Offensive operations of any description, on our part, were not in contemplation; and to every purpose of defensive warfare our means on the Lake were amply competent. To have deprived the Admiral, on the Halifax station, of the services of the Tartarus, when every ship was required by him for the protection of our trade from the numerous cruizers of the enemy, without any adequate object in view, would have been altogether unjustifiable on the part of Sir George Prevost. Whether, if the captain and seamen of the Tartarus had been sent to Lake Ontario, the enemy's flotilla, preparing at Sackett's Harbour,[41] could have been destroyed; or whether, if ship-carpenters had, at the commencement of the war, been sent to Kingston, we could have built as rapidly as the enemy, cannot be proved, as neither course was attempted: nor is it material to the present discussion that it should be proved; the only question being, whether Sir George Prevost, in the then state of affairs, ought to have adopted either measure. From the preceding statement, it appears that he would not have been warranted in so doing. The observation of the Reviewer,[42] that the common-place attempt to hire, at Quebec, sailors for the Lake at one-half the wages which merchants were giving at the same moment, was the only exertion used to strengthen our flotilla, would not merit notice, if it were not for the purpose of exposing the writer's disingenuousness and want of candour. He must have known, when he made the assertion, that the merchants at Quebec hire their sailors for what is called the run-home (to England), and that for this purpose double and triple the amount of the common wages is frequently given; one-half, therefore, of that amount for a permanency, and on the Lake establishment, which held out many advantages to the men, was, as it proved, a sufficient inducement for them to enter into that service, and as many of the description required as could be found at Quebec, were procured by active and intelligent officers sent for that purpose. To these were added some valuable and experienced seamen from two transports then in the river St. Lawrence; and this supply of seamen, together with an additional number of shipwrights and other workmen, was during the winter forwarded to Kingston and York.