Just when the dockyards were founded it is difficult to say, but it is generally agreed that it was either at the end of the reign of Henry VII. or at the beginning of that of Henry VIII. Certain it is that from the latter’s reign down to the early days of Victoria the dockyard flourished. From its slips were launched many of the most famous of the early old “wooden walls of England”—the _Great Harry_ (afterwards called the _Henry Grace de Dieu_), the _Prince Royal_, the _Sovereign Royal_, and also many of those made famous by the glorious victories of Drake and Cavendish, and in the wonderful voyages of Hawkins and Frobisher. The _Sovereign Royal_, which was launched in the time of Charles I., was a fine ship of over 1,600 tons burden, and carried no less than a hundred guns. “This royal ship,” says old Stow, “was curiously carved, and gilt with gold, so that when she was in the engagement against the Dutch they gave her the name of the ‘Golden Devil,’ her guns, being whole cannon, making such havoc and slaughter among them.” With the passing away of the “wooden walls” and the advent of those huge masses of steel and iron which have in modern times taken the place of the picturesque old “three-deckers,” Woolwich began to decay as a Royal dockyard; for it soon became an unprofitable thing to build at Thames-side, and the shipbuilding industry migrated to towns nearer to the coalfields and the iron-smelting districts. Yet Woolwich continued, and has continued right down to this very day, its activities as a gun-foundry and explosives factory. Just when this part of the Royal works was founded we do not know. There is a story extant (and for years the story was accepted as gospel) to the effect that the making of the Arsenal was due entirely to a disastrous explosion at Moorfields in the year 1716. Apparently much of the Government work in those days was put out to contract, and a certain factory in the Moorfields area took a considerable share in the work. On one occasion a very large crowd had assembled to witness the casting of some new and more up-to-date guns from the metal of those captured by the Duke of Marlborough. Just as everything was ready, a clever young Swiss engineer, named Schalch, noticed that the material in the moulds was wet, and he warned the authorities of the danger. No notice was taken, the molten metal was poured into the castings, and there was a tremendous explosion. According to the story, the authorities were so impressed by the part which Schalch had played in the matter that they appointed him to take charge of a new Government foundry, and gave him the choice of a site on which to build his new place, and he chose the Woolwich Warren, slightly to the east of the Royal Dockyards. This is a most interesting story, and one with an excellent moral, no doubt—such a story, in fact, as would have delighted the heart of old Samuel Smiles; but, unfortunately for its veracity, there have been discovered