The Sun.
London, England, 1849-08-14 00:00:00

NAVY AND MARINES, &c.

The following return has been presented to the House
of Commons (moved for by Mr. Ewart), "showing
what examinations, or tests of qualification, are re-
quired on admission into, or on promotion of officers
in, the Navy and Marines."
No. 1.-QUALIFICATIONS REQUIRED FOR APPOINT-
MENT AS NAVAL CADETS.
A naval cadet must not be under twelve years of
age, and must be in good health and fit for service;
that is, free from impediment of speech, defect of
vision, rupture, or any other physical inefficiency,
which must be certified by the surgeon of the flag-
ship at the port where the ship to which he is appointed
is fitting out; he must be able to write English from
dictation, and be acquainted with common arithmetic,
including the Rule of Three. The examination upon
these subjects is to be made by a naval instructor or
some other competent person, in the presence of the
captain or commander of the flag ship at the port at
which the ship to which he may be appointed is
fitting out; and every cadet, when received on board
the -hip to which he is appointed, is to produce to the
commanding officer his quadrant or sextant.
No. 2.---QUALIFICATIONS REQUIRED FOB, APPOINT-
MENT AS MIDSHIPMAN.
When a naval cadet shall have served long enonudgha
to entitle him to be rated as midsthnipnmea,
examineda
vacancy may offer. for' him, hed is
by
3Orntehe incapatainahip7d
anedomrnanotehre,rva when bush.l3 the
and the first lieutenant
captain or commander,
of the ship to which he shall belong, assisted by the
naval instructor, if there be one on board; he must
produce to them logs for the period he has served as
cadet, and a certificate of his good conduct during
that period; he must also afford to them satisfactory
proof of his being fourteen years of age when he is
to be examined by them, to ascertain that he has a
due knowledge of arithmetic, geometry, and trigono-
metry, and a practical acquaintance with the use of the
quadrant, and the manner of making observations f r
ascertaining the latitude and longitude therewith, and
that he can keep a ship's reckoning by the common
rules, usually called a day's work ; also that he has
a due knowledge of steering and managing a boat
under oars and sails, and of knotting and splicing,
&c. If his proficiency in the said points be such as
to prove satisfactory to the examining officers, they
are to give him a certificate to such effect, and the
cadet may be afterwards placed in any midshipman's
vacancy offering for him; but should there be no
vacancy, he may be rated and borne as extra mid-
shipman until a vacancy occurs for him in the com-
plement of midshipmen ; but his vacancy as cadet is
not to be filled up so long as he remains au extra
midshipman.
When he shall have served two years as midshipman,
he is to be examined by the same examining officers,
of the same rank, assisted by the master, as to his
progress in the knowledge of rigging masts, bow-
sprit, &c. ; in getting tops over and placing a lower
cap ; in setting up rigging, and especially as to
the precautions required in staying lower masts ;
in hoisting a quarter or stern boat up in a strong
breeze with a sea on ; in making up a course and
topsail for bending at sea; in shifting topmasts,
yards, and sails at sea, and the effect of the sails
on the ship, both in tacking and wearing; and also
as to the progress he may have made in navigation ;
a certificate whereof is to be given to him by the ex-
amining officers, and a report thereof is to be made to
the Secretary of the Admiralty, in the quarterly re-
turns. He is also to be examined by a gunnery lieu-
tenant as to his proficiency in the gunnery, musket,
and cutlass exercises ; and at this examination the
midshipman-is to show to the examining officers that
his quadrant or sextant is in good order.
No. 3.—EXAMINATION OF CANDIDATES FOR LIEUTE-
NANTS' COMMISSIONS.
Whenever a candidate may be desirous of passing
the necessary examination to qualify him for promo-
tion, the commander-in-chief may give orders for his
being examined by the proper officers, according
to the following instructions ; enjoining the
xamining officers to be very particular in this im-
portant duty, and to grant the required certificate to
the candidate without partiality or favour.
A candidate for a lieutenant's commission is to be
examined by three captains or commanders ; but as a
midshipman is allowed to take rank as mate from the
date of his passing his examination for lieutenant,
and as a ship to which a midshipman, having corn-
pleted his time of service, shall belong, may be sepa-
rated for a considerable period from the commander-
in-chief, the captain or commander of the said ship
or vessel in which such midshipman may be serving,
with the senior lieutenant or second officer, and the
master or second master (according to the class of ship
and the rank of officers on board her), assisted by
the naval instructor, if there be one on board,
may proceed to examine such midshipman as to his
qualifications to perform the duties of lieutenant of her
Majesty's navy ; and if they find him to be, in their
opinions, duly qualified, they are to give him a
certificate to that effect, dated on the day of such
examination ; and the captain may forthwith give him
an acting order as mate ; and if, on the first oppor-
tunity that shall afterwards offer for his tieing re-
examined, under the commander-in-chief's order, by
three captains or commanders, as before muired, he
lasses successfully, he will receive from the
commander-in-chief, or senior officer, an acting order
as mate, to take rank according to the date of the first
certificate ; and if he pass his examination successfully
at the Naval College, within two months after his
return to England, or shall prove to the satisfaction
of the Admiralty his having availed himself of, the
first opportunity open to him for passing such exa-
mination, he will be confirmed from the date of his
first certificate, according to the Queen's regulations,
chap. 2, art. 4, page 13.
When a candidate for the appointment of lieutenant
is to be examined, the examining officers are to see
that everything required by the Queen's regulations
has been complied with, as regards the candidate, and
that he produce certificates of good conduct from
captains he has served under, for six years, and log-
books kept by himself fur the corresponding period ;
and they are to satisfy themselves of the ability of the
candidate to take charge of a watch at sea, to manage
a ship in all situations, to steer her, and to rig her, to
get tops and caps over head, to raise and secure sheers,
&c., and to keep a reckoning, to ascertain her position
by observation ; that he has a due knowledge of the
elements of mathematics, and of the theory of naviga-
tion, and of ascertaining the latitude and the longi-
tude, the Variation of the 'compass, &c., by all the
modes in use ; and also a competent knowledge
of practical gunnery, and._ oati . generally execute
the various. duties of a sea aoffieer, In the exami-
nation, however, of a candidate "while in England,
his knowledge of navigatitin, astronomy, and
gunnery need not be inquired into by the
examining officers, as he will have to undergo those
branches of his examination at the Naval College and
on board the Excellent.
No. 4 is the form for the passing certificate qualifi-
cation for a lieutenant.
No. S.—QUALIFICATIONS AND REGULATIONS - RE-
SPECTING THE ADMISSION Of OFFICERS INTO THE
ROYAL MARINES.

