Favorite quotes 3: Jack and Stephen

"By God, I could do with my coffee," he said, coming abruptly back into a present in which ordinary time flowed steadily once more and appetite mattered. "But, however," he reflected, "I must go below." This was the ugly side: this was where you saw what happened when a man's face and an iron ball met.

"Captain Aubrey," said Stephen, clapping his book to the moment he saw Jack in the cockpit. "I have a grave complaint to make."

"I am concerned to hear it," said Jack, peering about in the gloom for what he dreaded to see.

"They have been at my asp. I tell you, sir, they have been at my asp. I stepped into my cabin for a book not three minutes ago, and what did I see? My asp drained -- drained, I say."

"Tell me the butcher's bill; then I will attend to your asp."

"Bah -- a few scratches, a man with his forearm moderately scored, a couple of splinters to draw -- nothing of consequence -- mere bandaging. All you will find in the sick-bay is an obstinate gleet with low fever and a reduced inguinal hernia: and that forearm. Now my asp--"

"No dead? No wounded?" cried Jack, his heart leaping up.

"No, no, no. Now my asp--" He had brought it aboard in its spirits of wine; and at some point in very recent time a criminal hand had taken the jar, drunk up all the alcohol and left the asp dry, stranded, parched.

"I am truly sorry for it," said Jack. "But will not the fellow die? Must he not have an emetic?"

"He will not: that is what is so vexing. The bloody man, the more than Hun, the sottish rapparee, he will not die. It was the best double-refined spirits of wine."

Master and Commander, p. 214-215.

It was dark when they reached Ashdown Forest; by this time Jack's horse was lame, and they still had a long ride before them.

"Let me look to your pistols," said Jack, as the trees came closer to the road. "You have no notion of hammering your flints."

"They are very well," said Stephen, unwilling to open his holsters (a teratoma in one, a bottled Arabian dormouse in the other). "Do you apprehend any danger?"

"This is an ugly stretch of road, with all these disbanded soldiers turned loose. They made an attempt upon the mail not far from Aker's Cross. Come, let me have your pistols. I thought as much: what is this?"

"A teratoma," said Stephen sulkily.

"What is a teratoma?" asked Jack, holding the object in his hand. "A kind of grenado?"

"It is an inward wen, a tumour: we find them, occasionally, in the abdominal cavity. Sometimes they contain long black hair, sometimes a set of teeth: this has both hair and teeth. It belonged to Mr Elkins of the City, an eminent cheese-monger. I prize it much."

"By God," cried Jack, thrusting it back into the holster and wiping his hand vehemently upon the horse, "I do wish you would leave people's bellies alone. So you have no pistols at all, I collect?"

"If you wish to be so absolute, no, I have not."

Post Captain, p. 63-64.

"Jack, Jack," said Stephen, when the lamp was lit, "I fear I am a sad embarrassment to you. I think I shall pack my chest and go ashore."

"No, soul, never say that," said Jack wearily. "This explanation with Parker had to come: I had hoped to avoid it, but he did not catch my drift; and really I am just as glad to have had it out."

"Still and all, I think I will go ashore."

"And desert your patients?"

"Sea-surgeons are ten a penny."

"And your friends?"

"Why, upon my word, Jack, I think you would be better without me. I am not suited for a sea-life. You know far better than I, that discord among the officers is of no use to your ship; and I do not care to be a witness of this kind of brutality, or any party to it."

"Ours is a hard service, I admit. But you will find as much brutality by land."

"I am not a party to it by land."

"Yet you did not so much mind the flogging in the Sophie?"

"No. The world in general, and even more your briny world, accepts flogging. It is this perpetual arbitrary harassing, bullying, hitting, brow-beating, starting -- these capricious torments, spreadeagling, gagging -- this general atmosphere of oppression. I should have told you earlier. But it is a delicate subject, between you and me."

"I know. It is the devil ... At the beginning of a commission a raw, ugly crew (and we have some precious hard bargains, you know) -- has to be driven hard, and started into prompt obedience; but this had gone too far. Parker and the bosun are not bad fellows -- I did not give them a strong enough lead at the beginning -- I was remiss. It will not be the same in the future."

"You must forgive me, my dear. Those men are dropsical with authority, permanently deranged, I must go."

