The King now intervened in an unusually incisive manner. He informed Pitt that it would be better to recall Fitzwilliam than to allow further concessions to Catholics, a subject which was "beyond the decision of any Cabinet of Ministers." Accordingly, Fitzwilliam was recalled, his departure from Dublin arousing a storm of indignation which bade fair to overwhelm the Administration of his successor, Earl Camden.

Such is a brief outline of the Fitzwilliam affair. No event could have been more unfortunate. It led Irish patriots and the Whigs at Westminster to inveigh against the perfidy and tyranny of Pitt. He was unable to publish documents in his own defence, while Fitzwilliam crowned his indiscretions by writing two lengthy letters charging the Cabinet with breach of faith and Beresford with peculation. Nominally private, they were published at Dublin, with the result that Pitt and Camden were held up to execration and contempt. On reviewing this question, we may conclude that Pitt erred in not procuring from Fitzwilliam a written statement that he would make no sweeping changes at Dublin, either in regard to men or measures, without the consent of the Cabinet. It is, however, clear that Ministers regarded the verbal understanding with Fitzwilliam as binding; for Grenville, Portland, Spencer, and Windham sided with Pitt in this painful dispute, Portland's chilling behaviour to the Earl on his return marking his disapproval of his conduct.

Never did a Lord-Lieutenant enter on his duties under auspices more threatening than those besetting the arrival of Camden on 31st March 1795. After the swearing-in ceremony the passions of the Dublin mob broke loose. Stones were flung at the carriages of the Primate and Fitzgibbon. The rabble then attacked the Speaker's residence and the Custom House, and not till two of their number fell dead under a volley of the soldiery did the rioters disperse. The rebellion which Fitzwilliam predicted on his departure seemed to be at hand.

Camden, on whom this storm was to burst three years later, was not a strong man. He entered on his duties doubtfully and before long sent requests for his recall on account of his family concerns. He might well quail at the magnitude of his task. His instructions bade him by all available means discourage the claims of the Catholics, and rally the discouraged Protestants. Thereafter he might conciliate the Catholics by promising relief for their parochial clergy, the foundation of a seminary for the training of their priests, and some measure of education for the peasantry. The instructions ended thus: "Moderate, soothe, conciliate these jarring spirits. We have great confidence in your judgment, firmness, discretion."[480] The despatch refutes the oft-repeated assertion that the Ministry sought to inflame the animosities of Protestants and Catholics in order to force on the Union. That was the outcome of the whole situation; but in the spring of 1795 Ministers hoped to calm the ferment, which they rightly ascribed to the imprudence of Fitzwilliam. Their forecast for a time came true. In the first debates at Dublin the lead given by Camden's able Secretary, Pelham, served to close the schism in the Protestant ranks. Despite the vehement efforts of Grattan, his Bill for the admission of Catholics was thrown out by a majority of more than one hundred; and Ireland entered once more on the dreary path of reaction.

In the hope of softening the asperities of Irish life, Pitt favoured the plan of founding a seminary for the training of Catholic priests in Ireland. The proposal was alike one of justice and expediency; of justice, because the expense of training Irish priests in foreign seminaries had been a sore burden to their co-religionists; and of expediency, because the change promised to assuage the anti-British prejudices of the priests. Moreover, amidst the sweeping triumph of secularism in France and Belgium, most of the seminaries frequented by Irish youths had disappeared. The chief objections urged against the scheme were the narrowness of view certain to result from the curriculum of a semi-monastic institution, and the desirability of educating priests at Trinity College along with Protestants. On these grounds we must regret Pitt's decision to found a separate training college, albeit at first intended for the education of lay youths as well. The considerations above set forth, however, prevailed; and the chief legislative result of the year 1795 at Dublin was the charter establishing Maynooth College. Undoubtedly it was the outcome of Pitt's desire to pacify Catholic Ireland; but the unhappy conditions of the ensuing period told heavily against success. Indeed, as Wolfe Tone predicted, that institution fostered insular patriotism of a somewhat narrow type.

The trend of things in the years 1795-7 set steadily towards rebellion. The discontent was most threatening among the sturdy Presbyterians of Ulster, chafed as they were by the exaction of tithes by the Protestant Established Church. The founders and the ablest leaders of the League of United Irishmen were Protestants. For a time they aimed merely at a drastic measure of Parliamentary Reform similar to that advocated by English Radicals. But the disappointment of the hopes of Grattan and Irish Whigs in the spring of 1795 exasperated all sections of reformers and impelled the League towards revolutionary courses. Sops like Maynooth they rejected with scorn; and at the close of that year, after the passing of certain repressive measures, their organization became secret; they imposed an oath on members and gradually devised means for organizing the whole of Ireland in brotherhoods, which by means of district and county delegations, carried out the behests of the central committee at Dublin.

Yet their system was far from absorbing the whole of the nation. The vivacity of the Celt and the hardness of the Saxon tell against close union; and where the two races dwell side by side, solidarity is a dream. Now, as always, in times of excitement the old animosities burst forth. The Catholic peasantry banded together in clubs, known as Defenders, to glut their hatred upon Protestant landlords and tithe-reaping clergy. Their motives seem in the main to have been agrarian rather than religious; but, as in Leinster, Munster, and Connaught the dividing lines between landlords and peasants were almost identical with those between Protestants and Catholics, the land feud became a war of creed. The ensuing horrors, midnight attacks, cattle-maiming, and retaliation by armed yeomanry, exerted a sinister influence upon Ulster, where the masses were fiercely Protestant. Certain of the Catholic villages were ravaged by Protestant Peep o' Day Boys, until the Irishry fled in terror to the South or West, there wreaking their vengeance upon squires and parsons. By degrees the Peep o' Day Boys became known as Orangemen, whose defiant loyalty sometimes caused concern to Camden and Pitt; while the Defenders joined the better drilled ranks of United Ireland, which therefore became a preponderatingly Catholic body.

Thus affairs revolved in the old vicious circle. Feuds, racial, religious, and agrarian, rent Ireland asunder. Disputes about land have ever sunk deep into the brooding imagination of the Celt; and the memories of holdings absorbed, or of tithes pitilessly exacted in lean years, now flashed forth in many a deed of incendiarism or outrage. To Camden there appeared to be only one means of cure, coercion. An Indemnity Act was therefore passed to safeguard squires and yeomen who took the law into their own hands. Then followed the Insurrection Act, for disarming the disaffected, and the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act for strengthening the arm of the law.

The outcome was that the United Irishmen turned towards France. Even in the year 1793 the Republic sent agents into Ireland to stir up revolt. Nothing definite came of those efforts, except that a section of Irish patriots thenceforth began to strive for separation from Great Britain. Early in 1796 Wolfe Tone proceeded to Paris to arrange for the despatch of a French auxiliary corps. On 20th April General Clarke, head of the Topographical Bureau at the War Office, agreed to send 10,000 men and 20,000 stand of arms. The mercurial Irishman encountered endless delays, and was often a prey to melancholy; but the news of Bonaparte's victories in Italy led him to picture the triumph of the French Grenadiers in Ireland.[481]

Another interesting figure is that of Lord Edward Fitzgerald. Sprung from the ancient line of the Geraldines, and son of the Duke of Leinster, he plunged into life with the gaiety and bravery of a Celt. After serving with distinction in the British army in America he returned, became a member of the Irish Parliament, and in 1790 during the acute friction with Spain, received from his uncle, the Duke of Richmond, an introduction to Pitt, who offered him the command of an expedition against Cadiz. Nothing came of the proposal; but the incident reveals the esteem in which the chivalrous young officer was held. He soon married Pamela, the reputed daughter of the Duke of Orleans and Mme. de Genlis, whence he himself was often dubbed "Egalite." The repressive policy of Camden made him a rebel; and in May 1796 he made his way to Hamburg, hoping to concert plans for a French invasion. There he was joined by Arthur O'Connor, who impressed Reinhard with a sense of ability and power. Together the two Irishmen travelled to Basle, where they induced Barthelemy to favour their scheme. Meanwhile the French Directory entered into the plan of Wolfe Tone; the mission of Fitzgerald had no direct result, apart from the revelation of his plan to a travelling companion, who had been the mistress of a British Minister, and now forwarded a description of it to London.[482]

Meanwhile Wolfe Tone had sketched the outline of the enterprise to Clarke and General Hoche, predicting to the latter, the commander-elect, that he would "amputate the right hand of England for ever."[483] As is well known, Hoche's expedition to Bantry Bay at the close of the year 1796 was an utter failure; and the sterner spirits in Ulster believed that the French had designed that it should end so. The malcontents therefore relaxed their efforts for a time, until, in the spring following, the mutinies in the British fleet aroused new hopes. It seems probable that their intrigues had some effect on events at the Nore. In quick succession United Ireland despatched to Paris two delegates, named Lewins and McNevin, to concert plans for another landing. The Directory sent an agent to treat with the League. Fitzgerald met him in London, and declared that the Irish Militia and Yeomanry would join the French on their landing. The United Irishmen also sought help from Spain.[484]

In Ireland the organisation went on apace until Camden struck sharp blows through the military. In the middle of May 1797, when the malcontents were excited by news of the second mutiny at Portsmouth, they rose in the North, but in three or four engagements the loyal Militia and Yeomanry broke up their bands. The South remained quiet, and the efforts to seduce the army and Militia were fruitless; but Lord Clifden, writing to Abbot on 15th May, predicted a general rising when the French attempted a second invasion, as they certainly would.[485] On 19th June Beresford wrote from Dublin to Auckland, stating that, but for the repressive measures and wholesale seizures of arms, not a loyalist's head would have been safe.[486] The spring of 1797 was indeed a time of great risk. But for the weakness of the Dutch and French navies, a landing in Ireland could have taken place with every chance of success. As it was, Camden's vigorous measures so far cowed the malcontents that the rebellion was deferred for a year. This respite probably saved the British Empire. Amidst the financial and naval difficulties of the first half of the year 1797, a telling blow struck at Ireland could scarcely have failed of success. Rarely were the enemies of England so formidable; never were her means of defence so weak. Fortunately, no blow was aimed at her until the month of October; and then, when the Dutch fleet set out to convoy an expedition to Ireland, it was utterly crushed by Duncan at Camperdown. There was therefore little risk of an invasion in force after October 1797, the very month which saw Napoleon Bonaparte set free from his lengthy negotiations with Austria. Verily, if Fortune pressed hard on Pitt at Toulon and in Flanders and Hayti, she more than redressed the balance by her boons at sea in the year 1797.

