duct during the discussions of the mediation, if the historian cannot positively applaud them, he will find at least that it is difficult to blame them for it, and still more so to discover in it a sufficient ground of war. In effect, these political wiles, far from being new or extraordinary, are but too frequent; all statesmen, and especially those who employ them, consider such means, if not honorable, at least allowable for attaining their ends. But, as we have already observed, the primary and capital motive, to which all the others did little more than serve as a veil, was the wish to destroy the maritime superiority of England. The king of Spain even made the avowal of it, herein also imitating the candor of the king of France. He formally declared in his manifesto, that in order to obtain a durable peace, it was necessary to set bounds to the immoderate power of England by sea, and to demonstrate the falsity of those principles upon which she founded her usurpation. He concluded with observing, that the other maritime powers, and all the nations of the universe, were interested in the triumph of so equitable a cause. This argument was no doubt as just as it was noble; but it would have been more honorable still, if the tyrannical domination of England, about which so much noise was then made, had not been, not only peaceably tolerated for a long series of years, but even formally acknowledged. The king of Great Britain replied with another manifesto, wherein no little address was displayed in refuting the assertions of the two kings, his enemies. It closed with the most energetic, but the most ordinary protestations of his regard for humanity. Since these pompous declamations have been brought into use between the governments of civilised nations, is it found that wars are become less frequent, or less destructive?

While the two belligerent parties were endeavoring to justify their conduct in the sight of the universe, while each of the kings was protesting that he had not been the first disturber of peace, the fleets of France and Spain presented themselves with formidable parade upon the coasts of Great Britain. They consisted of sixty-six ships of the line, comprehending a Spaniard of one hundred and fourteen guns, the San Trinidad, two Frenchmen of one hundred and ten, and one hundred and four, the Bretagne and the Ville de Paris, eight others of eighty, and fifteen of seventy-four; the rest of less force. This immense armada was followed by a cloud of frigates, corvettes, cutters, and fire ships. It was commanded in chief by the count d' Orvilliers who mounted the Bretagne; the vanguard was under the conduct of the count de Guichen, and the rear under the conduct of don Gaston. The vanguard was itself preceded by a light squadron commanded by M. de la Touche Treville, and composed of five swift sailing ships, and all the frigates which were not attached to the first divisions. The object of this squadron was to discover and announce whatever should appear at sea.

Finally, the armament was followed by another squadron of observation, composed of sixteen ships of the line, at the orders of don Lewis de Cordova. The design of the allies was, according to appearances, to make a descent upon that part of the coasts of Great Britain which they should find the most conveniently accessible. Every thing seemed to conspire in their favor; even the importance of the enterprise, the immensity of their forces, the defenceless condition of Ireland, the inferiority of the British marine, the weakness of the regular tropps that remained for the defence of England, since the greater part had been sent to America and the West Indies. Beside this fleet, one of the most tremendous which the ocean had ever borne, three hundred transports were prepared at Havre de Grace, St. Malo, and other ports on that coast. All was in movement in the northern provinces of France. Upwards of forty thousand men lined the coasts of Normandy and Britanny; many other regiments were on the march to join them from other parts of the kingdom. The king appointed the generals who were to conduct the expedition. The troops who were already assembled upon the coasts that looked towards England, daily exercised themselves in the various manoeuvres of embarkation and debarkation. Each soldier manifested the most eager desire to set foot on the opposite shore, in order to combat and prostrate an ancient rival. An artillery as numerous as well served, was attached to this army; five thousand grenadiers, the flower of the French troops, had been drawn from all the regiments, to form the vanguard, and strike the first blows.

England was seasonably apprised of the preparations of France, and the invasion with which she was menaced. The ministers had promptly directed all the measures of defence, which the shortness of time, and the present state of the kingdom admitted; they had assembled thirty-eight ships of the line, under the command of admiral sir Charles Hardy, and had sent him to cruise in the Bay of Biscay, in order, if still possible, to prevent the junction of the two hostile fleets. It is difficult to comprehend, that armaments which occupied so vast an extent of sea, and whose light squadrons were reciprocally on the look out, should not have encountered, or come to any knowledge the one of the other. The king of England issued a proclamation, informing his subjects that the enemy threatened to invade the kingdom. The officers in command upon the coasts were ordered to stand on the alert, and at the first appearance of danger to remove the cattle and provisions to a proper distance. The militia exercised continually in arms, and held themselves in readiness to march to the places of debarkation. The royal guards themselves expected every moment the order to march. All minds were strongly excited at the danger of the country; but amidst the senti

ments of fear and hope which agitated them, the resolution to resist valiantly was general.

Meanwhile, the combined fleet which had been detained a long time by calms at the entrance of the channel, all at once made its appearance there, the fifteenth of August; it presented itself before Plymouth with dread display. The alarm was immediately spread among the inhabitants of the coasts; the militia flew to their post; the guards were doubled at the arsenals of Plymouth and Portsmouth. The bank in the latter town was closed; all commerce was suspended. From all parts of the coast of Cornwall, whole families were seen flying towards the inland countries with their most valuable effects. A new incident added to the universal panic. The Ardent ship of the line, of sixty-four guns, which had sailed from Portsmouth in order to join the fleet of admiral Hardy, fell into the hands of the French in view of Plymouth. During this time the British admiral was standing off and on near the mouth of the channel; his inferiority, and the position of the enemy, not permitting him to bring succour to his country, amidst the perils that menaced it. But, what men could not do, was operated by chance. At the moment when the success of this great enterprise was going to be decided, all at once there sprung up a violent gale from the northeast, which forced the combined fleet to quit the channel for the open ocean. The gale having abated, it displayed itself anew from the Lands End and the Scilly islands to the chops of the channel, with intent to intercept admiral Hardy, and to prevent his retreat into the ports of England. Nevertheless, he profited with so much ability of a favorable wind, that on the thirty-first of August he made good his entrance into the channel in full view of the allies, who could not hinder him. His design was, to entice them up to the narrowest part of the strait, where the superiority of numbers would avail them little, and the advantage of position would thus compensate the inequality of forces. The allies followed him as far as Plymouth. Each of the hostile fleets preserved the best order; the British to avoid being approached till after having arrived at the desirable point, and to be always prepared to fall upon such of the enemy's vessels as should chase them too near; the French and Spaniards, to keep together, and to gain Plymouth before the enemy. But admiral Hardy having eluded all the projects of his adversary, the count d'Orvilliers decided to retire from the coasts of England, and return to Brest. His retreat was attributed at the time to several causes, such as the continued prevalence of east winds, the want of provisions, the proximity of the equinox, and the great sickness and mortality among his crews, by which some of the ships were totally disabled.

