viency to wealth, rank, and influence been carried, that men now hardly venture to think in the presence of those who are in these respects their superiors; to give utterance to opinions that might differ from the views taken by the magnates of the time or place would be ridiculous, seeing how little they would be attended or even listened to, not to say that in vastly polite society such conduct might be deemed highly uncivil. In the bustling world, therefore, men are loved or admired, and character is estimated, by the simple criterion of gold or power: against which truth has, at the best, a hard battle to fight; but before-the-mast, and in the barrackroom, there is nothing to impede its way; all there is equality, and men are tried by their individual value alone; tried too by those who are keen and close observers, and amply interested in discovering the merits or demerits of their superiors: a fact that all naval and military officers would do well to recollect, bearing constantly in mind also, the true remark made by Voltaire, that--" Jamais la nature humaine n'est si avilie que grand l'ignorance est armée du pouvoir."

The war-horse requires, no doubt, a sharp curb, but it is not enough that the reins should be held by a strong hand, they must be held by a steady one, able to direct without chafing, and to control the noble steed without breaking his paces; capable also of giving the rein and putting him to his mettle, without therefore allowing him to run wild: a task that strength can never perform unless when tempered by feeling and directed by judgment. Edu-cation, necessary to all who now move in the rank of gentlemen, may draw out, cultivate and improve these qualities, but neither the aristocracy of birth nor of wealth can confer them, for they belong exclusively to the aristocracy of nature. The artillery that contained in its ranks the least sprinkling of aristocracy, acted more perfectly up to its calling during the war, than either of the other two branches of the service. The infantry, next in composition, was also next in conduct; for the Guards were too few to form a separate class, and though always distinguished, were not looked upon as superior to the line, and never, in military opinion, attained even to the level of the light division. The cavalry, on the other hand, the most aristocratic of the three arms, stood lowest in general estimation, but invariably shared, with a few battalions of Guards, a far greater proportion of promotion than fell to the lot of the rest of the

army.

It will, perhaps, be urged against us, that we have here been calling on the military administration to reward only merit, whilst showing that they possess not the means of discovering its existence. To a certain extent this may be true, but it should be recollected that to point out faulty principles, implies no pledge of suggesting improvements beyond what naturally results from the first indispensable step to all amelioration, the discovery of error. might be the best mode of ascertaining the relative merit of different claimants for preferment we pretend not to know, but that some more efficient criterion than the mere possession of rank and wealth, might, if anxiously sought after, be easily found, is sufficiently evident; for it is astonishing how much men can achieve by mere firm

What

ness of will, particularly when acting up to virtuous and patriotic resolutions. But it is too much the custom for public men to fall into the beaten track that in their official career presents itself before them; and it has unfortunately been too much the fashion to undervalue the talents necessary for the performance of military duties, an error that our political institutions have in no slight degree tended to foster; because party and faction too generally thought only of attacking the Government for the losses and failures in military enterprises, that if closely investigated might not unfrequently have been traced to the errors of the commander or the inefficiency of his subordinates. The expedition to Walcheren was well conceived and amply provided for, and yet it failed in the most shameful manner; the same may be said of the attacks on Ferrol, New Orleans and Buenos Ayres; but, except in the latter case, no blame was ever thrown on the army or its commander, and then only perhaps, because the ministry that sent out the expedition was no longer in power when the result became known. As the mere holding a commission was deemed therefore tantamount to the power of fulfilling the various duties it entailed, it is not to be wondered at that so little attention was bestowed on the choice and promotion of properly qualified individuals.

Owing to the exertions of the late Duke of York, great improvements were no doubt made in our military organization, but His Royal Highness's endeavours were feebly seconded by the Government, and strenuously opposed by a powerful party in the country. It was in the army alone that the efforts of the generous Prince met with full and active support; and it is to the exertions of the officers of the army, though forced to contend against every obstacle that faction and folly could throw in their way, that the nation is indebted for its present military fame and renown. When at the commencement of the Spanish war, the Moniteur told us, by order of Napoleon, that the Continental officers laughed at the bare mention of a British army, and when these oracular words were repeated in a dastardly spirit by an un-British press, the soldiers of Britain an swered the insulting taunts by victories that added confidence to courage, and quickly enlisted all honest and patriotic feeling on their side. Thus cheered by success, and animated by the applause of their country, both officers and men exerted every nerve in the cause, and acquired at last a degree of professional knowledge and energy, that however inferior to what with proper training it might have been, enabled them to perform actions never surpassed in gallantry, to beat down the proudest armies of Continental Europe, and to raise their country to a station of power and grandeur unattained by any nation of modern times.

