Page:Some Particulars of the Life and Adventures of James Guidney - third edition.pdf/10

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their course. The "Calcutta" reached Gibralta in safety; and the troops after remaining the e about eighteen months, proceeded from thence, on board transports, to Minorca, a very fertile and pleasant island. The Forty-eighth Regiment then joined the expedition under General Fox, which consisted of twenty-four thousand men, intended for Geneva; but finding that the French garrison there had been reinforced, they sailed on to Leghorn. After remaining eleven days at Leghorn, they proceeded to Malta, which they reached in September, 1799.

Having disembarked, the troops commenced throwing up sand-bank batteries against the citadel of Valetta, which the French occupied. After a four months' siege they surrendered, and were allowed to return to France. The English then took possession of the citadel.

James Guidney having had a good opportunity of viewing the island, during a stay of nearly three years, thinks that a short description will not be out of place here. Malta is an island in the Mediterranean, lying between Africa and Sicily; it is twenty miles long, twelve broad, and contains about eighty thousand inhabitants. Grapes, figs, oranges, lemons, and cotton are the principal objects of cultivation. In Valetta, the