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LIFE OF COLONEL MACERONI.

within a few yards of shore. I was often able to distin-guish the colours of the combatants’ clothes, and observeevery action as perfectly as at Astley’s Amphitheatre.Such is the clearness of the atmosphere, that with apocket glass the very countenances of the officers and menupon the batteries on the opposite shore, were perfectlydistinguishable. The English vessels were generally moreinclined to fight a little time after dinner ; then theywould approach the shore batteries, so as to lose manyvaluable lives without the slightest benefit. Many suchfoolish exhibitions have I seen both at Scylla and in thebay of Naples, when a British line of battle ship has madea tour before each battery, and on each, in turn, bestowinga couple of broadsides (one hundred pounds worth ofammunition) knocking a hole perhaps in some poor fisher-man’s boat, and conferring on the men in the battery theperquisite of some score of twenty-four pounder shotdeposited on the sand. But, on the other hand, I haveusually seen these ships struck by many thirty-two poundershot from the batteries, which could hardly go cleanthrough them, sometimes fore and aft even, withoutdoing lamentable and bootless mischief. Many an Englishman-of-war have I seen brought under the batteries bytheir young lordling commanders, who ought to have beenbrought to court-martials for their pains! Surely, theblood of their countrymen shed upon those occasions restsupon their empty heads, mingling its hues with the crimsonvelvet of their bauble “ coronets,” typical of hereditary,irresponsible, and selfish legislation. Nine times out often,these foolish (I may say criminal) attacks upon batteries,with their guns generally mounted en Barbette, on whichthey never killed a man, were made in the evening, after“my lord” the captain and his officers had drank theirwine. I had the names of several of these commanders,