Master and Commander

by Patrick O'Brian

  'How long is a cable?' asked Stephen.

  'About two hundred yards, sir,' said James. 'So I put my helm down—she was wonderfully quick in stays—and steered to ram the Frenchman amidships. With the wind on her quarter, the Dart covered the, distance in little more than a minute, which was as well, since they were peppering us hard. I steered myself until we were within pistol-shot and then ran for'ard to lead the boarders, leaving the tiller to the boy. Unhappily, he misunderstood me and let the privateer shoot too far ahead, and we took her abaft her mizzen, our bowsprit carrying away her larboard mizzen shrouds and a good deal of her poop-rail and stern-works. So instead of boarding we passed under her stern: her mizzen went by the board with the shock, and we flew to the guns and poured in a raking broadside. There were just enough of us to fight four guns, with the King's Messenger and me working one and Brown helping us run it out when he had fired his own. I luffed up to range along under her lee and get across her bows, so as to prevent her from manoeuvring; but with that great spread of canvas they have, you know, the Dart was becalmed for a while, and we exchanged as hot a fire as quickly as we could keep it up. But at last we forged ahead, found our wind again and tacked as quickly as we could, right athwart the Frenchman's stem—quicker, indeed, for we could only spare two hands to the sheet and our boom came crack against her foreyard, carrying it away—the falling sail dowsed her bow-chaser and the swivels. And as we came round there was our starboard broadside ready, and we fired it so close that the wads set light to her foresail and the wreckage of the mizzen lying there all over her deck. Then they called for quarter and struck.'

  'Well done, well done!' cried Jack.

  'It was high time,' said James, 'for the other privateer had been coming up fast. By something like a miracle our bowsprit and boom were still standing, so I told the captain of the privateer that I should certainly sink him if he attempted to make sail and bore up directly for his consort. I could not spare a single hand to take possession, nor the time.'

  'Of course not.'

  'So here we were approaching on opposite tacks, and they were firing as the whim took them—everything they had. When we were fifty yards away I paid off four points to bring the starboard guns to bear, gave her the broadside, then luffed up directly and gave her the other, from perhaps twenty yards. The second was very remarkable, sir. I did not think four-pounders could have done such execution. We fired on the down-roll, a trifle later than I should have thought right, and all four shot struck her on the waterline at the height of her rise—I saw them go home, all on the same strake. A moment later her people left their guns—they were running about and hallooing. Unhappily, Brown had stumbled as our gun recoiled and the carriage had mangled his foot most cruelly. I bade him go below, but he would have none of it—would sit there and use a musket—and then he gave a cheer and said the Frenchman was sinking. And so he was: first they were awash, and then they went down, right down, with their sails set.'

  'My God!' cried Jack.

  'So I stood straight on for the third, all hands knotting and splicing, for our rigging was cut to pieces. But the mast and boom were so wounded—a six-pound ball clean through the mast, and many deep scores—that I dared not carry a press of sail. So I am afraid she ran clean away from us, and there was nothing for it but to beat back to the first privateer. Luckily, they had been busy with their fire all this time, or they might have slipped off. We took six aboard to work our pumps, tossed their dead overboard, battened the rest down, took her in tow, set course for Malta and arrived two days later, which surprised me, for our sails were a collection of holes held together with threads, and our hull not much better.'

  'Did you pick up the men from the one that sank?' asked Stephen.

  'No, sir,' said James.

  'Not corsairs,' said Jack. 'Not with thirteen men and a boy aboard. What were your losses, though?'

  'Apart from Brown's foot and a few scratches we had no one wounded, sir, nor a single man killed. It was an astonishing thing: but then we were pretty thin on the ground.'

  'And theirs?'

  'Thirteen dead, sir. Twenty-nine prisoners.'

  'And the privateer you sank?'

  'Fifty-six, sir.'

  'And the one that got away?'

  'Well, forty-eight, or so they told us, sir. But she hardly counts, since we only had a few random shots from her before she grew shy.'

  'Well, sir,' said Jack, 'I congratulate you with all my heart. It was a noble piece of work.'

