#the mauritius command

[soundoftheirwings]

Yea their symmetrical depression

[leona-florianova]

'You will not mention this to Sophie, nor to any other person,' said Stephen, with a cold, penetrating glare. 'Must I not even start looking to my sea-chest?' 'What a fellow you are, Jack!' cried Stephen, in great disgust. 'Of course you must not, not until the port admiral's messenger is come. Cannot you see the obvious cause and effect? I should have thought it plain even to the meanest intelligence.' 'A ship!' cried Jack, springing heavily into the air. There were tears in his eyes, and Stephen saw that he might wish to shake hands at any minute. He disliked all effusion, privately thinking the English far too much given to weeping and the flow of soul; he pursed his lips with a sour expression, and put his hands behind his back. He said, 'Plain to the meanest intelligence: I appear—you have a ship. What must Sophie conclude? Where is my character?'

--The Mauritius Command

[spilverhare]

Stephen (bad at math) falls prey to the Gambler’s Fallacy

[bedes-silliest-soldier]

One of my favorite things about the Aubreyad is how POB does literature… things. I don’t know the right word here. The Mauritius Command is basically narrative foils the book (Jack and Clonfert, Maturin and MacAdam) Desolation Island is basically foreshadowing the book (can’t say without spoilers but I’m rereading it right now and HOLY CRAP did he foreshadow a lot).

[readwing]

Stephen.

[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.

[lovedthestars-toofondly]

absolutely cannot get over the fact that at the beginning of The Mauritius Command, Stephen sees Jack and literally his first thought is "well he may have money problems but at least his ass is still juicy"