of ship's cables, it would be a valuable acquisition. The imported phormium flax has been manufactured and tested with the best hemp, and found of superior strength." A VISIT TO SAN LORENZO. SIR- I have been induced to send you the following notices, trusting they are not of a nature unsuited to your Chronicle. The virtues of a man and of a Christian, never shine so much in the sailor as when he pays a last tribute to the worth of a departed messmate. If his friend have died in a foreign land far from his own native country, he is loth to depart without raising some humble inscription to mark the spot. I met with several of these inscriptions, some of which I copied, on the island of San Lorenzo, which forms a natural breakwater to the noble harbour of Callao, a port of Peru. It is the most desolate place conceivable. On it the sun shines to no purpose, and refreshing dews visit it to cheer no herbage: not a weed grows on it. The island, which is about four miles in length, is very steep, its highest point about 700 feet above the level of the sea and almost too perpendicular to climb. One dreary sandy valley on it, which faces the town of Callao, has been chosen as the burial place for the seamen of different nations that happen to die in the port. In her Majesty's ship S— we used frequently to take a trip to this island, for the purpose of exercising our men, firing great guns, small arms, &c., and to paint and refit ship. One day I went to visit the burial-ground, and thinking I might fall in with something worthy of note, I took the precaution to carry pencil and paper with me. I found about, at a rough guess, seventy or eighty graves there, and nearly half of them had records of the inhabitant. These were English and American. The inscriptions were painted on boards of the shape of tomb-stones, and at a distance would not be distinguished as otherwise, a large cross was painted on each, for unless this is done the native fishermen carry them off for firewood. To despoil these they look upon as sacrilege, and this painted symbol besides, they look upon as shewing the erectors to have been Catholics.-The three following I copied. Sacred to the Memory of William Edwards, late Royal Marines who departed this life November the 29th, 1837, I'm here at rest from busy scenes, I once belonged to the Royal Marines, This, I think, carries somewhat of originality, with it! Another, Sacred to the Memory of three seamen, who departed this life on board of H.M.S." Blonde," May 1835. Namely, John Froud the 9th, (aged 24 years,) James Oldridge on the 30th, (aged 29 years,) Also, Robert Beecroft who died May 1st, 1837, (aged 15 years.) These seamen in their bloom; Their shipmates have interred them here, The lines, taken as poetry, of this are not bad, but there is much nonsense in them. Their shipmates in the interring of them, could pay no tribute to their memory, which it would seem their lines imply by the putting have instead of having, and in the last line and for have. It should be, Here is a third, In tribute to their memory dear, Their shipmates having laid them here Have raised this humble tomb. In Memory of who departed this life Short was the summons to the dreary tomb, No kindred wept above his youthful bier, And strangers' hands have placed this tribute here. This poor fellow had been murdered in his sleep, by one who had been his friend, and who had stabbed him in a rage of jealousy, thinking he had made friends with another and slighted him. He was hung at the yard-arm of U.S.S. Peacock, some months after. Sod seems ludicrous here, as no vegetation exists, as I have before said, on the island. Maldon, Essex. M. X. M BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE OF ADMIRAL SIR ROBErt Crown. THE Sovereigns of Russia have been particularly fortunate in the characters of the British officers who have from time to time attached themselves to the Russian navy, which within our own times could boast a list of English officers, not excelled in merit or in valour by their more fortunate countrymen engaged to fight the battles of their native land; and so great was their zeal to set an example to the Russians under their command, that fourteen out of thirty-six English officers were killed or wounded in the Swedish war in less than two years. The great Catherine, from an early period of her reign, adopted the policy of forming her navy on the model of that of England, and for that purpose confided the construction of her ships to Mr. Yeames, a very scientific builder, and the command of them to the late Admiral Sir Samuel Greig, whose merit she early appreciated, and who justified her patronage by his signal victories over the Turks and Swedes; and whose son, Admiral Alexis Gregg, is the worthy representative, in all his estimable qualities, of his excellent father. The year 1790, when Catherine was disappointed in her aim of crushing the Turks, by the vexatious interposition of Gustavus of Sweden, rallied round her flag a bevy of as distinguished a set of young English officers* as could well be assembled; their own country being then in a state of profound repose, their ardent spirits could not submit to the inglorious routine and slow progress of promotion in time of peace, and they therefore were readily allured