| There is no forcing a willing mind. |
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This page is for book one: Master and Commander!
Welcome to my commentary on book one! Strap on your slash goggles and enjoy!
[Jack] leant back in his chair, extinguishing it entirely, sighed happily and turned towards his neighbour with a smile. The words 'Very finely played, sir, I believe' were formed in his gullet if not quite in his mouth when he caught the cold and indeed inimical look and heard the whisper, 'If you really must beat the measure, sir, let me entreat you to do so in time, and not half a beat ahead.'
Jack Aubrey's face instantly changed from friendly ingenuous communicative pleasure to an expression of somewhat baffled hostility: he could not but acknowledge that he had been beating the time; and although he had certainly done so with perfect accuracy, in itself the thing was wrong. His colour mounted; he fixed his neighbour's pale eye for a moment, said, 'I trust . . .', and the opening notes of the slow movement cut him short.
[...]
[...] so as the 'cello came in with its predictable and necessary contribution of pom, pom-pom-pom, poom, Jack's chin sank upon his breast and in unison with the 'cello he went pom, pom-pom-pom, poom. An elbow drove into his ribs and the sound shshsh hissed in his ear. He found that his hand was high in the air, beating time; he lowered it, clenched his mouth shut and looked down at his feet until the music was over.
[...]
In the applause and general din his neighbour looked at him, not so much with defiance as with total, heart-felt disapprobation: they did not speak, but sat in rigid awareness of one another [...]
[...]
A nudge, a thrust of that kind, so vicious and deliberate, was very like a blow. Neither his personal temper nor his professional code could patiently suffer an affront: and what affront was graver than a blow?
I love so much that the book begins with Jack meeting Stephen by chance, just because they happened to be sat next to each other while listening to a musical performance. ...And they immediately dislike each other. Jack wants to sing along and tap his foot to the music off-rhythm, Stephen wants this stranger he's sitting beside to shut the hell up, and Jack is affronted by Stephen's gall to tell him to either stay on time or stop trying to keep the beat at all.
Jack Aubrey and his neighbour in the rusty black coat stood up at the same time, and they looked at one another: Jack let his face return to its expression of cold dislike—the dying remnants of his artificial rapture were peculiarly disagreeable, as they faded—and in a low voice he said, 'My name is Aubrey, sir: I am staying at the Crown.'
'Mine, sir, is Maturin. I am to be found any morning at Joselito's coffee-house. May I beg you to stand aside?'
For a moment Jack felt the strongest inclination to snatch up his little gilt chair and beat the white-faced man down with it; but he gave way with a tolerable show of civility—he had no choice, unless he was to be run into [...]
Basic etiquette ensuring they have to make a short introduction is also so hilarious to me, Jack immediately wants to beat the shit out of Stephen after their very first introduction.
Then he remembered his own conduct that evening, particularly his withdrawing to let the small man walk by, and his inability to find any remark, any piece of repartee that would have been both crushing and well clear of boorishness. He was profoundly dissatisfied with himself, and with the man in the black coat, and with the service. And with the velvet softness of the April night, and the choir of nightingales in the orange-trees, and the host of stars hanging so low as almost to touch the palms.
Jack was already in a bad mood, but his inability to think of a comeback for Stephen in time has pissed him off so much further that now even the choir of birdsong and beautiful shining stars aren't escaping criticism.
He was unable to keep still. Pacing briskly up and down the room he put on his coat, threw it off again and uttered a series of disconnected remarks, chuckling as he did so. 'There I was, worrying . . . ha, ha . . . such a neat little brig—know her well . . . ha, ha . . . should have thought myself the happiest of men with the command of the sheer-hulk, or the Vulture slop-ship . . . any ship at all . . . admirable copperplate hand—singular fine paper . . . almost the only quarterdeck brig in the service: charming cabin, no doubt capital weather—so warm . . . ha, ha . . . if only I can get men: that's the great point . . .'
I also love the way Jack talks to himself just after gaining command of a ship. Such a great character moment so early on, the first chapters of the series perfectly illustrate to the reader just what kind of person Jack is.
[...]Jack saw the man in the black coat on the other side of the road, near the coffee-house. The evening flooded back into his mind and he hurried across, calling out, 'Mr—Mr Maturin. Why, there you are, sir. I owe you a thousand apologies, I am afraid. I must have been a sad bore to you last night, and I hope you will forgive me. We sailors hear so little music—are so little used to genteel company—that we grow carried away. I beg your pardon.'
'My dear sir,' cried the man in the black coat, with an odd flush rising in his dead-white face, 'you had every reason to be carried away. I have never heard a better quartetto in my life—such unity, such fire. May I propose a cup of chocolate, or coffee? It would give me great pleasure.'
'You are very good, sir. I should like it of all things. To tell the truth, I was in such a hurry of spirits I forgot my breakfast. I have just been promoted,' he added, with an off-hand laugh.
'Have you indeed? I wish you joy of it with all my heart, sure. Pray walk in.'
[...]
[Stephen said] to the waiter, speaking in the Catalan of the island, 'Bring us a pot of chocolate, Jep, furiously whipped, and some cream.'
'You speak the Spanish, sir?' said Jack, sitting down and flinging out the skirts of his coat to clear his sword in a wide gesture that filled the low room with blue. 'That must be a splendid thing, to speak the Spanish.
The next day after basically dissing each other, now they're bffsies because Jack's in a way better mood and, presumably, Stephen's just happy to be complimented (and/or thinks he'll get a free breakfast from the interaction). He even flushes at Jack's sudden apology and politeness toward him, hee hee...
I also love how Jack complements Stephen's abilities with language (and mistakes the Catalan for Spanish), and then they go into chatting about playing music:
'You play, sir?' [said Stephen]
'I scrape a little, sir. I torment a fiddle from time to time.'
'So do I! So do I! Whenever I have leisure, I make my attempts upon the 'cello.'
'A noble instrument,' said Jack, and they talked about Boccherini, bows and rosin, copyists, the care of strings, with great satisfaction in one another's company[...]
They really just immediately become enamored with each other upon realizing the other maybe isn't so rude after all.
Jack Aubrey emptied his cup and pushed back his chair. '[...] I hope I may count upon the honour, and may I say the pleasure—the great pleasure—of your company for dinner?'
'Most happy,' said Maturin, with a bow.
They were at the door. 'Then may we appoint three o'clock at the Crown?' said Jack. 'We do not keep fashionable hours in the service, and I grow so devilish hungry and peevish by then that you will forgive me, I am sure. We will wet the swab, and when it is handsomely awash, why then perhaps we might try a little music, if that would not be disagreeable to you.'
And then, while leaving, Jack immediately asks Stephen out for a second date dinner, of course.
And obviously, playing music together is always a metaphor for... What else?
Oh, and then directly after that line, Stephen interrupts with:
'Did you see that hoopoe?' cried the man in the black coat.
'What is a hoopoe?' cried Jack, staring about.
'A bird. That cinnamon-coloured bird with barred wings. Upupa epops. There! There, over the roof. There! There!'
'Where? Where? How does it bear?'
'It has gone now. I had been hoping to see a hoopoe ever since I arrived. In the middle of the town! Happy Mahon, to have such denizens. But I beg your pardon. You were speaking of wetting a swab.'
'Oh, yes. It is a cant expression we have in the Navy. The swab is this'—patting his epaulette—'and when first we ship it, we wet it: that is to say, we drink a bottle or two of wine.'
'Indeed?' said Maturin with a civil inclination of his head. 'A decoration, a badge of rank, I make no doubt? A most elegant ornament, so it is, upon my soul. But, my dear sir, have you not forgot the other one?'
'Well,' said Jack, laughing, 'I dare say I shall put them both on, by and by. Now I will wish you a good day and thank you for the excellent chocolate. I am so happy that you saw your epop.'
Aside from the hilarity of the book setting up Stephen as a ornithology-head naturalist, and Jack congratulating Stephen on the bird sighting, I love when Jack explains nautical terms to Stephen. It's always so cute. I know it's also for the benefit of the reader, but I love how not just willing, but pleased he gets to explain things to Stephen, even on their first positive meeting.
'Allow me to press you to a trifle of this ragoo'd mutton, sir,' said Jack.
'Well, if you insist,' said Stephen Maturin. 'It is so very good.'
[...]
'I have not eaten so well for many a day, nor'—with a bow—'in such pleasant company, upon my word,' said Stephen Maturin.
They're on a daaaaaaate. <3
'Is it swine's flesh?' [said Jack]
'Wild boar. Allow me . . .'
'You are very good. May I trouble you for the salt? It is capital eating, to be sure; but I should never have guessed it was swine's flesh. What are these well-tasting soft dark things?'
'There you pose me. They are bolets in Catalan: but what they are called in English I cannot tell. They probably have no name—no country name, I mean, though the naturalist will always recognize them in the boletus edulis of Linnaeus.'
'How . . .?' began Jack, looking at Stephen Maturin with candid affection.
First of all, a win with boletes being included by name in their meal. My girl is famous! (I featured an antique botanical print of one in the sidebar graphics for these pages!)
More importantly, with the sheer amount of times that Jack looks at Stephen "with affection" in this series, it's almost like Patrick O'Brian wants me to ship them.
'[...]But even so, Doctor, even so, I think I should have had you run aboard and kept under hatches till we were at sea. My poor Sophie has no surgeon and there is no likelihood of finding her one. Come, sir, cannot I prevail upon you to go to sea? A man-of-war is the very thing for a philosopher, above all in the Mediterranean: there are the birds, the fishes—I could promise you some monstrous strange fishes—the natural phenomena, the meteors, the chance of prize-money. For even Aristotle would have been moved by prize-money. Doubloons, sir: they lie in soft leather sacks, you know, about so big, and they are wonderfully heavy in your hand. Two is all a man can carry.'
He had spoken in a bantering tone, never dreaming of a serious reply, and he was astonished to hear Stephen say, 'But I am in no way qualified to be a naval surgeon. To be sure, I have done a great deal of anatomical dissection, and I am not unacquainted with most of the usual chirurgical operations; but I know nothing of naval hygiene, nothing of the particular maladies of seamen . . .'
