REMARKS ON THE Present Condition OF THE NAVY, And particularly of the VICTUALLING.  
In which the Notion of Fortifying of Garrisons is exploded:  
And 'tis clearly proved that the only Security of England consists in a Good FLEET.  
In a Letter from a Sailor to a Member of the House of Commons.  
London, Printed in Year 1670.   

Epistle to the READER.  
I Can wish there was no occasion for me to disturb my Brains in my Hammock about the Abuses of the Sailors; but they have been of too long a continuance to be born without Resentment: by frequent Complaints the Miserable often find Mercy; and we are bound to pray, though Heaven thinks not fit to grant, when we think we stand most in need of what we desire. I don't say that Navys in former Reigns have been without Corruption; but how easily have their Grievances been redressed? Sir John Thompson in his Preface to the Earl of Anglesey 's State of the Government, from 21 Edw. 3. Nᵒ 58. says, The Commons complain, That whereas divers Merchants were slain and robbed on the Sea by the King's Enemies of France, they which undertook the Conduct may be made come into this present Parliament to make Greenshield to the Merchants, who by their default have lost their Goods. To which the King answers, Let Persons and Places be appointed for hearing the Plaints of all that will complain, to the end Right and Reason may be fully done to the Plaintiff. Sir John further adds from the 45th of Edw. 3. Nᵒ 31. When the Commons affirm the Decay of the Navy to arise by three Causes, viz. 1. For that sundry men's Ships are stayed for the King long before they serve, whereby the Owners are driven at their Charges to find their Mariners to their undoing. 2. For that Merchants, the Nourishers of the Navy, are often restrained their Shipping; whereby Mariners are driven to seek other Trades and Live. 3. For that the Masters of the King's Ships do take up Masters of other Ships as good as themselves are; whereby the most of these Ships do lie still, and the Mariners are enforced to seek new Live, whereof they pray Remedy: The King promises to provide Remedy. These were but Innocent Grievances to what ours now are, yet of a far shorter continuance. Q 's and R 's were Letters then unknown to have Power enough to keep Sailors out of their Pay. Those that were public Scandals and Grievances to the People, were the same then to the King, as Sir John also instanceth from 5 Hen. 4. That the King's Confessor, the Abbot of Door, Mr. Richard Dutham and Crosby of the Chamber, at the Request of Parliament, were removed from the King's presence, The King saying, That he knew no Cause wherefore they should be removed, but only for that they were hated of the People, and therefore charged them to departed from his House, all but the Abbot who was not then present.   

REMARKS ON THE Present Condition OF THE NAVY, etc.  
THE monstrous Mismanagements in our Naval Affairs, have not only tired the Tongues of Complainers, but the Pens of Writers, in representing Grievances of so high a nature, and of such fatal Consequence to the English Nation. Our Maritime Miscarriages have been the anxious Concern even of the whole Kingdom: They have been the industrious Care of Parliament, who have unravelled all the Mystery of Iniquity, and laid the Common Grievance of the good People of England in this point before his Majesty in an English Address. Whether that Address gave being to the present Commission of Admiralty, is not worth our Enquiry: but if Persons had been punished, as well as their Crimes discovered, it might have deterred succeeding Commissioners, who now by the Success of their Predecessors may be encouraged to raise their Fortunes to the ruin of the Kingdom. Vice unpunished has a very attractive Virtue in it, and men easily tread the Path to Riches, though never so wicked, when they see others pass with safety before them. When men have lost all sense of Honesty and Conscience, what Crimes will they not commit? especially such as can leap over all Fences of Law, or can have recourse to Noli prosequi's or Privy Seals. But it seems the Crimes of the late Commission of Admiralty are forgiven, though they'll never be blotted out of the Book of the People's remembrance, since this Age is likely to feel the Effects of their Management. An ill Star has influenced our Horizon hitherto, and the Sons of the Sea have been under a fatal Direction. But you say, Sir, we have a new Commission, upon which you desire my Opinion.  
