The Mauritius Command by Patrick O’Brian

how exactly he remembered it all; there were a few more civilian houses in the village at the bottom of the bay, but everything else was just the same--the steady beat of the surf, the mountains, the men of- war's boats crossing to and fro, the hospital, the barracks, the arsenal: he might himself have been a lanky boy, returning to the Resolution after catching Roman-fish off the rocks. He was filled with a pleasurable excitement, with countless memories, yet at the same time with an apprehension that he could not define.
    "Boat ahoy?" asked the Raisonable.
    "Boadicea," replied the acting coxswain in a voice of brass; and then more quietly he said, "Rowed of all." The gig kissed against the tall flank of the flagship, the sideboys ran down with their scarlet man- ropes, the bosun started his call, and Jack was piped aboard. As he took off his cocked hat he realized with a shock that the tall bowed white-haired figure who answered his salute was the Admiral Bertie he had last seen in Port of Spain as the lithe, lively, wenching captain of the Renown; and some part of his busy mind said to him, beneath all the rest, "Perhaps you are not so very young yourself, either, Jack Aubrey."
    "Here you are at last, Aubrey," said the Admiral, shaking his hand. "I am very happy to see you. You know Captain Eliot-
    "Yes, sir; we were shipmates in the Leander in ninety-eight. How do you do, sir?"
    Before Eliot could reply with anything more than an extension of the friendly smile that he had worn ever since Jack's face appeared, the Admiral went on, "I dare say those papers are for me? Come along; let's have a look at them in the cabin." Splendour; opulence; carpets; a portrait of Mrs Bertie, looking plump and comfortable. "Well," he said, wrestling with the outer covers, "so you had a tedious passage of it: but did you have any luck on your way down? They used to call you Lucky Jack Aubrey in the Mediterranean, I remember. God damn these seals."
    "We saw barely a sail, sir; but we did have a little brush off the Dry Salvages, and retook the old Hyaena."
    "Did you? Did you, indeed? Well, I am heartily glad of it..." The papers were free now, and as he glanced through them he said, "Yes. I have been expecting these. We must take them along to the Governor at once. But you have a politico aboard, I see? A Mr Farquhar? He must come too: I shall send my barge, by way of compliment; you cannot be too careful with these political gents. You had better order some cool clothes, too; it is a twenty mile ride to Cape Town. The Governor will not object to nankeen trousers and a round jacket." He gave his orders and called for a bottle of wine. "This is the right Diamant of the year one, Aubrey," he said, sitting down again. "Too good for you young fellows but you did retake the old Hyaena- I was a midshipman in her. Yes." His washed-out blue eyes looked back over forty-five years, and he observed, "That was in the days before carronades." Returning to the present he drank his wine, saying, "I trust your luck will hold, Aubrey: you need it, on this station. Welt, and so we shall have to fag over that damned mountain, a wearying ride in this infernal dust--dust everywhere, rain or shine; a whole nation of swabbers would never come to an end of it. I wish we did not have to go. If it were not for the political side, I should get you to sea the minute you had your water aboard. The situation is far worse than ever it was before you left England--far worse than when these orders were written. The French have snapped up two more Indiamen, this side of the Ten Degree channel, the Europe and the Streatham: homeward-bound Indiamen, worth a mint of money."
    "Lord, sir, that is very bad," cried Jack.
    "Yes, it is," said the Admiral, "and it is going to get even worse unless we bring it up with a round turn, and smartly at that. That is what we must do: it is feasible, and it must be done. Oh, yes, it is feasible, with a certain amount of initiative... and maybe I