which appeared suspicious: one of the French captains was going about among them, evidently inciting them to some concerted action; which, with all the English crew aloft, might well have been entirely successful. But they had not reckoned with the officer in charge. With his hand in his pocket, clutching his pistol, but not exhibiting it so as to precipitate violence, he approached the French captain, and quietly told him that instant death was his portion on the smallest evidence of any attempt to capture the ship; then, hailing his own men, he bade them look sharp down from aloft, and the danger was averted in a few minutes. Nothing save undaunted courage, combined with absolute outward calm, could have saved the situation; had Hutchinson appeared alarmed or flustered he would have been lost; and this incident, briefly and modestly related by himself, affords a sure indication of his character. In 1757, after the war with France was renewed, Hutchinson was in command of a fine privateer, the _Liverpool_, named after the port from which she hailed, in which he made several successful cruises. We are told that "he would not permit the least article to be taken from any of the French prisoners," from which we may conclude that, as we should expect of a man of his stamp, he was an honourable and strict privateer commander, who was emphatically captain of his ship, and insisted upon a high standard of duty. One night he made a lamentable mistake. Continuing, after dark, the chase of a vessel which had been previously sighted, and was believed to be a French privateer, he came up with her and hailed her in _French_. The only reply was a tremendous and well-directed broadside, which did serious damage aloft, pierced the hull close to the water-line, and wounded no fewer than twenty-eight of the crew. Captain Hutchinson devoutly wished that he had stuck to his native tongue, instead of airing his French, for the vessel turned out to be his Majesty's ship _Antelope_! Hutchinson did no more in the way of privateering after the year 1758. In the following year he was appointed principal water-bailiff and dockmaster of Liverpool, and held this post for nearly forty years. In 1777 he published a book entitled "A Practical Treatise on Seamanship," and justified--if it needed justification--this act by a verse under the frontispiece (a vessel under full sail), whether original or a quotation does not appear: Britannia's glory first from ships arose; To shipping still her power and wealth she owes. Let each experienced Briton then impart His naval skill to perfect naval art.