The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1876-07-18 00:00:00

RITUALISM AFLOAT.

The reader must not imagine for an instant that we are
triflinz with him if we tell him that My Lords of the
Admiralty, and the House of COIIIIIIOII4 by a majority of
twelve, have arrived at the conclusion that churchman.
chip is more essential than seamanship for the manage-
ment of a British man-of-war. This, we maintain, is the
only rational explanation of the long discussion with
winch Mr. Ashley, Sir A. Gordon, Mr. Hunt, and others,
amused honourable members last Tuesday night No
doubt the First Lord may be in possession of facts justi-
fying the decision. Ile hinted as much: but still he
claimed to have demolished the statenients of Mr. Ashley
and Sir A. Gordon, without finding it uer-rosry to make
a clean breast of his secret; and outsiders can only judge
from the publishisl facts. Henceforth, until further
orders, let no captain of a man-of-war ostpone his Prayer
Book to his Hutton on "Navigation,' or the Rubrics to

"iitrriliente of Mr. Ashley's story was the fifteen months'
warfare between Captain Sullivan and one of the
" officers," the Reverend Mr. Penny, of Her Majesty's ship
London. The captain opposed his subordinates attempts
to turn the man-of-war into • high I 'beech chapel afloat ;
and in his serious,, the chaplain plaintively protested
a -Aiwa "the disabilities under which the Church of
England laleurs in this vessel." No doubt divine service
was indispensable ; but the former thought that, if it
was to be conducted in such fashion a, to "interfere with
the working of the ship,- the sooner the parson becante
skipper the better. Their mutual dislike was embittered
by the fact that Captain Sullivan was a conscientous
Dissenter, and Mr. Penny the highest of High Churchmen
—belonging, WI Mr. Ashley perhaps too contemptuouslE
expressed it, " to the very highest order of priestcraft
In his wrath against his obstinate subordinate, the
captain rejected the Holy Communion ; often ordered him
to "cut short" his discourse ; and as often started up, and
walked off in the I ery middle of the outraged Penny's
most glowing periods. Not Moses himself, with all his
meekness, could have steed such treatment, muck less a
naval officer "belonging to the highest order of priest.-
craft;" no the chaplain systematically "cut" the captain,
not only on the quarter-deck, but at dinner, and finally
took to "preaching it" him. Mr. Penny's subsequent ex-
planation is a little melancholy, besides rather irrelevant:
for "an old sermon" may be as rich in inuenclo as • new
one; and why should a naval chaplain, with plenty of
time to kill, ever think of falling back on old sermons?
The truth was that the captain had wounded the chaplain
in the most tender point of all—his vestments. One day
Mr. Penny appeared in a stole with three gold crosses.
The captain surveyed him all over; asked him where be
ifiit it • called it "anon-regulation uniform"; and ordered
it /ea to his reverence's wardrobe. Whereupon Mr.
f'enny—metaphorically snapping his fingers—defied all
the skippers in Christendom, with the Admiralty at their
hack, to divest him of the stole and crosses. After which,
a circumlocutory correspondence ensued between Captain
Sufis an, the Commodore at the Cape, two Admirals in the
Indian Osman, and the Admiralty itself—the Admirals
tabooing the uniform, the Commodore apparently think-
ing it muustrowt that the ship's business should be
"delayed" on account of a row about a stole, but • last
declining the grave responsibility of admonishing the
defiant parson—a triumph for the reverend and gallant
officer. The skipper and his man went on fighting like
cat and dog; until at last the former descended his own
companion-ladder, a superseded captain, while Mr. Penny
—no doubt in his stole and crosses —leaned over the
bulwark, and waved hint a parting blessing.
No doubt "there were faults on both sides." It was
dreadfully rude first to order the chaplain to "cut it
short," and next to walk out in the middle of • sermon.
The captain's " rejection " of the Holy Communion was
decidedly irreverent—plucky, perhaps, but an offence
which might have landed him at the stake in an age leas
tolerant than the present. It was a perfectly harmless
article of dress; and if we had been skipper, we would
most joyfully have settled our chaplain's peace of mind,
forthwith and for ever, by inviting him to put on as
many "stoles with three crosses" as he pleased—with
11.1300 of them, if he liked—and to sleep all the year
round in them, if he felt in the least Inclined. Never
would we consent to have the usual hilarity of our
dinner-table spoiled for the sake et a chaplain's clothe.,
however gaudy. But, we are told, the crew numbered
fr 2 Dissents:is!, whose religious scruple; were outraged by
Mr. Penny is "nun-regulation uniform." Nonsen.se ! We
CALI testify, from • fair acquaintance with hint that Jack
has no religious scruples worth speaking about. It is all
one to him whether his chaplain -when he has one -
mime% " upstairs- in a stole and white bands, or in a red
tic and monkey-jacket. His theological education has
leen sadly neglected, and to his unsophisticatal mind a
stole with cremes is simply a hit of ritualistic bunting
with no occult virtue whatever. At the same time, and
on My Lords' own showing, Mr. Penny's conduct was
anything but that of a model clerfopman, and the flexion
subjected his infitain to insults which the latter would
not have endured front any other officer on board. A lay
officer you can promptly deal with, but it is far otherwise
when the obdurate one is an officer in holy orders. The
skipper could not punish, the naval officer without
punishing the clergyman. "I do not punish the Bishop
of Bayeux, but only the Duke of Kent," the King said.
when he caught his own rebellious brother ; but it
requires a Oulielmus Concitsestor to separate in that
rough-and-ready style the two functionaries in one and
the saute personalty. Mr. Penny was a giant in his two-
fold personality; and for the sake of the cloth, as also of
Her Majesty's navy, we are grieved that he used his
power like a giant.
The public will be as much astounded as Mr. Goschen
himself at the condemnation of a skilful and gallant
officer of:10 years' service to removal from his command,
when a mild reprimand from the Admiralty would have
fully sufficed. It is admitted that the captain had a
perfect right to order that very same skipping of certain
passages in the Prayer Book which is systematically
observed by the chaplain of the House of Commons.
Onquesti/nably, as the First Lord contends, the
Admiralty can dismiss an officer without assigning any
reasons. But that was an igunratio ele•leAi, which, we
must admit., Mr. Hunt contrived to make the most
of. In sentencing Captain Sullivan, the Admiralty
thoroughly *Whines itself. It admits that the
chaplain's conduct was highly disrespectful to the
captain—the officer who always has been, is, and must
suprenie in his own ship. " Foolish squabble," ruutter
their lordships once more : and yet to quote Mr. Gtschen,
they punish this silly collision with one's own chaplain as
terribly as they would &collision with one of Her Majesty's
ironclad& Captains are plentiful, and chaplains scarce,
say they again ; and yet they inflict disgrace and heavy
pecuniary loss on an admittedly zealous and first-rate
commauder for the crime of having regarded Mr. Penny's
stole as • " non-regulation uniform' Their Lordships'
decision is simply monstrous. They are bound to recon-
sider the case --at all events, to grant Captain Sulivan
that trial by courtmartial for which he has thrice
prayed in vain. Examinee.