You know it does not much lie in my way to be acquainted with Persons, but Things: I am no Courtier, nor never desire to be one. All the knowledge I have of your Courtiers arises from the Influence their Management has upon the Public. If I have an ill piece of work put into my hands, it matters not who made it; he was either ignorant, no Artist, or a cheating Knave, and consequently not worth my Acquaintance. You know Men as well as Things, and may easily guests how they will prove, by their Temper and Inclination, before they come into Office, and by comparing their Principles with the Principles of those whom they succeed; for if they are cast in the same Mould, they'll incline the same way, and their Management will produce the same Effects: If they have no more Honesty, nor more Skill in Naval Affairs, and are no better Friends to Trade and the English Interest than the others, your new Commission is like some Revolutions, an Alteration without a Change; you have only changed your Shilling for two Sixpences, and got not one Farthing by the bargain. I could give you a better account of your new Commission, had not your demand been so speedy; for we have scarcely yet felt the Influence of our new Masters, and hardly know whether it be worth while to drink their Healths. I cannot so well tell you what they are, as I can tell you what they ought to be, which if I should do, perhaps they'll be angry with me; and therefore, to fight close and sure, and avoid the Fireships of the Gatehouse and Newgate, I'll tell you what they ought not to be.  
They ought not to be men of slavish Principles; for we Tarrs see so much Slavery abroad, and like it so ill, that we shall never endure it at home. No one in the world shall ever persuade me, that a Person who declared the Navy of England useless by voting for a Standing Army, is fit to have the management of it. The very notion of a Standing Army contains in it all the Villainies and Rogueries that ever the World saw; for Slavery, Popery, and all the Devildoms of the Universe are its inseparable Accidents. Now if this Principle of a Standing Army is to succeed the Doctrines of Passive Obedience and Nonresistance, and this must serve for a Test now as the others did in the late Reigns, no man can have a right to an Office, till he has first quitted his Right to Liberty. When men of such Principles are under the influence of the Royal Favour, there needs no Proclamation to tell the methods of acquiring an Office.  
These men might surely be contented with the Advantages they receive by trumping up a Standing Army to the ruin of their Country, without reflecting upon others, who endeavour to maintain this Government according to our Constitution, and are not willing to put their Liberties under the Conduct of a Land Force. 'Tis true the Prince of Orange came over by their Advice, and at their Request; and they in requital have ven him three of the most potent and flourishing Kingdoms of the Universe, and more Money to support him in them than to many of his Predecessors. They brought him over to restore their Liberties to them, and deliver them from the Slavery of a Standing Army; d'ye think they are now mad, to take up the same Fetters they so lately knocked off? These men tell us that the Nation cannot be secure without a Standing Army, and we say our Liberties are in danger with one; and certain it is a good King will acquiesce with that Security the People provide for their Liberties and the Kingdom: They'll take special care in this point; for the Liberties and Rights of the People are more valuable than the Rights and Prerogatives of the Crown. They are born Freemen, and are in actual possession of their Rights the first minute they draw their Breath, a Title a King as such cannot have, his Right depending upon the Consent of a willing People. A King may forfeit and lose his Crown, and the Regalities thereof may devolve upon the People, as the Legal Centre of all Honour and Dignity; but an Englishman can never forfeit his Liberty and the Rights he was born to. If he be convicted of High Treason without the Privilege of Gavel-kind, and his Estate becomes confiscate, his Son, notwithstanding this, is Heir to his Liberty and Property, and enjoys all the Privileges of a Freeman: His Cause is pleadable at Bar in a Court of Justice; he must be tried by his Peers according to the known Laws of the Realm: So that an Englishman can upon no account forfeit his Right. Now the Liberties of the People being so valuable, firm, and lasting, this Government has more reason to conside in their Security than any heretofore; for this King was brought to the Throne by worthy Patriots, such as opposed the Tyrannies of the late Reigns, and such as this Government has not made fat and lazy by Offices of Profit and Trust. These men are still living, and have nothing but their Liberties to leave to their Children; which being their last Stake, they'll be sure to manage it well, and not suffer it to be taken away by Invaders from abroad, nor by Standing Armies at home.  
