... ‘Greenwich. You would not believe, sir, the amount of money they screw out of poor hardworking seafaring men for that old chest of theirs. And who ever seen a penny piece out of it? Not Old Mould, any gate.’
    ‘Lo, Greenwich, where many a shrew is in,’ said Stephen, unthinking.
    ‘Greenwich is bad enough, bad enough; there are some very disagreeable females in Greenwich. But it is nothing at all,’ said Mould, his voice rising passionately as he caused the stout tiller to tremble under his hand, ‘nothing at all, set against Shelmerston, for shrews. Take Mrs Mould, for instance…’ He took Mrs Mould and handled her most severely, not only for her ignorant, illiberal, worldly rejection of the plurality of wives – ‘Think of Abraham, sir: think of Solomon: remember Gideon – threescore and ten sons, and many wives!’ – but also for a variety of shortcomings that it would scarcely be decent to name, all denounced with such vehemence that it would have been necessary to check him if a lighter more or less guided by an idiot boy with a single enormous oar had not drifted across the Ringle's bows, so that her topsail was obliged to be backed at once, to take the way off her, and all sheets let fly, while every soul that could seize a spar fended off in an uproar of reprobation.

• We're sort of back in 1814 but it's gotten even more ahistorical. The ship battle in this is not very good; there really hasn't been a good battle since I don't know when.
• Jo Walton's reread at tor dot com. Interesting fictional tie in to another book.
• Apparently pottos are also called "softly-softly".
• Some gunroom mailing list chatter about the book. Mostly end-of-series discussion. Of interest is someone who copied some of O'Brian's notes from the Lilly Library.
• Other mailing list discussion. Impending rot is a topic.
• Aubreyisms.
• When Jack is sick the (non-Maturin) doctor recommends "Night Thoughts" as a nice calming thing to read to Jack which I suppose is a joke, and contrasted with Stephen's idea that the despairing die easier.
• The part where Stephen wakes up and hears Jack playing at Ashgrove is lovely.
• Jack's cur-tailed appreciation count: 381
• Stern gallery appreciation count: 49,355

    ‘Damn the Doctor.’
    ‘Rot the Doctor.’
    ‘The Doctor’s soul to Hell,’ said the lower deck, the midshipmen’s berth, and the wardroom.

Mr. Oakes is fucking dead! It's a little wild that this fact is dropped at the end of the last book, and not really discussed in this book. Mrs. Oakes is around being unlikable and eating two eggs for dinner. Brigid is Stephen's manic pixie dream daughter. Stephen about laughs himself to death when Clarissa says Brigid mostly only speaks English to cats and pigs. Some people think she's a natural child. Padeen is promised a farm in Ireland. They're packed off to Spain. Sarah and Emily have to endure Mrs. Williams' slurs, then get set up at the Grapes and pretty much forgotten.

Sophie throws a dinner which Stephen is propelled into late. She drags Jack up and down for giving some red silk to Clarissa, but off-screen. Mrs. Williams, Mrs. Morris, and Mr. Briggs are perfectly awful. Mr. Briggs informs often and is paid back in Trump's Lane. "Black night, no words; only a din like a great puppy being whipped."

Charlotte and Fanny are going around doing stuff. Charlotte has the NERVE to dare correct her mother that she is not Fanny nor is her face swollen and bloated. Charlotte is "the fatter twin". They're "almost pretty". George abbreviates "positive" to "poz". They're all crazy about the uniform.

Heneage Dundas and Sir Joseph Blaine probably should have figured more in various character blurbs in previous posts. They are pretty steadily who they are, though, which is competent, helpful, and horny. Blaine weirdly gives Stephen a porphyry Jove of a couple tons to deliver probably to some lady friend an awkward annoying favor by someone who doesn't think much about ships. Dundas is having money trouble.

Jack's got three captain's under him like with The Mauritius Command and similarly one's discipline is lax (Capt. Duff, because of the sodomy) and the other's too taut (Capt. Thomas, the Purple Admiral, because he sucks). They're not really served up as a character study or anything. Thomas' Thames hits a reef and never gets to the fight, nor is he scragged. Duff's Stately screws up a tacking maneuver and gets mauled pretty bad.

Pullings is having a weird career as Jack's pet Post Captain. Mr. Whewell is a new officer, who grew up around the slave trade and passed for officer but not gentleman; he's just all-around competent, though scarred and ugly but still blushing from a run in with Dahomey Amazons at a handsomer age. Reade seems to be having all the fun in the Ringle that Jack wishes he could have. No mention made of missing an arm or being much caressed.

Killick is everywhere as usual. He has no respect for the lubberly butler giving the "butler's wipe" to Jack's silver. He procures cheddar. In a rare scene without Jack or Stephen he has a discussion with Bonden about Jack and Sophie parting brass rags (no longer being raggies). Bonden beats Dick Roe's face for mocking the fever-struck Maturin. Killick says it ain't catching but "if it ain’t catching why does the poor bugger take in the victuals at a run, holding his breath with a piece of charcoal in his mouth and then rush out, daubing his face with vinegar and Gregory’s cordial, pale and trembling? Not catching, my arse." Killick calls the nice room in Ashgrove Cottage the welwet saloon because it has one velvet chair in it. He's described as "looking as usual like a lean, cantankerous and out of work ratcatcher." When Stephen tries to wave goodbye to Dundas, he nearly falls off the Ringle but Bonden catches him and passes him to Joe Plaice to be tied down without batting an eyelash.

Joe Plaice is a little bit here and there, such as grinning in from a gun port while Stephen is dismayed at the Bellona's sick bay. He's also servant at the officer's dinner where Stephen dips his sleeve in the soup. Described as Stephen's "old mild fat and bald friend". Stephen thinks he's acting out of character getting caught up in the inter-ship rivalries. Awkward Davies has a red waistcoat and keeps the captured slaves at work on the pumps.

Christine Wood (nee Heatherleigh) the "Mrs. Governor" of Freetown is unbeatable at bats and stirs Stephens let's call it bosom. Jack Square is at least Rectangular, and is almost certainly not getting paid enough for being a guide and pilot.

Notable animals: The embarrassing frisky horse Lalla. The lucky roach-eating potto. Slaver following sharks. Remembrance of a poor goat on the Sophie. Mr. Brigg's Abhorson (Abhor + whoreson?) who gets startled by a blackbird and dumps Jack off onto a boundary stone head first.

Regrettable Deaths: Mr. Gray cut for the stone, survives the surgery but not the infection and buried in two thousand fathoms. The Stately Marine and the Thames lieutenant who duel and both gut stab each other.

    ‘You must certainly come tomorrow,’ she said as they parted, ‘and I will show you my garden and my creatures – I have a chanting goshawk and a brush-tailed porcupine! And perhaps you might like to see my bones.’
    ‘Nothing could possibly give me greater pleasure,’ said Stephen, pressing her hand. ‘And perhaps we might walk by the swamp.’