when you are preventing the conqueror from improving his victory, and only preventing the vanquished from attempting what without a miracle he cannot do, cannot, even with all your assistance, venture to try? But such was our just conduct in an interference which we had not the shadow of a right to take upon ourselves. We showed our friendly feelings towards an ancient ally by forcibly screening his revolted subjects, and compelling him to delay for nearly seven months the total defeat of those rebels and the complete restoration of tranquillity. From the 10th of September, when Messina fell, to the 30th of March, when we were kindly pleased to let the armistice expire, the English fleet persevered in reducing the King to inaction, and saving his rebellious subjects from the operation of his armies. But for our own fleet, there is not a doubt that Catania and Palermo must have fallen in a fortnight; but we nursed, and fostered, and prolonged the insurrection for above half a year. Talk of your humanity! Boast of your Admiral and his French associate interposing to save bloodshed! Whose fault was it that Catania, having profited by the respite you forced the King to grant, still held out, instead of opening her gates as soon as Messina had fallen, when the insurrection must have been crushed in its cradle? Who but your commanders and envoys are to blame for the necessity under which they placed the King's troops of fighting a battle on the 6th of April? That engagement no doubt put down the insurrection; but many lives were lost in it. Five-and-twenty officers were killed and wounded on the King's side, and some hundreds of men must likewise have expiated their loyalty with their lives, to say
