Patrick O'Brian: H.M.S. Surprise

‘Does laurel grow along this coast, sir?’ asked the chaplain. ‘Wild laurel? I had always imagined it to be Greek. I do not know the Mediterranean, however, apart from hooks; and as far as I recall the ancients do not notice the coast of Languedoc.’

‘Why, it has been gathered there, sir, I believe,’ said Jack. ‘And it is said to go uncommon well with fish. A leaf or two gives a haut relievo, but more is deadly poison, I am told.’

General considerations upon fish, a wholesome meat, though disliked by fishermen; Dover soles commended; porpoises, frogs, puffins rated as fish for religious purposes by Papists; swans, whales and sturgeon, fish royal; an anecdote of a bad oyster eaten by Mr Simmons at the Lord Mayor’s banquet.

‘Now this fish,’ said Jack, as a tunny replaced the soup-​tureen, ‘is the only dish I can heartily recommend: he was caught over the side by that Chinaman in your division, Mr Fielding. The short one. Not Low Bum, nor high Bum, nor Jelly-​belly.’

‘John Satisfaction, sir?’

‘That’s the man. A most ingenious, cheerful fellow, and handy; he spun a long yarn with hairs from his messmates’ pigtails and baited the hook with a scrap of pork-​rind shaped like a fish, and so caught him. What is more, we have a decent bottle of wine to go with him. Not that I claim any credit for the wine, mark you; it was Dr Maturin that had the choosing of it - he understands these things - grows wine himself. By the bye, we shall touch at Minorca to pick him up.’

They should be delighted to see him again - hoped he was very well - looked forward much to the meeting. ‘Minorca, sir?’ cried the chaplain, however, having mulled over it. ‘But did we not give Minorca back to the Spaniards? Is it not Spanish now?’

‘Why, yes, so it is,’ said Jack. ‘I dare say he has a pass to travel: he has estates in those parts.’

‘The Spaniards are far more civilised than the French in this war, as far as travel is concerned,’ observed Lord Garron. ‘A friend of mine, a Catholic, had leave to go from Santander to St James of Compostella because of a vow - no trouble at all - travelled as a private gentleman, no escort, nothing. And even the French are not so bad when it comes to men of learning. I saw in The Times the Weasel brought that a scientific cove from Birmingham had gone over to Paris to receive a prize from their Institute. It is your scientific chaps who are the ones for travelling, war or no war; and I believe, sir, that Dr Maturin is a genuine smasher in the scientific line?’

‘Oh indeed he is,’ cried Jack. ‘A sort of Admiral Crichton - whip your leg off in a moment, tell you the Latin name of anything that moves,’ - his eye caught a brisk yellow weevil hurrying across the table-​cloth - ’speaks languages like a walking Tower of Babel, all except ours. Dear Lord,’ he said, laughing heartily, ‘to this day I don’t believe he knows the odds between port and starboard. Suppose we drink his health?’

‘With all my heart, sir,’ cried the first lieutenant, with a conscious look at his shipmates, all of whom shared it more or less, as Jack had noticed at their first appearance in the cabin. ‘But if you will allow me - The Times, sir, that Garron refers to, had a far, far more interesting announcement - a piece of news that filled the gunroom, which has the liveliest recollection of Miss Williams, with unbounded enthusiasm. Sir, may I offer you our heartiest congratulations and wish you joy from all of us, and suggest that there is one toast that should take precedence even over Dr Maturin?’

Lively,

at sea

Friday, 18th

Sweetheart,

We drank your health with three times three on Monday; for the fleet tender brought us orders while we were polishing Cape SiciŽ, together with the post and your three dear letters, which quite made up for our being diddled out of our cruise. And unknown to me it also brought a copy of The Times with our announcement in it; which I had not yet seen, even.

I had invited most of the gunroom to dinner, and that good fellow Simmons brought it out, desiring to drink your health and happiness and saying the handsomest things about you - they had the liveliest recollection of Miss Williams in the Channel, all too short, were your most devoted, etc., very well put. I went as red as a new-​painted tompion and hung my head like a maiden, and upon my honour I was near-​hand blubbering like one, I so longed for you to be by me in this cabin again - it brought it back so clear. And he went on to say he was authorised by the gunroom to ask, should you prefer a tea-​pot or a coffee-​pot, with a suitable inscription? Drinking your health recovered me, and I said I thought a coffee-​pot, begging the inscription might say that the lively preserved the liveliest memory. That was pretty well received, and even the parson (a dull dog) laughed hearty in time, when the bonne mot was explained to him.

Then that night, standing in with a fine topgallant sail breeze, we raised Cape Gooseberry and bore away for the signal-​station: we landed a couple of miles from it and proceeded across the dunes to take it from behind, for just as I suspected its two twelve-​pounders were so placed that they could only fire out to sea or at the most sweep 75 of the shore, if traversed. It was a long grind, with the loose sand flying in the wind they always have in these parts filling our eyes and noses and getting into the locks of our pistols. The parson says that the Ancients did not notice this coast; and the Ancients knew what they were about, deep old files - one infernal dust-​storm after another. But, however, we got there at last, steering by compass, without their smoking us, gave a cheer and carried the place directly. The Frenchmen left as we came in, all except a little ensign, who fought like a hero until Bonden collared him from behind, when he burst into tears and flung down his sword. We spiked the guns, destroyed the semaphore, blew up the magazine and hurried back to the boats, which had pulled along, carrying their signal-​books with us. It was a neat piece of work, though slow: if we had had to reckon with tides, which there are none of here, you know, we should have been sadly out. The Livelies are not used to this sort of caper, but some of them shape well, and they all have willing minds.

The little officer was still in a great passion when we got him aboard. We should never have dared to show our faces, says he, had the Diomede still been on the coast; his brother was aboard her, and she would have blown us out of the water; someone must have told us - there were traitors about and he had been betrayed. He said something to the effect that she had gone down to Port-​Vendres three days or three hours before, but he spoke so quick we could not be certain - no English, of course. Then, something of a cross-​sea getting up as we made our offing, he spoke no more, poor lad: piped down altogether, sick as a dog.

The Diomde is one of their heavy forty-​gun eighteen-​pounder frigates, just such a meeting as I have been longing for and do long for ever more now, because - don’t think badly of me sweetheart - I must give up the command of this ship in a few days’ time, and this is my last chance to distinguish myself and earn another; and as anyone will tell you, a ship is as necessary to a sailor as a wife, in war-​time. Not at once, of course, but well before everything is over. So we bore away for Port-​Vendres (you will find it on the map, down in the bottom right-​hand corner of France, where the mountains run down to the sea, just before Spain) picking up a couple of fishing-​boats on the way and raising Cape Bear a little after sunset, with the light still on the mountains behind the town. We bought the barca-​longas’ fish and promised them their boats again, but they were very glum, and we could not get anything out of them - ‘Was the Diomde in Port-​Vendres? -Yes: perhaps. - Was she gone for Barcelona? -Well, maybe. - Were they a pack of Tom Fools, that did not understand French or Spanish? - Yes, Monsieur’ - spreading their hands to show they were only Jack-​Puddings, and sorry for it. And the young ensign, on being applied to, turns haughty - amazed that a British officer should so far forget himself as to expect him to help in the interrogation of prisoners; and a piece about Honneur and Patier, which would have been uncommon edifying, I dare say, if we could have understood it all.