[Footnote 2: Captain Sasse, an officer esteemed as one of the best and bravest of the foreigners in the Greek service. "This," says Colonel Stanhope, in a letter, February 18th, to the Committee, "is a serious affair. The Suliotes have no country, no home for their families; arrears of pay are owing to them; the people of Missolonghi hate and pay them exorbitantly. Lord Byron, who was to have led them to Lepanto, is much shaken by his fit, and will probably be obliged to retire from Greece. In short, all our hopes in this quarter are damped for the present. I am not a little fearful, too, that these wild warriors will not forget the blood that has been spilt. I this morning told Prince Mavrocordato and Lord Byron that they must come to some resolution about compelling the Suliotes to quit the place."] [Footnote 3: This was a fresh, and, as may be conceived, serious disappointment to Lord Byron. "The departure of these men," says Count Gamba, "made us fear that our laboratory would come to nothing; for, if we tried to supply the place of the artificers with native Greeks, we should make but little progress.] "On Saturday we had the smartest shock of an earthquake which I remember, (and I have felt thirty, slight or smart, at different periods; they are common in the Mediterranean,) and the whole army discharged their arms, upon the same principle that savages beat drums, or howl, during an eclipse of the moon:--it was a rare scene altogether--if you had but seen the English Johnnies, who had never been out of a cockney workshop before!--or will again, if they can help it--and on Sunday, we heard that the Vizier is come down to Larissa, with one hundred and odd thousand men. "In coming here, I had two escapes, one from the Turks, _(one_ of my vessels was taken, but afterwards released,) and the other from shipwreck. We drove twice on the rocks near the Scrophes (islands near the coast). "I have obtained from the Greeks the release of eight-and-twenty Turkish prisoners, men, women, and children, and sent them to Patras and Prevesa at my own charges. One little girl of nine years old, who prefers remaining with me, I shall (if I live) send, with her mother, probably, to Italy, or to England. Her name is Hato, or Hatagee. She is a very pretty, lively child. All her brothers were killed by the Greeks, and she herself and her mother merely spared by special favour and owing to her extreme youth, she being then but five or six years old. "My health is now better, and I ride about again. My office here is no sinecure, so many parties and difficulties of every kind; but I will do what I can. Prince Mavrocordato is an excellent person, and does all in his power, but his situation is perplexing in the extreme. Still we have great hopes of the success of the contest. You will hear, however, more of public news from plenty of quarters; for I have little time to write. "Believe me yours, &c. &c. N. BN."