Such was the issue of an expedition which seemed to portend the downfall of a most powerful empire. If there never had been so great a naval force assembled on the seas, so never were effects less

answerable to appearances. Enfeebled by the loss of more than five thousand sailors, victims of the epidemic, the combined fleet could attempt no enterprise during the rest of the campaign. It followed that the weaker gathered those fruits which the stronger might reasonably have expected. Not only the numerous fleets of British merchantmen, loaded with the riches of the two Indies, arrived happily in the ports of Great Britain, but the squadron of Hardy put to sea again, and captured a multitude of French and Spanish vessels. Europe was astonished; she had not expected that so many preparations and such mighty efforts were to end in this wise. The glory of the British marine thus acquired a new lustre. The allies bad, assuredly, shown no want either of ability or of valor; but the greater part of men judge of merit by success, and the arms of the enemies of England lost much of their splendor. But whatever might be the causes which prevented the great naval armaments of the belligerent powers from coming to a decisive action, a few days after their retreat several partial combats were engaged, in which the French, the English, and the Americans seemed to vie for the palm of deep and desperate valor. The count d' Orvilliers had sent out from Brest, to observe the movements of the British fleet, the frigate Surveillante, commanded by the chevalier du Couedic, and the cutter Expedition, at the orders of the viscount de Roquefeuil. These two vessels fell in, near the isle of Ouessant, with the British frigate Quebec, captain Farmer, accompanied also by a sloop called the Rambler. The two parties immediately engaged with fury. The forces, skill and bravery being equal on both sides, the action lasted three hours and a half. The frigates fought so close that several times their yards got entangled. Their artillery had already made a frightful ravage; the decks were covered with dead and wounded, their masts shivered and shot away; they could no longer be steered. Nor one nor other, however, seemed disposed to retire or surrender. The French captain received a wound in the head and fainted; but on recovering sense, he immediately resumed the command. Two fresh wounds in the belly could not constrain him to give over, on the contrary he gave orders for boarding. Captain Farmer displayed, on his part, an invincible courage. To smooth the way for boarding, the French threw a great quantity of grenades aboard the Quebec. Her sails took fire; the flames spread, and soon caught other parts of the ship. The English exerted themselves to extinguish them, and obstinately refused to strike. The chevalier du Couedic, to avoid the combustion, was forced to think of retiring, which he with difficulty accomplished. His bowsprit got embarrassed with the rigging of the enemy. At length the fire took the magazine of the British frigate, and she blew up with her colors waving to the last.

The French captain, with an example of humanity that cannot be honored enough, devoted all his cares to saving the greatest possible number of his enemies, who, to escape the flames, threw themselves headlong into the sea. Only forty-three of them could be rescued from the waves, the sole survivors of three hundred men who composed the company of the Quebec. Captain Farmer was swallowed up with the wreck of his ship. The French frigate was unable to move; the cutter Expedition, disengaged herself from the Rambler, which she had combated with advantage, in order to succour the Surveillante. She took her in tow, and brought her the following day into the port of Brest. The French government faithful to its own examples and those of civilised nations, sent free to England the forty-three Englishmen, not willing to retain those prisoners who, in the same day, had escaped the fury of men, cannon, fire and water. The French had forty killed and a hundred wounded. The king promoted the chevalier du Couedic to the rank of captain of ship. But he could not long enjoy the glorious reputation which his valor and humanity had acquired him; his wounds proved mortal three days after the engagement. He was

deeply regretted in France; his name was pronounced with distinction throughout Europe, but no where with warmer eulogium than in England.

A few days before, the coasts of Great Britain had witnessed a combat no less sanguinary, and no less honorable for the two parties. Paul Jones, a Scotchman by birth, but engaged in the service of the United States, had established his cruise at first in the seas of Ireland, and afterwards in those of Scotland, where he was waiting for an opportunity to make some prize, or, according to his practice, to land upon some point of the coast in order to sack the country. His flotilla was composed of the Bonhomme Richard of forty guns, the Alliance of thirty-six, both American ships; the Pallas, a French frigate of thirty-two, in the pay of Congress, with two other smaller vessels. He fell in with a British merchant fleet, on its return from the Baltic, convoyed by captain Pearson, with the frigate Serapis, of forty-four guns, and the Countess of Scarborough, of twenty.

Pearson had no sooner perceived Jones, than he bore down to engage him, while the merchantmen endeavored to gain the coast. The American flotilla formed to receive him. The two enemies joined battle at about seven in the evening, with great resolution, and the conflict was supported on both sides with equal valor. The Serapis had the advantage of metal and manoeuvre; to obviate which, Jones took the resolution to fight her closer. He advanced till the two frigates were engaged yard to yard, and their sides so near that the muzzles of their guns came in contact. In this position they continued to fight from eight in the evening till ten, with an audacity bordering on frenzy. But the artillery of the Americans