Post Captain

by Patrick O'Brian

  'Purser Jones: I am a married man, Doctor.

  'SM: Yes.

  'Jones: But Mrs J is a very religious woman, is a very virtuous woman; and she don't like it.

  'SM: I am concerned to hear it.

  'Jones: Her mind is not given that way, sir. It is not that she is not fond and loving, and dutiful, and handsome—everything a man could wish. But there you are: I am a very full-blooded man, Doctor. I am only thirty-five, though you might not think it, bald and pot-bellied and cetera and cetera. Sometimes I toss and turn all night, and burn, as the Epistle says; but it is to no purpose, and sometimes I am afraid I will do her a mischief, it is so . . . That is why I went to sea, sir; though I am not suited for a naval life, as you know all too well.

  'SM: This is very bad, Mr Jones. Do you represent to Mrs Jones that . . .

  'Jones: Oh, I do, sir. And she cries and vows she will be a better wife to me—hers is not an ungrateful mind, she says—and so, for a day or two, she turns to me. But it is all duty, sir, all duty. And in a little while it is the same again. A man cannot still be asking; and what you ask for is not given free—it is never the same—no more like than chalk and cheese. A man cannot make a whore of his own wife.

  'He was pale and sweating, pitiably earnest; said he was always glad to sail away, although he hated the sea; that she was coming round to Deal to meet him; that as there were drugs that promoted venereal desire, so he hoped there might be some that took it away and that I should prescribe it for him, so that they could be sweethearts. He swore "he should rather be cut" than go on like this, and he repeated that "a man could not make a whore of his own wife." '

  Some days later the diary continued: 'Since Wednesday JA has been his own master; and I believe he is abusing his position. As I understand it, the convoy was complete yesterday, if not before: the masters came aboard for their instructions, the wind was fair and the tide served; but the sailing was put off. He takes insensate risks, going ashore, and any observation of mine has the appearance of bad faith. This morning the devil suggested to me that I should have him laid by the heels; I could so with no difficulty at all. He presented the suggestion with a wealth of good reasons, mostly of an altruistic nature, and mentioned both honour and duty; I wonder he did not add patriotism. To some extent JA is aware of my feelings, and when he brought her renewed invitation to dinner he spoke of "happening to run into her again", and expatiated on the coincidence in a way that made me feel a surge of affection for him in spite of my animal jealousy. He is the most inept liar and the most penetrable, with his deep, involved, long-winded policy, that I have ever met. The dinner was agreeable; I find that given warning I can support more than I had supposed. We spoke companionably of former times, ate very well, and played—the cousin is one of the most accomplished flautists I have heard. I know little of DV, but it appears to me that her sense of hospitality (she is wonderfully generous) overcame all her more turbid feelings; I also think she has a kind of affection for the both of us; although in that case, how she can ask so much of JA passes my understanding. She showed at her best; it was a delightful evening; but how I long for tomorrow and a fair wind. If it comes round into the south—if he is windbound for a week or ten days, he is lost: he must be taken.'

  Chapter Nine

  The Polychrest left her convoy in 38° 30' N., ll° W., with the wind at south-west and the Rock of Lisbon bearing S87E., 47 leagues. She fired a gun, exchanged signals with the merchantmen, and wore laboriously round until the wind was on her larboard quarter and her head was pointing north.

  The signals were polite, but brief; they wished one another a prosperous voyage and so parted company, with none of those long, often inaccurate hoists that some grateful convoys would keep flying until they were hidden by the convexity of the earthly sphere. And although the previous day had been fine and calm, with an easy swell and warm variable airs from the west and south, the merchant captains had not invited the King's officers to dinner: it was not a grateful convoy, and in fact it had nothing to be grateful for. The Polychrest had delayed their departure, so that they had missed their tide and the best part of a favourable breeze, and had held them back in their sailing all the way, not only by her slowness, but by her inveterate sagging to leeward, so that they were all perpetually having to bear up for her, they being a weatherly set of ships. She had fallen aboard the Trade's Increase by night, when they were lying-to off the Lizard, and had carried away her bowsprit; and when they met with a strong south-wester in the Bay of Biscay she rolled her mizzenmast out. Her maintopmast had gone with it and they had been obliged to stand by while she set up a jury-rig. Nothing had appeared to threaten their security, not so much as a lugger on the horizon, and the Polychrest had had no occasion to protect them or to show what teeth she might possess. They turned from her with loathing, and pursued their voyage at their own far brisker pace, setting topgallants and royals at last.