  'So do I,' said Stephen. 'So do I. A glass of wine with you, Mr Dillon,' he said, bowing and raising his glass.

  'Come,' cried Jack, with a sudden inspiration. 'Let us drink to the renewed success of Irish arms, and confusion to the Pope.'

  'The first part ten times over,' said Stephen, laughing. 'But never a drop will I drink to the second, Voltairian though I may be. The poor gentleman has Boney on his hands, and that is confusion enough, in all conscience. Besides, he is a very learned Benedictine.'

  'Then confusion to Boney.'

  'Confusion to Boney,' they said, and drank their glasses dry.

  'You will forgive me, sir, I hope,' said Dillon. 'I relieve the deck in half an hour, and I should like to check the quarter-bill first. I must thank you for a most enjoyable dinner.'

  'Lord, what a pretty action that was,' said Jack, when the door was closed. 'A hundred and forty-six to fourteen; or fifteen if you count Mrs Dockray. It is just the kind of thing Nelson might have done—prompt—straight at 'em.'

  'You know Lord Nelson, sir?'

  'I had the honour of serving under him at the Nile,' said Jack, 'and of dining in his company twice.' His face broke into a smile at the recollection.

  'May I beg you to tell me what kind of a man he is?'

  'Oh, you would take to him directly, I am sure. He is very slight—frail—I could pick him up (I mean no disrespect) with one hand. But you know he is a very great man directly There is something in philosophy called an electrical particle, is there not? A charged atom, if you follow me. He spoke to me on each occasion. The first time it was to say, "May I trouble you for the salt, sir?"—I have always said it as close as I can to his way ever since—you may have noticed it. But the second time I was trying to make my neighbour, a soldier, understand our naval tactics—weather-gage, breaking the line, and so on—and in a pause he leant over with such a smile and said, "Never mind manoeuvres, always go at them." I shall never forget it: never mind manoeuvres—always go at 'em. And at that same dinner he was telling us all how someone had offered him a boat-cloak on a cold night and he had said no, he was quite warm—his zeal for his King and country kept him warm. It sounds absurd, as I tell it, does it not? And was it another man, any other man, you would cry out "oh, what pitiful stuff" and dismiss it as mere enthusiasm; but with him you feel your bosom glow, and—now what in the devil's name is it, Mr Richards? Come in or out, there's a good fellow. Don't stand in the door like a God-damned Lenten cock.'

  'Sir,' said the poor clerk, 'you said I might bring you the remaining papers before tea, and your tea is just coming up.'

  'Well, well: so I did,' said Jack. 'God, what an infernal heap. Leave them here, Mr Richards. I will see to them before we reach Cagliari.'

  'The top ones are those which Captain Allen left to be written fair—they only need to be signed, sir,' said the clerk, backing out.

  Jack glanced at the top of the pile, paused, then cried, 'There! There you are. Just so. There's the service for you from clew to earing—the Royal Navy, stock and fluke. You get into a fine flow of patriotic fervour—you are ready to plunge into the thick of the battle—and you are asked to sign this sort of thing.' He passed Stephen the carefully-written sheet.

  His Majesty's Sloop Sophie

  at sea

  My Lord,

  I am to beg you will be pleased to order a Court Martial to be held on Isaac Wilson (seaman) belonging to the Sloop I have the honour to Command for having committed the unnatural Crime of So
domy on a Goat, in the Goathouse, on the evening of March 16th.

  I have the Honour' to remain, my Lord,

  Your Lordship's most obedient very humble servant

  The Rt. Hon. Lord Keith, K.B., etc., etc.

  Admiral of the Blue.

  'It is odd how the law always harps upon the unnaturalness of sodomy,' observed Stephen. 'Though I know at least two judges who are paederasts; and of course barristers . . . What will happen to him?'

  'Oh, he'll be hanged. Run up at the yard-arm, and boats attending from every ship in the fleet.'

  'That seems a little extreme.'

  'Of course it is. Oh, what an infernal bore—witnesses going over to the flagship by the dozen, days lost . . . The Sophie a laughing-stock. Why will they report these things? The goat must be slaughtered—that's but fair—and it shall be served out to the mess that informed on him.'