FESTIVAL AT HADDON H ALL.
This fine old remnant of the feudal ages was on
Friday last, the 10th instant, the scene of the most
joyous festivities. Permission had been granted by
his Grace the Duke of Rutland to the committee of
the Bakewell and High Peak Literary Institute, to
hold their annual festival at his ancestral hall, and a
most numerous and highly respectable company as•
sembled. Such was the attractive nature of the en-
tertainment, that more than a thousand applications for
tickets had been refused. Amongst those present were
Lord John Manners, the Hon. G. H. Cavendish,
M.P., and Lady Louisa Cavendish, W. Evans, Esq.,
M.P., the Bishop of Madras, Captain Underwood, Dr
Conde!, Captain Barker, R. Nerfeld, Esq., and Mrs.
Nereid, Rev. H. R. Cornish, &c.
An entertainment was provided for the guests at
six o'clock, in the banqueting-hall, after which the
company were addressed by the members and patrons
of the institute.
R NERFELD, Esq., the chairman, having made a
few introductory observations, called upon
Lord JOHN MANNERS, who was received with
enthusiastic cheering. The Noble Lord said—The
committee of the High Peak Institute, encouraged by
the success of the fete held there last year, had
thought it proper to allow them the opportunity of
assembling there under the same circumstances on
this occasion. He was sure he need not tell them
that when application was made to his father for the
use of that hall, that permission was granted not only
with readiness, but with the utmost delight and satis-
faction. He was charged to assure them that hut for
his advancing years, and a hard day's work, which he
thought it his duty yesterday to undergo, in support
of an important public institution, he would have
been there in person to give them a welcome to his
old hall, and to express to them the pleasure he de-
rived from assemblages of this character.—(Cheers.)
He must, however, ask them to accept from him
(Until John Manners), as his father's substitute, the
most cordial welcome. Those amongst them who
were present at their last year's festival could hardly
have forgotten the very remarkable speech then de-
livered by Mr. Ellison—a speech read and admired
throughout the whole country. In that speech Mr.
Ellison drew a contrast between the distressed condi-
tion of many great countries in Europe and the com-
parative peace which pervaded our own shores.—
(Cheers.) It was still permitted them to draw a si-
milar contrast. Many of the continental states were
now agitated with domestic convulsions, or fears of,
foreign invaders, while here in their own tight little
island they had their hardy Queen coasting the pic-
turesque shores of the most unfortunate portion of her
dominions, and receiving an enthusiastic welcome from
an excitable, though, he firmly believed, loyal popula-
tion.—(Cheers) Ireland was emphatically the coun-
try of ruin. Turn which way they would in that un-
fortunate land they could see nothing but ruin—cabin
and abbey, castle and grange, cottage and farmhouse
—wherever they di:ected their eyes, they beheld ruin.
Ile did not think that any or.e travelling in Ireland
cou!d draw a happy and hopeful augtry from her ar-
chitectural remains. But here, while they wandered
through corridor and court, they might trate without
difficulty the history of that part of the country. They
read in those old walls the representatives of their still
older predecessors, raised from the same old limestone
work, when Sir R. Vernon obtained from the Regent
permission to build the house, provided it had no
battlements upon it—the same Sir Richard Vernon
obtained from the Pope, in consequence of the occa-
sional floods which from time to time ravaged the
vale, permission to have a chaplain resident in his
house, and Divine service had been performed in the
chapel down to their assembling there on that beauti-
ful August evening in 1849—he said they might trace
from those days to the present the fortunes and occu-
pations of the inhabitants of that part of the country.
.Not only in the higher classes of society, but in the
ranks of the yeomanry and peasantry could be traced,
through the present registers of Bakewell and Youl-
greave, the members of one family following each
other's occupation down the long stream of years
from generation to generation—tilling the same
beautiful valleys, or as miners winning from their
wealth -producing banks the valuable minerals with
which these mountain districts were stored ; and at
this day there were to be found men pursuing the
same occupations as that followed by their fathers at
the period when the parish chronicles were commenced.
—(Cheers.) In the course of such an investigation
they would find th it no very great change had oc-
curred in the social, civil, and religious policy of the
