firmly established In Great Britain. There were 61 armed cutters in the government service, besides 9 excise cutters on the coast of England mounting from four to twelve guns each, 11 revenue cutters on the coast of Scotland mounting from eight to twenty guns each, and 15 luggers employed in the royal service.
Charnock gives the particulars of some eighty cutters, many of them apparently large seagoing vessels. Among them may be mentioned the
Rattlesnake, 185 tons, 12 guns; Kite, 218 tons, 12 guns; Flying Fish, 190 tons, 12 guns; Busy, 190 tons, 12 guns; Alert, 205 tons, 14 guns; Pilot, 218 tons, 14 guns; Ranger, 201 tons, 14 guns; and Sea Flower, 203 tons, 16 guns.
The lines are here given of one of these cutters,—the Busy, built at Folkstone in 1778; also the lines of a sloop published in the European Magazine, 1790.
The British cutters and sloops of this period accompanied the naval fleets and made distant voyages; and while there is no record that any of