  'Could you not set them both ashore—on separate shores, if you have strong feelings on the moral issue—and sail quietly away?'

  'Well,' said Jack, whose anger had died down. 'Perhaps there is something in what you propose. A dish of tea? You take milk, sir?'

  'Goat's milk, sir?'

  'Why, I suppose it is.'

  'Perhaps without milk, then, if you please. You told me, I believe, that the gunner was ailing. Would this be a convenient time for seeing what I can do for him? Pray, which is the gun-room?'

  'You would expect to find him there, would you not? But in fact his cabin is elsewhere nowadays. Killick will show you. The gun-room, in a sloop, is where the officers mess.'

  In the gun-room itself the master stretched and said to the purser, 'Plenty of elbow-room now, Mr Ricketts.'

  'Very true, Mr Marshall,' said the purser. 'We see great changes these days. And how they will work out I do not know.'

  'Oh, I think they may answer well enough,' said Mr Marshall, slowly picking the crumbs off his waistcoat.

  'All these capers,' went on the purser, in a low, dubious voice. 'The mainyard. The guns. The drafts he pretended to know nothing about. All these new hands there is not room for. The people at watch and watch. Charlie tells me there is a great deal of murmuring.' He jerked his head towards the men's quarters.

  'I dare say there is. I dare say there is. All the old ways changed and all the old messes broken up. And I dare say we may be a little flighty, too, so young and fine with our brand-new epaulette. But if the steady old standing officers back him up, why, then I think it may answer well enough. The carpenter likes him. So does Watt, for he's a good seaman, and that's certain. And Mr Dillon seems to know his profession, too.'

  'Maybe. Maybe,' said the purser, who knew the master's enthusiasms of old.

  'And then again,' went on Mr Marshall, 'things may be a little more lively under the new proprietor. The men will like that, when they grow used to it; and so will the officers, I am sure. All that is wanted is for the standing officers to back him up, and it will be plain sailing.'

  'What?' said the purser, cupping his ear, for Mr Dillon was having the guns moved, and amid the general rumbling thunder that accompanied this operation an occasional louder bang obliterated speech. Incidentally, it was this all-pervasive thunder that made their conversation possible, for in general there could be no such thing as private talk in a vessel twenty-six yards long, inhabited by ninety-one men, whose gun-room had even smaller apartments opening off it, screened by very thin wood and, indeed, sometimes by no more than canvas.

  'Plain sailing. I say, if the officers back him up, it will all be plain sailing.'

  'Maybe. But if they do not,' went on Mr Ricketts, 'if they do not, and if he persists in capers of this kind—which I believe it is his nature so to do—why then, I dare say he will exchange out of the old Sophie as quick as Mr Harvey did. For a brig is not a frigate, far less a ship of the line: you are right on top of your people, and they can give you hell or cause you to be broke as easy as kiss my hand.'

  'You don't have to tell me a brig is not a frigate, nor yet a ship of the line, Mr Ricketts,' said the master.

  'Maybe I don't have to tell you a brig is not a frigate, nor yet a ship of the line, Mr Marshall,' said the purser warmly. 'But when you have been at sea as long as I have, Mr Marshall, you will know there is a great deal more than mere seamanship required of a captain. Any damned tarpaulin can manage a ship in a storm,' he went on in a slighting voice, 'and any housewife in breeches can keep the decks clean and the falls just so; but it needs a headpiece'—tapping his own—'and true bottom and steadiness, as well as conduct, to be the captain of a man-o'-war: and these are qualities not to be found in every Johnny-come-lately—nor in every Jack-lie-by-the-wall, neither,' he added, more or less to himself. 'I don't know, I'm sure.'

  Chapter Four

  The drum rolled and thundered at the Sophie's hatchway. Feet came racing up from below, a desperate rushing sound that made even the tense drum-beat seem more urgent. But apart from the landmen's in the new draft, the men's faces were calm; for this was beating to quarters, an afternoon ritual that many of the crew had performed some two or three thousand times, each running to a particular place by one allotted gun or to a given set of ropes that he knew by heart.

