“It was about the hour of noon when van Ghent let go his anchor just above Upnor Castle. But his fire-ships did not come to anchor. No! Still favoured by wind and tide, they proceeded onward, and presently fell among our great but defenceless ships. The two first of these fire-ships burned without any effect, but the rest that went upward grappled the _Great James_, the _Royal Oak_, and the _Loyal London_, and these three proud ships which, under other names, and even under the names they now bore, had so often been plumed with victory, lay a helpless prey to the enemy, and were presently in a blaze. “Having burned to the water’s edge the _London_, the _James_, and the _Royal Oak_, and some few other vessels of less note, van Ghent thought it best to take his departure. Yet, great as was the mischief he had done, it was so easy to have done a vast deal more, that the English officers at Chatham could scarcely believe their own eyes when they saw him prepare to drop down the river with the next receding tide, and without making any further effort ... the trumpeters on their quarter decks playing ‘Loth to depart’ and other tunes very insulting and offensive to English pride.” What shall we say of Chatham, Rochester, and the associated districts of Stroud and New Brompton? It is difficult, indeed, to find a great deal that is praiseworthy. They may perhaps still be summed up in Mr. Pickwick’s words: “The principal productions of these towns appear to be soldiers, sailors, Jews, chalk, shrimps, officers, and dockyard men.” Formerly the view from the heights of Chatham Hill must have been a splendid one, with the broad Medway and its vast marshlands stretching away for miles across to the wooded uplands of Hoo. Now it appears almost as if a large chunk of the crowded London streets had been lifted bodily and dropped down to blot out the beauties of the scene, for there is little other to be seen than squalid buildings huddled together in mean streets, with just here and there a great chimney-stack to break the monotony of the countless roofs. The dockyard at Chatham is much the same as any other dockyard, and calls for no special description. From its slips have been launched many brave battleships, right down from the days of Elizabeth to our own times. Here at all seasons may be seen cruisers, battleships, destroyers, naval craft of all sorts, dry docked for refitting. All day long the air resounds to the noise of the automatic riveter, and the various sounds peculiar to a shipbuilding area.