had no remedy but a chancery suit. The law respecting partnership, therefore, must be taken into view, when we would form an estimate of the probable permanence of such societies in this country. It would be absurd to overlook these difficulties: at the same time, they should not be rashly pronounced insurmountable. No scheme can be devised for improving the condition of the poor which shall not be liable to some objections and apprehensions; but they must be shown to be equally certain and great as the evils which at present exist, before we admit them as conclusive against the scheme.

We have ventured on the above reflections concerning the tendency of co-operative communities-but we offer them only as conjectures, and with a diffidence proportioned to the uncertainty of the events to which they relate. These societies are all of them of too recent establishment to allow of our forming any judgment at present concerning their future progress and ultimate effects. Whether co-operation will make a stir among the working classes for a few years only, and then die away and be heard of no more; or whether it will increase and multiply throughout the island; what influence, finally, supposing them to succeed, this new organization of society among the working classes would have on the aristocracies of capital and rank-all these are questions which we are not far-sighted enough to determine with the naked eye, and we have no telescope through which we can see clearly. The political economists will, of course, point their glasses at the distance, and calculate the result with unfailing certainty; but we have no faith in the reports of these political star-gazers. We leave them to prophecy, contenting ourselves with the humbler task of watching the progress and awaiting the issue of the experiment. It is at present in its infancy-a cloud no bigger than a man's hand. Whether it is to dissipate in heat, or gradually spread over the land, and send down refreshing showers on this parched and withered portion of society, God only knows, and time only can reveal.

ART. V.-Life and Services of Captain Philip Beaver, of his Majesty's Ship Nisus. By Captain William Henry Smyth, R.N. 8vo. London. 1829.

THE race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong,' and that thought should carry with it a salutary sense of humiliation to the heart of every one who has won the prize, whatever it be, for which he contended. The most successful of fortune's favourites may call to mind men who started

with him in the same course, having equal ardour, prospects equally encouraging, and equal, or perhaps greater natural endowments, yet who have dropped on the way, or been left lagging far behind him, at hopeless distance: some, perhaps, owing to their own misconduct, but others neither for want of strength, nor of wise and virtuous exertion: he has been in the full stream of fortune; but they have been caught in its eddy, and embayed, or borne back, or sunk, it having so seemed good to that Providence which directs all our ways, while its own are inscrutable: this, let us repeat, ought to be a solemn, and humiliating, and, therefore, a salutary consideration for those who in their lifetime have received their good things.

The person whose memoirs are now before us will be known by name to a very small portion of our readers, though a braver, an abler, more accomplished, or more high-minded officer never trod the deck of a British ship. Philip Beaver (the third_of eight children, two of whom died in infancy) was born on February 28th, 1766, at Lewknor, in Oxfordshire, a village in which his father resided seventeen years, as curate. In the summer of 1777, the father was presented to the living of Monksilver, in Somersetshire just as this better prospect had opened, he died in the vigour of life. His widow, in the complicated misery of her situation,' received from her friends that active kindness which was due to her husband's worth and to her own; and at General Caillaud's request, Captain Joshua Rowley received Philip as a midshipman on board the Monarch. The boy was then in his twelfth year; he had never seen the sea, scarcely even a boat;' but he had an ardent predilection for a sailor's life.

:

The Monarch, in Admiral Keppel's action (July, 1778), received the fire of the enemy's whole line,-great havoc was made in her crew, her spars and rigging were seriously injured, and her hammock nettings set on fire by the enemy's wads.' Beaver was only in his thirteenth year; but when he was questioned by Admiral Forbes concerning the particulars of the action, his relation was so clear and satisfactory, that the veteran declared he had never heard a consistent account of it before. As he told a straightforward tale, so he delivered a straightforward opinion; for, being asked what he thought of the two flag officers, whose recriminations were then the general topic, he replied, They both deserve to be shot.' We must not mention Admiral Forbes without noticing, that he, when a lord of the Admiralty, refused to sign Admiral Byng's death-warrant, a refusal more to his honour than if he had gained a victory like that of the Nile or of Trafalgar. At the close of that year Commodore Rowley hoisted his broad pendant on board the Suffolk, took all the officers of the Monarch

with him, and went with seven sail-of-the-line to reinforce Admiral Byron in the West Indies. Byron was so proverbially unfortunate, that it was said he had never once met with a fair wind; yet his acknowledged merits were such, that his disasters were always imputed to his ill fortune, never to his fault.

We must pass over the details of some busy months, including an action 'more remarkable for gallantry than success,' with D'Estaign. That able commander, notwithstanding his superior force, avoided a close and general conflict, and Byron made the best of his way to Basseterre roads, there to repair his damaged ships. This allowed Beaver time to improve himself in navigation and nautical astronomy, there being a master's mate on board who had a considerable proficiency in both sciences. At this time he was not more remarkable for buoyant spirits than for occasional sedateness and caustic observation, which drew from the admiral a remark, that if that boy should get safely through the snares which snap us up between fifteen and five-and-twenty, he would turn out an admirable officer.'

