The suggestion of the Solent as a more suitable locality than Dartmouth appears to require a good deal of explanation; the committee, in the same breath almost, deprecates the want of a spacious deck for the boys to run about on during short intervals of recreation, when they _cannot land_. There would be plenty of long intervals in the Solent without landing! It is obvious that if a stationary ship, instead of a college, is used, she must be so placed that easy communication with the shore is never interrupted by weather. And then the brigs. Why _brigs_? Why not a steam vessel, larger and more commodious than the _Wave_, and fully rigged? She would be able to sail in and out of Dartmouth sometimes, when there happened to be a "soldier's wind"--by no means unfrequent there--and at other times there is the screw to fall back upon. The suggested substitute for nominations also strikes one as impractical in the extreme. Where are the boys to go after they have intimated their desire to enter the Navy, and have produced an Oxford and Cambridge Local certificate? There must be a list of such candidates at the Admiralty, and they would be scattered all over the kingdom at various schools when notice would have to be given of the examination by the Civil Service Commissioners. On the whole, one gets somewhat weary of committees; and very weary work indeed is the reading of the thousands of questions and answers so scrupulously recorded in the Blue Book. Meanwhile, the _Britannia_ got on pretty well in the 'eighties, and turned out the usual proportion of efficient executive officers. Out of 763 who presented themselves for the passing out examination, 36, or 4·7 per cent., failed; which, considering that the _Britannia_ is admittedly a probationary establishment, and that it was being constantly alleged at this time that the cadets could not learn their work properly, is a very small proportion of failures. The officers who commanded the _Britannia_ during the 'eighties were as follow:-- Captain R. Wells, appointed August 31st, 1880. Captain N. Bowden-Smith, appointed September 20th, 1883. Captain F. G. D. Bedford, appointed August 16th, 1886. Captain Noel S. F. Digby, appointed September 7th, 1889. The total number of entries during this period was 883, of whom the Navy List gives the following record:-- ACTIVE LIST. Captains, 5; commanders, 132; lieutenants, 431. RETIRED LIST. Lieutenants, 21. A total of 589, leaving a balance of 294, or 33 per cent., to be accounted for as dead or removed from the Navy List.