enabled him to commit the robbery without danger either to himself or his
marauding crew. Not one of Jones's relations had ever been in the service of
lord Selkirk; and he showed that he had a spirit far above the meanness imputed to him, by buying the whole of the articles from the captors, who claimed them as their right by the usages of war, and, at a subsequent period, restoring
them, in their original packages, to the noble owner. In a correspondence which was carried on between Jones and lady Selkirk relative to the affair, her ladyship most gratefully acknowledged the generosity and the integrity of his character.
But these exploits on shore did not exhaust the good fortune of Jones. The very next day, in the bay of Carrick Fergus, lie fell in with the Drake, a king's ship of twenty guns, and after a desperate resistance, in which the English captain and his first lieutenant were both killed, made her his prize, with which, and another large ship, he returned to Brest, after an absence of twenty-eight days. In this short period, besides destroying a number of valuable ships, he had thrown the coasts both of Scotland and Ireland into the deepest consternation. This cruise, short as it was, occasioned the British government immense sums of money for the fortification of harbours, and it was the ostensible cause of embodying the Irish volunteers, a measure of which we have yet felt only a few of the consequences.
Notwithstanding the brilliant success that had attended his exertions, Jones was now subjected to no small degree of mortification. As a token of good-will to the United States, the French ministry had promised to furnish him with a ship, aboard of which he was to hoist the American flag ; but after multiplied applications, and a number of written memorials, the engagement seemed to be forgotten or disregarded. Wearied out with the delays and apologies which he was daily receiving, Jones set out for Paris to make his application to the French ministry in person, in consequence of which lie obtained the command of the Duras, a ship of forty guns, the name of which, in compliment to a saying of poor Richard, "If you would have your business done, come yourself," he changed to Le bon homme Richard. In this vessel, badly manned and poorly furnished, Jones sailed with a little squadron, to which he acted as commodore. This squadron consisted of the Alliance, of thirty-six guns, the Pallas of thirty-two, the Serf of eighteen, the Vengeance of twelve, and two privateers, who were promised their share of the prizes that might be made. Having taken a number of prizes, the Alliance, the Serf, and the privateers deserted him, in order to pursue their own plans singly. The courage and skill of the commodore, however, did not forsake him, and after again alarming the coasts of Ireland, he sailed by the North Sea round to Leith, in the roads of which he appeared with his own ship, the Richard, accompanied by the Pallas and the Vengeance, in the month of September, evidently determined to seize upon the guard ship and two cutters that lay in the roads, and to lay Leith and perhaps the city of Edinburgh under contribution. The wind, however, which was fair when he made his appearance, shifted during the night, and the next day he continued working up the firth with great labour and slow progress. While he was thus employed, a boat from the shore, sent out by an official character, who mistook his ships for British, informed Jones that he was greatly afraid of a visit from that desperate buccaneer Paul Jones, and begging that he would send him some powder and shot. Highly amused with his mistake, the good-humoured republican sent him a barrel of gunpowder, with a civil answer to quiet his fears, and a modest apology for not including shot in the present he had sent him. In the mean time he relaxed nothing in his exertions to come at the ships of war in the roads, and other two tacks would have laid him along
