It is true,perhaps,that there is more of ostentation than of real utility in ships of this vast and unwieldy burden,which are rarely capable of acting against an enemy;but if the building such contributes to preserve,among other nations,the notion of the British superiority in naval affairs,the expense,though very great,is well incurred,and the ostentation is laudable and truly political.Indeed,I should be sorry to allow that Holland,France,or Spain,possessed a vessel larger and more beautiful than the largest and most beautiful of ours;for this honor I would always administer to the pride of our sailors,who should challenge it from all their neighbors with truth and success.And sure I am that not our honest tars alone,but every inhabitant of this island,may exult in the comparison,when he considers the king of Great Britain as a maritime prince,in opposition to any other prince in Europe;but I am not so certain that the same idea of superiority will result from comparing our land forces with those of many other crowned heads.In numbers they all far exceed us,and in the goodness and splendor of their troops many nations,particularly the Germans and French,and perhaps the Dutch,cast us at a distance;for,however we may flatter ourselves with the Edwards and Henrys of former ages,the change of the whole art of war since those days,by which the advantage of personal strength is in a manner entirely lost,hath produced a change in military affairs to the advantage of our enemies.As for our successes in later days,if they were not entirely owing to the superior genius of our general,they were not a little due to the superior force of his money.Indeed,if we should arraign marshal Saxe of ostentation when he showed his army,drawn up,to our captive general,the day after the battle of La Val,we cannot say that the ostentation was entirely vain;since he certainly showed him an army which had not been often equaled,either in the number or goodness of the troops,and which,in those respects,so far exceeded ours,that none can ever cast any reflection on the brave young prince who could not reap the laurels of conquest in that day;but his retreat will be always mentioned as an addition to his glory.
In our marine the case is entirely the reverse,and it must be our own fault if it doth not continue so;for continue so it will as long as the flourishing state of our trade shall support it,and this support it can never want till our legislature shall cease to give sufficient attention to the protection of our trade,and our magistrates want sufficient power,ability,and honesty,to execute the laws;a circumstance not to be apprehended,as it cannot happen till our senates and our benches shall be filled with the blindest ignorance,or with the blackest corruption.
Besides the ships in the docks,we saw many on the water:the yachts are sights of great parade,and the king's body yacht is,I believe,unequaled in any country for convenience as well as magnificence;both which are consulted in building and equipping her with the most exquisite art and workmanship.
We saw likewise several Indiamen just returned from their voyage.
These are,I believe,the largest and finest vessels which are anywhere employed in commercial affairs.The colliers,likewise,which are very numerous,and even assemble in fleets,are ships of great bulk;and if we descend to those used in the American,African,and European trades,and pass through those which visit our own coasts,to the small craft that lie between Chatham and the Tower,the whole forms a most pleasing object to the eye,as well as highly warming to the heart of an Englishman who has any degree of love for his country,or can recognize any effect of the patriot in his constitution.Lastly,the Royal Hospital at Greenwich,which presents so delightful a front to the water,and doth such honor at once to its builder and the nation,to the great skill and ingenuity of the one,and to the no less sensible gratitude of the other,very properly closes the account of this scene;which may well appear romantic to those who have not themselves seen that,in this one instance,truth and reality are capable,perhaps,of exceeding the power of fiction.When we had passed by Greenwich we saw only two or three gentlemen's houses,all of very moderate account,till we reached Gravesend:these are all on the Kentish shore,which affords a much dryer,wholesomer,and pleasanter situation,than doth that of its opposite,Essex.This circumstance,I own,is somewhat surprising to me,when I reflect on the numerous villas that crowd the river from Chelsea upwards as far as Shepperton,where the narrower channel affords not half so noble a prospect,and where the continual succession of the small craft,like the frequent repetition of all things,which have nothing in them great,beautiful,or admirable,tire the eye,and give us distaste and aversion,instead of pleasure.With some of these situations,such as Barnes,Mortlake,etc.even the shore of Essex might contend,not upon very unequal terms;but on the Kentish borders there are many spots to be chosen by the builder which might justly claim the preference over almost the very finest of those in Middlesex and Surrey.
How shall we account for this depravity in taste?for surely there are none so very mean and contemptible as to bring the pleasure of seeing a number of little wherries,gliding along after one another,in competition with what we enjoy in viewing a succession of ships,with all their sails expanded to the winds,bounding over the waves before us.