But nobody ever sang by moonlight on the upper deck, and the congregational singing at church and prayers was not of a superior order of architecture.

I put up with it as long as I could and then joined in and tried to improve it, but this encouraged young George to join in too, and that made a failure of it; because George's voice was just "turning," and when he was singing a dismal sort of bass it was apt to fly off the handle and startle everybody with a most discordant cackle on the upper notes.

George didn't know the tunes, either, which was also a drawback to his performances.

I said: "Come, now, George, don't improvise.

It looks too egotistical.