property which Kidd had
amassed was given for the support of Greenwich Hospital. The Earl of
Bellamont, Governor of New England, and others, were accused in
Parliament of favouring Kidd, and giving him a commission, but the
charges were refuted.

On the 25th of July, 1701, a new _Royal Sovereign_, of 110 guns, was
launched at Woolwich. She was the largest ship in the navy, the length
of her keel was 146 feet 6 inches, and from the top of the taffrail to
the fore-part of the figure-head, 210 feet 7 inches; her extreme breadth
being 54 feet 3 and a half inches.

Several actions exhibiting extraordinary courage, performed during the
war with France, are worthy of notice. On the 30th of May, 1695,
William Thompson, master of a fishing-boat belonging to Poole, in
Dorsetshire, with a crew of one man and a boy, observed a French sloop
privateer standing towards him. He had but two swivel guns and a few
muskets; the privateer had two guns, several small-arms, and sixteen
men. Thompson, finding that his small crew were ready to support him,
made up his mind to do battle with the Frenchman. As she approached, he
began blazing away, and in a short time wounded the captain, and mate,
and six men of the privateer, upon which she sheered off. Thompson on
this made chase, and so skilfully did he manage his little craft, and
with so much determination keep up his fire, that after engaging the
privateer for two hours, she struck. On his arrival at Poole with his
prize, he was warmly received, and the Lords of the Admiralty, hearing
of his gallantry, presented him with a gold chain and a medal of the
value of 50 pounds.

Another fishing-vessel, belonging to Whitesand, commanded by a Mr
Williams, falling in with some merchant-vessels which had been captured
by French privateers, attacked them with so much courage and skill, that
he retook the whole. He received the same reward as had Mr Thompson.

Not long afterwards a coasting sloop, the _Sea Adventure_, commanded by
Peter Jolliffe, fell in, off Portland, with a French privateer, which
was in the act of taking possession of a small fishing-vessel belonging
to Weymouth. The privateer endeavoured to escape, when Jolliffe made
sail in chase, and coming up, briskly opened his fire, when he compelled
her to release her prize. Not content with this success, he continued
the fight, and at length drove her on shore in Lulworth Bay. The
seafaring population of the village hurryin