The interval of waiting must have been full of anxiety. It was generally known that the number of French Privateers which were being sent out from St. Malo, Bordeaux, Nantes, and a dozen other ports, to prey on British commerce was beyond all precedent. Many of these Privateers cruised with the express intention of intercepting the Packets, attracted not only by the bullion which the Falmouth vessels frequently had on board, but even more by the hope of intercepting the Government despatches, and of striking blows at British trade by sending mercantile correspondence to the bottom of the sea. How seriously such disasters were felt in the City of London the Postmaster General knew well; and they knew too that the West India merchants, those unfriendly critics who were constantly at their side, would pounce unmercifully on the first misfortune, and declare that the new system had broken down. Month after month went by, however, and no bad news reached Lombard Street. Packet after Packet came into port, and recorded uneventful voyages. Some had been chased, a few had exchanged shots with an enemy; but not one had been seriously engaged, or had experienced the least difficulty in escaping an antagonist; and the end of the year came before any Packet crept in beneath Pendennis Castle with battered sides, and sails torn by shot. The “Antelope” Packet was commanded by Captain Kempthorne, a member of an old Cornish family which for many generations gave the navy some of its best officers. Captain Kempthorne, by some accident which he regretted during the short remainder of his life, had remained at home, and given over the command of his ship to Mr. Edward Curtis, the master, an officer of courage and discretion.