duced by the French cutting the dykes and inundating the neighbourhood of Flushing in the hot season of the year; but it should appear, from the dreadful mortality on the spot, and from the appearance of many of the patients who survived only to come home and die in English hospitals, that there must have been an admixture of typhus or of some other of the more virulent class of fevers. Malaria fever and ague kill but very slowly, even in much hotter climates.* Our army physicians and surgeons appear, at the moment, to have understood little or nothing of the disease or of the causes that produced it, and it is said that the medical board, not having been consulted previously, had made no preparations and had sent out no medicines proper for the case. Some wiseacres took it into their heads that the disease originated in the quality of the water of the island, which the men were obliged to drink; and this opinion had so much weight at home that English water was sent over for the use of the troops, the requisite quantity being calculated at 500 tons per week. When the first importation of Thames water arrived it seemed to be so little wanted that Sir Eyre Coote asked the army physicians what he should do with it, and by their advice he distributed it to the fleet. The water in which the soldiers often had to stand and work or march (several thousands of them were, on one occasion, up to their middle in water during the whole night), the want of needful accommodation, and even of common comforts, for the sick, were more apparent causes of disease than the water they took inwardly. As the army had been intended for most active service-for a rush and dash upon Antwerp-it had been encumbered as little as possible with heavy baggage: hence there was a want of covering and bedding for the sick, many of whom were obliged to lie on the floor in their great coats, and with their knapsacks for pillows. In the Flushing hospitals the roofs had been broken in by the bombardment, and the patients lay exposed to the weather. Towards the end of October a hundred English bricklayers were sent over, with English bricks and mortar, tiles and trowels all complete, to mend the hospital roofs (as if such workmen

Besides Flushing, the island of Walcheren contains two other towns, Middleburg and Veere, and many villages. Middleburg, the chief place, had then a population of 10,000 or 11,000 souls. Even when the dykes were not broken, and the country not inundated, it was not considered a very salubrious spot; but, it was probably not (to the indigenous) much more unhealthy than Romney Marsh, or the Hundreds of Essex, or the worst parts of the Lincolnshire Fens. A writer who has laudably distinguished himself by his exertions for promoting the medical statistics of the army, and the study of statistics in general, says that the ratio of mortality in Zealand is a little higher than it is in the marshy parts of some of the counties in England, and about the same as in the parish of Spalding, which is situated in the lowest part of the fens of Lincolnshire. But it appears that the influence of the climate of Zealand upon strangers must be far more fatal than is that of our worst Lincolnshire fen; that the old Scotch regiment in the Dutch service had been known to bury their whole number at Sluys, in Dutch Flanders, in three years; that, of the French forces employed since the war of the Revolution in those marshy regions, about 33 per cent. had been annually cut off by endemic disease, and that even Dutch troops brought thither from healthier parts of the country had scarcely suffered less than the French-Henry Marshall, Deputy Inspector General of Army Hos pitals, Contributions to Statistics of the Sickness and Mortality which occurred among the troops employed on the Expedition to the Scheldt in the year 1809. (From the Edin. Med. and Surg. Journal, No. 133.)

and such materials could not have been procured in the country at the end of August, when the disease began to be dreadful); but the repairs proceeded but slowly, and the imported workmen themselves soon increased the number of the sick. In the large town of Middleburg there was better accommodation and abundance of room; but, not to disturb the townspeople, the poor sick soldiers were quartered in cold damp churches, or huddled in barns and warehouses, mostly without windows and a free circulation of air. The Dutch, who sleep between two feather beds, might have been made to spare some bedding; but such a resource seems never to have been thought of by our stultified commanders, who left two fever-stricken soldiers to toss and groan in the same bed-where beds there were. If the Earl of Chatham* and his successor Sir Eyre Coote, and the officers serving under them, had studied how to render the fever a pestilence and a plague, they could scarcely have hit upon a better course than the one they followed. When the government became seriously alarmed at ravages almost unexampled in military history, they called upon the principal officers of the army medical department to repair to Walcheren to examine into the causes of the malady, and report thereon.† To this summons the surgeon

