At ten P.M., the ammunition of the fleet running short, and its work being substantially accomplished, the ships began to haul off.  The sea defences and a great part of the town were in ruins.  “To be again effective,” wrote Exmouth, “the defences must be rebuilt from the foundation.”  The flanking batteries and the hill forts continued to annoy the vessels as they retired, but the spirit of the Dey was broken.  Towards eleven a light air from the land sprang up, which freshened into a violent and prolonged thunderstorm, lasting for three hours; and the flashes of heaven’s artillery combined with the glare of the burning town to illuminate the withdrawal of the ships.

The following morning the Dey signified his submission, and on the 30th of August Lord Exmouth made known to the fleet that all the terms of Great Britain had been yielded; that Christian slavery was forever abolished, and that by noon of the following day all slaves then in Algiers would be delivered to his flag.  This was accordingly done, the whole number amounting to 1642; which, with those previously released at Tunis and Tripoli, raised to 3003 the human beings whom Exmouth had been the instrument of freeing from a fate worse than death.  Of this total, but eighteen were English; the remainder were almost wholly from the Mediterranean countries.  On the 3d of September, just one week after the attack, the fleet sailed for England.

Profuse acknowledgment necessarily awaited the hero of a deed in which national exultation so happily blended with the sentiment of pity for the oppressed.  The admiral was raised to the next rank in the peerage, and honors poured in upon him from every side,—­from abroad as well as from his own countrymen.  His personal sense of the privilege permitted him, thus to crown a life of strenuous exertion by a martial deed of far-reaching beneficence, was a reward passing all others.  In the opening words of his official report he voices his thankfulness:  “In all the vicissitudes of a long life of public service, no circumstance has ever produced on my mind such impressions of gratitude and joy as the event of yesterday.  To have been one of the humble instruments in the hands of Divine Providence for bringing to reason a ferocious Government, and destroying for ever the horrid system of Christian slavery, can never cease to be a source of delight and heartfelt comfort to every individual happy enough to be employed in it.”

Here Lord Exmouth’s career closes.  Just forty years had elapsed since as a youth he had fought the Carleton on Lake Champlain, and he was yet to live sixteen in honored retreat; bearing, however, the burden of those whose occupation is withdrawn at an age too advanced to form new interests.  Though in vigorous health and with ample fortune, “he would sometimes confess,” says his biographer, “that he was happier amid his early difficulties.”  The idea of retirement, indeed, does not readily associate