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portance to this empire to be left to the bare contingencies of wind and weather, or of ships being present to protect them; and no expence or precaution should be spared to make them secure; which at present they are not, and never have been. I will add that, besides being rendered invulnerable from outward attack, they should be purified from the presence of convicts. The labour done in them should be per. formed by honest men, at a fair and reasonable remuneration; and so good a price should be paid as to render expulsion a severe punish

ment.

The plan of employing felons in our dock yards, and giving them better food and clothing than the poor but honest labourer is able to obtain, has operated as a stimulant to vice and crime, and has done infinite mischief to the morals and habits of the working classes. The miserable reason for this, which was once. given to me by a gallant officer at the head of one of these establishments, was, that the men so employed did not become chargeable to the parish: forgetting how many other honest people were driven to seek parochial relief by that very system of employing convict labour. Our shameful and abandoned policy has been, first to degrade a human being to the lowest possible level, and

then to obtain his labour (as you fancy) gratuitously, in expiation of his offence. The error is great, and the plan extravagant, and may be fatal for our dockyards are our main feature of strength and greatness.

The motto on the coat of arms of Lord St. Vincent, "Thus," was suggested, his lordship told me, by his sister, Mrs. Ricketts, who had heard the details of the above chase and the action talked over among her brother's friends so often as to become conversant in naval terms. The expression is peculiar to ships sailing by the wind, or in chace of an enemy. When the captain or master says, in giving directions to the helmsman, "Thus," he means to keep the ship's head directed to an indicated point of the compass. The escutcheon partook of the name of both ships: an eagle grasping a thunderbolt represents the Foudroyant; the winged horse, the Pegase.

Sir John Jervis was advanced to the rank of Rear Admiral of the Blue, on the 24th Sept., 1787; and in 1793 to that of Vice Admiral; in 1795, he was made a full Admiral.

During the war, promotions were sufficiently rapid; but, in the later years of the peace, they have not been so by any means. In 1790, after what was called the Spanish armament, two

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hundred young men were promoted to the rank of lieutenants, almost every one of whom amply repaid the generous expenditure, by becoming the brightest ornaments of the profession. At that time, we had not more than one thousand two hundred lieutenants on the list, and of these there were four hundred candidates for active employment at sea. At this moment, with three thousand six hundred lieutenants on the list, there is not one to be found who will voluntarily go afloat, unless in some very particular situation, where he is morally certain of promotion. The fact is, that sufficient encouragement is not given to any class of officers, either in pay or promotion; and no man will resign his domestic comforts, with a certainty of decreasing his income, and wearing out his constitution, without a hope of any distant or even final reward. Our young officers require the stimulant of promotion, while the old and worn out claim the national gratitude in the form of a liberal retirement. But the navy seems to have been entirely forgotten, in these days of " economy, retrenchment, and reform."

My warning at present will probably go for nothing; but what will the economists and the nation say when they see the British coast insulted by a foreign fleet? and they may see it

ere long. In fact, Russia, France, and America, are rapidly improving their marine; while our's, in point of officers and seamen, is going as rapidly to decay. At the same time, it must be admitted that we are improving in the art of ship-building; but, if our sailors are not better attended to, we shall only be building fine ships for our enemies to take, thus aggravating tenfold both our disgrace and our calamity. The injustice spoken of in the following chapter, of the appointment of children, certainly does not exist, but a neglect of the service has succeeded -a neglect the more fatal, since we scarcely know on what particular body to lay the charge. It is a general apathy and indifference to the once favoured profession, which is the sure forerunner of national decay.

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CHAPTER IV.

Sir John Jervis makes his first appearance in Parliament — Advocates the cause of Captain David Brodie - Is defeated— Remarks — Has his flag on board the Prince of 98 guns, in 1790-In 1792 makes a motion in the House of Commons in favour of disabled Seamen Motion withdrawn in consequence of a promise for redress.

THE first time I find the name of Sir John Jervis on the records of the House of Commons, is in the minority on Mr. Fox's bill, November the 27th, 1783, for vesting the affairs of the East India Company in the hands of commissioners; but I do not find that he offered any remarks upon the occasion. The first time he spoke was on the 31st of May, 1784, when Mr. Brett, then a lord of the Admiralty, moved for twentysix thousand seamen to be employed in the service of the current year.

On this occasion, Admiral Sir Thomas Frankland, grandfather to the present Sir Robert Frankland Russell, spoke with great energy on the decay of discipline in the navy, and the appointment of boys to the rank of lieutenants; in which complaint he was too well borne out by the facts, when it is remembered, that children