The Fortune of War Quotes

“...looking angrily at the wombat: and a moment later, 'Come now, Stephen, this is coming it pretty high: your brute is eating my hat.'
'So he is, too,' said Dr. Maturin. 'But do not be perturbed, Jack; it will do him no harm, at all. His digestive processes--”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“Wallis,' said Maturin, 'I am happy to see you. How is your penis?”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“If I no longer love Diana,’ he wrote, ‘what shall I do?’ What could he do, with his mainspring, his prime mover gone? He had known that he would love her for ever - to the last syllable of recorded time. He had not sworn it, any more than he had sworn that the sun would rise every morning: it was too certain, too evident: no one swears that he will continue to breathe nor that twice two is four. Indeed, in such a case an oath would imply the possibility of doubt. Yet now it seemed that perpetuity meant eight years, nine months and some odd days, while the last syllable of recorded time was Wednesday, the seventeenth of May.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“Two weevils crept from the crumbs. ‘You see those weevils, Stephen?’ said Jack solemnly. ‘I do.’ ‘Which would you choose?’ ‘There is not a scrap of difference. Arcades ambo. They are the same species of curculio, and there is nothing to choose between them.’ ‘But suppose you had to choose?’ ‘Then I should choose the right-hand weevil; it has a perceptible advantage in both length and breadth.’ ‘There I have you,’ cried Jack. ‘You are bit – you are completely dished. Don’t you know that in the Navy you must always choose the lesser of two weevils? Oh ha, ha, ha, ha!”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“He considered old age and its mutilations and wondered what it would do for him: examples presented themselves to his mind, not only of mental decay, physical weakness, gout, stone and rheumatism, but of boastful mendacious garrulity, intense and peevish selfishness; timidity if not cowardice, dirt, concupiscence, avarice.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“And then, sir,' he added, 'you would oblige me infinitely by marrying us, if you have the leisure.'
Captain Broke paused for a moment: was this a strangely-timed pleasantry? Judging from the Doctor's demeanour and his pale, determined face, it was not. Should he wish him joy of the occasion? Perhaps, in view of Jack's silence and Maturin's cool, matter-of-fact, unfestive manner, that might be inappropriate. He remembered his own wedding-day and the desperate feeling of being caught on a leeshore in a gale of wind, unable to claw off, tide setting hard against him, anchors coming home. He said, 'I should be very happy, sir. But I have never performed the manoeuvre -that is, the ceremony - and I am not sure of the forms nor of the extent of my powers. You will allow me to consult the Printed Instructions, and let you know how far I may be of service to you and the lady.' Stephen bowed and walked off.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“What are you tittering at, Mr Holles?' asked Captain Aubrey.
'Nothing, sir.'
'Now I come to think of it, I have a letter from your guardian, Mr Holles. He wishes to be assured that your moral welfare is well in hand, and that you do not neglect your Bible. You do not neglect your Bibles, any of you, I dare say?'
'Oh, no, sir.'
'I am glad to hear it. Where the Devil would you be, if you neglected your Bible? Tell me, Mr Holles, who was Abraham?' Jack was particularly well up in this part of sacred history, having checked Admiral Drury's remarks on Sodom:
'Abraham, sir,' said Holles, his pasty, spotted face turning a nasty variegated purple. 'Why, Abraham was . .
But no more emerged, other than a murmur of 'bosom'.
