16 The Wine-Dark Sea - Libro della tutto

Patrick O'Brian The Wine-Dark Sea
Clarissa Oakes, poor young Oakes's widow,
who lives there: what a fine young woman she
is.' He paused again; then brightened and
went on, 'But tell me, as far as you can, because
Melville let me understand that there
was something confidential about your voyage'
– Melville, or more formally Lord Melville,
was Heneage Dundas's elder brother and First
Lord of the Admiralty – 'as far as you properly
can, then, how your enterprise went.'
'Well, I gathered that the first part, in the East
Indies, went well for Stephen – at least the
French were discomforted – but I flung the
Diane on a reef in the South China Sea, a total
loss. And then in this second bout, now
ending, thanks be, we did take a fair number
of prizes to begin with and we destroyed a
truly odious pirate; but then I contrived to lose
three American China ships: Heavens, such
wealth! It is true they were protected by a brig