The Blackwall frigates form a connecting link between the lordly East Indiaman of the Honourable John Company and the magnificent P. & O. and Oriental liners. They were first-class well-run happy ships, and the sailor who started his sea life as a midshipman aboard a Blackwaller looked back ever afterwards to his cadet days as the happiest period of his career.The East still calls, yet its glamour was twice as alluring, its vista twice as romantic, in the days of sail.Part I deals with the history of the Blackwall Yard, one of the oldest shipbuilding yards.Part II details a voyage out East in the good old days.Part III deals with the beautiful frigate-built passenger ships of Green, Wigram, Smith, Somes, Devitt & Moore and Duncan Dunbar.The illustrations are of value, in the first place, because the old lithographs which, many years ago, could be seen in every office and picture seller\'s window are fast becoming harder and harder to find; secondly, because the photographs are taken from prints, the negatives of which, in most instances, have long been lost.The Blackwall Frigates by Basil Lubbock. Published by Brown, Son and Ferguson 1973. Reprint. 280pp. Hardback with dust jacket. Dust jacket condition: Poor - very torn, with loss to bottom of spine. Very marked. Book condition: Poor - rear board damp stained, former owner\'s ownership label to half-title. Tightly bound and largely clean internally.