#the mauritius command

[leona-florianova]

At some distance below Ashgrove Cottage a deep lane led up through the fungus-smelling woods. The heavy autumnal rains had turned the clayey bottom into a quagmire, and through this quagmire, sitting sideways upon his horse with his feet so withdrawn from the mud that he appeared to be crouching on its back, like an ape, rode Dr. Maturin, Captain Aubrey's closest friend, the surgeon in many of the ships he had commanded, a small, indefinably odd and even ill-looking man with pale eyes and a paler face, topped by the full-bottomed wig that marked him as a physician, if a somewhat old-fashioned one. He was, for him, unusually well dressed in a snuff-coloured coat with silver buttons and buckskin breeches; but the effect was spoilt by the long black sash that he wore wound three times round his waist, which gave him an outlandish air in the English countryside. On his saddle-bow lay a net, filled with a variety of mushrooms—bolets of all kinds, blewits, chanterelles, Jew's ears—and now, seeing a fine flush of St Bruno's collops, he sprang from his horse, seized a bush, and scrambled up the bank.

--The Mauritius Command - Patrick O'Brian

[ola-na-tungee]

Literally every book of the series

[bomberqueen17]

liveblogging the Aubreyad: a snippet from book 4

This is a long snippet that is totally incidental to the plot and does nothing but advance our knowledge of several characters, so of course I could not resist it. Mostly it is an excellent example of what a fucking troll Stephen is.

context: McAdam is the ship's surgeon on a vessel called Nereide, upon which Stephen is being transported to do some intelligence-work. McAdam is another Irishman, from Ulster, and a physician also, of high reputation but fallen on hard times-- his specialty is diseases of the mind, and he remains fascinated by psychological and psychiatric issues, but he himself is now deeply alcoholic to the point of frequent inability to function, though he maintains an unfortunate perspicacity in some matters that perhaps Stephen might wish he did not. He and Stephen do not really get along, and in fact the previous night he had upset Stephen severely. Stephen's good humor, severely tried by recent events, has been restored because he has just been summoned on deck by Nereide's solicitous captain, who is aware that Stephen is a passionate naturalist, to witness a mermaid, who was floating next to the ship as it passed.

McAdam looked singularly unappetizing in the morning light, ill-conditioned and surly: apprehensive too, for he had some confused recollection of harsh words having passed the night before. But, having beheld the mermaid, Stephen was in charity with all men, and he called out, "You missed the mermaid, my dear colleague; but perhaps, if we sit quietly here, we may see another." "I did not," said McAdam, "I saw the brute out of the quarter-gallery scuttle; and it was only a manatee." Stephen mused for a while, and then he said, "A dugong, surely. The dentition of the dugong is quite distinct from that of the manatee: the manatee, as I recall, has no incisors. Furthermore, the whole breadth of Africa separates their respective realms." "Manatee or dugong, 'tis all one," said McAdam. "As far as my studies are concerned, the brute is of consequence only in that it is the perfect illustration of the strength, the irresistible strength, of suggestion. Have you been listening to their gab, down there in the waist?" "Not I," said Stephen. There had been much talk among the men working just out of sight forward of the quarterdeck rail, cross, contentious talk; but the Nereide was always a surprisingly chatty ship, and apart from putting this outburst down to vexation at their late arrival, he had not attended to it. "They seem displeased, however," he added. "Of course they are displeased: everyone knows the ill-luck a mermaid brings. But that is not the point. Listen now, will you? That is John Matthews, a truthful, sober, well-judging man; and the other is old Lemon, was bred a lawyer's clerk, and understands evidence." Stephen listened, sorted out the voices, caught the thread of the argument: the dispute between Matthews and Lemon, the spokesmen of two rival factions, turned upon the question of whether the mermaid had held a comb in her hand or a glass. "They saw the flash of that wet flipper," said McAdam, and have translated it, with total Gospel-oath conviction, into one or other of these objects. Matthews offers to fight Lemon and any two of his followers over a chest in support of his belief.” “Men have gone to the stake for less," said Stephen: and walking forward to the rail he called down, "You are both of you out entirely: it was a hairbrush." Dead silence in the waist. The seamen looked at one another doubtfully, and moved quietly away among the boats on the booms with many a backward glance, thoroughly disturbed by this new element.

