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THE RUSSIAN FLEET

he has to grapple with ; the long winters proving amain impediment to his people’s learning that art;since in so long an interval they easily forgot whatthey but imperfectly knew the foregoing summer.Nay, if a man of some experience comes, and con-tinues a while in their fleet, he must use someaddress to retain his former acquisitions of know-ledge ; for as there is neither ebb nor flood in theBaltic, some essentials in a seaman’s duty are notto be learned by the ignorant, and persons of someskill in navigation preserve with difficulty the ex-perience they had formerly gained. These, withother reasons, will necessitate the Tsar to be at theconstant charge of fitting out annually a squadronof ships of war for sea, be it only to discipline hismen.

Boys in the service are of late standing ; and thepractice of breaking regiments for some years past,and forcing the men to serve at sea, has but littleanswered the design. For these people, longinured to the land service and now compelled whenstiff with age and accidents to enter upon a life ofquite a different nature, are so disheartened, that inbad weather, when ordered to go aloft, they will fallall along, and submit to your utmost resentment,rather than stir a foot in what they apprehend sohazardous an undertaking. And the Russian popu-lation in general are incredibly dispirited, partlythrough the despotic power of their superiors ; as alsoby their own mean, sordid way of living, being muchaddicted to salts and acids and extremely afflictedwith the scurvy ; and so accustomed to bagnios thatunless they have recourse at least once a week tocleanse themselves, they are almost consumed withvermin. But of the last disservice in this article,is that their religion enjoins a strict observation ofthree annual fasts, amounting in the whole to fifteen