During the war the Spanish Government placed Ceuta, to defend it from France, in the possession of England. Several English establishments were formed, and considerable sums expended, in the belief that England would never give it up; but the immorality of the Government had not then overtaken the baseness of the people. The Moorish Government, however, thought this an opportunity of recovering its own, and having furnished supplies to Gibraltar, and to our fleet, and corn for our army in Spain, conceiving itself entitled to some favour, claimed the restitution of the place. The appeal proved ineffectual, although it was backed by the offer of a million of dollars. The English Government could not, as may be supposed, well urge on the Spanish Government the claims of its Moorish ally. Muley Suleyman expressed the anguish of his spirit in a distich which might have suggested Moore’s celebrated lines on Poland:-- “There is no faith in our foe, There is no comfort in our friend.” We landed within a mole or jetty which corresponds with the Ragged Staff at Gibraltar, thence ascended by a stair to the gate, crossed a bridge, and found ourselves on a lively esplanade. An alley of trees opened upwards through the straggling town, and a terrace along the sea-wall stretched eastward to the extremity of the promontory. The buildings were in the Moresco style with the columned court. The arms of Spain are to be seen at Gibraltar beside those of England--here the arms of Portugal are beside those of Spain. To the whitewash of the Spaniards and the Moors, was here added the yellow of the Portuguese, running two or three feet as a skirting round the court-yards, and along the streets: everything was dazzlingly bright, exquisitely clean, and elaborately ornamented.[49]