16 The Wine-Dark Sea - Libro della tutto

Patrick O'Brian The Wine-Dark Sea
said Tom.
'Very good, Captain Pullings,' replied Jack.
'Make it twelve.'
Pullings turned to Norton, the mate of the
watch, and said, 'Make it twelve,' in a strong,
hieratic voice. Norton, with equal gravity,
hailed the quartermaster, not three feet away,
'Strike eight bells and turn the glass.' The four
double strokes rang out, and with the last still
in the air, Pullings, directing his words to the
bosun, roared, 'Pipe to dinner.'
The lions at the Tower of London made a
prodigious and indeed a shocking din on being
fed, but theirs was a kittenish mewling
compared with that of the Surprise; besides,
the lions were rarely provided with mess-kids
upon which the seamen beat with such zeal,
this being Thursday, a salt-pork day, and one
upon which an extraordinary plum-duff was to