Indeed the Attempt of settling a Standing Army supposed the People easy, and willing to quit their Rights at once; for Standing Armies are contrary to the Constitution of any Government where the People have the least Right. Soldiers are but Badges of Slavery in any Country where they are found; and what is the notion of Guards, but a supposition that the People are not able to defend themselves? and if so, they are a Prey to any body. The Miseries of those Countries where Soldiers are, are Arguments to those where they are not to keep them out. Like so many Caterpillars they wast and destroy the most fruitful Provinces: They carry a sort of Charm about them, that nothing prospers where they come; and even in those Countries where they are found sometimes necessary, as lately in England, they are confounded Evils, and men can hardly distinguish which is most dangerous, the Remedy or the Disease. We found our War attended with many Inconveniences besides our quartering of Soldiers: our Trade and Commerce decayed, as the Trade of War increased; nay the Heavens themselves seemed to be angry at us, and bestowed one continued Frown upon a base and degenerate Age. The Sun (as if ashamed to behold our Erterprises) shrouded his Head in thicker Clouds, and denied the favourable Influence of his Beams to an Apostate Country: Nature withdrew her wont Bounty from us, and fed us with Fruits as immature as our Actions: The Seasons altered upon us; we knew Summer nor Winter, Spring nor Autumn, any otherwise than by Mensuration of time. What Storms then did we meet with on the Ocean in Seasons little expected? The whole Course of Nature seemed to go Retrograde, as we declined from our ancient Principles of Virtue and Liberty. But now we have assumed our pristine Courage, and the Genius of our Country informs our Parliament; now we have in foam measure rid ourselves of our Armies, the cause of our multiplied Curses, the Heavens smile upon us, the Seasons of the Year return to their ancient Course, being all unwilling to curse a fruitful Land with Barrenness upon the account of a few Thistles that start up in it, and to destroy a brave and glorious Country upon the account of a few ill Men.  
I have, Sir, made the larger Digression upon this Subject, to vindicate those worthy English Gentlemen that put down the Army, believing them to be true Friends to us Sailors, in laying aside the Support of Armies, and trusting altogether to us; but if you suffer those who were for a Land Army to be our Directors and Governors, as they are wholly ignorant of Maritime Affairs, they superintend us with an envenomed grudge upon the foresaid account: for the Dispute in your House was not whether an Army was ever useful, but whether an Army was a better Security to our Kingdom than a Fleet; and the Members of your honourable House knew very well, that of the two Supports proposed for your Realm, you ought to choose the best, and that you had no occasion of both when one would serve Now (if I may so say) we Sailors carrying our point in the House of Commons against the Soldiers, must of necessity be hated by the Army Folk; and if any of these Army men or but one of them is in your New Commission, we are fallen most damnably to Lee-ward, and God knows when we shall fetch up the old Honour and Glory of the English Navy.  
But I now, Sir, tack about upon your new Commission, or your new Commissioners, which you please; for take the Office entire, 'tis Linsey-woolsey, half new, half old; new Commissioners with all the old Officers. It is perhaps beneath the Dignity of great Personages to have any knowledge of their own in Naval Affairs, and therefore are forced to trust to the Judgement of others. You know, Sir, taking of Minutes, writing a Letter or Order is a mighty piece of Business not to be left to the Judgement of a new Secretary; 'tis necessary to have one that served the old Commission, else how shall we steer the old Course? for whoever conns the Ship of the Admiralty, the Secretary is always at the Helm; he knows all the Reaches, Buoys and Shelves of the River of Parliament, and knows how to steer clear of 'em all: He is the Spring that moves the Clockwork of the whole Board, the Oracle that is to be consulted on all Occasions; he sits at the Board behind a great Periwig, peeping thro' it like a Rat out of a Butter-firkin, ready to misrepresent the Case of any Complainer, by telling the Commissioners that he complains out of prejudice, that he has written or spoken against the late Commissioners, that he is mad, etc. and indeed what man in his Wits would endeavour to mend an Administration so corrupt and rotten as ours, or to complain of Grievances, when 'tis just like flinging of hot Water to windward at Sea, which certainly flies back in your face and scalds you?  
It is observable that they follow the Example of the old Commissioners in that unaccountable whim of gazetting all Complaints that are transmitted to them. If A. B. sends them a Letter, can't they desire A. B. to attend them, without telling the world the subject matter of A. B's Letter? A. B. knew of it before, and the knowledge of it can be no advantage to any besides the Party complained against.  
You know, Sir, for some years last past the noise of an Invasion has been a necessary Imagination in our Government, and has been presented to us as a necessary shooing horn to draw on you know what; for if there be any meaning in it, it must be a few more Land-forces, and a great deal more Money, as if the Children of England were but one Remove from Naturals, and willing to make Ducks and Drakes with their Money, and play it away as Boys do Cherrystones. Had the noise of an Invasion the latter end of last Sessions been real, and our Intentions to prevent it sincere, our good Lords of the Admiralty would have sent our Fleet from the Downs before the 15th of July. We have made a fine Summer's Work of it, considering the great Danger they told us we were in in the Spring. Some of our great Ships have sailed from the Medway to the Downs, and from the Downs to Medway: Over the Water, Master, for a Penny. At this Rate our great Ships may spoil the Trade of the Deal-hookers, and our small Craft be supplanted by the King's Frigates. Did they not now give any body time enough to disembark upon our Country? The Enemy might have come upon our Coasts, and fastened their Hazers to our Rocks, and towed away our Island, and made it a part of the Continent, in so long an Interval betwixt Counsel and Action. We have made but a very indifferent Figure at Sea this year, if we consider England as the most Potent Nation of the Universe in shipping, having Ships enough to beat the whole World twice over, and a good Fleet left for a Reserve into the Bargain. But such Actions as these must be done by the natural Sons of the Sea, and the management of the Fleet must at such a time be under the Conduct of men, whose Heads are not crammed with Land-Notions, and who would manage Fleets as they do Land-Armies ashore. And this leads me to discuss a new Point, the late Notion of Fortifying of Garrisons for Security of our Shipping.  
