The pier or wall that embraces and forms the basin or port, is of the most massive construction, and its extensive fortifications, rising in tiers like the sides of a ship, present the most formidable offensive works to an assailing enemy. The walls are covered with guns, and the coast, right and left of the town, covered with batteries, as well to protect it against a landing, as to flank and gall an attack on the front of the place by sea. There are also many advanced works of irregular construction, and a citadel in the south-east angle of the city, occupying one of the corner bastions.

At the formidable attempt made by Charles the Fifth, with a fleet of one hundred and twenty ships, twenty gallies, and an army of 30,000 men, added to the knights of Malta, he was enabled, by means of the gallies, to land his army and materiel, notwithstanding the flatness of the shore; but the natural consequence of lying on such a shore was, that the first heavy gale of wind drove all the fleet, the whole of which, in half an hour, were dispersed; and in the extremity of danger (except the Maltese, who, by their superior skill and equipment, maintained their position on the coast, to the admiration of the terrified army on shore, to whom they presented a solitary but slight prospect of salvation from the enemy), fifteen gallies and eighty-six ships of the emperor's totally perished: the loss of men consequent on the embarkation, under such circumstances, was immense. Although the Maltese contributed the most extensive co-operation of their navy, only four hundred and nine knights, each attended by two gentlemenat-arms, were permitted to serve in the army. These knights, in the spirit of chivalrous gallantry, to render themselves conspicuous, wore over their armour a surtout of crimson velvet, with the star of their order emblazoned in white on the front of their breast, and served as a rear guard, covering the whole of the embarkation, being themselves the last who went on board.

On one occasion, a very formidable sortie having been made by the Algerines, a large body of troops were cut off; but the Maltese, rallying some detachments, repulsed the enemy so vigorously, that the Chevalier Sevignan, standard-bearer of the order, stuck his poignard into the

gate of the city, and left it there as a memento.

In 1601, the Spaniards made another attack on Algiers, which was supposed to be a fortunate expedition, because they came off without loss; but they effected nothing.

In 1602, an English squadron, under Sir Robert Maxwell, was not more fortunate than the Spaniards the year before; but, in 1682, a French fleet bombarded the town, and set it in flames; and next year repeated the attack with increased vigour, procured the release of all the christian captives, and the payment of a heavy fine in money. Among the captives were several English, who, to the disgrace of the French nation, were sent back by Captain Damfreville, the French commissioner; after which, the fortifications were extended and increased. Since the possession of Gibraltar, in fear of our strength, and inclined to conciliatory measures, the depredations of the Algerines were carried on against all other christian powers; but they continued to respect the ships of this country.

In 1775, the Spaniards made an unsuccessful attempt with upwards of twenty thousand troops, two hundred horse, forty-seven ships of war, and three hundred and forty transports.

In 1784 and 1785, the same nation made two attacks, which only terminated in the expenditure of a vast quantity of ammunition.

For a series of years, the pirates on the coast of Barbary had committed great depredations on almost every civilized state; and at length ventured to attack the English flag. Sir Thomas Maitland, the governor of Malta, proceeded, in consequence, to Tripoli, the government of which acceded to all that he proposed; and at Tunis every thing was amicably settled by negotiation. These arrangements, however, proving ineffectual, admiral lord Exmouth, with a portion of the Mediterranean fleet, proceeded, in the early part of the year 1816, first to Tunis, and then to Tripoli. At both these places, the deys appeared disposed to accede to any terms; and his lordship proposed a treaty, for ever prohibiting the making of Christian slaves, and that such prisoners as might be taken in war, should be treated according to the practice of civilized Europe.

These stipulations were readily agreed to, treaties were signed, and the fleet returned to Algiers, where lord Exmouth proposed to the dey a similar treaty, against which, however, he made a firm and resolute stand. Lord Exmouth, therefore, departed from the interview with a determination to commence hostilities; on which the dey ordered the British consul, M'Donald, to be confined, and all the English vessels at Oran to be seized. Negotiations, however, were resumed, which ended in an agreement that three months should be allowed for obtaining the sanction of the Grand Seignior to the proposed treaty, and the Tagus frigate was appointed to take the dey's ambassador to Constantinople. Scarcely, however, had lord Exmouth reached England, when intelligence arrived of a new and horrible outrage, between three and four hundred Corsican, Neapolitan, and Sicilian fishing-boats, employed in the coral fishery, near Tunis, having been attacked by an Algerine frigate, the fortress of Bona also firing upon them. At the same time, a corps of cavalry from Bona charged them furiously, and the slaughter amongst these poor defenceless creatures was most dreadful.

