but fortunately it fell calm at the moment when his capture appeared inevitable, and by using the sweeps he was enabled to push between them and gain a safe distance before another breeze sprang up. The Indian was subsequently placed under the orders of Sir John B. Warren, on the Halifax station, where Captain Austen captured la Jeune Estelle, French schooner privateer, of 4 guns and 25 men, with a cargo of flour and provisions, bound to St. Domingo; a Spanish letter of marque, of similar force; and three merchant vessels.
On the 10th May, 1810, Captain Austen was posted into Sir John B. Warren’s flag-ship, the Swiftsure 74; and shortly afterwards removed to the Cleopatra 32, in which frigate he returned home, about the summer of 1811.
Captain Austen’s next appointment was, Nov. 20, 1811, to the Namur 74, bearing the flag of his early friend and patron, Sir Thomas Williams, and employed as a receiving ship at the Nore.
The duties which Captain Austen had now to attend to were of no trifling nature, and attended with considerable responsibility, he being charged with the regulation of all the men raised for the navy in the river Thames and eastern ports, as also with the detail of manning the ships of war fitted out in the Thames and Medway. That the Lords of the Admiralty were fully satisfied with his execution of these duties during a period of nearly three years, is evident from his having been appointed to the Phoenix, a 32-gun frigate, immediately after Sir Thomas Williams’s command expired.
Early in 1815, Captain Austen proceeded to the Mediterranean; and on the renewal of hostilities with France and Naples, in consequence of Buonaparte’s escape from Elba, he was sent to the Adriatic, with the Undaunted 38, and Garland 22, under his orders, for the purposes of co-operating with the Austrian army, and endeavouring to intercept some Neapolitan men of war.
After the surrender of Naples, according to the military convention of Casa Lanza, Captain Austen entered into a correspondence with the authorities at Brindisi, relative to two frigate of the largest class, then lying there, and which
