chance of restitution. Many were utterly ruined by the extortions of the Dey and governors. Heavy bribes--called "the customary presents"--had to be distributed on the arrival of each fresh consul; and it is easy to understand that the Dey took care that they did not hold the office too long. The government presents were never rich enough, and the unlucky consul had to make up the deficit out of his own pocket. The Dey would contemptuously hand over a magnificently jewelled watch to his head cook in the presence of the donor; and no consul was received at the Palace until the "customary presents" were received. The presence of a remonstrating admiral in the bay was a new source of danger; for the consul would probably be thrown into prison and his family turned homeless into the streets, while his dragoman received a thousand stripes of the bastinado. When the French shelled Algiers in 1683, the Vicar Apostolic, Jean de Vacher, who was acting as consul, and had worked untiringly among the poor captives for thirty-six years, was, by order of Mezzomorto, with many of his countrymen, blown from the cannon's mouth;[83] and the same thing happened to his successor in 1688, when forty-eight other Frenchmen suffered the same barbarous death. The most humiliating etiquette was observed in the Dey's court: the consul must remove his shoes and sword, and reverently kiss the rascal's hand. The Hon. Archibald Campbell Fraser, in 1767, was the first consul who flatly refused to pay this unparalleled act of homage, and he was told, in a few years, that the Dey had no occasion for him, and he might go--as if he were the Dey's servant. "Dear friend of this our kingdom," wrote that potentate to H. M. George III. of England, "I gave him my orders,--and he was insolent!" Mr. Fraser went, but was sent back to be reinstated by a squadron of His Majesty's ships. Admiral Sir Peter Denis sailed into Algiers Bay, and having ascertained that the Dey would not consent to receive Mr. Fraser again, sailed out again. His Majesty's Government expressed themselves as completely satisfied with the admiral's action, and resolved to leave the Dey to his reflections. Finally, in the very next year, King George accepts his friend of Algiers' excuses, and appoints a new consul, specially charged "to conduct himself in a manner agreeable to you." The nation paid a pension of £600 a year to Mr. Fraser as indemnity for its Government's poltroonery.