This fortifying of Garrisons to secure the Fleet, looks so much like entrenching, which for several Years together in Flanders cost the English Nation such a woundy deal of Money, in Spades, Pickaxes and Wheelbarrows, that I can't down with it. Such a Notion as this may suit the Governments of Sally and Madagascar well enough. But the English are yet Masters of the Sea, and have no occasion of a Subterfuge that I know of: Our Guns on board Ship have hitherto been their Defence, without the Auxiliary Assistance of Platforms and Lines. But the last year we had an Author started out with an Answer to all the Books written against a Standing Army, encouraged in that pious Work by the Court Party; wherein he tells us, Pag. 66. That the French from Stokes-bay may be able to destroy our Fleet at Portsmouth. His Subject required something to be said of Fleets and Bays; and Stokes-bay, Soulbay, or Torbay are the same to the folk he wrote for. But pray, Mr. Positive, what sort of Guns must the French have to destroy our Ships at Portsmouth from Stokes-Bay? If you build them a Platform a top of Gilkicker or Stoke-Church, you may do something tho you're a woundy way off still: But being a good Pilot, you may perhaps bring them from Stokes-Bay into Portsmouth Harbour, notwithstanding they must first engage the Castle; and then entering the Harbour, must by the position of the Sands fall so near a Platform of Guns on the Starboard side, that one may fling a Biscuit Cake ashore from the Ship. If they get by here, they next pass a Castle upon the Point, and all the Point lined with Cannon, and within Musket Shot of the Enemy. Next they have on the Larboard-side, the whole Garrison of Gospert, its Castles, Lines, and Platforms to engage; besides in the midst of that Harbour a Castle and a great many Guns at the Dock. Now, Mr. Infallible Courtier! the French are in a very good station, Gospert rakes 'em fore and aft, and Portsmouth peppers their Quarters and Sterns: you have even fairly brought them on, how the Devil will you get them off? And pray remember I han't spoke one word of Southsea-Castle all this while, which I am sure upon such an occasion would have one slap at their Arses; nay the very Potguns at Rhyde would do 'em some mischief. Now let the world judge whether the Author of that Book deserved 500 l. for such a Notion as this▪ I dare engage they won't give me half the Money for my Book, though it contains plain Truth and matter of Fact, wholly designed for the Interest of the English Nation.  
It is evident, that it is none of our Interest to lock up our Ships in the Chest at Chatham, nor to secure them in the Harbours of Portsmouth or Plymouth. Our Ships were built to keep the Enemies from our Harbours, and not our Garrisons built to defend our Shipping. Our first Contest aught to be upon the Water, where if we are beaten (which I think we shan't be under a good Management) and we fly for Refuge to our fortified Harbours, the Enemy will hardly follow us thither, for 'tis none of their business to knock their Heads against Stonewalls; their business then is to land upon us and invade us, being well assured if they can get the Land, the Forts, Garrisons and Ships will come in of course. For my part I never questioned the Courage of my Brethren the Tarrs, nor their Constancy and Fidelity to the Interest of the English Nation; they can do Wonders when under a good Management and Usage. This Notion of fortifying of Garrisons to secure Shipping, looks also as if we were afraid of some new Imaginary Evil; here is something started up in the room of an Invasion, the Fears and Jealousies of our Courtiers grow like Mushrooms: but I'll say that for 'em, that they never advance a terrible Goblin but there's Money in the Tail on't. I hope our doughty Author that encounters and answers all Mankind, when our Garrisons come to be fortified, will be at least Sir Christopher Wren in the Action; 'tis pity this wonderful Notion of his should go without a farther Reward.  