Camden's letters to Pitt reveal the imminence of bankruptcy in Ireland throughout that year; and it is noteworthy that the loan raised for the Irish Government in January and February was the final cause of the Bank crisis in London. Even so, the Irish Exchequer was in dire need. On 25th April Camden informed Pitt that only L8,000 remained in the Exchequer, and he had no means for equipping the troops if the French should land. The sum of L200,000 must be sent at once. Such a demand at that time was impossible; and not until the end of May could Pitt forward the half of that sum, Camden meanwhile borrowing money in Dublin at 8 3/8 per cent. On 1st June he wrote to Pitt a confidential letter, laying bare his real aims. He urged him to do all in his power to procure peace from France. He had recommended this step in April; but now his language was most insistent. Assuming that it would be sheer madness to tempt fortune in another campaign, he suggested that, if the French terms were too onerous, Pitt should leave it to another Prime Minister to frame a peace. But whatever happened, Pitt must not lower his dignity by conceding Reform and Catholic Emancipation in Great Britain and Ireland. If those measures were inevitable, others must carry them. The latter would only satisfy the Irish Catholics for a time, their aim being to rule the country. The only way of escaping these difficulties was a Union of the Parliaments; but he (Camden) could not undertake to carry it, still less Catholic Emancipation. Finally he declared the Presbyterians of Ulster to be Republicans who would rise en masse if the French landed; but if Cornwallis were sent over to lead the troops, even that crisis might be overcome.[487]

Pitt received this letter at the height of the mutiny at the Nore. He seems to have sent no answer to it: indeed, silence is the best reply to such an effusion. Camden's letters to Pitt show that he longed for his recall. In that of 16th November 1796 he concluded with the significant remark that he looked forward to the time when they would once more live as country gentlemen in Kent. Pitt had the same longing; but he never wrote a line expressing a desire to leave the tiller at the height of the storm. Obviously Camden was weary of his work. Fear seems to have been the motive which prompted his proclamation of martial law in several counties and the offer of an amnesty to all who would surrender their arms before Midsummer 1797. Those enactments, together with the brutal methods of General Lake and the soldiery in Ulster and Leinster, crushed revolt for the present but kindled a flame of resentment which burst forth a year later. As the danger increased, so did the severities of the Protestant Yeomanry and Militia. Thus, fear begot rage, and rage intensified fear and its offspring, violence. The United Irishmen had their revenge. In the summer of 1797 their two delegates, Lewins and McNevin, did their utmost to defeat the efforts of Pitt to bring about peace with France; and the former had the promise of the Director, Barras, that France would never sheathe the sword until Ireland was free.[488]

Again Camden begged Pitt to seek the first opportunity of freeing him from his duties in order to disentangle his private affairs which were in much confusion, the excess of expenditure over income at Dublin being a further cause of embarrassment. In fact nothing but a sense of public duty, in view of a hostile invasion, kept him at his post. So far from the truth are those who, without knowledge of the inner motives of statesmen, accuse them of delight in cruelty and of intriguing to provoke a revolt.

Early in the year 1798 the hopes of malcontents centred in the naval preparations progressing at Brest and Toulon.[489] Bonaparte also seemed about to deal a blow at London. In February he surveyed the flotilla at Dunkirk and neighbouring ports; and the hearts of English Jacobins beat high at the thought of his landing in Kent or Sussex. The London Corresponding Society, after a time of suspended animation, had now become a revolutionary body. On 30th January its new secretaries, Crossfield and Thomas Evans, issued an encouraging address to the United Irishmen. Somewhat later Evans and Binns formed a society, the United Englishmen, which imposed on its members an oath to learn the use of arms, its constitution in local, or baronial, committees being modelled on that of the United Irishmen. A society of United Scotsmen was founded about the same time; a society of United Britons also came to being, and issued a fraternal address to the United Irishmen on 5th January.

Most significant of these effusions is one, dated 6 Pluviose An VI [25th January 1798], by "the Secret Committee of England" to the French Directory, containing the assurance that Pitt had come to the end of his borrowing powers and that the people were ready to throw off his yoke. "United as we are," it concluded, "we now only await with impatience to see the Hero of Italy and the brave veterans of the great Nation. Myriads will hail their arrival with shouts of joy: they will soon finish the glorious campaign." This address was drawn up fourteen days before Bonaparte set out for Dunkirk. It is clear, then, that its compilers were not so ignorant as that consequential tailor, Francis Place, represented them. Their chief mistake lay in concluding that Bonaparte intended to "leap the ditch." As we now know, his tour on the northern coast was intended merely to satisfy the Directors and encourage the English and Irish malcontents to risk their necks, while he made ready his armada at Toulon for the Levant.[490] Meanwhile the United Britons and United Irishmen sought to undermine Pitt's Government so that it might fall with a crash at the advent of the hero of Italy. They knew not that the chief efforts of the "soldiers of liberty" were then being directed to the pillage of Rome and of the cantonal treasuries of Switzerland in order to provide funds for Bonaparte's oriental adventure.

Already Irish, English, and French democrats had been fraternizing. In January 1798 the United Englishmen sent over two delegates to Dublin to concert action, and about the same time a priest of Dundalk, named O'Coigly (Anglice Quigley), came over from Ireland as a delegate from the United Irishmen to Evans's Society. Place asserts that his plan of proceeding to France was not known. But, as Place habitually toned down or ridiculed the doings of that Society, this is doubtful. Owing to secret information (probably from Turner, a British spy at Hamburg) the Government arrested Quigley, Arthur O'Connor, and Binns, a leading member of the London Corresponding Society, at Margate as they were about to board a hoy for France (28th February). A little later Colonel Despard, Bonham, and Evans were arrested. The evidence against all but Quigley was not conclusive, and they were released. The case against Quigley depended on a paper found by a police officer in his pocket, urging a French invasion of England. He was therefore condemned for high treason and was hanged on 7th June 1798. Probably Quigley had that paper from a London Society; but if so, why were not its officials seized? In some respects the Quigley affair still remains a mystery. Certainly it added fuel to the hatred felt for Pitt by British and Irish Jacobins.[491]

The evidence against O'Connor was weighty. It was proved that he was the leader of the party and that he knew Quigley well. He had a cipher in his possession, which was surely superfluous if, as he stated, he was travelling on private business. Probably his acquittal was due to his relationship to Lord Longueville, an influential Irish peer. Fox, Sheridan, and the Duke of Norfolk also proceeded to Maidstone to answer for the virtuous and patriotic character of O'Connor, a fact which probably led the judge to give a strangely favourable summing-up. The conduct of the Opposition leaders in this matter led their former comrade, the Earl of Carlisle, to declare that they had now sunk to a lower political hell than any yet reached. The Government, however, had not done with O'Connor. He was at once arrested at Maidstone on another charge (22nd May), and was in prison in Dublin during the rebellion. He then confessed that he had done more than any one to organize Leinster for revolt, also that he had had conferences with French generals with a view to invasion so far back as 1793; and he stated that he knew the member of the United Irishmen who in the winter of 1796 advised the French not to come until the spring of 1797.[492] There certainly was some misunderstanding between the Irish rebels and their would-be helpers; but the full details are not known. Finally O'Connor was allowed to retire to France; he became a French general, and helped Napoleon to concert plans for the invasion of Ireland, assuring him that, after the work of liberation was done, 200,000 Irishmen would help him to conquer England.

Meanwhile further news respecting the Franco-Irish plans reached Pitt through a man named Parish at Hamburg. An American friend of his at Brussels, while waiting at the municipal office for passports, saw those of two young Irishmen, named O'Finn, delegates of the United Irishmen of Cork. They had a large packet for the Directory at Paris, which contained the plans of the United Irishmen, the numbers and positions of the British troops and of the British warships between Dungeness and the North Foreland. The O'Finns stated this to the commissary of the Brussels bureau, who heard it with joy. The American secretly forwarded the news to Parish. The fact that the O'Finns had a list of the forces on the Kentish coast implied information from the English malcontents. Accordingly, on 19th April, Government seized the papers of the London Corresponding Society. They contained nothing of importance except the constitution of the Society, the oath to learn the use of arms, and the address to the United Irishmen. The Parliamentary Committee of Secrecy also believed that a plan was afoot for bringing to London a band of Irish fanatics to strike a blow which would paralyse Government while the French landed and Ireland revolted. This inference seems far-fetched; but the evidence at hand warranted the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act, which Pitt procured from Parliament on the following day. Place, with his usual perverse ingenuity, argued that Pitt nursed the conspiracy in order to be able to create alarm and govern despotically.[493]

Events were now moving fast in Ireland. Chief among the exciting causes were the repressive measures of Camden and the licence of the Militia and Yeomanry. So able and active a commander as General Abercromby failed to keep discipline and prevent military outrages. Not long after his return from the West Indies he reluctantly accepted these thankless duties (November 1797). His dislike of the work appears in the following letter, addressed probably to one of Pitt's colleagues:

Bantry, Jan. 28, 1798.[494] DEAR SIR,

... I have found the country everywhere quiet, but there exists among the gentlemen the greatest despondency: they believe, or affect to believe, that there is a plot in every family, and a conspiracy in every parish, and they would abandon the country unless the troops were dispersed over the face of it for their protection. I believe the lower ranks heartily hate the gentlemen because they oppress them, and the gentlemen hate the peasants because they know they deserve to be hated. Hitherto rents have been paid, tithes have not been refused or taxes withheld. No arms or ammunition have anywhere been introduced, and there are no tumultuous assemblings of the people. I have often heard of disaffection among the militia; it may perhaps exist among a few individuals; but it cannot exist to any considerable amount. My inquiries have been unremitted in this particular. Were, however, a landing of the enemy to take place, I cannot say what might happen to a people dissatisfied with their situation and naturally of great levity; the new doctrines would give activity. We are preparing for whatever may happen and no labour or exertion shall be wanting.

