text:  Independently of the blockade of Toulon and the necessity of continually watching the enemy's fleet which might be brought out by the same wind which blew off the British the admiral had the responsibility of protecting the Mediterranean convoys of sustaining the British interests in the neutral courts of assisting the allies on shore of overawing the Barbary powers which were then peculiarly restless and insolent and of upholding the general supremacy of England from Smyrna to Gibraltar