eposited at
the consul's the Majorcan mail, which he had taken from a vessel which
he had captured. It was a complete collection of the letters which the
inhabitants of the Baleares had been writing to their friends on the
Continent.

"Look here," said M. Dubois Thainville to me, "here is something to
amuse you during the voyage,--you who generally keep your room from
sea-sickness,--break the seals and read all these letters, and see
whether they contain any accounts by which we might profit how to aid
the unhappy soldiers who are dying of misery and despair in the little
island of Cabrera."

Scarcely had we arrived on board the vessel, when I set myself to the
work, and acted without scruple or remorse the part of an official of
the black chamber, with this sole difference, that the letters were
unsealed without taking any precautions. I found amongst them several
dispatches, in which Admiral Collingwood signified to the Spanish
Government the ease with which the prisoners might be delivered.
Immediately on our arrival at Marseilles these letters were sent to the
minister of naval affairs, who, I believe, did not pay much attention to
them.

I knew almost every one at Palma, the capital of Majorca. I leave it to
be imagined with what curiosity I read the missives in which the
beautiful ladies of the town expressed their hatred against _los
malditos cavachios_, (French,) whose presence in Spain had rendered
necessary the departure for the Continent of a magnificent regiment of
hussars; how many persons might I not have embroiled, if under a mask I
had found myself with them at the opera ball!

Many of the letters made mention of me, and were particularly
interesting to me; I was sure in this instance there was nothing to
constrain the frankness of those who had written them. It is an
advantage which few people can boast having enjoyed to the same degree.

The vessel in which I was, although laden with bales of cotton, had some
corsair papers of the Regency, and was the reputed escort of three
richly laden merchant vessels which were going to France.

We were off Marseilles on the 1st of July, when an English frigate came
to stop our passage: "I will not take you," said the English captain;
"but you will go towards the Hyeres Islands, and Admiral Collingwood
will decide on your fate."

"I have received," answered the Barbary captain, "an express commission
to conduct these vessels to Marseilles, and I will execu