Abercromby soon proclaimed his disgust at the excesses of his troops in unmeasured terms. True, he had much provocation. The militia officers under him were a loose swaggering set, whose cruelties to the peasantry during the prolonged search for arms were unpardonable. Further, their powers had been enlarged by Camden's order of May 1797, allowing them to use armed force without the requisition of magistrates, a step deemed necessary to screen the civil authorities from outrage or murder. Seeing that officers often put these powers to a brutal and arbitrary use, exasperating to the peasants and demoralizing to the soldiery, Abercromby determined publicly to rescind the viceregal mandate. The language in which he announced his decision was no less remarkable than the decision itself. On 26th February 1798 he stated in a general order: "That the frequency of courts-martial, and the many complaints of irregularities in the conduct of the troops in this kingdom having too unfortunately proved the army to be in a state of licentiousness which must render it formidable to everyone but the enemy, the commander-in-chief" forbids officers ever to use military force except at the requisition of magistrates.

That the army and militia did not assault their commander after this outrageous insult shows that their discipline had not wholly vanished. In face of the vehement outcries of the Irish loyalists against Abercromby, Camden showed much forbearance. He issued a guarded statement that Abercromby had been accustomed to command troops abroad, and did not realize the impression which would be caused in Ireland by his censure of the soldiery. Portland, however, openly blamed the commander-in-chief. Pitt's letter of 13th March to Camden shows that, had he seen Portland's censure before it went off, he would have toned down some of its expressions; but on the whole he heartily disapproved of Abercromby's indiscriminate rebuke to the army as not only unjust, but calculated to depress its spirits and encourage those of the French and the Irish malcontents. Portland's reprimand brought about Abercromby's resignation, which Camden sought to avert. Thus again events took the worst possible course. Abercromby was an able and energetic man; and his resignation, at the time when the arrival of the French was expected, undoubtedly helped to raise the hopes of malcontents. Well might Camden write to Pitt on 25th April that Abercromby had done much harm. With that commander's desire to repress the outrages of the soldiery everyone must sympathize. The manner in which he sought to effect it was incredibly foolish.

Meanwhile, the work of the conspirators had been undermined by treachery. One of the conspirators, named Reynolds, took fright and revealed the secret of the plot to an official at Dublin Castle (26th February), adding the information that the Dublin committee would hold a secret meeting on 12th March. The police, bursting in, seized eighteen members, including McNevin, along with their papers, amongst which were some incriminating O'Coigly. Lord Edward Fitzgerald escaped for a time; but an informer gained knowledge of his movements, and those of two brothers named Sheares. On his warning the Castle that they were about to arouse Dublin to revolt, Camden resolved to anticipate the blow. Two police officers, Swan and Ryan, tracked Fitzgerald to his lair on the 19th of May. They found him in bed. At once the fierce spirit of his race surged up. He sprang at them with the small dagger ready by his side and struck at Swan. The blow went home, while the pistols aimed by the officers missed fire. Turning on Ryan, he dealt thrust upon thrust. The two wounded men clung to him while he struggled and struck like a wild beast. He was dragging them towards the door when Major Sirr rushed in and shot him in the shoulder. Even then his convulsions were so violent that two or three soldiers, who ran upstairs, scarcely overpowered him. Swan soon died. The wounds of Ryan were not mortal. That of Fitzgerald was not deemed serious, but it mortified, and he passed away on 4th June, mourned by all who knew his chivalrous daring spirit.[495]

The fury of Fitzgerald is intelligible. He was the one necessary man in the plot then coming to a head for the capture of Dublin on 23rd May. Among his effects were found a green uniform, the seal of the Irish Union, the line of route for the Kildare rebels in their advance, together with a plan for the seizure of the chief officials. The triumph of the Castle was completed by the capture of Neilson and the Sheares. Their papers showed that no quarter was to be given. Irish historians (among them Plowden) maintained that Pitt and Camden all along knew of the plot and allowed the conspirators to drive on their mine in order at the right moment to blow them up. There is no evidence to this effect, except during the few days preceding the blow. Camden's efforts were uniformly directed towards disarmament and coercion, so much so that he is reproached for his cruelty by the very men who accuse him of playing with the conspiracy. It is clear that he sought to prevent a rising, which was expected to coincide with a French invasion. In fact the only prudent course was to repress and disarm at all possible points.

The severity of the crisis appears in the letters which Beresford, Cooke, and Lees, officials at Dublin Castle, wrote to Auckland. In answer to Lord Moira's reckless charge in the Irish Parliament, that they were pushing on the country to rebel, Beresford on 10th April asks Auckland how can they, who are daily exposed to murder, push on a nation to deeds of violence which must fall on them? On 1st May he writes: "We think the Toulon squadron will join the expedition against Ireland.... Pikes are making in numbers, and the idea of a rising prevails. Kildare and Wicklow are armed, organized, and rebellious. Dublin and the county are very bad. The rebels expect the French within a month. Such is their last Gazette." On 7th May Lees writes to Auckland: "Lord Camden must steel his heart. Otherwise we are in great jeopardy." On 9th May Beresford states that it would be a good plan to seize a number of malcontents, threaten them with flogging and induce them to turn informers. He adds: "At present the quiet which prevails in some parts is deceptive. Where the country is organized, quiet appears. Where the organization is going on there is disturbance. In Kildare there are complete regiments, with large quantities of arms in their possession." On 10th May Lees writes that Galway is arming for revolt, and, nine days later, after the arrest of Fitzgerald, he states that they expect a rising in Dublin on the morrow. On 21st May after the arrest of the Sheares, Cooke writes: "A rising is not given up; but I think it will not take place. Parts of Kildare will not give up arms.... A search for arms will commence. We are in good spirits." On 20th May Beresford informs Auckland of the receipt of news at the Castle from three different quarters that there would be a rising on the 21st, owing to the vigorous measures now taken by the Government.[496]

This is not the language of men who are nursing a plot. It evinces a resolve to stamp out disaffection before the Brest and Toulon fleets arrive. As for Pitt, his letters show a conviction of the need of continuing the repressive measures whereby Camden had "saved the country." He approved the plan of allowing officers to act without the orders of magistrates, seeing that the latter were often murdered for doing their duty. The thinness of his correspondence with Camden is somewhat surprising until we remember that his energies mainly went towards strengthening the army and navy. His letter to Grenville early in June shows that he expected news of the arrival of the French off the Irish coast, since they had got out from Toulon on 19th May.

It is not surprising that Ireland was thought to be their goal. Bonaparte and the Directory had kept the secret of their Eastern Expedition with far more care than Pitt displayed in worming it out. Certainly Pitt's spy system was far less efficient than has been imagined.[497] With ordinary activity the oriental scheme could have been found out from one of Barras' mistresses or from some official at Toulon. The fact that Bonaparte had some time previously engaged Arab interpreters might surely have enlightened an agent of average intelligence. So far back as 20th April French engineers in uniform, accompanied by interpreters, had arrived at Alexandria and Aleppo in order to prepare for the reception of large forces. The interpreters, it is said, "collect all possible information respecting Suez and the navigation of the Red Sea, as also particularly whether the English have any ships in the Persian Gulf. It is supposed that General Buonaparte will divide his army, one corps to be embarked from the Red Sea and pass round to the Gulf of Persia, the other part to proceed from Syria overland to the Euphrates, by which river they are to advance and join the remainder near the mouth of this river; from thence to make, united, the grand descent on the coast of Malabar or Deccan."[498] In these days it is difficult to imagine that this news did not reach Pitt until about 5th July.

The Irish malcontents were as ill informed as Pitt. Basing their hopes on the arrival of the French fleet, they prepared to rise about the end of May. But the arrests in Dublin hurried on their plans. The men of Kildare and Westmeath received orders from the secret Directory in Dublin to take arms on 23rd May, on the understanding that the whole of Ireland would revolt. They were to seize the towns and villages on the roads to Dublin, while the rebels in the city murdered the authorities and captured the chief positions. But on the 22nd the Government seized quantities of arms, and the presence of General Lake's garrison of 4,000 Yeomen daunted the United Irishmen; on the night of the 23rd-24th only the more daring of them stole about the environs, waiting for a signal which never came; and by dawn their bands melted away. In Meath also the rising failed miserably. A large concourse assembled on the historic slopes of Tara Hill, whence 400 Fencibles and Yeomen drove them with ease (25th May).

