er with
her in that condition, and proposed that her poop should be cut down, her
masts shortened, and her guns exchanged to four-pounders. The Navy Board,
however, decided that she should be restored to her original state as far
as it was possible to do so; she was therefore ordered to Sheerness, and
her Captain was instructed to join his ship and see the alterations were
properly carried out.

Before leaving London Cook, who had heard it was said that he was not
satisfied with the vessels chosen for the voyage, wrote to Mr. Stephens
on the subject, giving his opinion that the crankness of the Resolution
"was owing to the additional works that have been built upon her in order
to make large accommodation for the several gentlemen passengers intended
to embark in her." He added that the proposed alterations of the Navy
Board would "render her as fit to perform the voyage as any ship
whatever"; and, referring to the report that he did not approve of the
type of ship, he says, "from the knowledge and experience I have had of
these sort of vessels, I shall always be of opinion that only such are
proper to be sent on Discoveries to very distant parts." On the 21st he
again wrote Stephens that the alterations were making satisfactory
progress, and that a man had been in the yard who had known the ship
before her purchase, and he had "with some warmth asserted that at that
time she was not only a stiff ship, but had as many good qualities as any
ship ever built in Whitby." In reply to a rumour that the men were afraid
to sail in her, he points out that she is moored alongside a wharf, and
the men could go ashore whenever they pleased, yet he had not lost a
single man.

BANKS WITHDRAWS.

Mr. Banks did not approve of the reduction in his accommodation
necessitated by these alterations, and tried to get a 40-gun ship in
place of the Resolution, and he and his friends succeeded in raising a
very acrimonious discussion on the subject; but the admiralty stood firm,
and the alterations went on under the superintendence of Cook. On 24th
May Banks and Solander went to inspect her, and on their return to town
Banks wrote to the Admiralty that he should not go the voyage as "the
ship was neither roomy nor convenient enough for my purpose, nor no ways
proper for the voyage." Cook, who says the preparations had cost Banks
"about five Thousand Pounds," does not think that the reasons given by
Banks were the only ones he had for not taki