Many circumstances have combined to make me take a warm interest in all that concerns the navy. In early life, having passed several months in a line-of-battle ship during the war with France, I was an eye-witness of scenes and events, which called forth some of those qualities that are illustrated in the following pages. For the restoration of my health, in the year 1811, I was advised to try the effects of sea air and a change of climate, and was glad to accept the opportunity offered me, by the captain of an eighty-gun ship, to take a cruise with him off the southern parts of the French coast. On one occasion, in a severe tempest in the Bay of Biscay, a flash of lightning struck the ship and set her on fire. The calmness with which orders were given and obeyed, and the rapidity with which the fire was extinguished, without the least hurry or confusion, made a deep impression on me. This was afterwards increased by the conduct of the crew in a severe gale of wind, when it was necessary to navigate one of the narrow channels, by which the squadron that blockaded Rochelle and Rochfort was frequently endangered. The vessel had to pass between two rocks, so near that a biscuit could have been thrown from the deck on either. An old quarter-master was at the wheel; the captain stood by to con and to direct his steering. At one fearful crisis, every blast threatened to shiver a sail, or to carry away a spar, and a single false movement of the helmsman, or the slightest want of steadiness or of obedience on the part of any man on duty, would have been fatal to the life of every one on board. As they drifted on their path There was silence deep as death, And the boldest held his breath For a time. When the danger was over, the captain thanked the officers and men for their conduct, and gave a snuff-box with five guineas in it to the quarter-master, in admiration of his steady head and iron nerves. I mention these incidents in my early experience as a sort of apology for a landsman's presumption, in venturing to write this Preface to a series of nautical details. In after years, the death of a dear brother, a lieutenant in the navy, who lost his life in a generous attempt to save a vessel from shipwreck on the coast of Sussex, moved me to a still deeper concern for those whose employment is 'in the great waters.'