viii
PREFACE
manner in which he entered, from the date of my earliest application to him, into my views; and for the kindness with which he made known my intentions to his venerable predecessor Sir John Barrow, and after his own accession to office extended to me every facility for acquiring information. The memory of Sir John Barrow, too, I must ever revere, for the attention I experienced from him during the latter part of his official life, and for the sympathy he expressed, and the interest he appeared personally to take, in my labours. To my valued friend John Barrow, Esq., Keeper of the Records of the Admiralty, I owe more than I can well express. I could indeed scarcely find words adequate to convey my sense of the indefatigable assistance I have received at his hands through out the progress of the work, and of the benefits I have at all times derived from his experience and his highly-prized advice.
Independently of the Admiralty, I have reason to feel gratified by the courtesy which has been exhibited towards me by members of other departments of the public service; and to no one am I more bound by obligation, and it is with heartfelt pride and pleasure I record it, than I am to William George Anderson, Esq., the Assistant Paymaster-General, both for the aid which his official position has enabled him to render me, and for the acts of personal kindness by which they have been accompanied.
It would be unjust to terminate this series of grateful acknowledgments without mentioning the aid I have received from a member of my own family, my brother, Robert Henry O’Byrne, author of the ‘Representative History of Great Britain and Ireland’; to whose affectionate zeal and energetic exertions I am indebted not only for the compilation of the greater part of the Appendix, but for the collection of a large portion of the details on which the work is founded.
