ck into the
boat. Still undismayed, they boarded the brig further ahead, and after a
desperate struggle on her deck, carried her. Of the boat's crew, one man
was killed, and eight wounded; the brig had six killed, and twenty
wounded. The other boats now came up, and the prize was towed out under
a heavy, but ineffectual fire from the batteries.

This very brilliant action was rewarded with peculiar notice. The
squadron gave up the prize to the captors; Earl St. Vincent presented
Mr. Coghlan with a sword; and a most unusual distinction, he was
immediately made a lieutenant by an order in council, though, by the
regulations of the service, he had still to serve a year and a half
before he would be entitled to promotion.

A few days after, Sir J.B. Warren arrived, with a small squadron and a
fleet of transports; and having re-embarked the troops from Houat, and
taken the _Impetueux_ under his orders, proceeded to attack Ferrol. The
fleet arrived in the bay of Playa de Dominos on the 25th of August, and
Sir James Pulteney, the military commander-in-chief, desired that the
troops might be landed immediately. The direction of this service was
committed to Sir Edward Pellew, who first silenced a fort of eight
twenty-four pounders by the fire of the _Impetueux_, assisted by the
_Brilliant_, 28-gun frigate, _Cynthia_, sloop of war, and _St. Vincent_
gun-boat; and landed the whole army the same evening, without losing a
man. Sixteen field-pieces were landed at the same time, and the sailors
got them, with the scaling ladders, to the heights above Ferrol.

A slight skirmish took place on the first advance of the troops, and a
sharper one next morning; but the enemy were effectually driven back,
and the heights which command the harbour of Ferrol gained, with the
loss in all of sixteen men killed, and five officers and sixty-three men
wounded. Six sail of the line, two of them large first-rates, were in
the harbour. Sir James now resolved to abandon the enterprise. Sir
Edward entreated that he might be allowed to lead on with his sailors,
for he was confident that the town must yield. But Sir James--to the
intense disappointment and indignation of Sir Edward, who refused
afterwards and in consequence even to meet him at dinner--declined to
advance, and the troops and guns were all re-embarked without loss the
same night. It was afterwards ascertained, that the garrison, despairing
of effectual resistance, were prepared to surrend