warrant for a further issue of money until the last issues were accounted for. The defaulter, who had great influence with George III, used it to persuade the king that everything was right, and that the new secretary did not understand his business. Meanwhile Croker pursued his investigations, and satisfied himself that ‘it was a case of ruin and disgrace to the individual and a loss of at least 200,000l. to the public.’ He laid the facts before the head of the department, Lord Mulgrave, and, finding his lordship did not take the same view of the case, tendered his resignation. Upon this Perceval took the matter up, satisfied himself that Croker was right, and insisted that no compromise should be made. He explained the facts to the king, who thereupon sent the young official a warm assurance of satisfaction at his zeal in doing his duty, and ‘his firmness in resisting his (the king's) own first suggestions under a misunderstanding of the case.’ Nothing could more conclusively prove the soundness of Croker's appointment than his conduct in this affair. It showed his determination that it should be no fault of his if the public service were not discharged honestly and efficiently, for rather than connive at misappropriation of the funds allotted to his department he was ready to sacrifice a fine appointment and an income of 3,500l. a year. In the face of this and other proofs of ability and zeal the attacks of those who had assailed his appointment died down, and he devoted himself to the work of his office with an energy and sagacity, which the critical position of the country and the importance of maintaining its naval forces in high efficiency made especially valuable. The extent of work in which he was at once involved was, to use his own words, ‘quite terrific.’ He was at his office by nine, and worked there till four or five. But his heart was in his work, and he was always to be found at his desk. ‘For two-and-twenty years,’ he wrote to Mr. Murray, the publisher, in 1838, ‘I never quitted that room without a kind of uneasiness like a truant boy.’ Such devotion, combined with strong practical sagacity and the determination to master every detail and to see that full value should be obtained for money spent, soon made him the presiding spirit of the department. The rules which he laid down and the organisation which he established are, we are told by his biographer, Mr. Jennings, acknowledged to this day as the foundation of ‘all that is best and most businesslike in the department.’ He was not of a temper to lose any of the authority which his superior knowledge gave him, and his ascendency over his official superiors became ultimately so well recognised, that on one occasion, when he stated in the House of Commons that he was only ‘the servant of the board,’ Sir Joseph Yorke, a former lord of the admiralty, remarked that when he was at the board ‘it was precisely the other way.’ In any case the work of the board was admitted to be thoroughly well done, and there is no record during his long term of office under successive administrations of any complaints of his official conduct. The three first lords under whom he served—the Earl of Mulgrave, the Right Hon. Charles Yorke, and Viscount Melville—all respected and got on well with him, and he had the courage to maintain his ground against the whims and vagaries of the Duke of Clarence, when lord high admiral, with a spirit for which in after years William IV bore him no ill-will. The duke once said to him, in 1815, that when he became king Croker should not be secretary of the admiralty. ‘I told him,’ says Croker, ‘“a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.” He had just before told me he would in that event declare himself lord high admiral, and asked me what objection I could start to that. I replied, with a low bow, “None; that there was a case in point; James II had done the same.”’ Very early after his appointment at the admiralty Croker became numbered among the friends of the Prince of Wales, with whom he was always a favourite, probably because he had little of the courtier in him, and could be relied on for sincerity in giving his opinion. He was always a welcome visitor at Carlton House and Windsor, and later at the Pavilion in Brighton. A sister of Croker's wife, whom Croker had adopted from childhood as his daughter, was a great favourite with George IV, who was fond of children. She was never forgotten at the children's balls which were often given at the palace, and the king always called her by her pet name, ‘Nony.’ Miss Croker, as she was called, afterwards Lady Barrow, wife of Sir George Barrow, grew up a beautiful woman, and inspired one of Sir Thomas Lawrence's finest portraits, best known in a masterly mezzotint by Samuel Cousins. While establishing a great reputation as a public official, Croker steadily made his way in parliament as a debater of the first rank. His great command of facts and accuracy of statement made him a formidable adversary even to the leaders of the opposition. He was terse and incisive in style, and showed a sharp and ready vein of sarcasm, which occasionally rose into a strain of eloquent invective. In committee of supply his services to the ministry were invaluable. ‘At a distance of forty years,’ the late Lord Hatherton, writing in 1857, speaks