by the offer of one step of added rank held out by Catherine; while her fascinating condescension and profuse dispensation of honours inspired them with genuine zeal in her cause. The effect of the Swedish war was to save Turkey, but the naval engagements in the Baltic were otherwise indecisive, although on every occasion the English officers, as far as their personal influence or example could extend, amply sustained the national character, and several fell in exertions of heroism worthy of a better cause. Capt. Treveneu, a name still remembered and regretted in the British service, fell in one engagement, while within a few days his brother-in-law, Capt. Dennison, was killed in an attack of gun-boats, while serving under the famous Prince of Nassau, against the Swedish galley-fleet, commanded by the king in person. Capt. Marshall also lost his life on the same occasion; being mortally wounded, his ship sunk under him, and went down, colours flying: and I well remember the dread experienced at St. Petersburg, on account of the tremendous roar of cannon distinctly heard there, with all the fearful speculations it gave rise to, and sometime afterwards I witnessed a portion of the effect of it on Capt. Elphinston's ship, which was towed into Cronstadt harbour, perforated with balls, many of which were to be seen embedded in her sides. In the battle of the galley-fleet, a spirited young Irishman of the name of Macarthy was second in command of one of the Russian galley frigates (commanded by Commodore Dennison, who was killed, as before alluded to, in the same engage. To enumerate the list would, at this time, be no easy task; it comprised, among others, Captains Candler, Green, Hamilton, Aikin, (son of the very respectable actor of that name,) Halliday, Rider, and Thesiger, the three latter of whom afterwards returned to the British service, and were deservedly promoted to rank and active service. Captain Nicholas Tomlinson, then a lieutenant in the English navy, also went to St. Petersburg, being recommended to that court by the Russian Ambas sador, and made a tender of his services, which were accepted, but owing to some demur on his part as to taking the oaths required, his engagement was not completed, although his name was immediately included in the Russian navy list, and he was therefore fortunately at liberty to return to England at the commencement of the French war; and having succeeded, in 1793, in obtaining the command of a small vessel, distinguished himself by his extraordinary activity and enterprise on many occasions, as recorded in the Gazettes of that period, particularly in the recapture of the Oporto Convoy, and other services, for which a piece of plate was voted to him by the Committee of Underwriters at Lloyd's, promotion rapidly followed, and he is now as a Post Captain, high on the list, intitled to look forward to no distant day for the honourable rank of a British admiral, as the well earned reward of his labours. [This anticipation has been verified, and Admiral Tomlinson at a green old age is enjoying in the bosom of his amiable family, and in a circle of attached friends, the most pleasing solace for his past labors.-ED. N.M.] ment,) which entered so warmly into the action that she found herself surrounded by the whole of the Swedish galleys, on board of one of which, was the King of Sweden, and Sir Sydney Smith; in this situation 219 men out of her complement of about 300, were killed and wounded before she struck-a carnage so tremendous, that when Sir Sydney boarded her, he reproached Macarthy with not having sooner surrendered, upon which that gallant officer observed, that it never should be said that an Englishman was the first to strike a Russian flag, and that he would sooner, than have done so, perished with every soul on board. This gallant reply was so much admired by Sir Sydney, that he desired Macarthy to consider him for the future as his friend, and that should they ever meet in the British service, he would use his best endeavours to forward his promotion, and which he was afterwards enabled to do. By a singular concatenation of events, this same Macarthy was the means of introducing the celebrated Capt. Wright (who was originally sent out to St. Petersburg by the house of Longman and Broderip, as a vendor of music and musical instruments on commission) to Sir Sydney Smith, by whom they were both received as midshipmen on board the Diamond frigate, commanded by him, at the commencement of the revolutionary war, and both afterwards died prematurely; Wright being murdered in the temple at Paris, and Macarthy being lost while cruizing off Jersey, in a gun-vessel under his command. It may be necessary here to observe, that Wright, although on a mercantile mission at St. Petersburg, had before duly served as a midshipman in the British service, and had been an acting lieutenant at the siege of Gibraltar, where he was particularly noticed for his personal strength, and daring courage. Admiral Tate was at this period the senior British officer in the Russian service, and was highly respected for his private worth and professional talents. He died full of years and honor, and was succeeded by Admiral Crown, whose more active service had obtained for him greater distinctions than any