to call him on the river, acause of his lame foot and the thick sole he used to wear to make one leg same length as tother; and perhaps, after all, it was Bobs toe as made him such a drinking chap, and not the example as Gimlet set him. Anyhow, that there dont matter; only when Im a-telling a thing I likes to be exact, as one used to be with the inwoices o the goods one had to deliver up or down the river.
Well, I was going up and down the river with all sorts o goods, from ships, and wharves, and places sundry things, you know, for I never had no dealings with coals and one day, down the river, we loaded up with barrels off a wharf down by Tilbury not the Tilbury as was blowed up the other day, cause that was only a monkey boat, but Tilbury down the river, you know; where theres the fort, and soldiers, and magazines, and all them sort o things.
Loaded up we were, and the little barrels all lying snug, and covered up with tarpaulins, and us a-waiting for the tide to come for we was going up to Dumphies Wharf, up there at Isleworth when Bob Solly comes up to me, and he says, says he
Guvnor, he says, we aint got no taties.
Well, Bob, I says, then hadnt you better get some?
Yes, he says, I will.
And then Gimlet, who had been standing by, he says
And we aint got no herrins.
The long and the short on it was that them two chaps goes ashore to buy some herrins and some taties, so as we could cook em aboard in the cabin, where we bargees reglar kind o lived, you know.
I ought to ha knowed better; but Id got an old Weekly Dispatch , as was the big paper in them days, and I was a-spelling it over about the corrynation o King George the Fourth, and the jolly row thered been up by Westminster Abbey when Queen Carryline went up to the doors and said as she wanted to be crowned too. I might ha knowed what ud follow, but I was so wrapped up in that there old noosepaper, not being a fast reader, that I never thought about it; and consequently, when it was about low tide, and time for us to go, them two chaps was nowhere.
Seen anything o my mates? I hollers to a chap ashore, for I was now out in the stream.
Theyre up at the Blue Posties, he says. Shall I fetch em?
Yes, and be hanged to em! I says; and I goes down to the cabin, vexed like, gets hold o the flint and steel and my pipe, and was going to fill it, when I remembered what we took aboard, and I put em all back in the cupboard.
Quarter of an hour arter, just as the tide was beginning to turn, them two chaps comes aboard, reglar tossicated, not to say drunk, and werry wild I was, and made em go down into the cabin, thinking as theyd sleep it off; and then, casting loose, I put out one of the sweeps, and we began to float gently up the river.
I got on very comfortably that afternoon, never fouling any of the ships lying in the Pool, getting well under London Bridge, and old Blackfriars with its covered-in seats like small domes of St. Pauls cut in half, and so on and under Westminster Bridge, which was very much like the one at Blackfriars, and on and on, till the tide was at its height, when I let go the anchors and went to look at them two chaps; when, instead of being all fight, I found as the money as ought to have bought herrins and taties had gone in a bottle of stuff which one of em had smuggled in under his jacket, and they was wuss than ever.
Of course I was precious wild; but as its waste o words to talk to men in that state, I saved it up for them, went forward, and rolled myself up in my jacket, pulled a bit o tarpaulin over me, wished for a pipe, and then began to think.
Now, I suppose that I got thinking too hard, as I sat there looking at the lights, blinking here and there ashore, as the tide ran hissing down by the sides of the barge; for after a time I got too tired to think, and I must have gone off fast asleep, for I got dreaming of all sorts of horrible things through being in an uncomfortable position, and among others I suppose all on account of twenty ton of gunpowder I had on board I dreamed as it had blown up, and I was in our little boat, rowing about on the river amongst burnt wood and bits of barge and powder barrels, picking up the pieces of myself.
Yes, rowing about and picking up the pieces of myself; because, I said to myself, I ought to be buried decently, and not be left to go floating about up and down with the tide. I had a hard job, I remember now fishing up a foot, now a leg, and now pieces of my body. How it was I never seemed to ask myself, that I could be rowing about and fishing myself up; but there it was, and I got quite cross at last because my head gave me so much trouble: for every time I reached at it with one of the oars it bobbed under water, and came up again, and rolled over and over,
and edged a little away. I felt ready to faint again; but by degrees I got away, went on deck and threw my coat into the river, looked myself all over, and then, fighting hard against the wish to jump over and swim ashore, I forced myself to the hatchway, looked down to see all black there as pitch, and then I knelt down on that bit of a deck and said the first prayer to God as Id said for years.