Another piece of work taken in hand was the improvement of the quality of the ships. The inferiority of our vessels was seen so soon as they came to be compared with the Spanish and French. Inquiry showed that though schemes had been drawn up in 1706 and 1719, and attempts had been made to improve the ships later, they had all been habitually neglected. Our vessels had been built, not only on bad principles, but not on any regular scale, so that vessels of the same rate were of different sizes, and the fittings of one could not be used for another. Here as elsewhere there was waste. A new scheme was made in 1746 and modified in 1751 without bringing complete amendment. The scandals of the navy had also shown the necessity for a revision of the laws regulating the discipline of the service. Hitherto the Navy Discipline Act had been that passed in the thirteenth year of Charles II. (1661). It conferred the right of holding courts martial, but under inconvenient limitations. The jurisdiction of the court was confined to offences committed on the high seas, and in the main rivers of His Majesty’s possessions below bridges. There was thus no power to punish offences committed ashore or in foreign countries. This was conferred in 1720, and some further amendments were made in 1745 and 1748. The worst defects of the old system remained and they were serious. The power to hold a court martial was given only to the commander-in-chief, that is the admiral or captain acting as commodore, with a separate command. If he died, or was compelled to come home by bad health, another commission had to be sent out to his successor. When Vernon came home from the West Indies, his successor, Sir Chaloner Ogle, was left for a whole year without power to hold a court martial, as the first vessel sent out with his commission was captured. Neither could the power be delegated by the commander-in-chief to any officer whom he detached. It was alleged in the course of the debates in Parliament in 1749 that, during the late war, a captain serving on the coast of Portugal had put his first lieutenant in irons. He went into Lisbon where there were several other warships, and the imprisoned officer applied for a court martial, but as the commander-in-chief was not present none could be held. The vessel left for England with the first lieutenant still in irons. On her way a French man-of-war was met. The captain then gave such visible proofs of derangement of mind, that the other officers shut him in his cabin and released the first lieutenant who took command of the ship. When she reached home an inquiry was made, and it was found that the captain was insane.