people, nor, perhaps, that what canges had taken
place were for the better. If the spirit of the laws had
become more humane, let them hope that they had
not therefore become emasculated—if religion were
less superstitious, let them also hope that it was not
more dull and more cold—if the ties which bound
men to men and class to class had become more re-
laxed, let them hope that they had not grown more
selfish—if learning arid knowledge had increased, let
them hope that they had nut brought evils in their
train.—(Cheers.) Let them hope all this, and let
them endeavour to prove that they were justified in
the expression of that hope. He was aware that all
instruction was not education—that all knowledge
was not wisdom ; and it was because he had perused
a catalogue of the library, and was satisfied that the
management of the institute was sound and judicious,
that he rejoiced in its success, and commended it cor-
dially to the support of all present. Although he
had drawn a distinction between instruction and edu-
cation, and although he thought all branches of know-
hdge were not synonymous with the acquisition of
wisdom, far be it from him to throw the slightest
impediment in the way of those who quitted the
highways of learning to saunter in the by-paths of
literature. On the contrary, he abominated most
he ,rtily the system that would teach only the exact
sciences, and he detested most cordially that system
which would substitute Mrs. Somerville for Mrs.
Hubbard.—(Cheers and laughter.)
"It likes me not that mortal hands have sounded
Each inlet of the Hyperborean main,
And traced, and mapped, and tracked the sinuous bends
Of Niger's weird unfathomable stream:'
In these materialistic days let them, on the con-
trary, train up a spirit of fancy, of poetry, and of
enthusiasm ; and then they might depend upon it
that in no useful art, in no common-place manu-
facture, not even in the most unromantic trade,
would the man who took an occasional flight into the
regions of fancy be without his reward in that parti-
cular branch by which he earned his daily bread.
How was it that in every great branch of English
industry we depended more or less upon foreigners
for patterns ? How was it that Government was
obliged to establish schools of design ? It was owing
to the want of that spirit which might be essentially
promoted by the reading of such books as those
to which he had just alluded. Let them not
imagine, then, that he wished to throw any impedi-
ment in the Way of occasional flight into the
realms of fancy, because
of science .
twas in them, rather than
in the stricter kingdom that beauty of
pattern and excellence of designs were to be found.
For the direct benefits which institutions of this kind
afforded, they ought to rejoice in te success of the
B
dkewell Institute; but they had also reason to con-
gratulate themselves on its indirect influences. Ile
must have a cold heart and a calm head, who, on all(
occasions like that, could not cast aside all thoughts
of its direct benefits, and congratulate himself on the 1 MEMORANDUM.
indirect benefits such institutions conferred. Within 1 Admiralty, 22d April, 1841.
halls, in olden times, the knight, the!
maa . under-mentioned sums are to be paid by each
these very
guest, the pilgrim, the forester, the huntsman, were TjaihadeeatcaadeutatdoetrheoacrdeioDuanrtyanteigreenuemrsatlaonfcetah? navy3o
ann_um.
wont to carouse perhaps with ruder and doubtl.ess,
Sons o officers d • :
wont
upon full-pay, or of officers
with heartier cheer. In the fair gallery up stairs
withyling
.arge families and inadequate
where they would soon enjoy a more gratifying .
upon
half-pay
many a means, 151. per ann
amusement than listening to speechmakers,
Sons of officers killedum in the service, or ofofficers
stately coranto or dignified pavane, or the more plc- Sons
full spay, whose familie
turesque dances which prevailed under the dynasties
dying on
of the Tudors and the Stuarts, were wont to be seen;
distress, gratis. s areleft m great
or, in later times, many a hoop had there sailed gitifß.9

MEMORANDUM.
Admiralty, December 10, 1839.
The following qualifications are required in
candidates for commissions in the corps of Royal
Marines :

Every candidate will be required to possess a com-
petent knowledge a—
l. Common and decimal arithmetic.
2. First six books of Euclid.
3. Algebra, as far as simple equations.
4. A portion of plane trigonometry, and the use
of logarithms.
And to write English correctly from dictation.
By command of their Lordships,
JOHN BARROW.

QUALIFICATIONS REQUIRED FOR PASSING CANDIDATES.
ROYAL MARINES.
Age not less than 16, not exceeding 21 years.
Height not less than 5 feet 4 inches.
Conttitution approved by the director-general of
the Navy.