What has been the reward of such conduct, and what were the honours and triumphs decreed to the officers of an army that had performed so many and such brilliant actions, we shall endeavour to show in our next Number; the proofs of national gratitude are too curious and too illustrative of the enlightened liberality of the age of intellect, to be confined within the very short space we could still devote to this most difficult and interesting subject.

THE BOUNTY AGAIN!

It is not long since we felt it a duty to our late departed and highly esteemed friend, Capt. Peter Heywood, to occupy a few pages of this Journal with a sketch of his eventful and meritorious life. It will be remembered that he, unhappily, first went to sea in the ill-fated Bounty, and was consequently immersed in a series of undeserved hardships. The train of marvellous circumstances connected with the mutiny in that vessel, the open boat navigation, the wreck of the Pandora, and the unexpected discovery of the last of the mutineers, altogether form a story so romantic and of such intense interest, that we rejoiced in seeing them embodied in a volume of Murray's Family Library. Owing, however, to some allusions therein made to what we had said, we must in self-defence be allowed to state, that our opinions remain unshaken, because they are grounded upon undeniable evidence,-nor had we adduced the whole of our knowledge on the several heads touched upon; the intent being merely such a sketch of our friend's career as suited the confined space allotted to biographical communications.

Doubt is thrown upon the anecdote of Heywood's being mastheaded off Cape Horn, because it was not mentioned in the grave matter which followed; but, according to the customs of the sea at that period, such a punishment for a midshipman was a thing too common to be introduced in defence of mutiny. Be this as it may, by a sort of" rerum concordia discors," the circumstance is indisputable, because we had it from the lips of Capt. Heywood himself. Secondly, if Bligh were innocent, and his crew only to blame, he must have been a singularly unfortunate commander to have fallen amongst such officers and such men, through all the successive employments of a long and somewhat successful career.

.

The hacknied" audi alteram partem" has generally been the precursor of vituperation; but we entertain no such design. We think, that in sheer justice to ourselves and our readers, such an attack should be noticed, yet it will be purely a defensive act. Our pages are destined to carry materials to the future historian, and their character must therefore be free from doubt; for, as officers hold themselves responsible for their statements, the advantage to the public is, that however deficient our details may prove in flowing periods, or sophistry of argument, they may be implicitly relied upon for authenticity.

To continue: Bligh, whom, from our admiration of his merit as a navigator we called that "mistaken officer"-is accused in our sketch of being inhuman, insolent, and coarse. We repeat the charge, and can readily appeal to numerous readers of these pages as witnesses of the truth of the assertion. We think we are borne out even by the book before us, and that our sentence rather falls short of than exceeds what that evidence substantiates and justifies. Mais le vrai n'est pas toujours vraisemblable; and the Author "can scarcely believe" that a commander would use the language imputed: this may be amiable, but it has nothing to do with the case; optimism has little in common with poor human nature, and inference must ever succumb to fact. Tippoo Saib ferociously exclaimed, that he had

U. S. JOURN. No. 36. Nov. 1831.

X

rather live as a tiger for two days than exist as a sheep for two hundred years; and were we to proceed on ideas only, a jury need not now be empannelled to find whether Holloway is guilty of the "incredible" act of cutting his miserable wife into pieces. Our opinions are not lightly formed or delivered; and from reperusing an interleaved copy of Bligh's Journal, where for many years we have kept notes, we do not feel inclined to retract a single shadow from the lamentable picture we have drawn. Yet we must acknowledge that we have been assured by some of his nearest and dearest connections, that in his domestic relations Bligh was kind and considerate; so that if we admit that he was, as Tippoo would have said, a tiger at sea and a lamb on shore, we might yield that the insolence, inhumanity, and coarseness which we denounce, were developed in his professional character. It is time, however, to introduce the comments of the aforesaid volume, which we will do from

Page 72. "But in this age of refined liberality, when the most atrocious criminals find their apologists, it is not surprising it should now be discovered, when all are dead that could either prove or disprove it, that it was the tyranny of the commander alone, and not the wickedness of the ringleader of the mutineers of the Bounty, that caused that event. We all know,' it is said, that mutiny can arise but from one of these two sources, excessive folly or excessive tyranny; therefore'-the logic is admirable,—'as it is admitted that Bligh was no idiot, the inference is obvious.' If this be so, it may be asked to which of the two causes must be ascribed the mutiny of the Nore, &c.? The true answer will be to neither. Not only,' continues the writer, was the narrative which he published proved to be false in many material bearings, by evidence before the Court-martial, but every act of his public life after this event, from his successive command of the Director, the Glatton, and the Warrior, to his disgraceful expulsion from New South Wales, was stamped with an insolence, an inhumanity, and coarseness, which fully developed his character.""

