The French, as may be supposed, made the most of this affair. They declared that Adjutant-general Donzelot, with two companies of the 21st regiment, had, without any loss on his part. defeated 400 British troops, although supported by two frigates. That the British retired with such precipitation, as to leave a 6-pounder and more than 60 of their killed and wounded upon the beach .* False as this account undoubtedly is, for even the one man killed was carried onboard the Fox, and buried with christian rites, there appears some truth in the statement that 6000 round shot, fired from the two frigates, were picked up in the fort and town. This amounts to about three-fourths of the quantity of shot to which two frigates of the class of the Dædalus and Fox are entitled ; nor, at such a distance from home, was it very easy to supply the deficiency. Hence, it seems. doubtful which side lost the most by an enterprise, the utility of which, taking all the circumstances into consideration, is not very apparent.

General Kléber was by no means pleased with the sudden, and to him quite unexpected, departure of the commander-in-chief from the shores of Egypt. From the following abstract, of the state of the French resources in Egypt on the 26th of September, Buonaparte may have considered that, if he did not abandon the army, the army would, in all probability, abandon him. The effective strength of that army was about 20,000 men, or not much more than half what it amounted to 14 months before, when it disembarked at Marabou. These 20,000 men occupied all the principal posts of. the triangle formed by the Cataracts of the Nile on the south, the fortress of El-Arich on the east, and the city of Alexandria on the west. The troops were in want not only of pay and clothing, but of arms and ammunition. Buonaparte had not left a sous in the chest, and the arrears of pay due to the army amounted to four millions of francs. All the siege artillery, except some sea-service guns, had been lost in the Syrian campaign ; and the latter were used in arming the two frigates in which Buonaparte had taken his passage. The number of sick was greater than when the army was of nearly double the strength. Egypt had the appearance of being quiet ; but the natives naturally looked upon the French as enemies, who had invaded their soil, and whom, at the first opportunity, that presented itself, they would be justified in destroying. The mamelukes had been dispersed, but not destroyed. Mourad-Bey was harassing the French in Upper Egypt ; and lbrahim-Bey was at Gaza with about 2000 mamelukes. On the plains of Acre was the grand vizier's army, numbering, with that under Djezzar-Pacha, nearly 30,000 men. To add to all this a Turkish naval force of considerable amount was again assembling on the coast.

* Victoires et Conquêtes, tome xii., p. 28.

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