The doctor looked up on our entrance from what seemed suspiciously like a copy of one of the daily journals, which he had been apparently studying with great interest; but, of course, I might have been mistaken. He was a pleasant, easy-going gentleman, I thought; and when I spoke about him subsequently to father, he said he was probably like most of the `sawbones' he had met with in his time in the Navy--"chaps as wouldn't let their sense of duty ever fret their minds too much!" I could not help seeing now, that, though the steward held out our papers to him, he did not take the trouble to stretch out his hand for them; allowing the man to lay them on the table before him when he was tired of holding them out. "Oh, that you, Trimmens?" he said languidly, as if he were too tired almost to get out the sentence, though he had a nice, agreeable voice. "What! You don't mean to say you've brought in another batch of boys to be examined?" "Yes, sir," replied the sick-berth steward, opening his mouth, and closing it again with a sort of snap, and uttering the two words as one. "Three of 'em now, sir!" "Why, that makes the fourth lot this morning!" exclaimed the other plaintively. "The ship'll be chock-full if they keep on coming in like this. Only at the beginning of the month, too!" "Yes, sir," agreed the steward. "Shall I make a start with 'em, sir?" "Oh yes, carry on, Trimmens," said the doctor, looking at his watch, and then sitting bolt upright in his chair with more alertness than he had yet displayed. "But, by Jove, you must look sharp! It's close on lunch time, and we haven't much time to spare." "Yes, sir," answered the sick-berth steward in the same snappy, mechanical way; and then, turning to us, he said, "Which of ye came first, boys?" "Me, zur," replied `Ugly,' stepping forwards. "I were first aboard this mornin'; an', by rights, I comes first." "Boys have no rights in the Navy, or wrongs either if they behave themselves properly," observed the doctor, giving my joker a `snop' for his bumptiousness. "What's your name?" "Reeks," replied `Ugly,' a bit abashed. "My name be Moses Reeks, zur." "Leeks?" "No-a, zur, Reeks. We spells it with a `har,' double `he,' and a `k' and a `hess,' zur." "Oh, all right, Reeks; but it looks uncommonly like Leeks on your paper here; and I thought you were a Welshman," said the doctor, smiling at his queer Hampshire pronunciation; for some of the chaps down our way speak just as badly as the cockneys in the east end of London, especially those coming from the country part beyond Cosham and Fareham. "Now, strip off your clothes to the waist, Reeks, and you, Trimmens, just take his chest measurement, please. You need not take off your trousers, boy!" He added this caution in the nick of time, for `Ugly' appeared about to peel off everything, to his naked pelt! The sick-berth steward then proceeded to put a tape-measure round his body, just under the armpits, compassing his chest.