So Boy Jim went down to the George, at Crawley, under the charge of Jim Belcher and Champion Harrison, to train for his great fight with Crab1 Wilson, of Gloucester, whilst every club and bar parlour of London rang with the account of how he had appeared at a supper of Corinthians, and beaten the formidable Joe Berks in four rounds. I remembered that afternoon at Friar’s Oak when Jim had told me that he would make his name known, and his words had come true sooner than he could have expected it, for, go where one might, one heard of nothing but the match between Sir Lothian Hume and Sir Charles Tregellis, and the points of the two probable combatants. The betting was still steadily2 in favour of Wilson, for he had a number of bye-battles to set against this single victory of Jim’s, and it was thought by connoisseurs3 who had seen him spar that the singular defensive4 tactics which had given him his nickname would prove very puzzling to a raw antagonist5. In height, strength, and reputation for gameness there was very little to choose between them, but Wilson had been the more severely6 tested.
It was but a few days before the battle that my father made his promised visit to London. The seaman8 had no love of cities, and was happier wandering over the Downs, and turning his glass upon every topsail which showed above the horizon, than when finding his way among crowded streets, where, as he complained, it was impossible to keep a course by the sun, and hard enough by dead reckoning. Rumours9 of war were in the air, however, and it was necessary that he should use his influence with Lord Nelson if a vacancy10 were to be found either for himself or for me.
My uncle had just set forth11, as was his custom of an evening, clad in his green riding-frock, his plate buttons, his Cordovan boots, and his round hat, to show himself upon his crop-tailed tit in the Mall. I had remained behind, for, indeed, I had already made up my mind that I had no calling for this fashionable life. These men, with their small waists, their gestures, and their unnatural12 ways, had become wearisome to me, and even my uncle, with his cold and patronizing manner, filled me with very mixed feelings. My thoughts were back in Sussex, and I was dreaming of the kindly13, simple ways of the country, when there came a rat-tat at the knocker, the ring of a hearty14 voice, and there, in the doorway15, was the smiling, weather-beaten face, with the puckered16 eyelids17 and the light blue eyes.
“Why, Roddy, you are grand indeed!” he cried. “But I had rather see you with the King’s blue coat upon your back than with all these frills and ruffles18.”
“And I had rather wear it, father.”
“It warms my heart to hear you say so. Lord Nelson has promised me that he would find a berth19 for you, and to-morrow we shall seek him out and remind him of it. But where is your uncle?”
“He is riding in the Mall.”
A look of relief passed over my father’s honest face, for he was never very easy in his brother-in-law’s company. “I have been to the Admiralty,” said he, “and I trust that I shall have a ship when war breaks out; by all accounts it will not be long first. Lord St. Vincent told me so with his own lips. But I am at Fladong’s, Rodney, where, if you will come and sup with me, you will see some of my messmates from the Mediterranean20.”
When you think that in the last year of the war we had 140,000 seamen21 and mariners22 afloat, commanded by 4000 officers, and that half of these had been turned adrift when the Peace of Amiens laid their ships up in the Hamoaze or Portsdown creek23, you will understand that London, as well as the dockyard towns, was full of seafarers. You could not walk the streets without catching24 sight of the gipsy-faced, keen-eyed men whose plain clothes told of their thin purses as plainly as their listless air showed their weariness of a life of forced and unaccustomed inaction. Amid the dark streets and brick houses there was something out of place in their appearance, as when the sea-gulls, driven by stress of weather, are seen in the Midland shires. Yet while prize-courts procrastinated25, or there was a chance of an appointment by showing their sunburned faces at the Admiralty, so long they would continue to pace with their quarter-deck strut26 down Whitehall, or to gather of an evening to discuss the events of the last war or the chances of the next at Fladong’s, in Oxford27 Street, which was reserved as entirely28 for the Navy as Slaughter’s was for the Army, or Ibbetson’s for the Church of England.
