at the engagement between the American frigate Essex
with the two English cruisers, the Phoebe and Cherub, off the Bay of
Valparaiso, during the late war. It is admitted on all hands that the
American Captain continued to fight his crippled ship against a greatly
superior force; and when, at last, it became physically impossible that
he could ever be otherwise than vanquished in the end; and when, from
peculiarly unfortunate circumstances, his men merely stood up to their
nearly useless batteries to be dismembered and blown to pieces by the
incessant fire of the enemy's long guns. Nor, by thus continuing to
fight, did this American frigate, one iota, promote the true interests
of her country. I seek not to underrate any reputation which the
American Captain may have gained by this battle. He was a brave man;
_that_ no sailor will deny. But the whole world is made up of brave
men. Yet I would not be at all understood as impugning his special good
name. Nevertheless, it is not to be doubted, that if there were any
common-sense sailors at the guns of the Essex, however valiant they may
have been, those common-sense sailors must have greatly preferred to
strike their flag, when they saw the day was fairly lost, than postpone
that inevitable act till there were few American arms left to assist in
hauling it down. Yet had these men, under these circumstances,
"pusillanimously cried for quarter," by the IV. Article of War they
might have been legally hung.

According to the negro, Tawney, when the Captain of the
Macedonian--seeing that the Neversink had his vessel completely in her
power--gave the word to strike the flag, one of his officers, a man
hated by the seamen for his tyranny, howled out the most terrific
remonstrances, swearing that, for his part, he would not give up, but
was for sinking the Macedonian alongside the enemy. Had he been
Captain, doubtless he would have done so; thereby gaining the name of a
hero in this world;--but what would they have called him in the next?

But as the whole matter of war is a thing that smites common-sense and
Christianity in the face; so everything connected with it is utterly
foolish, unchristian, barbarous, brutal, and savouring of the Feejee
Islands, cannibalism, saltpetre, and the devil.

It is generally the case in a man-of-war when she strikes her flag that
all discipline is at an end, and the men for a time are ungovernable.
This was so on board of the English frigate. The