On the 12th of September some of the British batteries opened fire on the enemy, with the view of interrupting the workmen engaged in enlarging and pushing forward their fortifications; and for several days the firing was kept up, though with no particular vigour. In November the garrison began to experience the effects of scarcity, and provisions fetched the most extravagant prices. Mutton was 3s. and 3s. 6d. per lb.; veal, 4s.; pork, 2s. and 2s. 6d.; a pig’s head fetched 19s., and ducks from 14s. to 18s. a couple; while a goose was prized at a guinea. Fish was not less dear, and vegetables were scarcely attainable “for love or money;” but bread, the staff of life, was the article most wanted. It was about this period, says Drinkwater, that the governor made trial what quantity of rice would suffice a single person for twenty-four hours, and for eight days he actually lived on four ounces of rice a day. General Elliot, however, was always remarkable for his abstemiousness of living, his general fare being vegetables, simple puddings, and water. He was not the less a robust and healthy man, capable of much hard work and exercise; but the scanty diet just mentioned would certainly not suffice for a man working hard in a climate where the heat makes exhausting demands on the human frame. On the 14th October occurred an episode which gives a striking idea of the courage and resources of the British seaman “of the olden time.” About eight in the morning the look-outs discovered a small cutter, flying the British flag, coming down towards the Bay with a westerly wind. It proved to be the _Buck_, Captain Fagg, fitted out as a privateer, and carrying 24 nine-pounders. The Spaniards also sighted her, and made the usual signal for seeing an enemy, at Cabrita Point. Immediately, the Spanish admiral, with a ship of the line, a 50-gun ship, a 40-gun frigate, and some smaller craft, twenty-one in all, got under weigh to intercept this formidable foe! The _Buck_, nothing daunted, changed her course, and stood direct for the Barbary coast, speeding along at a gallant rate; while the Spanish frigate, xebecs, and lighter craft, unable to sail so closely to the wind, were carried downward by the strength of the current, like a squadron of huntsmen when baffled by the sudden doubling of a hare. When the Spanish admiral, who was last in the chase, became aware of this misadventure, he tacked, wore round, and returned to the Point, so as to cut off the _Buck_ in the Bay. The 50-gun ship also wore, and in this way checked her drift to leeward. Captain Fagg at this moment steered direct for the garrison. The 50-gun ship endeavoured to intercept her, but the batteries at Europa opened fire, and drove her off. Then the Spanish admiral bore down heavily from Cabrita Point, but the _Buck_ nimbly manœuvred past her, and replied to a couple of irregular broadsides of shot and shell with her little stern-chase guns,--soon afterwards