It did not surprise me, therefore, that we should find the large room in which we supped crowded with naval29 men, but I remember that what did cause me some astonishment30 was to observe that all these sailors, who had served under the most varying conditions in all quarters of the globe, from the Baltic to the East Indies, should have been moulded into so uniform a type that they were more like each other than brother is commonly to brother. The rules of the service insured that every face should be clean-shaven, every head powdered, and every neck covered by the little queue of natural hair tied with a black silk ribbon. Biting winds and tropical suns had combined to darken them, whilst the habit of command and the menace of ever-recurring dangers had stamped them all with the same expression of authority and of alertness. There were some jovial31 faces amongst them, but the older officers, with their deep-lined cheeks and their masterful noses, were, for the most part, as austere32 as so many weather-beaten ascetics33 from the desert. Lonely watches, and a discipline which cut them off from all companionship, had left their mark upon those Red Indian faces. For my part, I could hardly eat my supper for watching them. Young as I was, I knew that if there were any freedom left in Europe it was to these men that we owed it; and I seemed to read upon their grim, harsh features the record of that long ten years of struggle which had swept the tricolour from the seas.
When we had finished our supper, my father led me into the great coffee-room, where a hundred or more officers may have been assembled, drinking their wine and smoking their long clay pipes, until the air was as thick as the main-deck in a close-fought action. As we entered we found ourselves face to face with an elderly officer who was coming out. He was a man with large, thoughtful eyes, and a full, placid34 face—such a face as one would expect from a philosopher and a philanthropist, rather than from a fighting seaman.
“Here’s Cuddie Collingwood,” whispered my father.
“Halloa, Lieutenant35 Stone!” cried the famous admiral very cheerily. “I have scarce caught a glimpse of you since you came aboard the Excellent after St. Vincent. You had the luck to be at the Nile also, I understand?”
“I was third of the Theseus, under Millar, sir.”
“It nearly broke my heart to have missed it. I have not yet outlived it. To think of such a gallant36 service, and I engaged in harassing37 the market-boats, the miserable38 cabbage-carriers of St. Luccars!”
“Your plight39 was better than mine, Sir Cuthbert,” said a voice from behind us, and a large man in the full uniform of a post-captain took a step forward to include himself in our circle. His mastiff face was heavy with emotion, and he shook his head miserably40 as he spoke41.
“Yes, yes, Troubridge, I can understand and sympathize with your feelings.”
“I passed through torment42 that night, Collingwood. It left a mark on me that I shall never lose until I go over the ship’s side in a canvas cover. To have my beautiful Culloden laid on a sandbank just out of gunshot. To hear and see the fight the whole night through, and never to pull a lanyard or take the tompions out of my guns. Twice I opened my pistol-case to blow out my brains, and it was but the thought that Nelson might have a use for me that held me back.”
Collingwood shook the hand of the unfortunate captain.
“Admiral Nelson was not long in finding a use for you, Troubridge,” said he. “We have all heard of your siege of Capua, and how you ran up your ship’s guns without trenches43 or parallels, and fired point-blank through the embrasures.”
The melancholy44 cleared away from the massive face of the big seaman, and his deep laughter filled the room.
“I’m not clever enough or slow enough for their Z-Z fashions,” said he. “We got alongside and slapped it in through their port-holes until they struck their colours. But where have you been, Sir Cuthbert?”
“With my wife and my two little lasses at Morpeth in the North Country. I have but seen them this once in ten years, and it may be ten more, for all I know, ere I see them again. I have been doing good work for the fleet up yonder.”
“I had thought, sir, that it was inland,” said my father.
Collingwood took a little black bag out of his pocket and shook it.
“Inland it is,” said he, “and yet I have done good work for the fleet there. What do you suppose I hold in this bag?”
“Bullets,” said Troubridge.
“Something that a sailor needs even more than that,” answered the admiral, and turning it over he tilted45 a pile of acorns46 on to his palm. “I carry them with me in my country walks, and where I see a fruitful nook I thrust one deep with the end of my cane47. My oak trees may fight those rascals48 over the water when I am long forgotten. Do you know, lieutenant, how many oaks go to make an eighty-gun ship?”
My father shook his head.
“Two thousand, no less. For every two-decked ship that carries the white ensign there is a grove49 the less in England. So how are our grandsons to beat the French if we do not give them the trees with which to build their ships?”
He replaced his bag in his pocket, and then, passing his arm through Troubridge’s, they went through the door together.
