therefore, he could not restore them without offending all his subjects; and, if he thought good, they would conclude a peace with him; and, for the future, offer no acts of hostility to the English; and having accompanied this answer with a large present of fresh provisions, Blake left Algiers, and sailed on the same errand to Tunis; the Dey of which place, not only refused to comply with his demand, but denied him the liberty of taking in fresh water. "Here," said he," are our castles of Goletto and Porto Ferino; do your worst." Blake, at hearing this, began, as his custom was, when highly provoked, to curl his whiskers; and after a short consultation with his officers, bore into the bay of Porto Ferino, and coming within shot of the castle, fired on it so warmly, that in two hours it was rendered defenceless, and the guns on the works along shore completely dismounted, though sixty of them played at a time on the English. Blake found nine ships in the road, and ordered every captain to man his long-boat with choice men to enter the harbour and to set fire to the city, which they effected, with the loss of twentyfive men killed and forty-eight wounded; whilst he and his men covered them from the castle by playing continually on them with their great guns. This daring action spread the terror of his name through Africa and Asia. From Tunis he sailed to Tripoli, caused the English slaves to be set at liberty, and concluded a peace with that government. Hence he returned to Tunis, where the inhabitants implored his mercy, and begged him to grant them peace, which he did, upon terms highly advantageous to England. He next sailed to Malta, and obliged the knights to restore the effects taken by their privateers from the English; and by these great exploits, so raised the glory of the English name, that most of the Princes and States of Italy thought fit to pay their compliments to the Protector, by sending solemn embassies to him. 1 He passed the next winter either in lying before Cadiz, or in cruizing up and down the Straits; and was at his old station, at the mouth of that harbour, when he received information that the Spanish plate fleet had put into the bay of Sancta Cruz, in the island of Teneriffe. On this he weighed anchor, on the 13th April 1657, and on the 20th, rode with his ships off the bay of Sancta Cruz, when he saw sixteen Spanish ships of war lying in the form of a halfNear the mouth of the haven stood a castle, furnished with great ordnance; besides which, there were seven forts round the bay, joined to each other by a line of communication, manned by musketeers To make all safe, Don Diego Diagures, general of the Spanish fleet, caused all the smaller ships to be moored close along the shore; and the six large galleons to stand farther out, at anchor, with their broadsides towards the sea. Blake having prepared for the fight, a squadron of ships was drawn out to make the first onset, commanded by Captain Stayner, in the Speaker frigate; who, no soorer received orders, than he sailed into the bay, and fell upon the Spanish fleet, without the least regard to the forts, which spent their shot prodigiously upon them. No sooner were these entered into the bay, than Blake following after, placed several ships to pour broadsides into the castles and forts; and these played their parts so well, that, after some time, the Spaniards found their forts too hot to be held. In the mean time, Blake struck in with Stayner, and bravely fought the Spanish ships, out of which the enemy were beaten, by two o'clock in the afternoon; when Blake, finding it impossible to carry them away, ordered his men to set them afire; which was done so effectually, that they were all reduced to ashes, except two, which were sunk. This is allowed to have been one of the most remarkable actions that ever happened at sea. "It was so miraculous," says the Earl of Clarendon," that all men, who knew the place, wondered, that any sober man, with what courage soever endowed, would have undertaken it; and they could hardly persuade themselves to believe, what they had done, whilst the Spaniards comforted themselves with the belief, that they were devils, and not men, who had destroyed them in such a manner." This was the last and greatest action of the gallant Blake. He was consumed with at dropsy and scurvy; and hasted home, that he might yield up his last breath, in his native country, which he had so much adorned by his valour; but he expired, as he was entering Plymouth, 17th August 1657, aged fifty-eight years. Never was man so zealous for a faction, so much. respected and esteemed even by the opposite party. Disinterested, generous, liberal, ambitious of true glory, dreadful only to his country's avowed enemies he forms one of the most perfect characters of that age, and the least stained with those errors and violences, which were then so predominant. The Protector ordered him a pompous funeral at the public charge; but the tears of his countrymen were the most honorable panegyric on his memory. Lord Clarendon observes, that "he was the first man who brought ships to contemn castles on shore which had ever been thought very formidable, and were discovered by him to make a noise only, and to fright those, that could be rarely hurt by them. He was the first that infused, that degree of courage into scamen, by making them see by experience, what mighty things they could do, if they were resolved; and the first that taught them to fight in fire as well as water." * BLEECKER, (ANN ELIZA) the youngest daughter of Mr. Brandt Schuyler of the city of New-York, was born, October 1752. Though in her early years, she never displayed any partiality for school, yet she made so great proficiency in the first rudiments of learning that she was able to read, with propriety, any book |