o fall before the walls of St. Lazar, where they behaved like
their own country mastiffs, which shut their eyes, run into the jaws of
a bear, and have their heads crushed for their valour.

But to return to my narration. After having put garrisons into the forts
we had taken, and re-embarked our soldiers and artillery (a piece of
service that detained us more than a week), we ventured up to the mouth
of the inner harbour, guarded by a large fortification on one side, and
a small redoubt on the other, both of which were deserted before our
approach, and the entrance of the harbour blocked up by several old
galleons, and two men-of-war that the enemy had sunk in the channel. We
made shift, however, to open a passage for some ships, that favoured a
second landing of our troops at a place called La Quinta, not far from
the town, where, after a faint resistance from a body of Spaniards, who
opposed their disembarkation, they encamped with a design of besieging
the castle of St. Lazar, which overlooked and commanded the city.
Whether our renowned general had nobody in his army who knew how to
approach it in form, or that he trusted entirely to the fame of his
arms, I shall not determine; but, certain it is, a resolution was taken
in a council of war, to attack the place with musketry only. This was
put in execution, and succeeded accordingly; the enemy giving them such
a hearty reception, that the greatest part of their detachment took up
their everlasting residence on the spot.

Our chief, not relishing this kind of complaisance in the Spaniard's,
was wise enough to retreat on board with the remains of his army, which,
from eight thousand able men landed on the beach near Bocca Chica, was
now reduced to fifteen hundred fit for service. The sick and wounded
were squeezed into certain vessels, which thence obtained the name of
hospital ships, though methinks they scarce deserved such a creditable
title, seeing few of them could boast of their surgeon, nurse, or cook;
and the space between decks was so confined that the miserable patients
had not room to sit upright in their beds. Their wounds and stumps,
being neglected, contracted filth and putrefaction, and millions of
maggots were hatched amidst the corruption of their sores. This inhuman
disregard was imputed to the scarcity of surgeons; though it is well
known that every great ship in the fleet could have spared one at least
for this duty, an expedient which would have be