It was a gallant sight to witness one of these little cruisers, apparently surrounded by an enemy's squadron, and yet dashing through its midst, fly away before the wind, while the water around was driven into foam by the shot that sped after her. Their conduct and success throughout the war, revealed the vast resources at the command of our navy. We have only to build ships, not educate sailors. Our commerce pierces to every clime, and our fisheries extend beyond the Arctic Circle; and, hardened by exposure and taught by experience and perils, our sailors are thoroughly trained in all the duties of their calling. Crews that the commanders of men-of-war might well be proud of, are at this moment afloat in every part of the world. On mere call we could man the navies of Europe with well instructed men. One great difficulty with the French navy is, that during war she has no where to go for recruits. Her sailors require a long training, while ours have been trained from boyhood. Privateering has been denounced as unworthy of civilized nations, but if the object of maritime warfare be to destroy the enemy's commerce, it is difficult to see why a private armed vessel should not be commissioned to do it as well as a national one. If it be plundering private property on the high seas, so is the capture of merchantmen by men-of-war. The sailors in both are stimulated by the same motives, viz., prize money. If maritime war was to be carried on between national vessels alone, and commerce be left untouched, there would be little use for a navy. Ports are blockaded to injure commerce and weaken the resources of the enemy; so are fleets of merchantmen captured, supplies cut off and nations distressed for the same purpose. And if this is to be done, it seems hardly worth quarrelling about who shall do it. Our fleet was so small at the commencement of the war, that the balance of injury and loss would have been heavy against us, but for our privateers. Our large vessels were soon blockaded in port, and the contest on the seas was for some time almost wholly carried on by privateers, and of the more than two thousand vessels captured during its progress, the greater part was taken by them. A single privateer would slip through a blockading squadron, stand out to sea, and in a few weeks destroy vessels and seize property to the amount of millions. At one time they cruised so daringly in the English waters, that sixty dollars was paid in England to insure five hundred across the Irish Channel. Some of them fought British national vessels and captured them, while it scarcely ever happened that an American privateer struck to an English vessel, when there was any approximation to an equality of force. Of the twenty-three naval engagements during the war, where either one or both were national vessels, the Americans were victorious in seventeen. A similar success marked the contests of private armed vessels.