I promised that I would not mention it, and I kept my word; but circumstances which the reader will learn in the sequel have freed me from the condition. Nobody can quiz him now.
We gained our station off the coast of Perpignan; and as soon as we made the land, we were most provokingly driven off by a severe gale. I am not about to make any remarks about the gale, for one storm is so like another; but I mention it, to account for a conversation which took place, and with which I was very much amused. I was near to the captain when he sent for Mr Muddle, the carpenter, who had been up to examine the main-topsail yard, which had been reported as sprung.
"Sprung, sir, most decidedly; but I think we'll be able to _mitigate_ it."
"Will you be able to secure it for the present, Mr Muddle?" replied the captain, rather sharply.
"We'll _mitigate_ it, sir, in half an hour."
"I wish that you would use common phrases when you speak to me, Mr Muddle. I presume, by mitigate, you mean to say that you can secure it. Do you mean so, sir, or do you not?"
"Yes, sir, that is what I mean, most decidedly. I hope no offence, Captain Savage; but I did not intend to displease you by my language."
"Very good, Mr Muddle," replied the captain; "it's the first time that I have spoken to you on the subject, recollect that it will be the last."
"The first time!" replied the carpenter, who could not forget his philosophy; "I beg your pardon, Captain Savage, you found just the same fault with me on this quarter-deck 27,672 years ago, and--"
"If I did, Mr Muddle," interrupted the captain, very angrily, "depend upon it that at the same time I ordered you to go aloft, and attend to your duty, instead of talking nonsense on the quarter-deck; and, although, as you say, you and I cannot recollect it, if you did not obey that order instantaneously, I also put you in confinement, and obliged you to leave the ship as soon as she returned to port. Do you understand me, sir?"
"I rather think, sir," replied the carpenter, humbly touching his hat, and walking to the main rigging, "that no such thing took place, for I went up immediately, as I do now; and," continued the carpenter, who was incurable, as he ascended the rigging, "as I shall again in another 27,672 years."