A little incident occurred on the night before the memorable engagement, which even at this distance of time is of painful interest, but which shows the confidence reposed in the young naval officer by the hero of Quebec. After the orders for the assault next day were given, Wolfe requested a private interview with him; and saying that he had the strongest presentiment of falling on the field, yet that he should fall in victory, he took from his bosom the miniature of a young lady to whom he was attached, gave it to Jervis, desiring that, if the foreboding came to pass, he should return it to her on his arrival in England. Wolfe's gallant fate and brilliant victory are known: the picture was delivered to Miss Lowther.

After the capture of Quebec, Jervis was dispatched to England; and was appointed to the Scorpion, to carry out important despatches to General Amherst. On this occasion, he gave an instance of that remarkable promptitude which characterised him throughout his whole career. The Scorpion was in such a crazy state that she had nearly foundered between Spithead and Plymouth. On reaching the latter port, and representing at once the condition of the vessel and the importance of the despatches, the port-admiral instantly ordered him to proceed to sea in the Albany, a sloop in the Sound. But the Albany had been a long time in commission; her people claimed arrears of pay; and by no means relishing a voyage across the Atlantic in such weather, they absolutely refused to heave the anchor. Their young commander first tried remonstrance, but in vain; he then took a more effectual means—he ordered his boat's crew, whom he had brought from the Scorpion, to take their hatchets and cut the cables, and then go aloft to loosen the foresail. Perceiving the kind of man with whom they had to do, the crew submitted, and the Albany instantly proceeded to sea: the ringleaders were punished; and the service was performed. The Albany made New York in twenty-four days.

In October 1761, Commander Jervis was made Post, into the Gosport of 60 guns. Among his midshipmen was the afterwards Admiral Lord Keith. In 1762, peace was made. The Gosport was paid off next year, and Captain Jervis did not serve again until 1769, when he commanded the Alarm of 32 guns for the next three years.

A striking incident occurred during the cruise of this vessel in the Mediterranean, exhibiting not only the spirit of her captain, but the historic recollections by which that spirit was sustained. One Sunday afternoon, the day after her arrival at Genoa, two Turkish slaves, in enjoyment of the holiday's rest from labour, sauntered from their galley near the mole. Seeing the Alarm's boat, they jumped into her, wrapped themselves in the British colours, and exclaimed, "We are free!" The Genoese officer on duty, however, ordered them to be dragged out, which was done, though one of them tore away in his struggle a piece of the boat's pendant. On the circumstance reaching the captain's ears he was indignant, and demanded instant reparation. To use his own language:—"I required," said he, "of the Doge and Senate, that both the slaves should be brought on board, with the part of the torn pendant which the slave carried off with him; the officer of the guard punished; and an apology made on the quarterdeck of the Alarm, under the king's colours, for the outrage offered to the British nation."

On the following Tuesday this was complied with in all the particulars; but, unhappily, the government at home did not exhibit the spirit of their gallant officer abroad; and in a letter which he addressed to his brother he says:—"I had an opportunity of carrying the British flag, in relation to two Turkish slaves, as high as Blake had ever done, for which I am publicly censured; though I hope we have too much virtue left, for me not to be justified in private."

The result, however, of this transaction was, that for many years afterwards, in the Barbary states, if a slave could but touch the British colours, which all our men-of-war's boats carry in foreign ports, he could of right demand his release. This, however, was counteracted as far as possible by the renewed vigilance of the Moors, who kept all their slaves out of sight while a British flag flew in the harbour. The allusion to the famous Blake shows with what studies the young officer fed his mind, and in how high a spirit he was prepared to adopt them.

Another instance of his skill and intrepidity soon followed. In March 1770, the frigate, after a tempestuous cruise, came to anchor at Marseilles. An equinoctial gale came on, and after two days of desperate exertion, and throwing many of the guns overboard, the frigate was driven from her anchors, stranded on a reef of rocks, and the crew in such peril that they were saved only by the most extraordinary exertions, and the assistance of the people on shore. The port officer, M. de Peltier, exhibited great kindness and activity, and the ship was rapidly repaired, but with such an exact economy, that its complete refit, with the expense of the crew for three months, amounted only to L1415.

The first act of this excellent son was to write to his father:—"Do not be alarmed, my dear sir, at the newspaper accounts which you will hear of the Alarm. The interposition of Divine Providence has miraculously preserved her. The same Providence will, I hope, give long life to my dear father, mother, and brother."

In July he wrote to his sister from Mahon, after the repairs of the vessel:—"The Alarm is the completest thing I ever saw on the water, insomuch that I forgot she was the other day, in the opinion of most beholders, her own officers and crew not excepted, a miserable sunken wreck. Such is the reward of perseverance. Happily for my reputation, my health at that period happened to be equal to the task, or I had been lost for ever, instead of receiving continual marks of public and private approbation of my conduct; but this is entre nous. I never speak or write on the subject except to those I most love. You will easily believe Barrington to be one; his goodness to me is romantic."

It is gratifying to state, that the English Admiralty, on the young captain's warm representation of the French superintendent, M. de Peltier's hospitality and kindness, sent a handsome piece of plate in public acknowledgment to that officer; and, as if to make the compliment perfect in all its parts, as it arrived before the frigate had left the station, the captain had the indulgence of presenting it in person; thus making, as his letter to his father mentioned, "the family of Pleville de Peltier happy beyond description."

The frigate was soon after paid off, and as there was no probability of his being speedily employed, he applied himself to gain every species of knowledge connected with his profession. We strongly doubt whether the example of this rising officer is not even more important when we regard him in peace than in the activity and daring of war. There is no want of courage and conduct in the British fleet; but life on shore offers too many temptations to indolence, to be always turned to the use of which it is capable. Captain Jervis, on the contrary, appears always to have regarded life on shore preparatory to life afloat, and to be constantly employed in laying up knowledge for those emergencies which so often occur in the bold and perilous life of the sailor. There is often something like a predictive spirit in the early career of great men, which urges them to make provision for greatness; and remote as is the condition of a captain of a smart frigate from the commander of fleets, yet the captain of the Alarm, though the least ostentatious of men, seems always to have had a glance towards the highest duties of the British admiral. "Time," says Franklin, "is the stuff that life is made of;" and as France is the antagonist with which the power of England naturally expects to struggle, his first object was to acquire all possible knowledge of the naval means of France. The primary step was to acquire a knowledge of the language. Accordingly, he went to France, and placed himself in a pension. There he applied himself so closely to the study of the language, that his health became out of order, and his family requested him to return. But this he declined, and in his answer said that he had adopted this pursuit on the best view a military man in his situation could form. "For it will always," said he, "be useful to have a general idea of this prevalent language, and a knowledge of the country with which we have so long contended, and which must ever be our rival in arms and commerce."

Having accomplished his object of acquiring sufficient fluency in speaking French, his next excursion was to St Petersburg. He and Captain Barrington went in a merchant vessel, and reached Cronstadt. While at sea, Captain Jervis kept a regular log. During the voyage, all the headlands are described, all the soundings noted, and every opportunity to test and correct the charts adopted. As an example, he remarks on the castle of Cronenburg, which guards the entrance into the Sound, that it may be overlooked by a line-of-battle ship, which may anchor in good ground as near the beach as she pleases. He remarks the two channels leading to Copenhagen, puts all the lighthouses down on his own chart, and lays down all the approaches to St Petersburg accurately; "because," said he, "I find all the charts are incorrect, and it may be useful." And he actually did find it useful; for when he was at the head of the Admiralty, this knowledge enabled him, while his colleagues hesitated, to give his orders confidently to Sir Charles Pole, in command of the Baltic fleet. His sojourn at St Petersburg was but brief; but it was at a time of remarkable excitement. The Empress Catharine was at the height of her splendour, a legislator and a conqueror, and surrounded by a court exhibiting all the daring and dashing characters of her vast empire. His description of this celebrated woman's character on one public occasion, shows the exactness with which he observed every thing:—"When she entered the cathedral, Catharine mingled her salutations to the saints and the people, showing at once her compliance with religious ceremonials, and her attentions to her servants and the foreign ambassadors. But she showed no devotion, in which she was not singular, old people and Cossack officers excepted. During the sermon she took occasion to smile and nod to those whom she meant to gratify; and surely no sovereign ever possessed the power of pleasing all within her eye to the degree she did. She was dressed in the Guards' uniform, which was a scarlet pelisse, and a green silk robe lapelled from top to bottom. Her hair was combed neatly, and boxed en militaire, with a small cap, and an ornament of diamonds in front; a blue riband, and the order of St Andrew on her right shoulder."

