Captain Blood (Version 3)

Captain Blood is a historical novel written by Rafael Sabatini, about a quiet country doctor who gets swept away by the aftermath of the Monmouth rebellion in 1685. "Peter Blood, being quick to learn and oddly greedy of knowledge, received at the age of twenty the degree of baccalaureus medicinae at Trinity College, Dublin. His father survived that satisfaction by three months only. Thus Peter Blood came into an inheritance of some few hundred pounds, with which he had set out to see the world and give for a season a free rein to that restless spirit by which he was imbued. A set of curious chances led him to take service with the Dutch, then at war with France; and a predilection for the sea made him elect that this service should be upon that element. He had the advantage of a commission under the famous de Ruyter, and fought in the Mediterranean engagement in which that great Dutch admiral lost his life. "After a rather tumultuous career in the navy he has finally settled down a skillful but quiet country doctor. "Until the night Jeremy Pitt knocked on his door, and thus, Peter Blood set out upon his Odyssey. For this Pitt, in whom he beheld no more than the messenger of a wounded rebel gentleman, was indeed the very messenger of Fate." - Summary by UncleStripes and from the text