Absolutely making history, sir." But this event, creditable to Nostromo, was to lead immediately to another, which could not be classed either as "history" or as "a mistake" in Captain Mitchell's phraseology.

He had another word for it.
"Sir" he used to say afterwards, "that was no mistake.

It was a fatality.

A misfortune, pure and simple, sir.

And that poor fellow of mine was right in it--right in the middle of it! A fatality, if ever there was one--and to my mind he has never been the same man since.".