'I wasn't thinking about the jolly boat,' said Hornblower. 'I was thinking about Hales.'
'Oh, 'im?' said Jackson. 'Don't you fret about 'im, sir. 'E wouldn't never 'ave made no seaman, not no 'ow.'
CHAPTER FIVE
The Man Who Saw God
Winter had come to the Bay of Biscay. With the passing of the Equinox the gales began to increase in violence, adding infinitely to the labours and dangers of the British Navy watching over the coast of France; easterly gales, bitter cold, which the storm-tossed ships had to endure as best they could, when the spray froze on the rigging and the labouring hulls leaked like baskets; westerly gales, when the ships had to claw their way to safety from a lee shore and make a risky compromise between gaining sufficient sea-room and maintaining a position from which they could pounce on any French vessel venturing out of harbour. The storm-tossed ships, we speak about. But those ships were full of storm-tossed men, who week by week and month by month had to endure the continual cold and the continual wet, the salt provisions, the endless toil, the boredom and misery of life in the blockading fleet. Even in the frigates, the eyes and claws of the blockaders, boredom had to be endured, the boredom of long periods with the hatches battened down, with the deck seams above dripping water on the men below, long nights and short days, broken sleep and yet not enough to do.
Even in the Indefatigable there was a feeling of restlessness in the air, and even a mere midshipman like Hornblower could be aware of it as he was looking over the men of his division before the captain's regular weekly inspection.
'What's the matter with your face, Styles?' he asked.
'Boils, sir. Awful bad.'
On Styles' cheeks and lips there were half a dozen dabs of sticking plaster.
'Have you done anything about them?'