He speaks of the empress excelling in that inclination of the body which the Russian ladies substitute for the curtsy, and which he justly regards as very becoming, the empress adding dignity and grace. He describes Orloff as an herculean figure, finely proportioned, with a cheerful eye, and, for a Russian, a good complexion: Potemkin as having stature and shoulders, but being ill limbed and of a most forbidding countenance. His examination of the Russian dockyards, naval armament, and general style of shipbuilding, was most exact; and he records in his notes his having seen, in the naval arsenals of Norway, sheds to cover ships on the stocks—an important arrangement, which was afterwards claimed as an invention at home.

After inspecting the harbours of Sweden and Norway, the travellers returned by Holland, where they made similar investigations. In the following year they renewed their tour of inspection, and traversed the western parts of France. And this active pursuit of knowledge was carried on without any pecuniary assistance beyond his half-pay. He had hitherto made no prize-money. "To be sure," he said in after days, "we sometimes did fare rather roughly; but what signifies that now? my object was attained."

His character was now high, but it is to be presumed that he had some powerful interest; for on his return he was appointed to two line-of-battle ships in succession, the Kent, 74, and the Foudroyant, 84, a French prize, and reckoned the finest two-decker in the navy.

From this period a new scene opened before him, and his career became a part of the naval history of England. In 1778 he joined the Channel fleet, and his ship was placed by the celebrated Keppel as one of his seconds in the order of battle, and immediately astern of the admiral's ship, the Victory, on the 27th of July, in the drawn battle off Ushant with the French fleet commanded by D'Orvilliers. The people of England are not content with drawn battles, and the result of this action produced a general uproar. Keppel threw the blame on the tardiness of Sir Hugh Palliser, the second in command. Palliser retorted, and the result was a court-martial on the commander of the fleet; which, however, ended in a triumphant acquittal. It was not generally known that Keppel's defence, which was admired as a model of intelligence, and even of eloquence, was drawn up by Captain Jervis. The transaction, though so long passed away, is not yet beyond discussion; and there is still some interest in knowing the opinion of so powerful a mind on the general subject. It was thus given in a private letter to his friend Jackson:—"I do not agree that we were outwitted. The French, I am convinced, never would have fought us if they had not been surprised into it by a sudden flow of wind; and when they formed their inimitable line after our brush, it was merely to cover their intention of flight."

He then gives one of those comprehensive maxims which already show the experienced "admiral:"—"I have often told you that two fleets of equal force can never produce decisive events, unless they are equally determined to fight it out, or the commander-in-chief of one of them misconducts his line." We have then an instance of that manly feeling which is one of the truest characteristics of greatness, and yet which has been deficient in some very remarkable men.

"I perceive," says he, "it is the fashion of people to puff themselves. For my part, I forbade my officers to write by the frigate that carried the despatches. I did not write a syllable myself, except touching my health; nor shall I, but to state the intrepidity of the officers and people under my command, (through the most infernal fire I ever saw or heard,) to Lord Sandwich," (first lord of the Admiralty.) But one cannot feel the merit of this self-denial without a glance at his actual hazards and services during the battle.

"In justice to the Foudroyant," he thus ends his letter, "I must observe to you, that though she received the fire of seventeen sail, and had the Bretagne, Ville de Paris, and a seventy-four on her at the same time, and appeared more disabled in her masts and rigging than any other ship, she was the first in the line of battle, and truly fitter for business, in essentials, (because her people were cool,) than when she began. Keep this to yourself, unless you hear too much said in praise of others.

"J.J."

The national wrath was poured on Sir Hugh Palliser, Keppel's second in command, whose tardiness in obeying signals was charged as the cause of the French escape; so strong had already become the national assurance that a British fleet could go forth only to victory. But the succession of courts-martial cleared up nothing except the characters of the two admirals. Palliser was enabled to show that his ship had suffered so much from the enemy's fire as to be at least (plausibly) unfit for close action, and the whole dispute on land closed, like the naval conflict, in a drawn battle. Jervis was the chief witness for Keppel, as serving next his ship; and his testimony was of the highest order to the gallantry, skill, and perseverance of the admiral. But Palliser was acknowledged to be brave; and it is evident from Jervis's personal opinion, that when it was once the object of the enemy's commander to get away, it was next to impossible to have prevented his escape.

But these were trying times for the British navy: it was scarcely acquainted with its own strength; the nation, disgusted with the nature of the American war, refused its sympathy; without that sympathy ministers could do nothing effectual, and never can do any thing effectual. The character of the cabinet was feebleness, the spirit of the metropolis was faction; the king, though one of the best of men, was singularly unpopular; and the war became a system of feeble defence against arrogant and increasing hostilities. France, powerful as she was, became more powerful by the national exultation—the frenzied rejoicing in the success of American revolt—and the revived hope of European supremacy in a nation which had been broken down since the days of Marlborough; a crush which had been felt in every sinew of France for a hundred angry years. Spain, always strong, but unable to use her strength, had now given it in to the training of discipline; and the combined fleets presented a display of force, which, in the haughty language of the Tuileries, was formed to sweep the seas.

The threat was put in rapid and unexpected execution. The combined fleet moved up the Channel; and to the surprise, the sorrow, and the indignation of England, the British fleet, under Sir Charles Hardy, was seen making, what could only be called "a dignified retreat." The Foudroyant, on that melancholy occasion, had been astern of the Victory, the admiral's ship. If Jervis had been admiral, he would have tried the fate of battle—and he would have done right. No result of a battle could have been so painful to the national feelings, or so injurious in its effects on the feelings of Europe, as that retreat. If the whole British fleet on that occasion had perished, its gallantry would have only raised a new spirit of worth and power in the nation; and England has resources that, when once fully called into exertion, are absolutely unconquerable. But that was a dishonour; and even now we can echo the feelings of the brave and high-minded young officer, who was condemned to share in the disgrace. He writes to his sister, as if to relieve the fulness of his heart at the moment—"I am in the most humbled state of mind I ever experienced, from the retreat we have made before the combined fleets all yesterday and this morning." The Admiralty ultimately gave the retreating admiral an official certificate of good behaviour, "their high approbation of Sir Charles Hardy's wise and prudent conduct;" but "gallant and bold conduct" would have been a better testimonial. The truth seems to be, that the Admiralty, blamable themselves in sending him to sea with an inadequate force, and scarcely expecting to escape if they had suffered him to lie under the charge, were glad to avail themselves of his personal character as a man of known bravery; and thus quash a process which must finally have brought them before the tribunal. But let naval officers remember, that the officer who fights is the officer of the nation. Nelson's maxim is unanswerable—"The captain cannot be mistaken who lays his ship alongside the enemy."

This, too, was a period of cabinet revolutions. No favouritism can sustain a ministry which has become disgustful to the nation. Lord North, though ingenious, dexterous, and long enough in possession of power to have filled all its offices with his dependents, was driven from the premiership with such a storm of national contempt, that he could scarcely be sheltered by the curtains of the throne. Lord Rockingham, a dull minister, was transformed into a brilliant one by his contrast with the national weariness of Lord North; and it fell to the lot of Captain Jervis to give the country the first omen of returning victory. France had already combined Holland in her alliance, and the French minister, already made insolent by his triumph in the Channel, had determined on a blow in a quarter where English interests were most vulnerable, and where the assault was least expected. A squadron of French line-of-battle ships, convoying a fleet of transports, were prepared for an expedition to the East Indies.

The preparations for the combined movement were on an immense scale. The fleets of France, Spain, and Holland were again to sweep the Channel; and while the attention of the British fleets was thus engrossed, the Eastern expedition was to sail from Brest. The Admiralty, in order to counteract, or at least delay, this formidable movement, immediately dispatched Admiral Barrington, with twelve sail of the line, to cruise in the bay of Biscay. On the 18th of April the French expedition sailed, and on the 20th, when Admiral Barrington had reached a few leagues beyond Ushant, the Artois frigate signaled a hostile fleet, but could not discover their flag or numbers. The signal being made for a general chase, the Foudroyant, Jervis's ship, soon left the rest of the fleet behind; and before night she had so much gained upon the enemy as to ascertain that they were six French ships of war, with eighteen sail of convoy. The whole of the British fleet, being several leagues astern, was now lost sight of, and did not come up till the following day. In the mean time Jervis was left alone. At ten at night, the French ships of war separating, Jervis, selecting the largest for pursuit, prepared to attack: at twelve, he had approached near enough to see that the chase was a ship of the line. The Foudroyant's superior manoeuvring enabled her to commence the engagement by a raking fire. Its effect was so powerful, that the enemy was thrown into extreme disorder, and was carried by boarding, after an action of only three quarters of an hour. The prize was the Pegase, seventy-four. The loss of life on board the enemy was great; but by an extraordinary piece of good fortune, on board the Foudroyant not a man was killed, Captain Jervis and five seamen being the only wounded.

