[The Lieutenant and Commander by Basil Hall]@TWC D-Link bookThe Lieutenant and Commander CHAPTER XIII 17/29
I did succeed, however, and merely said, in passing, "You should not play these tricks upon travellers; cast him loose immediately." One of the men pulled his knife from his breast, and cutting the cord which fastened the poor Spaniard to the ladder, let him scamper off.
Unluckily for the gravity of the officers, however, and that of the crew, Jacko did not run below, or jump into one of the boats out of sight, but made straight for his dear friends the marines, drawn up in line across our little hurricane-house of a poop.
Unconscious of the ridicule he was bringing on his military patrons, he took up a position in front of the corps, not unlike a fugleman; and I need hardly say, that even the royals themselves, provoked though they were, now joined in the laugh which soon passed along the decks, and was with difficulty suppressed during the remainder of the muster. A day or two afterwards, and while the monkey was still puzzled to think what was the matter with his chin, he happened to observe the doctor engaged in some chemical process.
As his curiosity and desire for information were just such as ought to characterize a traveller of his intelligence, he crept gradually from chest to chest, and from bag to bag, till he arrived within about a yard of Apothecaries' Hall, as that part of the steerage was named by the midshipmen.
Poor Mono's delight was very great as he observed the process of pill-making, which he watched attentively while the ingredients were successively weighed, pounded, and formed into a long roll of paste.
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