"I say you shall not," said Jack, with a smile.

"I say I shall."

"Do you know, my dear Stephen, that you may not come and go as you please?" said Jack, leaning back in his chair and gazing at Stephen with placid triumph. "Do not you know that you are under martial law? That if you was to stir without my leave, I should be obliged to put an R against your name, have you taken up, brought back in irons and most severely punished? What do you say to a flogging through the fleet, ha? You have no notion of the powers of a captain of a man-of-war. He is dropsical with authority, if you like."

"Must I not go ashore?"

"No, of course you must not, and that's the end to it. You must make your bed and lie on it." He paused, with a feeling that this was not quite the epigram that he had wished.

Post Captain, p. 242-243.

"But tell me, Jack, how did your journey go? How did Sophie withstand the motion of the vessel? Did she take her porter with her meals?"

"Oh, admirably, admirably!" It had been the most perfect series of warm, gentle days, scarcely a fleck of white water -- Simmons had made a magnificent show with royals and skysails, and studdingsails aloft and alow; she had never seen anything more beautiful, she said -- the Lively had left the Amethyst standing: red faces on her quarterdeck -- and then there had been some charming dead calms, the whole day long -- they had often talked of Stephen -- how they had missed him! -- and she had been so kind to that youngster Randall, who wept when poor Cassandra died -- Randall senior loved her to distraction; so did the whole gun-room -- they had dined twice with the officers -- Cecilia seemed very well with Dredge, of the Marines -- Jack was grateful to him for drawing her off -- certainly Sophie had drunk her porter, and a glass of bosun's grog -- had eaten splendidly: Jack loved a girl that tucked in hearty -- and as for the future, they were full of hope, but ... could do with very little ... no horses ... cottage ... potatoes. "Stephen," he said, "you are asleep."

"I am not," said Stephen. "You just mentioned the last syllable of recorded time with evident approval. But I am weary, I confess. I travelled all night, and yesterday was something of a trial. I will turn in, if I may. Where must I sleep?"

"There's a question," said Jack. "Where should you berth, in fact? Of course you shall sleep in my cot; but officially where should you be? That would puzzle Solomon. What seniority did they give you?"

"I have no idea. I did not read the document, apart from the phrase. We, reposing especial trust and confidence in S.M., which pleased me."

"Well, I suppose you are junior to me; so you shall have the leeward side of the cabin and I the windward, and every time we go about, we shall change sides, ha, ha, ha. Ain't I a rattle? But seriously, I suppose you should be read in to the ship's company -- an amazing situation."

Post Captain, p. 477-478.

Jack, wrapped in a boat-cloak, with a dark lantern between his knees, sat in the stern-sheets, filled with pleasurable anticipation. He had not seen Stephen Maturin for a vast stretch of time, made even longer by the grinding monotony of the blockade: how lonely he had been for the want of that harsh, unpleasant voice!

H.M.S. Surprise, p. 52.

"Jack, what are you about?"

"I am taking off my shirt."

"To swim so soon after dinner, and such a dinner? I cannot advise it. You are very corpulent; full of gross, viscous humours after these weeks and months of Poirier's cooking. And now we are come to the point, my dear, it is my clear duty to warn you against gule, against ungoverned appetite ... a brutish vice, inductive mainly to the sin of Eve ... bulimy, bulimy ... dinners have killed more men than ever Avicenna healed ..." he prosed away while Jack took off his trousers. "So you are determined on your bathe?" he said, looking at his naked companion. "Will you let me see your back, now?" He ran his fingers over the dull-blue scar and asked, "Do you feel it, these days?"

"Just a trifle, this morning," said Jack.

The Mauritius Command, p. 79-80.

He reached the deck at last, more dead than alive, oozing blood from scratches inflicted by the barnacles; they emptied some of the water out of him, carried him below, and plucked off his clothes.

"There, there, take it easy," said Jack, looking anxiously into his face and speaking in that compassionate protective voice which has vexed so many invalids into the tomb.

"There is not a moment to lose," cried Stephen, starting up.

Jack pressed him back into the cot with irresistible force, and still in the same soothing voice he said, "We are not losing any time at all, old Stephen. Not a moment. Do not grow agitated. All is well. You are all right now."

