The Statesman.
London, England, 1815-04-17 00:00:00

Committee to ascertain and report the names of the
Members of the House of Commons, and of their
holding Sittecnres and Pensions, and of the
antount of those Pensions and Sinecures, was not
,ttilicietst to excite an aversion towards me in the
.minds of the majority of that (louse? And whether
Illy wopented exposures of the abuses in the Courts of
Atlmitalty, which not only frequently .swallow up
the entire proceeds of naval captures, but in some
instances 'oblige the captors to pay further sums for
the adjudication of their prizes ; and which abuses,
so detrimental in time of ear to the interests of the
country, is;.. practised in defiance of various Acts of
l'arliament for the encoutagemeet of seamen, which
lo.allf to them as a reward the produce of their cap-
tures from the enemy,—may not have exposed me to
the enmity of those who preside over those Courts;
sett even of their relatives and bosom friends in other
departments of the law ? And, Gentlemen, if you
look into the Resolutions which I proposed relative
to the Naval Service, and into the language employ.
ed by the Secretary of the Admiralty on that 'and
other occasions, when attempting to refute the
troth of my statements, )ou will easily decide whe-
ther !Mines of hostility did not exist towards
me in the Naval Department of Government ? The
refusal to appoint me to a ship, notwithstanding the
earliest applicntiotts of Sir A. Cochrane, until he used
his privilege as Commander in Chief to nominate me'
his on n Captain, is a further proof of the prevalence
of such feelings in the minds of men then Members of
the Board of Admiralty.
" It is worthy of observation that the abuses and
grievances w hich I sought to redress by a variety of
motions, and particularly by the above-mentioned i
Resolutions, and which were so fatly and in-
dignantly denied by the Secretary of the • Ad.
miraity, bare since, by that same Secretary, been
acknowledged to exist. Look into the' Letter which
he lately addressed to the seamen of the Beet, enu-
merating many of the evils which he had treated as
.chimerical when complained of by me, and seeking
for himself and his employers, popularity and ap.
please for their tardy and partial redress. These evils,
notwithstanding she maintenance of a double naval
establishment of which they occasioned the necessity,
were main causes of our late naval disgraces and dis-
asters; many of at hich, I am firmly persuaded, could
not have occurred, if the grievances in question had
been investigated and remedied when first complain.
ed of by me.
" I complained of the hardship of unlimited ser-
vice ; of the ctuelty of harbour duty ; of the uncer-
tain system of reward; of the exactions for discharge,
even front %%rounded, disabled, and pensioned sea-
men • of withholding from the seamen their pay, un-
til their return home, and their consequent priva-
tions abroad ; and of keeping ships abroad until their
crews had perished. I complained of the custom of
imposing on the seamen the performance of frivolous,
vexatious, and eenecessary labours—such as scour-
ing and polishing iron bars, bolts, hooks, pins, shot,
&e. Etc. which was a constant source of discontent,
and the cause of more flagellation than the violation
of all the Articles of War. I complained of the
mottecessary system of repairing and restoring ships
at sea on common and ordinary service occasions; of
its effect on the health of the crews ; and of the or.
ders when in port which deprived them of the corn.
tort of stretching their limbs on the soil of their na-
tive land. I complained of the want of the like ne-
cessary comforts in Naval Hospitals which were al-
lowed to the Army ; of the refusalto admit into those j
hospitals certain diseases .which during the winter !
ie35011 could not be eared at sea; of -the inadequate
.supply of medicines to the ships of war ; of the
limited quantity of lint fur dressing wounds and
sores • of the substitution of sponge, which, being •
applied without distinction to the wounds of all,
parted to some the infection it received from others,
and originated the necessity of numerous amputa.l
tines; and of the misery .to which men, thus cruelly
crippled, were retleced, having no acknowledged
claim to, or any certainty of reward for their un-
merited sulleringa. And I reprobated the system of
retaining invalids fbr -harbour dory, of which. the '
hardships are 'testae than those of active service;
and of permitting them, sod even compelling them
by means of those hardships, to re-enter the Navy ,
when their physical powers and constitutions were
holly decayed.
44 If the abuses of which I complained in the ,
House of Commons, some of which only I have here
enumerated, had been as promptly corrected as they
were honestly exposed, a part of that waste of blood
and treasure which the country bewails—a portion of
that deep diatreas and heavy taxation under which it
has long groaned, and is stow sinking, would have ,
been spared end avertexl. But, Gentlemen, although'
I am aware that the description of abuses which I
conceived it my peculiar province to attack, compre.
bends but a small part of the progeny of the parent •
evil—and although I am aware that to call on the
Rouse of Commons (constituted as it is) for the re- ,
moval of ;buses, is nearly as hopeless as to sue to a
tree to shake oil its branches ; jet my efforts in the
exposure of corruption. feeble and confined as they
were, tied much as they were contemned by the ,
espousers of that corruption, have not been wholly '
oarless or ineffectual. I have lived to see some benefit
arise irons every motion or representation made by
toe in the House ; at leant I hove lived to see many of
the evils which I was the first to point out, reluctantly
*eke° *hedged and partially redressed; and I have lived
to feel the resentment of those to whose ignorance or
ickedness I truly attributed their origin and multi-
auance Gentlemen, I have also lived to see those
rewarded 'rho pursued a different line of conduct.
64 Gaetlernen, There was. a time when I, Who •
nave 10.. an accused of sacrificing my integrity and
rite:, :.t the shrine of avarice, rejected a splendid
offer--a squadron and a regiment—for the execution
of my own plans in the Mediterranean, at a time
wheat the almost defenceless coasts and ports of the
enemy were swarming with vessels intertbeegingahe
sal:table manufactures of France for the riohoiroditc-
tions of holy ; an infallable opportunity orieettifing
ii,:hes not reify withoit reproach, but with applause;'
utf acquiring incomparably- more than the utesbit pit-
tance that could possibly have accessed from the.m6st
accessful execution of the edifiers attributed taxer.:
cattlemen, I say that I rejected the most tempting
and retioanced the brightest pospects, rather:
l!a,. abstain frenra painful. !while duty from which
:tipato(l. aed wets not disappointed, nothing