BRIGANDS LANDED BY THE ENGLISH. 387

Naples, that even the bitterest enemies of Murat,—the old-fashioned Bourbonites, could not help feeling somethinglike national excitement and satisfaction at the brilliantretreat of their countrymen. My readers will easily conceivethis feeling which Radicals, Whigs, and Tories of Englandwould all alike experience, were they to see a foreign enemyfighting their ships on their own shores. I must not forgetto mention that the English lost in this action two large gun-boats sunk, one galley, armed with two long twenty-fourpounders, burnt; and what men killed and wounded Icannot tell, without reference to the “ Naval History,” orthe official report of the action, to which I have no access.The English abandoned the siege of Scilla, leaving all theirguns and ammunition in the hands of General Partenneaux,who was advancing to attack them; and the news of thebattle of Wagram , and the total overthrow of the Austrians,induced the brave Sir John Stuart to retire from Procida andIschia, after blowing up the forts, and to return to Sicily .

The external war thus put an end to, the internal becamedestructive and horrible in the extreme. The numerousbands of assassin allies, landed by the English on so manypoints of the coast, became desperate, as no hope of life wasleft to them but in some sort of success against society.For two months these wretches had some degree of im-punity. Dreadful were their cruelties and excesses. Thevillage of Crichi, in Calabria , was surprised by a bandof five hundred bandits, who put every living thing to death ;men, women, children, old infirm persons, and even infantsat the breast; similar outrages were committed in otherprovinces. At Salerno a corps, increased to fifteen hundredbrigands, threatened even that populous city. The detailsof these efforts at legitimate restoration, although mosthorrifying, would be very curious and amusing to many ofmy readers, but I have no space allowed me for the relation.

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