Were the writer of this better acquainted with us, we scruple not to say, he would never have assigned us a berth amongst the apologists of "most atrocious" criminals; even the passage which he quotes in part begins with-" Now, though nothing can excuse mutiny, we all know," &c. We never sought to extenuate the succeeding transactions of the ship's crew, because as every moral and professional feeling must revolt at the offence, the task were an odious one, especially to an officer: but it is impossible to overlook the intemperate severity which led to their commission. Our position as to the sources of mutiny, may not be delivered in good "logic," having been written currente calamo, but it results from reflection, and we trust it will prove perfectly tenable, with this exception,that an unseemly junction of the two sources, folly and tyranny, too frequently occurs.

Instancing the mutiny at the Nore, is beginning with the explosion rather than the mine, and our "true answer" would probably bear some stamp of the advice which we gave in the very same paragraph whence the extract was made, viz. to search beneath the surface in order to trace hidden causes. But being particularly averse to such discussions, we will merely draw a parallel by observing that, if we were about to dilate upon the bloody scenes which desolated France at her Revolution, we would not commence with

the diamond necklace, nor the poissardes of Paris; we would fall back upon the excessive folly and tyranny of her government, the exemptions of an immoral and irreligious nobility, the grinding exactions of the farmers-general, the detestable obscenities of the Parc-au-Cerf, and the purblind rage for Utopian and visionary perfection in place of tangible benefits.

It is observed that all those who could prove or disprove the occurrences are dead; this is the natural consequence of the lapse of nearly half a century, but there are hundreds at hand who have personally conversed with the principal actors of the fatal drama; and a more undeniable mass of established documentary evidence was never accumulated upon a single question that we are acquainted with. Capt. Heywood was the last survivor of the mutineers, and Purcell the carpenter, for some time the solitary remnant of the ejected party, is now the sole living witness of an event which is still a matter of public interest. This man is in indifferent health, and has within the last few months shown symptoms of derangement, so that, as far as the Bounty is concerned, the curtain is about to drop over the tragedy. Of the Pandora's crew we are not in possession of such decided knowledge, but an officer of that ship, with whom we are acquainted, is still in full health and vigour.

From a sort of censure for our accusing the Captain of having falsified his narrative, we think it incumbent to show how we stand confronted upon several items, by the following extracts from the said volume. Our charge originated in finding discordances that appeared to us the consequence of direct mistatement, rather than of any conceivable error; but the author actually goes far beyond our assertions, and imputes to Bligh such odious malice of heart, as basely to compass the deaths of innocent men in cold blood!

Page 91. "The temptations, therefore, which it was supposed Otaheite held out to the deluded men of the Bounty, had no more share in the transaction than the supposed conspiracy; it does not appear, indeed, that the cry of Huzza for Otaheite!' was ever uttered; if this island had been the object of either Christian or the crew, they would not have left it three hundred miles behind them, before they perpetrated the act of piracy; but after the deed had been committed, it would be natural enough that they should turn their minds to the lovely island and its fascinating inhabitants, which they had just quitted, and that in the moment of excitement some of them should have so called out; but Bligh is the only person who has said they did so."

Page 130. "In fact, another mutiny was within an ace of breaking out, which if not checked at the moment, could only, in their desperate situation, have ended in irretrievable and total destruction. Bligh mentions, in his printed narrative, the mutinous conduct of a person to whom he gave a cutlass to defend himself. This affair, as stated in his original manuscript jour-' nal, wears a far more serious aspect."

Page 133. "Some excuse may be found for hasty expressions uttered in a moment of irritation, when passion gets the better of reason; but no excuse can be found for one, who deeply and unfeelingly, without provocation, and in cold blood, inflicts a wound on the heart of a widowed mother, already torn with anguish and tortured with suspense for a beloved son, whose life was in imminent jeopardy: such a man was William Bligh. This charge is not loosely asserted; it is founded on documentary evidence under his own hand."