“There’s a man whose life might help you to trim your own course,” said my father, as we took our seats at a vacant table. “He is ever the same quiet gentleman, with his thoughts busy for the comfort of his ship’s company, and his heart with his wife and children whom he has so seldom seen. It is said in the fleet that an oath has never passed his lips, Rodney, though how he managed when he was first lieutenant of a raw crew is more than I can conceive. But they all love Cuddie, for they know he’s an angel to fight. How d’ye do, Captain Foley? My respects, Sir Ed’ard! Why, if they could but press the company, they would man a corvette with flag officers.”
“There’s many a man here, Rodney,” continued my father, as he glanced about him, “whose name may never find its way into any book save his own ship’s log, but who in his own way has set as fine an example as any admiral of them all. We know them, and talk of them in the fleet, though they may never be bawled50 in the streets of London. There’s as much seamanship and pluck in a good cutter action as in a line-o’-battleship fight, though you may not come by a title nor the thanks of Parliament for it. There’s Hamilton, for example, the quiet, pale-faced man who is learning against the pillar. It was he who, with six rowing-boats, cut out the 44-gun frigate51 Hermione from under the muzzles52 of two hundred shore-guns in the harbour of Puerto Cabello. No finer action was done in the whole war. There’s Jaheel Brenton, with the whiskers. It was he who attacked twelve Spanish gunboats in his one little brig, and made four of them strike to him. There’s Walker, of the Rose cutter, who, with thirteen men, engaged three French privateers with crews of a hundred and forty-six. He sank one, captured one, and chased the third. How are you, Captain Ball? I hope I see you well?”
Two or three of my father’s acquaintances who had been sitting close by drew up their chairs to us, and soon quite a circle had formed, all talking loudly and arguing upon sea matters, shaking their long, red-tipped pipes at each other as they spoke. My father whispered in my ear that his neighbour was Captain Foley, of the Goliath, who led the van at the Nile, and that the tall, thin, foxy-haired man opposite was Lord Cochrane, the most dashing frigate captain in the Service. Even at Friar’s Oak we had heard how, in the little Speedy, of fourteen small guns with fifty-four men, he had carried by boarding the Spanish frigate Gamo with her crew of three hundred. It was easy to see that he was a quick, irascible, high-blooded man, for he was talking hotly about his grievances54 with a flush of anger upon his freckled55 cheeks.
“We shall never do any good upon the ocean until we have hanged the dockyard contractors,” he cried. “I’d have a dead dockyard contractor56 as a figure-head for every first-rate in the fleet, and a provision dealer57 for every frigate. I know them with their puttied seams and their devil bolts, risking five hundred lives that they may steal a few pounds’ worth of copper58. What became of the Chance, and of the Martin, and of the Orestes? They foundered59 at sea, and were never heard of more, and I say that the crews of them were murdered men.”
Lord Cochrane seemed to be expressing the views of all, for a murmur60 of assent61, with a mutter of hearty, deep-sea curses, ran round the circle.
“Those rascals over yonder manage things better,” said an old one-eyed captain, with the blue-and-white riband for St. Vincent peeping out of his third buttonhole. “They sheer away their heads if they get up to any foolery. Did ever a vessel62 come out of Toulon as my 38-gun frigate did from Plymouth last year, with her masts rolling about until her shrouds63 were like iron bars on one side and hanging in festoons upon the other? The meanest sloop64 that ever sailed out of France would have overmatched her, and then it would be on me, and not on this Devonport bungler65, that a court-martial would be called.”
They loved to grumble66, those old salts, for as soon as one had shot off his grievance53 his neighbour would follow with another, each more bitter than the last.
“Look at our sails!” cried Captain Foley. “Put a French and a British ship at anchor together, and how can you tell which is which?”
“In the old ships, maybe, but how many of the new are laid down on the French model? No, there’s no way of telling them at anchor. But let them hoist67 sail, and how d’you tell them then?”
“Frenchy has white sails,” cried several.
“And ours are black and rotten. That’s the difference. No wonder they outsail us when the wind can blow through our canvas.”