'Mr Peters?' Mr Peters expressed his conviction that Abraham was a very good man; perhaps a corn-chandler, since one said 'Abraham and his seed for ever'.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“You are a reasonably civil, complaisant creature on dry land,' said Stephen, 'but the moment you are afloat you become pragmatical and absolute, a bashaw - do this, do that, gluppit the prawling strangles, there - no longer a social being at all. It is no doubt the effect of the long-continued habit of command; but it cannot be considered amiable.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“Man is a deeply illogical being, and must be ruled illogically. Whatever that frigid prig Bentham may say, there are innumerable motives that have nothing to do with utility.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“Oh for women at sea to obviate the eternal crosscat-harpings,' he said to himself, 'to do away with the grumlinfuttocks, and to inject a little civilization, even of an equivocal nature, even at the risk of moral deviation.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“What else raises your blood, your spirits, your whole being, to the highest pitch, so that life is triumphant, or tragic, as the case may be, and so that every day is worth a year of common life? When you sit trembling for a letter? When the whole of life is filled with meaning, double-shotted? To be sure, when you actually come to what some have called the right true end, you may find the position ridiculous, and the pleasure momentary; but novels, upon the whole, are concerned with getting there. And for that matter, what else makes the world go round?”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“saying nothing with the practiced ease of a politician”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“Where would conversation be, if we were not allowed to exchange our minds freely and to abuse our neighbours from time to time?’ said Stephen.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“The operation, performed on an immensely obese, timid patient, was far more intricate than they had expected; yet finally it was done, and not only was it successful in itself, but there was a real likelihood that the man might live.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“Stephen strode forward and as the Frenchman turned he brought the massive obsidian down on his head, breaking both. Pontet-Canet was on the floor, limp but breathing. Stephen bent over him, catling in hand, felt for the still beating common carotid, severed it, and stood back from the jet of blood. Then he pulled the body to the hip-bath, placed towels and mats to prevent the blood soaking through to the floor below, and went through the dead man's pockets. Nothing of significance, but he did take Pontet-Canet's pistol and, since he did not possess one, his watch, a handsome Breuguet very like that which had been taken from him years ago, when he was captured by the French off the coast of Spain.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“That must be my surgeon coming aboard. You will like him; a reading man too, most amazing learned; a full-blown physician into the bargain, and my particular friend. But I must tell you this, Yorke; he is wealthy – ‘ In point of fact Captain Aubrey had little idea of his surgeon’s fortune, apart from knowing that he owned a good deal of hilly land in Catalonia with a tumbledown castle on it. But Stephen had done pretty well out of the Mauritius campaign; his manner of living was Spartan – one suit of clothes every five years and perhaps a couple of shirts – and apart from books he had no visible expenses at all. Jack was no Macchiavel, but he did know that to the rich it should be given; that capital possessed a mystical significance; that even the most perfectly disinterested respected it and its owner; and that although a naval surgeon was ordinarily a person of no great consequence, the same man moved into quite a different category the moment he was endowed with comfortable private means. In short, that whereas an ordinary surgeon, living on his pay, might not readily be indulged in room for exotic livestock, an imperfectly- preserved giant squid, and several tons of natural specimens, in a stranger’s ship, a wealthy natural philosopher might meet with more consideration; and Jack knew how Stephen prized the collection he had made during their arduous voyage. ‘ – he is wealthy, and he only comes with me because of the opportunities for natural philosophy; though he is a first-rate surgeon, too, and we are lucky to have him. But this voyage the opportunities have been prodigious, and he has turned the Leopard into a down-right Ark. Most of the Desolation creatures are stuffed or pickled but there are some from New Holland that skip and bound about: I hope you are not too crowded in La Fleche?”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“They emerged from the tropical vegetation, greeted by a general cheer. Stephen advanced, carrying his hurly: he was feeling particularly well and fit; he had his land-legs again, and no longer stumped along, but walked with an elastic step. Jack came to meet him, and said in a low voice, 'Just keep your end up, Stephen, until your eye is in; and watch out for the Admiral's twisters,' and then as they neared the Admiral, 'Sir, allow me to name my particular friend Dr. Maturin, surgeon of the Leopard.
'How d'ye do, Doctor?' said the Admiral.
'I must beg your pardon, sir, for my late appearance: I was called away on -- '
'No ceremony, Doctor, I beg,' said the Admiral, smiling: the Leopard's hundred pounds were practically in his pocket, and this man of theirs did not look very dangerous. 'Shall we begin?'
'By all means,' said Stephen.
'You go down to the other end,' murmured Jack, a chill coming over him in spite of the torrid sun.
'Should you like to be given a middle, sir?' called the umpire, when Stephen had walked down the pitch.
'Thank you, sir,' said Stephen, hitching at his waistband and gazing round the field, 'I already have one.'
