Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1898-08-29
4 STORY OF WATSON.
An OCCASION WHEN THE OLD SEA
DOG WANTED TO SWEAR.


John Crittenden Watson does not be-
long to the list of ''cussing officers, -
yet as a man-o'- war skipper he never
had Il man of his ships company aft for
swearing. He was singularly indulgent
of the hard svearers forward.
''Hard language helps man along
occasionally, he has been known to
say to one of his deck officers upon over
heari4g a stream of maledictions from
the lips of some old fiat foot working at
a stubborn Job forward, land it is bet
ter for the men to work off their wrath
over fouled anchor chains in cuss words
than to take it out of each others
hide
| Aboard ono of the ships under Wat
sons command there was an old bos'n,s
mate named Fuller who had the call
! throughout the whole navy as the cham
pion profane man. OF the governments
Ene of Packets. Fuller never raised his
voice when he swOre. He would simply
stand back and quietly regard the imam
innate object of his wrath-a bent be-
| laying pin perhaps or a slack ridge rope
-and then he would open up in an or
dinaEy conversational tone. But the ut
| terances he gave vent to were sulphur
/ Gus. lt alSays took Fuller a good five
minutes To work eff what he considered
! the necessary number of remarks ON
such occasions, and it railways seemed,
when he was through, that he had quite
exhausted the whole vocabulary of pro-
family. But this was n mistake. The
very next time anything went wrong
with Il bit OF Fullor's gear he would
start in on new line that would con-
| tain absolutely not IA single repetition
Of any Of his previous performances. 1t
| was always u source of wonder to Full
| ler's slHpmates, even the old timers,
where he picked up the New ones, all
! of which We're of startling originality
) and force.
These shi pmates related only one in
| stance in which ne found himself at a
| loss for words. He was with landing
party from~his ship, marching on the
outskirts OF Chemulpo, Korea. -He'stlb-
| bed his, toe on a loose bowlder in the
road and fell on. his face III the dust.
He picked himsclf up and looked at the
road. lie opened his mouth to say some
thing, but he had no words. He was
dumb with wrath Two or three times
he attempted to begin, but it was no
go. He was stuck for once, 80 he pulled
out pistol and deliberately fired it into
the air five times. He had to express his
feelings in some way.
When Fuller was serving aboard
Watson ship, he was in good shape,
and his frequent quiet cuttursts kept
the forward part of the ship keyed up
with wonder as to what was coming
next. One morning at Big 1gun drill
Captain Watson himself was superin-
tending the exercise. One of the wooden
cartridges became damned in the breech
Of the 6 inch rifle to whiciEhe was de
voting most of his attention. He
wouldn't permit any of tho gunner's
mates around him TO attempt to loosen
the cartridge, but essayed tho job him
sels. lie eugged at tAoNjammed cartridge
and broke his finger nails over it, and
still it wouldn't come out. 1t was a
pretty hOt morning on deck, and the
persPiration began to roll off his face i'll
streams, but no persisted in trying to
looson the stuck cartridge. He looked
as if &c would like to say a heap were
he a swearing man. but he wasn't a
swearing man. When he had been
workingfor five minutes over the jam
med cartridge with no success, he look
cd pretty helpless and miserable. He
gave one final tug, 6ut the stuck car
tridso remained III the guns breech.
The skipper gathered himself together,
nlopped his forehead and looked at the
gun.
'Confound it ALL" he broke eut,
"where'g FuIler? Send mo Fuller, some
body"
Fuller was ON hand directly. He
wasn't n Eunner's mate, and he had
nothing 70 DO with the guns, bat Wat
so1> wanted Fuller to tackle the damned
ca<tridge a]l'the same.
T'Fuller.' said Watson, try and get
that dummy out Of that gun
Fuller looked at the stuck cartridge,
ard Watson reiterated to the, starhsard
side Of the quarter deck. Fuller made !
two or three claws at the wooden car
fridge, but 10 wouldn't come out. a |
gunner's mate could have got it out in |
Il jifTy, but Fuller wasn't IN that line |
of the service. He tugged away, but 1t |
was 10 go. Watson stood regarding the |
horizon on the starbCard side of the |
quarter deck. Fuller spat ON his hands |
and made enc more try. The dummy |
didn't move 4 tenth of an inch. Then |
Fuller mopPe1 his forehead with his |
He'RtIChl6A ciaDpeu MS cap on tne pack 1
of his head and opened MP. 1t was great !
work, this performance Of Fuller's, and |
no mistake. He eclipssd all of his for
mer efforts He stood with his hands on |
his sides loohingsa at tke gun breech and /
saying things at it that no Morgan or |
Kidd or Teach or other heaven defying
pirate could ever have equaled. The
men stood around Just looking at Full
Ter in open mouthed amaZement. They
couldn't make ont where he got them /
all. They We're all in English, but the
combinations were weird. The perora-
ton was frightful, although delivered
III the mildcst tone Imaginable.
When Fuller finished, he mopped his
ferehead with his neckerchief again and !