ONER.

The two officers who succeeded to the command in the Mediterranean,
were accompanied by lord Tyrawley, whom his majesty had appointed to
supersede general Fowke in the government of Gibraltar, that gentleman
having incurred the displeasure of the ministry, for not having
understood an order which was unintelligible. By the same conveyance, a
letter from the secretary to the admiralty was transmitted to Mr. Byng,
giving him notice that he was recalled. To this intimation he replied in
such a manner as denoted a consciousness of having done his duty, and
a laudable desire to vindicate his own conduct. His answer contained
a further account of the engagement in which he was supposed to have
misbehaved, intermixed with some puerile calculations of the enemy's
superiority in weight of metal, which served no other purpose than that
of exposing his character still more to ridicule and abuse; and he was
again so impolitic as to hazard certain expressions, which added fresh
fuel to the resentment of his enemies. Directions were immediately
despatched to sir Edward Hawke, that Byng should be sent home in
arrest; and an order to the same purpose was lodged at every port in the
kingdom; precautions which, however unnecessary to secure the person of
a man who longed ardently to justify his character by a public trial,
were yet productive of considerable effect in augmenting the popular
odium. Admiral Byng immediately embarked in the ship which had carried
out his successor, and was accompanied by Mr. West, general Fowke, and
several other officers of that garrison, who were also recalled, in
consequence of having subscribed to the result of the council of war,
which we have mentioned above. When they arrived in England, Mr. West
met with such a gracious reception from his majesty as was thought due
to his extraordinary merit; but Mr. Byng was committed close prisoner in
an apartment of Greenwich hospital.

ACCOUNT OF THE SIEGE OF ST. PHILIP'S FORT IN MINORCA.

In the meantime, the siege of St. Philip's fort in Minorca was
prosecuted with unremitting vigour. The armament of Toulon, consisting
of the fleet commanded by M. de la Galissonniere, and the troops under
the duke de Richelieu, arrived on the eighteenth day of April at the
port of Ciudadella, on that part of the island opposite to Mahon, or
St. Philip's, and immediately began to disembark their forces. Two days
before they reached the island, general Blakeney ha