In Kildare and the north of Wicklow, where the influence of the Fitzgeralds made for revolt, large throngs of men assembled on the night of 23rd-24th May, and made desperate attacks on Naas and Clane, important posts on the roads leading to the capital. Their headlong rushes broke in vain against the stubborn stand of the small garrisons. But at a village hard by, named Prosperous, the rebel leaders fooled the chief of a small detachment by a story of their intention to deliver up arms. Gaining access to the village, they surprised the soldiers in the barracks, girdled them with fire, and spitted them on their pikes as they jumped forth. That night of horror ended with the murder of the Protestant manufacturer, whose enterprise had made their village what it was. A few days later General Ralph Dundas somewhat indiscreetly granted an armistice to a large body of Kildare rebels at Kilcullen on the promise that they would give up their arms and go home. Nevertheless a large body of them were found on the Curragh and barred the way to General Duff, who courageously marched with 600 men to the aid of Dundas. Duff was informed that these rebels would be willing to lay down their arms. His men were advancing towards them when a shot or shots were fired by the rebels, whether in bravado or in earnest is doubtful. The troops, taking it as another act of treachery, charged with fury and drove the mass from the plain with the loss of more than 200 killed. Thus, here again, events made for animosity and bloodshed. Protestants remembered the foul play at Prosperous; the rebels swore to avenge the treachery at the Curragh.

* * * * *

News of the first of these events sped across the Irish Sea on 25th and 26th May. They reached Pitt just before or after his Whitsunday duel on Putney Heath. Thick and fast came the tales of slaughter. On 29th May Camden wrote in almost despairing terms—The rebellion was most formidable and extensive. It would certainly be followed by a French invasion. It must be suppressed at once. The Protestants and the military were mad with fury, and called aloud for a war of extermination. The strife would be marked by unheard-of atrocities. For the sake of human nature, Pitt must at once send 5,000 regular troops. Camden added that cavalry were useless against lines of pikemen, a phrase which tells of the dogged fury of the peasantry. Nevertheless, his assertion that the rebellion was extensive proves his lack of balance. The saving facts of the situation were that the Ulstermen had not yet moved; that Connaught and Munster were quiet; and of Leinster, only Kildare, Wexford, and parts of Carlow and Wicklow were in arms. In Dublin murder was rife, but the pikemen did not muster.

Pitt's reply of 2nd June to Camden is singularly cool. In brief and businesslike terms he stated that, despite the difficulties of the situation, he had already prepared to despatch 5,000 men; but Camden must send them back at the earliest possible moment in order not to disarrange the plans for the war. Still more frigid was the letter of George III to Pitt. The King lamented the need of sending troops to Ireland, as they would thereby be cut off from "active service." Camden (he wrote) must really not press for them unnecessarily. However, as the sword was drawn in Ireland, it must not be sheathed until the rebels submitted unconditionally. Eleven days later the King wrote to Pitt that the new Lord Lieutenant "must not lose the present moment of terror for frightening the supporters of the Castle into an Union with this country; and no further indulgences must be granted to Roman Catholics, as no country can be governed where there is more than one established religion."[499] The thinness of the King's thought is in part redeemed by its tenacity. His mind resembled an elemental two-stringed instrument, which twanged forth two notes—Church and State.

In strange contrast to the calculations of the King and Pitt were the effusions of Camden. On 7th June he referred plaintively to Portland's despatch, stating that only 3,000 men could be sent. He warned Pitt that it was a religious war; priests marched at the head of the rebels, who swept together and drove at their head the reluctant. For the sake of humanity Pitt must send larger reinforcements. He added that Lake was unequal to the emergency. Fortunately, on that day Pitt received the consent of the Marquis Cornwallis to act as Lord Lieutenant and Commander-in-Chief in Ireland. As Camden had more than once pointed out the urgent need of that appointment, it is surprising to find him on 16th June upbraiding Pitt with the suddenness of the change. Surely it was no time for punctiliousness. Already the Ulstermen were rising, and 30,000 rebels were afoot in Wexford. But, as it happened, the worst of the trouble was over before Cornwallis could take the field. Landing on 20th June near Dublin, he heard news portending a speedy decision in Wexford.

It is not easy to account for the savagery of the revolt in that county. The gentry resided among their tenants on friendly terms; and the search for arms had been carried out less harshly than elsewhere. Gordon, the most impartial historian of the rebellion, admits that the floggings and half-hangings had been few in number, yet he adds that the people were determined to revolt, probably from fear that their turn would come. Neither is the religious bigotry of the rebels intelligible. The Protestants were numerous in Wexford town, Enniscorthy, and New Ross; but there seems to have been little religious animosity, except where tales were circulated as to intended massacres of Catholics by Orangemen. The Celt is highly susceptible to personal influence; and, just as that of the Fitzgeralds largely accounts for the rising in Kildare, so does the personality of Father John Murphy explain the riddle of Wexford. The son of a peasant of that county, he was trained for the priesthood at Bordeaux, and ardently embraced the principles of the French Revolution and the aims of United Ireland. His huge frame, ready wit, and natural shrewdness brought him to the front in Wexford; and he concerted the plan of establishing an Irish Republic on a strictly Romanist basis, a programme incompatible with that of Wolfe Tone and the United Irishmen.

Murphy, marching with his flock to the house of a neighbouring Protestant clergyman, bade him and his terrified friends surrender. Meeting with a refusal, they fired the outbuildings; and when the flames gained the house, they granted the prayers of the occupants for mercy if they came out. On coming out the adult males were forthwith butchered. Meeting with large reinforcements from the hills, Father John's pikemen beat off a hasty attack by 110 men of the North Cork Militia, only seven of whom escaped to Wexford. Such were the doings on that Whitsunday in Wexford (27th May). Next, the rebels swept down upon Enniscorthy; and though beaten back from the very heart of the town by the steady valour of the defenders, these last were yet fain to fall back on Wexford. But for the plundering habits of the peasantry, not a man could have reached that town. The priest and his followers now took post on Vinegar Hill, a height east of the River Slaney, which overlooks Enniscorthy and the central plain of the county. There on successive days he and his council dealt out pike-law to some four or five hundred Protestants and landlords. Meanwhile, as no help drew nigh, Maxwell, the commander at Wexford, deeming that town untenable, beat a timely retreat westwards to Duncannon Fort on Waterford Harbour (30th May).

Master of Wexford county, Murphy and his colleague, Father Michael, proposed to raise Wicklow and Waterford. If these efforts succeeded, it was probable that Dublin and Munster would rise. Ulster might then revolt; and the advent of the French would clinch the triumph. In full confidence, then, the masses of pikemen moved against the loyalists at New Ross, an important position on the River Barrow. Parish by parish, the priests at their head, they marched, some 30,000 strong. At dawn of 5th June, when near the town, they knelt during the celebration of Mass. Then they goaded on herds of cattle to serve as an irresistible vanguard, and rushed at the old walls. General Johnstone and the 1,400 defenders were at first overborne and had to retreat over the bridge; but the plundering habits of the victors were their ruin. The soldiery re-formed, regained their cannon, and planting them skilfully, dealt such havoc among the disorderly mass, that finally it surged out into the plain.[500] After their defeat the rebels deposed Harvey, a Protestant, from his nominal command.

This success of the loyalists saved Waterford and Kilkenny from anything more than local riots; and Moore, moving up from Fermoy and Clonmel, soon threatened the rebel county from the west. The beaten peasants glutted their revenge on Protestant prisoners near New Ross; and a general massacre of prisoners at Wexford was averted only by the rapid advance of Moore. Meanwhile, Father John, moving into County Wicklow with a force some 30,000 strong, sought to break down the defence at Arklow. But that important post on the River Avoca was stoutly held by General Needham with some 1,500 men, mostly militia and yeomen. There, too, the priests led on the peasants with a zeal that scorned death. One of the peasant leaders rushed up to a gun, thrust his cap into it, and shouted, "Come along, boys; her mouth is stopped." The next moment he and his men were blown to pieces. Disciplined valour gained the day (9th June), and John and his crusaders retired to Vinegar Hill. His colleague, Father Michael Murphy, who had claimed to be able to catch Protestant bullets, was killed by a cannon-shot; and this may have decided the rebels to retreat.

The British Guards had now arrived, to the inexpressible relief of Camden and his advisers. Beset by reports of a general rising in Ulster and by the furious protests of loyalists against the inaction of Pitt, the Lord Lieutenant had held on his way, acting with energy but curbing the policy of vengeance, so that, as he informed Pitt, he was now the most unpopular man in Ireland. Nevertheless, before he left her shores, he had the satisfaction to see his measures crowned with success. The converging moves of Lake, Needham, Dundas, and Johnstone upon Vinegar Hill cooped up the rebels on that height; and on 21st June the royal troops stormed the slopes with little loss. The dupes of Father John no longer believed in his miraculous powers. The survivors broke away southwards, but then doubled back into the mountains of Wicklow. The war now became a hunt, varied by savage reprisals. Father John was hanged on 26th June. By his barbarities he had ended the dream of United Ireland. Few of the malcontents of Antrim and Down obeyed the call to arms of the United Irishmen early in June; and the risings in those counties soon flickered out. Religious bigotry enabled Dublin Castle once more to triumph.

Pitt was vehemently blamed by Irish loyalists for his apathy at the crisis. The accusation, quite natural among men whose families were in hourly danger, was unjust. As we have seen, even before the arrival of Camden's request, he took steps to send off 5,000 men. As the Duke of York and Dundas cut down that number to 3,000, and endeavoured to prevent any more being sent, they were responsible for the despatch of an inadequate force. If the French detachments intended for Ireland had arrived early in June, they must have carried all before them. But it was not until 22nd August that General Humbert, with 1,100 men, landed at Killala. Even so his little force was believed to be the vanguard of a large army, a fact which explains the revival of rebellion at the end of the summer.

