Some of those complaints may be fictitious, and some ignorant; but the constant changes in their structure, and their perpetual repairs, imply inferiority in our naval schools of architecture. The chief attention of the royal dockyards, within these few years, has been turned to the building of large steam-ships, armed with guns of the heaviest calibre. But the attempt is evidently in a wrong direction. The effort to make fighting ships of steamers, ruins them in both capacities. It destroys their great quality, speed; and it exposes them with an inadequate power to the line-of-battle ship. They are incomparable as tugs to a fleet, as conveying troops, as outlying vessels, as every thing but men-of-war. A shot would break up their whole machinery, and leave them at the mercy of the first frigate that brought its broadside to bear upon them in their helpless condition. In all the trials of the fleet during the last two years, the heavy armed steamers were invariably left behind in a gale, while one of the light steamers ran before every frigate.
We have now two fleets on service, one in the Tagus, and another at Malta; but both are weak in point of numbers, though in a high state of equipment. A few rasee guardships are scattered round the coast. Some large steamers remain at Portsmouth and Plymouth ready for service; but, from all accounts, there is nothing of that active and vigorous preparation which ought to be the essential object of the country, while France is menacing us from day to day, while she has an immense naval conscription, is building powerful ships, is talking of invasion, and hates us with all the hatred of Frenchmen. In such emergencies, to think of sparing expense is almost a public crime; and no public execration could be too deep, as no public punishment could be too severe, if neglect of preparation should ever leave us at the mercy of the most mischievous of mankind. But no time is to be thrown away.
Whether we shall be prepared to meet and punish aggression, ought no longer to be left dependent on the will of individuals. The nation must bestir itself. It must have meetings, and subscriptions, and musters. We must be ready to give up a part of our superfluities to save the rest. Whether France intends to attack us, without provocation, and through a mere rage of aggression, we know not; but the language of her journals is malignant, and it is the part of wise and brave men to be prepared.
We shall now give an outline of the gallant career of one of those remarkable men, who, uniting courage and conduct, achieved an imperishable name in our naval annals.
William Sidney Smith was born on the 21st of June 1764. He began his naval career before he was twelve years old. All his family, for four generations, had been naval or military. His great-grandfather was Captain Cornelius Smith. His grandfather was Captain Edward Smith, who commanded a frigate, in which he was severely wounded in an attack on one of the Spanish settlements in the West Indies, where he died shortly after. His father was the Captain Smith of the Guards, whose name became so conspicuous on the trial of Lord George Germaine, to whom he was aide-de-camp at the battle of Minden, and who after that trial retired from the army in disgust. Sir Sidney's uncle was a general, and his two brothers were Lieut.-Colonel Douglas Smith, governor of Prince Edward's Island, and John Spencer Smith, who held a commission in the Guards, but afterwards exchanged the service for diplomacy, in which his name became distinguished as an envoy to several Continental courts during the war of the Revolution. Sir Sidney's mother was the daughter of a Mr Wilkinson, an opulent London merchant, who, however, seems to have disinherited his daughter from discontent at her match, and left the chief part, if not the entire, of his property to her sister, who was married to Lord Camelford. Sir Sidney was for a few years at Tunbridge School, from which, however, he was withdrawn at an age so early that nothing but strong natural talent could have enabled him to exhibit in after-life the fluency, and even the occasional eloquence, which distinguished his pen. His first rating on the books of the Admiralty was in the Tortoise, in June 1777. In the beginning of the next year he was appointed to the Unicorn, and began his career by a gallant action, in which his ship captured an American frigate. He was then but fourteen. In 1779 he joined the Sandwich, the flag-ship of Rodney, in which he was present at the victory obtained over the Spaniards in the next year.
Those were stirring times. In the same year he was appointed lieutenant of the Alcide. And in this ship he was present at Graves' action with the French, off the Chesapeake.
In the following year he was in the greatest naval action of the war—the famous battle of the 12th of April 1782, off the Leeward Islands, when Rodney defeated the French fleet, commanded by the Comte de Grasse. In the following May, he was appointed to the command of the Fury sloop, by Rodney; and in the October following was promoted to the rank of captain into the Alcmene, having been on the list of commanders only five months.
Thus he was a captain at the age of eighteen! The war was now at an end; his ship was paid off, and he went to reside at Caen, for the purpose of acquiring a knowledge of the French language. There he spent a well-employed and agreeable time. Many of the French families of condition resided in the neighbourhood; and the young captain, having brought letters to the Duc de Harcourt, governor of the province, was hospitably received. The French were then a polished people; they knew nothing of republicanism, and were not proud of their ferocity; they had none of that frantic hatred of England which is the folly and the fashion of our day, and might be regarded as a civilised people. The duke invited him to his country-seat, and there showed him the improvements in his grounds, and introduced him to his visitors.
Like most men destined to distinction, Sir Sidney Smith was constantly preparing himself for useful service, by the acquisition of knowledge. The Mediterranean is naturally presumed to be the great theatre of naval exploits. He obtained leave of absence, and went to the Mediterranean. While at Gibraltar, thinking, from the violent language of the Emperor of Morocco, that there might be a Moorish war, he made a journey along the coast of Morocco, for the purpose of acquainting himself with the condition of its naval force and harbours. Having obtained the necessary information, which obviously required considerable exertion and no slight expense, he stated its results in a manly and intelligent letter to the Admiralty, offering his services in case of hostilities, and suggesting the appointment of a squadron to be stationed outside the Straits, for the prevention of any naval enterprise on the part of the Moors.
Among the most accessible ports, he mentions Mogadore, which, as not being a bar harbour, is easily approachable by ships of force; and though the works contained many guns, yet they were so ill-placed, that in all probability they could not resist an attack. We recollect that the cannonade of this town was one of the exploits on which the Prince de Joinville plumed his heroism, and of which all France talked as if it were the capture of a second Gibraltar.