ship, depose the officers, and liberate their condemned companions ; and that the evening previous to the day appointed carrying the sentence into execution, was the time fixed for putting their plan in force. Captain Peard, observing the crew assembled in the waist, approached and addressed them to the following effect: "I am perfectly aware of your intentions, and shall oppose them at the risk of my life. You have determined to oppose the authority of your officers. I am resolved to do my duty, and to enforce strict obedience to my orders. I am sensible that you are, for the most part, the victims of delusion. I know the ringleaders, and do not hesitate to avow my intention of bringing them to justice. I command you to disperse, and to return to your duty."

Finding that this address did not produce the desired effect, Captain Peard and his first lieutenant, John Hatley, rushed amidst the crowd, resolutely seized two of the people, whom he knew to be the promoters of the conspiracy, dragged them out by main force and put them in irons, without experiencing any opposition from the crew. The determined courage of Captain Peard on this occasion produced such an effect upon the crew generally, that order was immediately restored and the men returned to their duty.

On the next morning, the 7th, the three mutineers, already mentioned as condemned, were hanged at the fore yard-arm of the St.-George ; and on the 9th the two belonging to that ship, having on the preceding day been tried and convicted, were executed in a similar manner. For his very spirited and exemplary conduct, Lieutenant Hatley was soon afterwards promoted to the rank of commander.

Except for a few weeks at the commencement of the present year, when Commodore Nelson was on his passage from the isle of Elba, and again at its close, when a small squadron, as we shall presently see, was sent to Algiers, scarcely a British cruiser was to be met with to the eastward of Gibraltar. Previously to any mention of the advantages which France derived, from the undisturbed egress and regress of her Toulon fleet, we will briefly advert to her recent territorial and other acquisitions along the shores of the Mediterranean.

The numerous and brilliant successes of the extraordinary man, who was at the head of her armies, had compelled, first the Pope, and then Austria, to sue for peace ; and the treaty with the latter, which was begun at Leoben on the 18th of July, 1797, and concluded at Campo-Formio on the 17th of October following, gave to France, among other territories and advantages, the whole of the Austrian Netherlands ; also Corfu, Zante, Cephalonia, and the remaining Venetian islands in that part of the Adriatic : while Austria was allowed to possess in return Istria, Dalmatia, with all the Venetian islands in the Adriatic, lying to the north-west of the gulf of Lodrino; also

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