New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1873-09-07
and when Tom and me was relieved it was

AFTER we got outside Of the Hook and
discharged our pilot we squared away atore
the wind, and she went flynn 0o"n the
beach like a race horse. Our mate was a
wide-awake chap, and he just turns TO ana
locks all the lower deck matches, anu nc
gives the keys to the quartermaster OF tne
regiment, and, says he:
you've got more stores down there than
have, and you'd better keep the keys.
can trust your men not to steal any OF OUT
stores, but l wouldn't advise you ~ trust
NV sailors down there at all, for if you do
you'll have Flemish account OF your
stores"
Now, the Quartermaster was young
chap Just on his first beard and he wash
gOin' to trouble himself about the keys, al
so he hands them over to his sergeant. Ar
ter that, whenever we needed bread in the
forecastle, the mate would say:
go TO Sergeant Devine and get the key
of the hatch. and go down and get a barrel
of bread. Our bread is navy bread, and is
slowed aft; the sogers' bread is pilot bread,
and is slowed for'ard. Don't make any
mistake and get the wrong bread"
Notwithstanding his teilin' of EN- this, it
was curious thing that in every instance
durin' that passage whoever went down to
get bread always made that very identical
mistake. But the mate never knew any
thing about il. There was always boxes OF
pants and coats and shoes, too, down there
in the hold; and when we got to Vera Cruz
some Of these had been broken open and
the clothln' taken out, which the mate told
the quartermaster must have been done by
the stevedores men in New York, and that
he would write to the stevedore and inc uire
about it as soon as ever he got 10 New Or
leans.
You see," says he, 'they couldn't have
been stole on the passage, cause you've
had the keys yourself, and that was why
give them to you"
1t was funny thing, though, that we
found a many of these kind OF coats and
things in the forcastle arter we left Vera
Cruz, but nobody knowed how they got
there. l got five or six pair Of shoes my
self, but. bless you, they wasn't worth
stealth, for as soon as they was wet they
come all to pieces bein only stuck together
with gum. The pants and the coats wasn't
much better, and / don't think was ever
SO cheated in all my life as l was with that
rubbish. Yankee Jim said as how if ever
that contractor that supplied that truck
come athwart his hawse he'd hit him
lug under the trestletrees that would raise
the eyes OF his rigging without startin'
lanyard. ITO rob the government in this
way" says jim, ''is about the meanest
that man can be guilty Of"
These sogers didn't have no beef amongst
their stores, nOthin' but pork, and l never
knowd afore wis sailors was always called
'beef-eatin' beggars," but l s'pose that's
the reason that sogers don't eat beef. Well,
the pork was first class mess pork, and SO
the mate he snapped OFF some old beef that
he had for some of this pork, barrel for bar
rel, which was good trade, but the sogers
got tired of pork and wanted the beef, even
If it was more like mahogany than anything
else, and the mate got rid of some old
salt -horse that had crossed the ocean sew
eral times. These were dirty lot, these
sogers; there was hunks built for them all
along on both sides of the 'twixt decks and
a couple of tiers more amidships, but they
had no beds or bedding, and they just
turned in, all standing, like troopers
horses. Some of them, | really do think
never washed themselves from the time
they left New York till they got down to
Vera Cruz. There was some exceptions, of
course, cause there was some among
them which had been sailormen at some
time in their lives and of course had been
well brought up, and knew how to keep
themselves clean, but the balance were a
bad lot AS for the officers, they didn't
care no more for them than they did for
each othoIa Most OF them knowed their
officers afore theS listed; they'd been
BARRIERS and tailors and thinkers and cobblers
together, and there was no authority among
'em at all. The colonel of the regiment was
chose jist on account of his havin' money to
help pay the expense of getting up the regi-
ment, and from the colonel down it was
the same thing; the man with the next
most money was next in rank. and the
poorest one took the lowest position. AS
soon as3verShe officers got over their sea-
sickness they went to work playn' poker
and by the time we got down to Vera Cruz
one or two of the KNOWN ones had about all
the cash there was in the crowd, and held
the notes of some of the party for great
deal more. Our old man was an old chap
nigh on to seventy years old, and had been
over fifty years to sea, so that you may
know he stood to know about as much as
could be learned in this world; and these
here young officers used, so the steward
told me, to try to get the old man to play
poker with them. They had found out
somehow that the old man had a few hun
dreds for port expenses in Vera Cruz, and
they thought they would like little of
that to begin the campaign with in Mexico
But the old man always told EN- that he
was too old to learn any new game, and
would mt play with them not on no account.
At last, one night after we had got by Hat
teras, when the wind was right aft and
the weather fine, the old man consented to
take hand. He used to make 'em quit
playin at ten o'clock, and that night | had
the wheel from ten to twelve, and at about
half past ten one OF the captains-Negely,
think, his name was-c0mes up on deck
to have a smoke afore turnin' in, and saws
he to our mate:
THAT there old man of yours is the luck
lest man l ever met at poker; he didn't
know anything about the game at all, and
he played contrary to all rulee. but he's list
won about $500 tonight by sheer luck"
The mate says to me arter the captain
had gone below:
Tom" says he, Il supposes our old man
played poker afore any of those Young
chaps was done sucking