He alluded to his nieces as rude, selfish monkeys, without either feelings or manners.

And he went on to talk about his ship being laid up for a month and dismantled for repairs.

The worst was that on arriving in London he found he couldn't get the rooms he was used to, where they made him as comfortable as such a confirmed sea-dog as himself could be anywhere on shore.
In the effort to subdue by dint of talking and to keep in check the mysterious, the profound attraction he felt already for that delicate being of flesh and blood, with pale cheeks, with darkened eyelids and eyes scalded with hot tears, he went on speaking of himself as a confirmed enemy of life on shore--a perfect terror to a simple man, what with the fads and proprieties and the ceremonies and affectations.

He hated all that.

He wasn't fit for it.