PORT DUTIES. 



43 



lity of foretelling changes, or of estimating, with 

 any precision, the probable effect of the great po- 

 litical convulsions by which the country was torn, 

 rendered it a matter of extreme difficulty for the 

 Commander-in-chief to give instructions to his 

 officers, for whose proceedings, however, he was 

 officially responsible. Still less, it may be sup- 

 posed, could his Majesty''s Government at home 

 have any clear conception of what ought to be the 

 details of management, in the midst of such a 

 prodigious confusion of circumstances, varying 

 every hour. In the end, it became obvious that 

 the only method was, to make the officers well ac- 

 quainted with the general principles by which 

 their conduct was to be regulated, and to leave 

 them afterwards, as a matter of absolute necessi- 

 ty, to act to the best of their judgment and abili- 

 ty, according to circumstances, but always in the 

 spirit of their instructions. With every possible 

 care, however, cases would sometimes occur, so 

 difficult and complicated, as to seem utterly inca- 

 pable of adjustment, without an extension of their 

 powers. On such occasions, a reference to high- 

 er authority became indispensable. 



