native land.

His disease had been daily gaining strength, till at last it confined him to his bed altogether. And on the 17th of August, as the Naseby was entering Plymouth Sound, but before she could come to an anchor, he expired.

The honour which would have been more gladly paid to him if he had lived was not denied to his remains. His body, by Cromwell's express order, was removed to London "in all the state that could be; ”* where, after having lain in state for some days at Greenwich Hospital, it was buried in Henry VII.'s chapel at Westminster. At the Restoration it would seem to have been thought unfit that an officer of Cromwell should repose in the same hallowed soil which contains the ashes of so many of our kings, and in obedience to the Royal command his remains were exhumed, and re-interred in the adjacent parish church. But, as we have seen, it was not as an officer of Cromwell, but as a servant of the country, that he had regarded himself; and his country has at all times accepted that view, and has cherished his memory, not only as a brilliant conqueror, but as a sincere and honest patriot. Naval science was still in some degree in its infancy; and unquestionably in point of professional skill Blake cannot be placed on a level with some of his successors. But though the same assertion may be made of men in almost all professions, if the achievements and skill of

* Clarendon, Book xv.

those of an earlier age have been generally surpassed in later ages, yet the earlier heroes are entitled to the praise of having set the example and pointed out the way. And this praise is unanimously given to Blake. After the lapse of more than two hundred years his fame is as ungrudgingly extolled as while he was awaiting the tomb in Greenwich Hospital. To quote all the eulogies which have been pronounced on him would be to fill a volume. But none are more striking than that recorded by his great contemporary, Clarendon; who, while deservedly execrating those whose commands as the usurping rulers of the state he carried out, makes no reservations in his praise of him as the greatest of the sailors who had as yet adorned our annals. "He was," says the noble writer in his imperishable "History of the Rebellion," "the first man that despised the old track, and made it manifest that the science might be attained in less time than was imagined; and despised those rules which had been long in practice to keep his ship and his men out of danger, which had been held in former times a point of great ability and circumspection, as if the principal art requisite in the captain of a ship had been to be sure to come home safe again. He was the first man who brought the ships to contemn castles on shore, which had been thought ever very formidable, and were discovered by him to make a noise only, and to fright those who could very rarely be hurt by them. He was the first that infused that proportion of courage into the seamen, by making them see by

experience what mighty things they could do if they were resolved; and taught them to fight in fire as well as upon water. And though he hath been very well imitated and followed, he was the first that gave the example of that kind of naval courage, and bold and resolute achievement."

COOK.

`HE example which Clarendon gives Blake the credit of having set was promptly and gallantly followed; and, from the day of his death to the present moment, England has never wanted a succession of naval heroes, who have carried her flag triumphantly over every sea; not, indeed, always unopposed, or failing at times to encounter worthy antagonists, but never finding equals; and who have established for her by their heroism, and too often by their blood, an undisputed supremacy,

"Wherever the tempests rage, the billows foam;"

and, as a consequence of that supremacy, an absolute inviolability from all foreign invasion which she enjoys alone of all the nations on the earth. Ever since the beginning of the present century there is not one capital of a foreign country that has not witnessed a hostile army in possession of its gates. London alone has never beheld a hostile soldier, and that immunity has been owing, not to any moderation of England's enemies, but to the impossibility that the fiercest of them have no knowledge of coping with England's seamen. So continuous have been our naval triumphs in the years that have passed since Blake was laid in the grave, and so numerous the

brave men who have led our fleets to victory, that our space will not allow us to do more than mention the names of a few of Russell, whose victory at La Hague dissipated Louis' hope of landing an army in England, as, a century before, Howard and Drake had overthrown the calculations of Philip; of Rooke, the victor of Malaga and the captor of Gibraltar, the key to the Mediterranean, from which the most formidable force ever brought against a single fortress has been unable to tear down the flag which he hoisted on it; of Anson, in his triumph on the Spanish coast, imitating Blake in his circumnavigation of the world, following the example of Drake; of Hawke, who more than once taught the boastful Frenchmen that even their harbours were no protection to their fleets against the resolute courage of British sailors; or of Boscawen, whose successes were not confined to one shore of the Atlantic.

But the enterprises of our sailors have not been confined to warlike achievements. Peace has likewise had her triumphs. And we may fitly interrupt our sketches of our great warriors with a short account of one who did great service to his country, and won undying celebrity for himself, by extending her knowledge of and sovereignty over lands hitherto unexplored, and imparting to them the blessings of civilization still more undreamt of by them.

James Cook is one of those men of whom our annals afford so many specimens, who owe their advancement and fame entirely to their own talents and energy.

He

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