[multishipperextraordinaire]

Into my comfort book series! Let's see what absolutely absurd ship nonsense Aubrey and Maturin get up to in The Mauritius Command! In this book, Jack does spy shit with Stephen. That cannot possibly go well.

[xserpx]

"Good morning, Stephen," he said. "You look as pleased as Punch--the trip was to your liking, I hope and trust?"

"The most delightful trip, I thank you, Jack; and a very good morning to you too. Most delightful . . . look!" He held out his two hands, opened them cautiously and disclosed an enormous egg.

"Well, it is a prodigious fine egg, to be sure," said Jack: then, raising his voice, "Killick, light along the breakfast, will you? Bear a hand, there."

"Other things have I brought with me," said Stephen, drawing a green-baize parcel from his pocket and a large cloth bag. "But nothing in comparison with the truly regal gift of that most deserving young man Fortescue. For what you see there, Jack, is nothing less than the concrete evidence of the albatross's gigantic love. Whereas this"—pointing to the gently heaving parcel—"is no more than a poll-parrot of the common green, or West African, species, too loquacious for its own good." He undid the baize, snipped the band confining the parrot's wings, and set the bird upon its feet. The parrot instantly cried. "A bas Buonaparte. Salaud, salaud, salaud," in a metallic, indignant voice, climbed on to the back of his chair, and began to preen its ruffled feathers.

another gem found in "Mauritius Command"

Stephen with his enormous egg, transporting it with him through the air in a bosun's chair from ship to ship.

And then the parrot. (it cries "Down with Bonaparte. Bastard. Bastard. Bastard" in case you wonder) @thekenobee. You know why.

[thekenobee]

whenever you have the time/inspiration, could I request a Sophie doodle? with or without Jack and any/all of the kids (I finally finished Mauritius Command!) ♥

But of course, love!

She’s been keeping a weather eye on the horizon, Jack will be there any minute 🦪

[peresephoknee]

One of the series’s returning themes is the distance between experience and depictions of experience. Here, for example, we understand how Stephen feels: love, dread that the love he once felt for Diana has changed or been destroyed, his desire to believe that perhaps his changing feelings are the result of external/bodily shifts - not an internal one. But Stephen’s writing limits it. Each paragraph begins with a sentence he writes in his diary but the meat of each paragraph is internal. He keeps his feelings inside, unwritten on the page.

[gigamuffin]

i know Tom Pullings probably named his son 'John' because its the most popular name in england, but deep down in my heart i know he named him after Jack Aubrey

[whencyclopedia]

Edward England

Edward England was an Irish pirate who operated in the Caribbean, the Eastern Atlantic, and the Indian Ocean between 1717 and 1720 during the Golden Age of Piracy (1690-1730). Captain England’s successful but brief pirate career came to an end when he was marooned by his crew on the island of Mauritius in 1720.

Early Career

Captain England has his own chapter in the celebrated pirate’s who’s who, A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the Most Notorious Pyrates, compiled in the 1720s. The book was credited to a Captain Charles Johnson on its title page, but this is perhaps a pseudonym of Daniel Defoe (although scholars are still debating the issue, and Charles Johnson may have been a real, if entirely unknown pirate expert). As with many other pirates, the General History is an invaluable source on England’s career, even if there are fictional additions to the factual information laboriously garnered from such sources as court records, official documents, and letters of the period.

Edward England’s real name was possibly Jasper Seager (or Seegar). Like many pirates of the period, England was obliged to join a pirate crew after the ship on which he was serving was captured. England had been an officer on a Jamaican sloop when it was taken by Christopher Winter, who was based at the pirate haven of New Providence in the Bahamas. The General History gives the following not unfavourable assessment of England’s character:

England was one of those men, who seemed to have such a share of reason, as should have taught him better things. He had a great deal of good nature, and did not want for courage; he was not avaricious, and always averse to the ill usage prisoners received: he would have been contented with moderate plunder, and less mischievous pranks could his companions have been brought to the same temper, but he was generally over-ruled. (114)

Following the successful attacks on pirates in their haven at New Providence (now Nassau) by Woodes Rogers, Governor of the Bahamas from 1717, England sailed across the Atlantic to continue his piracy elsewhere. Several merchant ships were captured in the Azores, Cape Verde Islands, and off the coast of West Africa.

