proclamation, the Leander, and the two ships in her company at the time the unfortunate occurrence happened, as well as all other vessels commanded by the same three captains, were prohibited from entering the harbours and waters of the United States. At a subsequent period Captain Whitby, at the instance of the British admiralty, was tried by a court-martial for the murder of John Pierce, and, there not being a particle of evidence to prove the charge, was acquitted.

On the 25th of May, in the afternoon, the British 18-gun ship-sloop Renard (sixteen 18-pounder carronades and two sixes), Captain Jeremiah Coghlan, being about 10 miles north-northeast of the island of Mona, standing to the northward, with a light wind at east-south-east, saw and chased a strange sail under the island of Zacheo, bearing south-east. The pursuit continued all night ; and daylight on the 26th discovered the stranger to be a brig, and apparently a cruiser. All this day and night passed in chase, each vessel still on the starboard tack, the Renard gaining. On the 27th, at 8 A.M., owing to the calm state of the weather, the Renard took to her sweeps, and continued plying them until 8 P.M., when a light breeze sprang up. That night passed, and at noon on the 28th the Renard, being in latitude 20� 30' north, longitude 68� west, and having got almost near enough to the stranger to open her fire, was saved that trouble by the French brig-corvette Diligent, Lieutenant Vincent Thevenard, hauling down her colours ; and this, notwithstanding the brig mounted 14 long 6-pounders and two brass 36-pounder carronades, and had on board a crew of 125 men. The Diligent had sailed from Pointe-�-Pitre seven days before, and was bound to Lorient.

What could have possessed M. Thevenard, that he should have so disgraced the flag under which he served as to haul it down without making the slightest resistance ? As the bearer of despatches from Guadaloupe to France, he was justified in speaking no one. That excused his flight, but not his surrender. The moment he saw that he could not escape, and that the ship approaching him was of about equal size to his own (the Renard was of 348, the Diligent of 317 tons), he; should have fought her. Not a 10-gun schooner-privateer from the island he had quitted, but would have done so. What had he to fear, with the weathergage and a battery of seven French 6-pounders and one 36-pounder carronade, opposed to eight 18-pounder carronades and one 6-pounder ? The only difference in force between the Renard and a common English gun-brig, or one of the large armed schooners, was in number, not in caliber of guns. On coming to close quarters, and beginning to feel the weight of his opponent's heavier shot, what was to hinder the French captain from boarding ?

To call the conduct of M. Thevenard by any softer name than cowardice, would be acting more leniently towards a Frenchman

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