Page:Royal Naval Biography Marshall v3p1.djvu/283

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268
POST CAPTAINS OF 1825.

ports in both these kingdoms; at Calcutta, Bombay, the Cape of Good Hope, and other English settlements; and by the mercantile marine of North America; the work has also been printed in Dutch and Italian, and is eminently calculated to render important service to navigation at large, and to the shipping interest of Great Britain in particular. By an ordonnance of the French government, no merchant vessel can be insured in that country without having these signals on board.

On the 13th of June, 1820, Captain Marry at was appointed to the Beaver sloop; and in Sept. following, he had the honor of dining with his late Majesty on board the Royal George yatch. He subsequently proceeded to Madeira, Teneriffe, St. Jago, Trinidad on the Main, Tristan de Cunha, the Cape of Good Hope, and St. Helena, off which island he continued cruising, to windward, until the death of Napoleon Buonaparte; when, having been attacked with dysentery, he exchanged into the Rosario sloop, and brought home duplicate despatches relative to that event, from Rear-Admiral Lambert and Sir Hudson Lowe. On the day after the decease of the captive, a likeness of him was taken by Captain Marryat.

The Rosario formed part of the squadron that escorted the remains of her late Majesty from Harwich to Cuxhaven, in Aug. 1821. She afterwards cruised with some success against the smugglers in the British channel; but being found no longer seaworthy, was paid off, Feb. 7th, 1822.

In the same year, Captain Marryat published “Suggestions for the Abolition of the Present System of Impressment in the Naval Service,” in which pamphlet he pointed out the propriety of all merchant vessels carrying apprentices proportioned to their tonnage, instead of West Indiamen only, as was then the case. A few months after its appearance, his Majesty’s ministers put this suggestion in force, taking the scale proposed by Captain Marryat as their guide, with but little if any alteration.

Captain Marryat’s next appointment was, March 31st, 1823, to the Larne of 20 guns, fitting out for the East India station, where he joined his commander-in-chief, the late