by Dudley Pope
Ramage was still standing at the entryport watching the bustle alongside the ship when Aitken came up to him. 'When do you want to bring your furniture on board, sir? With the guns stowed and the painters finished in your cabin, we're ready for you.'
'Very well, let's say the day after tomorrow: that will give me time to let the shopkeepers know when to deliver.'
'Have you any idea when we are expected to sail, sir?'
'No, neither when or where to. Six months' provisions can mean the Mediterranean, West Indies, America or the East Indies.'
'I hope it's not back to the Mediterranean, again,' Aitken said. 'I think I've seen enough of it to keep me going for a while.'
'It's about the only place where there's any action at the moment,' Ramage pointed out. 'We were kept busy there with the Calypso.'
'True, but the seventy-fours in Naples seem to be having a dull time.'
'I'm sure their officers were having a busy time socially,' Ramage said ironically. 'I believe Naples is one of the more favoured stations as far as that is concerned.'
The new gunner and the chaplain arrived on board within an hour of each other, and it was as if a whimsical Admiralty had sent two complete opposites. The gunner, William Higgins, came from Boston, in Lincolnshire, and was a tall, thin and stooped man with a dry sense of humour. He was going bald, but what was left of his hair was fair and greying, trimmed like a monk's tonsure.
The chaplain, Benjamin Brewster, brought to mind Friar Tuck: he was a jolly, round little man whom Ramage liked on sight, thankful that the first chaplain he had ever had on board a ship he commanded looked as though he would be an asset and likely to be popular with the men. The trouble with most chaplains, he knew, was that they were too closely associated with the wardroom, more interested in their food than the spiritual welfare of the ship's company.
Ramage was determined that right from the start Brewster should understand his views, and he took the man out to the balcony of his cabin and walked him up and down while questioning and telling him.
'As far as I am concerned,' Ramage said, 'the chaplain is responsible for the spiritual health and happiness of every man on board - that will be a ship's company of 625 men. We have a first-class surgeon who will make sure that their bodies are healthy. I am concerned that we have a first-class chaplain who will make sure they are healthy in spirit.'
'I understand you, sir,' Brewster said. 'But I hope you will leave me to do it in my own way.'
'How do you mean?' Ramage asked suspiciously. 'Well, sir, I left my last ship because of the captain's attitude,' Brewster said frankly. 'He was a man with very narrow and fixed religious views. In my opinion he did not need a chaplain: he interfered so much - even to providing notes for sermons - that he did the chaplain's work for him. Except, of course, the men never went to him for help or advice, as they would have done with the chaplain.'
'You mean that they did not come to you?'
'No, they didn't. They should have done, but they were intimidated by the captain giving them long sermons and conducting prayers - doing my job, in fact. That was why I left the ship and applied for a transfer to another of the King's ships.'
Ramage appreciated the man's frankness and replied in kind. 'Well, Brewster, I am not going to interfere with your work while you are chaplain of this ship and providing you carry out your duties satisfactorily - in fact I have only one rule for you to start with: no long sermons. Ten minutes is quite long enough, whether the men are sitting there in the freezing cold or under a Tropical sun.'
'I'm a ten-minute man myself, sir,' chuckled Brewster. 'My last captain reckoned on a minimum of half an hour. If he was delivering the sermon himself he could go on for an hour.'
Ramage shuddered at the thought. 'All right, Brewster, ten minutes of crisp talk, and rousing hymns where the men can sing their hearts out.'
That evening he gave instructions to Jessop to call at the shops next day and arrange for deliveries on board the Dido on the day following.
He found Sarah sitting in their room at The George busy embroidering a cot cover for him. She had chosen a design of griffins, the Ramage family crest, sewn in the correct colours of blue and gold.
'I am having to use yellow thread instead of gold,' she explained. 'I can't find any gold thread in Portsmouth - gold colour, anyway: actual gold thread would be heavy, and I'd never get it done before you sail.'
