Chapter 4 Summary

Leopard makes excellent progress and the daily routine is interrupted only by punishment on Saturday. Herapath is brought up on being absent during his watch, Jack ascribes it to simple ignorance and the punishment is very lenient—Aubrey admonishes him. Later Herapath goes aloft, accompanied by an old salt. He is afraid but gains the top and feels liberated by the vast panorama. He begins to run about until he loses his balance and plunges into the sea. Aubrey, nearly as a matter of course, draws the drowning man from the water and Maturin revives him. Wogan sees the entire episode and—for the first time—realizes that Herapath is aboard. Sometime later Aubrey writes a long letter home to Sophie, noting all of the recent happenings and his interpretation thereof. He critiques his crew in an honest way and...