The pole mast was only a few inches thick and he locked his legs around it securely before transferring his grip and hauling himself upwards. Not daring to look down he watched the truck come closer - nearer, and then it was within his reach. Something rattled on the far side of the mast. He followed it up and saw that it was a stout chain clamped to the round of the truck. A new-fangled lightning conductor. On a crazy impulse he transferred his hands to the chain and drew himself up to the truck itself. A strong copper rod continued in the thin air beyond the truck.

It was the work of moments to heave himself up and past the cap - and then he was standing erect on the bird-slimed truck, trembling with fatigue and exhilaration and holding the lightning rod in a death grip. He flung up an arm to indicate his position, but before starting his descent he snatched a look at the panorama. Every part of the vessel was now at a level below him, decks, masts, sails. Not a single thing intruded to spoil the totality of his three-hundred-and-sixty-degree view.

Carefully lowering himself back down the mast, he slid the few feet down to the royal backstay. Transferring his grip from mast to stay he soared hand over hand down the backstay to the deck again.

'I do confess I am at a stand. It's no parcel of lubberly landmen we have here, Mr Spershott,' Powlett said to the lean officer next to him.

It took a moment or two for Kydd to realise why the mess deck was so different. There were the same mess tables and ship's side racks for cutlery and mess traps, but here there were no massive cannon regularly spaced along the sides. Aboard the battleship Kydd was used to having his living space between a pair of massive thirty-two-pounder long guns, sharing his domestics with the smoke and blast of broadsides, but here there was only a single function.

It was noon and the berth deck was alive with gossip and laughter after the issue of grog. A ship's boy had shown them to their new mess, half the party to a starboard mess, the other to larboard. They stood awkwardly.