shall give the Admiralty the needful account, at the end of every circuit, there to be entered into the office aforesaid: for many men, during war, betake themselves to live with their friends in the inlands, and follow their occupations, and at the end of the wars return to their maritime lives, or wait to make slips into merchantmen; but this being duly executed by vice-admirals, customhouses, and high sheriffs, and transmitted unto such an office as before mentioned, and there well digested into method, and duly kept, it would enable the lord high admiral, at all times, to give the king, his council, and parliament, when required, a true and certain state of the kingdom, as to maritime strength; and also enable him to collect them from all places, in little time, less charges, and less trouble to the people, in their disquiet of the country so there might be made good estimates of the increase or decrease of our maritime strength, at any time to be gathered out of the ledger books of the said office, and only communicated to the Admiralty; and yet farther, at the king's, or perhaps the lord high admiral's order, proclamation might be made upon the Exchange, or put out in gazettes, requiring all merchants, owners of ships, &c. to signify by their letter to the said oflice where their ships were, by their last advices, and whither bound, and where expected next, with some estimate of the ship's number of men, burthen, and some value of cargo; that care proportionably might be taken for their protection and preservation; the which may often prevent the sudden seizures of the subjects and wealthy effects of the nation; for it is not possible that merchants, &c. can be privy to the intrigues of states, which ought to have their paths in secret and select councils. As for the methodizing these things, I do not project; but only hint the basis and foundations thereof; that the superstructures might be raised thereon to perfection, by the skilful architects of the wise legislators and state politicians of the nation. FOR PLATE CCXLIX. NOR the drawing from which the annexed plate was engraved, we are indebted to our friend G. T. La Guayra is in the province of Caracas, on the Spanish main, is in the latitude of 10' 37' north, latitude 66° west.—It is very strongly fortified. In the year 1713, Captain Knowles (afterwards Sir Charles with a squadron under his command, made an unsuccessful attack To this place the mutineers, after so cruelly murdering their captain, carried the Hermione, in 1797, and were recived in a manner that did no credit to the governos. There is no harbour, but the road is well protected by numerous batteries, aud there are several strong commanding ports on the land, side. MARINE SCENERY. EXTRACTS FROM GREGORY'S ECONOMY OF NATURE. THE THE marine or sca-bow is a phenomenon sometimes observed in a much agitated sea, when the wind, sweeping part of the tops of the waves, carries them aloft, so that the sun's rays falling. upon them, are refracted, and paint the colours of the bow. Dr. Halley, in the diving bell, observed, that when he was sunk many fathoms deep into the sea, the upper part of his hand, on which the sun shone directly through the water, was red, and the lower part a blueish green. Or these phenomena, Mr. Delaval observes, that the sea water abounds with heterogeneous particles, many of which approach so near in density to the water itself,, that their reflective power must be very weak, though, as they are not quite of the same density, they still must have some degree of reflective power. Although these, therefore, may be invisible when separately viewed, yet when the forces of a great number of such minute bodies are united, their action on the rays of light becomes perceptible, some rays being reflected by them, while others are transmitted through their intervals, according to the quantity of reflective matter which the rays arrive at in the internal parts of the water. The opacity of the sea, caused by the numerous reflections from its internal parts, is so considerable, that it is not near so transpa. rent as other water; the reflective particles, therefore, which are dispersed through the mass of sea water, have consequently a greater reflective power than those which are dispersed through the atmosphere. Instead, therefore, of reflecting a delicate blue, such as that of the sky, the sea water, by acting upon a greater portion of the more refrangible rays, exhibits a green colour, which we For the memoir of the late Sir Charles, see our first volume of the NAVAL CHRONICLE―his portrait was given in the ninth volume, |