Definition of "gamesomeness"

So when they were working that evening at the pumps, there was on this head no small gamesomeness slily going on among them, as they stood with their feet continually overflowed by the rippling clear water; [...]

1851 November 14, Herman Melville, “The Town-Ho’s Story (As Told at the Golden Inn.)”, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, page 274