EBOOK PUNCH ***
Produced by Malcolm Farmer, William Flis, and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team.
PUNCH,
OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.
VOL. 100.
January 24, 1891.
MR. PUNCH'S PRIZE NOVELS.
NO. XII.--THE MATE OF THE MARLINSPIKE.
(_BY SHARK MUSSELL; AUTHOR OF "ERECT WITH A STOVE IN HER," "MY GYP
MADE TO WHEEZE," "THE ROMANCE OF A PENNY PARLOUR," "A HOOK FOR THE
BANNOCK," "FOUND THE GAL ON FIRE," "THE MYSTERY OF THE LOTION JAR,"
"THE JOKES O' LEAD," &C., &C., &C._)
["Here you are, my hearty," writes the Author, "this is a
regular briny ocean story, all storms and thunderclaps and
sails and rigging and soaring masts and bellying sails. How
about 'avast heaving' and 'shiver my timbers,' and 'son of a
sea-cook,' and all that? No, thank you; that kind of thing's
played out. MARRYAT was all very well _in his day_, but that
day's gone. The public requires stories about merchant ships,
and, by Neptune, the public shall have them, with all kinds
of hairy villains and tempest-tossed wrecks and human interest
and no end of humour, likewise word-pictures of ships and
storms. That's me. So clear the decks, and here goes."]
CHAPTER I.
We were in mid-ocean. Over the vast expanses of the oily sea no ripple
was to be seen although Captain BABBIJAM kept his binoculars levelled
at the silent horizon for three-quarters of an hour by the saloon
clock.
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