"Oh, your soul to the devil, Jack Aubrey," said Stephen, and in an even stronger tone, "Killick, Killick, you mumping villain, bring in the coffee, will you now, for the love of God."

The Mauritius Command, p. 309.

"Stephen," he called, over the growling 'cello, "how do you spell chimaera?"

"Many people start with ch, I believe. Have you told her about my stink-pot petrel?"

"Is not stink-pot a hellish low expression for a letter, Stephen?"

"Bless you, my dear, a mother that tends her own babies will not boggle at stink-pot. But you may put thalassodrome, if you find it more genteel."

The Mauritius Command, p. 327.

"The Leopard's lost her nose," said Jack to Stephen some time later, when the ship could be allowed a glim behind her deadlights and the dark-lanterns were put out. "If I were not so fagged, I believe I could make a joke about that, with so much pox aboard," and he laughed very heartily at the thought of his near approach to wit.

"When am I to be given my supper?" asked Stephen. "You invited me to partake of toasted cheese, in luxury. I find no luxury, but a shambles: I find no toasted cheese, but a host groping for jocosity about what is in fact a grave and painful disease. Yet stay, I think I do perceive the smell of cheese above the powder-reek and the stench of that vile dark-lantern. Killick, belay there; are you now about the cheese?"

"Which it's just coming up, ain't it?" said Killick angrily.

Desolation Island, p. 204.

Jack turned, saw him, and waved: the boat pulled in. It disappeared under the land and presently Jack came toiling up the slope. It was not his leg that made him toil and puff, for the numbness had passed off some time ago, but rather his bulk. While he had only been able to stump for a hundred yards or so he had nevertheless eaten voraciously; and greed growing with its indulgence, he was now walking up the hill for his breakfast eggs.

"It seems almost sacrilegious," said Stephen, as Jack held them out. "When I think of how I prized mine, perhaps the only specimen in the three kingdoms, how I preserved it from the slightest shock in jeweller's cotton, the idea of deliberately breaking one ..."

"You cannot make an omelette without breaking eggs," said Jack quickly, before the chance should be lost for ever. "Ha, ha, Stephen, what do you say to that?"

"I might say something about pearls before swine -- the pearls being these priceless eggs, if you follow me -- were I to attempt a repartee in the same order of magnitude."

"I did not fag all the way up here to be insulted about my wit, which, I may tell you, is more generally appreciated in the service than you may suppose," said Jack.

Desolation Island, p. 293-294.

"I wish to God you were not going," said Jack in a low voice.

"There is no option," said Stephen.

Jack nodded: to be sure, Stephen's landing in some remote creek had as little free choice about it as Jack's carrying his ship into action; yet there was something so horribly cold-blooded about the creek -- cold-blooded, dark and solitary. He hated the idea: yet he drove the Worcester towards the place where the idea should become reality with all the skill he had acquired in a lifetime at sea.

The Ionian Mission, p. 213.

"God help us, Stephen," he said, throwing a towel over his nakedness as Stephen came in, "we might be in a hammam, a bagnio, a Turkish flaming bath. I must have lost a couple of stone."

"You could spare as much again," said Stephen. "And since you are of a very full habit, you would certainly benefit from a blood-letting. I will draw off sixteen or twenty ounces directly: you will feel more comfortable, and there will be a little less danger of siriasis or apoplexy," he said, putting down the box he was carrying and drawing a lancet from his pocket. "This is rather blunt," -- trying it on the locker -- "but I dare say we shall get it into the vein in time. I must sharpen the whole set tomorrow; for if this calm continue, I think of bleeding the whole ship's company."

"No," said Jack. "It may sound girlish, but I really do not want to see blood again today, my own or anyone else's."

Treason's Harbour, p. 189.

In his relief he said to Plaice, "Well, Plaice, at least some good has come out of this: at least nobody will ever be able to say, 'Poor old Plaice is down to his last shilling.'"

"How do you make that out, sir?" asked Plaice, closing one eye and smiling in anticipation.

"Why, because there are three of 'em screwed to your head, ha ha ha!" said his Captain.

"You are not unlike Shakespeare," observed Stephen, as they walked back to the cabin.

"So I am often told by those who read my letters and dispatches," said Jack, "but what makes you say so at this particular moment?"