In 1718, England himself obliged an otherwise honest man to turn pirate when he captured the Welshman Howell Davis who had been chief mate on a slave ship, the Cadogan of Bristol. The captain of the Cadogan was murdered, and Davis was given command of the slaver despite refusing to formally sign England’s ship’s articles and become a part of his pirate crew. Impressed with Davis’ courage, England allowed him to sail off. Davis ended up in Barbados where he was captured. Davis managed to escape prison, and he continued a pirate career on both sides of the Atlantic, a spree that ended with his death on Principe Island in 1719.

England was, for a time, an associate of the most successful of all pirates in the so-called Golden Age, Bartholomew Roberts (aka 'Black Bart' Roberts, c. 1682-1722). In the relatively small world of pirates, Roberts had taken over the crew of Howell Davis after the latter’s death. Roberts and England operated off the coast of Guinea, West Africa. England operated two ships: his own sloop and another prize renamed Victory. Command of the latter was given to John Taylor and together they raided the western coast of India and took more prize ships. When required, provisions were taken on board at the pirate base on Madagascar.

Continue reading...

[hms-lurking-latinist]

‘All the Frenchmen are in harbour, with their two Indiamen and the Victor. Have not you been on deck? We are lying off Port-Louis. The coffee has a damned odd taste.’ ‘This I attribute to the excrement of rats. Rats have eaten our entire stock; and I take the present brew to be a mixture of the scrapings at the bottom of the sack.’ ‘I thought it had a familiar tang,’ said Jack. ‘Killick, you may tell Mr Seymour, with my compliments, that you are to have a boat. And if you don’t find at least a stone of beans among the squadron, you need not come back. It is no use trying Néréide; she don’t drink any.’

(The Mauritius Command, ch. 5)

I cannot tell you what I would do for the scene of Killick going round the fleet in person to borrow coffee. Incredible.

[iphigeniacomplex]

spotted you in my book!! (the mauritius command by patrick o'brian, page 145)

omg am i a good quality ship or kind of a lame one does it ever say. i need to know my sailsona

[ola-na-tungee]

thank you Mr. O'Brian for making Jack a giant hunk with golden mane and an incredible bass voice. this man can crack SIX walnuts in one hand . I will be forever grateful

[bomberqueen17]

Liveblogging the Aubreyad, book 4 pt 3

ok yeah IDK why I thought I'd be able to keep working on that summary while on a transatlantic flight and back and the assorted shit I was doing there, that was kind of silly. But. I'm going to wrap this up. This book is a weird one, because it is stolen so wholesale without much alteration from real historical events.

Anyway we left off on what was about to be Thee Worst Defeat of the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Era, which nobody really remembers because it was part of a campaign that otherwise did not go well at all for France, but. Not to be spoilery. We left off at Ile de la Passe, and the French were just showing up, and the gunners who had taken the French battery at the mouth of the harbor were... not ready.

The various forces who came to the location aboard the Nereide are dispersed, having been engaged in little harrying actions here and there, and when the French show up-- five ships, two frigates, a corvette, and two captured British indiamen-- they have trouble getting into position. The gunners in the fort do not have an officer by, and while they roughly understand what to do, they are not confident. Also they raise a false French flag, and once the ships have been lured it in, they pull it down, and the person in charge of running up the replacement colors carelessly tosses it aside where it lands in a tub of burning slow-match and started a fire that blows up a magazine.

The Nereide has fired two broadsides and made the French corvette strike, but could not take possession, and meanwhile the fort has taken heavy casualties and damaged most of its guns without doing any damage of note to the French.

The French corvette un-strikes her colors and continues in to the harbor with the rest of the French ships, and they all get in easily with no further damage, under little fire; the Nereide engages them, but each slips through without much damage.