To the gallantry which produced this striking success, the young officer added extreme delicacy with respect to his prisoners. He would not allow the first boat to be sent on board the prize, until he had given written orders for the particular preservation of every thing in the shape of property belonging to the French officers, adding at the bottom of his memorandum,—"For though I have the highest opinion of my officers, we must not be suspected of designs to plunder."

The result of the action was, that sixteen transports out of twenty were taken, according to the letter of young Ricketts, the captain's nephew. It must be owned, that brave as the French are, their admiral made but a bad figure in this business: why the sight of one vessel should have been sufficient to disperse a fleet of six men-of-war, and of course ruin an expedition which must thus be left without convoy, is not easily to be accounted for; or why, when the admiral saw that his pursuer was but a single ship, he should not have turned upon him and crushed him, it is equally difficult to say. It only shows that his court wanted common sense as much as he wanted discretion. The expedition was destroyed, and the Foudroyant had the whole honour of the victory.

An action between single ships of this force is rare at any period, and nothing could be nearer a match in point of equipment then the two ships. The Foudroyant had the larger tonnage, and carried three more guns on her broadside; but the Pegase threw a greater weight of shot, had a more numerous crew, and a large proportion of soldiers on board. The English ship, however, had the incomparable advantage of a crew which had sailed together for six years, and been disciplined by such an officer as Jervis.

The ministry and the king were equally rejoiced at this return of the naval distinctions of the country, and the immediate consequence was, the conferring of a baronetcy and the order of the Bath upon the gallant officer. Congratulations of all kinds were poured upon him by the ministry, his admiral, and his brother officers. The admiral writes, in speaking of the squadron's cruise, "but the Pegase is every thing, and does the highest honour to Jervis."

Another instance of his decision, and, as in all probability will be thought, of the clearness of his judgment, was shortly after given in the memorable relief of Gibraltar. As it was likely that the combined fleets of France and Spain would oppose the passage of the British, Lord Howe, at an early period, called the flag-officers and captains on board the Victory, and proposed to them the question—Whether, considering the superiority of the enemy's numbers, it might not be advisable to fight the battle at night, when British discipline might counterbalance the numerical superiority? All the officers junior to Jervis gave their opinion for the night attack, but he dissented. "Expressing his regret that he must offer an opinion, not only contrary to that of his brother officers, but also, as he feared, to that of his commander-in-chief, he was convinced that battle in the day would be greatly preferable. In the first place, because it would give an opportunity for the display of his lordship's tactics, and afford the means of taking prompt advantage of any mistake of the enemy, change of the wind, or any other favourable circumstance; while in the melee of a battle at night, there must always be greater risk of separation, and of ships receiving the fire of their friends as well as their foes." It is obvious to every comprehension, that a night action must preclude all manoeuvring, and prevent the greater skill of the tactician from having any advantage over the blunderer who turns his ships into mere batteries. The only officer who coincided with Jervis was Admiral Barrington, who gave as an additional and a just argument for the attack by day, that it would give an opportunity of ascertaining the conduct of the respective captains in action. On those opinions Lord Howe made no comment; but it is presumed that he ultimately agreed with them, from his conduct in the celebrated action of the 1st of June 1794, when he had the enemy's fleet directly to leeward of him from the night before.

In the relief of Gibraltar, the Foudroyant had the honour to be the ship which was dispatched from the fleet to escort the victuallers into the harbour, which was accomplished amid the acclamations of the garrison. It had been expected that Lord Howe would have attacked the combined fleets, and the nation of course looked forward to a victory; but they were disappointed. The fact is, that Lord Howe, though a brave man, and what is generally regarded as a good officer, was of a different class of mind from the Jervises and Nelsons. He did his duty, but he did no more. The men who were yet to give a character to the navy did more than their duty, suffered no opportunity of distinction to escape them, relied on the invincibility of British prowess when it was boldly directed, and by that reliance rendered it invincible.

There was a kindness and generosity of nature in this future "thunderbolt of war," which shows how compatible the gentler feelings are with the gallant daring, and comprehensive talent of the great commander. Having happened to receive the Duc de Chabelais on board his ship when at Cadiz, the politeness of his reception caused the Sardinian prince to exhibit his gratitude in some handsome presents to the officers. One of Jervis's letters mentions, that the prince had given to each of the lieutenants a handsome gold box; to the lieutenant of marines and five of the midshipmen gold watches; and to the other officers and ship's company, a princely sum of money.

"I pride myself," he adds, "exceedingly in the presents being so diffused; on all former occasions they have centred in the captain." In another letter he says,—"I was twenty-four hours in the bay of Marseilles about a fortnight ago, just time to receive the warm embraces of a man to whose bravery and friendship I had some months before been indebted for my reputation, the preservation of the people under my command, and of the Alarm. You would have felt infinite pleasure at the scene of our interview." In a letter to the under-secretary of the Admiralty, he says,—"My dear Jackson, you must allow me to interest your humanity in favour of poor Spicer, who, overwhelmed with dropsy, asthma, and a large family, and with nothing but his pay to support him under those afflictions, is appointed to the —— under a mean man, and very likely to go to the East Indies. The letter which he writes to the Board, desiring to be excused from his appointment, is dictated by me."

He then mentions a contingency, "in which case I shall write for Spicer to be first lieutenant of the Foudroyant, with intention to nurse him, and keep him clear of all expense." Shortly after the Foudroyant was paid off, Sir John Jervis was united to a lady to whom he had long been attached, the daughter of Sir Thomas Parker, Chief Baron of the Exchequer. Every man in England, as he rises into distinction, necessarily becomes a politician. It was the misfortune of Sir John Jervis, and it was his only misfortune, that he was a politician before he had risen into distinction. Having had the ill luck to profess himself a Whig, at a period when he could scarcely have known the nature of the connexion, he unhappily adhered to it long after Whiggism had ceased to possess either public utility or national respect. But his Whiggism was unconscious Toryism after all: it was what even his biographer is forced to call it, Whig Royalism, or pretty nearly what Blake's Republicanism was—a determination to raise his country to the highest eminence to which his talents and bravery could contribute, without regarding by whom the government was administered. At the general election of 1784, he sat for Yarmouth.

In 1787, Sir John Jervis was promoted to the rank of rear-admiral. At the general election in 1790, he was returned for Wycombe, and shared in parliament the successive defeats of his party; until, in 1793, he was called to a nobler field, in which, unembarrassed by party, and undegraded by Whiggism, his talents took their natural direction in the cause of his country. It is now scarcely necessary to remark upon the narrow system of enterprise with which England began the great revolutionary war; nor can it now be doubted that, if the energies of the country had been directed to meet the enemy in Europe, measureless misfortunes might have been averted. If the succession of fleets and armies which were wasted upon the conquest of the French West Indies, had been employed in the protection of the feebler European states, there can be no question that the progress of the French armies would have been signally retarded, if invasion had not been thrown back over the French frontier. For instance, it would have been utterly impossible for Napoleon, in 1796, to have marched triumphantly throughout Italy with the British fleet covering the coast, commanding all the harbours, and ready to throw in troops in aid of the insurrections in his rear.

But it was the policy of the time to pacify the merchants, whose bugbear was a negro insurrection in the West Indies; and whether the genius or the fears of Pitt gave way to the impression, the consequence was equally lamentable—the mighty power of England was wasted on the capture of sugar islands, which we did not want, which we could not cultivate, and which cost the lives, by disease and climate, of ten times the number of gallant men who might have saved Europe. At the close of 1793, a grand expedition against the French Caribbee islands was resolved upon by the British cabinet; and it is a remarkable instance of both the reputation of Sir John Jervis and the impartiality of the great minister, that a Whig member of parliament should have been chosen to command the naval part of the expedition.

The expedition consisted of twenty-two ships of war and six thousand troops, the troops divided into three brigades, of which one was commanded by the late Duke of Kent. Sir John Jervis hoisted his flag as vice-admiral of the blue on the 3d of October.

