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CHAP.

III.

Theordnance

HISTORY OF ENGLAND.

ture; and their talk, where it was not made up of nauticalphrases, was too commonly made up of oaths and curses.Such were the chiefs in whose rude school were formed thosesturdy warriors from whom Smollet, in the next age, drewLieutenant Bowling and Commodore Trunnion. But it doesnot appear that there was in the service of any of the Stuartsa single naval officer such as, according to the notions ofour times, a naval officer ought to be, that is to say, a manversed in the theory and practice of his calling, and steeledagainst all the dangers of battle and tempest, yet of cultivatedmind and polished manners. There were gentlemen andthere were seamen in the navy of Charles the Second. Butthe seamen were not gentlemen; and the gentlemen were notseamen.

The English navy at that time might, according to themost exact estimates which have come down to us, have beenkept in an efficient state for three hundred and eighty thou-sand pounds a year. Four hundred thousand pounds a yearwas the sum actually expended, but expended, as we haveseen, to very little purpose. The cost of the French marinewas nearly the same; the cost of the Dutch marine con-siderably more.*

The charge of the English ordnance in the seventeenthcentury was, as compared with other military and navalcharges, much smaller than at present. At most of the gar-risons there were gunners, and here and there, at an important

* My information respecting the condition of the navy, at this time,is chiefly derived from Pepys. His report, presented to Charles the Se-cond in May 1684, has never, I believe, been printed. The manuscriptis at Magdalene College, Cambridge. At Magdalene College is also avaluable manuscript containing a detailed account of the maritime estab-lishments of the country in December 1684. Pepys’s “Memoirs relatingto the State of the Royal Navy for Ten Years, determined Decemberand his diary and correspondence during his mission to Tangier,are in print. I have made large use of them. See also Sheffield’sMemoirs, Teongc’s Diary, Aubrey’s Life of Monk, the Life of SirCloudesley Shovel, 1708, Commons’ Journals, March!, and March 20. 1682.