"Because his clowns make quips of that bludgeoning, knock-me-down nature. You have only to add marry, come up, or go to, with a pox on it, and it is pure Gammon, or Bacon, or what you will."

"That is only your jealousy," said Jack. "What do you say to some music tonight?"

"I should like it extremely. I shall not play well, being quite fagged out, as our American captive says."

"But Stephen, we say fagged out too."

"Do we? I was not aware."

The Far Side of the World, p. 218-219.

"Do you know the expression rogering, Jack?"

"I believe I have heard it."

The Letter of Marque, p. 37.

"Surely that is not the Marseillaise you are picking out?"

Stephen had his 'cello between his knees and for some time now he had been very quietly stroking two or three phrases with variations upon them -- a half-conscious playing that interrupted neither his talk nor his listening. "It is not," he said. "It is, or rather it is meant to be, the Mozart piece that was no doubt lurking somewhere in the Frenchman's mind when he wrote it. Yet something eludes me..."

"Stephen," cried Jack. "Not another note, I beg. I have it exactly, if only it don't fly away." He whipped the cloth off his violin-case, tuned roughly, and swept straight into the true line. After a while Stephen joined him, and when they were thoroughly satisfied they stopped, tuned very exactly, passed the rosin to and fro and so returned to the direct statement, to variations upon it, inversions, embroideries, first one setting out in a flight of improvisation while the other filled in and then the other doing the same, playing on and on until a lee-lurch half-flung Stephen from his seat, so that his 'cello gave a dismal screech.

The Letter of Marque, p. 63-64.

As he watched the falcon's heavier but still rapid flight he heard eight bells strike aboard, followed by the remote pipe of all hands to breakfast and the much more emphatic roar of the hungry seamen: a moment later he saw Jack Aubrey, mother-naked, plunge from the taffrail and swim out towards Old Scratch, his long yellow hair streaming behind him. When he was half way across two seals joined him, those intensely curious animals, sometimes diving and coming up ahead to gaze into his face almost within hand's reach.

"I give you joy of your seals, brother," said Stephen, as Jack waded ashore on the little golden strand, where the skiff now lay high, dry and immovable. "It is the universal opinion of the good and the wise that there is nothing more fortunate than the company of seals."

"I have always liked them," said Jack, sitting on the gunwhale and dripping all over. "If they could speak, I am sure they would say something amiable. But Stephen, have you forgot breakfast?"

"I have not. My mind has been toying with thoughts of coffee, stirabout, white pudding, bacon, toast, marmalade and more coffee, for some considerable time."

"Yet you would never have had it until well after dinner, you know, because your boat is stranded and I doubt you could swim so far."

"The sea has receded!" cried Stephen. "I am amazed."

"They tell me it does so twice a day in these parts," said Jack. "It is technically known as the tide."

"Why, your soul to the Devil, Jack Aubrey," said Stephen, who had been brought up on the shores of the Mediterranean, that unebbing sea. He struck his hand to his forehead and exclaimed, "There must be some imbecility, some weakness here. But perhaps I shall grow used to the tide in time. Tell me, Jack, did you notice that the boat was as who should say marooned, and did you then leap into the sea?"

"I believe it was pretty generally observed aboard. Come, clap on to the gunwhale and we will run her down. I can almost smell the coffee from here."

The Letter of Marque, p. 162-163.

As he tuned his fiddle that evening he said, "Stephen, what was the Americans' cry in 1775?"

"No representation, no taxation."

"Nothing about copulation?"

"Nothing at all. At that period the mass of Americans were in favour of copulation."

"So it could not have been No reproduction without copulation?"

"Why, my dear, that is the old natural philosopher's watchword, as old as Aristotle, and quite erroneous. Do but consider how the hydra and her kind multiply without any sexual commerce of any sort. Leeuenhoek proved it long ago, but still the more obstinate repeat the cry, like so many parrots."

"Well, be damned to taxation, in any case. Shall we attack the andante?"

The Thirteen Gun Salute, p. 162-163.

"Jack," he said, as they walked along the rim of the crater to a point where they could hail the ship, "did you reflect upon Ganymede at all?"

