HISTORY OF MARINE ARCHITECTURE:

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tended this ill-fated little armament, were not peculiar to itself. Felt, in a noless cruel degree, by the force sent to counteract its effects, the advocates in favourof its projectors poorly sought to palliate, in some measure, the miserable fat<*which attended their own countrymen, by enumerating, with an air of unphilanrthropic triumph, the losses of the enemy, and boasting that the distresses which theyunfortunately sustained on the same occasion, in a similar line of misery, consider-ably exceeded that of their own countrymen. In Europe, the warfare of the At-lantic appeared totally committed by the foe, to the charge of very inconsiderableprivateers, too swift to dread the vengeance of the British cannon ; and, at all times,certainly in general too contemptable to merit its vengeance. Availing themselvesof the former, and confiding in the latter, the spirit of enterprize was excited in theminds of Spanish adventurers. The depredations committed on the commerce ofBritain was immense; and notwithstanding the English fleet rode the undisputedmistress of the ocean, from the British Channel to the Streights of Gibraltar, duringthe whole of the war, the inhabitants of Spain were actually acquiring wealth fromthe predatory excesses of these petty corsairs. From the commencement of hostilities,till the time when France marie herself a party in the dispute, no naval event, inthe smallest degree consequential, appears to have taken place on the side of theAtlantic, except the capture of the Princessa, of 70 guns, and nearly eighteenhundred tons burthen. The effect produced by this success, which was effected,though with no inconsiderable difficulty, by three ships, nominally of equal forcewith herself, but of far inferior dimensions, and such very inadequate proportions, inrespect to force, as rendered them almost totally incompetent to the task of sustaininga combat, on any ground, against so formidable a vessel, had an instantaneous andmost salutary effect in producing that reform and alteration of system which hadbeen so long necessary. Sir John Norris, who was then universally considered thenaval oracle of Britain, was written to, by order of the admiralty board, on thissubject. The letter, with the documents annexed to it, form a curious, and well-eonnected, though concise history, of the civil eftablishment of the British navy,from the early part of queen Ann’s reign, down to the period when the shipjust mentioned was taken.

“ SIR,

“ The Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty have, sometime since, taken intoconsideration the methods now in use for building and re-building the ships of theroyal navy, and find that there has been no regular establishment made therein

since