Capt. Bainbridge joined the Essex at New York. He had Stephen Decatur for his first lieutenant, and was otherwise well officered and manned. The squadron, consisting of the President 44, Philadelphia 38, Essex 32, and Enterprise 12, sailed in company; the President being commanded by Capt. James Barron, the Philadelphia by Capt. Samuel Barron, and the Enterprise by Lieut. Com. Sterrett. The broad pennant of Com. Dale was flying on the President. This force went abroad under very limited instructions. Although the Bashaw of Tripoli was seizing American vessels, and was carrying on an effective war, Mr. Jefferson appeared to think legal enactments at home necessary to authorize the marine to retaliate. As respected ourselves, statutes may have been wanting to prescribe the _forms_ under which condemnations could be had, and the other national rights carried out in full practice; but, as respected the enemy, there can be no question his own acts authorized the cruisers of this country to capture their assailants wherever they could be found, even though they rotted in our harbors for the want of a prescribed manner of bringing them under the hammer. The _mode_ of condemnation is solely dependent on municipal regulations, but the right to capture is dependent on public law alone. It was in this singular state of things that the Enterprise, after a bloody action, took a Tripolitan, and was then obliged to let her go! The American squadron reached Gibraltar the 1st day of July, where it found and blockaded two of the largest Tripolitan cruisers, under the orders of a Scotch renegade, who bore the rank of an admiral. The Philadelphia watched these vessels, while the Essex was sent along the north shore to give convoy. The great object, in that day, appears to have been to carry the trade safely through the Straits, and to prevent the enemy’s rovers from getting out into the Atlantic; measures that the peculiar formation of the coasts rendered highly important. It was while employed on this duty, that Capt. Bainbridge had an unpleasant collision with some of the Spanish authorities at Barcelona, in consequence of repeated insults offered to his ship’s officers and boats; his own barge having been fired into twice, while he was in it in person. In this affair he showed his usual decision and spirit, and the matter was pushed so far and so vigorously, as to induce an order from the Prince of Peace, “to treat all officers of the United States with courtesy and respect, and more particularly those attached to the United States frigate Essex.” The high and native courtesy of the Spanish character renders it probable that some misunderstandings increased and complicated these difficulties, though there is little doubt that jealousy of the superior order and beauty of the Essex, among certain subordinates of the Spanish marine, produced the original aggression. In the discussions and collisions that followed, the sudden and somewhat