'Bless you,' cried Jack, 'never strain at gnats of that kind.'
God, he wants Stephen on his ship so bad it makes him look stupid. It's practically just: "Heh, uh, you wanna be my ship's physician? It'd be great for a naturalist like yourself, too, btw. JUST KIDDING! ...Unless?"
'No, no. We should be delighted to have you—more than delighted. Do, pray, consider of it, if only for a while. I need not say,' he added, with a particularly earnest look, 'how much pleasure it would give me, was we to be shipmates.'
How is this not just. Direct flirtation. Hello???
Oh, and then when Jack gets a letter of orders...
'Do not mind me, I beg,' said Stephen. 'You must read them directly.' He took up Jack's fiddle and walked away to the end of the room, where he played a low, whispering scale, over and over again.
Just casually playing another man's instrument. Like bros.
'[...]What do you say to taking tea? And perhaps a piece of muffin? Or should you rather stay with the port?'
'Tea would make me very happy,' said Stephen [...], walking back to the fiddle and tucking it under his chin[...]
[...]There was a long pause while the tea was brought in. 'You take milk in your tea, Doctor?' asked Jack.
'If you please,' said Stephen. He was obviously deep in thought: his eyes were fixed upon vacancy and his mouth was pursed in a silent whistle.
'I wish . . .' said Jack.
'It is always said to be weak, and impolitic, to show oneself at a disadvantage,' said Stephen, bearing him down. 'But you speak to me with such candour that I cannot prevent myself from doing the same. Your offer, your suggestion, tempts me exceedingly[...] and when I told you, some time ago, that I had not eaten so well for a great while, I did not speak figuratively.'
'Oh, what a very shocking thing!' cried Jack. 'I am heartily sorry for your embarrassment, and [...] I hope you will allow me . . .' His hand was in his breeches pocket, but Stephen Maturin said 'No, no, no,' a dozen times, smiling and nodding. 'But you are very good.'
Again, Jack so badly wants Stephen on his ship. He even tries to pay for the both of them like a proper gentleman at the end of their date! And Stephen being unable to deny his request because of how earnest he is... It's astounding how they're already literally in love two chapters into the first book.
'But Lord love you, Doctor, we must not let trifles stand in the way. [...] Come as soon as you like—come tomorrow, say, and we will dine together. Even the acting order will take some little time, so make this voyage as my guest. It will not be comfortable—no elbow-room in a brig, you know, but it will introduce you to naval life [...] Let me fill your cup. And I am sure you will like it, for it is amazingly philosophical.'
'Certainly,' said Stephen. 'For a philosopher, a student of human nature, what could be better? The subjects of his inquiry shut up together, unable to escape his gaze, their passions heightened by the dangers of war, the hazards of their calling, their isolation from women and their curious, but uniform, diet. And by the glow of patriotic fervour, no doubt.'—with a bow to Jack—'It is true that for some time past I have taken more interest in the cryptogams than in my fellow-men; but even so, a ship must be a most instructive theatre for an inquiring mind.'
'Prodigiously instructive, I do assure you, Doctor,' said Jack. 'How happy you make me[...]'
Just the way Jack already has the ability to convince Stephen to stay aboard for the purpose of studying the human psyche, and how Stephen immediately runs with the idea. There's some kind of 5D chess flirting going on here, I know it. "Passions heightened" and "isolation from women", indeed...
'Mr Marshall,' said Jack, 'pass the word for the carpenter, if you please. I have a guest coming aboard: we must do our best to make him comfortable. He is a physician, a great man in the philosophical line. [...] I have great hopes that if we make him comfortable he may stay with us as the Sophie's surgeon.'
[...]
'I want you to have a look at the bulkhead of my sleeping-cabin and see what you can do to make it a little more roomy for a friend: you may be able to shift it for'ard a good six inches.'
Jack immediately trying to make the sleeping arrangements more comfortable... They'll need the extra room, all right.
[Jack's] voice was hoarse. 'What made me so damned garrulous yesterday?' he said, still lying there in his cot. 'I am as hoarse as a crow, with talking. And what made me launch out in wild invitations? A guest I know nothing about, in a very small brig I have scarcely seen.' He pondered gloomily upon the extreme care that should be taken with shipmates—cheek by jowl—very like marriage—[...]'
Yeah, Jack sure did a bit of a U-Haul here, huh? Asking Stephen onto the ship after an enemies-to-lovers meet-cute and two dates. I'm sure he'd be all too happy to be "cheek by jowl" with his guest... To not even speak on "Very like marriage"...
Presently, [Stephen] took notice of the ants that were taking away his crumbs. Tapinoma erraticum. They were walking in a steady two-way stream across the hollow of his inverted wig, as it lay there looking very like an abandoned bird's nest[...].
They hurried along with their abdomens high, jostling, running into one another; his gaze followed the wearisome little creatures, and while he was watching them a toad was watching him; their eyes met, and he smiled. A splendid toad: a two-pound toad with brilliant tawny eyes. [...] Very gently he stretched out his finger and stroked the toad's throat: the toad swelled a little and moved its crossed hands; then sat easy, gazing back.
Just Stephen looking at ants and petting a toad. nbd.
'What am I to think of Captain Aubrey's invitation?' he said aloud, in that great emptiness of light and air[...]. 'Was it merely Jack ashore? Yet he was such a pleasant, ingenuous companion.' He smiled at the recollection. 'Still and all, what weight can be attached to . . .? We had dined extremely well: four bottles, or possibly five. I must not expose myself to an affront. He turned it over and over, arguing against his hopes[...]
...And Stephen wondering if that date went as well as he thought it did. Typical crush activities!
[...]three or four [of the men] were decidedly simple, and two others had that indefinable air of men of some parts whose cleverness sets them apart from their fellows, but not nearly so far as they imagine.
This is just a particularly amusing line.
Stephen had allowed his mind to convince itself entirely, and the strength of his emotion at the sight of the Sophie, her white sails and her low hull dwindling fast over the shining sea, showed him how much he had come to look forward to the prospect of a new place and new skies, a living, and a closer acquaintance with this friend [...].
He walked up through the town with his mind in a curious state; he had suffered so many disappointments recently that it did not seem possible he could bear another. What was more, he had allowed all his defences to disperse—unarm.
Poor Stephen is already completely smitten with the idea of being a naval doctor on the Sophie, huh... The phrasing just makes me kind of crazy, talking about how he couldn't bear another disappointment, how he let his defenses down... He really cares about going along with Jack that much, huh?
'Old Sodom and Gomorrah is sweet on Goldilocks,' murmured John Lane, foretopman, to his friend Thomas Gross. Thomas winked his eye and jerked his head, but without any appearance of censure—they were concerned with the phenomenon, not with any moral judgment.
The master's crush on Jack almost always makes me laugh. The way it just goes right over Jack's head every time... And I love that the crew are "concerned with the phenomenon, not with any moral judgment." Just in case you were worried the sailors were being judgy and homophobic: Nah, just gossipy. Thanks for the distinction, O'Brian!
A moment later pandemonium broke loose: pandemonium, that is, to the waking Stephen Maturin, who now for the first time in his life heard the unnatural wailing, the strange arbitrary intervals of the bosun and his mates piping 'Up all hammocks'. He heard a rushing of feet and a great terrible voice calling 'All hands, all hands ahoy!' [...] he heard oaths, laughter, [...] and then a far greater trampling as fifty or sixty men rushed up the hatchways with their hammocks, to stow them in the nettings.
[...]
it some emergency?' wondered Stephen, working his way with rapid caution out of his hanging cot. 'A battle? Fire? A desperate leak? And are they too much occupied to warn me—have forgotten I am here?' He drew on his breeches as fast as he could and, straightening briskly, he brought his head up against a beam with such force that he staggered and sank on to a locker, cherishing it with both hands.
A voice was speaking to him. 'What did you say?' he asked, peering through a mist of pain.
'I said, "Did you bump your head, sir?" '
'Yes,' said Stephen, looking at his hand: astonishingly it was not covered with blood—there was not even so much as a smear.
'It's these old beams, sir'—in the unusually distinct, didactic voice used at sea for landmen and on land for half-wits—'You want to take care of them; for—they—are—very—low.'
Stephen hitting his head getting up and being spoken to like an idiot just amuses me. That's all.
It's hilarious that at the start of the series he thinks the crew would leave him behind, and by the end of the first book the entire crew would die for him.
'There you are, Doctor,' cried Jack. 'Good morning to you. I trust you slept?'
'Very well indeed, I thank you. These hanging cots are a most capital invention, upon my word.'
'What would you like for breakfast? I smelt the gun-room's bacon on deck and I thought it the finest smell I had ever smelt in my life—Araby left at the post. What do you say to bacon and eggs, and then perhaps a beefsteak to follow? And coffee?'
'You are of my way of thinking entirely,' cried Stephen, who had great leeway to make up in the matter of victuals.
[...]
'How I slept,' said Stephen. 'Deep, deep, restorative, roborative sleep—none of your hypnogogues, none of your tinctures of laudanum can equal it. But I am ashamed of my appearance. I slept so late that here I am, barbarously unshaved and nasty, whereas you are as smug as a bridegroom. Forgive me for a moment.
Breakfast daaaaate!
Plus Stephen saying Jack looks as nice as a bridegroom and going off to shave, heeheehee...
'It was a naval surgeon, a man at Haslar,' he said, coming back, smooth, 'who invented these modern short arterial ligatures: I thought of him just now, as my razor passed within a few lines of my external carotid. When it is rough, surely you must get many shocking incised wounds?'
'Why, no: I can't say we do,' said Jack. 'A matter of use, I suppose.'
Remember, for later on, Stephen asking about sailors cutting themselves while shaving on rough seas, and Jack denying it happens...