As the Sancho Pancha to this Quixot, follows a nameless Squire with a Book about fortifying Dover Peer to secure the King's Ships: this he says is a Manuscript of Sir Walter Raleighs to Queen Elizabeth, which he found amongst some mouldy Records. Now all the Reason in this Book is not worth an Eggshel. What can you gather from it? Why this: Sir Walter Raleigh thought the fortifying of Dover Peer a security to Ships of War in the Days of Queen Bess, therefore it is necessary now. How far this Consequence will hold water I can't tell: But to say that Queen Elizabeth had a very pitiful Navy, not so good as our fifth and sixth Rates, yet by the Choice of good Commanders she routed and destroyed the Invincible Armado of Spain, and therefore we ought to follow the same Example, is good reasoning, and advantageous to the Realm. We may err in Particulars, but what has been generally acted for the good of the Realm, practised and approved by many Ages now extinct, will always hold good, and still be our help. Our Author does not beg our pardon for not telling us how much Money it will cost us to cleanse Dover Peer, how many Loads of Mud are in it, nor whether there is not more Mud there than will cover the whole County of Kent, though he is so civil in his Epistle to ask Sir W. Raleighs pardon for publishing his Manuscript, though Sir Walter died about 100 years ago. Whence the Devil this humour of crying all things down our Fathers have found useful came, I can't tell; But certainly men were never more out of love with old Things, and the approved Maxims and Ways of our Forefathers than now: How many Fleets have road in the Downs secure of all Tempests? tell me how many Ships we lost there, or have been forced from their Anchors thence during the War? Now suppose we had as much Money in England as there is Mud in Dover Peer, what advantage would the fortifying of it be to the English Navy? Perhaps we might lose more Ships in one year in bringing them into the Peer, than have and will be lost in the Downs from the beginning of the World to the Resurrection. If our Author be made Pilot to bring them into the Peer, I'll lay my Cap to a Trunnel that he's hanged in a Month's time. But what need all these Projects, these Chimaeras? who amongst us is afraid? For our parts we are not: give us but good Commanders, good Pay, and better Victuals, we defy the Devil and all his Works. Don't you remember what we did at lafoy Hogue, we can show you such another Trick whenever there is occasion for it. We have abundance of Attempts to set us beside our true Interest in Naval Affairs; pray when, Sir, will you give a fair push to set us before the Wind for the Honour and Glory of our Country?  
Thus I hope I have overset the Vanity of two Authors, though the design of my writing was to show you the Miscarriages of the Navy, the Wrecks they have already made, that you may steer clear of them, and find out  it is too late some Method to put us in a right posture for the defence of your Nation.  
I should in the next place proceed to the Navy Office, and give you an Account of the hard Usage of the Sailors there; the impious Method of buying their Tickets, of keeping them out of their Pay upon the account of Q's and Rs set upon their names in the Navy-Books; and the abominable Practices of the Officers of the Payoffice, etc. But another Method is taken to inform your Honourable House of their Grievances.  
I could also enlarge upon the abominable Practice of pressing the Seamen for the Service, and show how inconsistent it was with the rights of a freeborn People. Indeed the abuses of the Sailors are so many and so great, that a man knows not where to begin or end.  
Perhaps, Sir, you never heard of such an Office as Slop-seller to his Majesty's Navy, and therefore I must acquaint you with the Original of that Office. A certain Person in K. C. the 2d's time got in with one of the Royal Whores, and she got him a Patent to be Slop-seller to his Majesty's Navy, which is as much as to say she got him empowered by the King's Sign Manual to cheat all his Sailors; for no Slops were to be sent on Board, and sold to the Sailors, but what belonged to this Person; at this rate he got at least 50 per Cent. Now this Patent is still in force, and the Seamen under this Government have met with the same Usage. This has been the general Complaint of the Sailors of the whole Navy; but the Officers of the Navy finding it profitable to themselves, have still supported the Cheat: For the Slopseller allows 12 d. in the Pound to the Payoffice for stopping the Slop-Mony at the Pay-Table. If you please ('tis very easy) to examine the Books of the Payoffice upon this Account, you'll find that the Poundage received in that Office upon this and the Account of Tobacco, amounts to about 80 Thousand pound during the last War.  
