the other division, commanded by Brigadier-general Harcourt, a league or two to the northward of Basse-terre, under the direc tion of Commodore Samuel James Ballard, of the 74-gun ship Sceptre. On the 3rd of February an engagement took place between Brigadier-general Harcourt's division, and a body of French troops on the ridge Beaupère St. Louis, and again in the evening between the British reserve under Brigadier-general Wale, in forcing the passage of the river de la Père. In both cases the British were successful; and on the following morning, the 4th, the French hoisted flags of truce in all their positions; on the 5th, the terms of capitulation were settled; and on the 6th the island of Guadaloupe surrendered to the British arms.

In justice to the governor, General Ernouf, and the French troops on the island, it must be stated, that a great proportion of the latter were sick: that the force opposed to them, even in the first instance, was an overwhelming one; and that, as in the case at Martinique in the preceding year, there was a defection among the colonial militia. The British army sustained a loss of 52 officers and privates killed, 250 wounded, and seven privates missing. The navy, not having been engaged, suffered no loss. That on the part of the French troops is represented to have been between 500 and 600 in killed and wounded.

Before the 22nd of the same month of February the same two commanders followed up their success, with obtaining the peaceable surrender of the Dutch islands at St. Martin, St. Eustatius, and Saba; thereby completing the reduction of all the French and Dutch colonies in the Antilles.

East Indies.

On

The British commander-in-chief on this station, Rear-admiral William O'Brien Drury, being resolved to endeavour to possess the principal settlement of the Dutch in the Molucca sea, entrusted the enterprise to Captain Edward Tucker, of the 38-gun frigate Dover, with directions to take under his orders the 44-gun frigate Cornwallis, Captain William Augustus Montagu, and 18-gun ship-sloop Samarang, Captain Richard Spencer. the 9th of February, off the island of Amboyna, the first object of attack, the Dover and Samarang were joined by the Cornwallis; and the three ships, proceeding up the outer harbour of Amboyna, anchored, the same day in Lætitia bay with the view of examining the defences of the place. The principal was the castle of Victoria, and the batteries to the right and

left of it, mounting altogether 215 pieces of cannon (of all calibers from 32 to half-pounders), with an extremely strong sea-face. A little further to the right of the fort, close on the beach, was the Wagoo battery, mounting nine guns, consisting of four 12, one 8, and two 6 pounder long guns, and one brass 32-pounder carronade; and, far out in the sea, built upon piles, was a battery mounting nine long 12-pounders and one brass 32-pounder carronade, both batteries with very thick parapets. There were also two batteries on the heights; one, named Wannetoo, mounted five 12, two 8, and two 6 pounders, and two 5 inch brass howitzers; the other, named Batto-Gautong, and situated about 1500 yards from the former, mounted four 12, and one 9 pounder. Both the last-named batteries commanded, as well the town of Amboyna, as the castle and anchorage of Victoria and the anchorage at Portuguese bay. The several forts were garrisoned by 130 European, and upwards of 1000 Javanese and Madurese troops; exclusively of 220 officers and seamen, many of whom were Europeans, late belonging to the three vessels sunk in the inner harbour, and exclusively, also, of the Dutch inhabitants and burghers.

On the 16th, in the morning, the plan of attack was arranged; and at 2 P.M., everything being in readiness, the Dover, Cornwallis, and Samarang weighed and stood across the bay, with the apparent intention of working out to sea. But the ships, by keeping their sails lifting, and other manoeuvres, contrived to drift towards the spot fixed upon for a landing; the boats, all the while, remaining on the opposite side of the ships out of sight of the enemy. Upon a nearer approach, the three ships, by signal, bore up together, with a fine breeze; and, passing within a cable's length of the landing-place, slipped all the boats at the same moment, also by signal. The ships then opened their fire; and a smart cannonade was kept up between them and the different batteries on the shore.

The party in the boats, consisting of a detachment of 46 officers and privates from the Honourable Company's coast artillery, 130 officers and privates of the Madras European regiment, and 225 officers, seamen, and marines belonging to the ships, in all 401 men, under the command of Captain Major Henry Court of the first-named corps, landed without opposition. Immediately a division of 180 men, under the command of Captain Phillips of the Madras European regiment, marched to the attack of the battery at Wannetoo; which, after a determined opposition, was carried, with a loss to the garrison of

two officers killed and one desperately wounded. Under the able direction of Lieutenant Duncan Stewart, of the artillery, who, although wounded, continued at his post, three of the Wannetoo guns were brought to bear upon the enemy in his retreat, and subsequently upon the position at Batto-Gautong; which had opened a fire upon the British, the instant the latter had taken possession of Wannetoo.

With the remaining force, Captain Court proceeded along the heights, to turn the enemy's position at Batto-Gautong. This division endured, with the greatest spirit and patience, a most fatiguing march; ascending and descending hills over which there were no roads, and many of which were so extremely steep that the men had to help themselves forward by the bushes. By a little after sunset, however, the British reached an eminence that commanded Batto-Gautong; whereupon the enemy, after spiking the guns, retreated, and the battery was entered without opposition.

