The Captain took his sights--a mate below Noted the times; they shouted to each other, The Captain quick with "Stop," the answer slow, Repeating slowly one height then another. The swooping clipper stumbled through the smother, The ladder brasses in the sunlight burned, The Dauber waited till the Captain turned.
There stood the Dauber, humbled to the bone, Waiting to speak. The Captain let him wait, Glanced at the course, and called in even tone, "What is the man there wanting, Mr. Mate?" The logship clattered on the grating straight, The reel rolled to the scuppers with a clatter, The Mate came grim: "Well, Dauber, what's the matter?"
"Please, sir, they spoiled my drawings." "Who did?" "They." "Who's they?" "I don't quite know, sir." "Don't quite know, sir? Then why are you aft to talk about it, hey? Whom d'you complain of?" "No one." "No one?" "No, sir." "Well, then, go forward till you've found them. Go, sir. If you complain of someone, then I'll see. Now get to hell! and don't come bothering me."
"But, sir, they washed them off, and some they cut. Look here, sir, how they spoiled them." "Never mind. Go shove your head inside the scuttle butt, And that will make you cooler. You will find Nothing like water when you're mad and blind. Where were the drawings? in your chest, or where?" "Under the long-boat, sir; I put them there."
"Under the long-boat, hey? Now mind your tip. I'll have the skids kept clear with nothing round them; The long-boat ain't a store in this here ship. Lucky for you it wasn't I who found them. If I had seen them, Dauber, I'd have drowned them. Now you be warned by this. I tell you plain-- Don't stow your brass-rags under boats again.
"Go forward to your berth." The Dauber turned. The listeners down below them winked and smiled, Knowing how red the Dauber's temples burned, Having lost the case about his only child. His work was done to nothing and defiled, And there was no redress: the Captain's voice Spoke, and called "Painter," making him rejoice.
The Captain and the Mate conversed together. "Drawings, you tell me, Mister?" "Yes, sir; views: Wiped off with turps, I gather that's his blether. He says they're things he can't afford to lose. He's Dick, who came to sea in dancing shoes, And found the dance a bear dance. They were hidden Under the long-boat's chocks, which I've forbidden."