'And this, sir, is where we live,' said Mowett, advancing his lantern into the midshipmen's berth. 'Pray mind the beam.! must beg your indulgence for the smell: it is probably young Babbington here.'
'Oh, it is not,' cried Babbington, springing up from his book. 'You are cruel, Mowett,' he whispered, with seething indignation.
[...]
'There is some light from the grating, as you see, and a little air gets down when the hatch-covers are off. I remember in the after-cockpit of the old Namur the candles used to go out for want of anything in that line, and we had nothing as odorous as young Babbington.'
[...]
'The youngsters sling their hammocks by the breadroom, and [...] they come here and eat our food and destroy our books with their great greasy thumbs.'
'You are studying trigonometry, sir?' said Stephen, whose eyes, accustomed to the darkness, could now distinguish an inky triangle.
'Yes, sir, if you please,' said Babbington. 'And I believe I have nearly found out the answer.' (And should have, if that great ox had not come barging in, he added, privately.)
I also do love Mowett and Babbington arguing here, the little petty disagreements on the ship are always so funny to me.
'[...] and there I was at half-past four the next morning. I was shaving, as I remember very well, for I nicked my chin.' [said James]
'Ha,' said Stephen, with satisfaction.
b
'—when there was a cry of sail-ho and I hurried up on deck.'
'I'm sure you did,' said Jack, laughing.
And finally the callback! Stephen, smugly getting back at Jack about sailors not cutting themselves shaving.
...And this next excerpt is right after Jack complains about having to sign off on a letter about Court Martial-ing a man who has sodomized a goat:
'Oh, he'll be hanged. Run up at the yard-arm, and boats attending from every ship in the fleet.' [said Jack]
'That seems a little extreme.' [said Stephen]
'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.'
...Yeah, Stephen, I also don't know if I'd want to drink goat's milk after that conversation, either.
'Why do they do this?' asked Stephen, at his elbow.
I just like the phrasing of "at his elbow." Yeah, that's Stephen's natural place. At Jack's elbow. On Jack's elbow, even.
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, [...] for although he was used to this sense of isolation, [...] he now had a companion, an audible companion.
First of all, the way this draws on a bit earlier in the book where Jack feels a little lonely in his position of Captain, where the other men can't speak plainly with him because of rank, but now he and Stephen both have companionship and real friendship in each other. Kill me. But also just the amount of times throughout the series these two end up behaving like they're the only two people on earth. God, how can you not ship it?!
'. . . your station, for example, would be below, in what we call 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.
Again, Jack giving preference to Stephen not just as a ship's doctor but as his super special guest and friend always tickles me.
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.
Jack being shocked but endeared by Stephen's complete lack of naval knowledge despite his intellect is always great, obviously--- "gazing with pure affection" at Stephen's ignorance--- Delicious.
But I also always hone in on how meaningful the way Jack so sincerely tells Stephen that he will never be flogged. An unspoken vow to protect him from some of the uglier parts of the service.
'My dear sir,' said Jack to Stephen, measuring the Sophie's increasing speed and the distance that separated her from the embattled cat—in this state of triply intensified vitality he could perfectly well calculate, talk to Stephen and revolve a thousand shifting variables all at once—'my dear sir, do you choose to go below or should you rather stay on deck? Perhaps it would divert you to go to into the maintop with a musket, along with the sharpshooters, and have a bang at the villains?'
'No, no, no,' said Stephen. 'I deprecate violence. My part is to heal rather than to kill; or at least to kill with kindly intent. Pray let me take my place, my station, in the cockpit.'
'I hoped you would say that,' said Jack, shaking him by the hand. 'I had not liked to suggest it to my guest, however. It will comfort the men amazingly—all of us, indeed.
Jack giving Stephen the option to stay and fight out of courtesy, while actually hoping Stephen stays out of the fray and in the safety of being below deck. I'm crying.
[Stephen] was sitting there [...] reading [...] when Jack came down. He had put on Hessian boots and his sword, and he was carrying a pair of pistols.
'May I use the room next door?' asked Stephen, adding in Latin, so that he might not be understood by the loblolly boy, 'it might discourage the patients, were they to see me consulting my printed authorities.'
'Certainly, certainly,' cried Jack, riding straight over the Latin. 'Anything you like. [...]'
The way Stephen tries to talk to Jack in Latin for secrecy and Jack just replies in English anyway is so much.
'[...] But as soon as the sun is up I must have off the top of his skull with my little saw. You will see the gunner's brain, my dear sir,' [Stephen] added with a smile. 'Or at least his dura mater.'
'Oh dear, oh dear,' murmured Jack. Deep depression was settling on him—anticlimax—such a bloody little engagement for so little—two good men killed—the gunner almost certainly dead—no man could survive having his brain opened, that stood to reason [...]
[...]
'[...] But we must not give up hope. Dr Maturin is going to—going to do something prodigious clever with a saw, as soon as there is light. He needs light for it—something uncommonly skilful, I dare say.' [said Jack]
'Oh, yes, I'm sure, sir,' cried the bosun warmly. 'A very clever gentleman he must be, no question. The men are wonderfully pleased. "How kind," they say, "to saw off Ned Evans' leg so trim, and to sew up John Lakey's private parts so neat; as well as all the rest; he being, so to speak, on leave—a visitor, like." '
'It is handsome,' said Jack. 'It is very handsome, I agree.[...]'
Jack: No way this guy survives having his skull cut open.
Also Jack: ...But I have to defend Stephen's ability to do so anyway.
And also, I just love how much the crew already loves Stephen!
[...] when [Jack] saw no admiral in that beautiful great light-filled cabin but only a well-rounded young woman with her back to the window, he gaped like any carp.
'Jacky, dear,' said the young woman, 'how beautiful you are, all dressed up. Let me put your neck-cloth straight, la, Jackie, you look as frightened as if I were a Frenchman.'
'Queeney! Old Queeney!' cried Jack, squeezing her and giving her a most affectionate smacking kiss.
[...]
'This is the young man I told you about, Admiral,' said Queeney, patting poor pale Jack's black stock into place and waving a ring at him. 'I used to give him his bath and take him into my bed when he had bad dreams.'
I really do love this scene. It's so cute. Jack and Queeney's interactions are always great, I love imagining Jack when he was a little boy.
'[...] yet, you know, he is amazingly ancient—grey-haired, rising sixty, I dare say. Do you think, as a physician—I mean, is it possible . . .?' [said Jack]
'Possibilissima.' [said Stephen]
'Eh?'
'Possibile è la cosa, e naturale,' sang Stephen in a harsh, creaking tone, quite unlike his speaking voice, which was not disagreeable. 'E se Susanna vuol, possibilissima,' discordantly, but near enough to Figaro to be recognized.
'Really? Really?' said Jack with intense interest. Then after a pause for reflexion, 'We might try that as a duetto, improvising . . .[...]'
Jack asking Stephen if he thinks it's possible for a sixty-year-old man to actually get a woman pregnant, getting a sung reference to Figaro from Stephen's "not disagreeable" singing voice as a response, and then immediately saying he and Stephen should do a duetto... I know I love to read into things, and this one is particularly a stretch, but... There it is, anyway...
The sailormen had plenty of time to depress their hearers, already low in their spirits because of the unnatural death of Henry Gouges (had said, 'Ha, ha, mates, I am fifty years old this day. Oh dear,' and had died sitting there, still holding his untasted grog)
Fucking LOL.
That's a body on deck,' said Babbington, full of glee.
Again, LOL. Oh, Babbington, you little shit.
At once the Sophie sprang to life—bosun's calls shrilling, hands running to their places, general uproar—and in the din Stephen cried, 'I insist upon a boat—I protest . . .'
Jack took him by the elbow and propelled him with affectionate violence into the cabin. 'My dear sir,' he said, 'I am afraid you must not insist, or protest: it is mutiny, you know, and you would be obliged to be hanged. Was you to set foot [in the ship where a man has died of plague], even if you did not bring back the contagion, [...] half the hands would die of fright.'
'You mean to sail directly away from that ship, giving it no assistance?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Upon your own head, then.'
'Certainly.'
The log took little notice of this incident; it scarcely could have found any appropriate official language for saying that the Sophie's surgeon shook his fist at the Sophie's captain, in any case[...]
I love the idea that in the process of writing entries in the log, one has to ignore all the ways Jack and Stephen end up bickering like a married couple.
[...] [Jack] walked, bending low, into the gun-room. Here, rather to his surprise, he found Dillon [...] playing chess with Stephen, while the purser read them pieces from the Gentleman's Magazine, with comments.
'Do not stir, gentlemen,' he cried, as they all sprang up. 'I have just come to beg your hospitality for a while.'
They made him very welcome—hurried about with glasses of wine, sweet biscuits, the most recent Navy List—but he was an intruder: he had upset their quiet sociability, dried up the purser's literary criticism and interrupted the chess as effectually as an Olympian thunderbolt. Stephen messed down here now, of course—his cabin was the little boarded cupboard beyond the hanging lantern—and he already looked as though he belonged to this community: Jack felt obscurely hurt, and after he had talked for a while (a dry, constrained interchange, it seemed to him; so very polite) he went up on deck again.
Jack is so jealous that Stephen isn't eating every meal with him anymore AND playing chess with James! "Obscurely hurt"... That's called jealousy buddy!
Three bells. The quiet voice of the ship's corporal reporting all's well. Four bells. There were so many other possibilities, so many things the chase could have done [...]: hundreds of other things . . .
'What, what's this? Walking about in the rain in your shirt? This is madness,' said Stephen's voice just behind him.
'Hush!' cried Mowett, the officer of the watch, who had failed to intercept him.
'Madness. Think of the night air—the falling damos—the fluxion of the humours. If your duty requires you to walk about in the night air, you must wear a woollen garment. A woollen garment, there, for the captain! I will fetch it myself.'
Five bells, and another soft shower of rain. The relieving of the helm, and the whispered repetition of the course, the routine reports. Six bells, and a hint of thinner darkness in the east. [...]
Jack stuffed his glass into the pocket of the grego Stephen had brought him[...]