Not until 1st September did Pitt hear this alarming news. At once he ordered all possible reinforcements to proceed to Ireland. There was need of them. The Irish militiamen under Lake and Hutchinson who opposed the French at Castlebar rushed away in wild panic from one-fourth of their numbers (27th August). Such were "the Castlebar Races." Probably the Irishmen were disaffected; for many of them joined the enemy. Cornwallis proceeded to the front, and with 11,000 men made head against the rebels and the French. The latter were now but 800 strong, and after a most creditable stand finally surrendered with the honours of war (8th September). Cornwallis issued a tactful bulletin,[501] commending his troops for their meritorious exertions and trusting to their honour not to commit acts of cruelty against their deluded fellow subjects. In point of fact 11,000 men with difficulty brought 800 to surrender and then gave themselves up to retaliation on the rebels. Fortunately the French Directory sent only small parties of raiders. A month later, Wolfe Tone, with a squadron, appeared off Lough Swilly; but the French ships being overpowered by Sir John Warren, Tone was captured, taken to Dublin, and cut his throat in order to escape the ignominy of a public hanging. Another small French squadron entered Killala Bay late in October, but had to make for the open. Thus flickered out a flame which threatened to shrivel up British rule in Ireland.

What causes contributed to this result? Certainly not the activity and resourcefulness of Pitt and his colleagues; for their conduct at the crisis was weak and tardy. The Duke of York and Dundas must primarily be blamed for the despatch of inadequate reinforcements; but Pitt ought to have overruled their decision. Perhaps the Cabinet believed England to be the objective of Bonaparte and the fleet at Brest; but, thanks to the rapid growth of the Volunteer Movement, England was well prepared to meet an invading force and to quell the efforts of the malcontent Societies. In Ireland the outlook was far more gloomy. After the resignation of Abercromby, Camden and the officials of Dublin Castle were in a state of panic. Pitt did well finally to send over Cornwallis; but that step came too late to influence the struggle in Leinster. In truth the saving facts of the situation were the treachery of informers at Dublin and the diversion of the efforts of Bonaparte towards the East. The former event enabled Camden to crush the rising in Dublin; the latter left thousands of brave Irishmen a prey to the false hopes which the French leaders had designedly fostered, Barras having led Wolfe Tone to believe that France would fight on for the freedom of Ireland. The influence of Bonaparte told more and more against an expedition to her shores; but the Irish patriots were left in the dark, for their rising would serve to distract the energies of England, while Bonaparte won glory in the East. To save appearances, the French Government sent three small expeditions in August to October; but they merely prolonged the agony of a dying cause, and led that deeply wronged people to ask what might not have happened if the promises showered on Wolfe Tone had been made good.

It is recorded of William of Orange, shortly before his intended landing in England, that, on hearing of the march of Louis XIV's formidable army into the Palatinate, he serenely smiled at his rival's miscalculation. Louis sated his troops with plunder and lost a crown for James II. Similarly we may imagine the mental exultation of Pitt on hearing that Bonaparte had gone the way of Alexander the Great and Mark Antony. Camden and he knew full well that Ireland was the danger spot of the British Empire, and that the half of the Toulon force could overthrow the Protestant ascendancy. Some sense of the magnitude of the blunder haunted Napoleon at St. Helena; for he confessed to Las Casas: "If, instead of the expedition to Egypt, I had undertaken that against Ireland, what could England have done now?" In a career, illumined by flashes of genius, but wrecked by strange errors, the miscalculation of the spring of 1798 was not the least fatal. For of all parts of the British Empire Ireland was that in which the Sea Power was most helpless when once a French corps d'armee had landed.

FOOTNOTES:

[476] Pitt MSS., 108. See "Pitt and Napoleon Miscellanies," for a fuller investigation of the Fitzwilliam affair in the light of new evidence.

[477] Lecky, vii, 41-4.

[478] "Dropmore P.," iii, 35-8.

[479] Pitt MSS., 331.

[480] Quoted by Froude, "The English in Ireland," iii, 158-61.

[481] "Autobiography of Wolfe Tone," ii, chs. iv-vi; Guillon, "La France et l'Irlande."

[482] "Mems. of Ld. E. Fitzgerald," ch. xx.

[483] Tone, "Autob.," ii, 99.

[484] "Report of the Comm. of Secrecy" (1799), 22, 25; W. J. Fitzpatrick, "Secret Service under Pitt," ch. x; C. L. Falkiner, "Studies in Irish History," ch. iv; "Castlereagh Corresp.," i, 270-88.

[485] "Lord Colchester's Diary," i, 103.

[486] B.M. Add. MSS., 34454.

[487] Pitt MSS., 326. Quoted with other extracts from Camden's letters, in "Pitt and Napoleon Miscellanies."

[488] Tone, "Autob.," ii, 272.

[489] "Castlereagh Corresp.," i, 165-8.

[490] B.M. Add. MSS., 27808; "Report of the Comm. of Secrecy" (1799), App. x; "Nap. Corresp.," iii, 486-92. For Place see ante, ch. vii.

[491] W. J. Fitzpatrick, "Secret Service under Pitt," ch. iii; "Report of the Comm. of Secrecy" (1799), App. xxvi. For Despard, the plotter of 1802, see "Castlereagh Corresp.," i, 306, 326; ii, 4.

[492] "Auckland Journals," iv, 52. I have published the statements of O'Connor, etc., and the news sent by a British agent at Hamburg, in the "Eng. Hist. Rev." for October 1910.

[493] Pitt MSS., 324; B.M. Add. MSS., 27808; "Dropmore P.," iv, 167. On 24th May 1798 Thelwall wrote to Thos. Hardy from Llyswen, near Brecknock, describing his rustic retreat, and requesting a new pair of farmer's boots for "Stella." He hopes that O'Connor has returned in triumph to his friends. Tierney's vote in favour of suspending the Habeas Corpus Act does not surprise him, for he is vulgar and a sycophant. Hardy is too angry with Sheridan, whose chief offence is in going at all to the House of Commons. Sheridan surely does well in encouraging the people to resist an invasion. "I remain steady to my point—'no nation can be free but by its own efforts.' As for the French Directory and its faction, nothing appears to me to be further from their design than to leave one atom of liberty either to their own or to any nation. If, however, Mr. Sheridan supposes that all his talents can produce even a temporary unanimity while the present crew are in power, even for repelling the most inveterate enemy, he will find himself miserably mistaken. No such unanimity ever can exist: I am convinced, nay, the Ministers themselves seem determined, that it shall not. The only way to produce the unanimity desired is to stand aloof, and let these ruffians go blundering on till our most blessed and gracious sovereign shall see that either Pitt and Co. must bow down to the will of the people or his British crown bow down to five French shillings.... But what have we to do with Directories or politics? Peaceful shades of Llyswen! shelter me beneath your luxuriant foliage: lull me to forgetfulness, ye murmuring waters of the Wye. Let me be part farmer and fisherman. But no more politics—no more politics in this bad world!" (From Mr. A. M. Broadley's MSS.)

[494] Pretyman MSS. See, too, "Diary of Sir J. Moore," i, ch. xi.

[495] "Castlereagh Corresp.," i, 458-67; "Life and Letters of Lady Sarah Lennox," ii, 299-302; "Mems. of Lord E. Fitzgerald," chs. 27-30.

[496] B.M. Add. MSS., 34454.

[497] "Dropmore P.," iv, 230, 239.

[498] B.M. Add. MSS., 34454. News received through Sir F. d'Ivernois.

[499] Pretyman MSS. The King also stated that Pitt had "saved Ireland" by persuading Pelham to return and act as Chief Secretary. Pelham was a clever man, but often disabled by ill health.

[500] J. Alexander, "... Rebellion in Wexford" (Dublin, 1800).

[501] "Cornwallis Corresp.," ii, 395-404. For the panic in Dublin see "Dropmore P.," iv, 289 et seq. Cooke wrote to Castlereagh on 28th September that the Bishop of Killala and his family were saved from slaughter by a few French officers, "who execrate our savages more than they whom they have plundered." He adds that though the United Irishmen began the plot the Catholics are turning it solely to their own interests (Pitt MSS., 327). See, too, H. F. B. Wheeler and A. M. Broadley, "The War in Wexford" (1910).



CHAPTER XVII

THE SECOND COALITION

To reduce France within her ancient limits is an object of evident and pressing interest to the future tranquillity and independence of Europe.—Foreign Office Despatch of 16th November 1798.

It is difficult to realize that the independence of Europe was endangered by the French Republic. We associate the ascendancy of France in Spain, Italy, Germany, Switzerland, and Holland with the personality of Napoleon; and by contrasting him with the pygmies who strutted on the stage after the death of Pitt we find the collapse of Europe intelligible. But a backward glance of one decade more shows France dominating the Continent. True, it was Bonaparte's genius which brought Austria to the humiliating Peace of Campo Formio (October 1797); but his triumphs in Italy merely crowned the efforts of France in 1793-5. After the close of his Italian campaigns a touch of her little finger unseated the Pope. At the Congress of Rastatt her envoys disposed of German duchies and bishoprics in the lordliest way. Switzerland she overran, plundered, and unified. Ferdinand IV of Naples and his consort, Maria Carolina, quaked and fumed at her threats. Prussia was her henchman. And in the first months of his reign Paul I of Russia courted her favour. French policy controlled Europe from the Niemen to the Tagus, from the Zuyder Zee to the Campagna.

