called him a pious little turd. But that had been over the theft of the pears from Classic Jones’s garden. Every boy in the school had eyed them as ripe for plunder, but Jones the headmaster was so free with the birch sapling that no one was brave enough to act. Each, though, seemed stalwart enough to accuse every other boy in the room of being a scaredycat, an accusation that the younger Nelson could not countenance.
‘I’ll go.’
‘Shut up, Horace,’ said William.
‘I will not, brother. I make a genuine offer. If you and the others will aid me in the manufacture of a rope I will pinch Jones’s pears.’
‘You don’t like pears,’ William muttered.
But he was too late. Others, less fearful that the younger Nelson might get a good flogging, had already set to with their bed sheets, twisting and knotting them to make the rope necessary to lower him from the first floor window. Within five minutes he was out, hands clasped hard over one of the knots, being eased down to the ground.
A windowful of heads and whispered jabbering watched him climb the pear tree. Hands shot out to direct him to the most fecund branches. His pillowcase was full when he descended, and was sent aloft before the thief, who arrived in the room to see that a goodly half of his haul had tooth marks in them already.
‘Here, Nelson. Have some.’
He waved away the pears pressed on him. ‘I cannot abide pears.’
‘So why did you steal them?’ demanded a frustrated William.
‘The others were afraid to, brother. I was not.’
In his own head now those words sounded as though they had emanated from a pious little turd. Was he that? How would he fare here in this berth? What would he become in the Navy? Would future nephews sit at table while he, like his heroic uncle, moved cruets and cutlery to describe a historic battle? Would he make his late mother and dour father proud of him? The terror of failure was very real, and it was with deep gratitude that he heard the gunner’s wife come to rouse them so that they could wash, say their prayers and partake of breakfast.
No cleaner or any more pious than other boys their age, they spent much of their time circumventing the strictures of the gunner’s wife. Midshipman Nelson, almost as his first lesson, learnt that she was a slave to flattery. Praise for her natural maternity, judiciously mingled with hints that there was a desirable woman in that huge, squat body, could usually melt the frown that appeared when she espied anything amiss.
He also realised quickly that, for all his height and need to shave, Dobree was weak in the article of discipline, more interested in peace, food and a good pipe than any exercise of authority. Two of the others, Rivers and a fifteen-year-old called Makepeace, exerted whatever terror was going in the berth. This mostly extended to stealing victuals from the plates of those too young, small or cowardly to challenge them. Like all societies of youngsters, they revelled in vulgarity, never using a proper expression where slang, preferably larded with filth, would do. And for all the books he had brought, none referred to nautical vernacular so that initially a lot of the conversation went over his head.
And then there were the ceremonies by which boys initiate others into their group. It was in these that Rivers and Makepeace showed that their attitude wasn’t entirely harmless. In an undermanned ship at anchor, some of the usual jokes could not be played. But fertile minds found plenty with which to tease. Dobree sent the new arrival to the Bosun, to ask for a long weight; to the yeoman of the sheets to demand a skyhook. Midshipman Buckle, only a year older than him, gave him a kid and sent him to the wardroom to demand that it be filled with the midshipman’s daily ration of claret. On the first day that the breeze blew with any strength, Midshipman Foley, the same age as Nelson but with two years’ experience, challenged him to a pissing
‘I’ll go.’
‘Shut up, Horace,’ said William.
‘I will not, brother. I make a genuine offer. If you and the others will aid me in the manufacture of a rope I will pinch Jones’s pears.’
‘You don’t like pears,’ William muttered.
But he was too late. Others, less fearful that the younger Nelson might get a good flogging, had already set to with their bed sheets, twisting and knotting them to make the rope necessary to lower him from the first floor window. Within five minutes he was out, hands clasped hard over one of the knots, being eased down to the ground.
A windowful of heads and whispered jabbering watched him climb the pear tree. Hands shot out to direct him to the most fecund branches. His pillowcase was full when he descended, and was sent aloft before the thief, who arrived in the room to see that a goodly half of his haul had tooth marks in them already.
‘Here, Nelson. Have some.’
He waved away the pears pressed on him. ‘I cannot abide pears.’
‘So why did you steal them?’ demanded a frustrated William.
‘The others were afraid to, brother. I was not.’
In his own head now those words sounded as though they had emanated from a pious little turd. Was he that? How would he fare here in this berth? What would he become in the Navy? Would future nephews sit at table while he, like his heroic uncle, moved cruets and cutlery to describe a historic battle? Would he make his late mother and dour father proud of him? The terror of failure was very real, and it was with deep gratitude that he heard the gunner’s wife come to rouse them so that they could wash, say their prayers and partake of breakfast.
No cleaner or any more pious than other boys their age, they spent much of their time circumventing the strictures of the gunner’s wife. Midshipman Nelson, almost as his first lesson, learnt that she was a slave to flattery. Praise for her natural maternity, judiciously mingled with hints that there was a desirable woman in that huge, squat body, could usually melt the frown that appeared when she espied anything amiss.
He also realised quickly that, for all his height and need to shave, Dobree was weak in the article of discipline, more interested in peace, food and a good pipe than any exercise of authority. Two of the others, Rivers and a fifteen-year-old called Makepeace, exerted whatever terror was going in the berth. This mostly extended to stealing victuals from the plates of those too young, small or cowardly to challenge them. Like all societies of youngsters, they revelled in vulgarity, never using a proper expression where slang, preferably larded with filth, would do. And for all the books he had brought, none referred to nautical vernacular so that initially a lot of the conversation went over his head.
And then there were the ceremonies by which boys initiate others into their group. It was in these that Rivers and Makepeace showed that their attitude wasn’t entirely harmless. In an undermanned ship at anchor, some of the usual jokes could not be played. But fertile minds found plenty with which to tease. Dobree sent the new arrival to the Bosun, to ask for a long weight; to the yeoman of the sheets to demand a skyhook. Midshipman Buckle, only a year older than him, gave him a kid and sent him to the wardroom to demand that it be filled with the midshipman’s daily ration of claret. On the first day that the breeze blew with any strength, Midshipman Foley, the same age as Nelson but with two years’ experience, challenged him to a pissing
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