I'm sorry... Stephen ACTUALLY BROUGHT HIM A SWEATER? WHY ARE THEY SO MARRIED???
'Allow me to fill your glass,' said Jack, with the utmost benevolence. 'This is rather better than our ordinary, I believe?'
'Better, dear joy, and very, very much stronger—a healthy, roborative beverage,' said Stephen Maturin.
I just really love when they call each other "joy", and especially "dear joy", hehehe.
'[...] And then—God, how sleepy I am—we can set about our cruising in earnest. I have a plan for nightwork, lying close inshore but first I should tell you how I think to divide up our time. A week off Cape Creus, then back to Mahon for stores and water, particularly water. Then the approaches to Barcelona, and coastwise . . . coastwise . . .' [Jack] yawned prodigiously: two sleepless nights and a pint of the Aimable Louise's Priorato were bearing him down with an irresistible warm soft delicious weight. 'Where was I? Oh, Barcelona. Then off Tarragona, Valencia . . . Valencia . . . water's the great trouble, of course.' He sat there blinking at the light, musing comfortably; and he heard Stephen's distant voice discoursing upon the coast of Spain—knew it well [...], could show him many an interesting remnant of Phoenician, Greek, Roman, Visigothic, Arabian occupation; the certainty of both kinds of egret in the marshes by Valencia; [...] the very real possibility of flamingoes . . .
This part where Jack drifts off to the sound of Stephen's voice as he tells him about Spain... I'm crying. Dear god, it's just SO cute.
[...] Stephen was at his usual post by the elm-tree pump, peering down its tube into the sunlit upper layers of the Mediterranean; and when they told him there was a woman in the prize, having a baby, he said, 'Aye? I dare say. I thought I recognized the sound,' and showed every sign of returning to his place.
'Surely you can do something about it?' said Jack.
'I am certain the poor woman is dying,' said James.
Stephen looked at them with his odd expressionless gaze and said, 'I will go across.' He went below, and Jack said, 'Well, that's in good hands, thank God. [...]'
This bit always makes me laugh, I can perfectly picture Stephen's blank stare in my head. I can't tell if he was planning on letting nature take its course before he was told to intervene, or if he'd just forgotten not everyone is as capable a surgeon as he is in a life-or-death situation.
'Patriotism will not do?' [said James]
'My dear creature, I have done with all debate. But you know as well as I, patriotism is a word; and one that generally comes to mean either my country, right or wrong, which is infamous, or my country is always right, which is imbecile.' [said Stephen]
'Yet you stopped Captain Aubrey playing Croppies lie down the other day.'
'Oh, I am not consistent, of course; particularly in little things. Who is? He did not know the meaning of the tune, you know. He has never been in Ireland at all, and he was in the West Indies at the time of the rising.”
[...]
[Stephen] paused. 'But as for that song, I acted as I did partly because it is disagreeable to me to listen to it and partly because there were several Irish sailors within hearing, [...] and it would be a pity to have them hate him when nothing in the manner of insult was within his mind's reach.'
'You are very fond of him, I believe?'
'Am I? Yes; perhaps I am. I would not call him a gremial friend—I have not known him long enough—but I am very much attached to him. I am sorry that you are not.'
'I am sorry for it too. I came willing to be pleased. I had heard of him as wild and freakish, but a good seaman, and I was very willing to be pleased. But feelings are not to command.'
'No. But it is curious: at least it is curious to me, the mid-point, with esteem—indeed, more than esteem—for both of you. Are there particular lapses you reproach him with? If we were still eighteen I should say "What's wrong with Jack Aubrey?" '
'And perhaps I should reply "Everything, since he has a command and I have not," ' said James, smiling. 'But come, now, I can hardly criticize your friend to your face.'
'Oh, he has faults, sure. I know he is intensely ambitious where his profession is at issue and impatient of any restraint. My concern was to know just what it was that offended you in him.[...]'
First, I love Stephen's commentary on how quickly blind patriotism can get sour. Next... I always facepalm at how often Jack ends up being accidentally offensive out of pure ignorance. His mind really is 80% Naval life and 20% things Stephen said once. Though it does make me kind of go "of course" that Stephen stopped him half because he found the song offensive, and half to save Jack from having any Irish members of the crew hate Jack for a perceived intentional sleight.
Also... "You are very fond of him, I believe?" and "Am I? Yes; perhaps I am." OKAY? I mean, the way that (aside from the antiquated speech patterns) this conversation between James and Stephen just plainly reads like two friends gossiping about the one's boyfriend that the other doesn't approve of...
'[...] I may very well be unjust—jealous—wanting in generosity. I beg your pardon if I have offended you. And I willingly confess [Jack] is an excellent seaman.' [said James]
'Lord, James, we have known one another long enough to tell our minds freely, without any offence. Will you reach me the bottle?' [said Stephen]
'Well, then,' said James, 'if I may speak as freely as though I were in an empty room, I will tell you this: I think his encouragement of that fellow Marshall is indecent, not to use a grosser word.'
'Do I follow you, now?'
'You know about the man?'
'What about the man?'
'[...] he is enamoured of Captain Aubrey—toils like a galley-slave—would holystone the quarter-deck if allowed—hounds the men with far more zeal than the bosun—anything for a smile from him.'
Stephen nodded. 'Yes,' he said. 'But surely you do not think Jack Aubrey shares his tastes?'
'No. But I do think he is aware of them and that he encourages the man. Oh, this is a very foul, dirty way of speaking . . . I go too far. Perhaps I am drunk. We have nearly emptied the bottle.'
Stephen shrugged. 'No. But you are quite mistaken, you know. I can assure you, speaking in all sober earnest, that he has no notion of it. He is not very sharp in some ways [...]. I made a circuitous attempt at enlightening him a little, but he looked very knowing and said, "Don't tell me about rears and vices; I have been in the Navy all my life." '
'Then surely he must be wanting a little in penetration?'
'James, I trust there was no mens rea in that remark?'
'I must go on deck,' said James, looking at his watch.'
How bitchy does James get while drunk? Man, it's too much imagining Stephen trying to hint to Jack that Marshall is gay for him, and Jack's response! "Don't tell me about rears and vices"! Too fucking funny. ...And when Stephen points out that final double entendre--- and of course James just straight up leaves after that! Maybe just the slash goggles talking, but I think he was definitely trying to hint at something to Stephen... That his friend has a chance, perhaps...?
'My heart bleeds for you. I have never yet known a man admit that he was either rich or asleep: perhaps the poor man and the wakeful man have some great moral advantage.'
Yet another of Stephen's little quippy burns that I love.
Here's another bit from Stephen's Journal:
Yet Ld Nelson, by Jack Aubrey's account, is as direct and unaffected and amiable a man as could be wished. So, indeed, in most ways is JA himself; though a certain careless arrogancy of power appears at times. His cheerfulness, at all events, is with him still. How long will it last? What woman, political cause, disappointment, wound, disease, untoward child, defeat, what strange surprising accident will take it all away? But I am concerned for James Dillon: he is as mercurial as ever he was [...] I would give so much to bring him cordially friends with Jack Aubrey. They are so alike in so many ways, and James is made for friendship: when he sees that he is mistaken about JA's conduct, surely he will come round? [...] It is not impossible. But on the other hand, JD is a mercurial creature, and if once, on the upward rise, he comes to love JA as he should, he will not change [...]. I would give a great deal to bring them friends.
I always love the excerpts from Stephen's journaling... Especially when it ends up like this, where he's mostly going on about Jack, and especially especially this one, which is basically the timeless complaint of "why does my friend hate my boyfriend so much? I wish they could just be friends :((("
'I was contemplating on the Pongo,' [Stephen] said aloud as the door opened and Jack walked in with a look of eager expectation, carrying a roll of music.
'I am sure you were,' cried Jack. 'A damned creditable thing to be contemplating on, too. Now be a good fellow and take your other foot out of that basin—why on earth did you put it in?—and pull on your stockings, I beg. We have not a moment to lose. No, not blue stockings: we are going on to Mrs Harte's party—to her rout.'
'Must I put on silk stockings?'
'Certainly you must put on silk stockings. And do show a leg, my dear chap: we shall be late, without you spread a little more canvas.'
'You are always in such a hurry,' said Stephen peevishly, groping among his possessions.
Arguing about getting dressed to go to a party. You know, just boy best friend behaviors. Absolutely nothing married about this. Oh, and directly after this we get:
A Montpellier snake glided out with a dry rustling sound and traversed the room in a series of extraordinarily elegant curves, its head held up some eighteen inches above the ground.
'Oh, oh, oh,' cried Jack, leaping on to a chair. 'A snake!'
'Will these do?' asked Stephen. 'They have a hole in them.'
'Is it poisonous?'
'Extremely so. I dare say it will attack you, directly. I have very little doubt of it. Was I to put the silk stockings over my worsted stockings, sure the hole would not show: but then, I should stifle with heat. Do not you find it uncommonly hot?'
'Oh, it must be two fathoms long. Tell me, is it really poisonous? On your oath now?'
'If you thrust your hand down its throat as far as its back teeth you may meet a little venom; but not otherwise. Malpolon monspessulanus is a very innocent serpent. I think of carrying a dozen aboard, for the rats—ah, if only I had more time, and if it were not for this foolish, illiberal persecution of reptiles . . . What a pitiful figure you do cut upon that chair, to be sure. Barney, Barney, buck or doe, Has kept me out of Channel Row,' he sang to the serpent; and, deaf as an adder though it was, it looked happily into his face while he carried it away.
Firstly, LOL at the fact that Stephen doesn't even dignify Jack pointing out the snake with a response at first, he just asks if his stockings are okay, then continues to just talk about the stockings while teasing Jack the whole time about the snake being venomous. And then he starts singing to the snake as Jack stands on a chair like a cartoon housewife seeing a mouse! I seriously love the mental images this series paints.
'Allow me to name my friend—my particular friend—and surgeon, Dr Maturin,' said Jack, leading Stephen up to their hostess.
