changes, has, with us at least, ceased. Still there must be a peace establishment as a nucleus for naval operations; and the good order, high discipline, and moral tone of our naval schools, asylums, and ship-yards at this moment are due as much to the efforts and character of Admiral Foote as to any other

man.

At the Philadelphia Asylum, during a period of considerable excitement owing to certain local controversies and unsettled questions in relation to organization and government, he began that course of thorough moral reform which he carried. through his whole career. By dint of unceasing persuasion, he prevailed upon the pensioners of the asylum to take the temperance pledge, or, as an "old salt" would say, "stop their grog." He was one of the first to introduce the reform of total abstinence from intoxicating drinks into the Navy; and it was well understood that he was in thorough earnest in this matter, so that officers and men who were devoted to the use of liquor fairly understood that it would go hard with them if Foote was on judgment in cases of delinquency. Whether he sometimes carried this too far or not, all knew where he stood, and all were aware of the inflexible resolution he had taken to introduce the temperance reform into the Navy, in which determination he was successful. The Naval Asylum, in fact, made him a thorough temperance man. He said once in Philadelphia to his brother John: "I made up my mind that as a naval officer I could not be a temperance man. I met wi persons of all nations. I was obliged to conform to their customs. But when I came here I found these old sailors dreadful drunkards. Whenever I gave them any privilege, they invariably got drunk. I could do nothing with them. At last I signed the pledge myself, and then they followed me.” In a certain petition of the pensioners of the Naval Academy to the Honorable Secretary of the Navy-a characteristic sailors' document-Lieutenant Foote is thus spoken of:

Second Marriage.

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"The gallant Commodore Biddle was our first governor. A brave man like him knew what old sailors wanted. He indulged the good men, and brought the bad men into good order; and when he left us, we all to a man wished he had been left alone. The proper rooms were allotted by him to us, and the officers treated us like men. When he went away, Commodore Barron came, who commanded us as an old commodore ought to command old seamen like himself. He was ready to listen to us and to see our wants supplied, and may God bless him, and Biddle too, for both were old sailors' friends, which we put into the newspapers which you have read. When Commodore Barron left us, he left Lieutenant Foote to command. He has done us a great deal of good in making us all sober men. We once thought that old sailors could not do without grog. Now there is not a man in the house who draws his grog, and we feel like human beings, and hate the sin of getting drunk. We now understand the Word of God as it is written in the Bible, with which we are supplied, and hope our latter days will be better than our former lives have been. As old men, we wanted and have had quiet and peace of mind and body."

In all matters of strictly professional education and culture, the principles of navigation, practical seamanship, gunnery, naval tactics, and ship-building, he was, by the testimony of his contemporaries, for his time, a thorough master, leaving nothing to subordinates that he could do himself.

In the year 1842 (Jan. 27) Lieutenant Foote married for his second wife Caroline Augusta (his second cousin), the eldest daughter of Augustus Russel Street, of New Haven, a gentleman of wealth and high cultivation, now well-known as the generous founder of the art-school in Yale College.*

* Mrs. Caroline Augusta Foote died in New Haven, August 27, 1863, just two months after the death of her husband. She bore to him five children, three sons and two daughters, of whom two, Augustus Russel Street and John Samuel, survive their parents. Under the careful and scholarly training of her father, Miss Street's fine mind and lovely character were developed into a rare and beautiful womanhood, fitting her to become the true wife and counselor of a heroic man. She shared patiently his labors and sorrows, and rejoiced in his triumphs with a calm joy that intelligently appreciated their greatness, but was attempered by a higher hope.

But he enjoyed for a short time only the sweets of domestic repose on shore. His whole life was destined to be one of constant hard service in his profession.

In the summer of 1843 (Aug. 26) he was ordered, as first-lieutenant, to the flag-ship Cumberland, fifty guns, under Captain Breese. J. A. Dahlgren and others who have since won for themselves distinction were lieutenants and fellow-officers with Foote in this cruise of the Cumberland. This vessel bore at her peak the pennant of Commodore Joseph Smith, who on his return from this cruise was made Chief of the Bureau of Yards and Docks at Washington, and who, with Captain Breese, bore a distinguished part in the last war with Great Britain, especially in the battle of Lake Champlain. Commodore Smith proved to be. Foote's life-long and perhaps his most loved and trusted friend, and is himself a genial and noble-hearted Christian man. Commodore Smith soon appreciated Foote's working qualities, and in one of his earliest letters he says: "Would you be willing to go to Norfolk if I should go there? as that is a place of work, and requires energetic officers." He told Foote that he wished him to be always associated with himself, and he regarded him " as his mainmast."