A ludicrous circumstance occurred in the instance of a favourite officer, Mr Bayntun, who had applied for permission to join Sir John. Bayntun received in answer the following decisive note: "Sir, your having thought fit to take to yourself a wife, you are to look for no further attention from your humble servant, J. JERVIS." It happened that Bayntun was a bachelor, and he instantly wrote an exculpatory letter, denying that he had been guilty of so formidable a charge. The mistake arose from a misdirection in two notes which the admiral had written on the same subject. He had left them to Lady Jervis to direct, and she had addressed them to the wrong persons. The consequence, however, was, that Bayntun received the appointment, and the married man the refusal. This inveteracy against married officers seems strange in one who had committed the same crime himself; yet he constantly persisted in calling officers who married moon-struck, and appears at all times to have regarded matrimony in the service as little short of personal ruin.

On the passage out, a curious circumstance occurred to the Zebra frigate, under command of the gallant Robert Faulknor. The Zebra, which had been separated from the rest of the squadron, saw one evening a ship on the horizon. All sail was made in chase, and the ship was discovered to be a twenty-eight gun frigate. All contrivances were adopted to induce her to show her colours, but without success. At length Faulknor, impatient of delay, and disregarding the disparity of force, closed upon her, and jumped on board at the head of his men. To his astonishment he found that she was a Dutch frigate, quietly pursuing her way; and as Holland was at peace with England, equally unexpecting and unprepared for an attack. This instance of apathy night have procured her a broadside; but luckily the affair finished with the shaking of hands.

On the 5th of February the expedition reached Martinique. On the 18th of March Fort Lewis was stormed, General Rochambeau capitulated, and Martinique was taken, St Lucie followed, the Saintes next fell, and the final conquest was Guadaloupe. Thus in three months the capture of the French islands was complete.

But an enemy more formidable than the sword was now to be encountered. The yellow fever began its ravages. The troops perished in such numbers, that the regiments were reduced to skeletons; and just at the moment when the disease was at its height, Victor Hughes was dispatched from France with an expedition. The islands fell one by one into his hands, and the campaign was utterly thrown away.

The romantic portion of the European campaigns now began. The French Directory, unpopular at home, wearied by the sanguinary successes of the Vendean insurrection, and baffled in their invasion of Germany, were in a condition of the greatest perplexity, when a new wonder of war taught France again to conquer. Napoleon Bonaparte, since so memorable, but then known only as commanding a company of artillery at Toulon, and repelling the armed mob in Paris, was appointed to command the army on the Italian frontier. Even now, with all our knowledge of his genius, and the splendid experience of his successes, his sudden elevation, his daring offer of command, his plan of the Italian campaign, and his almost instantaneous victories, are legitimate matter of astonishment. In him we have the instance of a young man of twenty-six, who had never seen a campaign, who had never commanded a brigade, nor even a regiment, undertaking the command of an army, proposing the invasion of a country of eighteen millions, garrisoned by the army of one of the greatest military powers of Europe, which had nearly 300,000 soldiers in the field, and which was in the most intimate alliance with all the sovereigns of Italy. Yet, extravagant as all those conceptions seem, and improbable as those results certainly were, two campaigns saw every project realized—Italy conquered, the Tyrol, the great southern barrier of Austria, overpassed, and peace signed within a hundred miles of Vienna. The invasion of Italy first awoke the British ministry to the true direction of the vast naval powers of England. To save Italy if possible, was the primary object; the next was to prevent the superiority of the French fleet in the Mediterranean. A powerful fleet had been prepared in Toulon, for the purpose of aiding the French army in its invasion, and finally taking possession of all the ports and islands, until it should have realized the project of Louis XIV., of turning the Mediterranean into a French lake. It was determined to keep up a powerful British fleet to oppose this project, and Sir John Jervis was appointed to the command. Nothing could be a higher testimony to the opinion entertained of his talents, as his connexion with the Whigs was undisguised. But Pitt's feeling for the public service overcame all personal predilections, and this great officer was sent to take the command of the most extensive and important station to which a British admiral could be appointed. Lord Hood had previously declined it, on the singular plea of inadequacy of force; and Sir Charles Hotham having solicited his recall in consequence of declining health, the gallant Jervis was sent forth to establish the renown of his country and his own.

The fleet was a noble command. It consisted on the whole of about twenty-five sail of the line, two of them of a hundred guns, and five of ninety-eight; thirty-six frigates, and fifteen or sixteen sloops and other armed vessels.

Among the officers of the fleet were almost all the names which subsequently obtained distinction in the great naval victories— Troubridge, Hallowell, Hood, Collingwood, &c., and first of the first, that star of the British seaman, Nelson. It is remarkable, and only a just tribute to the new admiral, that he, almost from his earliest intercourse with those gallant men, marked their merits, although hitherto they had found no opportunities of acquiring distinction—all were to come. Nelson, in writing to his wife, speaking of the admiral's notice of him, says, "Sir John Jervis was a perfect stranger to me, therefore I feel the more flattered." The admiral, in writing to the secretary of the Admiralty, says—"I am afraid of being thought a puffer, like many of my brethren, or I should before have dealt out to the Board the merits of Captain Troubridge, which are very uncommon."

The French fleet, of fifteen sail of the line, lay in Toulon, ready to convoy an army to plunge upon the Roman states. Sir John Jervis instantly proceeded to block up Toulon, keeping what is called the in-shore squadron looking into the harbour's mouth, while the main body cruised outside. The admiral at once employed Nelson on the brilliant service for which he was fitted, and sent him with a flying squadron of a ship of the line, three frigates, and two sloops, to scour the coast of Italy. The duties of the Mediterranean fleet, powerful as the armament was, were immense. 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.

The French campaign opened on the 9th of April 1797, and the Austrians were beaten on the following day at Montenotte, and in a campaign of a month Bonaparte reached Milan. The success of the enemy increased to an extraordinary degree the difficulties of the British admiral. The repairs of the fleet, the provisioning, and every other circumstance connected with the land, lay under increased impediments; but they were all gradually overcome by the vigilance and intelligence of the admiral.

A curious and characteristic circumstance occurred, soon after his taking the command. Nelson had captured a vessel carrying 152 Austrian grenadiers, who had been made prisoners by the French, and actually sold by their captors to the Spaniards, for the purpose of enlisting them in the Spanish army. His letter to Jackson, the secretary of legation at Turin, on this subject, spiritedly expresses his feelings:—

"SIR,—From a Swiss dealer in human flesh, the demand made upon me to deliver up 152 Austrian grenadiers, serving on board his Majesty's fleet under my command, is natural enough, but that a Spaniard, who is a noble creature, should join in such a demand, I must confess astonishes me; and I can only account for it by the Chevalier Caamano being ignorant that the persons in question were made prisoners of war in the last war with General Beaulieu, and are not deserters, and that they were most basely sold by the French commissaries to the vile crimps who recruit for the foreign regiments in the service of Spain. It is high time a stop should be put to this abominable traffic, a million times more disgraceful than the African slave-trade."

But other dangers now menaced the British supremacy in the Mediterranean. The victories of Bonaparte had terrified all the Italian states into neutrality or absolute submission; and the success of the Directory, and perhaps their bribes, influenced the miserably corrupt and feeble Spanish ministry, to make common cause with the conquering republic. Spain at last became openly hostile. This was a tremendous increase of hazards, because Spain had fifty-seven sail of the line, and a crowd of frigates. The difficulty of blockading Toulon was now increased by the failure of provisions. On the night of the 2d of November, the admiral sent for the master of the Victory, and told him that he now had not the least hope of being reinforced, and had made up his mind to push down to Gibraltar with all possible dispatch.

The passage became a stormy one, and it was with considerable difficulty that the fleet reached Gibraltar. Some of the transports were lost, a ship of the line went down, and several of the fleet were disabled.

The result of the French successes and the Austrian misfortunes, was an order for the fleet to leave the Mediterranean, and take up its station at the Tagus. The vivid spirit of Nelson was especially indignant at this change of scene. In one of his letters he says—"We are preparing to leave the Mediterranean, a measure which I cannot approve. They at home do not know what this fleet is capable of performing—any thing, and every thing. Of all the fleets I ever saw, I never saw one, in point of officers and men, equal to Sir John Jervis's, who is a commander able to lead them to glory." The admiral's merits were recognized by the government in a still more permanent manner; for, by a despatch from the Admiralty in February 1797, it was announced that the king had raised him to the dignity of the peerage.

