“The crews of the vessels and transports that convoyed and carried the troops, suffered considerably by diseases which the season produced, while lying on the coast, and a thousand seamen lost their lives.

“Of about eighteen hundred people who were sent to different posts, at different embarkations, to connect and form the various dependencies of this expedition, few of the Europeans retained their health above sixteen days, and not more than three hundred and eighty ever returned; and those, chiefly, in a miserable condition.  It was otherwise with the negroes who were employed on this occasion.  Few of them were ill; and the remainder returned to Jamaica in as good health as they went from it.

     “The survivors of the party, after they left San Juan Castle,
     embarked for Blue Fields, an English settlement about sixty miles
     to the north of San Juan River, where most of them died.

“The climate of San Juan was not more destructive to the human frame, than the harbour was to the ships:  and, for the benefit of future naval operations, I think it is important to mention, here, that there is an absolute necessity for having every vessel employed on that coast copper-bottomed; especially, when there is a probability of detention:  for, in our expedition, the bottoms of the ships, not being coppered, which went with the first equipment from Jamaica, were in a short time so entirely eaten by the worms, as to become useless; and, had not fresh ships been dispatched from Jamaica, the remains of the troops must have perished there, for want of transports to bring them away.

“Lord Nelson, Duke of Bronte, then Captain Nelson, was the person who commanded the Hinchinbroke man of war, the convoy of the expedition.  On his authority I state, that the fever which destroyed the crews of the different vessels, invariably attacked them from about twenty to thirty days after their arrival in the harbour:  that, in his own ship, of two hundred men, eighty-seven were seized, and confined to their beds, in one night; that one hundred and forty-five were buried there; and, that not more than ten survived the expedition!

“In mentioning this illustrious character,” adds Dr. Moseley, “to whose skill and valour the British empire is so much indebted, I cannot conceal, that I have great pleasure in recording, that it was on our San Juan expedition he commenced his career of glory.

“His capacious mind gave, on this dangerous and dreadful service, an early specimen of those splendid elements, which have since decorated, with never-fading laurels, the English naval military fame; with deeds unparalleled in history, with atchievements beyond the hope of envy.

“When the unfortunate contentions alluded to had diffused their pernicious effects, slackened the ardour for the public-service, and