the next day, at 10 a.m., provided the French authorities would furnish, within a mouth, a conveyance for the whole body under his command and protection to any British settlement. To General De Caen, he sent copies of his correspondence with the Commodore, and expressed a hope that his Excellency would require no alteration in the terms proposed.
At 1 p.m., there arrived a second letter from General De Caen, pledging the faith of his Government, that, within a month, he would send every officer and ma, then with Captain Lambert, either to the Cape of Good Hope or to England, on condition of their not serving again until regularly exchanged; and also that no one should be deprived of his private property. It is said, that a sanguinary threat accompanied this last summons. Surrounded as be then was by an overwhelming force, and without a prospect of succour. Captain Lambert had no alternative but to surrender. In the necessity of this measure, his two brother-officers most fully concurred. The terms of the capitulation, however, were most basely violated.
Captains Pym, Lambert, and Curtis with their respective officers and crews. Captain Todd of the 69th regiment, whom Captain Willoughby had appointed commandant of l’Isle de la Passe, and the soldiers forming the garrison, were marched to Port Louis, and there treated in the harshest manner. Captain Lambert received many insults, and his brave companions were plundered of almost every article belonging to them; the whole of the commissioned officers, military as well as naval, with the exception of those named above, were cooped up in the cabin of a captured Indiaman, where the only light and air admitted were through the quarter-galleries, and a small hatchway, the ports and stern-windows being planked in:– when allowed to go upon deck, although in so hot a climate, the comfort of an awning even was denied them; their provisions were execrably bad, and very irregularly supplied; and, in spite of the solemn pledge given by De Caen, they were kept in that horrible state of confinement until the Mauritius was subjugated by the British, in the mouth of December following.
