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| The USS Constitution vs the HMS Java - Patrick O'Brian |
I'm re-reading The Fortune of War by Patrick O'Brian and the War of 1812 is going on. Stephen and Jack are aboard the HMS Java when they meet the USS Constitution off the coast of Brazil in mortal combat. Java is destroyed, the surviving Brits are captured and Jack and Stephen are interned in Boston.
Then I came across this bit that seems apropos of our current political contest. Stephen and the senior Mr. Herapath, a well-to-do Boston businessman, walk by one of Mr. Herapath's ships tied up in the harbor and Mr. Herapath hails his man keeping watch:
'Joe!' he shouted.
'What now?' called Joe from out of the fog.
"Mind your fenders.'
'I am a-minding them, ain't I?'
'God's my life,' said Herapath to Stephen, 'to speak to the owner so, and a black man at that! It could never have happened in the old days. With his democractical notions, that wicked fellow Jefferson has rotted the moral fibre of the whole country.'
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