Master and Commander (Aubrey & Maturin, #1)

by Patrick O'Brian

soused hog’s face

Yum...

‘How…?’ began Jack, looking at Stephen Maturin with candid affection. He had eaten two or three pounds of mutton, and the boar on top of the sheep brought out all his benevolence. ‘How…?’But

Excuse me, how much mutton?

What do you say to taking tea?

yes pls

‘Tea would make me very happy,’ said Stephen.

Samesies

With intense mortification he saw that the piece of meat he had hidden at yesterday’s dinner had oozed grease through his handkerchief and his pocket. ‘How wonderfully strange,’ he thought, ‘to be upset by this trifle; yet I am upset.’ He sat down and ate the piece of meat (the eye of a mutton chop);

Ffs maturin

Very gently he stretched out his finger and stroked the toad’s throat: the toad swelled a little and moved its crossed hands; then sat easy, gazing back.

Cute maturin

Jack beckoned with his hand, calling ‘Handsomely, handsomely now.’

It is a great while since I felt the grind of bone under my saw,’ he added, smiling with anticipation.

Damn, maturin, just when I'm thinking ur wholesome af

‘You could not explain this maze of ropes and wood and canvas without using sea-terms, I suppose. No, it would not be possible.’ ‘Using no sea-terms? I should be puzzled to do that, sir; but I will try, if you wish it.’

No sea terms!?

Our seaman’s drink, that we call grog – are you acquainted with it? It goes down gratefully enough, at sea. Simpkin, bring us some grog.

‘You know Lord Nelson, sir?’ ‘I had the honour of serving under him at the Nile,’ said Jack, ‘and of dining in his company twice.’ His face broke into a smile at the recollection. ‘May I beg you to tell me what kind of a man he is?’ ‘Oh, you would take to him directly, I am sure. He is very slight – frail – I could pick him up (I mean no disrespect) with one hand.

The barrels held forty-five pounds, so the Sophie would nearly empty one with each double broadside. ‘But even so,’ he went on, ‘I think we can have a couple of rounds: God knows how long these charges have been lying in the guns. Besides,’ he added in a voice within his inner voice – a voice from a far deeper level, ‘think of the lovely smell.’

Ok jack

A sloop with the depth of a mere ten feet ten inches cannot rival a ship of the line for dank airless obscurity below; but the Sophie did astonishingly well,

It's not Lovecraft, but take a drink for dank!

head and smiled too. ‘Are you very much attached to money?’ asked Stephen. ‘I love it passionately,’ said Jack, with truth ringing clear in his voice. ‘I have always been poor, and I long to be rich.’

it was lubricated by uncommonly good wine, for Dillon was well-to-do,

Everyone was unnaturally well behaved: Jack was to give the tone, as he knew very well – it was expected of him, and it was his privilege. But this kind of deference, this attentive listening to every remark of his, required the words he uttered to be worth the attention they excited – a wearing state of affairs for a man accustomed to ordinary human conversation, with its perpetual interruption, contradiction and plain disregard. Here everything he said was right; and presently his spirits began to sink under the burden.

The Navy speaks in symbols, and you may suit what meaning you choose to the words.’

1/2 past 10 tacked, 11 in courses, reefed topsail. AM cloudy and rain. 1/2 past 4 chase observed E by S, distance 1/2 mile. Bore up and took possession of d°, which proved to be L’Aimable Louise, French polacre laden with corn and general merchandise for Cette, of about 200 tons, 6 guns and 19 men. Sent her with an officer and eight men to Mahon.

Yeah this sorta dry log, even when recounting something exciting, is why i should probs not bother reading straight up antarctic expedition logs. Let others do that and put it in a book lol.

we will shoot larbowlines against starbowlines and watch against watch for a handsome prize; and what with that and what with emulation, I don’t despair of making our gunnery at least as dangerous to others as it is to ourselves.

the very real possibility of flamingoes…

Yessss

‘The Spanish colours, Mr Babbington,’ said Jack; and looking round Stephen saw the yellow and red break out at the peak. ‘We are sailing under false colours,’ whispered Stephen. ‘Is not that very heinous?’ ‘Eh?’ ‘Wicked, morally indefensible?’ ‘Bless you, sir, we always do that, at sea. But we’ll show our own at the last minute, you may be sure, before ever we fire a gun. That’s justice.

the news that the Dane, having a fellow-feeling for the Sophie because of her resemblance to his own vessel, and being gratified by Jack’s civility, had given word

Cute bonding over twinning ships

and her young master had taken his wife to sea. She was with child – her first – and the rough night, the chase and the dread of an explosion had brought on her labour.

