tch
of inferior refulgency on the shining breech of his gun, "that she's
that light and jumpy with mule-gas, after the sun's been beating on her
poop all day, that she lifts right up in the air and tugs at her
moorings like a kite balloon. And there's one buzz winging round that
they're going to run a pipe-line to her end and use the gas for
inflating----"

Gains, evidently feeling that there were limits to which the credulity
of a landsman should be imposed upon, cut in coldly and crushingly with:
"She's not the only old wreck 'round here that they could draw on for
'mule-gas' if there's ever need of it, my boy; and as for her rising
under her own power--well, if she ever goes as far as you did under
yours the night you jumped from the _Seagull_ to the _Bow_ I'll----"

The gusty guffaw that drowned the rest of Gains' broadside left us
all on good terms, and, by a happy chance, with the "Jutland ice"
already broken. Number Two, joining heartily in the laugh, said that,
"nifty" as was his jump from the _Seagull_ to the _Bow_, it wasn't a
"starter" to the "double back-action-summerset" with which Jock
Campbell was chucked from the _Bow_ to the _Seagull_. "We played a
sort of 'Pussy-Wants-a-Corner' exchange, Jock and me," he said, "for
Jock was Number Four or 'Trainer' of the crew of one of the fo'c'sle
guns of the _Bow_, and I was the same in the _Seagull_. We didn't
quite land in each other's place when the wallop came, but it wasn't
far from it; and we each finished the scrap in the other guy's ship.
You might pike aft and try to get a yarn out of Jock when 'Pack up!'
sounds. He's a close-mouthed tyke, though, and if you can get him to
tell how he played the human proj, you'll be doing more'n anyone else
has been able to pull off down to now. He's half clam and half sphinx,
I think Jock is, and that makes a 'dour lad' when crossed with a
'Glasgie' strain. Which makes it all the sadder to have him qualify
for membership in the 'Black Marias,' and me, because I finished in
the _Bow_, froze out."

I told him that I would gladly have a try at Jock later, provided only
that he would first tell me what happened in his own case, adding that
it wasn't every British sailor who could claim the distinction of
fighting the Hun from two different ships within the hour.

"It would have been a darned sight better for me if I'd confined my
fighting to _one_ ship," he replied with a wry smile, "and it was mighty
little fighting I g