You know how sailors love to create mystery where there is none. — Douglas Reeman

He was ashamed and embarrassed, angry too that such a man could end like this. If peace did eventually come, there would be many more redcoats begging in the streets.

Each gun-captain was a king, every breech a small demanding kingdom.

It was a harsh school, right enough ... but a lot of good had come from it.The petty tyrants and bullies were fewer now, for braggarts had little to sustain them in the face of an enemy broadside.