Let us now descend to the Victualling, the lowest and most corrupt Office of the Navy. The Cure of the Navy is done but by halves; for though the Head may be eased by Cephalick Medicines, yet if the lower Region of the Stomach be infected, its noxious and poisonous Vapours will ascend and affect the Brain. This is the Condition of our Navy. The Head is only shaved to prevent the Frenzy: without Blood-letting and other necessary Applications to effect a Cure, the whole Body labours under an ill Habit, which, till removed, our Ships Rudders will hardly cut water, and our Ships, the Walls of our Island, will be a weak Defence, and their Cannon as insignificant as so many Squibs or Crackers. From the Votes of your House the last Sessions by the Admiralty, I spell the whole Affair of the Navy; the Victualling and Navy Offices being rather constituent parts than dependent Offices upon it: and I thought that your Votes condemning the ill Practices of one, had supposed all the rest; that this was as clearly understood as if it had been verbally expressed; that since you were over Shoes, there was no occasion of your being over Boots too in the Augean Stable of the Navy; and that there was a little necessity for you to stir a thing that already stank over the whole Kingdom. I hoped the general Resentment of our Representatives in Parliament carried such a force in it, that the thing resented had no need of Retrospection. I little thought to have heard of any more Complaints, or to have employed my Pen any more on this Subject: But we still labouring under the same Mismanagements and Administration, I shall with Fidelity inform you of the past and present State of the Victualling; which Hints, I hope, by your greater Wisdom may be improved to an effectual Redress.  
I told you the last Sessions the Qualifications of those Commissioners; and methinks it is great pity, that so many worthy Patriots as brought his Majesty to the Throne, Men valuable for their Parts and Skill in Business, should want Employments, and his Majesty be forced to pick up a Journyman Apothecary, one that was hired at 50 s. per mensem Surgeon of a Ship to the West Indies upon the Revolution, to be a Commissioner in that Office. But how much soever Men of Merit and Worth are neglected it matters not, provided our Country and Government were well served, which cannot be done by ill men, that have neither Honesty nor Sense.  
When men are established Commissioners, what is their first business? If they have bought their Places, than they must do something to make good their Purchase chase Money; they must get something to live at a great rate; they must provide something for their children's Portions; they must lay by something to make their Peace, when they are found tardy; and they must reserve something to live upon when they are old; and after all their Somethings, 'tis ten to one if the People have any thing left besides Taxes. Now the Victuallers having nothing allowed them besides their Salaries, they must find out something too for themselves; and since they have no Perquisites, they must make some. Upon this account they seized to their own use the Boards-Ends in the Cooperidg, which Board's Ends are pieces sawed off from the Pipe-Staves, when they are cut into equal Lengths to make the Cask. These Boards-Ends were formerly sold for the King's advantage, and were sometime the Perquisite of the Master Cooper when the Victualling was in Contract. The largest of these Boards-Ends will serve to make Buckets for the Navy's use, the shorter to make Canns, and the least may be sold to Brush and Hourglass makers. Indeed the Boards-Ends themselves are a great loss to the King, but the loss is much advanced by the manner of securing them to the Commissioners use; every Commissioner but one having a Labourer appointed for that Service, and paid out of the Nations Pocket. These Labourers are not under the Check and Command of the Officers of the Yards; their Business is to carry in their Fardel of Boards-Ends to their Commissioners, and then their day's Service is over. And if at any time their Compliment of Boards-Ends falls short, than they saw the new Staves to pieces to make Ends. Mr. John Bridgar, the Overseer of the Cooperidg, once found a Labourer at this piece of Service, and immediately discharged him; upon which the Commissioner made his life uneasy by an inveterate grudge upon this Account, and at last made his Office useless; and though the Person he discharged was for some time out of Service, the Commissioners as a Reward of his Iniquity, preferred him to a much better Emyloyment in the Cutting-house.  
I shall not insist here upon the small Perquisites of Beef and Pork, the common Provision for their Families; nor on the deplorable Condition of the King's Bavin-stack torn to pieces by these Miscreants, from which 100 in a week have been carried into two of the Commissioners Houses.  
Another of their Perquisites is the Ox-Tongues, which formerly were distributed to the Ships of War in number according to the Proportion of Provisions the Ship received: To every 160 pieces of Beef (each Ox, one with the other, being computed to make so many pieces) was allowed a Tongue: But now the Ships have allowed according to their Rates what number of Tongues the Commissioners please, which Tongues they receive once a Year; the Overplus of Tongues, which is very considerable, falling to their own Disposal. At Christmas the Lords of the Treasury and their Officers have so many; the Lords of the Admiralty so many, Commissioners of the Navy so many, of the Victualling the rest; besides each a Quota of Marrowbones. Thus these kind Creatures make Presents to one another out of the public Stock of the Kingdom.  