A rapacious grin ran round the Cumberlands: they moved much closer in, crouching, their huge crab-like hands spread wide. The Admiral held the ball to his nose for a long moment, fixing his adversary, and then delivered a lob that hummed as it flew. Stephen watched its course, danced out to take it as it touched the ground, checked its bounce, dribbled the ball towards the astonished cover-point and running still he scooped it into the hollow of his hurly, raced on with twinkling steps to mid-off, there checked his run amidst the stark silent amazement, flicked the ball into his hand, tossed it high, and with a screech drove it straight at Jack's wicket, shattering the near stump and sending its upper half in a long, graceful trajectory that reached the ground just as the first of La Fleche's guns, saluting the flag, echoed across the field.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“It occurred to him that she had spent these last few years entirely among men, seeing no women apart from a few like Louisa Wogan; she spoke rather as men, and somewhat raffish, moneyed, loose-living men, speak when they are alone together. ‘She has forgotten the distinction between what can and what cannot be said,’ he reflected. ‘A few more years of this company, and she would not scruple to fart.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“to accompany those patients who were too sick to be moved from the Constitution, Jack and the two quarter-gunners who had been buried at sea a week ago,”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“A pity it is so big,’ said Jack, turning it over. ‘I remember when I was a boy in Ajax, and the Apollon was blazing away at us like Guy Fawkes’s night, a spent eighteen-pound ball came in at our port. The lieutenant – it was Mr Horner: you remember him, Bonden?’ ‘Oh yes, sir. A very sprightly gentleman, that loved his laugh.’ ‘He picked it up, called for a piece of chalk, wrote Post Paid on the ball, rammed it down our gun, and so sent it back in double quick time.’ ‘Ha, ha, ha!’ went the gun-crew and their neighbours on either side.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“I remember when I was a boy in Ajax, and the Apollon was blazing away at us like Guy Fawkes’s night, a spent eighteen-pound ball came in at our port. The lieutenant – it was Mr Horner: you remember him, Bonden?’ ‘Oh yes, sir. A very sprightly gentleman, that loved his laugh.’ ‘He picked it up, called for a piece of chalk, wrote Post Paid on the ball, rammed it down our gun, and so sent it back in double quick time.’ ‘Ha, ha, ha!’ went the gun-crew and their neighbours on either side. ‘And not long after that, he was made a post-captain, ha, ha, ha!”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“I remember when I was a boy in Ajax, and the Apollon was blazing away at us like Guy Fawkes’s night, a spent eighteen-pound ball came in at our port. The lieutenant – it was Mr Horner: you remember him, Bonden?’ ‘Oh yes, sir. A very sprightly gentleman, that loved his laugh.’ ‘He picked it up, called for a piece of chalk, wrote Post Paid on the ball, rammed it down our gun, and so sent it back in double quick time.’ ‘Ha, ha, ha!’ went the gun-crew and their neighbours on either side.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“qui ferox bello tamen inter arma sive iactatam religarat udo litore navim.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“At one time Stephen had been marooned on a bare rock in the South Atlantic, and his only drink was the warm rainwater that remained in the guano-filled hollows. It had been more disagreeable than Mrs. Wogan’s tea, but only very slightly so.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“Man is a deeply illogical being, and must be ruled illogically. Whatever that frigid prig Bentham may say, there are innumerable motives that have nothing to do with utility. In good utilitarian logic a man does not sell all his goods to go crusading, nor does he build cathedrals; still less does he write verse.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“Joe. Are youse a-going out?’ ‘I ain’t Joe,’ said Jack. ‘Who are you, then?’ asked the boat, now visible. ‘Jack.’ ‘Where’s Joe?’ ‘Gone to Salem.’ ‘Are youse a-going out, Jack?’ ‘Maybe.’ ‘You got any bait, Jack?’ ‘No.’ ‘Well, fuck you, Jack.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“He remembered his own wedding-day and the desperate feeling of being caught on a leeshore in a gale of wind, unable to claw off, tide setting hard against him, anchors coming home.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“The Americans had been kind, polite, hospitable, and their sailors thorough seamen, but they had the strangest notion of coffee: a thin, thin brew - a man might drink himself into a dropsy before the stuff raised his spirits even half a degree.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“...and in less time than he had ever known a woman take to dress she was back in a travelling habit and a broad-brimmed veiled hat.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War

“I love [chess]. Apart from anything else, it is agreeable to my sentiments as a citizen of a republic, since it always ends with the discomfiture of a king.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War