Upon application to the purser for a chair I received a camp stool.
At midnight a second woman of the same caste had been ushered into my room to occupy the third and last berth, whereupon next morning I had waited upon the purser of the ship, and modestly but firmly requested a change of location.
The purser told the woman that he had been shot in the right arm and could not help her nor come near to her.
That night, on deck, a close friend of the purser came for an hour's walk around the deck.
It seemed that some months before he had been a purser on an East Indian liner.
The force of the explosion literally blew the purser out of his berth.
The purser declared that the steamer would remain at anchor until morning, taking on her fruit during the night.
A boat from the steamer landed herpurser with his papers, and took out the quarantine doctor with his green umbrella and clinical thermometer.
Then half-clothed Caribs dashed into the water, and brought in on their backs the Valhalla's purser and the little native officials in their cotton undershirts, blue trousers with red stripes, and flapping straw hats.
Moments later the balding purser appeared, a lifelong seaman with an unctuous smile and rapacious eyes who had dispensed stores on many a prosperous merchantman, and grown rich on a career of bribes.
His face of twenty had suffered little from the voyage, for a stream of bribes to the knowing purser had reserved for him the choice provisions, including virtually all the honey and raisins.
The doctor and purser had taken a greater lurch, and fallen over it, sousing their white waistcoats and well-arranged shirt frills in the dirty mixture.
The appetites of the doctor and purser had risen in proportion.
Both Dr Thompson and thepurser looked in to see me.
Certainly, my love," said Mrs Purser pro tempore, looking a battery of amiabilities.
He began--but the wily purser at once started an objection to the first sentence--yea, even to the title.
The doctor and the purser liked me, because I could converse with them rationally upon matters not altogether nautical.
He was delighted to discover some cold fowls, a ham, and a couple of loaves of bread, which the purser had thoughtfully placed in a basket for the very object for which they were now so much-desired.
But the purser was fussily concerned because there were so many extra passengers from Altaira.
While other knights of the pen confided their missives to the purser of the despatch steamer, Arago, Carleton put his in the hands of a passing stranger, who was going North.
We hadn't been standing around the stove in the dining-room more than ten minutes, before the purser came hurrying toward us.
She was "putting about," the purser said, and her sails were flapping in the wind.
His position as purser had brought him into intimate contact with many people, and he seemed to have absorbed much from them.
It was in San Juan that Orrin first met Mr. Dominick, who was the purser on the Antilles-- you know, that big steamer of the Gulf Line that was burned last year and went down with seven million dollars aboard?
Met with Purser Washington, with whom and a lady, a friend of his, I dined at the Bell Tavern in King Street, but the rogue had no more manners than to invite me, and to let me pay my club.
One of the Roseveans went away, and became a purser in the Royal Navy.
The purser had purchased his stores, and got them on board.
A large tub was brought them to wash in, and they were supplied by the purser with a seaman's suit apiece.
John Clifton (see preceding note); he had been purserin the Answer in the Spanish voyage of 1605.
I am going now to give my letter of credit to the purser to lock up; shall I take yours?
I can keep it as safe as any purser now," she said, obstinately shaking her head.
I do not know if the yarn I am anxious for you to read is true; but the Spanish purser of the fruit steamer El Carrero swore to me by the shrine of Santa Guadalupe that he had the facts from the U.
Inside, the purser was untying a great roll of newspapers, many of them weeks old, gathered in the lower ports by the Pajaro to be distributed at casual stopping-places.
Of course, our captain was at the head of the table, the purser at the foot of it.
The purser opened his eyes and glared about him, as if he expected to find the record of the morning's doings chalked in big letters somewhere on the clean deck.
Nealie, seizing the purser by the arm to drag him along.
To-day we had delivered to us, by the purser of the ship, bedding and clothes.
We have chosen a purseramongst ourselves to take charge of the avails of the charity-box.
They rowed out in a bright-hued rowboat with a glass set in the bottom and gazed at the famed "sea gardens" and found them even more wonderful than the ship's purser had described.
The purser on the ship told us that, but we wouldn't believe it.
If you can see the purser and get our rooms changed, or do something to stop those waves from slapping against that horrible blinking one-eyed window, you can save my life; but no tonic is going to help me.
The purser was not there to take the humorous view, but he conceived that March wanted something higher up, and he was able to offer him a room of those on the promenade where he had seen swells going in and out, for six hundred dollars.
The purser observed that he had a suit of clothes belonging to one of the midshipmen killed in the action with the French frigate, which would, he thought, exactly fit Mr Rayner.
I hope he isn't going to do the way one boy did I used to have," said the purser to himself, "go down there and sleep.
The purser was sorry for what had happened, and most of all he regretted his inability to help Nat, for though he could not testify to it in a way to carry conviction, he was sure in his own mind of what had happened.
The mate saw his advantage, as thepurser hesitated, and he pursued it.
I shall report this to the purser if you don't answer," he threatened.
Nat, for the purser seemed so friendly that he ventured to speak to him of that pet ambition.
To be a helper to a pilot on a passenger steamer was much better than to be an assistant to the purser of a freighter.
Nat and the purser were kept busy checking off, and verifying cargo lists, and, when the Jessie Drew was ready to proceed, Nat took to the mate a duplicate list of what cargo had been discharged.
Here are the manifest slips all written up, Mr. Dunn," and he handed the purser some blanks, filled in with figures.
While Nat was checking off the bales, finding only one or two slight errors in the list the purser had given him, he heard a noise forward in the dark hold.
He found that part of his duties were to make out lists of the freight, enter the shipments on bills, put them in various books, check up manifests and way-bills, and help the purser verify the freight as it was taken on or put off.
From Mr. Dunn, Nat learned when they were in the unsafe passage, for the purser had been over that route many times.
The descent into the coal-hole was by battens, and not very easy for an old man like Mr C But Cross went down first, holding the light for the purser to follow, which he did very slowly, and with great caution.
As soon as they both stood on the coals below, the purser took the light to make his survey.
As the captain was saying this, I perceived the piece of paper which the purser had brought up as his report of killed and wounded lying on the table with the other reports.
She was talking to the purser and Dick saw that he must wait until she had finished.
Soon afterwards a steam launch came off, and thepurser stopped near Dick on his way to his room.
Dick could not see into the office, but heard the purser open a drawer and shuffle some papers, as if he wanted to get rid of his questioner.
This somewhat surprised him, for the purser transacted the ship's business and, so far as he knew, none of the other guests had been taken to the captain's room.
About then," the purser answered in awkward Castilian.
The purser gave him a list, and he noted Kenwardine's name near the bottom.
Nobody met them, however, and they found the purser disengaged.
The purser shut the drawer noisily, but just then a bell rang overhead and the whistle blew to warn the visitors that they must go ashore.
