Aboard Ethan Allan

Wednesday, November 20, 1929

Painted on the fo’cas’le and bulkhead this morning. It was cloudy, and when it began to drizzle we knocked off work. The rain soon stopped and I spent most the afternoon chipping the gangway ceiling.
The wheel broke in Slim’s watch at 9:30 AM and we were forced to shut off the engines and drift idly till after 7 PM while the damage was being repaired.
This and the fact we knocked off work a bit early seemed to furnish all the requisites of a gala day. Ten minutes after quitting I returned to the cabin to find corpulent (and always quiet) Johnson already lit up over a gallon jug of rum, and with him Red and Neal. The jug emptied like a sieve and the effect was almost instantaneous. At lunch the three had quite a time and afterward I thought I would pop when Red and I got Johnson started about his “yug” which was broken and Shipping Board sailors in general. He became loud and was just like a quarrelsome kid. Red wasn’t bad but Neal was lit up and started off to see the Skipper. Later he nearly had a fight with the bos’n. Liquor loosened tongues and what they didn’t call the bos’n was worth thinking about. Johnson, Red, and Chips the carpenter opened up another couple of quarts about dinner time and the cabin was sure a drunken brawl for a while. It was a comical trio though, especially Johnson and Chips, the old moon-faced Dutchman.

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