Book excerpt: Excerpt from Naval History of Great Britain, Including the History and Lives of the British Admirals, Vol. 6 of 8 At the meeting of parliament, November 25th, 1779, the speech which was delivered from the throne, was more remarkable for what it omitted, than for the topics on which it dwelt. Nothing was said respecting the state of affairs in America, or the West Indies; no hope of success in the war between the United States and Great Britain, was held out. Indeed, every thing relative to the war was cautiously passed over in silence. The designed attempts of the house of Bourbon, to press down and destroy the power of this country, were alluded to; and his Majesty expressed his firm reliance on the courage and fidelity of his subjects, that he should he able to withstand the combined power of his enemy; and finally to work out by their means a safe and honourable peace: it was, therefore, very extraordinary, that as a direct allusion was made to the restless and encroaching power of the house of Bourbon. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.