Quart

I always thought "quart" referred to a quarter of a gallon (presumably whatever the local gallon is). Wikipedia seems to agree.

But in one of the Patrick O'Brian books, the characters seem to refer to it as a quarter of a pint. Did I misread it? Or did the usage change over the last 200 years (or vary regionally)? Or is there a mistake by the copyeditor or author?

(Or possibly by the character saying it, although that seems unlikely.)

Mark 2:15-17

“Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?”

17 On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

This is another of the famous quotes, and one I quite like.

It's another that would probably be more readily understandable if "sinners and tax collectors" were translated into something more familiar to a modern reader. Perhaps "people who've been to jail a couple of times" fit the same "ostracised, sinning, but fairly normal for their culture" role?

Although it's probably instructive to imagine the same passage with a variety of different sinners. People probably imagine Jesus meeting people doing something technically illegal and socially ostracised, like people who've done prostitution.

How do you feel if Jesus were eating with someone in the middle of a killing spree?

What about running a corrupt hedge fund?

What about world leaders who committed their country to expensive and pointless wars with lots of people dead?

To me, each one produces a different sort of "He can't eat with them! No, wait..."

But on the other hand, most people read this passage already know that Jesus always turns out to have known best. If you knew a long-haired hippie cult leader, but DIDN'T think they were the son of God, wandering round the country collecting bands of desperate people and leading them away from their homes telling them "it doesn't matter if you have a home or a job, as long as you're with me everything will be ok", you would probably have lots of worries about how it might go wrong, but some of the worries might actually be RIGHT.

Quart II

OK, I found the relevant quote online. It was in Master and Commander, not Post Captain.

How much did he drink? Why, now, Tom was a popular young chap, so I dare say he had the whole allowance, bating maybe a sip or two just to moisten their victuals. That would make it close on a quart.'

'A quart. Well, it is a great deal: but I am surprised it should kill a man. At an admixture
of three to one, that amounts to six ounces or so – inebriating, but scarcely lethal.'

'Lord, Doctor,' said the gunner, looking at him with affectionate pity, 'that ain't the mixture.
That's the rum.'

'A quart of rum? Of neat rum?' cried Stephen.

'That's right, sir. Each man has his half-pint a day, at twice, so that makes a quart for each mess for dinner and for supper: and that is what the water is added to. Oh dear me,' he said, laughing gently and patting the poor corpse on the deck between them, 'if they was only to get half a pint of three-water grog we should soon have a bloody mutiny on our hands. And quite right, too.'

'Half a pint of spirits a day for every man?' said Stephen, flushing with anger.

I'm not positive my interpretation is right, but it looks to me like "allowance" refers to what you get twice a day, and "at twice" means "in two lots" not "twice". And that both people agree on the figures. I wouldn't have asked if it didn't look fairly incontrovertable, else I would just have assumed I (or the author, or the character) had muddled the figures somehow which didn't seem unlikely.

Printers

I wish my printer had a button that said "ignore the freaking settings, assume I want to print this from the tray that has paper in, not any of the others" :(