  But the Polychrest had little time for attending to the convoy as it disappeared, for this was Thursday, and the people were to be mustered. Scarcely had she steadied on her new course before five bells in the forenoon watch struck and the drum began to beat: the crew came hurrying aft and stood in a cluster abaft the mainmast on the larboard side. They had all been aboard some time now, and they had been mustered again and again; but some were still so stupid that they had to be shoved into place by their mates. However, by this time they were all decently dressed in the purser's blue shirts and white trousers; none showed the ghastly pallor of gaol or sea-sickness any more, and indeed the enforced cleanliness, the sea-air and the recent sun had given most the appearance of health. The food might have done something, too, for it was at least as good as that which many of them had been eating, and more plentiful.

  The first part of the alphabet happened to contain most of the Polychrest's seamen. There were some awkward brutes among them, such as that gap-toothed Bolton, but most were the right strong-faced long-armed bow-legged pigtailed sort; they called out 'Here, sir' to their names, touching their foreheads and walking cheerfully past their captain to the starboard gangway. They gave that part of the ship something of the air of the Sophie, an efficient, happy ship, if ever there was one, where even the waisters could hand, reef and steer . . . how fortunate he had been in his lieutenant. But Lord, how few the seamen were! After the letter G there were hardly more than two among all the names that were called. Poor meagre little creatures for the most part little stouter than the boys. And either surly or apprehensive or both: not a smile as they answered their names and crossed over. There had been too much flogging, too much starting: but what else could you do in an emergency? Oldfield, Parsons, Pond, Quayle . . . sad little objects; the last much given to informing; had been turned out of his mess twice already. And they were not the bottom of the barrel.

  Eighty-seven men and boys, no more, for he was still thirty-three short of his complement. Perhaps thirty of them knew their duty, and some were learning; indeed, most had learnt a little, and there were no longer the scenes of total incompetence that had made a nightmare of the earliest days. He knew all these faces now; some had improved almost out of recognition; some had deteriorated—too much unfamiliar misery; dull minds unused to learning yet forced to learn a difficult trade in a driving hurry. Three categories: a top quarter of good sound able hands; then the vague middle half that might go up or might go down, according to the atmosphere of the ship and how they were handled; and then the bottom quarter, with some hard cases among them, brutal, or stupid, or even downright wicked. As the last names were called his heart sank farther: Wright, Wilson and Young were the very bottom. Men like them were to be found aboard most men-of-war in a time of hot press, and an established ship's company could wear a certain number without much harm. But the Polychrest's was not an established ship's company; and in any case the proportion was far too high.

  The clerk closed the book, the first lieutenant reported the muster complete, and Jack gave them a last look before sendi
ng them to their tasks: a thoughtful look, for these were the men he might have to lead on to the deck of a French man-of-war tomorrow. How many would follow him?

  'Well, well,' he thought, 'one thing at a time,' and he turned with relief to the problem in hand, to the new-rigging of the Polychrest. It would be complicated enough in all conscience, with her strange hull and the calculation of the forces acting upon it, but in comparison with the task of making a crew of man-of-war's men out of the rag, tag, and bobtail from G to Y it was as simple and direct as kiss my hand. And here he was seconded by good officers: Mr Gray, the carpenter, knew his trade thoroughly; the bosun, though still too free with his cane, was active, willing and competent where rigging was concerned; and the master had a fine sense of a ship's nature. In theory, Admiralty regulations forbade Jack to shift so much as his backstays, but Biscay had shifted them for him, and a good deal more besides; he had a free hand, fine calm weather, a long day before him, and he meant to make the most of it.