The prospect now darkened round every quarter of the horizon. The power of Austria had given way; Spain and Holland were combined against our naval supremacy; Italy was lost; a French expedition threatened Ireland; there was a strong probability of the invasion of Portugal; and the junction of the French and Spanish fleets might endanger not merely the Tagus fleet, but expose the Channel fleet to an encounter with numbers so superior, as to leave the British shores open to invasion. The domestic difficulties, too, had their share. The necessity of suspending cash payments at the Bank had, if not thrown a damp upon the nation, at least given so formidable a ground for the fallacies and bitterness of the Opposition, as deeply to embarrass even the fortitude of the great minister. We can now see how slightly all these hazards eventually affected the real power of England; and we now feel how fully adequate the strength of this extraordinary and inexhaustible country was to resist all obstacles and turn the trial into triumph. But faction was busy, party predicted ruin, public men used every art to dispirit the nation and inflame the populace; and the result was, a state of public anxiety of which no former war had given the example.

It is incontestable that the list of the British navy at this period of the war exhibited some of the noblest specimens of English character—brave, intelligent, and indefatigable men, ready for any service, and equal for all; with all the intrepidity of heroes, possessing the highest science of their profession, and exhibiting at once that lion-heartedness, and that knowledge, which gave the British navy the command of the ocean. And yet, if we were to assign the highest place where all were high, we should probably assign it to Lord St Vincent as an admiral. Nelson certainly, as an executive officer, defies all competition; his three battles, Copenhagen, Aboukir, and Trafalgar, each of them a title to eminent distinction, place him as a conqueror at the head of all. But an admiral has other duties than those of the line of battle; and for a great naval administrator, first disciplining a fleet, then supplying it with all the means of victory, and finally leading it to victory—Lord St Vincent was perhaps the most complete example on record of all the combined qualities that make the British admiral. His profound tactics, his stern but salutary exactness of command, his incomparable judgment, and his cool and unhesitating intrepidity, form one of the very noblest models of high command. All those qualities were now to be called into full exertion.

The continental campaign had left Europe at the mercy of France. England was now the only enemy, and she was to be assailed, in the first instance, by a naval war. To prevent the junction of the Spanish and French fleets, the Tagus was the station fixed upon by Lord St Vincent. Ill luck seemed to frown upon the fleet. The Bombay Castle, a seventy-four, was lost going in; the St George, a ninety, grounded in coming out, and was obliged to be docked; still the admiral determined to keep the sea, though his fleet was reduced to eight sail of the line. The day before he left the Tagus, information was received that the enemy's fleets had both left the Mediterranean. The French had gone to Brest, the Spanish first to Toulon, then to Carthagena, and was now proceeding to join the French at Brest. A reinforcement of six sail of the line now fortunately joined the fleet off the Tagus; but at the same time information was received that the Spanish fleet of twenty-seven sail of the line, with fourteen frigates, had passed Cadiz, and could not be far distant. To prevent the junction of this immense force with the powerful fleet already prepared for a start in Brest, was of the utmost national importance; for, combined, they must sweep the Channel. The admiral instantly formed his plan, and sailed for Cape St Vincent.

The details of the magnificent encounter which followed, are among the best portions of the volumes. They are strikingly given, and will attract the notice, as they might form the model, of the future historian of this glorious period of our annals. We can now give only an outline.

On the announcement of the Spanish advance, the first object was to gain exact intelligence, and ships were stationed in all quarters on the look-out. But on the 13th Captain Foote, in the Niger frigate, joined, with the intelligence that he had kept sight of the enemy for three days. The admiral was now to have a new reinforcement, not in ships but in heroes; the Minerva frigate, bearing Nelson's broad pendant, from the Mediterranean, arrived, and Nelson shifted his pendant into the Captain. The Lively frigate, with Lord Garlies, also arrived from Corsica. The signal was made, "To keep close order, and prepare for battle." On that day, Lord Garlies, Sir Gilbert Elliot, and Captain Hallowell, with some other officers, dined on board the Victory. At breaking up, the toast was drunk, "Victory over the Dons, in the battle from which they cannot escape to-morrow!"

The "gentlemen of England who live at home at ease," can probably have but little conception of the price which men in high command pay for glory. No language can describe the anxieties which have often exercised the minds of those bold and prominent characters, of whom we now know little but of their laurels. The solemn responsibilities of their condition, the consciousness that a false step might be ruin, the feeling that the eye of their country was fixed upon them, the hope of renown, the dread of tarnishing all their past distinctions, must pass powerfully and painfully through the mind of men fitted for the struggles by which greatness is to be alone achieved.

"It is believed that Sir John Jervis did not go to bed that night, but sat up writing. It is certain that he executed his will." In the course of the first and second watches, the enemy's signal-guns were distinctly heard; and, as he noticed them sounding more and more audibly, Sir John made more earnest enquiries as to the compact order and situation of his own ships, as well as they could be made out in the darkness. Long before break of day, he walked the deck in more than even his usual silence. When the grey of the morning of the 14th enabled him to discern his fleet, his first remarks were high approbation of his captains, for "their admirably close order, and that he wished they were now well up with the enemy; for," added he thoughtfully, "a victory is very essential to England at this moment."

Now came on the day of decision. The morning was foggy; but as the mist cleared up, the Lively, and then the Niger, signaled "a strange fleet." The Bonne Citoyenne was next ordered to reconnoitre. Soon after, the Culloden's guns announced the enemy. At twenty minutes past ten the signal was made to six of the ships—"to chase." Sir John still walked the quarterdeck, and, as the enemy's numbers were counted, they were duly reported to him by the captain of the fleet.

"There are eight sail of the line, Sir John."

"Very well, sir."

"There are twenty sail of the line, Sir John."

"Very well, sir."

"There are twenty-five sail of the line, Sir John."

"Very well, sir."

"There are twenty-seven sail of the line, Sir John." This was accompanied by some remark on the great disparity of the two forces. Sir John's gallant answer now was:—

"Enough, sir—no more of that: the die is cast, and if there are fifty sail, I will go through them."

At forty minutes past ten the signal was made to form line of battle ahead and astern of the Victory, and to steer S.S.W. The fog was now cleared off, and the British fleet were seen admirably formed in the closest order; while the Spaniards were stretching in two straggling bodies across the horizon, leaving an open space between. The opportunity of dividing their fleet struck the admiral at once, and at half-past eleven the signal was made to pass through the enemy's line, and engage them to leeward. At twelve o'clock, as the Culloden was reaching close up to the enemy, the British fleet hoisted their colours, and the Culloden opened her fire. An extraordinary incident, even in those colossal battles, occurred to this fine ship. The course of the Culloden brought her directly on board one of the enemy's three-deckers. The first lieutenant, Griffiths, reported to her captain, Troubridge, that a collision was inevitable. "Can't help it, Griffiths—let the weakest fend off," was the hero's reply. The Culloden, still pushing on, fired two of her double-shotted broadsides into the Spaniard with such tremendous effect, that the three-decker went about, and the guns of her other side not being even cast loose, she did not fire a single shot, while the Culloden passed triumphantly through. Scarcely had she broken the enemy's line, than the commander-in-chief signaled the order to tack in succession. Troubridge's manoeuvre was so dashingly performed, that the admiral could not restrain his delight and admiration.

"Look, Jackson," he rapturously exclaimed, "look at Troubridge there! He tacks his ship to battle as if the eyes of all England were upon him; and would to God they were, for then they would see him to be what I know him."

