In the early days of October, 1799, at which time we were warring with Holland, H.M.S. _Lutine_ was lying at Yarmouth, while the British troops garrisoned on the island of Texel off the Dutch coast were waiting anxiously for their pay. The _Lutine_ was commissioned to carry the £140,000 due to the troops, and, hearing that she was departing for the Continent, many merchants sought permission to ship gold and silver by her for the relief of the merchants of Hamburg, who were financially embarrassed by the wars and the ensuing depression of the money market. The permission was readily granted, and 1000 bars of gold and 500 bars of silver were taken to Yarmouth and safely shipped aboard. In the ordinary course of business, the owners of the bullion went to Lloyd’s and effected an insurance for the sum of £900,000. On October of the year stated, the _Lutine_ weighed anchor and sailed out of Yarmouth Roads on her voyage to Hamburg. As she bowled across the North Sea, the wind freshened and culminated that night in a terrific gale which the _Lutine_, gallant ship as she was, could not weather. The treacherous shoals off the Dutch coast reached out for her, and the mighty seas battered the life out of her and engulfed her. Of all aboard, but one human soul survived to tell of the wreck before he, too, succumbed from exhaustion. The loss of the _Lutine_ was a tremendous blow to Lloyd’s. It meant that the underwriters had to find the sum of £900,000 with which to meet the claims of the insurers. Somehow they found the money and met all claims, thus adding fresh lustre to the name of Lloyd’s and helping to raise it to the position it occupies to-day as the greatest and most powerful marine insurance association in the whole world. In return for their £900,000 the underwriters became possessed of the treasure--or rather the right to recover it! At that time, immediately after the calamity, when salvage operations naturally stood the best chance of success, the underwriters were prevented from doing anything at all owing to our war with Holland, and later on the Dutch Government made its position clear about the matter by claiming the wreck and all that was in it. As the vessel lay, it was just possible to get to her when the sea was calm and the tides were at their lowest. It can be imagined that the Dutch fishermen made the most of their opportunities. Their government encouraged them by offering them one-third of everything they recovered, so the fishers found it profitable to leave their nets and spend their time fishing in the _Lutine_. Although the bulk of the treasure was beyond their reach, they managed during the next couple of years to lay their hands on a good deal of it. The Dutch Government received from the wreck treasure to the value of £56,000, and of this over £18,000 was paid to the salvors, while the rest was minted into Dutch money.