The fast-sailing vessels were compelled to hoist no more canvass than would enable their slow companions to keep up with them. It was like the bed of Procrustes applied to sea affairs. And what fun it was to watch the crowd of vessels as they rounded the narrow channel by the Rock; such bumping and thumping, such fidgeting and signal-firing on the part of the guardian angel to check the fast ones, and stimulate the slow ones, and keep them all well together. Nor must we forget here to mention another class of vessels, which made a very remarkable and prominent feature of the days which we are describing. We speak of the privateer. Liverpool was famous for this kind of craft. The fastest sailing vessels were, of course, selected for this service; and, as the men shipped on board of them were safe, in virtue of the letter of marque, from impressment, the most dashing and daring of the sailors came out of their hiding-holes to take service in them. On the day when such a vessel left the dock, the captain, or owner, generally gave a grand dinner to his friends, and it was a great treat to be of the party. While the good things were being discussed in the cabin, toasts given, speeches made, and all the rest of it, she continued to cruise in the river, with music playing, colours flying, the centre of attraction and admiration, “the observed of all observers,” as she dashed like a flying-fish through the water. And then the crew? The captain was always some brave, daring man, who had fought his way to his position. The officers were selected for the same qualities; and the men—what a reckless, dreadnaught, dare-devil collection of human beings, half-disciplined, but yet ready to obey every order, the more desperate the better. Your true privateer’s-man was a sort of “half-horse, half-alligator, with a streak of lightning” in his composition—something like a man-of-war’s man, but much more like a pirate—generally with a superabundance of whisker, as if he held, with Samson, that his strength was in the quantity of his hair. And how they would cheer, and be cheered, as we passed any other vessel in the river; and when the eating and drinking and speaking and toasting were over, and the boat was lowered, and the guests were in it, how they would cheer again, more lustily than ever, as the rope was cast off, and, as the landsmen were got rid of, put about their own vessel, with fortune and the world before them, and French West Indiamen and Spanish galleons in hope and prospect. Those were jolly days to some people, but we trust we may never see the like of them again. The dashing man-of-war, and the daring privateer, dazzled the eyes of the understanding, and kindled wild and fierce enthusiasm on all sides. The Park and Tower guns and the _Extraordinary Gazette_ confirmed the madness, and kept up a constant fever of excitement. But count the cost. Lift up the veil, and peep at the hideous features of the demon of war.