What if we were particular friends and we were both boys?
Stephen stood with his hands behind his back, his head bowed, his face gravely inclined in a listening attitude. He was not, indeed, inattentive; but his attention was not so wholly taken up that he did not hear Jack cry, 'Oh, yes, yes! The rest of them are certainly coming ashore—they are lining the rail in their shore-going rig, with money in their pockets, their eyes staring out of their heads and their pricks a yard long.' He could scarcely have avoided hearing it, for Jack had a fine carrying voice, and his remark happened to drop into one of those curious silences that occur even in very numerous assemblies.
Stephen regretted the remark; he regretted its effect upon the ladies the other side of the orange-tree, who were standing up and mincing away with many an indignant glance; but how much more did he regret Jack's crimson face, the look of maniac glee in his blazing eyes and his triumphant, 'You needn't hurry, ladies—they won't be allowed off the sloop till the evening gun.'
I love that Stephen always has half an ear out to listen to whatever inappropriate nonsense Jack is ill-advisedly spouting... And boy, what inappropriate nonsense it is, lmao! "Their pricks a yard long..." ohhhh Jack. Yeah, I'd be scarcely able to avoid hearing it, too, if I were Stephen. And also how embarrassed Stephen is on Jack's behalf, oh man.
'Dr Maturin, please take your friend away,' said Molly Harte in a low, urgent tone. 'Tell him his ship is on fire—tell him anything. Only get him away—he will do himself such damage.'
Stephen nodded. He lowered his head and walked directly into the group, took Jack by the elbow and said, 'Come, come, come,' in an odd, imperative half-whisper, bowing to those whose conversation he had interrupted. 'There is not a moment to be lost.'
Molly Harte really said "Stephen PLEASE come get your man!!"
Out to sea, where [Jack] could not be betrayed by his own tongue, where Stephen could not get himself into bad odour with authority, and where that infernal child Babbington did not have to be rescued from aged women of the town. And where James Dillon could not fight a duel.
Fuck. The usual suspects, over here.
Hitherto, Jack had been too busy working up his crew to pay much attention to the education of his midshipmen, but he had looked at yesterday's slips and they, with a very suspicious unanimity, had shown the Sophie in 39°21'N, which was fair enough, but also in a longitude that she could only have reached by cleaving the mountain-range behind Valencia to a depth of thirty-seven miles.
'What do you mean by sending me this nonsense?' he asked them. It was not really an answerable question; nor were many of the others that he propounded, and they did not, in fact, attempt to answer them; but they agreed that they were not there to amuse themselves, nor for their manly beauty, but rather to learn their professions; [...] and that no man was fit to pass for a lieutenant, let alone bear any command ('May God forgive me,' said Jack, in an internal aside) who could not instantly tell the position of his ship to within a minute—nay, to within thirty seconds. Furthermore, they would show up their journals every Sunday, cleanly and legibly written.
'You can write decently, I suppose? [...]' They hoped so, sir, they were sure; they should do their best.
But he did not seem convinced and desired them to sit down on that locker, take those pens and these sheets of paper, to pass him yonder book, which would answer admirably for them to be read to out of [...].
This was how it came about that Stephen, pausing in the quietness of his sick-bay to reflect upon the case of the patient whose pulse beat weak and thin beneath his fingers, heard Jack's voice, unnaturally slow, grave and terrible, come wafting down the wind-sail that brought fresh air below. 'The quarter-deck of a man-of-war may justly be considered as a national school for the instruction of a numerous portion of our youth; there it is that they acquire a habit of discipline and become instructed in all the interesting minutiae of the service. Punctuality, cleanliness, diligence and dispatch are regularly inculcated, and such a habit of sobriety and even of self-denial acquired, that cannot fail to prove highly useful. By learning to obey, they are also taught how to command.
'Well, well, well,' said Stephen to himself, and then turned his mind entirely back to the poor, wasted, [patient] in the hammock beside him [...]
It's always cute when Jack interacts like this with the young midshipmen, but being within earshot of Stephen makes it all the more squee-worthy. I love Jack semi-hypocritically lecturing the boys about proper conduct. I am definitely not immune (especially in movie-verse) to Jack and Stephen all but adopting the younger members of the crew.
'[...]But I will not lose a patient because of sailors' prejudices. He must be put to lie out of reach of their malignance, and if he recovers he shall be my loblolly boy, an isolated employment. So much so, indeed, that the present lad—'
'I beg your pardon, sir, but Captain's compliments and would you like to see something amazingly philosophical?' cried Babbington, darting in like a ball.
Babbington racing in to fetch Stephen on Jack's request literally in the middle of a sentence really is this little shit's character in perfect form.
[...]through his narrowed eyelids Stephen could distinguish Old Sponge, the taller Greek, standing naked in a pool of water by the starboard hances, dripping still and holding out a piece of copper sheathing with great complacency. On his right stood Jack, his hands behind him and a look of happy triumph on his face: on his left most of the watch, craning and staring. The Greek held the corroded copper sheet out a little farther and, watching Stephen's face intently, he turned it slowly over. On the other side there, was a small dark fish with a sucker on the back of its head, clinging fast to the metal.
'A remora!' cried Stephen with all the amazement and delight the Greek and Jack had counted upon, and more.
And once again, Stephen being as excited as "Jack had counted upon and more" because of a specimen they saved for him is always always one of my favorites.
And then what the crew has to say about the little fish makes me laugh every time:
The remora was so strong it had certainly torn the sheathing off, they explained to him; but that was nothing—it was so strong it could hold the sloop motionless, or almost motionless, in a brisk gale! But now they had him—there was an end to his capers now, the dog—and now the Sophie would run along like a swan. For a moment Stephen felt inclined to argue, to appeal to their common sense, to point to the nine-inch fish, to the exiguity of its fins; but he was too wise, and too happy, to yield to this temptation, and he jealously carried the bucket down to his cabin, to commune with the remora in peace.
And he was too much of a philosopher to feel much vexation a little later when a pretty breeze reached them, coming in over the rippling sea just abaft the larboard beam, so that the Sophie (released from the wicked remora) heeled over in a smooth, steady run that carried her along at seven knots [...]
'A very fine landfall, Mr Marshall,' said Jack, coming down from the top, where he had been scrutinizing the cape through his glass. 'The Astronomer Royal could not have done better.'
'Thank you, sir, thank you,' said the master, who had indeed taken a most painstaking series of lunars, as well as the usual observations, to fix the sloop's position. 'Very happy to—approbation—' His vocabulary failed him, and he finished by jerking his head and clasping his hands by way of expression. It was curious to see this burly fellow—a hard-faced, formidable man—moved by a feeling that called for a gentle, graceful outlet; and more than one of the hands exchanged a knowing glance with a shipmate. But Jack had no notion of this whatsoever—he had always attributed Mr Marshall's painstaking, scrupulous navigation and his zeal as an executive officer to natural goodness, to his nautical character; and in any case his mind was now quite taken up with the idea of exercising the guns in the darkness.
Oh, boy... Once again, Jack's clueless that Marshall has a crush on him...
Since the first time he had watched a repetition of the exercise [of practicing firing cannons] (what a great while since it seemed), Stephen had tended to avoid the performance; he disliked the report of the guns, the smell of the powder, the likelihood of painful injury to the men and the certainty of a sky emptied of birds, so he spent his time below, reading with half an ear cocked for the sound of an accident—so easy for something to go wrong, with a briskly-moving gun on a rolling, pitching deck.
[...] and Jack said, 'Why, there you are, Doctor. You have come on deck to see what progress we have made, no doubt. It is a charming sight, is it not, to see the great guns fire? And tonight you will see them in the dark, which is even finer. Lord, you should have seen the Nile! And heard it! How happy you would have been!'
The improvement in the Sophie's fire-power was indeed very striking, even to so unmilitary a spectator as Stephen.
Stephen: Man I hate when the guns get fired
Jack: Hey best friend!!!! Wanna watch the guns fire with me? :D :D :D it'll be soooo super cool and awesome!! I know you'll love it!!
'Well now, my dear sir,' said Jack to Stephen, 'what do you say to a little music, if your ears are not quite numbed?[...]'
[...] 'I am really pleased with tonight's exercise,' said Jack, tuning his fiddle. 'Now I feel I can run inshore with a clearer Conscience—without risking the poor sloop too much.'
'I am happy you are pleased; and certainly the mariners seemed to ply their pieces with a wonderful dexterity; but you must allow me to insist that that note is not A.'
'Ain't it?' cried Jack anxiously. 'Is this better?'
Stephen nodded, tapped his foot three times, and they dashed away into Mr Brown's Minorcan divertimento.
'Did you notice my bowing in the pump-pump-pump piece?' asked Jack.
'I did indeed. Very sprightly, very agile. I noticed you neither struck the hanging shelf nor yet the lamp. I only grazed the locker once myself.'
Again, playing music together is surely a metaphor for...?
'Captain Aubrey,' said Stephen, clapping his book to the moment he saw Jack in the cockpit. 'I have a grave complaint to make.'
'I am concerned to hear it,' said Jack, peering about in the gloom for what he dreaded to see.
'They have been at my asp. I tell you, sir, they have been at my asp. I stepped into my cabin for a book not three minutes ago, and what did I see? My asp drained—drained, I say.'
'Tell me the butcher's bill; then I will attend to your asp.'
'Bah—a few scratches, a man with his forearm moderately scored, a couple of splinters to draw—nothing of consequence—mere bandaging. All you will find in the sick-bay is an obstinate gleet with low fever and a reduced inguinal hernia: and that forearm. Now my asp—'
'No dead? No wounded?' cried Jack, his heart leaping up.
'No, no, no. Now my asp—' He had brought it aboard in its spirits of wine; and at some point in very recent time a criminal hand had taken the jar, drunk up all the alcohol and left the asp dry, stranded, parched.'
'I am truly sorry for it,' said Jack. 'But will not the fellow die? Must he not have an emetic?'
