n on American commerce was committed on
the 25th of July, 1785, when the schooner Maria, Stevens master, owned
in Boston, was seized off Cape St. Vincent by a corsair and carried into
Algiers. Five days later the ship Dauphin of Philadelphia, Captain
O'Brien, was taken and carried into the same port. Other captures
quickly followed, so that at the time of Barlow's mission there were one
hundred and twenty American citizens in the Algerine prisons, exclusive
of some forty that had been liberated by death or ransomed through the
private exertions of their friends.

The course pursued by Congress for the liberation of these captives
cannot be viewed with complacency even at this late day. After some
hesitation it decided to ransom the prisoners, and proceeded to
negotiate--first, through Mr. John Lamb, its agent at Algiers, and
secondly through the general of the Mathurins, a religious order of
France instituted in early times for the redemption of Christian
captives from the infidel powers. These negotiations extended through a
period of six years, and accomplished nothing, from the fact that the
dey invariably demanded double the sum which Congress thought it could
afford to pay. In June, 1792, with the hope of negotiating a treaty and
rescuing the captives, the celebrated John Paul Jones was appointed
consul to Algiers, but died before reaching the scene of his mission.
His successor, Mr. Thomas Barclay, died at Lisbon January 19, 1793,
while on his way to Algiers. The conduct of Barbary affairs was next
confided to Colonel Humphreys, our minister to Portugal, with power to
name an agent who should act under him, and Mr. Pierre E. Skjoldebrand,
a brother of the Swedish consul, was appointed under this arrangement;
but the latter gentleman seems to have been no more successful than his
predecessors. Late in 1794, Humphreys returned to America, and while
here it was arranged that Joseph Donaldson should accompany him on his
return as agent for Tunis and Tripoli, while Barlow, it was hoped, could
be induced to accept the mission to Algiers and the general oversight of
Barbary affairs.

The two diplomats left America early in April, 1795, and proceeded to
Gibraltar, where they separated, Donaldson continuing his journey to
Algiers _via_ Alicant, and Humphreys hastening on to Paris in search of
Barlow, as has been narrated. Colonel Humphreys and Mr. Barlow did not
reach Lisbon until the 17th of November, and when the latter