He turned to another favourite naval song:
There happened of late a terrible fray,
Begun upon our St James’s day,
With a thump, thump, thump, thump, thump,
Thump, thump a thump, thump.
An ape on a rock no great way off three a turd at him, quite unprovoked; and when he half rose in protest it shook its wizened fist and gibbered so furiously that he sank down again, so low were his spirits.
— Master and Commander – Patrick O’Brian
‘You go a-walking,’ he said. ‘Do for all love go walking up very steep heights — traverse the Rock from end to end — traverse it again and again on an empty stomach. You are an obese subject; your hand quiver as you go. You must weight sixteen or even seventeen stone.’
‘And to be sure I do sweat like a mare in foal,’ he reflected, sitting under the shade of a boulder, loosening his waist-band and mopping himself.
Master and Commander – Patrick O’Brian
Knock-knock on the door. ‘Beg pardon, your honour. Loblolly boy’s all in a mother, sir. Young Mr Ricketts has swallowed a musket-ball and they can’t get it out. Choking to death, sir, if you please.’
‘Forgive me,’ said Stephen, carefully putting down his glass and covering it with a red spotted handkerchief, a bandanna.
‘Is all well — did you manage . . .?’ asked Jack five minutes later.
‘We may not be able to do all we could wish in physic,’ said Stephen with quiet satisfaction, ‘but at least we can give an emetic that answers, I believe. You were saying, sir?’
Master and Commander – Patrick O’Brian
‘I say these damned things,’ Jack went on, musing as they drank their bottle, ‘and don’t quite understand at the time, though I see people looking black as hell, and frowning, and my friends going “Pst, pst”, and then I say to myself, “You’re brought by the lee again, Jack.” Usually I make out what’s amiss, given time, but by then it’s too late.’
Master and Commander – Patrick O’Brian
Indignation at the Sophie‘s treatment was not confined to the sloop, but naturally it was strongest there, and as the crew heaved the capstan round to unmoor they sang a new song, a song that owed nothing whatever to Mr Mowett’s chaste muse.
Fuck old Harte, Fuck old Harte,
That red-faced son of a dry French fart.
Hey ho, stamp and go,
Stamp and go, stamp and go,
Hey ho, stamp and go.
The cross-legged fifer on the capstan-head lowered his pipe and sang the quiet solo part:
Says old Harte to his missis
O what do I see?
Bold Sophie’s commander
With his fiddle-dee-dee.
Then the deep cross rhythmical bellow again
Fuck old Harte, Fuck old Harte,
That one-eyed son of a blue French fart.
– Master and Commander – Patrick O’Brian
Captain Harte saluted the quarter-deck with a sketchy motion towards his hat and stared with elaborate disgust at the grubby sideboys, the marines with their crossbelts awry, the heap of water-butts and Mr Dalziel’s little fat meek cream-coloured bitch, that had come forward into the only open space, and that there, apologizing to one and all, her ears, and whole person drooping, was in the act of making an immeasurable pool.
Master and Commander – Patrick O’Brian
Ever since Stephen Maturin had grown rich with their first prize he had constantly laid in great quantities of asafetida, castoreum and other substances, to make his medicines more revolting in taste, smell and texture than any others in the fleet; and he found it answered — his hardy patients knew with their entire beings that they were being physicked.
Master and Commander – Patrick O’Brian
Stephen looked at him attentively, took his pulse, gazed at his tongue, asked squalid questions, examined him. ‘Is it a wound going bad?’ asked Jack, alarmed by his gravity.
‘It is a wound, if you wish,’ said Stephen. ‘But not from our battle with the Cacafuego. Some lady of your acquaintance has been too liberal with her favours, too universally kind.’
‘Oh, Lord,’ cried Jack, to whom this had never happened before.
Master and Commander – Patrick O’Brian
‘Do you follow me, Dr Maturin?’
‘I do indeed, sir, and am much obliged to you for your candor in telling me this: it confirms what was in my mind and I shall do all I can to make him conscious of the delicacy of his position. Though upon my word,’ he added with a sigh, ‘there are times when it seems to me that nothing short of a radical ablation of the membrum virile would answer, in this case.’
‘That is very generally the peccant part,’ said Mr Florey.
Master and Commander – Patrick O’Brian
‘Dear Doctor, you know what to do?’ Stephen nodded, taking over the spokes and feeling the life of the wheel. The quartermaster stepped away, picked up a cutlass with a grim look of delight. ‘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.’
Master and Commander – Patrick O’Brian
The Love Pirate 