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Page 17
Long Jack roared down the hatch, and the "second ha'af"
scrambled up at once.
The shadow of the masts and rigging, with the never-furled
riding-sail, rolled to and fro on the heaving deck in the moonlight;
and the pile of fish by the stern shone like a dump of fluid silver.
In the hold there were tramplings and rumblings where Disko
Troop and Tom Platt moved among the salt-bins. Dan passed
Harvey a pitchfork, and led him to the inboard end of the rough
table, where Uncle Salters was drumming impatiently with a
knife-haft. A tub of salt water lay at his feet.
"You pitch to Dan an' Tom Platt down the hatch, an' take keer
Uncle Salters don't cut yer eye out," said Dan, swinging himself
into the hold. "I'll pass salt below."
Penn and Manuel stood knee deep among cod in the pen,
flourishing drawn knives. Long Jack, a basket at his feet and
mittens on his hands, faced Uncle Salters at the table, and Harvey
stared at the pitchfork and the tub.
"Hi!" shouted Manuel, stooping to the fish, and bringing one up
with a finger under its gill and a finger in its eyes. He laid it on
the edge of the pen; the knife-blade glimmered with a sound of
tearing, and the fish, slit from throat to vent, with a nick on either
side of the neck, dropped at Long Jack's feet.
"Hi!" said Long Jack, with a scoop of his mittened hand. The cod's
liver dropped in the basket. Another wrench and scoop sent the
head and offal flying, and the empty fish slid across to Uncle
Salters, who snorted fiercely. There was another sound of tearing,
the backbone flew over the bulwarks, and the fish, headless,
gutted, and open, splashed in the tub, sending the salt water into
Harvey's astonished mouth. After the first yell, the men were
silent. The cod moved along as though they were alive, and long
ere Harvey had ceased wondering at the miraculous dexterity of it
all, his tub was full.
"Pitch!" grunted Uncle Salters, without turning his head, and
Harvey pitched the fish by twos and threes down the hatch.
"Hi! Pitch 'em bunchy," shouted Dan. "Don't scatter! Uncle Salters is
the best splitter in the fleet. Watch him mind his book!"
Indeed, it looked a little as though the round uncle were cutting
magazine pages against time. Manuel's body, cramped over from
the hips, stayed like a statue; but his long arms grabbed the fish
without ceasing. Little Penn toiled valiantly, but it was easy to see
he was weak. Once or twice Manuel found time to help him
without breaking the chain of supplies, and once Manuel howled
because he had caught his finger in a Frenchman's hook. These
hooks are made of soft metal, to be rebent after use; but the cod
very often get away with them and are hooked again elsewhere;
and that is one of the many reasons why the Gloucester boats
despise the Frenchmen.
Down below, the rasping sound of rough salt rubbed on rough
flesh sounded like the whirring of a grindstone--steady undertune
to the "click-nick" of knives in the pen; the wrench and shloop of
torn heads, dropped liver, and flying offal; the "caraaah" of Uncle
Salters's knife scooping away backbones; and the flap of wet, open
bodies falling into the tub.
At the end of an hour Harvey would have given the world to rest;
for fresh, wet cod weigh more than you would think, and his back
ached with the steady pitching. But he felt for the first time in his
life that he was one of the working gang of men, took pride in the
thought, and held on sullenly.
"Knife oh!" shouted Uncle Salters at last. Penn doubled up,
gasping among the fish, Manuel bowed back and forth to supple
himself, and Long Jack leaned over the bulwarks. The cook
appeared, noiseless as a black shadow, collected a mass of
backbones and heads, and retreated.
"Blood-ends for breakfast an' head-chowder," said Long Jack,
smacking his lips.
"Knife oh!" repeated Uncle Salters, waving the flat, curved
splitter's weapon.
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