The leeward division of the enemy, perceiving the fatal consequences of their disunited order of sailing, now endeavoured to retrieve the day, and to break through the British line. A vice-admiral, in a three-decker, led them, and was reaching up to the Victory just as she had come up to tack in her station. The vice-admiral stood on with great apparent determination till within pistol-shot, but there he stopped; and when the Victory could bring her guns to bear upon him, she thundered in two of her broadsides, sweeping the Spaniard's decks, and so terrified him, that when his sails filled, he ran clear out of the battle altogether. The Victory then tacked into her station, and the conflict raged with desperate fury. At this period of the battle, the Spanish commander-in-chief bore up with nine sail of the line to run round the British, and rejoin his leeward division. This was a formidable manoeuvre; but no sooner was it commenced, than his eye caught it "whose greatest wish it ever was to be the first to find, and foremost to fight, his enemy." Nelson, instead of waiting till his turn to tack should bring him into action, took it upon himself to depart from the prescribed mode of attack, and ordered his ship to be immediately wore. This masterly manoeuvre was completely successful, at once arresting the Spanish commander-in-chief, and carrying Nelson and Collingwood into the van and brunt of the battle. He now attacked the four-decker, the Santissima Trinidada, also engaged by the Culloden. The Captain's fore-topmast being now shot away, Nelson put his helm down, and let her come to the wind, that he might board the San Nicolas; Captain, afterwards Sir Edward Berry, then a passenger with Nelson, jumping into her mizen-chains, was the first in the enemy's ship; Nelson leading his boarders, and a party of the 69th regiment, immediately followed, and the colours were hauled down. While he was on the deck of the San Nicolas, the San Josef, disabled, fell on board. Nelson instantly seized the opportunity of boarding her from his prize; followed by Captain Berry, and Lieutenant Pierson of the 69th, he led the boarders, and jumped into the San Josef's main-chains. He was then informed that the ship had surrendered. Four line-of-battle ships had now been taken, and the Santissima Trinidada had also struck; but she subsequently made her escape, for now the Spanish leeward division, fourteen sail, having re-formed their line, bore down to support their commander-in-chief: to receive them, Sir John Jervis was obliged to form a line of battle on the starboard tack—the enemy immediately retired. Thus, at five in the evening, concluded the most brilliant battle that had ever till then been fought at sea.

Captain Calder was immediately sent off with the despatch, and arrived in London on the 3d of March. A battle gained over such a numerical superiority, for it was much more than two to one, when we take into our estimate the immense size of the enemy's ships, and their weight of metal, there being one four-decker of 130 guns, and six three-deckers of 112, of which two were taken; and further, the more interesting circumstance, that this great victory was gained on our part with only the loss of 73 killed and 227 wounded, the public feeling of exultation was unbounded; and when the minister on that very evening proposed that the vote of thanks should be taken on the following Monday, the House would hear of no delay, but insisted on recording its gratitude at the moment. The House of Peers gave a similar vote on the 8th; and the Commons and the Crown immediately proposed to settle upon the admiral a pension of three thousand a-year. A member of the House of Commons, on moving for an address to the Crown to confer some signal mark of favour on the admiral, was instantly replied to by the sonorous eloquence of the minister—"Can it be supposed," said he, "that the Crown can require to be prompted to pay the just tribute of approbation and honour to those who have eminently distinguished themselves by public services? On the part of his Majesty's ministers, I can safely affirm, that before the last splendid instance of the conduct of the gallant admiral, we have not been remiss in watching the uniform tenor of his professional career. We have witnessed the whole of his proceedings—such instances of perseverance, of diligence, and of exertion in the public service, as, though less brilliant and dazzling than the last exploit, are only less meritorious as they are put in competition with a single day, which has produced such incalculable benefit to the British empire."

The result was an earldom. The first lord of the Admiralty, Lord Spencer, having already written to Sir John the royal pleasure to promote him to a peerage, and the letter not having reached him previously to the battle, he thus had notice of the two steps in the peerage nearly at once.

Popular honours now flowed in upon him: London voted its freedom in a gold box, with swords to the admirals of the fleet and Nelson; vice-admirals Parker and Thompson were created baronets; Nelson received the red riband; the chief cities and towns of England and Ireland sent their freedoms and presents; and the king gave all the admirals and captains a gold medal.

We must now be brief in our observations on the services of this most distinguished person. We have next a narrative of the suppression of the memorable mutiny of 1798, whose purpose it was to have suffered the enemy's fleet to leave their harbours, to revolutionize the Mediterranean fleet, and, after putting the admirals and captains to death, proceed to every folly and frenzy that could be committed by men conscious of power, and equally conscious that forgiveness was impossible. The fleet under Lord St Vincent was on the point of corruption, when it was restored to discipline by the singular firmness of the admiral, who, by exhibiting his determination to punish all insubordination, extinguished this most alarming disaffection, and saved the naval name of the country.

On the resignation of Mr Pitt in 1801, and the appointment of Mr Addington as first lord of the treasury, a letter was written from the new minister to Lord St Vincent, offering him the appointment of first lord of the Admiralty. Having obtained an interview with the king, and explained the general tone of his political feelings, the king told him he very much wished to see him at the Admiralty, and to place the navy entirely in his hands. This was perhaps the only appointment of that singularly feeble administration which met with universal approval. There could be no question of the intelligence, high principle, or public services of the great admiral. Mr Addington came into power under circumstances which would have tried the talents of a man of first-rate ability. The war had exhausted the patience, though not the power, of the nation. All our allies had failed. The severity of the taxes was doubly felt, when the war had necessarily turned into a blockade on the Continent. We had thus all the exhaustion of hostilities without the excitement of triumph; and, to increase public anxieties, the failure of the harvest threatened a comparative famine. Wheat, which on an average of the preceding ten years had been 54s. a quarter, was now at 110s., then rose to 139s., and even reached as high as 180s. At one period the quartern loaf had risen to 1s. 10-1/2d. The popular cry now arose for peace. France, which with all her victories had been taught the precariousness of war, by the loss of Egypt and the capture of her army, was now also eager for peace. England had but two allies, Portugal and Turkey. At length the peace was made, and Lord St Vincent's attention was then drawn to an object which he had long in view, the reformation of the dockyards. This was indeed the Augean stable, and unexampled clamour arose from the multitude who had indolently fattened for years on the easy plunder of the public stores. However, the reform went on: perquisites were abolished, privileges taken away; and, rough as the operation was, nothing could be more salutary than its effect. The acuteness of the gallant old man at the head of the Admiralty could not be evaded, his vigour could not be defied, and his public spirit gave him an influence with the country, which enabled him to outlive faction and put down calumny. Yet this was evidently the most painful, and, to a certain extent, the most unsuccessful portion of his long career. Nominally a Whig, but practically a Tory—for his loyalty was unimpeachable and his honour without a stain—Lord St Vincent found himself in the condition of a man who presses reform on those with whom hitherto it has been only a watchword, and expects faction to act up to its professions.

The Addington treaty was soon discovered to be nothing more than a truce. Napoleon lived only in war; hostilities were essential to the government which he had formed for France; and his theory of government, false as it was, and his passion for excitement, whatever might be its price, made even the two years of peace so irksome to him, that he actually adopted a gross and foolish insult to the British ambassador as the means of compelling us to renew the conflict. The first result was, the return of Pitt to power; the next, the total ruin of the French navy at Trafalgar; the next, the bloody and ruinous war with Russia, expressly for the ruin of England through the ruin of her commerce; and finally the crash of Waterloo, which extinguished his diadem and his dominion together—a series of events, occurring within little more than ten years, of a more stupendous order than had hitherto affected the fate of any individual, or influenced the destinies of an European kingdom.

With the ministry of Mr Addington, Lord St Vincent retired from public life. He was now old, and the hardships of long service had partially exhausted his original vigour of frame. He retired to his seat, Rochetts in Essex, and there led the delightful life of a man who had gained opulence and distinction by pre-eminent services, and whose old age was surrounded by love, honour, and troops of friends. He appeared from time to time in the House of Lords, where, however, he spoke but seldom, but where he always spoke with dignity and effect.

In the month of March 1823, Lord St Vincent was seized with a general feeling of infirmity which portended his speedy dissolution. He had a violent and convulsive cough; yet his intellects were strongly turned upon public events, and he expressed an anxiety to know all that could be known of events in France, which was then disturbed; of the Spanish revolution, which then threatened to involve Europe; and even of the affairs of Greece. In the course of the evening of the 13th, while his physician and family were round him, his strength suddenly gave way, and at half past eight he died, at the age of eighty-eight, and was buried at Stone in Staffordshire. He was succeeded in the peerage by his nephew, who, however, inherits only the viscounty.

In our general notice of Lord St Vincent's career, we have adverted as little as possible to the opinions which his biographer had introduced from his own view of public affairs. We have no wish to make a peevish return to the writer of a work which has given us both information and pleasure. But it is necessary to caution Mr Tucker against giving trite and trifling opinions on subjects of which he evidently knows so little as of the Romish question, or the state of Ireland. Nothing is easier than to be at once solemn and superficial on such topics; and when a writer of this order flings his epithets of "bigoted, harsh, and impolitic," and the other stock phrases of party organs, he only enfeebles our respect for his authority in the immediate matters of his work, and rather lowers our respect for his faculties in all. The question of Popery in Ireland, is not a question of religion but of faction. Religious controversy on Romish doctrines has long ceased to exist. Romanism has no grounds on which a controversy can be sustained. It cannot appeal to the Scriptures, which it shuts up; and it will no longer be suffered to appeal to its mere childish pretence of infallibility. Its only ground in Ireland is party; and the present unhappy condition to which it has reduced Ireland, exhibits the natural consequences of indulgence to Popery, and the only means by which its spirit can be rendered consistent with the order of society.