All the blame is not to be imputed to Coote: the same lodging and treatment of the sick obtained before Chatham left for England: and, by the 8th of September, which was six days before the earl quitted Walcheren, the number of sick amounted to nearly 11,000! Many of these sick accompanied Chatham home. In the malaria fevers of the south of Europe the patient, in most cases, feels an imme diate benefit from being conveyed into a healthier atmosphere. But with this Walcheren fever it was not so; and it is said that General Monnet, the commandant of Flushing, had recommended the French government never to remove the sick, it having been found that a greater number of those who were kept in the island recovered, than of those who were removed from the island. A battalion of our first regiment of foot-guards, 872 strong, returned to England with 359 sick. The battalion was landed at Chatham in September. Many of the men who had returned apparently well were attacked with the fever, so that by the 8th of March, 1810, only 117 of the original strength of the battalion had escaped the disease, and some of these 117 men were attacked with intermittent lever as late as the middle of the month of June, 1810. It appears that of the number of cases in hospitals a large ratio terminated fatally. "But," adds Mr. Marshall, “long after this date many of the men who had apparently escaped the noxious influence of the climate of Walcheren were attacked and suffered severely from the specific endemic disease. . . . . . It is well known that among the regiments who had been employed in Walcheren, and who served afterwards in the peninsula, many of the men were, upon the first exposure to cold and fatigue, rendered unfit for duty, so as frequently not to leave one-third of the strength fit for service. A similar result may frequently, if not generally, be expected in all cases where troops have suffered severely from endemic fever, which commonly leaves less or more of organic disease, by which means recovery and restora tion to health is often only partial and temporary."

The alarming progress of the Walcheren fever is thus stated:On the 20th of August, the fifth day after the capitulation of Flushing, sickness began to show itself among the troops in South Beveland. The number of sick this day was 1564.

August 23. Sickness increased very much within the last twenty-four hours.

August 26. The sickness continued to increase rapidly. The number of sick amounted to 5000 rank and file.

August 28. The sickness still increased. Some of the general and many of the other officers were seized with fever.

August 31. Sickness still increasing; and, as in every case the actual numbers brought down for embarcation were much greater than stated in the returns given in to regulate the appropriation of transports, there was a deficiency of tonnage and room; and so the sick were em barked with the well, and both classes much crowded. The officers of the medical staff suffered very much from the disease.

September 1. The number of sick in South Beveland was upwards of 5000.

September 3. The number of sick amounted to 8194. September 4. The troops in South Beveland embarked, and that island was completely evacuated.

September 7. The transports with the troops ordered to England sailed. The sick of the whole army, including those sent to England, amounted to upwards of 10,948.

September 10. Sick in Walcheren, 7396. Thus, as only 16,766 rank

general of the army replied, that the question was not surgical but medical, and that consequently the duty ought to fall to the physician-general of the forces: the physician-general of the forces, on his part, represented that he had too much to do at home to be able to go abroad, and that the duty properly and indisputably appertained to the inspectorgeneral of army hospitals: the inspector-general of army hospitals replied, that the duty required was purely medical, and, as such, belonged to the physician-general-but, upon learning that both the physician-general and the surgeon-general had declined going, the inspector-general declared that he was ready to go upon the shortest notice. When this curiously dishonourable correspondence was laid before old Sir David Dundas, the present commander-inchief (who was not without his share of blame in the Walcheren expedition), Sir David and the secretary-at-war, Lord Castlereagh (who had a far greater share of blame with respect to the original enterprise than the commander-in-chief), were both decidedly of opinion that Sir Lucas Pepys, the physician-general, was the most proper person to be employed on this service; and accordingly an order was forthwith issued to Sir Lucas to proceed immediately to Walcheren. Sir Lucas hereupon expressed in writing his great concern at finding that a man of nearly seventy years of age, and with his infirmities, should be thought capable of undertaking such a duty-a duty which he solemnly declared himself incapable of performing. Sir Lucas recommended two other army-physicians to go in his stead, adding that they would see the business well performed, "whereas, if he himself were able to go, it would be merely pro formâ, and no possible good could arise from it, because he knew nothing of the investigation of camp and contagious diseases." But good came out of this evil, honour out of this disgrace. The physiciangeneral and the surgeon-general were both dismissed, and a new and incomparably better medical department was established.

