202
HISTORY OF MARINE ARCHITECTURE.
creased, even under the pressure of hostilities, from two hundred and seventv-four to three hundred and forty sail. In this augmentation there were com-prised twenty-one ships of the third rate, which experience had proved to be themost useful class of vessels constructed for the weightier purposes of war.
The attention both of government and of private individuals was not confinedto the mere augmentation of the marine, in respect to numbers, but every effortand experiment that prudence, study, and ingenuity, could suggest, were pro-gressively tried, for the purpose of effecting improvement in it. Those dimen-sions, which had a few years before been in general use and adoption, but, whoseinconvenience having long been complained of, began ere the conclusion ofthe preceding war to be partially removed, were during the succeeding peacetotally abolished. The third rates carrying eighty guns on three decks werecompletely laid aside; the Cambridge and Princess Amelia being the lastships of that class which were launched, the latter in the year 1759; theCambridge four years earlier: nor would those have been, in all probabi-lity, constructed, had not the timber and materials been prepared for the pur-pose ere mature consideration and observation had raised so perfect a judge-ment of the defects, as to cause a determination of totally abandoning the sys-tem of building three-decked ships carrying less than 90 guns. The ships mount-ing seventy guns as well as those of sixty became also exploded, and were re-placed by others carrying seventy-four and sixty-four guns. By augmentingthe tonnage of the former from 1230 to 1560 tons, which was the general bur-then of the new third rates, they became infinitely more equal to the task ofcontending with the enormous ships belonging to the enemy, which though no-minally of the same force, would in all probability have been able, under ju-
Epreuve
Hawke
Virgin
Ferret
Merlin
Stork
Speedwell cutterBasilisk bombFalcon bombSavage
14 1762 Lost in her return from South Carolina
12 1759 Taken off Cape Clear, retaken in 1761
12 1760 Taken in the West Indies; retaken the end of the year
12 1757 Foundered off Louisburg
10 1757 Taken off Brest, retaken next year
10 175S Taken in the West Indies
]() 1761 Detained in the harbour of Vigo
8 1763 Taken by the Audacieux privateer
8 1759 Lost in the West Indies
9 1762 Lost in Torbay
In the preceding list, however, it is to be remarked, that one ship only of 60 guns-, one of 50;three of 20 ; one of 18; two of 1 2 ; three of 10 : one of 8 guns each; making, in the whole, 12 sail,were captured, of which two only were of two decks, and all the rest of the most contemptible Free.Several of the ships lost had been launched during the war; an additional proof of the extent to whichBritish exertion was carried.
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