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Page 8
Mr. Commissioner Pordage kept in a red-and-black japanned box, like
a family lump-sugar box, some document or other, which some Sambo
chief or other had got drunk and spilt some ink over (as well as I
could understand the matter), and by that means had given up lawful
possession of the Island. Through having hold of this box, Mr.
Pordage got his title of Commissioner. He was styled Consul too,
and spoke of himself as "Government."
He was a stiff-jointed, high-nosed old gentleman, without an ounce
of fat on him, of a very angry temper and a very yellow complexion.
Mrs. Commissioner Pordage, making allowance for difference of sex,
was much the same. Mr. Kitten, a small, youngish, bald, botanical
and mineralogical gentleman, also connected with the mine--but
everybody there was that, more or less--was sometimes called by Mr.
Commissioner Pordage, his Vice-commissioner, and sometimes his
Deputy-consul. Or sometimes he spoke of Mr. Kitten, merely as being
"under Government."
The beach was beginning to be a lively scene with the preparations
for careening the sloop, and with cargo, and spars, and rigging, and
water-casks, dotted about it, and with temporary quarters for the
men rising up there out of such sails and odds and ends as could be
best set on one side to make them, when Mr. Commissioner Pordage
comes down in a high fluster, and asks for Captain Maryon. The
Captain, ill as he was, was slung in his hammock betwixt two trees,
that he might direct; and he raised his head, and answered for
himself.
"Captain Maryon," cries Mr. Commissioner Pordage, "this is not
official. This is not regular."
"Sir," says the Captain, "it hath been arranged with the clerk and
supercargo, that you should be communicated with, and requested to
render any little assistance that may lie in your power. I am quite
certain that hath been duly done."
"Captain Maryon," replied Mr. Commissioner Pordage, "there hath been
no written correspondence. No documents have passed, no memoranda
have been made, no minutes have been made, no entries and counter-
entries appear in the official muniments. This is indecent. I call
upon you, sir, to desist, until all is regular, or Government will
take this up."
"Sir," says Captain Maryon, chafing a little, as he looked out of
his hammock; "between the chances of Government taking this up, and
my ship taking herself down, I much prefer to trust myself to the
former."
"You do, sir?" cries Mr. Commissioner Pordage.
"I do, sir," says Captain Maryon, lying down again.
"Then, Mr. Kitten," says the Commissioner, "send up instantly for my
Diplomatic coat."
He was dressed in a linen suit at that moment; but, Mr. Kitten
started off himself and brought down the Diplomatic coat, which was
a blue cloth one, gold-laced, and with a crown on the button.
"Now, Mr. Kitten," says Pordage, "I instruct you, as Vice-
commissioner, and Deputy-consul of this place, to demand of Captain
Maryon, of the sloop Christopher Columbus, whether he drives me to
the act of putting this coat on?"
"Mr. Pordage," says Captain Maryon, looking out of his hammock
again, "as I can hear what you say, I can answer it without
troubling the gentleman. I should be sorry that you should be at
the pains of putting on too hot a coat on my account; but,
otherwise, you may put it on hind-side before, or inside-out, or
with your legs in the sleeves, or your head in the skirts, for any
objection that I have to offer to your thoroughly pleasing
yourself."
"Very good, Captain Maryon," says Pordage, in a tremendous passion.
"Very good, sir. Be the consequences on your own head! Mr. Kitten,
as it has come to this, help me on with it."
When he had given that order, he walked off in the coat, and all our
names were taken, and I was afterwards told that Mr. Kitten wrote
from his dictation more than a bushel of large paper on the subject,
which cost more before it was done with, than ever could be
calculated, and which only got done with after all, by being lost.
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