“The _Kangaroo’s_ boats and ours were now lowered, and made for the remaining merchantmen. Four of them cut their cables and ran ashore, where they were under the protection of a large body of troops on the beach. We could soon have driven these off had we had any ammunition left, but as it was, we were obliged to content ourselves with the capture of the other three ships. On our return to Port Mahon, after this really successful action, we found to our disgust that instead of the _Gamo_ being purchased as usual by government, she had been sold for a mere song to the Algerines, thereby depriving us of the prize-money we had expected to get for her. Cochrane was especially enraged, for had the _Gamo_ been purchased, we could have been transferred to her from the _Speedy_, and would have been in a position to do very much more than in that wretched little craft. It was, however, but a piece of the treatment that we had been receiving. The extraordinary number of prizes we had taken excited the jealousy of the senior officers on the station, for indeed we had captured more than all the other cruisers together; and the result was that our prizes were all sold for anything they would fetch, and owing to the ridiculous sums for which they were given away, and the rascality of the prize agents, we did not receive a tithe of the prize-money that should have come to us. “This ill-will resulted in bringing our career to an end. On our return to Port Mahon we were ordered to escort an extremely slow old mail-packet to Gibraltar. What rendered it more ridiculous was that we were to carry the mail-bags, and only to hand them over to the old tub on her arrival at Gibraltar and were then to return without communication with the shore. It was supposed that while engaged on this duty we should at least be able to take no further prizes, but we were so much faster than our convoy that while she crawled along we were able to run in and explore bays and creeks. In one several merchantmen were lying. As we bore in towards them they weighed their anchors and ran ashore. As soon as it was dark we sent our boats in and set fire to them, and as one was laden with oil it made a blaze that could be seen fifty miles away. Unfortunately three French line-of-battle ships were within that circle—the _Indomptable_, the _Dessaix_, and the _Formidable_—and they ran in to ascertain the cause of the fire. At daybreak we made out three large ships in the distance, and imagining they were Spanish galleons on their way home from South America, at once prepared to chase them. As the light broadened out we saw our mistake, and made them out to be line-of-battle ships. They at once crowded all sail and bore down towards us.