Zealand

19. A New Awareness

Sunday, 9th September 1666

Each day seemed like the next. The small fires continued burning in London, but there was no more spreading. And the breeze had changed to blow from the west, bringing at times the smoke, but always the smell of it. My reading had become easier, and I needed to ask Captain about fewer words. This was good because he was often away showing the parcels of land to the men Mister Harcourt had directed to Bessy – after he had told them the house was already taken.

Then on Sunday morning, I awoke to water dripping onto my face. It was too dark under the side deck to see, so I felt about above me to find it wet and more drops falling. My ticking was damp, and I wondered. A bucket spilt? But they're way up forward at the heads. And across to the other side. And the cooking one's empty.

Then Captain called, "Up, lad. Up and hie thee outside."

"Aye, sir."

I rolled from my bed and fetched up my breeches, and as I stepped a foot into them, he said, "Leave your clothes be, lad. No need for them."

Though I didn't understand, I had learnt to trust and obey him, so I ducked under the tarpawling to be surprised by the fall of rain.

Captain stood there as buff as Adam, and he handed me a chip of soap and a cloth. "Up onto the stern deck, lad. Time to wash away the sweat and soil of the past week."

I followed him, and as we stood soaping and scrubbing, I couldn't help but look at him. My eyes went to the hair on his chest and then down to that around his pisser. So thick compared to mine. And his balls hang so low. Must be what Mother meant about coming of age and the changes that happen.

As I looked closer, he chuckled, and I turned my head away, embarrassed. "Sorry, sir. I ain't before seen a grown man with no clothes."

"No offence, lad. Part of your natural curiosity, so nothing to be ashamed about."

I looked back at him, then nodding down, I asked, "When will those changes happen to me?"

"It varies, lad. Some begin before fourteen, others not until beyond sixteen." After a long pause, he asked, "Had your mother told you about it?"

"About the changes, sir?"

"Aye. And about their purpose."

"All she said was that there will be changes." I shrugged. "Didn't say what or why."

He was silent for another long while as he soaped his chest, then he said, "With your mother gone, I am effectively your guardian. And since you are my ward, it falls to me to offer guidance in these matters."

"Guidance, like Mother said a man should give me."

"Indeed! Yes, but where to begin?" He paused again, then he said, "There are big differences between men and women."

"I saw that the times Mother took me to wash at the strand along the river. The women kept their clothes on to bathe, but the children were all buff." I reached down and shook mine. "Girls got no pisser or balls like this, only a split."

"Aye, but the differences are beyond only the physical you would have seen – the cleft or the foretail. With the coming of age, much happens to those parts in both boys and girls, and their behaviours also change. As boys become men, they are driven by their minds and bodies, developing the skills to provide and to protect. But as girls mature, they are influenced more by their emotions and by the desire to nurture and to care."

"Oh! Why is this?"

"Part of the design to create and rear children."

I pondered this while I turned this way and that to let the rain rinse away the soap. Then I said, "I always wondered how babies are made, but Mother said a man should tell me."

Captain paused his soaping and nodded. "Yes, easier." He remained quiet as he tilted his head side to side, then he said, "In a woman's cleft is a hole, and the man inserts his tail there to deposit seeds."

"Seeds, sir?"

"From the testicles, lad. The balls, as you call them. And that is where the maturing changes begin. They will become sore and tender as they enlarge to hang down your thighs, and your tail will follow them." He pointed down my front. "Your acorn is already much enlarged, so you might have begun."

"Acorn, sir?"

"The knob on your tail, lad." He bent down to look more closely. "Though that might be inflamed. Had your mother not told you to slide the skin back and clean there?"

I shook my head. "No, sir."

"No, of course not." He chuckled. "Not having one, she would not know. But you are now of an age when you must regularly do so; otherwise, the deposits will cause inflammation." He reached down and grasped his. "Watch how I do it, lad. Then you do the same to yours."

When I uncovered my acorn, Captain could see no inflammation there, and he said the increased size shows I've started my changes. This pleased me.

He continued to tell me things as we washed, and even though I was beginning to chill, I didn't mind; I was learning so much. After he had explained the stiffening and its purposes, he said, "We should finish here and go inside, lad. You begin to shiver."

Under the tarpawling, while we dried with the bath sheets, he said, "This is how sailors bathe at sea – and also wash their clothing. But on sunny days at anchor, they jump into the water fully dressed, climb back aboard and soap their clothes, take them off, turn them inside out and don them again to soap the other side. Then back into the water again to rinse, accomplishing both bath and laundry at the same time."

"Then wear them wet."

"Nay, lad. They rinse them in a tub of fresh water to remove the salt, then hang them or spread them in the sun to dry."

"Then wander around in the buff."

"Aye, many do, particularly those with only one set of clothes. But others because they enjoy the unrestrained feeling, the freedom."

"Oh! Mother said grown people shouldn't be undressed near others."

"Aye, when there are both men and women."

I pondered this for a while, then I asked, "Where do the women go when the men wash like this? On the other side of the ship? Or do they take turns?"

Captain chuckled. "There are no women aboard ships."

"Oh! Why not?"

"Tradition, lad. Tradition going back to the ancients, warning that a ship is cursed with women aboard."