“In the Speedy,” said Cochrane, “the sailcloth was so thin that, when I made my observation, I always took my meridian68 through the foretopsail and my horizon through the foresail.”
There was a general laugh at this, and then at it they all went again, letting off into speech all those weary broodings and silent troubles which had rankled69 during long years of service, for an iron discipline prevented them from speaking when their feet were upon their own quarter-decks. One told of his powder, six pounds of which were needed to throw a ball a thousand yards. Another cursed the Admiralty Courts, where a prize goes in as a full-rigged ship and comes out as a schooner70. The old captain spoke of the promotions71 by Parliamentary interest which had put many a youngster into the captain’s cabin when he should have been in the gun-room. And then they came back to the difficulty of finding crews for their vessels72, and they all together raised up their voices and wailed73.
“What is the use of building fresh ships,” cried Foley, “when even with a ten-pound bounty74 you can’t man the ships that you have got?”
But Lord Cochrane was on the other side in this question.
“You’d have the men, sir, if you treated them well when you got them,” said he. “Admiral Nelson can get his ships manned. So can Admiral Collingwood. Why? Because he has thought for the men, and so the men have thought for him. Let men and officers know and respect each other, and there’s no difficulty in keeping a ship’s company. It’s the infernal plan of turning a crew over from ship to ship and leaving the officers behind that rots the Navy. But I have never found a difficulty, and I dare swear that if I hoist my pennant75 to-morrow I shall have all my old Speedies back, and as many volunteers as I care to take.”
“That is very well, my lord,” said the old captain, with some warmth; “when the Jacks76 hear that the Speedy took fifty vessels in thirteen months, they are sure to volunteer to serve with her commander. Every good cruiser can fill her complement77 quickly enough. But it is not the cruisers that fight the country’s battles and blockade the enemy’s ports. I say that all prize-money should be divided equally among the whole fleet, and until you have such a rule, the smartest men will always be found where they are of least service to any one but themselves.”
This speech produced a chorus of protests from the cruiser officers and a hearty agreement from the line-of-battleship men, who seemed to be in the majority in the circle which had gathered round. From the flushed faces and angry glances it was evident that the question was one upon which there was strong feeling upon both sides.
“What the cruiser gets the cruiser earns,” cried a frigate captain.
“Do you mean to say, sir,” said Captain Foley, “that the duties of an officer upon a cruiser demand more care or higher professional ability than those of one who is employed upon blockade service, with a lee coast under him whenever the wind shifts to the west, and the topmasts of an enemy’s squadron for ever in his sight?”
“I do not claim higher ability, sir.”
“Then why should you claim higher pay? Can you deny that a seaman before the mast makes more in a fast frigate than a lieutenant can in a battleship?”
“It was only last year,” said a very gentlemanly-looking officer, who might have passed for a buck78 upon town had his skin not been burned to copper in such sunshine as never bursts upon London—“it was only last year that I brought the old Alexander back from the Mediterranean, floating like an empty barrel and carrying nothing but honour for her cargo79. In the Channel we fell in with the frigate Minerva from the Western Ocean, with her lee ports under water and her hatches bursting with the plunder80 which had been too valuable to trust to the prize crews. She had ingots of silver along her yards and bowsprit, and a bit of silver plate at the truck of the masts. My Jacks could have fired into her, and would, too, if they had not been held back. It made them mad to think of all they had done in the south, and then to see this saucy81 frigate flashing her money before their eyes.”
“I cannot see their grievance, Captain Ball,” said Cochrane.
“When you are promoted to a two-decker, my lord, it will possibly become clearer to you.”
“You speak as if a cruiser had nothing to do but take prizes. If that is your view, you will permit me to say that you know very little of the matter. I have handled a sloop, a corvette, and a frigate, and I have found a great variety of duties in each of them. I have had to avoid the enemy’s battleships and to fight his cruisers. I have had to chase and capture his privateers, and to cut them out when they run under his batteries. I have had to engage his forts, to take my men ashore82, and to destroy his guns and his signal stations. All this, with convoying, reconnoitring, and risking one’s own ship in order to gain a knowledge of the enemy’s movements, comes under the duties of the commander of a cruiser. I make bold to say that the man who can carry these objects out with success has deserved better of the country than the officer of a battleship, tacking83 from Ushant to the Black Rocks and back again until she builds up a reef with her beef-bones.”