  No one could have called this a creditable performance, however. Much had been changed in the Sophie's comfortable old routine; the manning of the guns was different; a score of worried, sheep-like landmen had to be pushed and pulled into something like the right place; and since most of the newcomers could not yet be allowed to do anything more than heave under guidance, the sloop's waist was so crowded that men trampled upon one another's toes.

  Ten minutes passed while the Sophie's people seethed about her upper deck and her fighting-tops: Jack stood watching placidly abaft the wheel while Dillon barked orders and the warrant-officers and midshipmen darted furiously about, aware of their captain's gaze and conscious that their anxiety was not improving anything at all. Jack had expected something of a shambles, though not anything quite so unholy as this; but his native good-humour and the delight of feeling even the inept stirring of this machine under his control overcame all other, more righteous, emotions.

  'Why do they do this?' asked Stephen, at his elbow. 'Why do they run about so earnestly?'

  'The idea is that every man shall know exactly where to go in action—in an emergency,' said Jack. 'It would never do if they had to stand pondering. The gun-teams are there at their stations already, you see; and so are Sergeant Quinn's marines, here. The foc's'le men are all there, as far as I can make out; and I dare say the waisters will be in order presently. A captain to each gun, do you see; and a sponger and boarder next to him—the man with the belt and cutlass; they join the boarding-party; and a sail-trimmer, who leaves the gun if we have to brace the yards round, for example, in action; and a fireman, the one with the bucket—his task is to dash out any fire that may start. Now there is Pullings reporting his division ready to Dillon. We shall not be long now.'

  There were plenty of people on the little quarter-deck—the master at the con, the quartermaster at the wheel, the marine sergeant and his small-arms party, the signal midshipman, part of the afterguard, the gun-crews, James Dillon, the clerk, and still others—but Jack and Stephen paced up and down as though they were alone, Jack enveloped in the Olympian majesty of a captain and Stephen caught up within his aura. It was natural enough to Jack, who had known this state of affairs since he was a child, but it was the first time that Stephen had met with it, and it gave him a not altogether disagreeable sensation of waking death: either the absorbed, attentive men on the other side of the glass wall were dead, mere phantasmata, or he was—though in that case it was a strange little death, for although he was used to this sense of isolation, of being a colourless shack in a silent private underworld, he now had a companion, an audible companion.

  '. . . your station, for example, would be below, in what we call the cockpit—not that it is a real cockpit, any more than that fo'c'sle is a real fo'c'sle, in the s
ense of being raised: but we call it the cockpit—with the midshipmen's sea-chests as your operating table and your instruments all ready.'

  'Is that where I should live?'

  'No, no. We shall fix you up with something better than that. Even when you come under the Articles of War,' said Jack with a smile, 'you will find that we still honour learning; at least to the extent of ten square feet of privacy, and as much fresh air on the quarter-deck as you may choose to breathe in.'

  Stephen nodded. 'Tell me,' he said, in a low voice, some moments later. 'Were I under naval discipline, could that fellow have me whipped?' He nodded towards Mr Marshall.

  'The master?' cried Jack, with inexpressible amazement.

  'Yes,' said Stephen, looking attentively at him, with his head slightly inclined to the left.

  'But he is the master . . .' said Jack. If Stephen had called the Sophie's stem her stern, or her truck her keel, he would have understood the situation directly; but that Stephen should confuse the chain of command, the relative status of a captain and a master, of a commissioned officer and a warrant officer, so subverted the natural order, so undermined the sempiternal universe, that for a moment his mind could hardly encompass it. Yet Jack, though no great scholar, no judge of a hexameter, was tolerably quick, and after gasping no more than twice he said, 'My dear sir, I believe you have been led astray by the words master and master and commander—illogical terms, I must confess. The first is subordinate to the second. You must allow me to explain our naval ranks some time. But in any case you will never be flogged—no, no; you shall not be flogged,' he added, gazing with pure affection, and with something like awe, at so magnificent a prodigy, at an ignorance so very far beyond anything that even his wide-ranging mind had yet conceived.