The Readers Review: Literature from 1714 to 1910 discussion

O'Brien and Peter report for duty at Portsmouth, serving on a new ship, the Sanglier, with Captain John To, his wife and lots of pigs.
The ship goes to Plymouth to join a convoy to the West Indies, and Captain To swiches to another ship, trading places with Captain Savage.
How is this brought about?

Peter is sent on a shore errand by the lieutenant while Peter is wearing his dress uniform, and is punished on his return to the ship.
What occurred and why was the punishment unfair?

In the Bay of Biscay, Peter and Mr. Chucks have discussions about Peter's family, especially Lord Privilege. Peter's uncle, who has two daughters, has made a suspicious and sudden trip to Ireland, causing O'Brien to write a letter to Father McGrath.
What's going on here? Should Peter be worried?

On the way to the West Indies, the ship stops at Madeira, where Captain Savage goes onshore to dine with the governor.
He becomes seriously ill and dies as they are approaching Barbados.
There is a solemn funeral once they arrive on land, but after that the shore party gets rowdy.
What causes this? What does Peter learn?

The new captain is Captain Kearney, and Captain Falcon is assigned his own ship.
How would you describe Captain Kearney?

The following chapters contain conversations, tales of sea life, encounters with other ships and sea battles.
In the battle of St Thomas, Mr. Chucks is gravely wounded. What happens next?

As always, please comment on any characters, events or anything else that comes to mind.

Peter again proves to have wit when needed. His struggles to contain his men on shore reminded me of my time as a new teacher!
A number of incidents, including the party, caused me to remember how young Peter is and what a sheltered life he has led.

There is a democratizing theme in the book, as multiple officers are shown to be selfish, arrogant, or dishonest. There is a conversation about who is really a gentleman. The incident where Peter is blamed for the men's behavior on shore and the officer's subsequent apology showed respect across military grades.

He has a lot of responsibility for one so young, and he gets a raw deal sometimes-no time to sleep.

I enjoy Captain Kearney and his totally true 'tall tales" and the jabs that the subtley sardonic Phillot takes at his tales.

Rosemarie wrote: "How would you describe Captain Kearney?.."
Captain Kearney seems well-intentioned and if he tells 'tall-tales' its to entertain and impress and he has not bad-intentioned. In fact, I think Captain Kearney actually believes his own blarney probably because he's told certain stories often enough he's forgotten that he invented them. Since he invents stuff to entertain and impress and not to 'dupe" people, I think that eventually he truly forgets the source of his tales. It is funny that he certainly his on the alert for when anyone else might be telling a tall tale though. I understand, though. Inventing stories - that's his schtick. They should get their own schtick.

Another interesting section which threw up one or two events and procedures which fascinated me.

I was intrigued at the way Peter was sent up a mast to sit amongst the sails as a punishment. It was almost like a schoolboy punishment of the time, eg standing at the front of the class with a dunce sign around his neck. It didn’t explain how high he had to climb etcetera, and I wondered how many of the other sailors might be up there at any one time.

It seemed obvious that the sailors would want to see their wives and families etc. one last time before the ship departed, and poor Peter was at the mercy of all their tricks, not to mention their drunkenness. The fact that he was eventually cleared of all blame and received an apology did show that some of his superior officers at least were honest men and honour bound to admit their mistakes.

We found out more about life aboard ship in this section, including the different groups of sailors and how they prepared for a skirmish. Although they made light of cannon fire and grapeshot passing extremely close, I don’t think that the dangerous nature of their lives came across as strongly as I expected, even though poor Chucks becomes badly wounded.

Here are a one or two articles I found which are relevant to this week’s chapters.

https://www.warhistoryonline.com/inst...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british...

https://pennyhampson.co.uk/blog/histo...

Thank you for the links, Trev.
Years ago I read the book Scurvy: How a Surgeon, a Mariner, and a Gentleman Solved the Greatest Medical Mystery of the Age of Sail and learned just how pernicious a disease it is.