16 The Wine-Dark Sea - Libro della tutto

Patrick O'Brian The Wine-Dark Sea
besides, it had taken him years to persuade
Stephen that nautical days really did start at
noon, and he did not want his imperfect conviction
to be shaken in any way at all. Then
again, once this last day of the month had in
fact begun, he meant to carry out some physical
measurements for his friend the polymath
Alexander Humboldt, in whose penguin-filled
cold northern current the ship was now swimming.
Silence fore and aft: anxious peering through
many an eyepiece. Jack brought his own sun
down three times to the fine firm horizon, and
on the third it was a trifle below the second,
which had been the true altitude. He noted the
angle, and turning he found Tom Pullings,
who in this anomalous ship played many parts
as well as that of first lieutenant, standing
there bare-headed beside him. 'Noon and
thirty-three degrees south, sir, if you please,'