At 2 h. ? m. a.m. the strangers tacked, by signal of rockets, and were then about three miles on the Agamemnon's weather bow. At 4 a.m. the Agamemnon got within hail of a frigate, but, lest the latter should prove, to be a Neapolitan or Sardinian, with a convoy, was careful not to fire into her. Receiving no answer, however; to the hail, and observing the frigate to be making sail, the Agamemnon fired a shot ahead of her. On this, the frigate crowded sail to get off, steering two points from the wind ; and the Agamemnon, to prevent the frigate from getting before it, kept her about two points on the bow, chasing under every stitch of canvass. The four other vessels were now seen on the Agamemnon's quarter, steering after her and the frigate.

At daylight the frigate ahead hoisted French national colours, and began firing her stern-chasers. Occasionally, too, the frigate's superiority in sailing enabled her to give a yaw and fire her broadside; in return for which the Agamemnon could bring only a few of her foremost guns, now and then, to bear. While the breeze continued fresh, the 64 and frigate left the other ships far behind; but at 9 a.m., the two former having run into nearly a calm, the four ships in the north-west came up fast. To these, now plainly discovered to be two large and one smaller frigate, and an armed brig, the chase, evidently in a shattered condition, made signals: on which her friends stood for her, and she, hauling more up, was presently in the midst of them.

The Agamemnon, having her main topsail cut to pieces, main and mizen masts, and fore yard, badly wounded, and a great quantity of rigging shot away, could not haul her wind; and these four French frigates and brig-corvette, with the option, at any time before noon on that day, of bringing a British 64-gun ship to action, left her unmolested, and pursued their route.

The Agamemnon had only 345 men at quarters ; and of these she lost one man killed and six wounded. The aggregate crews of the five French vessels amounted to at least 1300 men : what loss was sustained by the only ship among them, that came within reach of the Agamemnon's shot, cannot now be ascertained.

On the 24th the Agamemnon anchored in Cagliari Bay to repair her damages ; and the French frigates proceeded to Mortella Bay. From this anchorage they might probably have been compelled to remove by the fire of the tower which, as is elsewhere stated, had been captured in the preceding month by the boats of the Lowestoffe ; † but Commodore Linzee had since removed

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