The whole trouble in messing in the old days arose out of quality, not quantity. The beef and pork were almost invariably bad, owing to the system of using up the old provisions first, with a view to economy. Every ship carried tons of good provisions going bad, while those already bad and decayed were being consumed. Consequently the men starved in the midst of relative plenty. It remains to add that the officers fared little better.[73] On the whole, taking their general shore food into consideration, it may be argued that they fared worse. As a rule, they had to eat what the men ate, a fact too often forgotten by those who believe that the officers of those days generally peculated on provisions for the men. Both aft and forward there was one consolation. Liquor was plentiful enough for anyone who wanted to be half seas over by eventime. So was the hard life lived, with an occasional battle to break the monotony. To both officers and men battle seems to have been the “beano” of to-day. Conditions on board were not rosy enough to make life worth clinging to, while battle meant a good time afterwards to those who got through unscathed. There was only one terror--being wounded. The horrors of the cockpit are beyond exaggeration. The surgeons did their best. They were poorly paid men[74] and expected to find their own instruments: only if they could not did they borrow tools from the carpenter.[75] [Illustration: A TRAFALGAR ANNIVERSARY.] They heated their instruments before use so as to lessen the shock of amputation; they doped their patients with wine or spirit so far as might be. They took all as they came in turn, whether officer or man. If anyone seemed too badly wounded to be worth attention they had him taken above and thrown overboard. If, at a hasty glance, taking off an arm or a leg, or both, seemed likely to promise a cure, they gave the wounded man a tot of rum and a bit of leather to chew, and set to work! The wounded who survived were treated with a humanity which makes the “more humanity to the wounded” of the Spithead mutineers a little difficult to understand at first sight. They were fed on delicacies; and anything out of the ordinary on the wardroom table was always sent to them. They also got all the officers’ wine. On the other hand, time in the sick bay was deducted from their pay,[76] and they were liable to all kinds of infectious diseases caught from the last patient.