yet another disaster to overtake Great Britain. And it
was little wonder. The Lords of the Admiralty, wedded to old notions,
unlike the Heads of the Naval Department of the United States, were
slow to alter the build or armament of the national ships. They seemed
to think that success must ultimately be dependent upon pluck, and that
there could be again few instances in which a sloop could be so
disabled by a storm as to be unable to cope with a brig, better manned,
better armed, and in good sailing trim. They continued to send
slow-sailing brigs and ill-armed sloops-of-war, for the protection of
large fleets of merchantmen, with valuable cargoes, while the frigates
of the enemy, in search of them, whether in the calm or in the storm,
were faster than British seventy-fours, and were equal to British ships
of the line in armament. It was after the loss of the _Macedonian_ that
the British Admiralty commissioned and sent to sea the frigate _Java_,
of the same tonnage, with the same deficiency of men, and, worse than
all, half of whom were landsmen, and of exactly the same armament as
the _Macedonian_, only that her weight of metal was less, to cope with
such frigates as the _United States_, the _President_, and the
_Constitution_. On the 12th of November, the _Java_ sailed from
Spithead, the remonstrances of Captain Lambert against the inadequacy
and inexperience of his crew being of no avail with the authorities. He
was told, when he insisted that he was no match for an American, even
of equal size, that "a voyage to the East Indies and back would make a
good crew." The difficulties in the way of getting to the East Indies,
to say nothing of coming back again, never entered into the heads of
men, who had long been laid up in ordinary, and were dry-rotting to
decay. These were the men who sent the water casks to contain the fresh
water of His Majesty's vessels afloat on our fresh water lakes. Then,
as now, were the wrong men in the wrong places. Men, who should have
been in Greenwich Hospital, talking of times gone by, or living in
dignified retirement, were entrusted with the management of affairs in
a new age, the country rather losing than gaining by their individual
experiences. And the British public stung to the quick, were aware of
it. The correctness of Captain Lambert's judgment was too soon brought
to the test. The _Java_ fell in with the _Constitution_ on the 28th of
December, when the latter stood off as the fo