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ORDERS OF ist MAY 51
was in clanger—were easily able to spread a general
suspicion of the intentions of Parliament.
If only the fleet could have put to sea at once when the
first mutiny ended, the seamen would have returned to
find their grievances redressed, and their wages increased
by a parliamentary grant. But as they waited at St.
Helens without hearing another word of the promises
made to them by the Admiralty, the doubt from which
their minds were never quite free grew stronger. They
did not understand how slow was the motion of the
administrative machinery, and their credulous minds
were easily worked upon to believe that they were being
hoodwinked by the government. 1 Their suspicions were
confirmed when they read in the newspapers that some
of the most prominent men in England feared trickery
as well. They had evidently expected that their
grievances would be redressed immediately, but still
their rate of wages remained the same, their measure of
food was not increased, and the same unpopular officers
still
held sway.
At the beginning of May the Admiralty gave them
further cause for alarm by a very ill-judged paper of
instructions issued to the commander of the fleet.
Naturally, the Lords of the Admiralty were anxious to
avoid the necessity of another disagreeable visit to
Portsmouth ; but if they thought to make their position
secure by mere repression, they were greatly mistaken.
Perhaps they imagined that the eagerness of the
mutineers for the royal pardon was a sign of weakness.
The instructions suggest more clearly than any direct
description can do the attitude of mind of the Admiralty,
and they had unexpected importance in the earlier half
1. Throughout the mutinies the seamen showed an extraordinaryreadiness
to believe any suggestion against the government. Their
suspicion, however, was natural, and is not without its parallel in
modern politics. Compare, for example, the remarks of Mr. Graham
Wallas on the town labourer : " If as he grows up, he does not himself
read, things beyond his direct observation are apt to be rather shadowy
for him, and he is easily made suspicious of that which he does not
understand" {Human Nature in Politics, p. 236).