that they often showed the qualities of
which Wellington was himself a type. The English officer was a gentleman
before he was a soldier, and considered the military virtues to be a
part of his natural endowment. But it was undoubtedly a part of his
traditional code of honour to do his duty manfully and to do it rather
as a manifestation of his own spirit than from any desire for rewards or
decorations. The same quality is represented more strikingly by the
navy. The English admiral represents the most attractive and stirring
type of heroism in our history. Nelson and the 'band of brothers' who
served with him, the simple and high-minded sailors who summed up the
whole duty of man in doing their best to crush the enemies of their
country, are among the finest examples of single-souled devotion to the
calls of patriotism. The navy, indeed, had its ugly side no less than
the army. There was corruption at Greenwich[18] and in the dockyards,
and parliamentary intrigue was a road to professional success. Voltaire
notes the queer contrast between the English boast of personal liberty
and the practice of filling up the crews by pressgangs. The discipline
was often barbarous, and the wrongs of the common sailor found
sufficient expression in the mutiny at the Nore. A grievance, however,
which pressed upon a single class was maintained from the necessity of
the case and the inertness of the administrative system. The navy did
not excite the same jealousy as the army; and the officers were more
professionally skilful than their brethren. The national qualities come
out, often in their highest form, in the race of great seamen upon whom
the security of the island power essentially depended.

NOTES:

[14] See _Military Forces of the Crown_, by Charles M. Clode (1869), for
a full account of the facts.

[15] _Parl. Hist._ xxx. 490. Clode states (i. 222) that L9,000,000 was
spent upon barracks by 1804, and, it seems, without proper authority.

[16] Debate in _Parl. Hist._ xiii. 1382, etc., and see Walpole's
_Correspondence_, i. 400, for some characteristic comments.

[17] Clode, ii. 86.

[18] See the famous case in 1778 in which Erskine made his first
appearance, in _State Trials_, xxi. Lord St. Vincent's struggle against
the corruption of his time is described by Prof. Laughton in the
_Dictionary of National Biography_, (_s.v._ Sir John Jervis). In 1801
half a million a year was stolen, besides all the waste due to
corruption