Clonfert sends to Pym for reinforcements. Pym comes with Sirius, promising Iphegenia and Magicienne to follow. Sirius and Nereide move into the channel to confront the cornered French. They do not have good maps, their pilots do not know the shoals, and the French have removed all buoys and markers. Sirius strikes hard on a coral reef and is aground and they cannot refloat her. Nereiede moors nearby to assist.

Sirius is hauled off the next morning as the other two British ships arrive, and Nereiede leads them in the pass.

Sirius strikes hard again. As they make their final approach, Magicienne strikes as well, so now two of the four British ships are aground. They had planned to have each ship take on a French opponent; Nereide, under the glory-hungry Clonfert, decides to take on two, to make up for the ships that cannot come up. Magicienne is at least in range, though only a few of her guns can bear. Iphegenia is not aground but becomes trapped behind a shoal after an interlude of fighting; three of the French ships run aground but all can bring their guns to bear on Nereide, and all fall to hammering her until most of her pople are dead.

Clonfert is badly wounded in the face and neck by a splinter. Stephen patches him up, and he insists on going back to the fight. He determines that the Nereide must strike, but they cannot get the colors down, they are stuck. In the morning the French are still firing on them, and Clonfert has the mast chopped down so that the colors will come down and the French will stop firing on what is mostly a dead ship full of dead and wounded men.

They load those who cannot bear to become prisoners into a boat, and leave the rest for the French; Stephen goes in the boat, and away. Clonfert stays with the ship, in his bandages.

Meanwhile, Pym is in charge, and Iphegenia, under Lambert, has freed herself from her trapped position. Lambert begs leave to go in , attack the French with all the hands from the Magicienne and Sirius to board the French, to retake the Nereide-- he is confident they can win the day. But Pym is not very bright and insists that he has to instead help Sirius unground herself. Meanwhile the Magicienne now gets the same treatment the Nereide did, but enough of her men survive to set her on fire rather than leaving her to be captured, and they all scramble aboard the Iphegenia, back to help the Sirius, which still cannot be brought off her reef.

Finally Pym realizes the Sirius cannot be saved, and they evacuate her onto the Iphegenia as well, and burn her. Now alone, the Iphegenia cannot sail out of the harbor, but must warp out instead-- using a boat to carry an anchor, then winching in the anchor, then carrying another anchor out in the boat, a laborious and slow process. By the time she is out in the channel, French reinforcements are arriving.

The Iphegenia sends men to the fort at the mouth of the harbor, the one that had done no good to begin with, but there is almost no ammunition left. She must surrender. They have lost utterly.

A few can be sent away in the ship's launch, and so away Stephen goes, with the Iphegenia's young gentlemen and ship's boys and other people her captain cannot bear to see made prisoner for possibly years, and a letter to the captain's wife. Lambert is bitterly furious: he could have won, but Pym was too stupid. Pym is vaguely aware of this but nothing can now be done.

Stephen gets to St. Paul's harbor on La Reunion with the news, and Jack calmly reckons that the odds are worse now but they must carry on.

The Windham Indiamen has passed back and forth between British and French hands now about four or five times; she was in French hands at Ile de la Passe but shied away from the channel and did not come in. As she bore away for Riviere Noire, TOM PULLINGS re-re-recaptured her in the schooner he picked up to replace Groper at St Paul after the island was taken.

Jack in Boadicea comes to Ile de la Passe to see what remains. The French have captured yet another British ship, the Ranger, full of badly-needed stores and supplies, and is using them to repair their damaged ships. The French squadron is all present, and enough of them that Boadicea can do nothing, but Jack sends a fast aviso under one of his midshipmen ahead of him back to St Paul to ask them to arm the Windham Indiaman with the unseaworthy Otter's guns, and let Otter's Tompkinson come out in her, as a makeshift consort which will allow Boadicea to engage the French.

But as Jack approaches, the Windham has not been prepared, and Jack is furious.

Out to meet them comes a transport, the Emma, cracking on as fast as she can. And it's TOM PULLINGS, with the news that Captain Tompkinson declined the command, believing that the Windham was not seaworthy. Emma's commander, a lieutenant friend of Tom's (she's from the flotilla of transports that came down with the Groper), is ill, but agreed that Tom should take her, and here she is, with all of the hands from Emma and the former Groper, all the guns from Windham and some from Otter, with gunners and small-arms-men from Keating's land forces to boot.

