Patrick O'Brian - The Mauritius Command

"He is a jolly old boy," said Jack, "and he has been as kind and obliging to me as I could wish: he confirmed my acting-order for Johnson at once--a most handsome compliment. As long as all goes well, I make no doubt he will back us to the hilt; apart from anything else, it is entirely in his interest. But his reputation in the service--well, in Jamaica they called him Sir Giles Overreach, from the fellow in the play, you know; and he certainly overreached poor James. A good officer, mark you, though he don't see much farther through a brick wall than another man." He considered for a while before saying, "But if I made a mistake, I should not be surprised to be superseded: nor if I stood between him and a plum. Though as things stand, I cannot see how that could come about."

"You have no very high opinion of his head, nor of his heart."

"I should not go as far as that. We have different ideas of what is good order in a ship, of course . . . no, I shall tell you one thing that makes me uneasy about his sense of what is right. This Russian brig. She is an embarrassment to everybody. The Admiral wishes her away, but he will not take the responsibility of letting her go. He will not accept the responsibility of making her people prisoners, either--among other things they would have to be fed, with everything charged against him if Government disapproved. So what he has done is to make the captain give his word not to escape and has left him lying there, ready for sea: he is trying to starve Golovnin out by allowing no rations for his men. Golovnin has no money and the merchants will not accept bills drawn on Petersburg. The idea is that he will break his word and disappear some dirty night when the wind is in the north-west. His word means nothing to a foreigner, said the Admiral, laughing; he wondered Golovnin had not gone off six months ago--he longed to be rid of him. He took it so much as a matter of course--did not hesitate to tell it--thought it such a clever way of covering himself--that it made my heart sink."

Stephen said, "I have noticed that some old men lose their sense of honour, and will cheerfully avow the strangest acts. What else affects your spirits, now? Corbett, I dare say? In that case the beadle within has quite eaten up the man."

"Yes: he is a slave-driver. I do not say a word against his courage, mark you; he has proved that again and again. But by my book his ship is in very bad order indeed. She is old too, and only a twelve- pounder. Yet with the odds as they are, I cannot possibly do without her."

"What do you say to the captain of the Sin'us?"

"Pym?" Jack's face brightened. "Oh, how I wish I had three more Pyms in three more 5iriuses! He may be no phoenix, but he is the kind of man I like- three Pyms, and there would be your band of brothers for you. I should have to do myself no violence, keeping on terms with three Pyms. Or three Eliots for that matter: though he will not be with us long, more's the pity. He means to invalid as soon as ever he can. As it is, I shall have to humour Corbett to some degree, and Clonfert; for without there is a good understanding in a squadron, it might as well stay in port. How I shall manage it with Clonfert I can hardly tell: I must not get athwart his hawse if I can avoid it, but with that damned business of his wife I am half way there already. He resented it extremely--refused my invitation, which is almost unheard- of in the service, previous engagement or not: and there was no previous engagement. This is an odd case, Stephen. When we talked about him some time ago, I did not like to say I had my doubts about his conduct--an ugly thing to say about any man. But I had, and I was not the only one. Yet maybe I was not as wise as I supposed, for although he still looks like a flash cove in a flash ship, he did distinguish himself up the Mediterranean with Admiral Smith."

"That, I presume, was where he came by his star? It is an order I have never seen."

"Yes, the Turks handed out quite a number, but they were thought rather absurd, and not many officers asked permission to wear them: only Smith and Clonfert, I believe. And he has also carried out some creditable raids and cutting-out expeditions in these waters. He knows them well, and he has a native pilot; the Otter draws little water, even less than the Nereide, so he can stand in among the reefs; and according to Admiral Bertie he might almost be setting up as a rival to Cochrane in the matter of distressing the enemy."

"Yes: I have heard of his enterprise, and of his ship's ability to go close to the shore. I shall no doubt have to be with him from time to time, to be landed and taken off. But just now you spoke of the odds. How do you see them at present?"

"Simply in terms of ships and guns, and only from the point of view of fighting at sea, they are rather against us. Then if you allow for the fact that we shall be more than two thousand miles from our base while they are in their home waters, with supplies at hand, why, you might say that they are in the nature of three to five. In the Channel or the Mediterranean I should put it nearer evens, since we are at sea all the time in those parts, and they are not: but their heavy frigates have been out the best part of a year now, plenty of time to work up their crews, given competent officers; and upon the whole the French officers are a competent set of men. But all this is very much up in the air--there are so many unknowns in the equation. For one thing, I know nothing of their captains, and everything depends on them. Once I catch sight of them at sea I shall be able to reckon the odds more accurately."

"Once you have had a brush with them, you mean?"

"No. Once I have seen them, even hull down on the horizon."

"Could you indeed judge of their abilities at so remote a view?"

"Of course," said Jack a little impatiently. "What a fellow you are, Stephen. Any sailor can tell a great deal from the way another sailor sets his jib, or goes about, or flashes out his stuns'ls, just as you could tell a great deal about a doctor from the way he whipped off a leg."

"Always this whipping off of a leg. It is my belief that for you people the whole noble art of medicine is summed up in the whipping off of a leg. I met a man yesterday--and he was so polite as to call on me today, quite sober--who would soon put you into a better way of thinking. He is the Otter's surgeon. I should probably have to cultivate his acquaintance in any event, for our own purposes, since the Otter is, as you would say, an inshore prig', but I do not regret it now that I have met him. He is, or was, a man of shining parts. But to return to our odds: you would set them at five to three in favour of the French?"

"Something of that kind. If you add up guns and crews and tonnage it is a great deal worse; but of course I cannot really speak to the probability until I see them. Yet although I have sent a hundred Boadiceas to lend a hand aboard the Sirius, and although I know Pym is doing his utmost to get her ready for sea, our own ship has to take in six months" stores, and I should love to careen her too, the last chance of a clean bottom for God knows how long--I cannot see how we can sail before Saturday's tide. I shall keep the people hard at it, and harry the arsenal until they wish me damned, but apart from that there is nothing I can do: there is nothing that the Archangel Gabriel could do. So what do you say to some music, Stephen? We might work out some variations on "Begone Dull Care"."

Chapter Four

The squadron, standing north-east with the urgent tradewind on the beam, made a noble sight; their perfect line covered half a mile of sea--and such a sea: the Indian Ocean at its finest, a sapphire not too deep, a blue that turned their worn sails a dazzling white. Sirius, Nereide, Raisonable, Boadicea, Otter, and away to leeward the East India Company's fast-sailing armed schooner Wasp, while beyond the Wasp, so exactly placed that it outlined her triangular courses, floated the only bank of cloud in the sky, the flat bottomed clouds hanging over the mountains of La Reunion, themselves beneath the horizon.