CHAPTER XV
For several days the captain seemed very much out of humor.
Nothing went right, or fast enough for him. He quarrelled with the
cook, and threatened to flog him for throwing wood on deck, and
had a dispute with the mate about reeving a Spanish burton; the
mate saying that he was right, and had been taught how to do it by
a man who was a sailor! This the captain took in dudgeon, and they
were at swords' points at once. But his displeasure was chiefly
turned against a large, heavy-moulded fellow from the Middle
States, who was called Sam. This man hesitated in his speech, was
rather slow in his motions, and was only a tolerably good sailor,
but usually seemed to do his best; yet the captain took a dislike
to him, thought he was surly and lazy, and ``if you once give a
dog a bad name,''-- as the sailor-phrase is,-- ``he may as well
jump overboard.'' The captain found fault with everything this man
did, and hazed him for dropping a marline-spike from the
main-yard, where he was at work. This, of course, was an accident,
but it was set down against him. The captain was on board all day
Friday, and everything went on hard and disagreeably. ``The more
you drive a man, the less he will do,'' was as true with us as
with any other people.
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