'Ah yes,' Ramage said, 'for once the Daily Report to the port admiral had some definite information today: I put down that we will be finished with the dockyard men - painters, caulkers and so on - in four days' time. We shall have taken on all the provisions and water by then, so it will be just a question of taking on powder and we are ready to sail.'
'And then you pack me off back to London?'
Ramage nodded. 'The admiral may want me on board before then: Jessop will be telling the shops to deliver the furniture and things the day after tomorrow, so I shan't have the excuse that the ship isn't ready for me.'
'Has the smell of new paint gone? You know how that makes you ill.'
'It's almost gone. All the ports are open so there's a good draught blowing through.'
He suddenly realized that Sarah was quietly crying.
'The time has gone so quickly,' she said, as he sat on the arm of her chair and held her to him. 'I had so looked forward to us being alone at Aldington, left in peace, and we haven't even been able to go down there.'
Suddenly Ramage felt a longing to be alone with Sarah at their home in Kent, walking, riding, and just lazing during the day, and making love at night, content just to be together after such a long time spent apart.
'At the end of this commission I'll go on half-pay for six months,' he said. 'You'll be tired of my company long before the time is up.'
'Can you be sure of being employed again after six months?'
Ramage thought of all the Gazette letters, and his recent unexpected promotion. 'Yes. I may have to wait a month or two, but their Lordships would find me another ship.'
'Are you making a promise?'
Ramage shrugged his shoulders. 'How can I? I may not even survive to the end of the commission. This one may last a couple of years - I don't even know where I am going.'
Sarah dabbed her eyes. 'No, it's unfair of me to ask you to promise: it's enough that you think about it. But it's so lonely at Aldington when you're at sea. I love the place, but I get lonely.'
'Ask your parents to stay. The marquis will enjoy the riding and your mother will enjoy chasing the gardener to plant more flowers!'
'The day after tomorrow, when the furniture is delivered, may I come to the ship again?'
'I was hoping you would, just to keep an eye on things and make sure that Silkin stows everything away properly.'
'Silkin will hate having the captain's wife interfering, but I want to see how the curtains and cushions look. It's one thing seeing the material in the shop before they are made, but it will be another seeing them in the ship. I hope I've made the right choices. I'm beginning to worry now. You have to live with them.'
CHAPTER FIVE
As Ramage left the ship for the port admiral's office the next morning, the first ships of the West Indies convoy were sailing into Spithead and the three junior lieutenants were just setting off with pressgangs in the boats. Ramage knew that it was a gamble: there were other ships in Portsmouth and at Spithead who needed more men, and they would be sending off pressgangs at the same time. He could picture the men in the homecoming West Indiamen watching with sinking hearts as the boats approached: it must be a cruel torture to be snatched for the King's service when so near home after a long voyage abroad.
But the fact remained that the King's ships had to be manned: there was a long and bitter war to be fought, and so far most of it had been fought at sea, so that seamen were needed. How many would he get from the convoy? It could be as many as a hundred or as few as twenty-five. One thing was fairly certain - most of them would be prim
e seamen. He was thankful that he now had a full complement of Marines - an unexpected bonus adding 123 men to the 225 or so brought over from the Calypso. At the moment, then, he was short of 277 men. He could expect to sail short of seventy-seven men, so he needed a couple of hundred, more if possible. A hundred men from the West Indies convoy and another hundred from the convoy due in from the Cape - was that too much to hope for? He decided it was. He would end up having to send pressgangs combing the countryside, apart from printing posters appealing to men to volunteer. He wondered whether posters were really worth the trouble. His name was well enough known to men who might volunteer, but they would be put off by the fact that he was no longer commanding a frigate. A frigate was more likely to get prize money - much more than a seventy-four. Frigates equalled prize money, seventy-fours did not: it was as simple as that.
When he arrived at the port admiral's house and was led into Vice-Admiral Rossiter's office, he at once noticed the heap of Daily Reports piled up on the desk. There was a smaller pile beside it, and he recognized his own writing.
Rossiter was friendly enough: his red face, greyish-silver hair and general manner still reminded Ramage of a landowner, and it was still a surprise to see him in uniform.
