The Sun.
London, England, 1839-02-21 00:00:00

exertion is to be expected from them, as a body
Younger brothers, as they are, with younger brothers'
portions, they have not the spirit to speak out as their bet-
ter endowed brethren in the army effectively do. They are
too truly a rope of sand, each following his own interests ;
and if there should be one intelligent and bold enough
to exclaim, with energy and effect, in the cause of his
country and profession, he is too soon silenced by the
sop thrown to him by his politic superiors. No class
of men in the Queen's dominions have been so neglected,
so brow beaten, so borne down, as the old veterans and
warriors of our fleet. They have been jostled out by
the immense infusion of aristocratic and political blood
during the first fifteen years of the peace, and yet with
all these grievances, nor.° so patient, so enduring, so un-
complaining. The old captain with his forty years of
service, his twenty to thirty years' rank as captain, on
his paltry ,two hundred a year, or less, denied employ-
ment because he dispises corrupt influence, and rests on
his professional services for reward ; shut out from the
society of his old war companions, and the professional
duties he loved ; and, more mortifying than all, with
perhaps the richest aristocratic blood in the land, shut
out from the society of his kindred of class, because the
profession he has chosen excludes him from the lowest
classes of the aristocracy of wealth ; yet is there no
class of the Queen's subjects who, with calmer eye and
placid brow await more patiently, though with mental
eagerness, the hour when they can again say, like the
brave Admiral Keppell, " Yes, I am ready to serve, to
do the best I can for my country and my Queen,
though I have nothing to boast of but the pride of
being at last called on to assist in fighting once more my
country's battles when it finds itself in danger." And
what is it now rouses the blood in the veins of one of
these uncomplaining servants of the country? It is not
their country's forgetfulness. It is not the pride and
partiality of office. It is invective, contumely,- and un-
warrantable assertions, on the part of one from whom
hotter things were expected, than a display of the
haughty assumption, which renders the halls of the Ad-
miralty more dreaded and more disgusting than the divan
of the greatest Eastern despot. Steep a man in poverty
to the very lips, and his mind may remain calm and un-
broken ; but add contumely and insult to his unmerited
misfortune, and he feels the bitterness of his situation.
Moral and mental degradation, the greatest of all evils,
neglect and poverty will not necessarily bring, because
there is a re-acting rectitude of spirit, and a conscious
fe,:ling that the unprofitable honour which shades his
brow, is a token of having done the State some little
service, and which will raise him above both. But add
contumely, and then, if debasement and degradation
do not follow, as in some weak minds, it will rouse the
energy of that mind it can neither break nor bend.
Happy, if the tocsin now sounded may aid in remedying
evils, which I have long in privacy mourned, as being
big with the most disastrous results to the country's

honour.
Although some of the grievances I have mentioned
and which have been elsewhere alluded to, exist in a
great degree, yet do I feel that they are of more con-
sequence to individuals than to the country at large,
and that one shake of the lion's mane would soon re-
medy the evil. Hundreds may die froth external irrita-
tion, from the effects of too loudly and too strongly ex-
pressed feelings—hundreds from that imperceptible, but
as certain destroyer of life—the silent gnawing grief—
which, like the cankerworm, goes right to the heart's
vital centre ; the burning indignation—
g The never-dying flame that feedetb,
The rankling wound that ever bleedetb ;"
though a quiet and uncomplaining smile may yet rest on
their lips. These will only be a race of noble spirits,
who yet merited better things, harvested to the grave
by the effects of their country's neglect ; a loss to their
children, but actual gain indeed to that country, disem-
barrassed of their maintenance and care. But I well know
it cannot affect the naval supremacy of the country, for
hundreds as able will instantly spring up in their place,
when occasion calls ; and, with these, one defeat from
inexperience will insure twenty victories, if the essential
" materiel" is given.
