whose word could make or mar the fortunes of a naval officer, and yet was not a competent judge of the naval officer’s work. That Colbert should have created such a rank, and that it should have been preserved by the very able men who succeeded him in the government of the French Navy, shows that they were all blinded by the professional jealousy of the civil official for the fighting man, and by the Frenchman’s mania for over-governing. The next in rank was the Chef d’Escadre, Rear-Admiral or Commodore. Then we have another civil official, the _Commissaire Général à la suite des armées navales_, a subordinate of the _Intendant des armées navales_, who watched the Captain as his superior did the Admiral. The order of precedence in a French ship could not offer much novelty. There was the Capitaine du Vaisseau, or Post-Captain, and the Capitaine du Brûlot, or Captain of a fireship. The second in command was called the Major. He commanded the soldiers in the ship’s company, and all landing parties. Then came the Lieutenant, and after him the Enseigne. The recruiting of the corps of officers was provided for by the _Gardes de la marine_. There were three companies of the Gardes: one at Brest, one at Rochefort, and one at Toulon. They were mostly young men of gentle birth—that is, members of the _noblesse_ who had a right to a coat of arms and to the privileges of their caste,—but members of respectable families who had received the education of gentlemen were admitted. They were supposed to receive a very thorough professional training, and to be drafted into the ships when qualified. The fact did not always square with the theory. It was found that young gentlemen of good family and some influence were kept to their books with great difficulty. A certain number of them did no doubt attain to a level of book-knowledge very rare among our officers, but the whole history of the eighteenth century is at hand to prove that as a class they were inferior in practical capacity to the men brought up in the rough school of the English Navy.