Note 83 — ACT II.

Dilke, in 1814, says that featherbeds were still used to protect the men from the fire of the enemy. As to the use of cables I refer the reader to Sir William Monson’s Naval Tracts (Collection of Voyages and Travels, 1704, iii. 358), where in the directions “How to preserve the men in fighting” it is stated:—“I prefer the coiling of cables on the deck, and keeping part of the men within them...; for the soldiers are in and out speedily upon all sudden occasions to succour any part of the ship, or to enter an enemy, without trouble to the sailors in handling their sails or to the gunners in playing their ordnance.”