! jacket! thou hast much to answer for, jacket!

CHAPTER LXXIX.

HOW MAN-OF-WAR'S-MEN DIE AT SEA.

Shenly, my sick mess-mate, was a middle-aged, handsome, intelligent
seaman, whom some hard calamity, or perhaps some unfortunate excess,
must have driven into the Navy. He told me he had a wife and two
children in Portsmouth, in the state of New Hampshire. Upon being
examined by Cuticle, the surgeon, he was, on purely scientific grounds,
reprimanded by that functionary for not having previously appeared
before him. He was immediately consigned to one of the invalid cots as
a serious case. His complaint was of long standing; a pulmonary one,
now attended with general prostration.

The same evening he grew so much worse, that according to man-of-war
usage, we, his mess-mates, were officially notified that we must take
turns at sitting up with him through the night. We at once made our
arrangements, allotting two hours for a watch. Not till the third night
did my own turn come round. During the day preceding, it was stated at
the mess that our poor mess-mate was run down completely; the surgeon
had given him up.

At four bells (two o'clock in the morning), I went down to relieve one
of my mess-mates at the sick man's cot. The profound quietude of the
calm pervaded the entire frigate through all her decks. The watch on
duty were dozing on the carronade-slides, far above the sick-bay; and
the watch below were fast asleep in their hammocks, on the same deck
with the invalid.

Groping my way under these two hundred sleepers, I en-tered the
hospital. A dim lamp was burning on the table, which was screwed down
to the floor. This light shed dreary shadows over the white-washed
walls of the place, making it look look a whited sepulchre underground.
The wind-sail had collapsed, and lay motionless on the deck. The low
groans of the sick were the only sounds to be heard; and as I advanced,
some of them rolled upon me their sleepless, silent, tormented eyes.

"Fan him, and keep his forehead wet with this sponge," whispered my
mess-mate, whom I came to relieve, as I drew near to Shenly's cot, "and
wash the foam from his mouth; nothing more can be done for him. If he
dies before your watch is out, call the Surgeon's steward; he sleeps in
that hammock," pointing it out. "Good-bye, good-bye, mess-mate," he
then whispered, stooping over the sick man; and so saying, he left the
place.

Shenly was lying on his back. His eyes