battle; and next morning, as a calm, with a heavy swell, prevented the fleet from moving, he sent Captain Dundas, of the Tagus, with renewed proposals.  The result was, that Sir Israel Pellew, with Captains Brisbane, Pechell, Dundas, Warde, and others, went on shore; and the Dey agreed to appoint an ambassador, who should proceed first to Constantinople for the sanction of the Porte, and thence to England to treat on Lord Exmouth’s proposal.  It may be supposed that the Admiral would not have endured this evasion, had he been authorised to act; but he had pressed the demand without instructions, and felt that he would not be justified in resorting to force, if it could be creditably avoided.  He was not even certain that his conduct in thus pressing the abolition of slavery would be favourably received; for it was a common remark, that the obstructions to the navigation of the Mediterranean, created by the Barbary corsairs, were advantageous to British commerce.  He expressed this doubt in a letter which he sent on shore on the 23rd of June, when the fleet had arrived in the channel:—­“It is with great delight I again bring myself nearer to you and the rest of my family, after a longer absence than I had any reason to expect when I left England, and which has at last ended without realizing that for which it was said we were kept so long abroad after peace was signed.  I had anxiously hoped I should have been directed to enforce the abandonment of their cruel system of retaining Christians who fell into their hands (in what they term war) in slavery.  I hope I have made the path easy for the Government, having obtained by my own exertions the relinquishment from two States, and a promise to treat on that point from the most violent, Algiers, after discussions which did not promise sometimes amicable terminations.  But I intreat you to observe the utmost silence on this point, as it may lead me into an awkward situation; for I have acted solely on my own responsibility, and without orders; the causes and reasoning on which, upon general principles, may be defensible, but as applying to our own country, may not be borne out, the old mercantile interest being against it.”

Four days previous to the date of this letter, Mr. Brougham had moved in the House of Commons for copies of Lord Exmouth’s treaties with Algiers for Naples and Sardinia, and for all the correspondence connected with them.  He condemned the principle upon which the treaties had been conducted, because, by ransoming the slaves, we had virtually acknowledged the right of these parties to commit their depredations.  He understood that the Algerines, dissatisfied with the Dey for having limited their sphere of plunder, had been pacified only by the assurance, that though restrained from cruising against Neapolitan subjects, there still remained a wide field for their enterprise.  The Roman States had already felt the effect of the new direction given to their piracies.  He then