Bonne-Citoyenne; and to that may be attributed, in a great degree, the comparative impunity with which the latter came out of the action.

In resolving to measure his strength with an antagonist of such apparently superior force, Captain Mounsey displayed a highly commendable zeal for the service ; as, in conducting the six hours' engagement to its final, and to him glorious result, he did an equal degree of skill and intrepidity. On the other hand, when it is considered that the French commander and two of his lieutenants (perhaps the only two) lay dangerously wounded, that more than 70 of his people had been placed hors de combat, and his ship battered until she was totally unmanageable and scarcely seaworthy ; that, when thus reduced, a body of British seamen, numerically equal, and, in the sickly state of a portion of the French troops, physically superior, to all his remaining hands, were ready to rush upon his decks : when all these circumstances are considered, few persons will think that the flag of the Furieuse could have been kept any longer flying.

It was not merely in gaining this victory, that the officers and men of the Bonne-Citoyenne displayed so large a portion of those qualities, by which British seamen have attained their admitted pre-eminence. Much remained to be done. Two crippled ships, one with five feet water in the hold, were to be carried from the middle of the Atlantic to a port of safety. The effective prisoners, too, were more than equal in number to those by whom, during so long a voyage, they were to be kept in subjection. It took the Bonne-Citoyenne until 1 h. 30 m. p.m. on the 7th, and that was by very great exertions, ere she could take her prize in tow and make sail for Halifax, Nova-Scotia. On the 8th, at 9 h. 30 m. P, M., the main and mizen masts of the Furieuse, no longer able, in their shattered state, to withstand the motion of the sea, fell overboard ; and thus was a ship of 500 tons, herself in a crippled condition, compelled to drag after her a dismasted ship of nearly 1100 tons. The Bonne-Citoyenne did so for 25 days, and anchored with her prize in Halifax. The season of the year, no doubt, was much in her favour : had it been winter, one ship, if not both, would in all probability have foundered.

The Furieuse was afterwards purchased for the use of the British navy, and became classed as a 36-gun frigate. When subsequently fitted for sea at Portsmouth, Captain Mounsey, who had been promoted to post-rank the moment his exploit reached the admiralty, was appointed to command her. Lieutenant Joseph Symes, first of the Bonne-Citoyenne at the capture of the Furieuse, gained also, what he justly merited, a step in his profession. Captain Mounsey, in his official letter, makes honourable mention of his second lieutenant, William Sandom, his master, Nathaniel Williamson, and his purser, John Nicholas C. Scott ; also of two passengers on board the

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