* * * * *



MARSTON; OR, THE MEMOIRS OF A STATESMAN.

PART X.

"Have I not in my time heard lions roar? Have I not heard the sea, puft up with wind, Rage like an angry boar chafed with sweat? Have I not heard great ordnance in the field, And Heaven's artillery thunder in the skies? Have I not in the pitched battle heard Loud 'larums, neighing steeds, and trumpets clang?" SHAKSPEARE.

On reaching the prison, I gave up all for lost; sullenly resigned myself to what now seemed the will of fate; and without a word, except in answer to the interrogatory of my name and country, followed the two horrid-looking ruffians who performed the office of turnkeys. St Lazare had been a monastery, and its massiveness, grimness, and confusion of buildings, with its extreme silence at that late hour, gave me the strongest impression of a huge catacomb above ground. The door of a cell was opened for me after traversing a long succession of cloisters; and on a little wooden trestle, and wrapt in my cloak, I attempted to sleep. But if sleep has not much to boast of in Paris at any time, what was it then? I had scarcely closed my eyes when I was roused by a rapid succession of musket-shots, fired at the opposite side of the cloister, the light of torches flashing through the long avenues, and the shouts of men and women in wrath, terror, and agony. I threw myself off my uneasy bed, and climbing up by my prison bars, endeavoured to ascertain the cause of the melee. But the imperfect light served little more than to show a general mustering of the national guard in the court, and a huge and heavy building, into which they were discharging random shots whenever a head appeared at its casements. A loud huzza followed whenever one of those shots appeared to take effect, and a laugh equally loud ran through the ranks when the bullet wasted its effect on the massive mullions or stained glass of the windows. A tall figure on horseback, whom I afterwards learned to be Henriot, the commandant of the national guard, galloped up and down the court with the air of a general-in-chief manoeuvring an army. I think that he actually had provided himself with a truncheon to meet all the emergencies of supreme command. While this sanguinary, and yet mocking representation of warfare was going on, M. le Commandant was in full eloquence and prodigious gesticulation. "A la gloire, mes enfans!" was his constant cry. "Fight, mes braves! the honour of France demands it: the eyes of Europe—of the world—are turned upon you. Vive la Republique!" And all this accompanied with waving his hat, and spurring his horse into foam and fury. But fortune is a jade after all; and the hero of the tricolored scarf was destined to have his laurels a little shorn, even on this narrow field. While his charger was caracoling over the cloisters, and his veterans from the cellars and counters of Paris were popping off their muskets at the unfortunates who started up against the old casement, I heard a sudden rush and run; a low postern of the cloister had been flung back, and the prisoners within the building had made a sally on their tormentors. A massacre at the Bicetre, in which six thousand had perished, had warned these unhappy people that neither the prison wall, nor night, was to be security against the rage of the bloodhounds with whom murder seemed to have grown into a pastime; and after having seen several of their number shot down within their dungeon, they determined to attack them, and, if they must die, at least die in manly defence. Their rush was perfectly successful; it had the effect of a complete surprise; and though their only weapons were fragments of their firewood—for all fire-arms and knives had been taken from them immediately on their entrance into the prison—they routed the heroes of the guard at the first charge. Even the gallant commander himself only shared the chance of his "camarades:" a flourish or two of his sabre, and an adjuration of "liberty," had no other effect than to insure a heavier shower of blows, and I had the gratification of seeing the braggadocio go down from his saddle in the midst of a group, who certainly had no veneration for the majesty of the truncheon. The victory was achieved; but, like many another victory, it produced no results: the gates of the St Lazare were too strongly guarded to be forced by an unarmed crowd, and I saw the prisoners successively and gloomily return to the only roof, melancholy as that was, which now could shelter them.

The morning brought my case before the authorities of this den. Half a dozen coarse and filthy uniformed men, and some of them evidently sufferers in the tumult of the night, for their heads were bound up and their arms bandaged—a matter which, if it did not improve their appearance, gave me every reason to expect increased brutishness in their tempers—formed the tribunal. The hall in which they had established their court had once been the kitchen of the convent; and, though all signs of hospitality had vanished, its rude and wild construction, its stone floor and vaulted roof, and even its yawning and dark recesses for the different operations which, in other days, had made it a scene of busy cheerfulness, now gave it a look of dreariness in the extreme. I could have easily imagined it to be a chamber of the Inquisition. But men in my circumstances have not much time for the work of fancy; and I was instantly called on for my name, and business in France. I had heard enough of popular justice to believe, that I had now arrived within sight of the last struggle, and I resolved to give these ruffians no triumph over the Englishman.

"Citizen, who are you?" Was the first interrogatory.

"I am no citizen, no Frenchman, and no republican," was my answer. My judges stared at each other.

"You are a prisoner. How came you here?"

"You are judges; how came you there?"

"You are charged with crimes against the Republic."

"In my country no man is expected to criminate himself."

"But you are a traitor: can you deny that?"

"I am no traitor to my king; can you say as much for yourselves?" They now began to cast furious glances at me.

"You are insolent: what brought you into the territory of France?"

"The same thing which placed you on that bench—force."

"Are you mad?"

"No—are you?"

"Do you not know that we can send you to the"—

"If you do, I shall only go before you."

This put an end to my interrogatory at once. I had accidentally touched upon the nerve which quivered in every bosom of these fellows. There was a singular presentiment among even the boldest of the Revolutionists, that the new order of things would not last, and that, when the change came, it would be a bloody one. Life had become sufficiently precarious already among the possessors of power; and the least intimation of death was actually formidable to a race of villains whose hands were hourly imbued in slaughter. I had been hitherto placed in scarcely more than surveillance. An order for my confinement as a "Brigand Anglais," was made out by the indignant "commission," and I was transferred from my narrow and lonely cell into the huge crowded building in the opposite cloister, which had been the scene of the attack on the previous night. I could, with Cato, "smile on the drawn dagger and defy its point." I walked out with the air of a Cato.

This change, intended for my infinite degradation until the guillotine should have dispatched its business in arrear, I found much to my advantage. The man who expects nothing, cannot be hurt by disappointment; and when I was conducted from my solitary cell into the midst of four or five hundred prisoners, I felt the human feelings kindle in me, which had been chilled between my four stone walls.

The prisoners with whom I was now to take my chance, were of all ranks, professions, and degrees of crime. The true crime in the eyes of the republic being, to be rich. Yet there the culprit had some hope of being suffered to live, at least while daily examinations, with the hourly perspective of the axe, could make him contribute to the purses of the tribunal. Those who happened to be poor, were found guilty of incivisme at once, and were daily drafted off to the Place de Greve, from which they never returned. But some of the prisoners were from La Vendee, peasants mixed with nobles; who, though no formal shape of resistance to the republic was yet declared, had exhibited enough of that gallant contempt of the new tyranny, which afterwards immortalized the name, to render them obnoxious to the ruffians at its head. It was this sturdy portion which had made the dash on the night of the riot, and their daring had the effect, at least, of saving their fellow-prisoners in future from being made marks, to teach the national guard the art of shooting. Even their sentries kept a respectful distance; and M. Henriot, wisely mindful of his flagellation, flourished his staff of command no more within our cloister. We were, in fact, left almost wholly to ourselves. Yet, if a philosopher desired to take a lesson in human nature, this was the spot of earth for the study. We had it in every shape and shade. We had it in the wits and blockheads, the courtiers and the clowns, the opulent and the ruined, the brave and the pusillanimous—and all under the strangest pressure of those feelings which rouse the nature of man to its most undisguised display. Death was before every eye. Where was the use of wearing a mask, when the wearer was so soon to part with his head? Pretence gradually vanished, and a general spirit of boldness, frankness, and something, if not exactly of dignity, at least of manliness, superseded the customary cringing of society under a despotism. In all but the name, we were better republicans than the tribe who shouted in the streets, or robbed in the tribunals.

I made the remark one day to the Marquis de Cassini, a philosopher and pupil of the great Buffon. "The reason is," said he, "that men differ chiefly by circumstances, as they differ chiefly by their clothes. Throw off their dress, whether embroidery or rags, and you will find the same number of ribs in them all."

"But my chief surprise is, to find in this prison more mutual kindness, and, in every sense, more generosity of sentiment, than one generally expects to meet in the world."

