’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 the Court-Martial held in the year 1792, by which Court Mr. Peter Heywood was condemned for being concerned in the mutiny on board the Bounty.  I felt this to be necessary, from having entertained a very strong opinion that it might be detrimental to the interests of his Majesty’s service, if a person under such a predicament should be afterwards advanced to the higher and more conspicuous situations of the navy; but having, with great attention, perused the minutes of that Court-Martial, as far as they relate to Mr. Peter Heywood, I have now the satisfaction of being able to inform you, that I think his case was such an one, as, under all its circumstances (though I do not mean to say that the Court were not justified in their sentence), ought not to be considered as a bar to his further progress in his profession; more especially when the gallantry and propriety of his conduct, in his subsequent service, are taken into consideration.  I shall, therefore, have no difficulty in mentioning him to the commander-in-chief on the station to which he belongs, as a person from whose promotion, on a proper opportunity, I shall derive much satisfaction, more particularly from his being so nearly connected with you.—­I have the honour to be, etc.

     (Signed) SPENCER.’

It is not here intended to follow Mr. Heywood through his honourable career of service, during the long and arduous contest with France, and in the several commands with which he was entrusted.  In a note of his own writing it is stated, that on paying off the Montague, in July, 1816, he came on shore, after having been actively employed at sea twenty-seven years, six months, one week, and five days, out of a servitude in the navy of twenty-nine years, seven months, and one day.  Having reached nearly the top of the list of captains, he died in this present year, leaving behind him a high and unblemished character in that service, of which he was a most honourable, intelligent, and distinguished member.

CHAPTER VIII

THE LAST OF THE MUTINEERS

         Who by repentance is not satisfied,
     Is nor of heaven nor earth; for these are pleased;
     By penitence th’ Eternal’s wrath’s appeased.

Twenty years had passed away, and the Bounty, and Fletcher Christian, and the piratical crew that he had carried off with him in that ship, had long ceased to occupy a thought in the public mind.  Throughout the whole of that eventful period, the attention of all Europe had been absorbed in the contemplation of ’enterprises of great pith and moment,’—­of the revolutions of empires—­the bustle and business of warlike preparations—­the movements