“Sir,” said the angry old sailor, “such an officer is at least in no danger of being mistaken for a privateersman.”
“I am surprised, Captain Bulkeley,” Cochran retorted hotly, “that you should venture to couple the names of privateersman and King’s officer.”
There was mischief84 brewing85 among these hot-headed, short-spoken salts, but Captain Foley changed the subject to discuss the new ships which were being built in the French ports. It was of interest to me to hear these men, who were spending their lives in fighting against our neighbours, discussing their character and ways. You cannot conceive—you who live in times of peace and charity—how fierce the hatred86 was in England at that time against the French, and above all against their great leader. It was more than a mere87 prejudice or dislike. It was a deep, aggressive loathing88 of which you may even now form some conception if you examine the papers or caricatures of the day. The word “Frenchman” was hardly spoken without “rascal” or “scoundrel” slipping in before it. In all ranks of life and in every part of the country the feeling was the same. Even the Jacks aboard our ships fought with a viciousness against a French vessel which they would never show to Dane, Dutchman, or Spaniard.
If you ask me now, after fifty years, why it was that there should have been this virulent89 feeling against them, so foreign to the easy-going and tolerant British nature, I would confess that I think the real reason was fear. Not fear of them individually, of course—our foulest91 detractors have never called us faint-hearted—but fear of their star, fear of their future, fear of the subtle brain whose plans always seemed to go aright, and of the heavy hand which had struck nation after nation to the ground. We were but a small country, with a population which, when the war began, was not much more than half that of France. And then, France had increased by leaps and bounds, reaching out to the north into Belgium and Holland, and to the south into Italy, whilst we were weakened by deep-lying disaffection among both Catholics and Presbyterians in Ireland. The danger was imminent92 and plain to the least thoughtful. One could not walk the Kent coast without seeing the beacons93 heaped up to tell the country of the enemy’s landing, and if the sun were shining on the uplands near Boulogne, one might catch the flash of its gleam upon the bayonets of manoeuvring veterans. No wonder that a fear of the French power lay deeply in the hearts of the most gallant men, and that fear should, as it always does, beget94 a bitter and rancorous hatred.
The seamen did not speak kindly then of their recent enemies. Their hearts loathed95 them, and in the fashion of our country their lips said what the heart felt. Of the French officers they could not have spoken with more chivalry96, as of worthy97 foemen, but the nation was an abomination to them. The older men had fought against them in the American War, they had fought again for the last ten years, and the dearest wish of their hearts seemed to be that they might be called upon to do the same for the remainder of their days. Yet if I was surprised by the virulence98 of their animosity against the French, I was even more so to hear how highly they rated them as antagonists99. The long succession of British victories which had finally made the French take to their ports and resign the struggle in despair had given all of us the idea that for some reason a Briton on the water must, in the nature of things, always have the best of it against a Frenchman. But these men who had done the fighting did not think so. They were loud in their praise of their foemen’s gallantry, and precise in their reasons for his defeat. They showed how the officers of the old French Navy had nearly all been aristocrats100. How the Revolution had swept them out of their ships, and the force been left with insubordinate seamen and no competent leaders. This ill-directed fleet had been hustled101 into port by the pressure of the well-manned and well-commanded British, who had pinned them there ever since, so that they had never had an opportunity of learning seamanship. Their harbour drill and their harbour gunnery had been of no service when sails had to be trimmed and broadsides fired on the heave of an Atlantic swell102. Let one of their frigates103 get to sea and have a couple of years’ free run in which the crew might learn their duties, and then it would be a feather in the cap of a British officer if with a ship of equal force he could bring down her colours.
Such were the views of these experienced officers, fortified104 by many reminiscences and examples of French gallantry, such as the way in which the crew of the L’Orient had fought her quarter-deck guns when the main-deck was in a blaze beneath them, and when they must have known that they were standing105 over an exploding magazine. The general hope was that the West Indian expedition since the peace might have given many of their fleet an ocean training, and that they might be tempted106 out into mid-Channel if the war were to break out afresh. But would it break out afresh? We had spent gigantic sums and made enormous exertions107 to curb108 the power of Napoleon and to prevent him from becoming the universal despot of Europe. Would the Government try it again? Or were they appalled109 by the gigantic load of debt which must bend the backs of many generations unborn? Pitt was there, and surely he was not a man to leave his work half done.
