How British sailors were expected to talk in 1909

[Jonathan Lighter]

U.S. paper, British source:

1909 _Salt Lake Herald_ (March 1) 6:

GAVE HIS WORDS FOR IT

(Tit-Bits)

Seaman’s return tickets are issued by most British railways at seaports
to sailors at reduced rates. A rather well groomed young man demanded one to


Birmingham; the booking clerk at Hull demurred.

“Seamen’s [sic] returns are only issued to sailors,” he snapped.
“Well, I’m a sailor,” was as the reply.

“I have only your word for that," said the clerk; “how am I to know it is
correct?”

"How are you to know?” came the the answer. “Why, you leather-necked,
swivel-eyed son of a sea cook, if you feel my starboard boom running foul
of
your headlights you’ll know I’ve been doing more than sit on a stool and
bleating
all my life, and you’ll haul in your jaw tackle a bit!”

“Give him the ticket,” said the passenger superintendent who had overheard
the
the dialogue; “he’s a sailor right enough.”

N.b., "leathernecked" is used here as a generally abusive epithet.
HDAS files have exx. of all the quoted expressions; _swivel-eyed_
'squint-eyed,' goes back at least as far as Grose.

JL

-- 
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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