This Office has followed the Example of most Offices in the Kingdom, in stifling such Complaints as have been brought against their Officers; and with good Reason too, for the little Thiefs are privy to the Embezlements of the great ones; and no Punishers are found when all men are guilty. We must make no Precedents of this Nature; thus the whole Axletree of our Offices would crack, and the setting of a small Star would be portentous of a black Night amongst them. Time has been when the Victuallers have preferred one of their Creatures soon after a Complaint against him for drinking K. James' Health, and have pardoned another upon his Confession of Embezlements. But of this I have spoke more at large in another Book, as of their buying and selling to the Office; so that I shall no farther urge what has been insisted on already, but shall leave it to the Consideration of your Honourable House how far detrimental it must be to the Nation to have Officers buy of the King, and sell to the King at their own Price; and whether this sort of Practice has not been a main Cause of the Deficiency of our Funds? The vast Estates got by Persons receiving small Salaries in that Office, are evident proofs of the sinister ways by which such Estates have been acquired.  
The Commissioners and Officers, by making Interest for their Friends to sell in Provisions, have too often been the Occasion of bad Provisions being brought into the Stores; for when Goods are bought by favour and affection, the Quality of the Commodity is not considered, but the Gratuity given the Officer is the principal Verb. By this means the Victualling was a long time supplied with Bread made of undue Mixtures, as Horse-Beans, Pease, Rye, Barley, etc. Nay damaged Pease have been bought out of the Office, afterwards dried over the Baker's Ovens, ground into Flower, Bread made of it, and sold into the Office at the same price as if made of all Wheat. These mixtures past a long time in the Office, to the Advantage both of the Buyer and Seller; but God knows very little to the Advantage of the poor Sailors, who died by Thousands in Nevil's Squadron in the West-Indies. This Practice was known to, and countenanced by the Commissioners, but no stop put to it till Mr. Kelly a Bisket-Baker moved in that point, when some of the Bread was left upon the Baker's hands; and being merchantable only with the King, they knew not how to dispose of it, and therefore applied themselves to others who had Interest enough to pass it into the Office, who bought it of them. I could tell you the Names of the Persons whobought this sophisticated Bread, and sold it into the Office; but they being Members of your own House, I must forbear. I could tell you also of another that sells Wheat to the King, and far from being the best, at the best price; and of another that sells Flower to the Office for Sea-Service, which after the Labourers have broken the Lumps in it, is baked into Coarse Bread. Perhaps you never yet heard in a former Parliament, when Wright the Purveyor was accused as having got a prodigious Estate in the Victualling, and excused by Sir Rob. Rich, that Sir Robert at that time sold him Oxen. You cannot tell, Sir, the many pretty ways we have of obliging some sort of People. 'Tis true we Tarrs only feel the Effect of this Management; we only at present are gut-foundered and poisoned: But these Storms at Sea may in time reach the Land, your lofty Turrets and stately Edifices may feel the fury of the Storm, which may levelly you into a Condition equal with ourselves. For how can your ancient Constitution, the old and approved Laws of the Realm, subsist under such perpetual Lopping? for every Member thus corrupted is a Bough cut off from the Tree of your Constitution, which suffering such Amputations, will in time whither and shrivel to nothing. If you do not restrain your own Members, who shall set Bounds to the Multitude? When such as should be Patrons of our Liberties, and Examples of Justice and Honesty to others, are corrupted by evil and sinister Rewards, they stagger the People of the whole Realm; these men break down a whole Pole of the Hedge at once, and leave a Gap for thousands to follow them.  
But before I leave this Head, I must tender you one Cake more of Horse-Bean Biscuit, which certainly must stick upon any man's Stomach endowed with common Principles of Humanity; which is the Lives of many Thousands of Sailors lost upon this account, the meanest of which did more Service to his Country, than all the Miscreants that fed them with corrupted Food; they are dead and gone, and their Service to their Country is quite lost: all you can do is to prevent the like for the future; which I wish were done for the common Good of the Realm.  
But getting of Estates, and not getting wholesome Provisions for the Sailors, has been the business of the Victualling. A certain Person might well enough stick in the Skirts of Admiral Russel about the Money Imprested to the Admiral for victualling in the Straits; this Money was diverted out of the proper Channel of the Victualling, and the other lost twice as much as the Admiral got by that Bargain, for otherwise the Money had passed thro' his Hands; and you know, Sir, the Nations Money will stick to the Officers fingers. This Gentleman needed no ways and means of getting Money, for every body must acknowledge it a comfortable Importance, for a man to be chief Commissioner of an Office, and his Son the Treasurer; for the one to order Payments, and the other to make them, especially in an Office that always paid out of Course, as the Victualling has done.  
