He waited until they had passed forwards before he went down the after-hatchway to the main deck; where, on the completion of the inspection, all hands were mustered and he read the form of prayer enjoined by the rubric for those about to travel by sea, which was listened to more attentively perhaps than it is in any church ashore. Sailors, however, watch as well as pray; so, no sooner had the chaplain finished than his congregation dispersed instantly to their stations, the commander singing out from the poop, the moment he had reached that coign of vantage, the long-delayed but welcome order, for which we had all been waiting in expectancy since the morning. "Hands, up anchor!" he cried in a brave shout, to which the boatswain on the forecastle gave a shrill response with his whistle, while his mates re-echoed the cry between decks, up and down the ship fore and aft, "All hands, up anchor!" The capstan was again manned below, and the marines and idlers heaved in the cable to the sound of the drum and fife, as before; although, this time, the tune was "The Girl I Left Behind Me," the tramp of their feet coming in every now and again as a sort of chorus to the music, while on the forecastle above, the boatswain overhauled the catfalls, and got up the up and down tackle, and the gunner's crew rigged out the fish davit with its gear. "The cable's `up and down,' sir," presently reported the boatswain to "glass-eye," our first lieutenant, who passed the word aft in the usual manner to the commander on the poop. "Cable's up and down, sir!" The merry sound of the drum and fife, and steady tramp of the men round the capstan on the main deck continued until, anon, the boatswain once again reported to the Honourable Digby Lanyard, as he stood surveying the progress made in heaving in from the knight heads, "Anchor's weighed, sir." This implied that the heavy mass of metal, of some four tons weight, by which we had been moored, was now off the ground, a fact that increased the strain on the cable and messenger, taking a longer and a stronger pull out of those working the capstan, and making the nippers, too, pass a trifle less briskly than before. "Anchor's in sight, sir, and a clear anchor, too!" was the next cry from the forecastle that went from hand to hand aft, causing `The Girl I Left Behind Me' to come out stronger than previously and the tramping feet to hasten their measured tread; and, in another minute or so, the ring of the anchor was chock up to the hawse pipe at the bows, and the boatswain piped "Belay!" "Hands make sail!" next came from the commander aft, the midshipmen stationed in the tops jumping into the rigging and scrambling up the ratlines before he could shout "Way aloft!"