Man Of War

‘Very well,’ he said, clearing his throat, and trying not to stare too much at the surgeon’s temporary auxiliaries: there were a dozen of them, one or two distinctly matronly, clearly the true partners of a lifetime, but several of them (it was surely no trick of the light?) uncommonly pretty. How the times were changing!

He cleared his throat again, took out his hunter and held it to the lantern above the surgeon’s table. A quarter before six bells – eleven o’clock; he could have an hour’s practice at the guns before the watches changed. It would be enough to see how sharp was the crew. ‘Very well, Mr Lambe, let us be about our business: we shall beat to quarters and clear for action!’

The order shrilled from hatch to hatch as the relay of midshipmen passed the word ‘arsey-varsey’ – from orlop to quarterdeck – until the drummer of marines caught it and began beating ‘Hearts of Oak’ in rapid time. Everywhere men sprang to their tasks like hounds to the scent. Peto had seen it so many times that it ought to have been a commonplace, but the thrill of the drumming, and the blood-lusting heaving on the guns never failed to set his own blood coursing, as if it would burst from his very veins. His hand twitched for the hilt of his sword (Flowerdew would be waiting with it on the quarterdeck, as he had always done): now they would see what the crew of His Majesty’s Ship Prince Rupert were made of.

Giving the order on the orlop was not without its advantages, however unusual: it allowed Peto a fair impression of each gun-deck as he made his way to his own station. The carpenter and his mates had already made aft, like terriers, to the officers’ quarters to unship the bulkheads – he had no fears on account of Mr Storr and his men – but other hands looked less capable, less ferocious in their clearing of comforts and the like. The boatswain knew it too: he was already among them flaying and lashing. In Nelson’s day he would have used the knotted rope; now he could only use his tongue (at least when there were witnesses). But with what violence and volume did Craig assault the crewmen thus! And with most palpable effect as the mates hurled trenchers and pots through the gunports to speed the effort.

On the middle deck they were already casting guns loose from the lashings, though too gingerly, to Peto’s mind – like men who still feared them as wild beasts rather than handling them as if tamed brutes. They seemed to know the working of their business, however, getting away the tackles neatly enough, and the breechings. Crows, handspikes, sponges and worm were all being laid out smartly, wads and shot garland too.

When he reached the upper deck the first of the gun captains were returning from the gunner’s storerooms with their cartouches and gunlocks, and the powder-boys were struggling up the ladders with their ‘salt-boxes’, the charges for the first broadside. Others were sprinkling wet sand on the decking, fetching buckets of drinking-water to each gun, and tubs of saltwater for the swabs. Above the waist and quarterdeck the netting was going up, if awkwardly, much to the consternation of the master’s mates; but aloft, Peto observed the topmen stopping the sheets and slinging the lower yards with chain as ably as ever he had seen it.

As he took the ladder to the quarterdeck he noted the reassuring red of the marines on the poop and forecastle. They were ever a steady and steadying sight – and some of them now armed with rifles, he was pleased to see (for practised as the marines were, the sea-pattern musket had as much windage as the land pattern, and was consequently no more accurate). He saw the fifers and drummers mustered in the waist, a dozen little fellows in oversize coats, younger even than the ship’s boys. They would keep the marines well supplied with cartridge during the fight – and cheer them with a merry tune as they closed for action. Peto felt an uncharacteristic lump in his throat at the sight of them – and the powder-monkeys – as he went to his place of command.

Lambe was already at his post as Peto took his sword from Flowerdew and buckled it on. He touched his hat to his captain, perhaps a shade anxiously, for he knew the clearing was too slow (not a single lieutenant had yet reported his part of ship ready, save the captain of marines), but he would make no excuse. They had held but two exercises with the guns – each ‘dry’, without powder – and this Peto knew already. It mattered not a jot, though, that heavy weather in the Channel and Biscay had kept the gunports closed, for the enemy made no concessions.

Peto touched his hat by return and took out his watch, rubbing salt into the soreness that was the lieutenant’s consternation. ‘It will not do, Mr Lambe. Fifteen minutes gone and not a battery ready.’

‘No indeed, sir.’

‘And the boats still inboard.’

‘Sir.’