Free The Wine-Dark Sea by Patrick O’Brian Page A

however hungry he might be was required by custom to dine later than anyone else. After the shadowy gunroom the full day was almost intolerably bright, a blue day with white clouds sailing on the warm breeze, a white ripple on the small cross-seas, no marked roll or pitch. They paced up and down with their eyes narrowed until they became used to the brilliance; and Martin said, 'An odd, somewhat disturbing thing happened to me this morning. I was coming back from the Franklin when Johnson pointed out a bird, a small pale bird that overtook us, circled the boat and flew on: certainly a petrel and probably Hahnemann's. Yet although I watched it with a certain pleasure I suddenly realized that I did not really care. I did not mind what it was called.'
    'We have never yet seen Hahnemann's petrel.'
    'No. That was what made it so disturbing. I must not compare great things with small, but one hears of men losing their faith: waking up one morning and finding that they do not believe in the Creed they must recite to the congregation in a few hours' time.'
    'One does, too. And on a scale of infinitely less consequence but still distressing there was a cousin of mine in the County Down who found - one morning, just as you say - that he no longer loved the young woman to whom he had made an offer. She was the same young woman, with the same physical advantages and the same accomplishments; she had done nothing reprehensible; but he did not love her.'
    'What did the poor man do?'
    'He married her.'
    'Was the marriage happy?'
    'When you look about among your acquaintance do you find many happy marriages?'
    Martin considered. 'No,' he said, 'I do not. My own is very happy, however; and with that,' nodding over the water at the prize, 'it is likely to be even happier. All the hands who have been on the Nootka run say she is extremely rich. And sometimes I wonder whether, with such a wife, a parish and the promise of preferment, I am justified in leading my present wandering life, delightful though it may be on such a day as this.'
    Six bells, and they hurried down the companion-ladder. 'Come in, gentlemen, come in,' cried Jack. He was always a little over-cordial with Martin, whom he did not like very much and whom he did not invite as often as he felt he ought. Killick's arrival with the coffee and his mate's with little toasted slices of dried breadfruit masked the slight, the very slight, awkwardness and when they were all sitting comfortably, holding their little cups and gazing out of the sweep of windows that formed the aftermost wall of the great cabin, Jack asked, 'What news of your instrument, Mr Martin?'
    The instrument in question was a viola, upon which, before it was broken, Martin played indifferently, having an uncertain ear and an imperfect sense of time. No one had expected to hear it again this voyage, or at least not until they touched at Callao; but the fortune of war had brought them a French repairer, a craftsman who had been sent to Louisiana for a variety of crimes, mostly crapulous, and who, escaping from bondage, had joined the Franklin.
    'Gourin says that Mr Bentley has promised him a piece of lignum vitae as soon as he has a moment to spare: then it will be only half a day's work, and time for the glue to dry.'
    'I am so glad,' said Jack. 'We must have some more music one of these days. There is another thing I wanted to ask, for you know a great deal about the various religious persuasions, as I recall?'
    'I should, sir, because in the days when I was only an unbeneficed clergyman,' said Martin, with a bow towards his patron, 'I translated the whole of Muller's great book, wrote my version out again in a fair copy, saw it through the press and corrected two sets of proofs; every word I read five times, and some very curious sects did I come across. There were the Ascitants, for example, who used to dance round an inflated wine-skin.'
    'The people I should like to know about are Knipperdollings.'
    'Our