his force have been tolerated. The French officers under Jones at this time, besides the feelings of national and professional rivalship, had also too little experience of the capacity of their commander to give him that entire confidence so indispensable to success. His ill-fortune, with these uncongenial associates, was the more distressing, as their opposition or fears, while they baffled his enterprises, averted no real danger to which the loitering squadron might be exposed. The conduct of the agents of the court of France had also promoted and even authorised this unhappy insubordination of which the Commodore, after his return to the Texel, bitterly complained. “I must," he says, "speak plainly; as I have been always honoured with the full confidence of Congress, and as I also flattered myself with enjoying, in some measure, the confidence of the court of France, I could not but be astonished at the conduct of M. de Chaumont, when, in the moment of my departure from Groix, he produced a paper or concordat for me to sign in common with the officers whom I had commissioned but a few days before. Had this paper,

or even a less dishonourable one, been proposed to me at the beginning, I would have rejected it with just contempt."

The other enterprise, which, after having failed at Leith, Jones so reluctantly abandoned, is not exactly known. It might have been against Hull or Newcastle. It had been a favourite project with him in the former year to distress London by destroying the coal-shipping.

Jones had now the mortifying prospect of going into the Texel with merely a few prizes, the sole fruit of a long cruise with a formidable maritime armament, when fortune threw in his way the most brilliant achievement of his public life.

CHAPTER VI.

THE engagement between the Serapis and the Bon Homme Richard was, previous to the last war, one of the most desperate in naval chronicles. As a close and deadly fight, hand to hand, and accompanied by all the dreadful circumstances that can attend a sea-engagement, it has even yet few parallels. Its incidents have been selected as the foundation of fictitious narratives of maritime combats, from exceeding in intense interest the boldest imaginings of the poet and the novelist.*

* Mr Cooper, the celebrated American novelist, and Allan Cunningham, have both chosen PAUL JONES as the hero of romances, very different in character, but equally admirable each in its peculiar style. Mr Cunningham has certainly in many instances made wild work with the sober facts of history; and, considering the very recent period in which his hero flourished, takes larger poetical license than is quite admissible. The charms and accom

This battle was fought on the 23d September, under a full harvest-moon,-thousands of spectators, we are told, watching the engagement from the English shore, with anxiety corresponding to the deep interest of the game. No account of this memorable engagement can equal the simple and animated narrative of the main actor, which we purpose to adopt. It is to be noticed, that while Jones engaged the Serapis, the Pallas fought the Countess of Scarborough. The commencement of the engagements was simultaneous,

plishments allotted to some of Paul's female relatives would probably have been disclaimed by these ladies if purchased at the expense of the fair and spotless fame of their maternal ancestor. However, if Mr Cunningham imagined this cast of character best suited to his purposes, there is no great harm done. Few live to feel offence,-none to believe in those romantic passages, which owe their existence solely to the imagination of the poet. In painting Scottish scenery, and embodying romantic tradition, Mr Cunningham is in his work as much at home as is the author of "THE PILOT" in those fields of ocean which, as a novelist, he at present " possesses as his own domain."

but the Countess of Scarborough had struck while the Serapis still held desperately out.

"On the 21st," says Jones, 66 we saw and chased two sail off Flamborough Head; the Pallas chased in the N. E. quarter, while the Bon Homme Richard, followed by the Ven geance, chased in the S. W.; the one I chased, a brigantine collier in ballast, belonging to Scarborough, was soon taken, and sunk immediately afterwards, as a fleet then appeared to the southward. This was so late in the day, that I could not come up with the fleet before night; at length, however, I got so near one of them as to force her to run ashore between Flamborough Head and the Spurn. Soon after I took another, a brigantine from Holland, belonging to Sunderland, and at daylight the next morning, seeing a fleet steering towards me from the Spurn, I imagined them to be a convoy bound from London for Leith, which had been for some time expected. One of them had a pendant hoisted, and appeared to be a ship of force. They had not, however, courage to come on, but kept back all except the one which seemed to be armed, and that one also kept to wind