16 The Wine-Dark Sea - Libro della tutto

Patrick O'Brian The Wine-Dark Sea
more, either.'
'The facetious bosun?'
'Just so. He had also been a bosun in the
Navy, you know; and with the Surprise being
run man-of-war fashion he slipped back more
and more into his old service ways. You know
the expression capabarre, I dare say?'
'Certainly. I am no new-fledged canvasclimber,
I believe. It is the topmost summit, the
ultimate pinnacle of some towering mast.'
'No doubt. But we commonly use it for that
tendency in the bosuns of King's ships to steal
all marine stores not immovably screwed
down. I checked him once for a missing kedge
in Annamooka and again for a coil of threeinch
manilla at Moahu, with God knows how
many things in between; and he promised to
reform. But in Callao he made off with several
lengths of chain, a can-hook, and our light-