140 
attachment to their late govern- 
ment: but they were a warlike, fe- 
rocious people, easily excited to 
take up arms. Persons of proper- 
ty in Calabria, lived in towns, and 
were little inclined to engage in 
commotions- But, the peasants and 
villagers were 2 miserable, savage, 
and rapacious race, ready to em- 
bark in any service, which promised 
to gratify their thirst for plunder, or 
to afford them means of indulging 
their private animosities and resent- 
ments. Divided into separate com- 
munities or townships, among which 
there prevailed the most inveterate 
feuds, they were unaccustomed to 
order or repose, and engaged often 
in open hostilities with one another, 
or with the inhabitants of the towns. 
So slight was the intercourse be- 
tween different parts of the coun- 
try, that some Albanian refugees, 
having settled in the heart of Cala- 
bria, soon after the death of Scan- 
derbeg, their descendants still used 
a Greek dialect, and, in some places, 
followed the ritual of the Greek 
church. Feudal institutions still 
prevailed in Calabria, and were en. 
forced with rigour. But,as the no- 
bles resided not on their estates, 
their authority over their vassals, 
was inconsiderable; and the pea- 
sants, who were strangers to their 
persons, and unacquainted with 
their existence, except through the 
rents and services exacted i in their 
name, were under ‘the direction of 
men of inferior condition, whom 
the money” and ‘protnises of ‘the 
court of Palermo had attached to 
its interests. The recollection of 
their former expedition to Naples, 
was Ais the minds of the Cala- 
brians ; and the plunder they had 
made, and the licence they had en- 
joyed on that occasion, disposed 
eg 
ANNUAL REGISTER, 1806. 
them to embark again willingly in 
the same cause. Assistance was also 
to be expected from the troops of 
banditti and free-booters, who had 
their haunts in Calabria, and who 
were but too ready in this, as they 
had been in the former war, to ex- 
ercise their trade under the sanction 
of alawful government. Disbanded 
galley slavesand mialefactors es- 
caped from justice, were employed 
as emissarics, to work upon thcse 
materials and stir them to insurrec- 
tion. But, notwithstanding so 
many propitious circumstances, such 
was the universal dread of the 
French arms, that the court would 
hardly have attained ifs ends, had 
not an English army landed on the 
coast of Calabria, and begua. its 
military operations by a most splen- 
did and glorious victory. 
About the middle of April, sir 
Sidney Smith had arrived at Paler- 
mo, in the Pompee of 84 guns, and 
taken the command of the English 
squadron, destined for the defence 
of Sicily. consisting of five ships of 
the line, besides frigates, transports, 
and gun, boats. With this force 
uader his command, sir Sidney sail- 
ed to the coast of Italy, and began 
his operations by introducing into 
Gaeta, supplies of stores and am- 
munition, of which its garrison had 
been greatly i in want. Having per- 
formed this important service, and 
left at Gaeta a flotilla of gun boats, 
under the protection of a frigate, to 
assist in the defence of the place, he 
proceeded to the bay of Naples, 
spreading such alarm along the coast, 
that the French conveyed in haste 
to Naples, part of their battering 
train from the trenches before Ga- 
eta, in order to protect the capital 
from insult, and secure it from at- 
tack. It "happened, that at the 
‘ : moment 