The Cumberland sailed from Boston for the Mediterranean on the 20th of November, 1843. When taking the stores on board for the voyage, some of the men got an opportunity to tap a barrel of whisky, and made themselves drunk. Trouble ensued: some of them insulted and attacked one of the officers, and were consequently flogged. Foote took the opportunity to form a temperance society, beginning with the officers, and being sustained and encouraged by the commodore. The movement became popular, and soon all the sailors but one consented to commute their grog-rations for money; and that solitary one, coming up every day to receive his grog, became a laughing-stock, and was soon got rid of.

The spirit-room was emptied of its contents, and the whole

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crew, with the exception of the one veteran toper, joined the movement, so that the Cumberland became the first temperance ship in the United States Navy; and how interesting is this, when we think of the future fate of this vessel, selected to be the martyr ship of our civil war; when, in the terrible fight with the iron-clad and iron-beaked Merrimack, with her flag flying and her crew cheering, she delivered her last fire at her country's foes, and went down unconquered and unsullied in her pure renown.

The effects of the temperance reform on the Cumberland were visible in the excellent discipline of the ship, showing that the moral element is the basis of the highest and most efficient military discipline. Lieutenant Foote delivered a parting temperance address before the crew of the Cumberland, November 1, 1845, from which the following are extracts:

"To illustrate the correctness of the position which I have taken, let us look at the changes within the last few years. See how the temperance movement has changed the aspect of things. Look around, and we see ourselves in a ship where that great enemy of man—the enemy to his hopes and happiness-ardent spirits, is abolished. Who would have believed a man, thirty years ago, had he predicted that a ship, a frigate-a flag-ship, too, of the squadron-would cruise a year without the grog-tub? But it has been done, and I have strong hopes that in thirty years hence every man-of-war will cruise without a grog-tub, and that liberty in almost every port, and money every month, as has been the case in this ship, with many other changes, will also take place, rendering life in a man-of-war comparatively respectable and happy. But the credit of taking the lead in this reform, this matter which will prove so great a blessing to so many generations of seamen, will ever belong to the Cumberland-to the crew of the Cumberland. They did it; they also sent a petition to Congress to abolish the whisky-ration-did it voluntarily, of their own accord-no coercion, no force was used. The subject was placed before them-they chose, they acted for themselves; and by it have not only astonished people abroad, but the papers at home are resounding with their praise, and the good effects of their choice have been witnessed in the good order and condition of the ship:

in her snugness aloft and cleanliness below; in her rapid exercise of battery, and no less rapid evolutions of getting under way, furling sails, and, I may now add, of beating every thing which we have met. Of such a ship we may well be proud, and no doubt we shall all, long after the cruise, recur to the Cumberland with the most pleasurable feelings. *** I say that temperance has done good, and I believe its good effects will long be felt by many poor deserted mothers, who for ten and fifteen years have not been visited by their sons, but who will in a few months share the gatherings of a two years' cruise. Will they not thank God for the temperance movement in the Cumberland? Yes; and I trust that in eternity, as well as in time, many of you will bless the Lord for sending you on board this ship. But now is the crisisnow is the time to make a stand. Now the time has come to decide the great question, whether seamen shall become a rational, long-lived, and respectable class of men, or whether they shall continue to be imposed upon by land-sharks, and madly rush into the grave in the middle age of life. I speak strongly, because I feel strongly on this subject; and here, at the termination of the cruise, still feeling a deep interest in the crew of this ship for their general behavior and efficiency, and hoping at some future day to sail with many of them, I conclude by saying, as a true friend, neither touch, taste, nor handle any thing that can intoxicate. I have practiced and will practice myself these doctrines which I advocate, and so let every man now determine for himself, or he is in danger of rushing, with his eyes open, upon the dreadful alternative -a drunkard's grave and the drunkard's endless doom; which may God avert from us. Farewell!"

Returning from this cruise of the Cumberland to Boston, November 10, 1845, after a leave of absence for six months, suffering as he was from ophthalmia, contracted while acting as captain of the boating-service of the Cumberland in Egypt and on the dazzling waters of the Mediterranean, he was ordered (June 1, 1846) to the Navy Yard at Boston, where he remained in comparative quiet, though strenuous as ever in the line of professional duty, as executive officer of that establishment, until June 1, 1848.

A few extracts from the familiar letters of Commodore Joseph Smith, at Washington, to Lieutenant Foote, while the