War now took place with Spain, and brought with it the usual expectations in which sailors indulge on such an occasion, and the usual disappointment which ensues. He was present at the destruction of part of a French convoy under the batteries of Port Royal Bay, and at the capture of three frigates belonging to La Motte Piquet's squadron; one of these the Suffolk chased, and having come up abreast, gave her a few random shot, which (says our midshipman in his journal) she impudently answered with a broadside, and then struck.' This has been often done by French ships of war, when about to strike to a superior force; so often, indeed, as to show that many of their naval officers see in it nothing inconsistent with honour and humanity, and to render it fitting that effectual means should be taken in any future war for putting a stop to a practice which is at once cowardly and murderous. After this success, Admiral Rowley shifted his flag to the Conqueror, and took Beaver with him: Rodney soon arrived to take the command, and it was then the boy's good fortune to serve, and in an active scene, under one of our best naval commanders. In the action of April 17th, 1780, the Conqueror had her masts, yards, and rigging much torn, her hull riddled by some heavy shot, besides the hits between wind and water; thirteen men killed and thirty-seven wounded: As for myself,' says he, in his Journal, I have still my proper complement of legs and arms; but I have twice to-day narrowly escaped a dive into Davy's locker.' The success which was that day within Rodney's reach was let slip, because some of the British ships, instead of doing their duty, took it easy.' One captain was brought to

a court

a court-martial: another, who inquired of Rodney why he had been mentioned in terms of reprehension, received this impressive answer: Could I have imagined that your conduct, and your inattention to signals had proceeded from anything but error in judgment, I had certainly superseded you; but God forbid I should do so for error in judgment only. I merely resolved, Sir, not to put it in your power to mistake again upon so important an occasion as the leading a British fleet to regular battle.'

Beaver followed Rowley's flag into the Terrible and the Princess Royal; but when that admiral was ordered to convoy the homeward-bound traders in the Grafton, it was thought best to leave him on so active a station, recommending him to the notice of Sir Peter Parker, who held the Jamaica command. While in the Princess Royal, he wrote a ballad on the battle between the Milford frigate and the Duc de Coigny, (fought on the 10th of May, 1780)—which, both for its spirit and diction, is a most remarkable production for a boy in his fifteenth year.

Early in the ensuing year, an American brig was brought in prisoner off Cape Nicola, and the charge of it given to this youth, as an efficient officer. Proud of this first command, he parted from the fleet in high spirits; but his joy was of short continuance. That same evening the vessel caught fire at the fore-peak, owing to the drunkenness of one of the men. All hands were half the night in extinguishing it; and hardly was this done, before he saw himself chaced by a privateer, whom he could neither resist nor escape, and he was carried into Portau-Prince. War was not then carried on upon the barbarous system of not exchanging prisoners; and after about eleven weeks' confinement, he was sent on board the Southampton frigate. In less than four weeks after he had joined her, that ship, in company with the Pomona, burnt two enemy's vessels, captured one, escaped from a French fleet, and took some shipwrecked sailors off the great Inague island. She then parted from the Pomona;

suffered

suffered severely in action with a large ship which got out of Nicola mole; and weathered that tremendous hurricane in which their late consort, with the elder brother of Captain and Sir Samuel Hood on board,

Whirl'd, riven and overwhelm'd, with all her crew

Into the deep went down.'

While the Southampton was refitting at Kingston, the town took fire; and Beaver and his messmates distinguished themselves by their exertions in pulling down the houses which would otherwise have spread the flames, removing people and property, and saving lives. Next year, this frigate escaped again from a French fleet, and from a second hurricane which disabled her. He was then removed into the London, 90, in which he had another providential preservation; for in a dreadful storm the lightning struck the foremast, and shivered it from the truck to the gunner's store-room, with a terrible explosion close to the fore magazine. But Beaver was desirous of more active service than a threedecker affords, and therefore obtained his removal into the Tobago sloop of war: from that sloop he was sent to navigate a prize into port, and in port was attacked by a dangerous fever. In that deadly climate, fevers are so generally fatal, that men's graves are sometimes made ready before they die; and his death was inserted in a Jamaica Gazette, copied into a London paper, and seen by his eldest sister. Strength of mind belonged to the family in an eminent degree: the sister, hoping against hope, determined not to communicate the intelligence till it should be confirmed. She had the fortitude to keep this resolution, and the inexpressible joy to receive letters from himself which announced his perfect recovery,

In June, 1783, his friend Admiral Rowley gave him an acting order to the Nemesis. He passed his examination on the 15th October. The next day Rowley complimented him with an appointment to act as first lieutenant of the same ship, which duty he performed till she was paid off; and so conspicuous were his merits, and so well known, not only by those under whom he had served, but by those also who had served in the same fleet, that he obtained his commission after the peace in May, 1784.

But, as many officers, with ostensibly better interest, failed at that time in obtaining their rank, Lieutenant Beaver became an object of envy, because, forsooth, bearing a high character from every officer with whom he had served, he was justly rewarded. This is what many of the most insignificant in the service call "luck"-as if a youth of strong natural parts, with obedient, diligent habits, was not likely to make his way, in a service which, however clogged by drones of interest, must always have a demand for efficient officers.

It is

really