ch to every free people.
Notwithstanding large bounties, granted by the government to volunteers,
it was found necessary to lay an embargo upon all shipping, and impress
all the seamen that could be found, without any regard to former
protections; so that all the merchant ships were stripped of their
hands, and foreign commerce for some time wholly suspended. Nay, the
expedient of compelling men into the service was carried to an unusual
degree of oppression; for rewards were publicly offered to those who
should discover where any seamen lay concealed; so that those unhappy
people were in some respects treated like felons, dragged from their
families and connexions to confinement, mutilation, and death, and
totally cut off from the enjoyment of that liberty which, perhaps at the
expense of their lives, their own arms had helped to preserve, in favour
of their ungrateful country.*

* At this juncture, a number of public spirited merchants of
the city of London, and others, formed themselves into a
very laudable association, under the name of the Marine
Society, and contributed considerable sums of money for
equipping such orphans, friendless, and forlorn boys, as
were willing to engage in the service of the navy. In
consequence of this excellent plan, which was executed with
equal zeal and discretion, many thousands were rescued from
misery, and rendered useful members of that society, of
which they must have been the bane and reproach, without
this humane interposition.

About eighty ships of the line and three-score frigates were already
equipped, and considerable bodies of land-forces assembled, when, on
the third day of February, a proclamation was issued, requiring all
officers, civil and military, upon the first appearance of any hostile
attempt to land upon the coasts of the kingdom, immediately to cause all
horses, oxen, or cattle, which might be fit for draught or burden, and
not actually employed in the king's service, or in the defence of the
country, and also (so far as might be practicable) all other cattle
and provisions, to be driven and removed twenty miles at least from the
place where such hostile attempt should be made, and to secure the same,
so as that they might not fall into the hands or power of those who
should make such attempt: regard being had, however, that the respective
owners should suffer as little damage as might be consistent with