CHAPTER XV.
AFTER THE GALE.
One of the most singular traits observable in the character of some boys is the willingness, and even the desire, under certain circumstances, to get into trouble.

A young gentleman, feeling that he has been slighted, or his merit overlooked, permits himself to fall into a mental condition in which he feels no responsibility for his conduct; in which he recklessly breaks through all regulations, places himself in an attitude of opposition to constituted authority, and seems to court the heaviest penalty which can be inflicted upon him for disobedience, impudence, and rebellion.
The fourth lieutenant of the Young America had worked himself up to this disagreeable pitch.

He was not only disposed to assume an attitude of opposition to the principal, who had made the obnoxious regulation which was the immediate cause of his rebellious condition, but to all who supported his authority, or willingly submitted to it.
Smoking was a high crime on board the Young America--not in the relation of the practice to the ship, but to the student.

It was condemned, not simply because it would be offensive in the cabins and steerage, and on deck, but because it was a bad habit for a boy to acquire.

The adult forward officers, the cooks and the stewards, were allowed to smoke on the forecastle at certain prescribed hours; but it was a punishable offence for a student to smoke at any time or in any place, whether on board or on shore.
Goodwin was indignant at the conduct of his room-mate, for the third lieutenant was not only opposed to smoking on principle, but the fumes of tobacco were intensely offensive to him; and there was no doubt that, in the confined space of the state room, insufficiently ventilated, while all the openings in the deck were closed during the gale, the smoke would make him "as sick as a horse." He was a noble-minded, manly youth, and had all a boy's detestation for tattling and tale-bearing.