CHAPTER XVIII

Capture of General Bordé and his Staff--A gallant Boarding Exploit--A horrible Murder by Italian Prisoners of War--Success of our Navy--A Balance of Accounts--My Promotion--Quitting the _Bacchante_--Pain of leaving old Friends and brave Shipmates--The Plague at Malta--Captain Pell gives me a Passage Home--An ineffectual Chase and a narrow Escape--Stratagems of the Enemy--Toulon--Gibraltar--The English Channel--Ingenious Device of Captain Pell, resulting in the curious Capture of a French Privateer--Arrival in England--A kind Reception by the First Lord of the Admiralty--An Official Promise--“Hope deferred maketh the Heart sick”--A Return to London--The Peace of 1814--Its Consequences--Half-Pay and an End to all Adventures Page 331

APPENDIX--

Letter of Barklimore to O’Brien Page 339

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

PORTRAIT OF CAPTAIN O’BRIEN _Frontispiece_

PAGE

MAP SHOWING THE LINES OF O’BRIEN’S THREE ESCAPES xxviii

ESCAPE FROM THE _GENDARMES_ NEAR SARREGUEMINES 118

CUTTING OUT THE ENEMY’S VESSELS AT PORT LEMA 314

CAPTURE OF A FRENCH FLOTILLA OFF OTRANTO 328