"Helvetius would tell you that all this was self-interest," was my pale-visaged and contemplative friend's reply. "But I always regarded M. Helvetius in the light of a well-trained baboon, who thought, when men stared at his tricks, they were admiring his talents. The truth is, that self-interest is the mere creature of society, and is the most active in the basest society. It is the combined cowardice and cruelty of men struggling for existence; the savageness of the forest, where men cannot gather acorns enough to share with their fellows; the effort for life, where there is but one plank in a storm, and where, if you are to cling at all, it must be by drowning the weaker party. But here," and he cast his eyes calmly round the crowd, "as there is not the slightest possibility that any one of us will escape, we have the better opportunity of showing our original bienseance. All the struggling on earth will not save us from the guillotine; and therefore we resolve to accommodate each other for the rest of our journey."

I agreed with him on the philosophy of the case, and in return he introduced me to some of the Vendean nobles, who had hitherto exhibited their general scorn of Parisian contact by confining themselves to the circle of their followers. I was received with the distinction due to my introducer, and was invited to join their supper that night. The prison had once been the chapel of the convent; and though the desecration had taken place a hundred years before, and the revolutionary spoil had spared but little of the remaining ornaments, the original massiveness of the building, and the nobleness of the architecture, had withstood the assaults of both time and plunder. The roofs of the aisles could not be reached except by flame, and the monuments of the ancient priors and prelates, when they had once been stripped of their crosses, were too solid for the passing fury of the mob. And thus, in the midst of emblems of mortality, and the recollections of old solemnity, were set some hundreds of people, who knew as little of each other as if they had met in a caravansery, and who, perhaps, expected to part as soon. The scene was curious, but by no means uncheerful. The national spirit is inextinguishable; and, however my countrymen may bear up against the extremes of ill-fortune, no man meets its beginnings with so easy an air as the man of France. Our supper was laid out in one of the side chapels; and, coarse and scanty as it was, I seldom recollect an evening which I passed with a lighter sense of the burden of a prisoner's time. I found the Vendean nobles a manlier race than their more courtly countrymen. Yet they had courtliness of their own; but it was more the manner of our own country gentlemen of the last century, than the polish of Versailles. Their habits of living on their domains, of country sports, of intercourse with their peasantry, and of the general simplicity of country life, had drawn a strong line of distinction between them and the dukes and marquises of the royal saloons. Like all Frenchmen of the day, they conversed largely upon the politics of France; but there was a striking reserve in their style. The existing royal family were but little mentioned, or mentioned only with a certain kind of sacred respect. Their misfortunes prohibited the slightest severity of language. Yet still it was not difficult to see, that those straightforward and honest lords of the soil, who were yet to prove themselves the true chevaliers of France, could feel as acutely, and express as strongly, the injuries inflicted by the absurdities and vices of the successive administrations of their reign, as if they had figured in the clubs of the capital. But the profligacies of the preceding monarch, and the tribe of fools and knaves whom those profligacies as naturally gathered round him as the plague propagates its own contagion, met with no mercy. And, though they were spoken of with the gravity which became the character and rank of the speakers, they were denounced with a sternness which seemed beyond the morals or the mind of their country. Louis XV., Du Barri, and the whole long succession of corrupting and corrupted cabinets, which had at length rendered the monarchy odious, were denounced in terms worthy of gallant men; who, though resolved to sink or swim with the throne, experienced all the bitterness of generous indignation at the crimes which had raised the storm.

We had our songs too, and some of them were as contemptuous as ever came from the pen of Parisian satire. Among my recollections of the night was one of those songs, of which the refrain was—

"Le Bien-Aime—de l'Almanac."

A burlesque on the title—Le Bien-Aime, &c., which the court calendar, and the court calendar alone, had annually given to the late king. I can offer only a paraphrase.

"Louis Quinze, our burning shame, Hear our song, 'old well-beloved,' What if courts and camps are tame, Pension'd beggars laced and gloved, France's love grows rather slack, Idol of—the Almanac.

"Let your flatterers hang or drown, We are of another school, Truth no more shall be put down, We can call a fool a fool, Fearless of Bastile or rack, Titus of—the Almanac.

"Louis, trample on your serfs, We'll be trampled on no more, Revel in your parc aux cerfs,[27] Eat and drink—'twill soon be o'er. France will steer another tack, Solon of—the Almanac!

"Hear your praises from your pages, Hear them from your liveried lords, Let your valets earn their wages, Liars, living on their words; We'll soon give them nuts to crack, Caesar of—the Almanac!

"When a dotard fills the throne, Fit for nothing but a nurse, When a nation's general groan, Yields to nothing but its curse; What are armies at thy back, Henri of—the Almanac?

"When the truth is bought and sold, When the wrongs of man are spurn'd, Then the crown's last knell is toll'd, Then, old Time, thy glass has turn'd, And comes flying from thy pack To nations a new Almanac!

"Mistress, minister, Bourbon, Rule by bayonets, bribes, and spies, Charlatans in church and throne, France is opening all her eyes— Down go minion, king, and quack, We'll have our new Almanac!"

[27] A scene of peculiar infamy near Paris.

When I returned to the place where my mattress was flung, the crowd had already sunk to rest, and there was a general silence throughout the building. The few lights which our jailers supplied to us, had become fewer; and, except for the heavy sound of the doubled sentries' tread outside, I might have imagined myself in a vast cemetery. The agitation of the day, followed by the somewhat unsuitable gayety of the evening, had thrown me into such a state of mental and bodily fatigue, that I had scarcely laid my side on my bed, untempting as it was, when I dropped into a heavy slumber. The ingenuity of our tormentors, however, prohibited our knowing any thing in the shape of indulgence; and in realisation of the dramatist's renowned mot, "traitors never sleep," the prison door was suddenly flung open—a drum rattled through the aisle—the whole body of the prisoners were ordered to stand forth and answer to their names; this ceremony concluding with the march of the whole night-guard into the chapel, and their being ordered to load with ball-cartridge, to give us the sufficient knowledge of what any attempt to escape would bring upon us in future. This refinement in cruelty we owed to the escapade of the night before.

At length, after a variety of insulting queries, even this scene was over. The guard marched out, the roll of their drum passed away among the cloisters; we went shivering to our beds—threw ourselves down dressed as we were, and tried to forget France and our jailers.

But a French night in those times was like no other, and I had yet to witness a scene such as I believe could not have existed in any other country of the globe.

After some period of feverish sleep I was awakened by a strange murmur, which, mixing with my dreams, had given me the comfortless idea of hearing the roar of the multitude at some of the horrid displays of the guillotine; and as I half opened my unwilling eyes, still heavy with sleep, I saw a long procession of figures, in flowing mantles and draperies, moving down the huge hall. A semicircle of beds filled the extremity of the chapel, which had been vacated by a draft of unfortunate beings, carried off during the day to that dreadful tribunal, whose sole employment seemed to be the supply of the axe, and from which no one was ever expected to return. While my eyes, with a strange and almost superstitious anxiety—such is the influence of time and place—followed this extraordinary train, I saw it take possession of the range of beds; each new possessor sitting wrapt in his pale vesture, and perfectly motionless. I can scarcely describe the singular sensations with which I continued to gaze on the spectacle. My eyes sometimes closed, and I almost conceived that the whole was a dream; but the forms were too distinct for this conjecture, and the question with me now became, "are they flesh and blood?" I had not sunk so far into reverie as to imagine that they were the actual spectres of the unhappy tenants of those beds on the night before, all of whom were now, doubtless, in the grave; but the silence, the distance, the dimness perplexed me, and I left the question to be settled by the event. At a gesture from the central figure they all stood up—and a man loaded with fetters was brought forward in front of their line. I now found that a trial was going on: the group were the judges, the man was the presumed criminal; there was an accuser, there was an advocate—in short, all the general process of a trial was passing before my view. Curiosity would naturally have made me spring from my bed and approach this extraordinary spectacle; but I am not ashamed now to acknowledge, that I felt a nervelessness and inability to speak or move, which for the time wholly awed me. All that I could discover was, that the accused was charged with incivisme, and that, defying the court and disdaining the charge, he was pronounced guilty—the whole circle, standing up as the sentence was pronounced, and with a solemn waving of their arms and murmur of their voices, assenting to the act of the judge. The victim was then seized on, swept away into the darkness, and after a brief pause I heard a shriek and a crash; the sentence had been fulfilled—all was over. The court now covered their heads with their mantles, as if in sorrow for this formidable necessity.