AN attempt is being made to get up a party of 30 or 40
members of Parliament and their friends an order to
pay an autumn visit to America, mainly to see Phila.
delphia Exhibition. A considerable proportion of the
necessary number has been provided, and a suitable
vessel Fas bocn offered to the promoters of the excursion,
hut some ‘lsca must clean' before anything is decided.
TH6 1{64: line nag 1,41.1. has taken a very practical
step_ towards hastening Mt day e. hog the DiallODUng lion
shell lie down with the Zpiscopal lamb. His ow &ape]
in the Wesuniuster-road, London, erected at a cost of
! !AMOK is to be used as a means of promoting catholie
Unit)', and with this view he throws the pulpit open to
the soinistrations of clergymen and ministers of various
denomination. Saturday was the first day upon which
the experiment was tried, and several Church of England
clergymen on that occasion occupied the pulpit and
delivered addresses. First came the Rev. W. H.
reztor of fit. Mary's, Bryanstono-square, wile
was tweeoesse tha Pfshop of London from preaching
In Dr. Parker's tlituPill• 'l.bo ..,:ewman llallexplaynea
that the worship, as at the N 4 suesaj claret, would
present a combiaation of rosin aeltktreedcr.2.
eveni_iree service would follow the Beeh
rant deviations, for the purpose Or avoidingofef :Ourummoingn "PZer few sisustl but very signill-
'esrs • ritualistic interpretation. There would also be
men/ similar' to those of Nonconformist', in
which, While the liturgy of song would be used, the form
of prayer would le left to the hes utterance of those who
. officiated. •