I do not dwell so much either on the fact of a less
number of vessels being kept in commission than might
otherwise be armed, although the evil consequences of
want of experience, and of that increase of improve-
ment derived from practice, may ensue. For the sailor's
profession, like the Brit;sh Constitution, leaves always
something to learn—something, in the all-changing course
of circumstance and time, to ameliorate. Some months'
practice in a change of system, would soon remedy the
evil, provided the " materiel" of the navy was as it should
be, and always supposing that the old practised war-
veterans were not wholly extinguished. To the ob-
jection also, so forcibly stated by my Gallant Friend,
Captain Napier, that the naval force kept in commis-
sion is not compatible with the security of the country,
considering the superior naval armaments of other
Powers with whom we may be brought into collision ;
it is just possible that the Government may be, and
ought to be, better acquainted with the symptoms
declarative of peace or war existing on the part of such
Powers ; aad may judge more correctly than the unini
tiated looker-on as to the necessity of putting a bur-
thened country to the great expense of a completely
armed fleet of twenty or thirty sail of the line, col-
lected and acting together as a fleet should be to be
effective. For the idea of talking of an effec-
tive fleet of twenty sail of the line being now in com-
mission is absurd, scattered as these ships over the
world, the plurality of them useless as to size ; useless
as unmanned and unexercised guardships ; or still more
useless as ante en flute flag-ships, with men insufficient
to preserve the proper discipline, or condition of a pat-
tern flag-ship, some never lifting an anchor for three
years ; or still more useless troop-ships, of all others
known to be, from the very nature of the service, the
worst disciplined, the least susceptible of that metho-
dical order and individual comfort which is the essence
of a ship of war, and consequently the least effective.
I do not dwell mainly on these evils, great as they
are, because a few months may bring the remedy, and
a gallant 'popular chief and an energetic Administration
would show the Lion in all his might. But I will dwell
most strongly on the evil arising from the state and con-
dition of the " materiel" composing the ships and vessels
forming the national marine. I allude particularly to
their size, form, qualities, and services, and I have no
hesitation in saying, and I will pledge myself to prove,
that the state and condition is most deplorably inferior
to what it should be to cope with certain honour and
credit with the improved vessels of other countries,
without hazarding more than we should do to the blind
chances of fortune, and risking the expenditure of more
of the blood of the country than we should lavishly
throw away for the sake of pecuniary economy.
I must_rernark that in these statements I am not urged
by party motive, and least of all by the wish to embar-
rass the present Administration, politically considered ;
for I do n A hesitate to declare myself the most uncom-
promiiing opponent of any Government advocating the
thedexio esttargiinngeraeolglfawteeexloci
of
regulated
ikvidm ; or
to
; o oner classof the of n
monopoly
of g
societies
, civil, or political rights or privi-
leges,o over
as belonging to one nation. more than another in
another, excepting that gradation of class which must
of a few for the disadvantage of the many ; to the con
verting the necessary machinery of the State into sources
of private patronage, and family endowment, to the in-
jury of deserving merit, and of the public weal.
Having said thus much, I cannot be justly ac-
cused of joining the cry of faction to aid in
ousting the present Government for the . purpose
of favouring the return of a party to power, whose
conduct, in the mass of their adherents, for the last few
years, under my own direct observation, has strength-
ened and established the uncompromising dislike and
entire disgust I have formerly felt at their proceedings,
however dear may be my regard for many individmils
ranged under their colours.
Indeed I feel it rather a duty to show that the
grievance complained of has been going on and increas-
ing fur years, and it is not the best feature in the case
that it has been long complained of. To show that
other shoulders should support the greater weight of the
blame, I will now refer to an article which appeared in
The San New-paper in the close of the year 1830, when
Lord Melville left the Board over which he had so
long presided. From that article I will sele.lt
.the fol-
lowing passages, applicable still at the present moment.
They will show that fifteen years subsequent to the
conclusion of the revolutionary war, instead of the Ad-
ministration of the day adopting an enlarged view of
circumstances connected with the maritime development
showing itself in all maritime countries, and acting es
the able regenerators of tha French Navy, Dupin and
Tupinier ; they set about repairing what was most ob-
jectionable, anti Wilt ships after models which the later
events of the said war had demonstrated most painfully
could only lead to disaster and defeat. With most tin,
fortunate precaution, also, did they eoremence that sys-
tem of protection to the stern, which, though well
enough for strength and defence under many circum-
stances, still was the last thing, as the brave Adtniral
Bergeret said at Paris, that a Navy like the British
should have thought proper Arst to adopt. Others have
been too ready to follow our example, and by doing so
have rendered it almost morally impossible for the old,
weakly armed, heavy sailers, unfortunately perpetuated
by'repairs, to have the remotest chance of defining a
flying enemy under the of a more feebly armed bow.
In reference to the change of Ministry which brought
Lord Grey into power, the article alluded to observes,
that " Among the various appointments which had bpeq
made in the different offices undAr Government, restilt-
ing frogs the recent ,tiange of Ministry, none should be
looked on with greater interest than those that have
been made in the Naval Administratirn. Most impor,
taut as the Naval service must eve-e. be to the country,
irons its peculiar local circumstances, yet is there no