LIKING FOR LARGE SHIM
Hampstead, 6th July 1855.
Sin-In the naval service, feats of valour displayed by officers are re- warded by promotion to a higher grade, from a Lieutenancy and so on to Post rank; when this is attained, the degree of estimation in which a Cap- tain is held is inferred from the size of the ship he is appointed to command. May not this be the real cause of the preference given to large vessels over small ones ? If so, it would rest frith the Admiralty to devise some mode by which this mischievous predilection for large ships might be done away with, but it would be further necessary to provide for the tendency of hu- man nature to command huge bodies of inferiors ; as is the case in a ship of 120 or 130 guns, when the Captain has ten or eleven hundred men under his immediate orders and control.
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