ROADS, LORD COCHRANE AT BASQUE.--“Our fire-ships were sent in, each conducted by a lieutenant and five men; the ships were sixteen in number, and some very heavy. When they got in, the French ships cut and slipt, nine sail of the line got on shore on the Isle of Aix, and the next morning we discovered them: the fire-ships having done little good, the small craft and frigates were ordered in to attempt to destroy them. The place where they lay was like Portsmouth harbour, under the fire of the two batteries, each of which had three tiers of guns, of twenty-nine each, all heavy metal: the navigation to get at them was very difficult, in some places there being only four fathoms water. Just as we were sitting down to dinner on board the Revenge, our signal was made to go in and assist the gun and mortar vessels; our ship was cleared for action in fifteen minutes, and in half an hour we were alongside of three sail of the line, when we opened a dreadful cannonade on them, which continued for an hour and a quarter, the Warsaw, a fine 80-gun ship, and the Aquilon, struck to us. We were now in a very critical state ourselves, being in only five fathoms water, which was ebbing very fast; the batteries on shore, having got our length, struck us almost every shot for the last quarter of an hour; luckily, a breeze springing up, we got off into deeper water, and out of reach of their guns, when we anchored again, and sent our boats to take out the prisoners, and set them on fire, about seven, p.m. At nine they were all in flames, and at two in the morning they blew up with a tremendous explosion; the French set fire to the Tonniere, and the Imperieuse to the Calcutta; three other ships of the line were on shore, very much mauled by the frigates and boom-ships; some of them were on their beam-ends, and but little chance of getting off again. The captain of the Warsaw was on board our ship; he said, they were bound out to relieve Martinique with troops and provisions. I went on board his ship after she struck, and the decks were strewed with dead and dying, a most dreadful slaughter. We also lost several killed and wounded, and our ship was much cut up in sails and rigging. Lord Cochrane caused about 1500 barrels of gunpowder to be started into puncheons, which were placed end upwards: upon the tops of these were placed between 3 and 400 shells, charged with fuses; and again, among and upon these were between 2 and 3000 hand-grenades. The puncheons were fastened to each other by cables wound round them, and jammed together with wedges; and moistened sand was rammed down between these casks, so as to render the whole, from stem to stern, as solid as possible, that the resistance might render the explosion the more violent.