Page:An Account of Corsica (1769).djvu/130

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120
AN ACCOUNT

tached to attempt taking the castle of Corte from the patriots; on which occasion, they were sorely defeated, and a great number of them were killed.

After various struggles, which the plan of this work does not allow me to relate, the Greeks were forced to leave their possessions, and retire to Ajaccio, where they now support themselves tolerably by their labour: and being convinced of the tyranny of the Genoese, wait with impatience for their total expulsion from the island; and hope from the generosity of Paoli and the Corsicans, that protection and encouragement which they deserve.

This colony has been sober, virtuous and industrious; and if they have acted in a hostile manner against the nation, it was from a good principle; from the fidelity which they owed to the republick that had granted them an asylum; which fidelity they would ever have preserved, had not the republick included them in the general oppression. I must observe of this colony, that it hath had the honour of producing an excellent physician, Signor Giovanni Stefanopoli, the first who hath had the wisdom and the spirit to bring inoculation into practice in Corsica, by which he preserves multitudes of lives; and may therefore