CHAPTER SIX.
THE STARLING.
Rubbing my eyes and then opening them to the full, wide awake at last, I at once recollected where I was, and who was speaking to me as he shook me.
It was Ching Wang, the Chinese cook, smiling all over his round yellow face, and holding out a tin pannikin with something steaming in it, that sent forth a fragrant smell which made my mouth water.
"Hi me wakee can do," he said in his broken pigeon English, although from having been several voyages he spoke more intelligibly than the majority of his countrymen, "Mass' Looney me axee lookee after lilly pijjin, and so me fetchee piecee coffee number one chop.

You wanchee-- hey ?" "Thank you," I cried gratefully, drinking the nice hot coffee, which seemed delicious though there was no milk in it.

Then, forgetting I was in the top bunk, I sprang off the mattress on which I had been lying, falling further than I thought, it being quite six feet to the deck below; and, knocking down the good-natured Chinaman, with whom I tumbled over amongst the things scattered about the floor and landed finally outside the door of the deck-house in a heap, rolled up with him in the blanket I had clutched as I fell! Fortunately, however, neither of us was injured by this little scrimmage, which somehow or other seemed to smooth over the awkwardness of our making acquaintance, both of us grinning over the affair as a piece of good fun.
"Chin-chin, lilly pijjin," said my new friend, as he picked himself up from the deck and made his way back to his galley with the empty pannikin, whose contents I was glad to have swallowed before jumping out of the bunk, or else it would have been spilt in another fashion.

"When you wanchee chow-chow you comee Ching Wang and he givee you first chop." "Thank you," I replied again, not knowing then what he meant by his term "chow-chow," although I fancied he intended something kind, and probably of an edible nature, as he was the cook.

But all thoughts of him and his intentions were quickly banished from my mind the moment I looked around me, and saw and heard all the bustle going on in the ship; for, men were racing here and there, and ropes were being thrown down with heavy bangs, the captain and Mr Mackay both on the poop were yelling out queer orders that I couldn't understand, and Mr Saunders and the boatswain on the forecastle were also shouting back equally strange answers, while, to add to the effect, blocks were creaking and canvas flapping aloft, and groups of sailors everywhere were hauling and pulling as if their lives depended on every tug they gave.
It was broad daylight and more; the sun having, unlike me, been up long since, it being after eight o'clock and a bright beautiful morning, with every prospect of fine weather before us for the run down the Channel.
We had come through the Bullock Channel, emerging from the estuary of the Thames ahead of the North Foreland, which proudly raised its head away on our starboard bow, the sun shining on its bare scarp and picking out every detail with photographic distinctness.