Patrick O'Brian: The Hundred Days

A cloud passed over her face, and putting her hand on Jack’s knee she said, ‘I was so happy to see you - to have recovered you from Cape Horn at the very last moment - that I overlooked more important things. Tell me, how is poor dear Maturin?’

‘He looks older, and bent; but he bears up wonderfully, and it has not done away with his love of music. He eats nothing, though, and when he came back to Funchal, having attended to everything at Woolcombe, I lifted him out of the boat with one hand.’

‘She was an extraordinarily handsome woman and she had prodigious style: I admired her exceedingly. But she was not a wife for him; nor a mother for that dear little girl. How is she? She was not in the coach, I collect?’

‘No. The only other one on the box was Cholmondeley; my mother-in-law and her companion inside, and Harry Willet, the groom, up behind - happily Padeen did not go that day. And Brigid does not seem very gravely upset, from what I understand. She is very deeply attached to Sophie, you know, and to Mrs Oakes.’

‘I do not believe I know Mrs Oakes.’

‘A sea-officer’s widow who lives with us, a learned lady - not as learned as you, Queenie, I am sure - but she teaches the children Latin and French. They are none of them clever enough for Greek.’

A pause. ‘If he does not eat, he will certainly grow weak and pine away,’ said Lady Keith. ‘We have a famous cook aboard Royal Sovereign - he came back to England with the Bourbons. Would an invitation be acceptable, do you think? Just us and the Physician of the Fleet and a few very old friends. I have a crux in this passage of Ennius I should like to show him. And of course he must have a conference with Keith’s secretary and the political adviser very soon... Oh, and Jack, there is something I must tell you, just between ourselves. Another Mediterranean command would be too much for him, so we are only here until Pellew comes out; though we shall stay in the Governor’s cottage a little while to enjoy the spring. Do you get along well with Pellew, Jackie?’

‘I have a great admiration for him,’ said Jack - and indeed Admiral Sir Edward Pellew had been a remarkably dashing and successful frigate-captain - ‘but not quite the veneration I have for Lord Keith.’

‘My dear Aubrey,’ cried the Admiral, walking in from the coach, ‘there you are! How glad I am to see you.’

‘And I to see you, my Lord Viscount, if I may so express myself. My heartiest congratulations.’

‘Thankee, thankee, Aubrey,’ said the Admiral, more pleasant than quite suited his wife. ‘But I must say that I deserve to be degraded for having put in that foolish proviso in your orders about waiting for Briseis. I should have said-but never mind what I should have said. The fact is that at that time I merely wanted your squadron to guard the passage of the Straits: now, at the present moment, the situation is much more complex. Six hundred thousand people cheered Napoleon when he entered Paris - Ney has joined

him - a hundred and fifty thousand King’s troops, well-equipped, drilled and officered, have done the same - he has countless seasoned men who were prisoners of war in England and Russia and all over Europe at his devotion, flooding to the colours - the Emperor’s colours. There is the Devil to pay and no tar hot. Is Dr Maturin with you?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Is he up to talking about all this with my secretary and the politicos?’

‘I believe so, my Lord. Although he shuns ordinary company he is dead set on the war and seizes upon any means whatsoever of informing himself - newspapers, correspondence and so on - and I have known him talk for three hours on end with a French officer - royalist of course - whose brig was in company with us during a flat calm off Bugio.’

‘He would sooner not dine aboard Royal Sovereign, I gather.’

‘I believe not, sir. But he will discuss the international situation and the means of bringing Napoleon down with the utmost vigour. That is what keeps him alive, it seems to me.’

‘I am glad he has so great a resource at such a dreadful time, poor dear man. I have a great regard for him: as you will remember, I proposed he should be Physician of the Fleet at one time. Aye, aye, so I did. Well, I shall not pain him with an invitation he might find difficult to refuse. But if, in the course of duty, you could require him to report aboard just after the evening gun, when I hope for an overland packet by courier, he may learn still more about the international situation. A damned complex situation, upon my word. As I said, when first I sent for you I thought your squadron would be enough, at a pinch, to guard the passage of the Straits - at a pinch, for you see how pitifully little we have here. But now, now, you will have to cut yourself in three to do half the things I want you to do. Heugh, heugh,- a damned complex situation as the Doctor will learn when he comes here: he will be finely amazed. I will give you the broadest view just for the now...’

Lady Keith gathered up her belongings and said, ‘My dear, I will leave you to it. But do not tire yourself: you have a meeting with Gonzalez this evening. I will send Geordie with a dish of tea directly.’

The broadest view, stripped of the Admiral’s great authority and of his distinctive northern accent, generally pleasing to an English ear though sometimes impenetrably obscure, was very roughly this: Wellington, with ninety three thousand British and Dutch troops, and Blucher, with a hundred and sixteen thousand Prussians, were in the Low Countries, waiting until Schwarzenberg, with two hundred and ten thousand Austrians, and Barclay de Tolly, slowly advancing with a hundred and fifty thousand Russians, should reach the Rhine, when in principle the Allies were to invade France. For his part Napoleon had about three hundred and sixty thousand men: they were made up of five corps along the northern frontier, the Imperial Guard in Paris, and some thirty thousand more stationed on the southeast frontier and in the Vendée.

Both men made their additions: both made their allowances for unity of command, the great value of a common language, and the stimulus of fighting on one’s own soil under the orders of a man who had battered Prussians, Austrians and Russians again and again, fighting with extraordinary tactical skill against odds far greater than these.

Jack could not with propriety ask about the zeal or even the good faith of the Austrians and Prussians at this juncture, still less about the efficiency of their mobilization and equipment; but the Admiral’s worn, anxious face told him a great deal. ‘Still,’ said Lord Keith, ‘this is all the soldiers’ business: we have our own concern to deal with. How I wish Geordie would come along with that tea - why, Geordie, put the tray down here, ye thrawn, ill-feckit gaberlunzie.’

A pause. ‘How I value a cup of tea,’ he said. ‘May I pour you another?’

‘Thank you, sir,’ said Jack, shaking his head. ‘I have done admirably well already.’

The Admiral reflected, carefully put more hot water to the teapot, and went on, ‘In the first place there is the difficulty about the French Navy, their attitude varies from port to port, ship to ship. They are of course extremely susceptible and any untoward incident - so easily brought about - might have disastrous results. But far worse is this building of French men-of-war in the obscure Adriatic ports: obscure, but filled with prime timber and capital shipwrights - country you know very well. This continued building, more or less disguised, is a great evil; and all the greater as Bonapartist officers and men are said to be standing by to take them over.’

‘But payment, sir? Even a corvette costs a very great deal of money, and there is talk of frigates, even of two or three heavy frigates.’