The admiral tapped the smaller pile of reports. 'You seem to be nearly ready to sail - except for men.'
'I'm hoping to get some prime seamen from the West India convoy which is just coming in.'
Rossiter sniffed. 'Fifty if you're lucky. The Dido isn't the only ship needing men.'
'No, sir, but she's the only one that concerns me,' Ramage said ruefully.
Rossiter gave a brisk laugh. 'You haven't received your orders yet from the Admiralty?'
'No sir: I haven't the faintest idea where I'm going.'
'Well, they ordered you to provision for six months, so you won't be hanging around the Channel, unless they want you for blockade duty off Brest.'
Ramage sighed. 'I hadn't thought of that.'
'It's not too bad in the summer,' Rossiter said. 'It's the winter that sorts out the men from the boys. You know Brest?'
'I was caught on land near there when the war began again - I was on my honeymoon.'
'Oh yes, I remember hearing something about it. Well, you'll be familiar with the Black Rocks. "Close up to the Black Rocks in an easterly",' the admiral quoted, repeating the rule for the blockade, an easterly wind being the only one with which the French could sail out of port. 'You should get your orders in a day or so - I shall tell the Admiralty by telegraph today that you are nearly ready to sail. I expect your orders will come down with the night messenger.'
'I still need men, sir,' Ramage reminded him.
'I'll send over as many as I can. Don't be too hopeful, but I can skim a few men from some ships that have full complements. Have you all your officers yet?'
'A fifth lieutenant to come, that's all. The gunner and chaplain arrived yesterday.'
'How is her ladyship? Are you still at The George?'
'She's well, and yes, we are still there.'
'I still haven't met your wife,' Rossiter grumbled.
'We haven't seen much of each other since we were married,' Ramage said. 'I had just started some leave when I was given command of the Dido.'
'You're hinting that you don't want me to order you to sleep on board yet.'
Ramage laughed and said: 'My furniture won't be delivered until tomorrow. At this moment the cabin, coach and bedplace are bare of anything except the 12-pounders.'
'I've never met a young husband at a loss for a reason to sleep on shore,' Rossiter said amiably. 'Let me know as soon as you receive orders from the Admiralty.'
The sails were swayed up to the yards by slings and bent on during the day: heavy and hard work. Southwick commented: 'It's a miracle how much we've got done so far: fitting out a ship of the line with a frigate's complement is like being on a treadmill.'
The boats with the pressgangs came back just after the midday meal, a delighted Aitken reporting to Ramage: 'We got ninety-seven men altogether. Clapton's busy getting their names down in the Muster Book. At least half of them should be prime seamen.'
'Let's hope we're as lucky with the Cape convoy. It's due in tomorrow.'
'I don't see why we shouldn't,' Aitken said. 'Kenton said there were not many other gangs out.'
'The admiral said he would send over some men. A hundred from the Cape convoy and fifty from the admiral, and we'll be able to sail.'
'We were lucky to get our full complement of Marines,' Aitken commented. 'Rennick says they're well trained, and he's quite content with the two lieutenants.'
'I'm more concerned with his four sergeants and four corporals: they are the backbone of the force,' Ramage said.
'We'll soon know,' Aitken said. 'I've got them bending on sails, and hoisting them up from the sail room is just the work for those Marines - some of them are giants.'
'How many of the new men are volunteering?' Ramage asked.
'When I last saw Clapton, most of them were taking the bounty. I think about one in ten was being put down as "pressed".'
Every man brought on board by a pressgang was given the chance of 'volunteering' and thus qualifying for the bounty paid to volunteers. It meant that 'vol.' was put against his name, instead of 'p' for pressed. Apart from being paid the bounty, h did not affect the way that a man was treated in the ship, but it did mean that a volunteer usually served more willingly - he had none of the resentment often felt by a man who had insisted on being rated 'pressed'.
Ramage, feeling bored, said: 'Let's make an inspection of the ship. Then I'll fill in the Daily Report and send it across to the admiral. He seemed quite content when I saw him this morning. Anyway, he did not complain.'
