itself to- chuckling to itself in a rattly v A few feet further on it flopped over a It affecting J and the When it Janghed the second time they n barat the rail, but it seemed e the ghost making for them on the nared off ready to receive it with the best Although I was t I'd been ordered to by the Cap seared I couldn't have moved if in, I couldn’t help noticing that they were facing each other and within handy reach, just as if they ve ont some grudge that had been ‘aching them | nd I guess the ghost noticed it too, for it turned two summersets without stopping, laughed louder than ever and then, while the ribbons on their hats fluttered, it gave a yell that could have been heard in Hoboken and rose up between them like the shadow of a man twelve feet high and seemed to dare them to hit it. Neither one of them flinched, sir. They both struck out together, but the ghost didn’t have any substance to it and Jack landed his right fall on the carpenter's mate’s nose just as the carpenter's mate The shock knocked them both off their pins, sir, and stretched them on the deck, while the ghost, yelling like mad, flopped its arms and plunged into the windsail. Before you could tell it, sir, those two men were on n, with their daddies up, and thumping y at cach other, and thinking that it was an awful solid ghost they’d got between them.” “True for it, sir,” said ~The ghost didn’t never scem to mind the clip [ give him no more ner if we'd whistled at him, but whether we was knocked down by the ghost or whether we knocked each other down, as the boy says, is more nor I_ knows, don't believe the carpenter’s mate ‘ud hit an old friend, sir.” ‘The officer looked puzzled for a minute and then he went to the cabin and looked in. When he returned he ordered the apprentice to goto the deck below and look up the indsail to see if the ghost could be seen there. The lad said ‘Aye, aye, sir, but moved hesitatingly till Jack said he would go along. When they returned from the deck below Jack was hanging back as if he wished to escape observation, and the boy carried a wad of paper. There was nothing into the windsail, he said blithely, “only this newspaper was lying on the deck.” “It's mine,” said the officer. “I was reading it before I fell asleep, and let it blow out the port and in over the rail to scare the anchor watch.” JOHN R. SPEAKS, Ix Avstria all patent medicines are tested by the government. As a Repub- lican, we favor applying this plan to our present administration. Let the cabinet officers take turns as testers, then the heads of bureaus, and afterwards all the new ap- pointes. comicbooks.com