E-text prepared by Al Haines Transcriber's note: "Taffrail" is the pseudonym of Henry Taprell Dorling. The book from which this etext was prepared was missing the leaf containing pages 41 and 42. STAND BY! Naval Sketches and Stories by "TAFFRAIL" Author of "Carry On!" "Pincher Martin O.D., Etc." London C. Arthur Pearson, Limited Henrietta Street, W.C. 1916 TO THE SHIP'S COMPANY WHO ARE SECOND TO NONE PREFACE It seems almost unnecessary to remark that the characters and ships figuring in the sketches throughout this book are entirely fictitious. "Bunting," "The Acting Sub," "Our Happy Home," "The Lost Sheep," "The 'Muckle Flugga' Hussars," and "The Mother Ship" appeared in the _Daily Mail_, and "The 'Pirates'" in the _Weekly Despatch_. They are here reprinted, with minor alterations, by kind permission of the Editors. TAFFRAIL. 1916. CONTENTS THE "ACTING SUB" THE MOTHER SHIP OUT HAPPY HOME BLOODLESS SURGERY "BUNTING" THE LOST SHEEP A NAVAL MENAGERIE THE "MUCKLE FLUGGA" HUSSARS THE "PIRATES" A MINOR AFFAIR THE FOG THE TRADERS POTVIN OF THE "PUFFIN" STAND BY! THE "ACTING SUB" He was a very junior young officer indeed when the powers that be first gladdened his heart and ruined his clothes by sending him to a destroyer. A mere sub-lieutenant with "(acting)" after his name, which, as any proper "sub" will tell you, is a sign of extreme juniority. Moreover, the single gold stripe on his monkey jacket was still suspiciously new and terribly untarnished. Not so very long before he had been a "snotty" (midshipman) in a battleship, a mere "dog's body," who had to obey the orders of almost every officer in the ship except those few who happened to be junior to him. It is true that he exercised his authority and a severe discipline on those midshipmen who had the misfortune to be a year or so younger than himself, and that he expressed a lordly contempt for the assistant clerk. But he lived in the gun-room, slept in a hammock, kept all his worldly possessions in a sea-chest, and bathed and dressed in the company of fifteen other boisterous young gentlemen. Then he had his watches to keep at sea and his picket boat to run in harbour, while his spare time was fully employed in mastering the subtleties of gunnery, torpedo work, and electricity, and in rubbing up his rapidly dwindling knowledge of engineering and _x_ and _y_. It was well that he did so, for at some distant period when the war ceased he would have to pass certain stringent examinations before he could be confirmed in the rank of lieutenant. So on the whole he had been kept fairly busy, more particularly as watch-keeping at the guns with the ship at sea in all weathers in war time was not all jam.