Page 82 - Michael Frost-Voyages to Maturity-23531.indd

some five months’ seniority to me. The mate’s birthday occurred one day after
leaving Port Elizabeth, and he held a party at which the two (one having been
the Chief Cadet Captain at Warsash, and, perhaps as a consequence, was quite
an arrogant young man) razzed him, unnecessarily and at length. I thought it
crude and in bad taste, and it obviously displeased the mate. Next day we were
collectively called into his office and told that because of our behaviour we were
to lose our wine account and shore leave, and that weekends would now be served
on the bridge instead of at leisure.

This was, I thought, somewhat harsh retribution, but in the circumstances
(and it being a British ship, with mostly ex-Public-School boys as deck officers,
wherein the Winchester School motto of ‘Manners Maketh Man’ – as asserted
by my school’s headmaster - was almost an article of faith in such a hierarchy)
was not unwarranted.

But the very next day the mate decided to ‘let bygones be bygones’ and told us
that the decision to remove privileges and the imposition of weekend work would
be reversed. We thought this pleasant news but agreed that this had been the
wrong way to handle disciplinary matters and collectively concluded that we had
lost some respect for him. It was apparent to us that the structure of a ship-bound
society was unique and necessarily called for ‘civilised’ and consistent discipline.
It was also obvious that the acquisition of respect is difficult, but that its loss could
be instantaneous and absolute.

The voyage continued without news of our next destination until we berthed
in Abadan, where we welcomed the delivery of long-missed mail (the ship-board
mail system, an essential lifeline for the crew’s sanity, was quite efficient; one’s
correspondents, especially in tankers, addressed letters to Shell in London, who
then, upon determining where a vessel would next berth, mailed to its local
agents that mail which it had by then received; it was not necessary to rely upon
deliveries to obscure and perhaps mail-less destinations). But the news was this
time not good; the loading was to be for Bombay, Gan, Madras and Calcutta,
none of which had I the slightest wish to visit or revisit.
But every now and again interesting little scenarios came up, and one such
occurred in this uninteresting port. Berthed close to us was a BP tanker, and in
the usual spirit of comity in such a moribund place, a couple of cadets came over
to visit our ship (Mantua was newer than most tankers; it probably looked from
the perspective of their senectuous home a vision of comfort and good living).
We entertained them in the wardroom, and our conversation moved around to
the perspectives that they had of their future careers, most P&O officers (in fact,
probably all but ‘half-a-mate’) seeing tanker service as little but an unfortunate

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