"Yes," said Jack. "I was up with him all last night, and should be this night were it not for the Sultan's visit tomorrow. Such an endearing little pale golden body as he peeps out -- he is easily my favourite. But I shall still have him almost all night, once the Sultan is done with."

"Shall you, though?" said Stephen, looking at his friend's pleased, well-fed face, rather more florid than usual from the Sultan's wine; and after a pause, "Brother, can we be talking of the same thing?"

"I should hope so," said Jack, smiling. "Jupiter is in opposition, you know. Nobody could have missed his splendour."

"No, indeed: a very glorious sight. And Ganymede is connected with him, I collect?"

"Of course he is -- the prettiest of the satellites. What a fellow you are, Stephen."

"How well named. But I meant another Ganymede, the Sultan's cup-bearer. Did you notice him?"

"Well, yes, I did. I said to myself, Why, damn my eyes, there is a girl. But then I remembered that there would be no girls at a feast like that, so I returned to my excellent haunch of venison, no bigger than a hare's, but uncommon well-tasting. Why do you call him Ganymede?"

"Ganymede was Jupiter's cup-bearer; and I believe their connexion, their relations, their friendship, would now be frowned upon. But I use the name loosely, as it is so often used; I mean no reflexion upon the Sultan."

The Thirteen Gun Salute, p. 201-202.

"Lord," said Jack, "I have heard poor Martin make many a dismal groan, but never on all four strings at once."

"I believe that was Mrs Oakes," said Stephen. "He has been trying to teach her to play the instrument for some time now."

"I never knew. Why did you not tell me?"

"You never asked."

"Has she any talent?"

"None whatsoever," said Stephen. "Pray do not, I repeat do not, endeavour to conceal my rosin in your breeches pocket."

The Truelove, p. 84.

"Lord, Stephen, joy makes me sleepy. Don't you find joy makes you sleepy?"

"I do not. You are much given to sleep these days, I find; and sure your tedious anxious careworn endless weeks or even God forbid months in that vile penal colony required a deal of reparation; but you are to consider that sleep and fatness go hand in hand, like fas and nefas -- think of the autumn dormouse, the hibernating hedgepig -- and I should be sorry if you were to grow even heavier. Perhaps you should confine yourself to one single dish of toasted cheese before turning in. I smell it coming."

"Some other time certainly," said Jack. "But tonight is Guy Fawkes' Eve, and must in common decency be celebrated to the full. Anything else would be close to treason, tasting of rank Popery -- oh Lord, Stephen, I am laid by the lee again. I am so sorry."

The Truelove, p. 88.

"Scribble, scribble, scribble, Dr Maturin," said Jack.

"You are not wet at all, I find," said Stephen.

"No," said Jack. "Not to put too fine a point on it, I am quite dry; and was you to put your nose above the coaming and look at the dog-vane, you would see why. The wind has veered a whole point, and the spray goes well away to leeward. In any case the sea has gone down. Could you do with a cup of coffee and a breadfruit biscuit?"

"I could, too."

The Truelove, p. 209.

Jack Aubrey weighed sixteen or seventeen stone, Stephen barely nine, and to avoid the tedium of self-sacrifice, protests against the sacrifice, and privy maundering afterwards it had long been agreed that they should share accordingly: finishing his fourth dish, therefore, Jack also finished his explanation of the remarkable sailing qualities of both the Franklin and the Surprise: "... so as I say, although at present we have the current setting against us, I believe I can promise we shall make as much of what breeze there is as any two ships afloat: from the look of the sky and the glass I should not be astonished if we achieved five knots tomorrow. And then, you know, as we slant down towards the equator, there is the counter-current in our favour."

"So much the better," said Stephen. "Now what do you say to our Boccherini in D major? The minuet has been running in my head these last two or three days; but we still have to work out the adagio."

"I should like it of all things," said Jack.

The Wine-Dark Sea, p. 61.

When he came back he found Jack arranging the score of their next duet on their music stands. Like many other heavy men Jack could be as sensitive as a cat on occasion: he knew that he had touched on some painful area -- that in any case Stephen hated questions -- and he was particularly attentive in laying out the sheets, pouring Stephen another glass of wine, and, when they began, in so playing that his violin helped the 'cello, yielding to it in those minute ways perceptible to those who are deep in their music if to few others.

