While the 51st were eating out their hearts in inaction at Lisbon, the British Navy was doing splendid work, sweeping the seas in every direction, capturing French merchant vessels, and protecting British commerce. Then Napoleon, seeking new fields for conquest, suddenly bethought him of Egypt, and forthwith transported thirty thousand men across the Mediterranean for the enterprise; but Nelson, following him, utterly destroyed the French fleet in those seas at the battle of the Nile, on the 1st August 1798. After this serious defeat, there appeared to be little prospect of Napoleon being able to carry out his threat of marching on Lisbon, and the 51st began to speculate about their future movements, having little doubt that they would be sent either to the West Indies or to the East Indies. In each quarter there was every prospect of fighting, for the West India Islands had been the scene of much conflict of recent years, their commercial value being considerable, and their possession being, consequently, of great importance. In the East Indies, also, much was doing; the East India Company was still struggling for supremacy over the native rulers; the great Mahratta war was being waged with vigour; and operations in the Carnatic were not yet at an end. To develop the trade of the East Indies was at this time of vital consequence to England, and since the insignificant French possessions in India (Chandernagore and Pondicherry) had already been captured, British trade had no competitors in that part of the world. It was necessary, however, to strengthen British rule in the country by reinforcing the land forces; and it was necessary also to keep open the long trade route between India and England by means of the Navy. The convoy system was by this time in excellent working order, and all British merchant vessels sailed under escort of men-of-war. It will be remembered that as far back as 1793 Sam Rice described in some of his earlier letters how large numbers of merchant ships assembled at Portsmouth to be convoyed to their destinations, and how the ship in which he sailed to Gibraltar was one of a fleet of two hundred. But besides these convoys, the various trading routes were patrolled by frigates and sloops-of-war, ever on the look-out for the enemy's cruisers or merchantmen. So by the one means or the other British ships were given a possibility of security, though occasionally a venturesome merchant, to whom time meant money, refused to wait for a convoy, and sent his ship to sea without one, as often as not to be captured. In 1798 Government decided to put a stop to these risky proceedings, and passed an Act making a convoy compulsory for every British merchantman. The East India Company at this time possessed a fleet of magnificent merchant vessels, and armed with guns; but they always sailed in a body with a convoy of men-of-war, and, considering the time taken in collecting a sufficient number of ships