In The Mauritius Command, Captain Jack Aubrey is ashore on half-pay without a command until his friend, and occasional intelligence agent, Stephen Maturin, arrives with secret orders for Aubrey to take a frigate to the Cape of Good Hope under a Commodore′s pennant.

But the difficulties of carrying out his orders are compounded by two of his own captains , one a pleasure-seeking dilettante, the other liable to provoke the crew to mutiny.