They played on, and only once did Jack raise his head from the score: the ship was leaning half a strake, and beneath their strings the sound of the rigging could just be heard. At the end of the allegro he said, turning the page with his bow, "She is making four knots."

"I believe we may attack the adagio directly," said Stephen. "The wind is in our poop, and we have never played better."

They swept into the next movement, the 'cello booming nobly, and carried straight on without a pause, separating, joining, answering one another, with never a hesitation nor a false note until the full satisfaction of the end.

The Wine-Dark Sea, p. 63-64.

Stephen was not a heavy, impercipient man in most respects, yet he had known Jack Aubrey all these years without discovering that he disliked even a very little blood and slime extremely: that is to say, cold blood and slime. In battle he was accustomed to wading ankle-deep in both without the least repulsion, laying about him in a very dreadful manner. But he could scarcely be brought to wring a chicken's neck, still less watch a surgical operation.

"You will take the exposed furcula between your finger and thumb," Stephen went on, "and all proportions guarded you will gauge its immobility."

Jack gave a thin smile: seven excuses came to his mind. But he was much attached to his friend; and the excuses were improbable at best. He walked slowly forward into what had once been his dining-cabin and was now, to judge from the reek, a charnel-house.

He did indeed take the exposed furcula as he was desired to do, and he listened to Stephen's explanations with his head gravely inclined: he looked not unlike a very large dog that was conscientiously carrying out an unpleasant duty: but how happy he was when the duty was done, when the explanations came to an end, and when he could walk out in to the fresh air with a clear conscience!

The Wine-Dark Sea, p. 91-92.

"I wonder you can speak with such levity about my daughter. I have always treated yours with proper respect."

"You called them a pair of turnip-headed swabs once, when they were still in long clothes."

"For shame, Jack: a hissing shame upon you. Those were your very own words when you showed them to me at Ashgrove before our voyage to the Mauritius. Your soul to the Devil."

"Well, perhaps they were. Yes: you are quite right -- I remember now -- you warned me not to toss them into the air, as being bad for the intellects. I beg pardon. But tell me, brother, has nobody told you what is afoot?"

"They have not."

"Where have you been?"

"I have been in my cabin downstairs, contemplating on mercury."

"A delightful occupation. But he is not to be seen now, you know: he is too near the sun. And to tell you the truth he is neither much of a spectacle nor a great help in navigation, though charming from the purely astronomical point of view."

"I meant the metallic element. In its pure state quicksilver is perfectly neutral; you may swallow half a pint without harm. But in its various combinations it is sometimes benign -- where would you portly men be without the blue pill? -- and sometimes, when exhibited by inexpert hands, its compounds are mortal in doses so small they can hardly be conceived."

"So you know nothing of what is going forward?"

"Brother, how tedious you can be, on occasion. I did hear some cries of 'Jolly rogers -- jolly rogers -- we shall roger them.' But in parenthesis, Jack, tell me about this word roger. I have often heard it aboard, but can make out no clear nautical signification."

"Oh, it is no sea-term. They use it ashore much more than we do -- a low cant expression meaning to swive or couple with."

Stephen considered for a moment and then said, "So roger joins bugger and that even coarser word; and they are all used in defiance and contempt, as though to an enemy; which seems to show a curious light on the lover's subjacent emotions. Conquest, rape, subjugation: have women a private language of the same nature, I wonder?"

Jack said, "In some parts of the West Country rams are called Roger, as cats are called Puss; and of course that is their duty; though which came first, the deed or the doer, the goose or the egg, I am not learned enough to tell."

"Would it not be the owl, at all?"

"Never in life, my poor Stephen. Who ever heard of a golden owl?"

The Wine-Dark Sea, p. 105-106.

"We shall have to stand off and on until well past the full," said Jack at supper -- fish soup, a dish of sweetbreads, Peruvian cheese, two bottles of Coquimbo claret -- "The full of the moon, of course."

"An uninviting prospect," said Stephen. "Last night I was unable to control my 'cello because of the erratic jerking of the floor, and this evening most of my soup is spread on my lap; while day after day men are brought below with cruel bruises, even broken bones, and are falling from the frozen ropes above or slipping on the icy deck below. Do you not think it would be better to go home?"

