e, that England has ever received
from any nation.[274] Happily, the Dutch fleet was not ready to put to
sea. The mutinous crews attempted to intimidate the government by
blockading the Thames, and trading vessels were stopped at the entrance
of the river. Some officers were ill-treated. Farmhouses on the coast
were sacked. The country was greatly alarmed, and the 3 per cents. fell
to a trifle over 48. The government acted with vigour; the garrison at
Sheerness was strongly reinforced; furnaces for heating shot were made
ready in the forts on the Thames; gunboats were fitted out, and the
buoys at the mouth of the river were taken up to prevent the escape of
the mutineers. In response to a royal message, parliament passed bills
on June 3 and 6 providing that incitement to mutiny should be punishable
with the highest penalties of misdemeanour, and that intercourse with
the mutinous ships should be a capital felony.

[Sidenote: _NAVAL DISCIPLINE RESTORED._]

The mutineers "ordered" captain Lord Northesk, who was virtually
imprisoned on his ship, to go to London and lay their demands before the
king. An official answer was returned requiring unconditional surrender.
They grew uneasy, and their doubts of success were increased by
addresses sent from the seamen of the channel fleet, severely
reprobating their conduct. Cut off from communication with the shore and
without hope of support from the channel fleet, they soon lost heart
altogether. Parker became unpopular. Ship after ship either left the
squadron or signalled a return to obedience, and finally, on the 14th,
the crew of the _Sandwich_ brought her under the battery at Sheerness,
and surrendered Parker. He was tried by a court-martial, and hanged at
the yard-arm of his ship. About forty were condemned to death, and some
others were flogged. The government was inclined to mercy, for the bulk
of the men had been deluded by Parker and other scoundrels; only
fourteen seamen and four marines were executed; the other condemned men
were pardoned by the king after the next great naval victory.

A mutinous spirit appeared in other divisions of the navy. The squadron
at the Cape was brought to order by Lord Macartney, the governor, who
threatened to sink the ship most forward in the movement by bombarding
her from the shore. One of the ships off Cadiz began a mutiny; St.
Vincent, a rigid disciplinarian, though, as the men knew, careful for
their welfare, was equal to the occa