'TWEEN DECKS IN THE 'SEVENTIES
Sam Noble, A.B. : An Autobiography. With a Foreword by Rear-Admiral A. P. Davidson; • D.S.0: (SamPsen Loy/.
6d. net.) •
IT is a joy-to an old sailor-man to read a book like this for it brings to mind scenes and adventures on sea and land in which one has .participated like -the author, Mr. Sam Noble. When quite, a boy Mr. Noble left the looms of Dundee for the training ship ' St. Vincent ' at Portsmouth in 1875. He was transferred to H.M.S. Victory ' and indulged his
Nelson hero-worship to the full.- Says he :— -
" Here this, here that—interest everywhere ! . . . We Snipped a small piece out of one of the sails and cut off one of the reef- points as trophies to bring home. Mire I gave to a girl years after- wards. Had I known this literary stunt was to come wouldn't I have.kept these and other relics I brought from sea with me ! "
Mr. Noble's description of H.M.S. Swallow' (too long to quote) is the best bit of writing in the book. In this little ship he voyaged for four years—for the Navy believed in long cruises then—sailing first for the coast of Africa to chase slave dhows. This little Scots lad was always a fighter, and " Billy, the first-lieutenant, used to give it to me hot for coming before him so often," he says. But time taught him the wisdoM of living " peaceably with all men," and soon other scenes and adventures crowded upon him.. The book is full of them ; every landing-place is described in simple language—the sentences taut and brief ; and every chapter contains a story. There is the story of Josie with the elegant whiskers who ".drank like a haddock," and was half shaved while he slept on the deck " absolutely fu'." There is the story of his first dinner of turtle-7" a most unplea:satrt, un- palatable dinner it was " ; but, adds Mr. Noble, " we soon got accustomed to it ! " There is, again, the story of the Medicine Man of Elephant Bay who cured a shipmate of a jigger in his foot ; of the girls at a native wedding " covered with fireflies " ; and a vivid bit of writing descriptive of " hundreds of bull and cow elephants with long waving trunks and immense tusks " washing their offspring in an inland lake.
Early in his voyage Mr. Noble discovered a facility for rhyming ; like Silas Wegg he frequently " dropped into poetry." He says :-
" I read and mused over every scrap I laid hands on ; and to turn out a bit myself seemed to me the very height of human achievement."
But the gift proved -his undoing ; for one- day he -lent the MS. book containing his verses to a signalman, who showed it to a liOutenant, Who read the Contents in- the–wardroom
" to the great glee of the rest of the officers." Mr. Noble was severely admonished by the officer whom he had most bitterly lampooned. One of the most remarkable stories in this racy book is entitled " Lady Johnson's Dream," which is an extraordinarily uncanny"-yarn of second sight. It is, on the whole, a striking' id, book; -compounded of humour, shrewdness, and a sense of character rare enough in autobiographies. We must recollect that it is based on a seaman's memories ; the passion of the past is over it all, And for that reason it is delightful—because of its simple enthusiasms, its honest intention, its British down-rightness.
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