It was he who took Iris on his shoulders and brought her to safety through the spume of the wrathful sea, he who carried her to the hut, he who crossed Fernando Noronha alone to protect her.
Coke was impartial.

He would have minimized his own singular bravery in running up the ship's signals had not Iris given him a breathing-space while she enthralled the others with her description.

Otherwise, Coke skipped no line of his epic.
"You'll rec'lect," he wheezed, in a voice that rasped like a file, "you'll rec'lect, Mr.Verity, as I said to you that Hozier was good enough to take charge of the bridge of a battleship.

By--well, any 'ow, if I'd said the Channel Fleet I shouldn't 'ave bin talkin' through me 'at.

Look at 'im now.