Yet this supremacy was in reality unsound. So fitful a ruler as the Czar Paul was certain to weary of his peaceful mood. He had good ground for intervention. By the Treaty of Teschen (1779) Russia became one of the guarantors of the Germanic System which the French now set at naught. Moreover his chivalrous instincts, inherited from his mother, Catharine, were chafed by the news of French depredations in Rome and Switzerland. The growth of indignation at St. Petersburg begot new hopes at Vienna. In truth Francis II, despite his timidity, could not acquiesce in French ascendancy. How could his motley States cohere, if from Swabia, Switzerland, and Italy there dropped on them the corrosive acid of democracy? The appeals from his father-in-law, Ferdinand of Naples, also had some weight. In fine the Court of Vienna decided to make overtures to London. On 17th March 1798 the Chancellor, Thugut, urged his ambassador, Stahremberg, to find out whether England would help Austria against "a fierce nation irrevocably determined on the total subversion of Europe, and rapidly marching to that end"; also whether Pitt would send a fleet to the Mediterranean, and, if necessary, prolong the struggle into the year 1799.[502] The entreaties from Naples were still more urgent.

Pitt resolved to stretch out a helping hand. Early in April he sought to induce Earl Spencer, First Lord of the Admiralty, to send to that sea a strong squadron detached from Earl St. Vincent's force blockading Cadiz. His letter asking for information on several topics is missing; but Spencer's letter to Grenville throws so much light on the situation that I quote parts of it, summarizing the remainder:[503]

Admiralty, April 6, 1798.

"I send you by Mr. Pitt's desire a sketch I have made out of answers to the queries he put down upon paper yesterday in Downing Street. The result is to my mind a decision which I fear will not tally very well with our wishes and the views you have formed as the groundwork of the communication at present proposed with Vienna." He then states that, even if a Russian squadron appears in the North Sea, yet we cannot keep a permanent squadron in the Mediterranean. "For that purpose we should at least have 70 sail, as the Channel cannot be trusted with safety with less than 35, including the coast of Ireland, and the remaining 35 would be but barely enough to watch Cadiz and command the Mediterranean. Our best plan appears to me to be to maintain as long as we can a position between Lisbon and Cadiz, and when we are excluded (which I conclude we soon shall be) from the Tagus, to send Lord St. Vincent with the fleet he now has to take a sweep round the Mediterranean and do all the mischief he can to the French navy." If, he adds, the Spaniards come northward, our home fleet can deal with them: if they go to the Mediterranean and join the French there will not be much danger from so ill-combined a force when opposed to St. Vincent's fleet, "which I consider as being the best formed to act together that perhaps ever existed." If Austria would be satisfied with our sweeping round the Mediterranean, Spencer advocates that plan, but not that of keeping a fleet there, "because, exclusive of the great expense, it would leave the Spaniards too much at liberty."

In answer to Pitt's questions Spencer states the force disposable for the Channel and the coast of Ireland as 34, for the Mediterranean 24; 3 more were fitting for sea, and 8 others were nearing completion; but the chief deficiency was in men, 8,000 more being needed. He adds that the Neapolitans have 4 sail-of-the-line and 7 frigates: the French have 6 sail at Corfu; but he thinks not more than 10 sail can be equipped at Toulon. He regards the Venetian fleet as valueless.

Clearly Spencer underrated the force at Toulon and in the ports of North Italy. But, even so, the position was critical. To send an undermanned fleet into the Mediterranean, while France was preparing a blow at Ireland, seemed almost foolhardy. Nevertheless, Pitt resolved to do so. For, as he stated to Grenville on 7th April, they must encourage Austria to play a decisive part in resisting French aggression; and, in view of the revival of the old English spirit, he was prepared to brave the risks of invasion, deeming even that event preferable to a lingering and indecisive war. As usual, Pitt's view prevailed; and a few days later orders went forth to St. Vincent to despatch a squadron under Nelson to the Mediterranean, Austria being also apprised of this decision, in terms which implied the formation of a league against France. While Russia and, if possible, Prussia defended Germany, Austria was to expel the French from Italy.[504] Here again Pitt's hopeful nature led him to antedate the course of events. The new Coalition came about very slowly. England and Austria were held apart by disputes respecting the repayment of the last loan, on which Pitt and Grenville insisted, perhaps with undue rigour. Distrust of Prussia paralysed the Court of Vienna, and some time elapsed before it came to terms with Russia. But in the midst of the haggling came news which brought new vigour to the old monarchies.

On 1st August 1798 Nelson destroyed the French fleet in Aboukir Bay; and thus, at one blow, naval supremacy in the Mediterranean passed from the tricolour to the Union Jack. This momentous change resulted primarily from the bold resolve of Pitt to encounter even a French descent on our coasts, provided that he could strike at France in the Mediterranean. Thus he exchanged the defensive for the offensive in a way no less bewildering to the French than reassuring to friendly Powers; and it is noteworthy that he adopted the same course in 1805, in sending Craig's expedition into that sea, thereby replacing Addington's tame acceptance of events by a vigorous policy which heartened Austria and Naples for the struggle against Napoleon. On both occasions he ran great risks, but his audacity proved to be the highest prudence. The results of the Battle of the Nile were immeasurably great. Bonaparte and his 30,000 veterans were cooped up in Egypt. The Maltese rose against the French garrison of Valetta two days after the arrival of the glad tidings from the Nile. At Naples the news aroused a delirium of joy, and filled Queen Maria Carolina with a resolve to drive the French force from the Roman States.

To Pitt also the news of Nelson's triumph brought intense relief. The disappearance of Bonaparte's armada after the capture of Malta had caused much concern. True, Naples, which was thought to be his objective, was safe; but Ireland and Portugal were deemed in jeopardy. No one at Whitehall anticipated the seizure of Malta and Egypt, still less the emergence of plans for a French conquest of India. A tone of anxiety pervades Pitt's letter of 22nd August to his mother: "The account of Bonaparte's arrival at Alexandria is, I am afraid, true; but it gives us no particulars, and leaves us in entire suspense as to Nelson."[505] All the greater, then, was the relief on 2nd October, when tidings of Aboukir at last arrived.

Further, there were signs of a Russo-French war. The romantic nature of the Czar was fired by the hope of acquiring Malta. At Ancona, early in 1797, Bonaparte had intercepted a Russian envoy bearing offers of alliance to the Knights of the Order of St. John; and their expulsion by the French at Midsummer 1798 seemed to Paul a personal affront. Some of the Knights proceeded to St. Petersburg and claimed his protection. The affairs of the Order became his most cherished concern; and on 24th July Sir Charles Whitworth, British ambassador at that Court, reported that Russia would now become a principal in the war against France, her aim being the re-establishment of peace on safe and honourable terms, but not the restoration of the French monarchy, on which Catharine had insisted. With this declaration the British and Austrian Cabinets were in full accord; and thus at last there was a hope of framing a compact Coalition. Fortunate was it that Bonaparte's seizure of Malta incensed Paul against France; for, early in August, the Swiss thinker, Laharpe, tutor of the future Czar Alexander I, brought tempting offers from Paris, with a view to the partition of the Turkish Empire.[506] That glittering prize was finally to captivate the fancy of Paul; but for the present he spurned the offer as degrading.

Nevertheless, the news of Aboukir did not wholly please him. For, while rejoicing at the discomfiture of the French atheists, he saw in Nelson's victory a sign of England's appropriation of Malta. In truth, that island now became the central knot of far-reaching complications. Formerly the bulwark of Christendom against the infidels, it now sundered European States.[507] So doubtful was the attitude of Paul and Francis that Pitt, in October 1798, twice wrote despondingly as to any definite decision on their part. All that was clear was their inordinate appetite for subsidies. These he of course withheld, knowing full well that neither would Paul tolerate for long the presence of the French at Malta, nor Francis their occupation of Switzerland. In any case he resolved not to give more than L2,000,000 to the two Empires for the year 1799.[508] For the time his hope lay only in the exertions of England, Europe being meantime "left to its fate." In order to humour the Czar, who was about to become Grand Master of the Knights of St. John, Grenville, on 23rd November, wrote to assure his Government that England renounced all aims of conquest in the Adriatic, or of the possession of Malta.

At the close of the year Pitt proudly displayed the inexhaustible resources of Great Britain. His Budget speech of 3rd December 1798 marks an epoch in economic history, alike for the boldness of the underlying conception and the statesmanlike assessment of the national resources. Well might Mallet du Pan declare that the speech surpassed all previous efforts in its illuminating exposition of a nation's finance. As appeared in our survey of the Budget of 1797, Pitt then sought to meet the year's expenses within the year. To a generation accustomed to shift present burdens on to its successors the proposal seemed Quixotic; and Fox blamed him for not adopting this device. Pitt held to his plan, and outlined a ten per cent. tax upon income. Having failed to gain the requisite tenth by means of the Assessed Taxes, he proposed to raise it by methods which even the shirkers could with difficulty circumvent.

