The history of unassuming worth, and unrewarded merit, claims the remembrance of a profession which it adorned, and of a Country, to whose service unabated exertions were dedicated: its biography must cause a lively emotion in the mind of every reader, and will awaken the noblest feelings of human nature. The eye long accustomed to behold the purple trappings of the Victor, or the bright career of success that knew no abatement, finds relief on being turned to the retreat, where professional virtue, acknowledged yet disregarded, sought at length an asylum that it might die in peace.

Mr. David Brodie, from a collateral branch of the Brodies of Brodie, an old and respectable family in Scotland, was born in that country; and entered into the Royal Navy at twelve years of age. His early patron was Admiral Vernon, whose friendship he long enjoyed without any abatement. Mr. Brodie commanded the Admiral's tender at the taking of Porto Bello in 1739; he was also at the bombarding of Carthagena in 1741, and in most of the Actions in the West Indies during the war.