Finding it impracticable to bind the barbarians by treaties, it was at length resolved to take severe vengeance for their cruelty and perfidy; and lord Exmouth accordingly sailed from Plymouth, on the twenty-eighth of July, in the Queen Charlotte, of a hundred and ten guns, with four other ships of the line, five frigates, and several sloops, bombs, &c. Having rendezvoused at Gibraltar, where he was joined by a Dutch squadron, his lordship proceeded on his voyage on the fourteenth of August. The Algerines, it appears, had, ever since the end of May, been preparing for the expected attack of our fleet, by removing every article of value from the town, which was well defended by about one thousand pieces of ordnance. The batteries were one above another, strongly constructed and fortified; and along a tongue of land, which defends the entrance into the inner part of the harbour, and also the approach to it, was a range of strong batteries, which our ships were obliged to pass, to take their station near the town, for the purpose of bombarding it. Lord Exmouth

arrived on the twenty-seventh of August; and, all proposals for conciliation having proved ineffectual, the fleet passed the batteries, and at three o'clock in the afternoon the firing commenced. The Queen Charlotte took her station off the extreme point of the tongue, by which she enfiladed the whole line of batteries along it; and so near was she, that every part of the mole, and what was called the Marine, was visible from her quarterdeck. Both were crowded with spectators, and lord Exmouth waved his hat to them to retire, and signified that he was about to begin hostilities; but they did not attend to, or perhaps did not comprehend the meaning of, his humanely intended warning, and the consequence was, that our first broadside swept off from five hundred to one thousand of them. The most advanced of the Algerine navy was a brig, to which the Queen Charlotte lashed herself: closer in with the shore, in the bosom of the harbour, were two frigates, and the rest of the Algerine vessels behind them. The fury and tremendous nature of the bombardment will never be forgotten. It continued till nearly eleven; the Algerines fighting all the time with the utmost fury, but yet with great skill and effect. About ten, the land breeze came on, and it was deemed advisable to take a larger offing during the night. It was extremely dark; but the darkness was illuminated by a. violent storm of lightning, with thunder, and by the incessant fire of the batteries. Next morning the city and harbour exhibited a terrible scene of desolation, four large Algerine frigates, five corvettes, a great number of smaller vessels of all descriptions, the magazines, arsenals, and a large quantity of marine stores, being destroyed; whilst their loss in men was between six and seven thousand: the assailants had also to lament a loss in killed and wounded of more than eight hundred. Lord Exmouth now repeated with effect the proposals which had before been rejected, and the result of this splendid achievement was, that the dey agreed totally to abolish Christian slavery; to deliver up all the slaves in his dominions, to whatever nation they might belong; to return all the money that he had received for the redemption of slaves since the commencement of the year; and to make reparation and a public

apology to the British consul, for the wrongs and indignities to which he had been subjected.

After the treaties had been negotiated, and the dey had refunded three hundred and eighty-two thousand five hundred dollars to the governments of Naples and Sardinia, and had released ten hundred and eighty-three Christian slaves, it came to the knowledge of lord Exmouth, that two Spaniards, the one a merchant, and the other the vice-consul of that nation, were still held in custody, on pretence that they were prisoners for debt. His lordship immediately insisted on their unconditional release, and prepared for the recommencement of hostilities; in consequence of which they were set at liberty, and not one Christian prisoner remained in Algiers. Our gallant squadron quitted on the third of September; and lord Exmouth, who was twice slightly wounded during the action, was raised from the dignity of baron to that of viscount, for his services on this occasion. A considerable promotion also took place amongst the officers who had so nobly participated in the chastisement of an unprincipled tyrant.

The following is Lord Exmouth's official account, which records many interesting particulars relative to this memorable transaction, written in a style which reflects the highest honour on the noble and gallant admiral :—

Queen Charlotte, Algiers Bay,
Aug. 28, 1816.

SIR, In all the vicissitudes of a long life of public service, no circumstance has ever produced on my mind such impressions of gratitude and joy as the event of yesterday. To have been one of the humble instruments, in the hands of Divine Providence, for bringing to reason a ferocious government, and destroying for ever the insufferable and horrid system of Christian slavery, can never cease to be a source of delight and heartfelt comfort to every individual happy enough to be employed in it. I may, I hope, be permitted, under such impressions, to offer my sincere congratulations to their lordships on the complete success which attended the gallant efforts of his Majesty's fleet in their attack upon Algiers of yesterday; and the happy result produced from it on this day, by the signature of peace.

Thus has a provoked war of two days' existence been attended by a complete victory, and closed by a renewed peace for England and her ally, the King of the Netherlands, on conditions dictated by the firmness and wisdom of his Majesty's government, and commanded by the vigour of their measures.

