So Pett thought out a device. About the time of high water he had a great lighter made fast at the stern of the _Prince Royal_ so as to help to float the latter. But it was of no avail, for the strong wind “overblew the tide, yett the shipp started, but yet the Dock gates pent her in so streight that she stuck fast between them by reason the ship was nothing lifted with the tide as we expected she should, and ye great lighter by unadvised counsel being cut of(f), the sterne of the ship settled so hard upon the ground that there was no possibility of launching that tide.” Furthermore, so many people had gone aboard the ship that one could hardly turn round. It was a terrible contretemps that the ship remained unyielding, for here were the distinguished visitors on board waiting. “The noble Prince himself accompany with ye Lord Admirall and other great Lords were upon the poope where the standing great guilt Cupp was ready filled with wine to name ye shipp so soon as she had been on floate according to ancient Custome and ceremoneys performed at such time by drinking part of the wine, giving the ship her name and heaving the standing cup overboard.” But time and tide wait on no man, prince or shipbuilder. It was no use to expect a launch that day. “The King’s Maj^{tie},” Pett adds sorrowfully, “was much grieved to be frustrate of his expectation comeing on purpose tho very ill at ease to have done me honour, but God saw it not so good for me, and therefore sent this Cross upon me both to humble me and make me to know that however we purposed He would dispose all things as He pleased.” Thus, at five that afternoon, the King and Queen departed. When the last guest had gone, Pett, pathetic but plucky, set to work with his assistants “to make way with the sides of the gates,” and, plenty of help being at hand, got everything ready before the next flood came up. The Lord Admiral had sat up all night in a chair in one of the rooms adjoining the yard till the tide “was come about the ship.” It was a little past full moon--when the tides, of course, are at their highest--and the weather was most unpropitious. It rained, it thundered and it lightened for half an hour, during which Prince Henry returned to the yard and went aboard the _Prince Royal_ together with the Lord Admiral and Pett. It was now about 2 a.m., or an hour before high water. Another attempt was made to launch the great ship, and happily this time she sped into the water without any difficulty or the straining of screws or tackles. As she floated clear into the channel, the Prince drank from the cup and solemnly named the ship the _Prince Royal_. Thus, at length, this glorious ship that was to be so much admired presently with her fine carvings and decorations, with her elaborate figurehead at the bows representing her namesake on horseback, kissed the waters of the Thames. Soon, fitted with three lanterns at the poop and her yards and masts, her fifty-five