In order to lay a first rough actuarial basis for his Income Tax, he made a careful study of the nation's resources in the autumn of 1798. The results he summarized in an interesting statement. There were available at that time only rough estimates, even as to the area of cultivated land and its average rental. Relying upon Davenant, King, Adam Smith, Arthur Young, and Middleton, he estimated the area at 40,000,000 acres, and the average rental at 15s. an acre. He prudently fixed the taxable value at 12s. 6d. an acre. The yearly produce of mines, timber, and canal shares he assessed at L3,000,000. He reckoned house rent at double that sum, and the earnings of the legal profession at one half of it. Half a million he deemed well within the total of doctors' fees. He assessed the incomes derived from the British West Indies at L4,000,000, and those from the rest of the world at L1,000,000, a highly suggestive estimate. Tithes were reckoned at L4,000,000; annuities from the public funds at L12,000,000; the same sum for profits derived from foreign commerce; and L28,000,000 for the profits of internal trade, whether wholesale or retail. Fixing the rental of land at L6,000,000, he computed the total national income as L102,000,000, which should therefore yield not less than L10,000,000 a year. He proposed to safeguard the collection by imposing an oath at the declaration of income, and enjoining absolute secrecy on the Crown commissioners. The new tax, beginning from April 1799, would take the place of the Assessed Taxes. As will appear in a later chapter, the new impost did not yield the amount which Pitt expected; but the failure was probably due to defects in the methods of collection. Pitt further proposed to set aside L1,200,000 for the Sinking Fund.

His purpose in making this prodigious effort was to inspirit other nations to similar patriotic exertions. He pointed out with pride that after nearly six years of war British exports and imports exceeded those of any year of peace. Thus, far from declining in strength and prowess, as croakers averred, England had never shone so transcendently in the arts of peace and the exploits of war, a prodigality of power which presaged the vindication of her own rights and of the liberties of Europe.

What was the new Europe which Pitt sought to call to being? The question is of deep interest, not only as a psychological study, but as revealing glimpses of British policy in the years 1814-15. The old order having been rudely shaken in Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and Italy, Pitt sought to effect a compromise between the claims of tradition and those of expediency. It being of paramount importance to safeguard Europe against France, Pitt and Grenville insisted on the limitation of that Power within its old boundaries, and the complete independence of Switzerland and Holland. That of the Kingdom of Sardinia afterwards figured in their stipulations. But one significant change now appears. The restoration of Austrian rule at Brussels being impracticable, it was suggested that the Belgic Provinces should go to the Prince of Orange when restored to his rights at The Hague. In the desperate crisis of 1805, as we shall see, Pitt sought to allure Prussia by offering Belgium to her; but that was a passing thought soon given up. The other solution of the Netherlands Question finally prevailed, thanks to the efforts of Pitt's pupil, Castlereagh, in 1814. The Foreign Office did not as yet aim at the retention of the Cape of Good Hope and Ceylon as a set off to British efforts for the Dutch and their acquisition of Belgium; but this thought was already taking shape. The barrier against French aggressions in the south-east was to be found in the reconstituted Kingdom of Sardinia, the House of Savoy rendering in that quarter services similar to the House of Orange in Flanders and Brabant. In other respects the British Cabinet favoured Austria's plans of aggrandisement in Italy as enhancing her power in a sphere which could not arouse the jealousy of Prussia. The aims of Berlin not being known, except that the restoration of the House of Orange was desired, Pitt and Grenville remained silent on that topic.[509]

The question whether the peoples concerned would submit to this under-girding of the European fabric did not trouble them. They saw only the statics of territories; they had no conception of the dynamics of nations. A future in which Nationality, triumphant in Italy and Germany, would bring about a Balance of Power far more solid than any which their flying buttresses could assure, was of course entirely hidden from them. But they failed to read the signs of the times. The last despairing efforts of the Poles, and the levee en masse of the French people, now systematized in the Conscription Law of 5th September 1798, did not open their eyes to the future. For they were essentially men of the Eighteenth Century; and herein lay the chief cause of their failure against Revolutionary France. They dealt with lands as with blocks. She infused new energy into peoples.

* * * * *

Meanwhile the return of Nelson to the Neapolitan coast intoxicated that Court with joy. Queen Maria Carolina, ever the moving spirit at Naples, now laid her plans for the expulsion of the French from Italy. Trusting to her influence over her son-in-law, Francis II, and to a defensive compact which the Courts of Vienna and Naples had framed on 20th May 1798, she sought to incite him to take the offensive. Her close friendship with Lady Hamilton, wife of the British ambassador at Naples, also enabled her to gain complete ascendancy over Nelson, who, with his usual hatred of "the French villains," counselled open and immediate war. For abetting this design, Sir William Hamilton received a sharp rebuke from Downing Street. Francis II and Thugut were even more annoyed. They repulsed the Neapolitan emissary who begged for help, and roundly accused the Pitt Ministry of inciting Naples to war in order to drag in Austria. Their anger was not appeased by the successes of the Neapolitans near Rome, which the French evacuated on 29th November. The counter-stroke soon fell. The French, rallying in force, pushed the Bourbon columns southwards; and the early days of 1799 witnessed in swift succession the surrender of Naples, the flight of its Court and the Hamiltons to Palermo on Nelson's fleet, the foundation of the Parthenopean Republic, and the liquefaction of the blood of St. Januarius in sign of divine benediction on the new regime.[510]

Nevertheless, Nelson and the royal fugitives had set in motion forces which elsewhere made for triumph. Paul, re-assured as to England's desire to re-establish the Order of St. John at Malta, entered into an alliance with her on 29th December 1798, whereby the two Powers agreed to reduce France within her old boundaries, Russia furnishing to England an army of 45,000 men, mainly with a view to the support of Prussia, on condition of receiving L75,000 per month and three months' subsidies in advance. She also promised to send 3,000 men to help in the siege of the French garrison at Malta and others to assist England in the defence of the Neapolitan lands. Austria, resentful towards Pitt and fearful of Prussia's designs, still held back, though the events in Italy, especially the dethronement of Charles Emmanuel IV of the House of Savoy by the French should have spurred her to action. Probably she waited until the needs of England and Russia should enable her to dictate her terms. The cupidity of Thugut had been whetted by Pitt's speech as to the wealth of England; and the efforts of Cobenzl at St. Petersburg led Whitworth to sign a compact on terms so onerous to the British Treasury as to draw on him a sharp disclaimer and reprimand from London.[511] So matters dragged on far into the year 1799, when plans for the ensuing campaign ought to have been matured.

Still more luckless were the dealings of the British Cabinet with Prussia. In the hope of winning over Frederick William III, Grenville in November 1798 despatched his brother Thomas on a mission to Berlin. His journey thither was one of the longest and most eventful on record. At Yarmouth he was detained by easterly gales; and when at last the packet boat made the mouth of the Elbe it was wrecked. The passengers and crew succeeded in making their way to shore over the pack-ice, Grenville saving his papers, except the "full-power" needful for signing a treaty. He reached Cuxhaven in great exhaustion; and arrived at Berlin on 17th March, only to find that the French by daring and intrigue had cowed the North German States into subservience. The terrible winter of 1798-9 largely accounts for the delays which ruined the subsequent campaign. Whitworth remained long without news from Downing Street; and at last, on 12th February, announced that he had received nine posts at once. Meanwhile France, controlling all the coasts from Bremen to Genoa, not only excluded British messengers, but carried on her diplomatic bargaining in Germany without let or hindrance. For all his trouble, Thomas Grenville could get no firm footing amidst the shifting sands of Prussian diplomacy. So nervous were the Austrian Ministers as to Prussia's future conduct that they seemed about to come to terms with France and join in the plunder of the smaller German States. This might have been the upshot had not French armies crossed the Rhine (1st March 1799), and shortly afterwards invaded the Grisons Canton.[512] Goaded to action, Francis II declared war eleven days later. On 28th April Austrian hussars seized the French envoys withdrawing from Rastatt, murdering two of the four and seizing the papers of all.

Thus began the war of the Second Coalition. Bonaparte's seizure of Malta and Egypt without a declaration of war, and the unbearable aggressions of the French in Switzerland, Italy, and on the Rhine, stirred to action States which the diplomatic efforts of Pitt and Grenville had left unmoved. For none of the wars of that period was France so largely responsible. Even now, when the inroad of the French into Germany threatened the ascendancy of Prussia, Frederick William declined to join the Allies; and his unstatesmanlike refusal thwarted the plans of Pitt for the march of the subsidized Muscovite force through Prussia for the recovery of Holland.

Another essential point was Switzerland. Like a bastion frowning over converging valleys, that Alpine tract dominates the basins of the Po, the Inn, the Upper Rhine, and the Upper Rhone. He who holds it, if strong and resolute, can determine the fortunes of North Italy, Eastern France, South Germany, and the West of the Hapsburg domains. Further, by closing the passes over the Alps he can derange the commerce of Europe; and the sturdy mountaineers will either overbear the plain-dwellers, or will serve as mercenaries in their forces. Accordingly Switzerland, like her Asiatic counterpart, Afghanistan, has either controlled her neighbours, or has been fought for by them. As commerce-controller, provider of troops, and warden of the passes, she holds a most important position. Fortunate it is that the Swiss have loved freedom, or money, more than dominion. For so soon as a great State possesses their land, the Balance of Power becomes a fiction.

Pitt evinced sure insight in his resolve to free the Switzers from the Jacobin yoke. To it the men of the Forest Cantons succumbed only after desperate struggles, which inspired Wordsworth with one of the noblest of his sonnets. There is no sign that Pitt set much store on winning over the public opinion of Europe by siding with the oppressed against the oppressor, as his disciple, Canning, did during the Spanish National Rising; but help from the Swiss was certainly hoped for. So early as August 1798 Pitt proposed to allot L500,000 for assistance to them, and, but for the delays at St. Petersburg and Vienna, the Allies might have rescued that brave people before it fell beneath the weight of numbers. Even in March 1799, when the rising against the French had scarcely begun, he set apart L31,000 per month for the purpose of equipping a corps of 20,000 Swiss. On 15th March, after hearing of the outbreak of war on the Rhine, Grenville urged that the Russian force subsidized by England should march towards Switzerland, now that Prussia's doubtful behaviour prevented a conquest of Holland by land. He also insisted that this addition to the allied forces destined for Switzerland must not be allowed to lessen the number of Austrians operating there.[513]

The Court of Vienna at once saw in the subsidized Russian army a tool useful for its own plans, and requested that it should serve with the Austrians in Swabia. The answer to this singular request can be imagined. For a day or two Whitworth was also disturbed by a belated effort of the French Directory to restore peace. It offered Poland to the Elector of Saxony, and Saxony to Prussia for her friendly services, Austria being led to expect Bavaria, if she would keep Russia "within her ancient limits." Whitworth mentioned this overture to Cobenzl, and saw him blush for the first time on record.[514] Probably, then, the scheme had some powerful backing; but now Austria had crossed the Rubicon.

