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HISTORY OF MARINE ARCHITECTURE/

the peace, raised to that summit of power and consequence which it had neverbefore reached, and the same display of might, was by every possible and ener-getic exertion, attempted to be supported in the same height, after the commence-ment of hostilities, yet did the losses it sustained in the vain attempt towards itsmaintenance, exceed all former example, even of those times when she wasinvolved in the most disastrous of her contests. The dimensions adopted byFrance in all such ships as were caused to be new built, have been just given ;and the comparison between them, and the British vessels of the same rate andforce built at the same time, may be drawn with the utmost facility, by re-ferring to the ensuing chapter, in which it will be found there is not a singleclass of vessels, where such reference cannot be made, as well in respect to di-mensions, as theory of form, or contour, from the actual possession of bona fide ex-amples, which have fallen into the possession of Britain. At the close of the eigh-teenth century, the latter country had actually acquired during the contest no1 fewer than twenty-four sail of the line, forty-one frigates, and a multitude ofinferior vessels, which were then actually employed in her service; while thetotal loss sustained by her adversary, including ships destroyed in fight, orwrecked in the course of expeditions fruitlessly undertaken, amounted to noless than three hundred and thirty-two sail, among which were forty-eight ofthe line, and fifty-three frigates of the largest dimensions: a navy in itself,which in times not very far remote, particularly when the quality of thevessels concerned is taken into the account, would have been considered suffi-cient, under a proper direction and management, to have overawed the unitedforce of every maritime power on the face of the earth. *

* Out of the whole force belonging to the department of Toulon at the commencement of hostilities,four ships only of the line, and three small frigates remained to France at the conclusion of thecentury, while the Guillaume Tell and Languedoc of 84 guns, the Genereux, the Souverain, The.jnistocle, the Leopard, and the Lys of 74 guns each, the Arethuse, the Fortunec, the Alceste,the Mignonne, the Vestale frigates, and a considerable number of corvettes had been capturedor destroyed at Toulon, and the Mediterranean, which were detached from the departments ofBrest and Rochfort. Four ships cf the line and a small frigate sent away by the British ad-miral scon after the convention took place, also belonged to the department of the Atlantic. Duringthe continuance of the contest, the exertions made by France to repair the disasters she had sustained,considering the various quarters and points to which her force was dire£led, and by the mul-tiplicity of which, her attenticn must have been of necessity distracted, were certainly unprece-dented, and may, to very remote ages, appear incredible. But, although in the midst of those flames ofwar which that people were brandishing and spreading on all sides, upwards of twenty sail of the line,

and