Indignant contemporary critics declared that accounts made in this fashion were in fact deliberately designed to “envelope in utter darkness the true appropriation of the immense sums they (the Ministers to wit) extort thereupon from the public.” The respective shares of deliberate design and mere convenient use and wont in producing the disorder present a nice question. What is beyond dispute is, that when the gilt book of the estimates showed the expenditure of such and such sums for repairs and stores, and when the money was devoted to other purposes, and the vessels named were lying rotten and unfit for sea, it must have been impossible even for the best informed officials to know the effective strength of the navy. Indeed, nothing is more difficult than to find what was the real available force of the fleet at this crisis. The common printed authorities, Beatson’s _Naval and Military Memoirs_, Schomberg’s _Chronicle_, and Derrick’s _Memoirs of the Royal Navy_ (all good books in their different ways), contradict one another. It is only natural they should, for there were no accurate sources of information. It was not till 1773 that the Admiralty itself began to try to take stock of its vessels. In that year it was ordered that a return, to be known as the “Progress of the Dockyards,” should be made every week, showing what ships of all classes were under the care of the officials. There was also a monthly list of ships in full sea pay. It ought to have been possible to make an exact return of the strength of the navy by adding the one to the other. But these papers were avowedly untrustworthy. A ship in full sea pay, or commission, might go into the dockyard for repairs. She would then appear in the Weekly Progresses, and if the totals alone were looked to, she would be counted twice. Then a vessel was considered to be in full sea pay when her captain was appointed, but months might pass before he joined her, and in the meantime she lay unmanned. So she, again, would be included twice. The Weekly Progresses were drawn up by the clerks of the Navy Office, and the monthly lists by the Admiralty officials. They were independent and might not agree. Some allowance must be made for mere blunders. It is obvious, too, that the dockyards returned such rotten hulks as H.M.S. =Dragon= among the ships under their charge, while the fact that a man-of-war was in full sea pay hardly established a presumption that she was manned, rigged, or as much as in good repair. These official papers are therefore but blind guides. When the great reform of the navy administration was begun in the early years of the nineteenth century, a manuscript book called the “Progress of the Navy from 1765 to 1806” was compiled in the Admiralty. The author warns all who may use it that his sources were untrustworthy, but he professes to have done his best to get at the truth and to have made the necessary deductions. It may be accepted as giving the nearest attainable approach to an exact statement of the paper strength of the navy during the years which it covers.