great, and the anchor drop again to the bottom, by the returning revolutions of the cylinder.  When this was explained to Sir Samuel Hood, he ordered the people in the launch to bowse away at the buoy-rope.  This proved a most seasonable relief to the poor natives, who, however, declared, that, if it were required, they would go on, and bring up the anchor fairly to the water’s edge.  As the good-natured Admiral would not permit this, the huge anchor, cylinder, natives, launch, and all, were drawn into deep water were the ship lay.  The master-attendant now explained to the natives that they had nothing more to do than to continue lying flat and still on the water, till the people on board the ship, by heaving in the cable, should bring the anchor to the bows, and thus relieve them of their burden.  The officer of the launch was also instructed not to slack the buoy-rope till the cable had got the full weight of the anchor, and the natives required no farther help.

Nothing could be more distinctly given than those orders, so that I cannot account for the panic which seized some of the natives when close to the ship.  Whatever was the cause, its effect was such that many of them let go their slew-ropes, and thus cast a disproportionate share of burden on the others, whose strength, or rather weight, proving unequal to counterpoise the load, the cylinder began to turn back again.  This soon brought the whole strain, or nearly the whole, on the stern of the launch, and had not the tackle been smartly let go, she must have been drawn under water and swamped.  The terrified natives now lost all self-possession, as the mighty anchor shot rapidly to the bottom.  The cylinder of course whirled round with prodigious velocity as the hawser unwound itself; and so suddenly had the catastrophe occurred, that many of the natives, not having presence of mind to let go their slew-ropes, held fast and were whisked round and round several times alternately under water beneath the cylinder and on the top of it, not unlike the spokes of a coach-wheel wanting the rim.

The Admiral was in the greatest alarm, lest some of these poor fellows should get entangled with the ropes and be drowned, or be dashed against one another, and beaten to pieces against the cylinder.  It was a great relief, therefore, to find that no one was in the least degree hurt, though some of the natives had been soused most soundly, or, as the Jacks said, who grinned at the whole affair, “keel-hauled in proper style.”

In a certain sense, then, this experiment may be said to have failed; but enough was done to show that it might be rendered exceedingly effective on many occasions.  The Admiral, one of the best practical sailors of his day, thus explained it:—­