As he followed the first lieutenant out of the cabin and crossed the halfdeck, Ramage began to feel depressed again: the ship looked a mess. There were heaps of canvas, more rolled up sails waiting to be swayed up to the yards, and the decks were filthy. There was no need to comment on them to Aitken: there was no room to scrub them because ropes and sails took up every spare inch of space. Frayed ends of rope littered the gangways, thrown down as men cut them off the coil. They had various names: cows' tails - which they resembled - or 'Irish pennants', a title no doubt unfair to Ireland.
At least the guns looked tidy; they stood against the ports, tackles and breechings secure, the barrels shiny with a coating of new black gun lacquer and the carriages and trucks newly painted in yellow. The 32-pounders were damned big guns, he thought, his eye much more accustomed to the Calypso's 12-pounders. But the Dido was a ship of the line: if she ever fought in the line of battle she would be expected to give a good account of herself, and most of the punch would come from those 32-pounders.
Up on the fo'c'sle painters were giving the last few dabs to the belfry, but the ship's bell itself was in need of polishing. Ramage could see from the way that Aitken eyed it (as though it had an unpleasant smell) that he could not wait for the painters to get out of the way and the paint to dry enough for him to set men to work with brick dust restoring a polish to the tarnished metal.
The huge mooring bitts were freshly painted; the knightheads and catheads, too, had been carefully touched up. But the Dido did not look like a ship yet. In fact, Ramage decided, she looked more like a warehouse where a lot of gear had been dumped on the floor without rhyme or reason.
'When do you expect the new fifth lieutenant, sir?' Aitken asked unexpectedly.
'I should have thought he'd have arrived by now. He's the last of the officers.'
'I wonder if he will fit in,' Aitken speculated. 'We were lucky with Hill; he's settled down very well, and gets on with Kenton and Martin. And Southwick, too. I think the old boy is quite fond of him.'
'Yes, he has a nice dry sense of humour,' Ramage said. 'And plenty of initiative.'
'We're lucky that all three of them have plenty of that. And young Orsini, too.'
'Yes. I am going to make him a mast
er's mate. That'll keep him ahead of these other midshipmen.'
Ramage was unusual in always referring to them as 'midshipmen': it was usual to refer to them as the 'young gentlemen', although their official rank - how they were listed in the Muster Book - was midshipmen. For years now Orsini had been the only midshipman on board the Calypso, and for that reason had quite unconsciously built himself up a privileged position, because it was usual for a frigate to have up to a dozen midshipmen on board. Ramage did not have a very high opinion of their usefulness, and Orsini had been lucky because, being the only one, he had been given extra responsibility, quite apart from the fact that his mathematics and navigation received Southwick's undivided attention, although mathematics were never going to be Orsini's strongest subject.
The huge foresail had been hoisted up and topmen were busy overhead securing it to the yard. The mainsail was already bent on to its yard and the maintopsail was being secured. Ramage was thankful that the shot for the 32-pounders, 24-pounders and 12-pounders had been left on board: collecting them from the stores and hoisting them in would have been a miserable job for the men. There was only the powder to come. For safety's sake every ship being refitted unloaded her powder into the powder hulks - a precaution against fire causing catastrophic explosions that could lay waste much of Portsmouth.
As Ramage and Aitken continued their inspection of the fo'c'sle, one of the new midshipmen came hurrying up. 'Mr Kenton's compliments, sir, but the new fifth lieutenant has just arrived on board.'
'Tell him to get his gear below and present himself in the cabin in fifteen minutes,' Ramage said.
As the boy hurried off, Ramage commented to the first lieutenant: 'Talk of the Devil . . .'
They went down to the messdeck, and Ramage was glad all the ports were open, creating a draught to get rid of the smell of paint. He looked round at the guns, tables and forms. The painters had been busy with the guns and carriages; the tables and forms were well scrubbed. Overhead rammers, sponges and wormers were held up in racks, restricting even more the limited headroom.
