Transcriber’s Note: Evident printing errors have been changed in theEnglish. In the passages in French, accents have been added/removed wherenecessary, but otherwise the spelling, complete with errors, is as printed.
MEMOIR
OF THE
LIFE AND SERVICES OF VICE-ADMIRAL
SIR JAHLEEL BRENTON,
BARONET, K. C. B.
EDITED BY
THE REV. HENRY RAIKES,
CHANCELLOR OF THE DIOCESE OF CHESTER.
LONDON:
HATCHARD AND SON, PICCADILLY;
SEACOME AND PRICHARD, CHESTER.
1846.
Dedication.
TO LADY BRENTON.
Dear Lady Brenton,
In dedicating to you the Memoir of which I havebeen permitted to be the Editor, I cannot but feel how inadequatethe portrait, which I have been endeavouring to sketch, mustappear to you, to whom it now is offered.
I undertook the work indeed, chiefly from a sense of publicduty; though without much hope that I should satisfy myself,or those by whom the charge was entrusted to me. It seemedfit and proper, that the world should be made acquainted with acharacter of such rare and peculiar excellence as that of your husband;and I felt that it was due to the naval service generally, andin particular to the younger members of it, that they should seehow qualities of a very different kind might be combined in oneman; and might render him, who was the ornament of his profession,a model of what man ought to be in every relation of life.My desire therefore was to do good to others, rather than to dojustice to my subject; and instead of dwelling, as to you mightseem natural and proper; on those various graces which endearedhim to all, and to those most, who knew him best; I have[ii]endeavoured to shew what he was, by describing his behaviourunder the several trials of his eventful life; and to extend thebenefit of his example by making it more generally known.
I dare not suppose, therefore, that the offer of the followingMemoir should have any other value in your eyes, than as atoken of the affectionate remembrance, with which I dwell uponthe character of your much loved husband. In this respect,had I attempted more, I should not have succeeded better;for language never satisfies the requirements of the heart; andyou would still have felt, that the half was yet unsaid; after Ihad written all that I could, in endeavouring to express myadmiration and regard.
My chief anxiety is, that the volume may be in some degreeacceptable to those, whose benefit has been always contemplatedduring its preparation; and that the navy may not lose thebenefit, which the example of Sir Jahleel Brenton is so well calculatedto give. In my solicitude to secure this object, I haveretained as much as possible of the language of the originalmemorial, which forms the basis of the narrative. I havesacrificed all attempt at forming a regular biography, that Imight preserve its originality. I have allowed inequalities ofstyle to remain, which may offend fastidious minds, that I mightnot weaken the effect of particular expressions; and the littlethat I have ventured to add, has chiefly been done for thepurpose of enabling readers to draw those inferences from theevents recorded, which he, writing with another object in view,and regarding what was written as merely a memorial addressedto his children, naturally assumed as certain to be drawn bythose for whom he wrote, and did not think it necessary to add.