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hopes had been disappointed. Why had he not
taken Sweaborg and Cronstadt? Why had he not
battered Sebastopol, and crushed its defenders in its
ruins? Nay, why had he not sailed right on to St.
Petersburg, and by its capture brought the war to a
glorious close ? Even the leading statesmen who had
cherished the popular hallucination, and endeavoured
to make political capital out of it, had now arrayed
themselves against Sir Charles Napier, and were
ready to become his accusers. But, after all, had
Sir Charles done nothing? This comparatively blood-
less campaign was not unproductive of important
results, which are thus summed up by his cousin, Sir
William Napier:�"He caused the thirty sail com-
posing the powerful Russian fleet to shrink like rats
into their holes; he took Bomarsund, caused Hango to
be blown up, interrupted the Russian commerce, and
for six months kept in a state of inaction certainly
80,000 or 90,000 good troops. He restored and en-
larged the knowledge of the Gulf of Finland to navi-
gation; ascertained what large vessels can do there, and
what they cannot do; when they can act alone, when
with troops, and when gun-boats can be used with
effect. He carried out an ill-manned undisciplined
fleet; he brought back unharmed a well-organized,
well-disciplined one, with crews exercised in gunnery
and seamanship�in fine, a fleet now really what it
was falsely called when it started�that is to say, one
of the most irresistible that ever floated on the ocean
for all legitimate purposes of naval warfare." Of the
prudence with which Sir Charles saved his fleet from
inevitable destruction, in spite of the popular urgency
and the condemnation with which he would be visited,
a single testimony which we now adduce is sufficient
to outweigh a whole nation of clamour and complaint.
It is that of the Earl of Dundonald�of our own gal-
lant sea-king Lord Cochrane�than whom no man
ever lived who combined such chivalrous daring with
so much prudent skilful calculation, and who there-
fore was not only the boldest but the most successful
of all our British admirals. Writing to Sir Charles
Napier on his return to England, the brave old earl
thus alludes to the Baltic campaign of 1854:�
"Those who are acquainted with the difficulties you
have had to surmount, and the nature of the ob-
stacles assigned you to encounter, can appreciate the
perseverance and moral courage requisite to over-
come the one and endure the other. My anxiety
lest your zeal should induce you to yield your judg-
ment to the notions of the uninitiated is now quite
relieved, and the noble fleet you command is safe
from the consequences of red-hot shot and incendiary
missiles propelled from granite fortresses situated
out of point-blank range of combustible ships. Be-
lieve me that I sympathize with you, but do not envy
the exalted position in which you have been placed,
knowing that my remaining energies are incapable
of effecting objects which you have already accom-
plished."
On returning home Sir Charles Napier was uncere-
moniously dismissed by the admiralty from the com-
mand of the Baltic fleet, and Admiral Dundas ap-
pointed in his room. But although the new admiral
succeeded to the command of a fleet now raised by
Napier's exertions to a high state of efficiency, and
supplied moreover with a large flotilla of gun-boats
which his predecessor had applied for in vain, he did
not take Sweaborg, attack Cronstadt, or accomplish
anything memorable. Soon after his return the
Aberdeen ministry retired, and their successors
offered to Sir Charles the grand cross of the Bath,
which he refused, and demanded an inquiry into his
conduct. At length in November, 1855, on being
returned M.P. for Southwark, he brought the ac-
count of his proceedings before the House of Com-
mons, and so complete was his justification, that
even his political opponents acknowledged he had
been unjustly used, and attributed the whole blame
of his failure to the admiralty. Thus satisfactorily
justified at last, he turned his attention to his favour-
ite subject�the improvement of the navy; and al-
though he did not accomplish in parliament all that
he sought, he effected much in behalf of our British
seamen, in which punctuality in their payment, and
the means of promoting the comforts of their wives
and families, were not of least account. Speaking of
his exertions in behalf of our seamen, a naval officer
thus writes: '' He was always fighting the admiralty,
and they were too strong for him; yet he was always
working them up to something, and it was his agita-
tion that was the means of getting all the good that
has been done for the last twenty years. He cer-
tainly might be justly styled the sailor's friend, the
sailor's advocate, and the sailor's defender, for he
was always at his post when there was any move on
the board about them, and always looking out sharply
after their interest."
On the 6th of March, 1858, Sir Charles in the
course of seniority was promoted from the rank of
vice-admiral of the Red to admiral of the Blue,
Onward until 1860 he continued his labours in par-
liament, and although he had now reached the age
of seventy-four years, he was still so ready for action,
that he offered to contribute his aid in upsetting
Bomba, the King of Naples, as he had formerly done
in dethroning Don Miguel of Portugal. He there-
fore proposed to Garibaldi, if he could obtain the
command of the Neapolitan fleet, to appear off the
coast of Naples, with which he was well acquainted,
and secure the capital by a short and sudden blow.
But Napier's last fight had been already fought, and
the iron constitution, which seemed only to grow
stronger amidst storms, and wounds, and perilous
victories, at length yielded to insult and ingratitude.
A change in his health had occurred before his
return from the Baltic, and the labour of vindicating
his character from the misrepresentations of his ene-
mies had broken a constitution which otherwise old
age alone would have exhausted. He sickened on
the 28th of October, and died at Merchiston Hall,
Horndean, Hants, on the 6th of November, 1860,
only seven days after the decease of the illustrious
Cochrane, Earl of Dundonald. Thus a single week
sufficed to deprive us of the two greatest heroes of
the British navy.
The literary works of Sir Charles Napier, besides
numerous contributions to the newspapers and the
United Set-vice Magazine, consisted of his histories
of the war in Portugal and the war in Syria. It was
a curious distinction of the "fighting Napiers," that
they wrote almost as ardently and ably as they fought.
Sir Charles was no exception to the general rule;
and although he was too straightforward and impa-
tient to study the graces of composition, he showed
that he had the power to become an eloquent writer.
Independently of his British titles of honour, he was
a knight of Maria Theresa of Austria, knight of
St. George of Russia, knight of the Red Eagle of
Prussia, grand cross of the Tower and Sword of
Portugal, a grandee of the first class, and Count
Cape St. Vincent in the peerage of that kingdom.
NAPIER, JOHN, of Merchiston, near Edinburgh,
the celebrated inventor of the logarithms, was bom
in the year 1550- He was descended from an
ancient race of land proprietors in Stirlingshire and
Dumbartonshire. His father, Sir Alexander Napier
of Edinbellie, in the former county, and Merchiston,