And then suddenly there was a bustle110 at the door. Amid the grey swirl111 of the tobacco-smoke I could catch a glimpse of a blue coat and gold epaulettes, with a crowd gathering112 thickly round them, while a hoarse113 murmur rose from the group which thickened into a deep-chested cheer. Every one was on his feet, peering and asking each other what it might mean. And still the crowd seethed114 and the cheering swelled115.
“What is it? What has happened?” cried a score of voices.
“Put him up! Hoist him up!” shouted somebody, and an instant later I saw Captain Troubridge appear above the shoulders of the crowd. His face was flushed, as if he were in wine, and he was waving what seemed to be a letter in the air. The cheering died away, and there was such a hush116 that I could hear the crackle of the paper in his hand.
“Great news, gentlemen!” he roared. “Glorious news! Rear-Admiral Collingwood has directed me to communicate it to you. The French Ambassador has received his papers to-night. Every ship on the list is to go into commission. Admiral Cornwallis is ordered out of Cawsand Bay to cruise off Ushant. A squadron is starting for the North Sea and another for the Irish Channel.”
He may have had more to say, but his audience could wait no longer. How they shouted and stamped and raved117 in their delight! Harsh old flag-officers, grave post-captains, young lieutenants118, all were roaring like schoolboys breaking up for the holidays. There was no thought now of those manifold and weary grievances to which I had listened. The foul90 weather was passed, and the landlocked sea-birds would be out on the foam119 once more. The rhythm of “God Save the King” swelled through the babel, and I heard the old lines sung in a way that made you forget their bad rhymes and their bald sentiments. I trust that you will never hear them so sung, with tears upon rugged120 cheeks, and catchings of the breath from strong men. Dark days will have come again before you hear such a song or see such a sight as that. Let those talk of the phlegm of our countrymen who have never seen them when the lava121 crust of restraint is broken, and when for an instant the strong, enduring fires of the North glow upon the surface. I saw them then, and if I do not see them now, I am not so old or so foolish as to doubt that they are there.
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crab
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| n.螃蟹，偏航，脾气乖戾的人，酸苹果；vi.捕蟹，偏航，发牢骚；vt.使偏航，发脾气 | |
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steadily
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| adv.稳定地；不变地；持续地 | |
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connoisseurs
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| n.鉴赏家，鉴定家，行家( connoisseur的名词复数 ) | |
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defensive
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| adj.防御的；防卫的；防守的 | |
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antagonist
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| n.敌人，对抗者，对手 | |
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severely
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| adv.严格地；严厉地；非常恶劣地 | |
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fore
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| adv.在前面；adj.先前的；在前部的；n.前部 | |
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seaman
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| n.海员，水手，水兵 | |
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rumours
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| n.传闻( rumour的名词复数 )；风闻；谣言；谣传 | |
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vacancy
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| n.（旅馆的）空位，空房，（职务的）空缺 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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unnatural
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| adj.不自然的；反常的 | |
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kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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hearty
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| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
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doorway
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| n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径 | |
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puckered
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| v.（使某物）起褶子或皱纹( pucker的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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eyelids
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| n.眼睑( eyelid的名词复数 )；眼睛也不眨一下；不露声色；面不改色 | |
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ruffles
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| 褶裥花边( ruffle的名词复数 ) | |
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berth
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| n.卧铺，停泊地，锚位；v.使停泊 | |
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Mediterranean
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| adj.地中海的；地中海沿岸的 | |
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seamen
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| n.海员 | |
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mariners
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| 海员，水手（mariner的复数形式） | |
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creek
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| n.小溪，小河，小湾 | |
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catching
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| adj.易传染的，有魅力的，迷人的，接住 | |
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25
procrastinated
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| 拖延，耽搁( procrastinate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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26
strut
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| v.肿胀，鼓起；大摇大摆地走；炫耀；支撑；撑开；n.高视阔步；支柱，撑杆 | |
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27
Oxford
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| n.牛津（英国城市） | |
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28
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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29
naval
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| adj.海军的，军舰的，船的 | |
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30
astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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31
jovial
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| adj.快乐的，好交际的 | |