But Emma is only a transport, and she cannot sail fast enough, no matter what Pullings may do. They cannot catch the French, so Jack sends Pullings off in the Emma to make for Rodriguez and then cruise beyond it to warn off British ships so the French shall at least not be able to capture any more Indiamen or store ships.

Boadicea heads back for La Reunion, and Jack refits the Otter and the Windham, ignoring the unhappy Tompkinson. There, they get news that another British frigate has arrived-- HMS Africaine, of 36 18-lb guns-- commanded by-- why it's none other than Captain Corbett, formerly of the Nereide, the flog-happy hard-horse Jack had worked so hard to get rid of. But he is back at Rodriguez with a beautiful powerful ship-- and the French are hard on his tail.

Otter, Staunch, and Boadicea hurry out to meet Africaine, who is in hot pursuit of the Iphegenie (yes, just now she was HMS Iphegenia) and the Astree. Africaine is faster than any of the others, being new and beautiful-- the "plum" reward Corbett was given for Jack choosing to send him up to be promoted. Jack worries briefly that Corbett will engage without waiting for the others to come up, but dismisses this worry; Corbett is smarter than that.

Corbett is not smarter than that. He engages the Iphegenia and Astree without waiting for the rest of the squadron. Boadicea, able to hear the gunfire, leaves the others behind and hurries to catch up, but the breeze fails. She manages to get within eyeshot just in time to see Africaine, completely dismasted, strike her colors, and the French, for some reason, continue to fire into her for another quarter of an hour, inhumanely brutal, and the wind won't allow Boadicea to come up.

Boadicea finally gets just close enough to give Iphegenia two furious broadsides, doing her a great deal of damage but not enough to cripple her, and then veers away; he cannot fight both ships and knows it. He waits to windward while Staunch and Otter labor to catch up, and as he contemplates the situation, watching the French hover there uneasily, Jack feels that the situation has changed, and that the force is on his side. He believes he can prevail; somehow he feels that once his forces are marshaled, he will retake the Africaine and then the French will not be able to regain their momentum, and he feels the whole campaign will inevitably succeed and this is the French high-water mark, right here. He is convinced that the French don't have their hearts in it, don't want it badly enough, and he can do what he must do with the few assets at his disposal, simply by being sharper and surer.

With Staunch and Otter having been told the plan, the three British ships sail enthusiastically toward the "uneasy French heap" to leeward. The Astree passes a towline to the wounded Iphegenia and they abandon the Africaine and sail away, declining the engagement.

The Africaines are so angry at their treatment, so eager for revenge, that some of them leap over the side and swim to the Boadicea, begging her to go in chase of the French and catch them so they can take their revenge for how they were handled.

'I know you can do it, sir," cried one with a bloody dressing round his upper arm, "I was shipmates along of you in Sophie, when we fucked the big Spaniard. Don't say no, sir." "I am glad to see you, Herold," said Jack, "and I wish I could say yes, with all my heart. But you are a seaman--look how they lay. Three hours stern chase, and five French frigates to northwards ready to come down for the Africaine. I understand your feelings, lads, but it's no go. Bear a hand with a towline, and we shall take your barky into St Paul's and refit her: then you shall serve the Frenchmen out yourselves." They looked longingly at the Astree and the Iphigenia, and they sighed; but as seamen they had nothing to say.

Captain Corbett was mysteriously killed in the engagement-- heavily implied that he was scragged by the crew , but no one will say and no one saw anything, of course. Africaine's surgeon, Mr. Cotton, says to Stephen that the other officers had begged him to confine Corbett, who was mad with authority, but alas it could not be done, and Corbett had never taught the hands to fire their guns because it would have marked up the deck too much.

Stephen helps Mr. Cotton with the many, many casualties, and in return Cotton comes aboard the next morning to help Stephen trephine the Boadicea's sole casualty, a seaman with a depressed cranial fracture. Jack of course supersititously takes it into his mind that if the seaman survives, then his luck will hold, so he gets very invested. (Spoiler: He does.)

