16 The Wine-Dark Sea - Libro della tutto

Patrick O'Brian The Wine-Dark Sea
ceivable nature they could prove their innocence.
At this conference they had weighed a
number of sacks of dried peas, and Jack, taking
advantage of the steelyard hanging from a
convenient beam, had also weighed himself:
to his shame he found that he had put on half
a stone, and he meant to walk it off as soon
as possible. He wished to hear no more flings
about obesity, no more facetious remarks
about letting out his waistcoats, no grave professional
warnings about the price big heavy
men of a sanguine temperament had so often
to pay for taking too little exercise, too much
food and too much drink: apoplexy, softening
of the brain, impotence.
Fore and aft, fore and aft, pacing the windward
side of the quarterdeck, his own private
realm, a narrow unencumbered path on which
he had travelled hundreds, even thousands of
miles since he first commanded the Surprise;