Seems like a terrible idea

And now, with what I saw in ’98, on both sides, the wicked folly and the wicked brute cruelty, I have had such a sickening of men in masses, and of causes, that I would not cross this room to reform parliament or prevent the union or to bring about the millennium. I speak only for myself, mind – it is my own truth alone – but man as part of a movement or a crowd is indifferent to me. He is inhuman. And I have nothing to do with nations, or nationalism. The only feelings I have – for what they are – are for men as individuals; my loyalties, such as they may be, are to private persons alone.’ ‘Patriotism will not do?’ ‘My dear creature, I have done with all debate. But you know as well as I, patriotism is a word; and one that generally comes to mean either my country, right or wrong, which is infamous, or my country is always right, which is imbecile.’

Maturin

excellent seaman.’

I think his encouragement of that fellow Marshall is indecent, not to use a grosser word.’ ‘Do I follow you, now?’ ‘You know about the man?’ ‘What about the man?’ ‘That he is a paederast?’ ‘Maybe.’ ‘I have proof positive. I had it in Cagliari, if it had been necessary.

Ew fckin die marshall

‘My heart bleeds for you. I have never yet known a man admit that he was either rich or asleep: perhaps the poor man and the wakeful man have some great moral advantage.

Maturin

Merriment, roaring high spirits before this: then some chance concatenation, or some hidden predilection (or rather inherent bias) working through, and the man is in the road he cannot leave but must go on, making it deeper and deeper (a groove, or channel), until he is lost in his mere character – persona – no longer human, but an accretion of qualities belonging to this character. James Dillon was a delightful being. Now he is closing in. It is odd – will I say heart-breaking? – how cheerfulness goes: gaiety of mind, natural free-springing joy. Authority is its great enemy – the assumption of authority. I know few men over fifty that seem to me entirely human: virtually none who has long exercised authority.

‘Oh, it must be two fathoms long. Tell me, is it really poisonous? On your oath now?’

Lol aubrey freakin out at snake

‘If you thrust your hand down its throat as far as its back teeth you may meet a little venom; but not otherwise. Malpolon monspessulanus is a very innocent serpent. I think of carrying a dozen aboard, for the rats – ah, if only I had more time, and if it were not for this foolish, illiberal persecution of reptiles … What a pitiful figure you do cut upon that chair, to be sure. Barney, Barney, buck or doe, Has kept me out of Channel Row,’ he sang to the serpent; and, deaf as an adder though it was, it looked happily into his face while he carried it away.

Lol maturin

Jack told them, in an uninhibited wealth of sea-jargon, exactly how each chase had behaved. They listened silently, with keen attention, nodding their heads at certain points and partially closing their eyes; and Stephen observed to himself that at some levels complete communication between men was possible.

Captaintalk

Hitherto, Jack had been too busy working up his crew to pay much attention to the education of his midshipmen, but he had looked at yesterday’s slips and they, with a very suspicious unanimity, had shown the Sophie in 39°21'N., which was fair enough, but also in a longitude that she could only have reached by cleaving the mountain-range behind Valencia to a depth of thirty-seven miles. ‘What do you mean by sending me this nonsense?’ he asked them. It was not really an answerable question; nor were many of the others that he propounded, and they did not, in fact, attempt to answer them; but they agreed that they were not there to amuse themselves, nor for their manly beauty, but rather to learn their professions; that their journals (which they fetched) were neither accurate, full, nor up to date, and that the ship’s cat would have written them better; that they would for the future pay the greatest attention to Mr Marshall’s observation and reckoning; that they would prick the chart daily with him; and that no man was fit to pass for a lieutenant, let alone bear any command (‘May God forgive me,’ said Jack, in an internal aside) who could not instantly tell the position of his ship to within a minute – nay, to within thirty seconds.

Kind creatures; such good-natured faces; but they were killing Cheslin.

But it was only now that Old Sponge’s accustomed eye had detected their sly common enemy hiding under the garboard-strake. The remora was so strong it had certainly torn the sheathing off, they explained to him; but that was nothing – it was so strong it could hold the sloop motionless, or almost motionless, in a brisk gale! But now they had him – there was an end to his capers now, the dog – and now the Sophie would run along like a swan. For a moment Stephen felt inclined to argue, to appeal to their common sense, to point to the nine-inch fish, to the exiguity of its fins; but he was too wise, and too happy, to yield to this temptation, and he jealously carried the bucket down to his cabin, to commune with the remora in peace.

‘They have been at my asp. I tell you, sir, they have been at my asp. I stepped into my cabin for a book not three minutes ago, and what did I see? My asp drained – drained, I say.’

Ew they drank maturins preserving alcohol that had asp in it

Stephen’s drawing: it showed a little bay with a village and a square tower at the bottom of it: a low mole ran twenty or thirty yards out into the sea, turned left-handed for another fifty and ended in a rocky knob, thus enclosing a harbour sheltered from all but the south-west wind.

