ctual
efforts.

When a ship is fairly commissioned, the first proceedings of the
captain, in respect to her equipment, must be determined by the
particular state in which she happens to be. The ship may be in dock,
or in the basin, or riding at the moorings--masted or unmasted; she
may have only just been launched, or may have been "paid off all
standing." In any case, one of the first points to be attended to is
the stowage of the ballast. If the ship has been in commission before,
a record of her sailing qualities, and the plan of stowage which was
found to answer best, will be supplied by the superintendent of the
dockyard, together with her draught of water, forward and aft, light
as launched and in ballast; and, lastly, when completely equipped for
sea, with guns, powder, provisions, and men on board. If the ship be
new, the captain will be furnished by the Surveyor of the Navy with
every particular respecting her trim, and the manner in which he
conceives her hold should be stowed. If this very important part of
the ship's economy be one that has occupied its due share of the
commanding-officer's attention, he will carefully examine the
conformation of the ship's bottom, and be enabled to tell whether or
not the former plan of stowing the ballast agrees with his own
theoretical views, and his experience in such matters, and then
putting the ship's recorded sailing qualities by the side of these
actual observations, he will be enabled to decide how the ballast
shall be distributed.

The Signal Books, Printed Naval Instructions, the Admiralty Statutes,
and other works of reference and guidance, are supplied by the
port-admiral, while a copy of all the Port Regulations and Orders
should be made, and so carefully perused by the captain and officers
as to be almost got by heart. A minute attention, indeed, to the
injunctions contained in these written orders, is absolutely
necessary to keep the officers of a ship out of eternal hot water with
admiral, flag-captain, secretary, and first lieutenant of the
flag-ship, all of whom are put out of their way by any neglect on the
part of an officer fitting or refitting a ship.

I remember once a grand row which I, in common with three or four
other commanding officers, got into. A signal was made from the
flag-ship at Spithead, the Royal William, or the Royal Billy as she
was universally called. The order was, "The ships at Spithead are to
send boats to assist the vessel