..
which lay in the harbour.
At the entrance to the pier I met a powerful, chunky lad who was called
"Nippers," he said. He, too, was going with the _South Sea King_ ... not
as a cattleman, but as stowaway. He urged me to stow away along with
him. And he gave me, unimaginatively, my name of "Skinny," which the
rest called me during the voyage.
* * * * *
We strolled up to the men and joined them.
"Hello, kids!"
"Hello, fellows! Are you the cattlemen for the _South Sea King_?"
"Right you are, my lad ... we are that!"
The men went on with their arguing. They were fighting the Boer War all
over again with their mouths. Some of them had been in it. Many of them
had tramped in South Africa. They shouted violently, profanely, at each
other at the tops of their voices, contending with loud assertions and
counter-assertions, as if about to engage in an all-round fight.
Several personal altercations sprang up, the points of the debate
forgotten ... I couldn't discover what it was about, myself ... only
that one man was a fool ... another, a silly ass ... another, a bloody
liar!
* * * * *
The launch which was to carry them to the _South Sea King_ at this
moment started nosing into the dock, on a turbulent zig-zag across the
harbour; and the men forgot their quarrelling.
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