without shot; next, that they should be shotted, but not fired so
as to injure the crews of our ally's ships; and, finally, that they
should be used as hostilely and destructively as was necessary to
accomplish the purpose of forcing Naples to let the Sicilian rebels
alone. But then it is said, and it is the pitiful pretext of equal
treatment to both parties, that the orders were alike to prevent
action of the King's troops and the revolters. Was ever there a more
wretched shift, a more hollow pretence, than this? Keep the Sicilians
from breaking an armistice enforced to save them from utter and final
destruction! Keep the beaten Sicilian rebel from overpowering his
victorious masters! Keep the felon convicted from rushing to the
gallows in spite of the respite granted him! Can human wit imagine a
more ridiculous pretext than this, of affecting to hold the balance
even, when you are preventing the conqueror from improving his
victory, and only preventing the vanquished from attempting what
without a miracle he cannot do, cannot, even with all your assistance,
venture to try? But such was our just conduct in an interference which
we had not the shadow of a right to take upon ourselves. We showed our
friendly feelings towards an ancient ally by forcibly screening his
revolted subjects, and compelling him to delay for nearly seven months
the total defeat of those rebels and the complete restoration of
tranquillity. From the 10th of September, when Messina fell, to the
30th of March, when we were kindly pleased to let the armistice
expire, the English fleet persevered in reducing the King to inaction,
and saving his rebellious subjects from the operation of his armies.
But for our own fleet, there is not a doubt that Catania and Palermo
must have fallen in a fortnight, but we nursed, and fostered, and
prolonged the insurrection for above half a year. Talk of your
humanity! Boast of your Admiral and his French associate interposing
to save bloodshed! Whose fault was it that Catania, having profited by
the respite you forced the King to grant, still held out, instead of
opening her gates as soon as Messina had fallen, when the insurrection
must have been crushed in its cradle? Who but your commanders and
envoys are to blame for the necessity under which they placed
the King's troops of fighting a battle on the 6th of April? That
engagement no doubt put down the insurrection; but many lives were
lost in it. Five-and-twenty offi