y, and gave information that one of
the ships which carried a duplicate of my memorial to the marine
minister, had reached France; and in a few days La Bellone, a frigate in
which the brother of the captain-general was an officer, got into Port
Louis; she had sailed in the end of January and brought despatches, but
if the general received any new order by this or the former vessel, it
was kept to himself. In June the English cruisers sent in a flag of truce
with a French lady, taken in L'Agile from St. Malo; this lady brought
many letters, in some of which the arrival in France of La Semillante was
mentioned; also that Bonaparte was at Paris when L'Agile sailed, and that
the naval officer who carried the last copy of my memorial had been
promoted and made a member of the legion of honour. I did now certainly
entertain hopes that general De Caen would have received an order to set
me at liberty, and that no further pretext for prolonging my detention
would be admitted; but week after week passed as before, without any
intimation of this so much desired event.

JULY 1809

There was reason to believe that a direct application to know whether any
order had arrived, would obtain no answer; therefore after waiting a
month, I wrote to ask "whether His Excellency would permit my wife to
come and join me, should she present herself before Port Napoleon." It
was not in reality my intention that she should leave England, but I
hoped to draw the desired information from the answer; and in six weeks
[SEPTEMBER 1809], after another vessel had arrived from France, one was
given to the following effect: "The captain-general will not oppose the
residence of your wife in the colony; but with respect to a safe conduct,
it is necessary that Mrs. Flinders should apply to the ministers of His
Britannic Majesty, who should make the request to those of His Majesty
the Emperor and King;" which was equivalent to saying, either that no
fresh order to set me at liberty had been received, or that it would not
be put into execution.

At this time there was much talk of an attack upon the island, said to be
projected by the British government; and all the English officers,
prisoners of war, were taken from their paroles and closely shut up. In
the middle of the month our cruisers quitted the island unexpectedly, and
a fortnight afterwards it was known that they gone to Bourbon, and made
an attack upon the town of St. Paul; both the town and bay wer