sincere and deep affliction, the irreparable loss of her
most valuable, affectionate, and darling daughter.'[35]

But to return to Mr. Heywood. When the king's full and free pardon had
been read to this young officer by Captain Montagu, with a suitable
admonition and congratulation, he addressed that officer in the
following terms,--so suitably characteristic of his noble and manly
conduct throughout the whole of the distressing business in which he was
innocently involved:--

SIR,--When the sentence of the law was passed upon me, I
received it, I trust, as became a man; and if it had been
carried into execution, I should have met my fate, I hope, in a
manner becoming a Christian. Your admonition cannot fail to
make a lasting impression on my mind. I receive with gratitude
my sovereign's mercy, for which my future life shall be
faithfully devoted to his service.'[36]

And well did his future conduct fulfil that promise. Notwithstanding
the inauspicious manner in which the first five years of his servitude
in the navy had been passed, two of which were spent among mutineers and
savages, and eighteen months as a close prisoner in irons, in
which condition he was shipwrecked, and within an ace of
perishing,--notwithstanding this unpromising commencement, he re-entered
the naval service under the auspices of his uncle, Commodore Pasley, and
Lord Hood, who presided at his trial, and who earnestly recommended him
to embark again as a midshipman without delay, offering to take him into
the _Victory_, under his own immediate patronage. In the course of his
service, to qualify for the commission of lieutenant, he was under the
respective commands of three or four distinguished officers, who had sat
on his trial, from all of whom he received the most flattering proofs of
esteem and approbation. To the application of Sir Thomas Pasley to Lord
Spencer for his promotion, that nobleman, with that due regard he was
always known to pay to the honour and interests of the navy, while
individual claims were never overlooked, gave the following reply, which
must have been highly gratifying to the feelings of Mr. Heywood and his
family.

_Admiralty, Jan. 13th_, 1797.

'Sir,--I should have returned an earlier answer to your letter
of the 6th instant, if I had not been desirous, before I
answered it, to look over, with as much attention as was in my
power, the proceedings on th