'He will not: that is what is so vexing. The bloody man, the more than Hun, the sottish rapparee, he will not die. It was the best double-refined spirits of wine.'
'Pray come and breakfast with me in the cabin; a pint of coffee and a well-broiled chop between you and the asp will take away the sting—will appease . . .' In his gaiety of heart, Jack was very near a witticism; he felt it floating there, almost within reach; but somehow it escaped and he confined himself to laughing as cheerfully as Stephen's vexation would with decency allow [...]
Stephen barely ever calls Jack "Captain Aubrey", and of course when he does it's over the preserving liquid in a specimen jar having been drunk!
And Jack's response being to soothe Stephen's "vexation" with an invitation to a breakfast date in his cabin, and withholding the urge for a witticism to not piss Stephen off further... Fuck, I love these two so much.
'Let us say ten minutes to run from the cove to the tower, and . . .'
'Allow twenty, if you please,' said Stephen. 'You portly men of a sanguine complexion often die suddenly, from unconsidered exertion in the heat. Apoplexy—congestion.'
'I wish, I wish you would not say things like that, Doctor,' said Jack, in a low tone: they all looked at Stephen with some reproach and Jack added, 'Besides, I am not portly.'
The captain has an uncommon genteel figgar,' said Mr Marshall.
LMFAOOOO. Oh Stephen, you can't just say that in front of everyone!!! And of course Marshall trying to cut in to Jack's defense!
'Now just listen to this one, will you,' [Jack] said, 'and tell me if it is good grammar and proper language. It begins like the others: Sophie, at sea; My Lord, I have the honour to acquaint you that pursuant to my orders I proceeded to Cape Nao [...] the Xaloc, loaded with a valuable cargo of quicksilver concealed in sacks of flour. Pretty bald, ain't it? However, I go on. [...] All the officers and men behaved so well that it were insidious to particularize; [...] I have the honour to be, my Lord—and so on. What do you think of it?'
'Well, it is somewhat clearer than the last,' said Stephen. 'Though I fancy invidious might answer better than insidious.'
'Invidious, of course. I knew there was something not quite shipshape there. Invidious. A capital word: I dare say you spell it with a V?'
I just really, really like the idea of Jack checking in with Stephen whenever he has to write an important letter. It's extremely cute.
'If it is fresh water you are wanting, I can show you a creek not far from here where you may fill all the barrels you choose.' [said Stephen]
'Why did you never tell me?' cried Jack, shaking him by the hand and looking delighted[...]
'You never asked. [...] and it may, I conceive, have real medicinal qualities. The country people use it in cases of impotence.'
'And can you find it, do you think?'
'Yes,' said Stephen. He sat for a moment with his head down. 'Listen,' he said, 'will you do me a kindness?'
'With all my heart.'
I know it's obviously not written with a romantic intention here, but Jack saying "with all my heart" in response to Stephen asking a favor... Gosh, it just makes me so weak and mushy when I choose to read it that way with my slash goggles on.
And then when Stephen's request is to be left onshore:
'But what if I am forced off the land? What would you do then?' [said Jack]
'I should present myself the next morning, or the morning after that—a whole series of mornings, if need be. [...]'
Ack. My heart. And How Jack reacts to Stephen being ashore!:
'I think we may run in now,' said Jack. 'It will do no harm to be before our time, for I should like to stretch my legs a little. In any case, I should like to see him as early as can be; I am uneasy with him ashore. There are times when I feel he should not be allowed out alone; and then again there are times when I feel he could command a fleet, almost.'
[...]
Jack glanced at his watch and with longing into the motionless silent pines: said, 'Lend me your knife, Bonden,' and picked up a big flattish stone. Regrediar he scratched on it (a notion of secrecy flitting through his mind), with the time and his initials. He struck it into the top of a little heap, took a last hopeless look into the wood and leapt aboard.
The whole first paragraph... I don't even know where to begin with. Holy hell. And then the fact that Jack looks "with longing". "Longing", I tell you! "Longing"!!! He longs to have his doctor, his Stephen back on board!!! He's "hopeless" without his Stephen!!!
[Jack's] mind returned to its many problems and to worrying about Stephen: it was sheer madness, this rambling about on a hostile shore.
[...]
And then again there was the problem of midshipmen. The sloop needed at least two more, a youngster and an oldster; he would ask Dillon if there was any boy he chose to nominate[...] His thoughts dwelt upon his coxswain, a fine seaman and captain of the maintop; then they moved on to consider the younger men belonging to the lower deck. He would far, far rather have someone who came in through the hawse-hole, a plain sailorman like young Pullings, than most of the youths whose families could afford to send them to sea . . . If the Spaniards caught Stephen Maturin they would shoot him for a spy.
He's just so preoccupied with worrying about Stephen! The entire time! Even when he tries to think about his other worries, his mind drifts right back to Stephen. I swear, that last line with the ellipses into thinking about Stephen, right after an unrelated thought could have been lifted straight from a slashfic.
[...] A gannet passed overhead, brilliant white, and Jack found himself pondering anxiously about Stephen, forgetful of his duty.
Genuinely. He's so overcome with thinking about Stephen!
'I am entirely at a loss, upon my honour; and so I lay the position before you, confiding wholly in your candour . . . [...]' [said Jack.] Stephen listened gravely, attentively, never interrupting [...]
[...]
With the utmost care, Jack reiterated his arguments about the necessity for having a happy ship if one was to command an efficient fighting machine; he quoted examples of like and contrary cases; and his audience listened and approved. Stephen could not bring his wisdom to the resolution of any of these difficulties, however, nor (as Jack would somewhat ignobly have liked) could he propose his good offices; for he was a merely ideal interlocutor, and his thinking flesh lay thirty leagues to the south and west, across a waste of sea.
And even in the very first lines of the next chapter, Jack is still missing Stephen so badly that he's literally talking to himself about his worries and pretending Stephen is there to listen.
[Jack's] was an exceedingly busy life; and yet since he entered an inviolable solitude [...], it left him a great deal of time for reflexion. [...] 'I shall speak to him, when we pick him up. I shall speak in the most general way, of the comfort it is to a man to have a confidential friend aboard; and of this singularity in the sailor's life, that one moment he is so on top of his shipmates, all hugger-mugger in the ward-room, that he can hardly breathe, let alone play anything but a jig on the fiddle, and the next he is pitched into a kind of hermit's solitude, something he has never known before.
In times of stress Jack Aubrey had two main reactions: he either became aggressive or he became amorous; he longed either for the violent catharsis of action or for that of making love. He loved a battle: he loved a wench.
'I quite understand that some commanders take a girl to sea with them,' he reflected. 'Apart from the pleasure, think of the refuge of sinking into a warm, lively, affectionate . . .'
Peace. 'I wish there were a girl in this cabin,' he added, after a pause.
A slasher of lesser fortitude may take this passage as blowing holes in their ship; after all, Jack is quite objectively thinking about having sex with a woman, ie. not Stephen.
However. Upon closer reading, we see that Jack goes directly from thinking about Stephen and saying to himself that the next time he sees him, he will speak to him about "the comfort" Stephen brings him in having "a confidential friend aboard", straight into wishing for the refuge and comfort of making love, and wishing he had a girl aboard. And that in itself is enough for me to take and run with very easily. Hopefully, your slash goggles are strapped on as tight as mine.
'Give your father my compliments and tell him my bankers are Hoares.' For Jack, like most other captains, managed the youngsters' parental allowance for them. 'Hoares,' he repeated absently once or twice, 'my bankers are Hoares,' and a strangled ugly crowing noise made him turn. Young Ricketts was clinging to the fall of the main burton-tackle in an attempt to control himself, but without much success. Jack's cold glare chilled his mirth, however [...]
LOL. I can't blame Ricketts, poor guy. I would have struggled not to laugh, too.
Indeed, this awareness of Jack's state of tension was general throughout the brig. 'Goldilocks is in a rare old taking about the Doctor,' they said. 'Watch out for squalls.' And when hammocks were piped up the seamen who had to pass by him to stow theirs in the starboard quarter-deck netting glanced at him nervously; one, trying to keep an eye on the quartermaster, and on the break of the deck, and on his captain, all at the same time, fell flat on his face.
The whole damn brig can tell Jack is in a bad mood because he misses Stephen! I mean, really!
But Goldilocks was not the only one to be anxious, by any manner of means, and when Stephen Maturin was at last seen to walk out of the trees and cross the beach to meet the jolly-boat, a general exclamation of 'There he is!' broke out from waist to fo'c'sle, in defiance of good discipline: 'Huzzay!'
'How very glad I am to see you,' cried Jack, as Stephen groped his way aboard, pushed and pulled by well-meaning hands. 'How are you, my dear sir? Come and breakfast directly—I have held it back on purpose. How do you find yourself? Tolerably spry, I hope? Tolerably spry?'
'I am very well, I thank you,' said Stephen, who indeed looked somewhat less cadaverous, flushed as he was with pleasure at the open friendliness of his welcome. 'I will take a look at my sick-bay and then I will share your bacon with the utmost pleasure.'
And once again, Jack invites Stephen for another breakfast date the moment he's able. D'awww. Aside from the obvious Jack&Stephen reunion moment, I also love how happy the rest of the sailors are to see Stephen. Everyone loves their doctor. <3
'[...]This I had from Mateu's own cousin as we danced—' [said Stephen]
'You danced?' cried Jack, far more astonished than if Stephen had said 'as we ate our cold roast baby'.
'Certainly I danced. Why would I not dance, pray?'
'Certainly you are to dance—most uncommon graceful, I am sure. I only wondered . . . but did you indeed go about dancing?'
'I did. You have not travelled in Catalonia, sir, I believe?'
'Not I.'
'Then I must tell you that on Sunday mornings it is the custom, in that country, for people of all ages and conditions to dance, on coming out of church[...]'
Firstly, LOL at "as we ate our cold roast baby."
Secondly, just Jack's astonishment at Stephen saying he danced, and then the backtracking... It's always so funny when Jack puts his foot in his mouth.
