Maturin enters actively into the humor of fractured proverbs by the eighth novel, "The Ionian Mission", as shown in this exchange between the two friends in Chapter 10: 'Why, as to that,' said Jack, blowing on his coffee-cup and staring out of the stern-window at the harbour, 'as to that ... if you do not choose to call him a pragmatical clinchpoop and kick his breech, which you might think ungenteel, perhaps you could tell him to judge the pudding by its fruit.' 'You mean, prove the tree by its eating.' 'No, no, Stephen, you are quite out: eating a tree would prove nothing. And then you might ask him, had he ever seen many poltroons in the Navy?' 'I am not quite sure what you mean by poltroons.'