Stephen goes out in the aviso Pearl of the Mascarenes for more intelligence work, and this time they send Bonden with him. They come flying back a few days later with the signal Enemy in sight due north-- the Africaine is not yet refitted but the Boadicea, Staunch, and Otter all come out to help because the Pearl witnessed HMS Bombay getting into a scrap with the French Venus and corvette Victor. Boadicea comes up after Bombay has been taken, but not long after. Venus is badly damaged, and Victor takes Bombay in tow to flee, but they are not moving very fast. Boadicea chases slowly-- the winds are not favorable for any of them-- and to pass the time, it being Sunday, Jack musters to divisions and inspects the ship. And the whole time everyone is trying to watch without watching as the Bombay's towline parts, the Venus has to come up to help, and the Boadicea is catching up amazingly.

Finally the Victor runs, leaving the Venus to stand and fight; she comes bravely up to the Boadicea but has staked everything on her first broadside doing enough damage, and Jack saw what she was about and put about just as she fired, so most of her shots missed. In return Boadicea ranges up directly next to her, fires a broadside of grapeshot only at her decks, and then the fifty volunteers Jack had taken aboard from the Africaine are given a one-minute headstart to board her, before the Boadiceas join them. Unsurprisingly, they win.

Now Jack's squadron has two more damaged but quite powerful ships: the Bombay and the Venus. And the French commodore, Hamelin, was killed by Boadicea's grapeshot. Jack is absolutely certain now that he can win this whole shooting-match with what he has now, and that the French will not fight hard any longer. They add the two new ships to the Africaine refitting, and work day and night to get them done; the attack must go while they have momentum, and they work like heroes to get ready. Finally they are ready for the final assault, and set off, the whole squadron and all the transports, to carry it out.

They have just sunk the land when they catch sight of a sail-- it is the Emma, Tom Pullings still in command, who was summoned to join them but they hadn't expected to see him so soon.

Then they see more sail. Four sail. Surely Emma could see them better, but she has no signal flying. Why is she saying nothing? More sails. Who could they be? They must be British ships. Indiamen? Jack realizes suddenly, with cold terror, that they must be British men of war. Now that they are like to win the whole thing, Admiral Bertie has stirred himself to come get some glory.

They turn around to meet the Emma and see that there are seventeen ships now, absolutely men of war.

Tom Pullings comes aboard, absolutely delighted and full of news.

He took a dog-eared Naval Chronicle from his pocket and plucked an official letter from among its pages, marking the place with his thumb; but holding the letter aloft, not quite delivering it, he said, "So no post, sir, since I last saw you?" "Not a word, Tom," said Jack. "Not a word since the Cape; and that was out of order. Not a word for the best part of a year." "Then I am the first," cried Pullings with infinite satisfaction. "Let me wish you and Mrs Aubrey all the joy in the world." He grasped Jack's limp, wondering hand, wrung it numb, and showed the printed page, reading aloud, "At Ashgrove Cottage, Chilton Admiral, in Hants, the lady of Captain Aubrey, of the Boadicea, of a son and heir," following the words with his finger.

Remember back in part 1 of this, how Sophie enticed Jack to stay one more night at home?

Well this is the result of that. I told you it was plot-significant!

So the Admiral comes up with a fleet to snatch the glory right out of Jack's mouth, and expects to be resented for it, but Jack is so overwhelmingly delighted at finding out he has a third child (and first son, he had badly wanted a son) that no bad mood can touch him.

Everyone else is furious. Col. Keating is absolutely incoherent with wrath, as this sort of thing has happened to him before and of course the squadron has brought with it more troops and a general to supersede him, so he will get no credit for the entire campaign. Pullings is devastated when he realizes that they were in fact just fine without his reinforcements, and if only he'd been less adept at cracking on to catch up to them he could have slow-walked it so that the attack could have gone off without these reinforcements-- he is really upset about it once he understands the situation, it was absolutely in his power to have delayed long enough for it not to happen--

but Jack is so happy that none of this bothers him.

Stephen takes advantage, and uses his skills to poison the Admiral a little, murmuring to the secretary the Admiral had sent to help them about how Jack is so unconcerned because of his great influence politically, no one really knows but he has all these connections, he didn't need any of this at all to advance his career, he's really going to wind up very highly-placed, etc. etc. It's not much but it makes him feel a little better.

