thousand pieces; carried away our taff-rail and lost her own jib-boom. Immediately col. A, with the speaking trumpet began to reprimand the master of the schooner, and ordered him at his peril never to approach so near the Lean. der in future. Lewis instantly kindled at this interference of the quarter master general with his duty, and without any ceremony commanded him not to repeat an action of the kind. High and insulting words passed on both sides; till Miranda thought it necessary to take part in the affray, and notwithstanding his disposi tion to support his nearest officer, in this in. stance he decided against him. He schooled him very severely. Armstrong received these rebukes with great meekness, alleging that his anxiety for the common good prompt. ed his interference, but promising that he would not offend again; the storm subsided, but grim looks are still seen in various direc tions. I suppose the war of frowns and words will not cease, till that of balls commences, which though more dangerous is not half so disagreeable as these eternal jarrings of discor dant tempers. These gentlemen can nevera. gree, and our captain particularly appears to

have an invincible dislike to the quarter master general.

March 31st. I had scarcely finished the last paragraph, when a brig was discovered standing towards us; of course we were cleared for action and ordered to our quarters; but in half an hour, finding she had no mind to make acquaintance with us, we retired from quarters to bed in sound skins. The general is not, nor any of his followers, wholly free from the apprehension of meeting a French or Spanish vessel of more strength than we shall be glad to see; though the English cruisers occasion the Dons and Monsieurs to be very scarce in these seas, and the danger of being *met is not great. Should any of the latter and we come in each other's way, we shall have but one of two alternatives, to run as fast or fight as hard as we can; and we might very possibly not succeed in either. The last is our chief resourse, though our crew have more bravery than skill. In sailing, the dullest cruiser in the West-Indies would be an over match for the Leander, otherwise an excellent ship.

LETTER VIII.

Another dispute.-Ship falls to the leeward.Chases a vessel.-The Leander cannot use the American Ensign.

April 1st, 1806.

SURELY the pope of the holy fathers have not invoked Heaven against Miranda's expedition in vain. It is worse and worse. The contest now has been between Lewis and the

general. Capt. Gardner of the Bacchus addressed a line to col. Armstrong for some articles for the schooner; and for an addition of hands, complaining that he had not men enough to work the vessel. Lewis thought (and very properly in my opinion) this note should have been addressed to him and that it belonged to him to give an answer. The gen. eral thought otherwise, and observed that Lewis had nothing to do but to obey his or ders. Lewis' temper could not bear this, and he took his stand. He declared the Bacchus should have none of his men, as he wanted all for his own vessel; and threatened that if he was overruled, he would resign. The alterca. tion grew more and more violent, till Lewis resolved instantly to leave the ship. He direct

ed his servant to produce his baggage that he might go on board the Bacchus, which had been ordered by him to heave to for that pur. pose. The mates of our ship seeing things going such lengths, swore they would follow Lewis and had their trunks brought on deck to be put into the boat then along side. Matters having proceeded thus far, col. Kirkland, who had prudently waited till Lewis' passion had a little calmed down, undertook the office of mediation-and by good management at length accomplished the restoration of peace, greatly to the satisfaction of every one. The Bacchus was supplied, except with the sailors, which were deemed unnecessary to her ; and we again made sail; for during the dispute we had been laying to. It is a grievous thing that Miranda has not taken more pains to cement his little band; and not suffered the ill will and malice, which might have been checked at first, to take such deep root in the minds of some of his principal officers, as to threaten deadly effects.

April 6th. Tell me, if you can, have all the demons of ill will and contradiction taken a stand against us, that we should fail in almost every thing which we set about? At leaving

Jacquemel it was the general's intention to an chor at Bonair, a small island near that part of the Spanish Main where it is supposed we are. to land. After being ten days at sea, we have the mortification to find ourselves, through the ignorance of our pilot carried almost to the bottom of the Gulf of Venezuela. We are seventy miles dead to the leeward of Bonair. What with the trade winds and the current, which is common here, and may happen to set against us, and most likely does, at this very moment, we may be two weeks or twenty days in this Gulf. We chased a small vessel this morning supposing her to be Spanish; but she gave us the slip by running into a ri-ver on the north side of the gulf; however, had we caught her, we could have done no.. thing, unless it had been under Columbian colours and then the capture would have been at our peril. It is not long, since the general said he did not intend to hoist his new flag on board the ship till it was first victoriously displayed in his native land; and that he had no right to use the American Ensign. The latter observation convinces me of what I have long suspected, that he never had any official encouragement from our government, though,