At first all went well. The French had played a game of bluff which they could not sustain. On all sides they were worsted in a way which suggests how decisive the campaign might have been had the Allies heartily seconded the salutary plans of Pitt. Unfortunately, despite his efforts, no compact came about between Great Britain and Austria. Russia and the Hapsburg State were but loosely connected; and, owing to a long delay in the arrival of the ratification of the Anglo-Russian Treaty, Paul did not until the beginning of May send forward the subsidized army under the command of Korsakoff.

On the other hand, the auxiliary Russian force sent forward to the help of Austria had by that time helped the white-coats to win notable triumphs in North Italy. In the months of April and May, Melas and the Imperialists, powerfully backed by Suvoroff's Muscovites, carried all before them, and drove the enemy from Milan. Soon afterwards the Allies entered Turin; and only by hard fighting and heavy losses did Moreau with the chief French army cut his way through to the Genoese coast. Meanwhile General Macdonald, retiring with a French corps from Naples, left that city to the vengeance of Nelson and Maria Carolina with results that are notorious. The French general made a brave stand in North Italy, only to fall before the onsets of the Allies at the Trebbia (17th-19th June). He, too, barely escaped to Genoa, where the relics of the two French armies faced about. These successes aroused the highest hopes at Westminster. Canning, who resigned his Under-Secretaryship of Foreign Affairs in March 1799, wrote that he cared not whether the Austrians were beaten; for their failure would serve as a good example to Europe. But in June, after their brilliant successes, he expressed a confident hope of the collapse of "the monstrous fabrick of crimes and cruelties and abominations" known as French policy; he added that Prussia could not be so stupid as to hold aloof from the Coalition; and that Pitt, again vigorous in mind and body, would carry through the war to the end.

But now in the train of victory there appeared its parasite, discord. The re-conquest of Italy was so brilliant and easy as to arouse disputes about the spoils; and when the Imperialists began to treat Suvoroff and his heroes cavalierly, the feud became acute. His complaints to his Sovereign that the Austrians thwarted him at every turn threw the irascible Czar into a rage, and he inveighed against the insolence of the Court of Vienna and its minions. Finally, in order to end these disputes, the British Ministry proposed the departure of Suvoroff to Switzerland in order to take command of Korsakoff's subsidized force. In the third week of June Grenville urged this plan on the Russian Court as securing concentration of force and unity of command, the result in all probability being the liberation of Switzerland, whereupon the Allies could prepare for an invasion of France on her undefended flank, Franche Comte. England (added Grenville) disapproved of the presence of "Louis XVIII" at the Russian headquarters; and if Monsieur, his brother, issued a declaration, it must be drafted with care. The need of caution appears in Monsieur's offer of pardon and clemency to the misguided French, provided that they joined his standard.[515]

The Allies, it will be seen, built their hopes on a revolt of the royalists of the East of France. In fact, widespread risings were expected. Bordeaux had been the centre of a conspiracy for leaguing together the malcontents of la Vendee with those of the South, these again being in touch with the royalists of the Lyonnais and Franche Comte. Wickham, who was sent as British agent to Switzerland in June 1799, opened up an extensive correspondence which promised to lead to a formidable revolt whenever the Allies invaded Franche Comte and Nice. The malcontents had as leaders Generals Precy, Pichegru, and Willot. In due course the Comte d'Artois ("Monsieur") was to appear and put himself at their head. Accordingly, in August 1799, he left Holyrood, came to London, and dined at Grenville's house with him and Pitt. The Prime Minister afterwards paid him a private visit: but the details of their conference are not known. It is certain, however, that the Cabinet accorded large sums of money to Wickham for use in the East of France. Even after the failure in Switzerland, he pressed for the payment of L365,000 in order to maintain the royalist movement.[516]

Pitt, then, was bent on using all possible means for humbling France; and, in view of her disasters in the field, the discontent at home, and the absence of Bonaparte's army in Egypt, the triumph of the Allies seemed to depend solely on their unanimity. Much can be said in favour of the British plan of uniting the two Russian armies in Switzerland to act with that of the Archduke Charles, in order to strike at Franche Comte in overwhelming force, while the Austrians in Italy invaded Nice. If all the moves had taken place betimes, formidable forces would have been massed for an attack upon the weakest parts of the French frontier. The Czar agreed to the plan on 9th July; but the Emperor Francis withheld his sanction for a suspiciously long time. Here again, as in 1794-6, the men of the pen interfered with the men of the sword. Immersed in plans for a vast extension of Austria's domains in Italy, Thugut turned a deaf ear to the demands of Russia and England for the restoration of the House of Savoy to the throne of Turin. He declared that, as Austria had recovered the continental domains of that dynasty, she could therefore dispose of them. It soon appeared that she sought to appropriate Piedmont, as well as Venetia, Lombardy, Parma, Modena, and the northern part of the Papal States in place of her troublesome Belgic domains, thus liberally fulfilling Pitt's suggestion that her chief gains should be on the side of Italy.

On this question Pitt and Grenville differed. The latter, sympathizing with Russia, strongly objected to Austria annexing Piedmont. Pitt, however, maintained that such an acquisition would not resemble the partition of Poland or of Venetia; for Charles Emmanuel had lost his lands through his own weakness, and now did nothing towards recovering them. Further, it was to the advantage of Europe that the rescuing Power, Austria, should hold them as a barrier against France. If the Czar Paul could not be induced to take this view we might leave the two Empires to settle the matter; but, at present this solution offered the best chance of arriving at a compact with Austria so much to be desired. Thus, in order to strengthen the Barrier System against France, Pitt was prepared to sacrifice legal rights to expediency, while Grenville upheld the claims of justice.

* * * * *

Limits of space preclude an investigation of the causes of the humiliating failure of the campaign in Switzerland. Suffice it to say that, when Korsakoff's army finally entered the north-east of Switzerland, the Archduke Charles was compelled by imperious mandates from Vienna to withdraw into Swabia. He foresaw disaster; and it soon came. While Suvoroff's army was toiling down the northern defiles of the St. Gotthard, Massena, after receiving strong reinforcements, overwhelmed Korsakoff at Zurich (25th-26th September). That Pitt expected defeat after the withdrawal of the Archduke Charles appears from his letter to Windham:

Downing Street, 30th August 1799.[517]

I should gladly accept your proposal to join the water-party today, but I came to town to meet Lord Grenville; and, having seen him, I am preparing to return part of the way to Walmer in the course of the evening. I was brought to town by the vexatious accounts from Vienna, which give too great a chance of our being disappointed in our best hopes by the blind and perverse selfishness of Austria's counsels.

Grenville was equally indignant and accused Austria of treachery.[518] Much can be said in support of that charge. Whatever may have been her motive, her conduct ruined the campaign. South-east of Zurich, Soult routed Hotze's Austrian corps, which might have linked the movements of Suvoroff with those of Korsakoff, and Suvoroff on arriving at Altorff found no other course practicable than to strike away eastwards over the Panixer Pass to Coire in the Grisons. There he arrived after severe hardships on 8th October, and swore never again to act with the Austrians. Paul, on hearing these dire tidings, registered the same vow, and informed the Viennese Court that thenceforth he separated his interests entirely from hers. Thus was it that Pitt's plans miscarried. Thus was it that British subsidies were flung away into the limbo strewn with tokens of Hapsburg fatuity.

* * * * *

The Anglo-Russian effort against the Batavian Republic is often referred to as if it were the principal event of the year 1799. On the contrary, it was little more than a diversion intended to help the chief enterprise in Switzerland and Franche Comte. The Czar Paul and Pitt probably did not intend to hold the Dutch Provinces unless the Allies pressed France hard on the Swiss frontier and the Orange party rose in force. If these contingencies held good, then Holland might be held as far as the River Waal. If not, then the effort must be temporary. Even so, its advantages were great. The seizure of the Dutch fleet at the Texel and Helder would end all chance of invasion from that quarter. Fears of such an attempt had prompted a counter-stroke dealt by General Coote's force in the spring of 1798 at the sluice-gates near Ostend. Its surrender under untoward circumstances was, perhaps, nearly counterbalanced by the destruction of canal works necessary for the assembly of the flat-bottomed boats at Ostend.

For a brief space the doubtful attitude of Prussia led Pitt and Grenville to concert a larger scheme. They hoped to form a great array of Prussians, Russians, Britons, and Hanoverians which would sweep the French out of Holland; but obviously such a plan depended on the support of the Berlin Cabinet. If it were hostile, or even unfriendly, no force could advance through Hanover for the delivery of Holland; for it would be at the mercy of Prussia. In order to bring her into the league, Pitt and Grenville held out the promise of gains near the Dutch frontier; but she held coyly aloof, doubtless from a conviction that Austria would oppose her aggrandisement. So at least Thugut declared to Eden on his departure from Vienna. Well might his successor, Lord Minto, remark that the Allies spent as much time in watching each other's moves as those of the enemy.