The Ship Great Harry.

The Great Harry was the ship in which Henry VIII. sailed to France to meet Francis L on the memorable occasion of the "Field of the Cloth of Gold."

This picture represents Henry on board a large four-masted ship, with two round-tops on each mast. The King is standing on the main deck with attendants. The sails aud pennants of the ship are of cloth of gold; the royal standard is flying on the four corners of the forecastle; and the arms of England and France are depicted on the front of the forecastle, and also on the ship's stern. Our engraving is copied from a large picture in the Naval Gallery at Greenwich, England. The form of the ship seems very uncouth to those who are accustomed to the beautiful models of our modern sailing vessels - so elegant in form, so compact in structure, and so well fitted to encounter the storms and squalls of long voyages. Nevertheless the Great Harry was a wonder in her time, and is mentioned with much laudation by the writers of that early period in the Naval History of England.

The Great Harry was rated at 1000 tons, and is set down as having 122 guns, but only 34 of these were such as would now be admitted into the rank of guns; the rest were pieces of small calibre, the largest deserving no higher name than swivels, and all of them distributed about, so as to make it a very harmless but fierce-looking vessel. But though the Great Harry was the wonder and admiration of its day, it was but a fair-weather vessel, fitted only to make people stare, and to be the centre of a holiday picture. It was ill adapted to stand a rolling sea or a gale of wind: while a broadside from a modern ship of war might have sent it plunging to the bottom. Doubtless the then watermen of the old school often shook their heads at the theoretical folly of attempting to build a ship so high out of water; and as they passed it in their shallops, pulled rapidly away, lest the great tottering thing should fall over on them. It was but little used; lasted for thirty-eight years, and was accidentally burned at Woolwich, in 1553.