He it was, I know, that carried some of Johnson's hasty talk to Wolf Larsen.

Johnson, it seems, bought a suit of oilskins from the slop-chest and found them to be of greatly inferior quality.

Nor was he slow in advertising the fact.

The slop-chest is a sort of miniature dry-goods store which is carried by all sealing schooners and which is stocked with articles peculiar to the needs of the sailors.

Whatever a sailor purchases is taken from his subsequent earnings on the sealing grounds; for, as it is with the hunters so it is with the boat-pullers and steerers--in the place of wages they receive a "lay," a rate of so much per skin for every skin captured in their particular boat.
But of Johnson's grumbling at the slop-chest I knew nothing, so that what I witnessed came with a shock of sudden surprise.