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32
austere
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| adj.艰苦的；朴素的，朴实无华的；严峻的 | |
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33
ascetics
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| n.苦行者，禁欲者，禁欲主义者( ascetic的名词复数 ) | |
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34
placid
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| adj.安静的，平和的 | |
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35
lieutenant
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| n.陆军中尉，海军上尉；代理官员，副职官员 | |
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36
gallant
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| adj.英勇的，豪侠的；(向女人)献殷勤的 | |
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37
harassing
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| v.侵扰，骚扰( harass的现在分词 )；不断攻击（敌人） | |
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38
miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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39
plight
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| n.困境，境况，誓约，艰难；vt.宣誓，保证，约定 | |
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40
miserably
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| adv.痛苦地；悲惨地；糟糕地；极度地 | |
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41
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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42
torment
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| n.折磨；令人痛苦的东西(人)；vt.折磨；纠缠 | |
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43
trenches
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| 深沟，地沟( trench的名词复数 )； 战壕 | |
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44
melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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45
tilted
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| v. 倾斜的 | |
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46
acorns
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| n.橡子，栎实( acorn的名词复数 ) | |
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47
cane
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| n.手杖，细长的茎，藤条；v.以杖击，以藤编制的 | |
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48
rascals
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| 流氓( rascal的名词复数 )； 无赖； （开玩笑说法）淘气的人（尤指小孩）； 恶作剧的人 | |
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49
grove
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| n.林子，小树林，园林 | |
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50
bawled
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| v.大叫，大喊( bawl的过去式和过去分词 )；放声大哭；大声叫出；叫卖（货物） | |
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51
frigate
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| n.护航舰，大型驱逐舰 | |
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52
muzzles
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| 枪口( muzzle的名词复数 )； （防止动物咬人的）口套； （四足动物的）鼻口部； （狗）等凸出的鼻子和口 | |
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53
grievance
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| n.怨愤，气恼，委屈 | |
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54
grievances
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| n.委屈( grievance的名词复数 )；苦衷；不满；牢骚 | |
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55
freckled
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| adj.雀斑；斑点；晒斑；（使）生雀斑v.雀斑，斑点( freckle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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56
contractor
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| n.订约人，承包人，收缩肌 | |
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57
dealer
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| n.商人，贩子 | |
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58
copper
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| n.铜；铜币；铜器；adj.铜(制)的；(紫)铜色的 | |
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59
foundered
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| v.创始人( founder的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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60
murmur
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| n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言 | |
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61
assent
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| v.批准，认可；n.批准，认可 | |
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62
vessel
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| n.船舶；容器，器皿；管，导管，血管 | |
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63
shrouds
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| n.裹尸布( shroud的名词复数 )；寿衣；遮蔽物；覆盖物v.隐瞒( shroud的第三人称单数 )；保密 | |
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64
sloop
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| n.单桅帆船 | |
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65
Bungler
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| n.笨拙者，经验不够的人 | |
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66
grumble
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| vi.抱怨；咕哝；n.抱怨，牢骚；咕哝，隆隆声 | |
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67
hoist
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| n.升高，起重机，推动；v.升起，升高，举起 | |
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68
meridian
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| adj.子午线的；全盛期的 | |
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69
rankled
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| v.（使）痛苦不已，（使）怨恨不已( rankle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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70
schooner
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| n.纵帆船 | |
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71
promotions
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| 促进( promotion的名词复数 )； 提升； 推广； 宣传 | |
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72
vessels
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| n.血管( vessel的名词复数 )；船；容器；（具有特殊品质或接受特殊品质的）人 | |
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73
wailed
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| v.哭叫，哀号( wail的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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74
bounty
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| n.慷慨的赠予物，奖金；慷慨，大方；施与 | |
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75
pennant
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| n.三角旗；锦标旗 | |
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76
jacks
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| n.抓子游戏；千斤顶( jack的名词复数 )；（电）插孔；[电子学]插座；放弃 | |