(And for bonus slash points, you can imagine Jack being jealous that he's never gotten the chance to dance with Stephen!)
'[...]Often we amuse the enemy with false signals too—anything but those of distress. Take great care of the paint, now.' [said Jack]
At this point Stephen fell straight into the sea—into the hollow of the sea between the boat and the side of the sloop as they drew away from one another. He sank at once, rose just as they came together, struck his head between the two and sank again, bubbling. Most of the Sophie's people who could swim leapt into the water, Jack among them; [...] but it was the brothers Sponge that found him, five fathoms down (heavy bones for his size, no fat, lead-soled half-boots) and brought him up, his clothes blacker than usual, his face more white, and he streaming with water, furiously indignant.
LOL. Poor Stephen! (But I love that Jack dives right in after him...)
But [Jack] knew very well that his tight, self-contained world was hopelessly out of tune and be was haunted by the depressing sentiment of failure—of not having succeeded in what he had set out to do. He would very much have liked to ask Stephen Maturin the reasons for this failure; he would very much have liked to talk to him on indifferent subjects and to have played a little music; but he knew that an invitation to the captain's cabin was very like an order, if only because the refusing of it was so extraordinary—that had been borne in upon him very strongly the other morning, when he had been so amazed by Dillon's refusal. Where there was no equality there was no companionship: when a man was obliged to say 'Yes, sir,' his agreement was of no worth even if it happened to be true. He had known these things all his service life; they were perfectly evident; but he had never thought they would apply so fully, and to him.
Jack wanting desperately to talk to Stephen about his crew not getting along, but not wanting to call Stephen in as an order and risk their friendship the way he screwed up with James... How pitiful...
'Good morning, Doctor,' said Jack, and Stephen noticed that his smile was strained, his eyes hard and wary.
This is a short sentence, but a telling one... Stephen is attentive enough to notice when Jack's tired...
On his knees, and with his chin level with the top of the table, Stephen watched the male mantis step cautiously towards the female mantis. She was a fine strapping green specimen, and she stood upright on her four back legs, her front pair dangling devoutly; from time to time a tremor caused her heavy body to oscillate over the thin suspending limbs, and each time the brown male shot back. He advanced lengthways, with his body parallel to the table-top, his long, toothed, predatory front legs stretching out tentatively and his antennae trained forwards: even in this strong light Stephen could see the curious inner glow of his big oval eyes. The female deliberately turned her head through forty-five degrees, as though looking at him. 'Is this recognition?' asked Stephen, raising his magnifying glass to detect some possible movement in her feelers. 'Consent?'
The brown male certainly thought it was, and in three strides he was upon her; his legs gripped her wing-covers; his antennae found hers and began to stroke them. Apart from a vibratory, well-sprung quiver at the additional weight, she made no apparent response, no resistance; and in a little while the strong orthopterous copulation began. Stephen set his watch and noted down the time in a book, open upon the floor.
Minutes passed. The male shifted his hold a little. The female moved her triangular head, pivoting it slightly from left to right. Through his glass Stephen could see her sideways jaws open and close; then there was a blur of movements so rapid that for all his care and extreme attention he could not follow them, and the male's head was off, clamped there, a detached lemon, under the crook of her green praying arms. She bit into it, and the eye's glow went out; on her back the headless male continued to copulate rather more strongly than before, all his inhibitions having been removed. 'Ah,' said Stephen with intense satisfaction, and noted down the time again.
Ten minutes later the female took off three pieces of her mate's long thorax, above the upper coxal joint, and ate them with every appearance of appetite, dropping crumbs of chitinous shell in front of her. The male copulated on, still firmly anchored by his back legs.
'There you are,' cried Jack. 'I have been waiting for you this quarter of an hour.'
'Oh,' said Stephen, starting up. 'I beg your pardon. I beg your pardon. I know what importance you attach to punctuality—most concerned. I had put my watch back to the beginning of the copulation,' he said, very gently covering the mantis and her dinner with a hollow ventilated box. 'I am with you now.'
'No you aren't,' said Jack. 'Not in those infamous half-boots. Why do you have them soled with lead, anyhow?'
At any other time he would have received a very sharp reply to this, but it was clear to Stephen that he had not spent a pleasant forenoon with the admiral; and all he said, as he changed into his shoes, was, 'You do not need a head, nor even a heart, to be all a female can require.'
'That reminds me,' said Jack, 'have you anything that will keep my wig on? A most ridiculous thing happened as I was crossing the square: there was Dillon on the far side, with a woman on his arm—Governor Wall's sister, I believe—so I returned his salute with particular attention, do you see. I lifted my hat right off my head and the damned wig came with it. You may laugh, and it is damned amusing, of course; but I would have given a fifty-pound note not to have looked ridiculous with him there.'
'Here is a piece of court plaster,' said Stephen. 'Let me double it over and stick it to your head. I am heartily sorry there should be this—constraint, between Dillon and you.'
'So am I,' said Jack, bending for the plaster[...]
I felt it was important to leave the entire Mantis-mating scene in unabridged. You're welcome.
...More importantly, we're blessed with another scene of Jack and Stephen dressing to go somewhere! Hooray for domesticity! Stephen helping Jack with his wig! Jack criticizing Stephen's clothes! I just love when they act like an old married couple.
'[James] would certainly never have meant to impugn your courage,' said Stephen.
'Would he not?' asked Jack, gazing into Stephen's face and balancing his wig in his hand. 'Should you like to dine at the Hartes'?' he asked, after a pause. 'I must go, and I should be glad of your company, if you are not engaged.'
'Dinner?' cried Stephen, as though the meal had just been invented. 'Dinner? Oh, yes: charmed—delighted.'
In spite of a candid delight in being fine, in putting on his best uniform and his golden epaulette, Jack had never had the least opinion of his looks, and until this moment he had scarcely thought of them for two minutes together. But now, having gazed long and thoughtfully, he said, 'I suppose I am rather on the hideous side?
'Yes,' said Stephen 'Oh yes. Very much so'
Jack had cut off the rest of his hair when they came into port and had bought this wig to cover his cropped poll, but there was nothing to hide his burnt face which, moreover, had caught the sun in spite of Stephen Maturin's medicated grease[...]
Again... It really does read like a married couple going out on a date night together...
When they had finished their business at the prize-agent's house [...] they walked up to their dinner. Leaving Stephen contemplating a tree-frog by the patio fountain, Jack saw Molly Harte alone for a moment in the cool anteroom.
Jack leaves Stephen with a tree-frog, and then:
'I am sorry to have let you in for that,' he said, taking Stephen's arm and guiding him down Pigtail Stairs, where the green lizards darted along the torrid wall.
...He apologizes for how shitty and boring the dinner ended up being by bringing him to a wall covered in lizards. He knows what Stephen likes, at least.
[...]by the time we are back from Alexandria. [...]' [said Jack]
'Did you say Alexandria?'
'Yes.'
'In Lower Egypt?'
'Yes. Did I not tell you? We are to run an errand to Sir Sidney Smith's squadron before our next cruise. He is watching the French, you know.”
'Alexandria,' said Stephen, stopping in the middle of the quay. 'O joy. I wonder you did not cry out with delight the moment you saw me. What an indulgent admiral—pater classis—O how I value that worthy man!'
'Why, 'tis no more than a straight run up and down the Mediterranean, about six hundred leagues each way, with precious little chance of seeing a prize either coming or going.'
'I did not think you could have been such an earthling,' cried Stephen. 'For shame. Alexandria is classic ground.'
'So it is,' said Jack, his good nature and pleasure in life flooding back at the sight of Stephen's delight.
I love that Jack's opinion of going to Alexandria is so easily and quickly changed the second he learns how excited Stephen is for their new course. Cute.
Again, these weeks have been among the most peaceful I have known: they might have been among the happiest, if I had not been so aware that JA and JD might kill one another, in the civillest way in the world, at the next point of land[...]
I'm always delighted when Stephen's journal entries are included in the text. And Jack and James killing each other "in the civillest way in the world" is such great phrasing, lol.
[Jack and Stephen] talked, in a quiet, desultory fashion, of badgers, otters, foxes—the pursuit of foxes—instances of amazing cunning, perfidy, endurance, lasting memory in foxes. The pursuit of stags. Of boars. And as they talked so the sloop ranged close along the Minorcan shore.
'I remember eating boar,' said Jack, his good humour quite restored, 'I remember eating a dish of stewed boar, the first time I had the pleasure of dining with you; and you told me what it was. Ha, ha: do you remember that boar?'
'Yes: and I remember we spoke of the Catalan language at the same time, [...]'
LITERALLY reminiscing about their first date. Okay!
[Jack said,] 'Yes, I had taken your point, and am much obliged to you for your attention in—'
A dark form drifted from the sombre cliff-face on the starboard beam—an enormous pointed wingspan: as ominous as fate. Stephen gave a swinish grunt, snatched the telescope from under Jack's arm, elbowed him out of the way and squatted at the rail, resting the glass on it and focusing with great intensity.
'A bearded vulture! It is a bearded vulture!' he cried. 'A young bearded vulture.'
'Well,' said Jack instantly—not a second's hesitation 'I dare say he forgot to shave this morning.' His red face crinkled up, his eyes diminished to a bright blue slit and he slapped his thigh, bending in [...] a paroxysm of silent mirth, enjoyment and relish[...]
A scene where we get both Stephen interrupting to look at a bird, and Jack making a terrible pun. It's both of them in a nutshell.
'There are times,' said James quietly, 'when I understand your partiality for your friend. He derives a greater pleasure from a smaller stream of wit than any man I have ever known.'
[...]
Stephen and James were playing chess in the gun-room: James' furious attack, based upon the sacrifice of a knight, a bishop and two pawns, had very nearly reached its culminating point of error, and for a long placid stretch of time Stephen had been wondering how he could avoid mating him in three or four moves by any means less obvious than throwing down the board. He decided (James minded these things terribly) to sit it out until the drum beat to quarters, and meanwhile he waved his queen thoughtfully in the air, humming the Black Joke.