  For form's sake he invited Parker to join their deliberations, but the first lieutenant was more concerned with his paintwork and gold-leaf than with getting the ship to move faster through the water. He did not seem to understand what they were driving at, and presently they forgot his presence, though they listened politely to his plea for a larger crow-foot to extend a double awning—'In the Andromeda, Prince William always used to say that his awning gave the quarterdeck the air of a ballroom.' As he spoke of the dimensions of the heroic euphroe that suspended this awning and the number of cloths that went into the awning itself, Jack looked at him curiously. Here was a man who had fought at the battle of the Saintes and in Howe's great action, and yet still he thought his yard-blacking more important than sailing half a point closer to the wind. 'I used to tell him it was no use racing one mast against the other in reefing topsails until the people at least knew how to lay aloft: I was wasting my breath. Very well, gentlemen,' he said aloud, 'let us make it so. There is not a moment to lose. We could not ask for better weather, but who can tell how long it will last?'

  The Polychrest, fresh from the yard, was reasonably well supplied with bosun's and carpenter's stores; but in any event, Jack's intention was rather to cut down than to add. She had always been crank and overmasted, so that she lay down in a capful of wind; and her foremast had always been stepped too far aft, because of her original purpose in life, which made her gripe even with her mizzen furled—made her do a great many other unpleasant things too. In spite of his fervent longing, he could do nothing about the stepping without official consent and the help of a dockyard, but he could do something to improve the mast by raking it forward and by a new system of stays, jibe and staysails; and he could make her less crank by stubbing her topmasts, striking topgallants, and setting up bentincks, triangular courses that would not press her down in the water so much and that would relieve her top-hamper.

  This was work he understood and loved; for once he was not in a tearing hurry, and he paced about the deck, seeing his plan take form, going from one group to the next as they prepared the spars, rigging and canvas. The carpenter and his mates were in the waist, their saws and adzes piling up heaps of chips and sawdust between the holy guns—guns that lay still today for the first time since he had hoisted his pendant; the sailmaker and his two parties spread over the forecastle and the greater part of the quarterdeck, canvas in every direction; and the bosun piled his coils of rope and his blocks in due order, checking them on his list, sweating up and down to his store-room, with no time to knock the hands about or even to curse them, except as a mechanical, unmeaning afterthought.

  They worked steadily, and better than he had expected: his three pressed tailors squatted there cross-legged, very much at home, plying needle and palm with the desperate speed they had learnt in the sweat-shop, and an out-of-work nailmaker from Birmingham showed an extraordinary skill in turning out iron rings from the armourer's forge: 'Crinkum-cankum, round she goes', a twist of his tongs, a knowing triple rap with his hammer, and the glowing ring hissed into a bucket.

  Eight bells in the afternoon watch, and the sun pouring down on the busy deck. 'Shall I pipe the hands to supper, sir?' asked Pullings.

  'No, Mr Pullings,' said Jack. 'We shall sway up the maintopmast first. Proper flats we should look, was a Frenchman to heave in sight,' he observed, looking up and down the confusion. The foremast was clothed already, with a fine potential spread of canvas but little drawing, for want of stays; the jury-mizzen still wore its little odd lateen, to give steerage-way; but the massive topmast was athwart the gangways, and this, together with the rest of the spars littering the deck, and all the other activities, made it almost impossible to move about—quite impossible to work the ship briskly. There was no room, although the boats were towing astern and everything that could be moved below had disappeared. She was making an easy three knots in the quartering breeze, but any emergency would find her helpless. 'Mr Malloch, there. Is your hawser to the capstan?'

  'All along, sir.'

  'Hands to the capstan, then. Are you ready at the word, there for'ard?'

  'Ready, aye ready, sir.'

