The Iron Pirate by Max Pemberton

The way from the dining-room was through a long passage, lighted with arc lamps at intervals, and having the doors of many rooms on the right-hand side of it. Several of these doors were open; and I saw the interiors of well-furnished bedrooms, of smaller sitting-rooms, and of a beautifully-furnished billiard-room. At the end of the passage, we descended a flight of stairs to another landing, where there was a steep rock-slope leading right through the cliff almost to the level of the water. This proved the way to a small stretch of beach which was at the uppermost end of the fjord; and here I found several substantial buildings of stone, evidently for the use of Black's company. The largest of the houses seemed to be a kind of a hall, well lighted by arc lamps. Into this we passed, lifting a heavy curtain of skins; and seated there, on all sorts of rough lounges and benches, were the men I had seen in Paris, with fifty or sixty others, no less ferocious-looking or more decently clad. There were negroes in light check suits and red flannel shirts; Americans in velveteen coats and trousers; Italians muffled up in jerseys; Spaniards playing cards before the roaring fire; half-castes smoking cheroots and drinking from china pots; Englishmen lying wrapped in rugs, asleep, or bawling songs to a small audience, which gave a chorus back in mellifluous curses; Russians drunk with spirits; Frenchmen chattering; Chinese mooningly silent; over all an atmosphere of smoke and foul odours, of fetid warmth and stifling heaviness.

As we entered the place the din was deafening, a medley of shouts and oaths, of songs and execrations; but it ceased when the captain bawled "Silence! " and an unusual stillness prevailed. The man Four-Eyes, who was always the immediate "go-between" so far as the captain and crew were concerned, at once put chairs for us near the huge fireplace, setting a great armchair for the skipper, with a small table whereon were many papers, and a small wooden hammer such as the chairman of a meeting commonly uses. Black took his seat in the great chair, with the doctor, the Scotsman, and myself around him; and then he harangued the men.