So the Admiral, deeply unnerved, puts all his pressure on the new general to go along with the existing plan, to press ahead precisely as it was planned out by the men they've superseded, and so they do. The French capitulate with only the briefest show, for pride.

Stephen goes ashore at Port-Louis before the capitulation is even complete, to check in with the captured McAdam and Clonfert. Jack has a letter from Lady Clonfert that he wishes to bring to Clonfert later that day, and wishes to tell Clonfert how much the fleet praises his noble defense of Nereiade-- kind things to say to an injured comrade. Stephen asks whether this would be advisable, and McAdam says perhaps Stephen should come a few minutes ahead just to see. Clonfert has been strange, lately.

Stephen watches the capitulation with a collection of wounded Nereiades who have come down to a bend in the road; they agree to look for his dodo-feather pillow when they go aboard after the Nereiade is returned to the British in the capitulation. Then he goes and meets with Jack, and they go back up to see Clonfert. Along the way they discuss the Admiral's official despatch about the victory-- carrying such a thing home is a tremendous honor and the bearer is almost invariably promoted.

Stephen goes in ahead to check on Clonfert and McAdam meets him, roaring drunk. "Make a lane there," he cried. "Make a lane for the great Dublin physician. Come and see your patient, Dr Maturin, you whore."

Clonfert has torn his bandages off and bled to death.

“Stephen bent to listen for any trace of a heart-beat, straightened, closed Clonfert's eyes, and pulled up the sheet. McAdam sat on the side of the bed, weeping now, his fury gone with his shouting; and between his sobs he said, "It was the cheering that woke him. What are they cheering for? says he, and I said the French have surrendered. Aubrey will be here and you shall have your Nereide back. Never, by God, says he, not from Jack Aubrey: run out McAdam and see are they coming. And when I stepped out of the door so he did it, and so bloody Christ he did it." A long silence, and he said, "Your Jack Aubrey destroyed him. Jack Aubrey destroyed him.”

There's the end of the weird, one-sided rivalry. Stephen just says he died, and tells Jack no more of it. Jack is sincerely regretful.

Then the Admiral's victory dinner, and countless speeches, but Stephen's subtle intelligence-poisoning of the Admiral bears its fruit.

“In the course of my long career," said the Admiral, "I have been compelled to give many orders, which, though always for the good of the service, have sometimes been repugnant to my finer feelings. For even an Admiral retains finer feelings, gentlemen." Dutiful laughter, pretty thin. "But now, with His Excellency's permission, I shall indulge myself by giving one that is more congenial to the spirit of a plain British sailor." He paused and coughed in a suddenly hushed atmosphere of genuine suspense, and then in an even louder voice he went on, "I hereby request and require Captain Aubrey to repair aboard the Boadicea as soon as he has finished his dinner, there to receive my despatches for the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty and to convey them to Whitehall with all the diligence in his power. And to this, gentlemen"--raising his glass -'I will append a toast: let us all fill up to the brim, gunwales under, and drink to England, home and beauty, and may Lucky Jack Aubrey reach 'em with fair winds and flowing sheets every mile of the way.”

The end!

[mystery-star]

I simply can't get over how wholesome that part where Jack is made Acting Commodore in "Mauritius Command"

Like...

Officially adressed as Commodore Aubrey. LOVE IT.

And his crew 'secretly' made that pendant for Jack because they KNEW he was gonna be 'promoted'.

Then Jack even needing to show his new pendant (that he loves) to Stephen, his best friend.

Just so wholesome. All of it.

[peresephoknee]

a bisexual rival has hit the mauritius command

[lurking-latinist]

I just keep thinking about that conversation near the end of The Mauritius Command that's just like:

Stephen: so you're a mental health specialist right?

McAdam: insofar as such a thing exists here in the 1800s, yes

Stephen: so do you ever get patients with depression?

McAdam: yeah

Stephen: what generally happens to them?

McAdam: well eventually they die like everybody else

Stephen:

McAdam: also sometimes they can do drugs about it

Stephen (who is already doing drugs about it): oh. okay thank you