  'Silence, fore and aft. Heave. Heave handsomely.' The capstan turned, the hawser tightened. It led from the capstan through a block on deck to another block on the mainmast head, thence to the head of the topmast, down to the square fid-hole in its heel, and so back to the topmast head, where it was made fast; bands of spun-yarn held it to the mast at intervals, and as it tightened so it began to raise the head. The topmast, a great iron-hooped column of wood some forty feet long, lay across the waist, its ends protruding far out on either side; as its head rose, so Jack called orders to the party on the other side to ease its heel in over the rail, timing each heave to the roll. 'Pawl, there. Stand to your bars. Heave. Heave and rally. Pawl.' The mast tilted up, nearer and nearer to the vertical. Now it was all inboard, no longer sloping but perfectly upright, swaying with the roll, an enormous, dangerous pendulum in spite of the controlling guys. Its head pointed at the trestle-trees, at the block high on the mainmast: the men in the top guided it through them, and still it rose with the turning of the capstan, to pause with its heel a few feet above the deck while they put on the cap. Up again, and they cut the spun-yarn as it reached the block: another pause, and they set the square over the mainmast head, banging it down with a maul, a thump-thump-thump that echoed through the silent, attentive ship.

  'They must be getting the cap over,' said Stephen's patient in the sick-bay, a young topman. 'Oh, sir, I wish I was there. He'll splice the mainbrace for sure—it was night on eight bells when you come below.'

  'You will be there presently,' said Stephen. 'but none of your mainbrace, none of your nasty grog, my friend, until you learn to avoid the ladies of Portsmouth Point, and the fireships of the Sally-Port. No ardent spirits at all for you. Not a drop, until you are cured. And even then, you would be far better with mild unctuous cocoa, or burgoo'

  'Which she told me she was a virgin,' said the sailor, in a low, resentful tone.

  The mast rose up and up, the thrust coming from nearer and nearer to the fid-hole as the spun-yarn bands were cut in succession. They had cast off the hawser in favour of the top-rope; they had got the topmast shrouds over, the stays and the backstays; and now the top-tackle was swaying it up with a smooth, steady motion interrupted only by the roll of the ship. A hitch at this point—the top-rope parting, a block-spindle breaking—might be fatal. The last cautious six inches, and the fid-hole appeared above the trestle-trees. The captain of the top waved his hand: Jack cried 'Pawl, there.' The captain of the top banged home the long iron fid, cried 'Launch ho', and it was done. The topmast could no longer plunge like a gigantic arrow down through the deck, down through the ship's bottom, and send them all to their long account. They eased the top-rope and the mast settled on its fid with a gentle groan, firmly supported below, fore, aft, and on either side.

  Jack let out a sigh, and when Pullings reported 'Main-topmast swa
yed up, sir,' he smiled. 'Very good, Mr Pullings,' he said. 'Let the laniards be well greased and bowsed taut, and then pipe to supper. The people have worked well, and I believe we may splice the mainbrace.'

  'How pleasant it is to see the sun,' he called over the taffrail, later in the afternoon.

  'Eh?' said Stephen, looking up from a tube thrust deep into the water.

  'I said how pleasant it was to see the sun,' said Jack, smiling down at him there in the barge—smiling, too, with general benevolence. He was warm through and through after months of English drizzle; the mild wind caressed him through his open shirt and old canvas trousers; behind him the work was going steadily along, but now it was a matter for expert hands, the bosun, his mates, the quartermasters and forecastlemen; the mere hauling on ropes was over, and the mass of the crew forward were making cheerful noises—with this day's rational work, with no cleaning and no harassing, the feeling aboard had changed. The charming weather and the extra allowance of rum had also helped, no doubt.

  'Yes,' said Stephen. 'It is. At a depth of two feet, Fahrenheit's thermometer shows no less than sixty-eight degrees. A southern current, I presume. There is a shark following up, a shark of the blue species, a carcharias. He revels in the warmth.'

  'Where is he? Do you see him? Mr Parslow there, fetch me a couple of muskets.'

  'He is under the dark belly of the ship. But no doubt he will come out presently. I give him gobbets of decayed flesh from time to time.'