I just love the irony of James all but calling Jack simple-minded, and meanwhile Stephen is having to try his best to not immediately beat him in their game of chess.
Another of Stephen's Journal entries, and another bit of his writing about Jack:
(and he played his transcription of Deh vieni with a truly exquisite delicacy, just before we reached Ciudadela)
I like when he confidentially compliments him in his journals...
'Tell me, if we are not prevented, shall we have some music this evening?' [said Jack]
'It would give me great pleasure,' said Stephen. Looking at Jack now he could see what his appearance might be when the fire of his youth had gone out: heavy, grey, authoritarian, if not savage and morose.
'Yes,' said Jack, and hesitated as though he were going to say much more. But he did not, and after a moment he went on deck.
Just casually imagining what my boy best friend will look like when we grow old together "the fire of his youth [has] gone out", nbd.
'I played that very badly,' said Jack, putting down his bow.
'Your heart was not in it,' said Stephen. 'It has been an active day—a fatiguing day. A satisfactory day, however.'
'Why, yes,' said Jack, his face brightening somewhat. 'Yes, certainly. I am most uncommonly delighted.'
And once again, this is a metaphor for...? Let's all say it together, now...!
'Upon my word, I cannot see what you mean by double loyalty. You can only have one King. And a man's heart can only be in one place at a time, unless he is a scrub.' [said Jack]
'What nonsense you do talk, to be sure,' said Stephen. 'What "balls", as you sea-officers say: it is a matter of common observation that a man may be sincerely attached to two women at once—to three, to four, to a very surprising number of women. However,' he said, 'no doubt you know more of these things than I. [...]'
L O L. CALLED OUT! What "balls" indeed!!!
'All hands aft,' [Jack] said, and as they waited for the crew to assemble Stephen could see that a smile kept spreading on his face—that he had to make a conscious effort to repress it and look grave.
Again, just them noticing each other's facial features and emotions really gets me every time, as minor as it is.
[Jack] darted below. Stephen had four quiet wounded men, two corpses. 'We're boarding her,' said Jack. 'I must have your man—every man-jack aboard. Will you come?'
'I will not,' said Stephen. 'I will steer, if you choose.'
'Do—yes, do. Come on,' cried Jack.
[...]
'Dear Doctor, you know what to do?' Stephen nodded, taking over the spokes and feeling the life of the wheel. [...] 'Doctor, what's the Spanish for fifty more men?'
'Otros cincuenta.'
'Otros cincuenta,' said Jack, looking into his face with a most affectionate smile. 'Now lay us alongside, I beg.' He nodded to him again, walked to the bulwark with his coxswain close behind and hoisted himself up, massive but lithe, and stood there holding the foremost shroud and swinging his sword [...]
[...]
For a fleeting moment, at the edge of his field of vision, [Jack] was aware of Stephen far below, on the deck of the Sophie, holding her wheel and gazing collectedly upwards. 'Otros cincuenta!' he shouted, for good measure: and as Stephen nodded, calling out something in Spanish, he raced back into the fight, his sword high and his pistol searching.
I fucking adore how they interact during and just before an altercation with another ship. And again the usage of "affectionate" as an adjective... God, Jack really is smitten with his dear doctor, huh? And then Stephen's small nod of affirmation at Jack properly remembering the Spanish he taught him for the fight. I love it.
The slash on [Jack's] left shoulder had opened at the far end. How he had come by it he could not tell; but there it was after the action, and Stephen had sewn it up at the same time he dressed the pike-wound across the front of his chest (one bandage for the two) and clapped a sort of dressing on what was left of his ear.
Not much to say about this, I just always like the mental image of Jack getting patched up by Stephen.
[Stephen] knew very well that Jack would act on the ancient seafaring belief that more is better and dose himself into Kingdom Come if not closely watched, and he stood there reflecting upon the passage of authority from one to the other in relationships of this kind (or rather of potential authority, for they had never entered into any actual collision) as Jack gasped and retched over his nauseous dose.
I don't even have to wax poetic about the exchange in power dynamics between Jack as the Captain and Stephen as his Doctor--- The book goes ahead and says it itself.
The Sophie's commander and her surgeon sat in the cabin amidst a heap of papers, for Stephen Maturin had been helping with some of the paper work as well as writing returns and letters of his own, and now it was three in the morning: the Sophie rocked gently at her moorings, and her tight-packed crew were snorting the long night through (the rare joys of harbour-watch). Jack had not gone ashore at all—had no intention of going ashore; and now the silence, the lack of real motion, the long sitting with pen and ink seemed to insulate them from the world in their illuminated cell; and this made their conversation, which would have been indecent at almost any other time, seem quite ordinary and natural.
...But, man, how often do these two completely flout the expected behaviors of being on a royal navy's ship and just behave like equals in their own little world anyway?
[Jack] tucked the fiddle under his chin, tightening his mouth and raising his head as he did so: and the tightening of his mouth was enough to release a flood of emotion. His face reddened, his breath heaved deep, his eyes grew larger and, because of the extreme contraction of their pupils, bluer: his mouth tightened still further, and with it his right hand. Pupils contract symmetrically to a diameter of about a tenth part of an inch, noted Stephen on a corner of a page. There was a loud, decided crack, a melancholy confused twanging, and with a ludicrous expression of doubt and wonder and distress, Jack held out his violin, all dislocated and unnatural with its broken neck. 'It snapped,' he cried. 'It snapped.' He fitted the broken ends together with infinite care and held them in place. 'I would not have had it happen for the world,' he said in a low voice. 'I have known this fiddle, man and boy, since I was breeched.'
Stephen taking notes about Jack's sadness in the same way he would the fucking mantises...!
I can't help but feel bad for Jack breaking his fiddle, though... How ever will they make sweet music together, now?
'Mr Day,' said Jack, 'be so good as to prepare some fire barrels—say half a dozen. Mr Daiziel, unless it comes on to blow I think we may take the boats in at about midnight. Dr Maturin, let us rejoice and be gay.'
Their gaiety consisted of ruling staves and copying a borrowed duet filled with hemidemisemiquavers. 'By God,' said Jack, looking up with red-rimmed streaming eyes after an hour or so, 'I am getting too old for this.' He pressed his hands over his eyes and kept them there for a while[...]
...Ah, that's how... Perhaps the mere metaphor for the act wasn't enough compared to the real 'comfort' Jack needs at a time like this...
'They tell me I am to be tried for the loss of the Sophie.' [said Stephen]
Jack had not thought of the court-martial since early that morning, when it became certain that the combined fleet was coming out: now it came back to him with an extraordinarily unpleasant shock, quite closing his stomach. However, he only replied, 'Who told you that? The physical gentlemen at the hospital, I suppose?'
'Yes.'
'Theoretically they are right, of course. The thing is officially called the trial of the captain, officers and ship's company; and they formally ask the officers if they have any complaints to make against the captain, and the captain whether he has any to make against the officers; but obviously in this it is only my conduct that is in question. You have nothing to worry about, I do assure you, upon my word and honour. Nothing at all.'
'Oh, I shall plead guilty at once,' said Stephen. 'And I shall add that I was sitting in the powder-magazine with a naked light at the time, imagining the death of the King, wasting my medical stores, smoking tobacco and making a fraudulent return of the portable soup. What solemn nonsense it is'—laughing heartily—'I am surprised so sensible a man as you should attribute any importance to the matter.'
'Oh, I do not mind it,' cried Jack. 'How you lie,' said Stephen affectionately, but within his own bosom.
Again, "affectionately"! Patrick O'Brian, why did you do this to me?!?
...And I know "within his own bosom" means that Stephen only thought those words and didn't speak them, but every time I read that line I mistakenly get a mental image of Stephen cradling Jack to his chest while saying that to him. In case you care.
Jack and Stephen stayed where they were. Dawn found them under their rock, with Jack steadily sweeping the Gut—calm now, and deserted—and Stephen Maturin fast asleep, smiling.
They cuddled against a rock... <3 Now the mental image is Jack letting a sleeping Stephen snuggle up beside him, of course.
And he was reflecting on industrial disease, on the corrosive effects of righteousness in judges, when he noticed that Jack had relaxed from his first rigid posture: and as the formalities went on and on this relaxation became more evident. He was looking sullen, oddly still and dangerous; the slight lowering of his head and the dogged way in which he stuck out his feet made a singular contrast with the perfection of his uniform, and Stephen had a strong premonition that disaster might be very close at hand.
[...]
[Stephen wrote] Nothing would give [Harte] greater pleasure than an outburst of indignation on your part at this moment on a corner of his paper: he passed it to the master, pointing to Jack. Marshall passed it on, by way of Daiziel. Jack read it, turned a lowering, grim face without much apparent understanding in it towards Stephen and gave a jerk of his head.
Stephen's still keeping a keen eye on Jack during the trial, for better or for worse...
They were all deeply affected by Jack's concern, anxiety and rage: they had seen him unmoved so often and in such circumstances that his present emotion shook them profoundly, and disturbed their judgment.
[...]
'This is an entirely irrational fear,' said Stephen Maturin, looking at his wet and clammy palm. 'It is but one more instance of the . . . for surely to God, surely for all love, if they had wished to sink him they would have asked "How came you to be there?"? But then I know very little of nautical affairs.' He looked for comfort at the master's face, but he found none there.
Poor Stephen has no idea how this type of thing usually plays out, can't look to Jack to glean a further understanding, and can't even get any comfort from the other crew members since they're just as scared as he is! His panic here on Jack's behalf is very pathetically blorboful and shippy, though, so it's a win for me, at least, especially considering it's the last shippy excerpt from book one!
I won't put in the ending, since I never intended to have this be a completely thorough recap of the book's plot; just the notable quotables and things I actually have worthwhile commentary on. If you want to know the particulars of why Jack was facing the threat of a court martial in the first place, and how the trial ends up, then go read the whole book!
Anyway, stay tuned for when I hope to give the second book this same treatment!