My thanks are justly due for the honour and confidence his Majesty's ministers have been pleased to repose on my zeal on this highly important occasion. The means were by them made adequate to my own wishes, and the rapidity of their measures speak for themselves. Not more than one hundred days since, I left Algiers with the British fleet, unsuspicious and ignorant of the atrocities which had been committed at Bona; that fleet, on its arrival in England, was necessarily disbanded, and another with proportionate resources created and equipped; and although impeded in its progress by calms and adverse winds, has poured the vengeance of an insulted nation, in chastising the cruelties of a ferocious government, with a promptitude beyond example, and highly honourable to the national character, eager to resent oppression or cruelty, whenever practised upon those under their protection.

Would to God that in the attainment of this object I had not deeply to lament the severe loss of so many gallant officers and men: they have profusely bled in a contest which has been peculiarly marked by proofs of such devoted heroism as would rouse every noble feeling, did I dare indulge in relating them.

Their lordships will already have been informed, by his Majesty's sloop Jasper, of my proceedings up to the 14th instant, on which day I broke ground from Gibraltar, after a vexatious detention, by a foul wind, of four days.

The fleet, complete in all its points, with the addition of five gun-boats fitted at Gibraltar, departed in the highest spirits, and with the most favourable prospect of reaching the port of their destination in three days; but an adverse wind destroyed the expectation of an early arrival, which was the more anxiously looked for by myself, in consequence of hearing, the day I sailed from Gibraltar, that a large army had been assembled, and that very considerable additional works were throwing up, not only on

both flanks of the city, but also immediately about the entrance of the mole; from this I was apprehensive that my intention of making that point my principal object of attack had been discovered to the Dey by the same means he had heard of the expedition. This intelligence was, on the following night, greatly confirmed by the Prometheus, which I had despatched to Algiers some time before, to endeavour to get away the consul. Captain Dashwood had with difficulty succeeded in bringing away, disguised in midshipman's uniform, his wife and daughter, leaving a boat to bring off their infant child coming down in a basket with the surgeon, who thought he had composed it, but it unhappily cried in the gateway, and, in consequence, the surgeon, three midshipmen, in all, eighteen persons, were seized and confined as slaves in the usual dungeons. The child was sent off next morning by the Dey, and as a solitary instance of his humanity, it ought to be recorded by me.

Captain Dashwood further confirmed, that about forty thousand men had been brought down from the interior, and all the janissaries called in from distant garrisons, and that they were indefatigably employed in their batteries, gun-boats, &c. and every where strengthening the sea-defences.

The Dey informed Captain Dashwood, he knew perfectly well the armament was destined for Algiers, and asked him if it was true; he replied, if he had such information, he knew as much as he did, and probably from the same source— -the public prints.

The ships were all in port, and between forty and fifty gun and mortar boats ready, with several more in forward repair. The Dey had closely confined the consul, and refused either to give him up, or promise his personal safety: nor would he hear a word respecting the officers and men seized in the boats of the Prometheus.

From the continuance of adverse winds and calms, the land to the westward of Algiers was not made before the 26th, and the next morning at day-break the fleet was advanced in sight of the city, though not so near as I had intended. As the ships were becalmed, I embraced this opportunity of despatching a boat under cover of the Severn, with a flag of

truce, and the demands I had to make, in the name of his Royal Highness the Prince Regent, on the Dey of Algiers, directing the officer to wait two or three hours for the Dey's answer, at which time, if no reply was sent, he was to return to the flag-ship: he was met near the mole by the captain of the port, who, on being told the answer was expected in one hour, replied, that it was impossible: the officer then said he would wait two or three hours; he then observed two hours was quite sufficient.

The fleet at this time, by the springing up of the sea-breeze, had reached the bay, and were preparing the boats and flotilla for service until near two o'clock; when, observing my officer was returning with the signal flying, that no answer had been received upwards of three hours, I instantly made the signal to know if the ships were all ready, which being answered in the affirmative, the Queen Charlotte bore up, followed up by the fleet, for their appointed stations; the flag, leading in the prescribed order, was anchored in the entrance of the mole, at about fifty yards distance. At this moment not a gun had been fired, and I began to suspect a full compliance with the terms which had been so many hours in their hands; at this period of profound silence, a shot was fired at us from the mole, and two at the ships to the northward then following; this was promptly returned by the Queen Charlotte, who was then lashing to the main-mast of a brig, fast to the shore in the mouth of the mole, and which we had steered for as the guide to our position.

Thus commenced a fire as animated and well supported as, I believe, was ever witnessed, from a quarter before three until nine, without intermission, and which did not cease altogether until half-past eleven.

The ships immediately following me were admirably and coolly taking their stations, with a precision even beyond my most sanguine hope; and never did the British flag receive, on any occasion, more zealous and honourable support. To look further on the line than immediately round me was perfectly impossible, but so well grounded was my confidence in the gallant officers I had to command, that my mind was left perfectly free to attend to other objects, and