ever hitherto bestowed by Russia on a foreign officer, he being at that time full Admiral of the Imperial Fleet, and decorated with almost all the orders of the empire. I feel persuaded that neither yourself or your readers will consider a page or two misapplied, in giving some details of the honorable manner in which Admiral Sir Robert Crown has thus raised himself from a comparatively humble origin, to rank and honors, without exciting displeasure in his own, or jealousy in his adopted country. Admiral Crown was originally from Scotland, and at a very early period of his life entered into his Britannic Majesty's service in India, where he served as master, first in 1778, under the command of Capt. Williamson, in the Cormorant sloop, in the Red Sea, and afterwards under command of Sir Charles Maurice Pole, on her voyage from Madras to England. Commodore Johnstone who had opportunities of ascertaining the zeal and intelligence of the young candidate for naval honours, gave him a commission as lieutenant of the Diana frigate, in which capacity he served under Captains Home, Edwards, and Calder, nearly three years, part of that time as first lieutenant. Great interest was exerted by all who knew him, to induce the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty * to confirm his commission, or even to permit him to serve as a midshipman, for which he himself earnestly petitioned, but these applications were peremptorily rejected by Lord Howe, the then first lord; and Mr. Crown felt himself thus compelled, as the only alternative left to him for pursuing the profession of his choice, to make a tender of his services to the empress of Russia, who readily accepted them, and immediately gave him a commission equal to that of commander in the English navy, and appointed him to the command of the Morewry, a boat of twenty-two carronades, in which after a very close and sharp engagement, he captured the Venus, a Swedish frigate of forty-two guns, on which occasion the empress bestowed on him the rank of post captain, with the command of that frigate, and conferred on him the order of St. George. Whilst in the Venus, he distinguished himself in a particular manner in the action of the galley fleets before alluded to, and was very near taking the king of Sweden himself, prisoner, as he captured the galley in which the king had embarked, and which his majesty only left at the suggestion of Sir Sydney Smith, who said he was sure, from the gallant seaman-like style in which she bore down upon them, that the Venus was commanded by an Englishman, and that the king would do well to avoid the consequence, upon which they took boat and went on board another galley. Soon after this, Capt. Crown took the Rhetvizan of sixty guns, also two cutters, eight row-boats, and four galleys, and burnt and sunk several others; for which he was promoted out of rotation to the rank of Post Captain of the first class. He likewise captured thirty-seven merchantmen, some of them richly laden, and brought them all safe into Elsineur: for these essential services he was rewarded with the third order of St. Vlademir, and an annual pension of 1000 silver roubles The unabated affection entertained by Admiral Crown for his native country, and his deep sense of the neglect experienced by him at his first outset in life, are forcibly expressed by him in a letter to a valued friend, from which the following is an extract. "My wife is become feeble; I will not say peevish, from experiencing a decay of those natural advantages attached to youth and strength; she is less a philosopher than I am, and often calls me an iron man; well she may, for I have had many a hard stroke on the anvil of fate. A pilot who last sailed with me used to exclaim that he had never seen a man so grey endure so much fatigue. You were right in your conjecture relative to my son Plato, who was one of the boarders who carried the French schooner off the coast of Africa. I am very proud of my son having done his duty, and hope he will not be wholly like his father, though I have infinite reason. to be grateful to his Imperial Majesty, when I compare his great goodness to me with the injustice done to my services by the country which gave me birth. After having most faithfully served it in the East and West Indies during the American war, in the most perilous and difficult duties, sometimes without a shoe to my foot on pointed rocks, sometimes nearly naked on the burning sands of the shore of the Red Sea, leaving deep traces of the effect of these hardships on my body and limbs, being the only vouchers remaining to me of my indefatigable endeavours to serve my country, which, when it had no farther use for me, flung me on shore naked and poor on Portsmouth beach, and told me afterwards by the voice of Howe, that I might go and seek my bread as I could. This was all the humanity, justice, and mercy, which a happy country would bestow on one who in his stations of master and lieutenant, had served it faithfully, and who still loves it dearly and forgives it freely. "I fervently adore the kind Providence which conducted me to this land where, though a foreigner, I was esteemed worthy of confidence beyond my merits, which, feeble as they are, have ever constituted my only means of advancement." |