Rocky knob drawing

‘Now this knob at the end of the jetty,’ he said aloud, ‘would you say it was ten foot high?’ ‘Probably more.

Big rocky knob

‘Let us say ten minutes to run from the cove to the tower, and…’ ‘Allow twenty, if you please,’ said Stephen. ‘You portly men of a sanguine complexion often die suddenly, from unconsidered exertion in the heat. Apoplexy – congestion.’ ‘I wish, I wish you would not say things like that, Doctor,’ said Jack, in a low tone: they all looked at Stephen with some reproach and Jack added, ‘Besides, I am not portly.’ ‘The captain has an uncommon genteel figgar,’ said Mr Marshall.

‘I think we may run in now,’ said Jack. ‘It will do no harm to be before our time, for I should like to stretch my legs a little. In any case, I should like to see him as early as can be; I am uneasy with him ashore. There are times when I feel he should not be allowed out alone; and then again there are times when I feel he could command a fleet, almost.’

Aw wants to go pick buddy maturin up after his night ashore

In times of stress Jack Aubrey had two main reactions: he either became aggressive or he became amorous; he longed either for the violent catharsis of action or for that of making love. He loved a battle: he loved a wench.

Something less than two hours later he reappeared, to view the remote irregular line on the starboard bow: Spain, with the singular mountain the English called Egg-top Hill in line with the best bower anchor, and their watering bay therefore directly ahead.

‘Take your hands out of your pockets. When did you last write home?’ Mr Babbington was at an age when almost any question evokes a guilty response, and this was, in fact, a valid accusation. He reddened, and said, ‘I don’t know, sir.’ ‘Think, sir, think,’ said Jack, his good-tempered face clouding unexpectedly. ‘What port did you send it from? Mahon? Leghorn? Genoa? Gibraltar? Well, never mind.’ There was no dark figure to be made out on that distant beach. ‘Never mind. Write a handsome letter. Two pages at least. And send it in to me with your daily workings tomorrow. Give your father my compliments and tell him my bankers are Hoares.’

Cute. "Write to your parents!"

‘And you, Mr Ricketts, have you written to your parents recently?’ with an audible ‘No, sir’ that scarcely quavered at all. ‘Then you will do the same: two pages, wrote small, and no demands for new quadrants, laced hats or hangers,’ said Jack; and something told the midshipman that this was no time to expostulate, to point out that his loving parent, his only parent, was in daily, even hourly communication with him.

Lol jacks odd way coping w stress waiting for maturin to get back on boat

Indeed, this awareness of Jack’s state of tension was general throughout the brig. ‘Goldilocks is in a rare old taking about the Doctor,’ they said. ‘Watch out for squalls.’

But Goldilocks was not the only one to be anxious, by any manner of means, and when Stephen Maturin was at last seen to walk out of the trees and cross the beach to meet the jolly-boat, a general exclamation of ‘There he is!’ broke out from waist to fo’c’sle, in defiance of good discipline: ‘Huzzay!’

‘The identity I am thinking of is something that hovers between a man and the rest of the world: a mid-point between his view of himself and theirs of him – for each, of course, affects the other continually. A reciprocal fluxion, sir. There is nothing absolute about this identity of mine.

Maturin

This I had from Mateu’s own cousin as we danced – ’ ‘You danced?’ cried Jack, far more astonished than if Stephen had said ‘as we ate our cold roast baby’. ‘Certainly I danced. Why would I not dance, pray?’ ‘Certainly you are to dance – most uncommon graceful, I am sure. I only wondered … but did you indeed go about dancing?’ ‘I did.

Lol wtf jack so surprised

But what do you tell me about this ship of force? What is her rate? How many guns does she carry? Where does she lie?’ ‘Cacafuego is her name.’ ‘Cacafuego? Cacafuego? I have never heard of her. So at least she cannot be a ship of the line. How is she rigged?’ Stephen paused. ‘I am ashamed to say I did not ask,’ he said. ‘But from the satisfaction with which her name was pronounced, I take her to be some prepotent great argosy.’

Aw maturin u will learn naval terms with me

The Sophie reeked of grilled sardines and fresh paint.

Take great care of the paint, now.’ At this point Stephen fell straight into the sea – into the hollow of the sea between the boat and the side of the sloop as they drew away from one another. He sank at once, rose just as they came together, struck his head between the two and sank again, bubbling. Most of the Sophie’s people who could swim leapt into the water, Jack among them; and others ran with boat-hooks, a dolphin-striker, two small grapnels, an ugly barbed hook on a chain; but it was the brothers Sponge that found him, five fathoms down (heavy bones for his size, no fat, lead-soled half-boots) and brought him up, his clothes blacker than usual, his face more white, and he streaming with water, furiously indignant.