His anxiety to clear the vessels from the contest shows that there was a power still unconquered, which he thought it better to leave to be restrained by the suffering population of the city, than to keep in a state of exasperation and activity by his presence.

What was this power but an unsubdued energy in the batteries?
The true solution of the question is, then, not so much the amount of injury done on the one side or the other--particularly as there was on one side a city to suffer as well as the batteries--as the relative efficiency of the parties when the battle closed.

All political agitation and popular clamor aside, what would have been the result had the fight been continued, or even had Lord Exmouth renewed it next morning?
These are questions that can be answered only on conjecture; but the manner the battle ended certainly leaves room for many doubts whether, had the subsequent demands of Lord Exmouth been rejected, he had it in his power to enforce them by his ships; whether, indeed, if he had renewed the fight, he would not have been signally defeated.

On the whole, we do not think that this battle, although it stands pre-eminent as an example of naval success over batteries, presents an argument to shake the confidence which fortifications, well situated, well planned, and well fought, deserve, as the defences of a seaboard.
We cannot help regarding these conclusions as just, when we reflect upon all the circumstances of the case.

The high character, skill, and bravery of the attacking force; their immense superiority in number of guns, with no surplus human life to be exposed; the antiquated and ill-managed works of defence, the entire want of skill of the Algerine artillerists, and the neglect of the ordinary means of preparation; the severe execution which these ill-served guns did upon the enemy's ships,--an execution far more dreadful than that effected by the French or Dutch fleets in their best-contested naval battles with the ships of the same foe,--from these facts, we must think that those who are so ready to draw from this case conclusions unfavorable to the use of land-batteries as a means of defence against shipping, know but little of the nature of the contest.
An English historian of some note, in speaking of this attack, says:--"It is but little to the purpose, unless to prove what may be accomplished by fleets against towns exactly so circumstanced, placed, and governed.