500 BIOGRAPHICAL ACCOUNT 



over Con flans, in Quiberon Bay, having been obtained (on 

 the 20th of November) a few days before he joined. Whether 

 the Royal William accompanied the rest of the fleet on this 

 occasion, I have not been able to learn. The body of General 

 Wolfe was brought home in that ship, and was landed at 

 Spithead, on the 18th of November. From that date to the 

 beginning of next year, I find nothing concerning the Royal 

 William, when that ship„ with the Namur and some others, 

 under the command of Admiral Boscawen, sailed on an ex- 

 pedition to the Bay of Quiberon. On this service the Royal 

 William remained between five and six months, having been 

 twice sent to cruise off Cape Finisterre, for five weeks each 

 time. 



About this period, a series of letters, from Mr Robison to 

 his father begins ; and though the letters do not enter much 

 into particulars, they leave us less at a loss about the remain- 

 ing part of his seafaring life. 



On the 3d of August the Royal William returned to Ply- 

 mouth, the greater part of the crew being totally disabled by 

 the sea-scurvy, from which MrRoBisoN himself had suffered very 

 severely. He writes to his father, that, out of seven hundred 

 and fifty able seamen, two hundred and eighty-six were confined 

 to their hammocks, in the most deplorable state of sickness and 

 debility, while one hundred and forty of the rest were unable 

 to do more than walk on deck. This circumstance strongly 

 marks, to us, who have lately witnessed the exertions of Bri- 

 tish sailors, in the blockade of Brest, and other ports of the 

 enemy, the improvement made in the art of preserving the 

 health of seamen within the last fifty years. The Royal 

 William, notwithstanding the state of extreme distress to 

 which her crew was reduced, by a continuance at sea, of hard- 

 ly six months, was under the command of Captain Hugh 



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