After the cannonade between the ships and batteries had continued for two hours and a half, during which the former, having drifted very close in, had been exposed to a very heavy fire, partly with red-hot shot, the ships took advantage of a spirt of wind off the land, and anchored in Portuguese bay, now freed from further annoyance by the success of the party on shore. In the course of the night, 40 men were landed from the Samarang and two field-pieces from the Dover, under the direction of Captain Spencer; and the seamen succeeded in getting the guns up the heights, over a heavy and difficult ground. During the night, also, one 9, and two 12 pounders in the Batto-Gautong battery were unspiked, and on the following day brought to bear on Fort Victoria. The fire of the British from the two captured batteries caused the enemy to abandon the Wagoo and the water battery, and finally to capitulate for the surrender of Fort Victoria and of the whole island of Amboyna.

This important capture was effected with a loss to the British of only two privates of the Madras regiment, one marine, and one seaman killed, one lieutenant and one corporal of artillery, four privates of the Madras regiment, and four seamen wounded. We must not omit to state, also, that Lieutenant Jeffries, of the Dover, while serving on shore, received a concussion in the breast from a spent grape-shot, but remained at his post. The three Dutch national vessels that had been sunk in the inner harbour were the brig Mandarin, Captain Guasteranus, of

12 guns (afterwards weighed by the British), cutter, name unknown, Lieutenant Haum, of 12 guns, and San-Pan, Lieutenant Dukkert, of 10 guns.

The success of the British in this quarter led to the surrender in a few days afterwards of the valuable islands of Saparoua, Harouka, Nasso-Lant, Bouro, and Manippa, all without bloodshed or resistance. After sending all the Dutch officers and troops from Amboyna to Java, Captain Tucker proceeded in the Dover to the Dutch port of Gorontello, in the bay of Tommine, on the northern part of the island of Celebes; and, on or about the 16th of June, succeeded in persuading the sultan and his two sons, who represented the Dutch Company, to haul down the Dutch, and substitute the British colours: a ceremony complied with under every demonstration of attachment to the British government.

Having thus opened a large proportion of the Celebes to the English trade, Captain Tucker set sail for Manado; and, arriving there on the 21st, sent a flag of truce on shore, with a summons to the governor of Fort Amsterdam, on which and some adjacent batteries were mounted 50 pieces, of various, but chiefly very light calibers. The terms offered were immediately acceded to; and the Dutch garrison, numbering 113 officers and men, laid down their arms. Along with Manado fell its dependencies, the ports of Kemar, Le Copang, Amenang, and Tawangwoo.

On the 1st of March the Cornwallis chased a Dutch man-ofwar brig into a small bay on the north side of the island of Amblaw, in the nighbourhood of Amboyna. As the wind was light and variable, and night approaching, Captain Montagu sent the yawl, cutter, and jolly-boat, under the command of Lieutenant Henry John Peachy, assisted by Mr. John Garland the master, and master's mate William Sanderson, to endeavour to bring the vessel out.

After a fatiguing pull during the whole night, the boats found themselves, at daylight, close to the vessel; which was the Dutch national brig Margaretta, mounting eight, but pierced for 11 guns, with a crew of 40 men. In the face of a heavy fire of grape and musketry, and of a brave defence by pikes and swords, Lieutenant Peachey and his party boarded and carried the brig, and that with so comparatively slight a loss as one man dangerously and four slightly wounded. The Dutch had one officer killed and 20 seamen wounded.

On the 10th of May the British 18-pounder 36-gun frigate

Caroline, Captain Christopher Cole, 38-gun frigate Piémontaise, Captain Charles Foote, 18-gun brig-sloop Barracouta, Captain Richard Kenah, and transport-brig, late Dutch prize, Mandarin, Lieutenant Archibald Buchanan, the two frigates having on board about 100 officers and men of the Madras European regiment, to be landed at Amboyna, and the transport a supply of specie and provisions for the same destination, set sail from Madras roads. Captain Cole had previously obtained from Rear-admiral Drury permission to make an attack upon some of the enemy's settlements that lay in his route to Amboyna; but that permission was accompanied by a friendly warning of the great strength of Banda, in reference especially to the small force then on board the frigates. On the 30th, after a very fine passage, the ships arrived at Pulo-Penang or Prince of Wales island, in the Straits of Malacca. Here, having made up his mind to attempt the reduction of the spice islands, and communicated his intentions to Captains Foote and Kenah, Captain Cole gained some slight information respecting Banda-Neira, the Dutch seat of government, but failed in obtaining what he most wanted, a plan of the island.

On the 10th of June, having been supplied by the Penang government with 20 artillerymen, two field-pieces, and 20 scaling-ladders, Captain Cole departed from the island, to make a passage into the Java sea against the south-east monsoon. On the 15th, when in the Straits of Sincapere, the ships fell in with the Samarang, and learnt from Captain Spencer, among other particulars, that the force at Banda, according to a return found at the capture of Amboyna, consisted of more than 700 regular troops. On the 25th the ships anchored, for a short time, under the north end of the island of Borneo, chiefly that the Piémontaise might repair her mainmast, which had been much damaged by lightning.

Apprehensive that Daendels, the Dutch captain-general of Java and the Moluccas, might succeed in throwing supplies and reinforcements into Banda before the arrival of the expedition, Captain Cole, the more quickly to get into the Soolo sea, entered the dangerous passage between Borneo and the small island of Malwali. The coral reefs were innumerable; and most of them just covered with water, and not easily seen until the sun had risen considerably above the horizon. By a good look-out and strict attention, the ships, in the course of 48 hours, had nearly cleared the shoals called by Dalrymple Felicia Proper, and the pilot had reported all danger as passed, when,