"Yes. It often occurs to me, but then my innate nobility of character cries out, 'Hey, Jack Aubrey: you mind your duty, d'ye hear me there?' Do you know about duty, Stephen?"

"I believe I have heard it well spoken of."

"Well, it exists."

The Wine-Dark Sea, p. 234.

"Now I come to think of it," said Jack, who had meant no harm at all, "I do not believe you have ever been aloft with the ship a little skittish. I hope it don't make you uneasy?"

"Not at all," said Stephen, glancing over the edge at the absurdly distant white-streaked sea immediately below on the starboard roll and closing his eyes again. "I like it of all things."

The Wine-Dark Sea, p. 236.

"Pass the word for Dr Maturin," said the Commodore, and the word passed down through the echoing decks.

"Him and the Commodore have been tie-mates this many a year," observed a seaman as it made its way along the orlop.

The Commodore, p. 96.

"Why, Stephen, there you are," cried Jack. "I have not seen you this age. How do you do?"

"Admirably well, I thank you. My sick-berth gives me great satisfaction. But," he went on, turning Jack to the light and peering up into his face, "I cannot congratulate you on your looks."

"You have never yet congratulated me on my looks at any time: it would make me uneasy if you were to begin now."

The Commodore, p. 185.

Coming into the cabin he found Jack sitting placidly on a locker, treating his fiddle to a fresh set of strings.

"Why, Stephen," he said, looking up, "I was so sorry to dash your spirits about the fetid swamp; but I dare say the miasma would have done you as much harm as an ordinary unlearned cove."

"Not at all, my dear," said Stephen. "I contemplated on the delights of the Sinon, the river that comes down by Philip's Island. I reflected upon the variety of vegetables and animals, of the very real possibility of a potto, and soon recovered my native ebullience."

The Commodore, p. 209.

It was through this prostration and this delirium -- a moderate delirium, apparently checked by the coca-leaves and nearer to a waking dream than to the raving of high fever -- that Stephen was continuously aware of Jack, a comforting presence, moving quietly about the room, talking now and then in a low voice, giving him a drink, holding him up to be sick.

The Commodore, p. 229.

"Never say that I am no weather-prophet," said Jack as he and Stephen sat down to dinner at a table that no longer required fiddles to keep the plates from one's lap. "And I believe my fog is on its way."

"God love you for your words, my dear. I should have been sorely vexed to miss my rendezvous."

"Yet it must not be too thick, for although our Brittany pilot knows the bay like his own bed, he has to have a terminus a quo and a terminus ad quem." He gave Stephen a satisfied look, and paused; but Stephen's face, civilly attentive, showed no change whatsoever; and Jack, never one to bear resentment, went on, "He is marking Ramillies's chart at present -- by the way, I asked Ramillies to dinner today -- we have an enormous great fat goose -- but he begged to be excused. He is taking medicine."

The Yellow Admiral, p. 115-116.

Jack and Stephen met again, almost on the very steps of the Crown. "Well met, brother," cried Jack from a little distance. Stephen considered the Commodore's face and his gait: was he sober? "You look uncommon cheerful, my dear," he said, leading him in the direction of the Pigtail Steps. "I wish you may not have met with some compliant young person, overwhelmed with all the gold lace upon your person."

"Never in life," said Jack. "Aubrey the Chaste is what I am called throughout the service. I did indeed meet a young person, but one that shaves, when he can afford it. Stephen, you may remember that I have told you about our grievous lack of master's mates, and how I yearned to replace poor Wantage?"

"I do not suppose you have mentioned it much above ten times a day."

The Hundred Days, p. 80-81.

"Now, Stephen," he said rather pettishly, "what are you pottering about for?"

"Pottering, is it? Have I not been searching every nook and cranny in this vile tub and the Dear knows she has a thousand of both systematically searching for my rosin, my only piece of rosin since an ill-conditioned rat ate the others. May I ask you to look in your pocket?"

"Oh, Stephen," cried Jack, his look of righteous indignation changing to a flush as he brought the rosin out with his handkerchief. "I am so sorry -- so very sorry. I do beg your pardon."

"Was you playing?" asked Stephen as he picked fluff and hairs off the ball.

Blue at the Mizzen, p. 99.