The Editors of the Naval Chronicle present their twenty-sixth Volume to the Public, in the gratifying consciousness, that, neither in the record of important public events, nor in the varied display of useful and interesting information, will it shrink from a comparison with any of the preceding.

It may be said, that the star of Britain has, of late, shined with unusual brilliancy in the East. The capture of the Isle of France, so amply illustrated in our twenty-fifth Volume, has been followed by the surrender, respectively, of Ternate, one of the strongest islands in the Molucca Seas; of Gorontello; of the French port of Tamatavé, at Madagascar; and, though last, not least, of Batavia, and the whole of the Island of Java, west of the Cheribon. To expatiate on the value of the last-mentioned acquisition, would be superfluous. “An Empire,” observes Lord Minto, in his official letter to the Earl of Liverpool, “which, for two centuries, has contributed greatly to the power, prosperity, and grandeur of one of the principal and most respected states of Europe, has been thus wrested from the short usurpation of the French government, added to the dominion of the British Crown, and converted, from a seat of hostile machinations and commercial competition, into an augmentation of British power and prosperity.”

The capture of the Isle of France was also succeeded by a naval battle, off Tamatavé, as hardly fought, and as successful in its result, as most that have been recorded during the present war.