I cannot forbear mentioning one practice in the Victualling, which I think very invasive on the Liberty of the Subject, which is, their selling of Protections to freeborn Englishmen; the Labourers and Workmen being first to take Protections from their Secretary at 12 d. apiece to secure them from the Press. The Laws of our Land say no man shall be kept in durance without Cause of Action; and an Englishman has a native Right to his Liberty, and is upon no Account to be under Constraint but by power of Law: Now for these men to sell an Englishman that Right he is born to, makes our Government look more like that of Algiers, than the Country of a free and independent People. We have a fine Revolution indeed if we are forced to purchase our Freedom from those that are in our Pay, and wear our Livery. If you suffer these men to sell our Liberties for a Shilling, they'll in a little time sell your Country for a Song.  
Had the Commanders of our Navy taken no more Care of their Hounds, than the Victuallers have done of their Sailors, we should have had as great a Mortality amongst the Dogs as we had amongst the Men. This is another abuse upon the Sailors and Nation, to have a Kennel of Hounds aboard Ship to eat up the Sailors Victuals; and the Folk in Spain could think you not otherwise than hair brained, to send a parcel of Huntsmen Commanders of the Fleet. This was a Dogtrick put upon 〈◊〉 poor Sailors, who instead of handling of Sails, and hawling the main Tack aboard, were employed in that pretty Diversion of looking after Hounds: It was one man's business at least, to fling the Bones over board when the Captain's Dogs had dined. And who victualled the Captain's Poultry, his Sheep, Hogs, & c? These were never born upon the Pursers' Book, and yet they had Provisions when the poor Sailors wanted it.  
And now, Sir, I have given you a short View of the Condition of the Navy: do you think under such a Management it will ever answer your Ends, or be that security to the Realm your Honourable House has proposed? I endeavoured the last Sessions, in my Seaman's Opinion of a standing-Army, to show that the Navy of England was our best and chief security; I am of the same Opinion still, but must needs say it can never be so under this Management. Our Forefathers found the Advantage of their Shipping, though made but of Wicker and Hydes; and I hear our old Sailors often talk of one K. Edgar, that used in a great Navy of these Frigates to coast upon this Island every Year, by which means he kept his Kingdom in Peace, which before was almost every year invaded by Foreigners. Certainly our Fleet is of more advantage to us, and a greater security to our Island than Foreign Alliances; The native strength of our Kingdom, which never yet failed us, will always be a better Support to us than any Auxiliary Prop can be. Auxiliaries may as well offend as defend us. Mercenaries serve those most that pay them best. But Nature has placed our Country by itself, contiguous to no part of the World; and as we stand by ourselves, we ought to be our self-defenders since we are capable of being so. But if we'll incapacitate ourselves, by letting our Shipping, the Bulwarks of the Kingdom, run to ruin, we must feel the Effects of our own Folly. We have but one Security left us, and like unthinking Sinners, we neglect the one Thing needful. We have but one sort of People amongst us, I mean our Sailors, that are our constant and ready help, and those we abuse after a most barbarous and inhuman manner. Are these the grateful Returns of our Country to Men that have done us the most singular Services? Are these the Rewards of Valour and Bravery? Are the Sons of the British Seas thus requited for their good Services to their Country? Tell it not in Gath, publish it not in the Streets of Askalon! Let not the Heathen World be acquainted with our Shame! Tell not how our young men have fallen, not by the Sword and destroying Bullets, but by bad Provisions and noisome Scents! Let not our infamous Annals be handed down to Posterity, but draw a Sable Curtain over our Erterprises, to hid them from the view of succeeding Ages! Let our Maritime Affairs be buried in the Bottom of the Deep, and their Memory in eternal Silence! 'Tis too hard a Turn of Fate to be the scandalous Wonder of this, and of future Ages. If you have any love, Sir, for your Country! if you have any kindness for the best constituted Government in the World! if you have any Bowels of Pity for your Children that are to succeed you, employ your Interest to revive the Credit of our sinking Navy; otherwise your ancient Estates may in time be the Possession of men of a strange Language, who shall disturb the peaceful Urns of your noble Progenitors, and not carry your Children away Captives, but make them Slaves upon their own Freeholds.  
FINIS.