To descend to the third, or even the lower second class in fiction is almost more dangerous here than a similar laxity in any other department; and we can no more admit Lord John Russell because he wrote a story called _The Nun of Arrouca_, than we can exhume any equally forgotten production of writers less known in non-literary respects. It can hardly, however, be improper to mention in connection with Marryat, the greatest of them all, some other members of the interesting school of naval writers who not unnaturally arose after the peace had turned large numbers of officers adrift, and the rise of the demand for essays, novels, and miscellaneous articles had offered temptation to writing. The chief of these were, in order of rising excellence, Captains Glascock, Chamier, and Basil Hall, and Michael Scott, a civilian, but by far the greatest writer of the four. Glascock, an officer of distinction, was the author of the _Naval Sketch Book_, a curious olla-podrida of "galley" stories, criticisms on naval books, and miscellanies, which appeared in 1826. It is not very well written, and in parts very dull, but provides some genuine things. Chamier, who was born in 1796 and did not die till 1870, was a post captain and a direct imitator of Marryat, as also was Captain Howard, Marryat's sub-editor for a time on the _Metropolitan_, and the part author with him of some books which have caused trouble to bibliographers. Chamier's books--_Ben Brace_, _The Arethusa_, _Tom Bowling_, etc.--are better than Howard's _Rattlin the Reefer_ (commonly ascribed to Marryat), _Jack Ashton_, and others, but neither can be called a master. Captain Basil Hall, who was born of a good Scotch family at Edinburgh in 1788 and died at Haslar Hospital in 1844, was a better writer than either of these three; but he dealt in travels, not novels, and appears here as a sort of honorary member of the class. His _Travels in America_ was one of the books which, in the second quarter of the century, rightly or wrongly, excited American wrath against Englishmen; but his last book, _Fragments of Voyages and Travels_, was his most popular and perhaps his best. Captain Basil Hall was a very amiable person, and though perhaps a little flimsy as a writer, is yet certainly not to be spoken of with harshness. A very much stronger talent than any of these was Michael Scott, who was born in Glasgow in 1789 and died in 1835, having passed the end of his boyhood and the beginning of his manhood in Jamaica. He employed his experiences in composing for _Blackwood's Magazine_, and afterwards reducing to book shape, the admirable miscellanies in fiction entitled _Tom Cringle's Log_ and _The Cruise of the Midge_, which contain some of the best fighting, fun, tropical scenery, and description generally, to be found outside the greatest masters. Very little is known of Scott, and he wrote nothing else.