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77
complement
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| n.补足物，船上的定员；补语；vt.补充，补足 | |
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78
buck
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| n.雄鹿，雄兔；v.马离地跳跃 | |
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79
cargo
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| n.(一只船或一架飞机运载的)货物 | |
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80
plunder
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| vt.劫掠财物，掠夺；n.劫掠物，赃物；劫掠 | |
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81
saucy
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| adj.无礼的；俊俏的；活泼的 | |
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82
ashore
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| adv.在(向)岸上，上岸 | |
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83
tacking
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| （帆船）抢风行驶，定位焊[铆]紧钉 | |
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84
mischief
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| n.损害，伤害，危害；恶作剧，捣蛋，胡闹 | |
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85
brewing
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| n. 酿造, 一次酿造的量 动词brew的现在分词形式 | |
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86
hatred
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| n.憎恶，憎恨，仇恨 | |
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87
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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88
loathing
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| n.厌恶，憎恨v.憎恨，厌恶( loathe的现在分词)；极不喜欢 | |
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89
virulent
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| adj.有毒的，有恶意的，充满敌意的 | |
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90
foul
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| adj.污秽的；邪恶的；v.弄脏；妨害；犯规；n.犯规 | |
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91
foulest
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| adj.恶劣的( foul的最高级 )；邪恶的；难闻的；下流的 | |
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92
imminent
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| adj.即将发生的，临近的，逼近的 | |
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93
beacons
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| 灯塔( beacon的名词复数 )； 烽火； 指路明灯； 无线电台或发射台 | |
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94
beget
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| v.引起；产生 | |
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95
loathed
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| v.憎恨，厌恶( loathe的过去式和过去分词 )；极不喜欢 | |
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96
chivalry
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| n.骑士气概，侠义；（男人）对女人彬彬有礼，献殷勤 | |
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97
worthy
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| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
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98
virulence
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| n.毒力，毒性；病毒性；致病力 | |
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99
antagonists
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| 对立[对抗] 者，对手，敌手( antagonist的名词复数 )； 对抗肌； 对抗药 | |
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100
aristocrats
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| n.贵族( aristocrat的名词复数 ) | |
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101
hustled
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| 催促（hustle的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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102
swell
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| vi.膨胀，肿胀；增长，增强 | |
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103
frigates
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| n.快速军舰( frigate的名词复数 ) | |
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104
fortified
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| adj. 加强的 | |
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105
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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106
tempted
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| v.怂恿（某人）干不正当的事；冒…的险（tempt的过去分词） | |
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107
exertions
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| n.努力( exertion的名词复数 )；费力；（能力、权力等的）运用；行使 | |
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108
curb
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| n.场外证券市场，场外交易；vt.制止，抑制 | |
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109
appalled
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| v.使惊骇，使充满恐惧( appall的过去式和过去分词)adj.惊骇的；丧胆的 | |
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110
bustle
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| v.喧扰地忙乱，匆忙，奔忙；n.忙碌；喧闹 | |
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111
swirl
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| v.(使)打漩，(使)涡卷；n.漩涡，螺旋形 | |
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112
gathering
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| n.集会，聚会，聚集 | |
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113
hoarse
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| adj.嘶哑的，沙哑的 | |
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114
seethed
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| （液体）沸腾( seethe的过去式和过去分词 )； 激动，大怒； 强压怒火； 生闷气(~with sth|~ at sth) | |
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115
swelled
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| 增强( swell的过去式和过去分词 )； 肿胀； （使）凸出； 充满（激情） | |
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116
hush
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| int.嘘，别出声；n.沉默，静寂；v.使安静 | |
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117
raved
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| v.胡言乱语( rave的过去式和过去分词 )；愤怒地说；咆哮；痴心地说 | |
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118
lieutenants
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| n.陆军中尉( lieutenant的名词复数 )；副职官员；空军；仅低于…官阶的官员 | |
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119
foam
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| v./n.泡沫，起泡沫 | |
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120
rugged
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| adj.高低不平的，粗糙的，粗壮的，强健的 | |
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121
lava
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| n.熔岩，火山岩 | |
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