ry to this work he hoped to have in a corps of
marines, to the number of a thousand, which Colonel Gordon Urquhart was
now trying, under his directions, to organise. "I have several things in
view which even this small force could accomplish," he wrote to Dr.
Gosse, "and amongst the rest will be the rooting out of the pirates from
the islands."

More important, however, than the restraint of piracy, was the
resistance, if possible, of the Turkish forces. Several of the Egyptian
ships which Lord Cochrane had hoped to destroy in the harbour of
Alexandria had now come out and joined the Ottoman fleet, which had
Navarino for its head-quarters. He determined, without loss of time, to
go and see what injury could be done to them; and accordingly, after a
brief visit to Poros, where he took on board some stores and provisions,
and where he left Dr. Gosse to use the scanty supply of money which he
had collected in completing the equipment of the other vessels, he
started in the _Hellas_, on the 28th of July, for the western side of
the Morea.

On the 29th, when near Cape St. Angelo, he fell in with the _Sauveur_,
returning from a cruise in the Gulf of Patras, and the two vessels
proceeded with all haste to Navarino. They reached that port, and had
sight of the Turkish fleet on the evening of the 30th. With French
colours flying, Lord Cochrane reconnoitred its position, and then
watched for an opportunity of attacking some part of it.

The opportunity occurred on the 1st of August. A corvette, carrying
twenty-eight fine guns, and a crew of three hundred and forty, with two
brigs and two schooners, had passed out on the previous day, apparently
with the intention of conveying reinforcements to the Gulf of Patras.
Lord Cochrane immediately gave them chase, and drove them backwards and
forwards between Zante and the shore north of Navarino all through the
night and till nearly noon on the 1st. Then suddenly tacking, he closed
upon the corvette, and there was hard fighting--the first in which he
had been able to persuade his Greeks to join--between the two vessels,
for fifty minutes. At about one o'clock, after fifty of their number had
been killed and thirty wounded, the Turks surrendered.[10] Lord Cochrane
found on board twenty Greek women and several children, who had been
subjected to the vilest treatment. In the meanwhile, Captain Thomas, of
the _Sauveur_, had engaged with one of the brigs, carrying twelve guns,
and captured