An English fourth-rate seen from before the port beam with, on the broadside, nine guns on the gun deck, ten on the upper deck (square decorated ports) and three in wreathed ports on the quarterdeck. There are eight sweep ports between the guns on the gun deck.

This is a pen and brown ink drawing with a wash over the preliminary work in pencil. It has been signed by the Younger, ‘W.V.VJ’.

The ship may be one of the 42-gun fourth-rates which in 1677 were armed with twenty guns on the gun deck, eighteen on the upper deck and four on the quarterdeck. They were the ‘Assurance’ (1646) ‘Constant Warwick’ (1646, rebuilt 1666) ‘Falcon’ and ‘Sweepstakes’ (1666), ‘Nonsuch’ (1668) and ‘Phoenix’ (1671). Other drawings and the small number of gun-deck ports led Robinson to suggest the ‘Assurance’ as most probable, but she was sold in 1698 and he considered it unlikely she would have been drawn as late as 1701, which the style here suggests. By the style and paper he related this drawing to PAH5024, which shows the ‘Seahorse’ of 1694 and could be more certainly dated to about 1701. Both are very accurate drawings in pen and brown ink and the early features here, such as the square decorated ports, might be accounted for if it is this drawing is based on an offset from an earlier example. Robinson, however, fails to say whether the ‘Assurance’ of 1646 was rebuilt in 1675, the date he ascribes to the ship as shown.