Some able men on the spot alleviated the sufferings of the soldiers; but, in proportion to the numbers left under Sir Eyre Coote's command, the sickness and mortality continued to be very great. Nevertheless Sir Richard Strachan, who remained there with his fleet-which, strange to say, suffered nothing from the disorder t-dissuaded ministers from the thought of giving up their precious conquest. It was a post, he said, of great importance as a naval station, and also as a pivot for future military operations on the continent. Indeed, as a demonstration in favour of Austria, it became of great importance, and might probably be equal to the defensive employment of 100,000 of the enemy's men, for it must keep the Emperor of the French in a constant state of

and file were left behind at Walcheren, nearly one-half of that force must have been in hospital, or in attendance on those that were.-Henry Marshall, Deputy Inspector General of Army Hospitals, Contributions to Statistics, &c.

a

Edinburgh Annual Register, 1809.

+"So local were the causes of disease that vessels stationed only few yards from the land continued perfectly healthy."—Id. VOL. IV.-GEO. III.

alarm or uneasiness, being so contiguous to the continent. Sir Richard even drew up a plan of defence-and not a bad one-which was submitted to the admiralty. He considered that, as the defence must be principally naval, about 12,000 land troops would be enough for duty on the island. On the other hand, Captain Cockburn (since Admiral Sir George), whose skill and judgment were highly prized, was as decidedly of opinion that no permanent possession ought to be contemplated, and that Walcheren would never prove worth the expense of defending it.* But England considered herself bound to retain possession so long as it could be of any use to our unlucky ally, and the Emperor of Austria solicited us to continue our operations in Holland down to the moment, and apparently even past the time, when, beaten again,' and again losing all heart, he prostrated himself at his conqueror's feet, and purchased terms for himself by proposing, or consenting to, the marriage of his daughter with Bonaparte. Dearly as it cost us, our occupation of Walcheren cost Bonaparte many exertions as well as anxieties, much wear and tear of his troops in marching and countermarching, and a great deal of money. French writers give a different account, and state that the Belgian militia, and a few thousand conscripts and volunteers from Paris and the French frontiers, were sufficient to keep the English army in check; but even these forces could not be equipped and brought into the field without a heavy outlay; and it is well known that Bernadotte brought down, and long kept at Antwerp, and in the forts and batteries lower down the Scheldt, many French and German troops that would otherwise have been sent from Hanover and from the Rhine to the Danube. Our ministers, however, at one time really acted as if they intended to keep Walcheren for good and all: they ordered our engineerofficers to continue to improve the fortifications, and some more bricklayers and masons, with large quantities of bricks and lime, were sent out to work upon the parapets and ramparts of Flushing, and to aid in making a chain of batteries and redoubts, to extend from Veere to Rammekins, and from Rammekins to Arnemuiden. But at last, on the 13th of November, which was a month all but two days after the Emperor Francis

Captain Cockburn could perceive no other advantage in our possession of Walcheren than this-the enemy's fleet in the West Scheldt could not escape from it without hazarding an engagement with our fleet which would lie in Flushing roads. But," he said, "the natural consequence would be that the enemy's ships would remain where they were, and where, as it had been proved, we could not get at them. If, on the contrary, Walcheren did not belong to us, and our squadron destined to oppose the Scheldt fleet were kept in the Downs, favourable circumstances might indeed enable the enemy to escape, but it would be at considerable risk ;"" and I cannot but think," he added, "that a French fleet being at sea is more advantageous to us than the knowledge of its existence in a In the latter case it is a constant source of anxiety to us; in the former, it is impossible to describe the energy, spirit, and hope with which the chance of its destruction fills every breast, especially of those who have spent many a long and dreary night blockading them. It is also to be remembered that, owing to the confused and hurried manner in which the enemy's squadrons traverse the seas during the short periods of their escaping our vigilance, the damage they have ever done our trade has been comparatively very small; but, on the other hand, if any of our squadrons fall in with them, the result always has been, and I trust will ever be, both honourable and advantageous to our country." 3 E

safe harbour.

had signed his degrading treaty of peace with the Emperor Napoleon in Vienna, his capital, orders were dispatched to Lieutenant-General Don, who had succeeded Sir Eyre Coote in the command, to evacuate Flushing, and take such measures as he might judge most effective for the destruction of the basin and of the naval defences of the island. General Don was to occasion as little injury as possible to the inhabitants; but he was to leave the whole island in such a state as would render its ports and arsenals unserviceable. Yet even now our ministers seemed to entertain some vague notion that Austria would fly to arms and renew the struggle rather than submit to the saddest extremity of humiliation; and Lord Liverpool, who had succeeded Lord Castlereagh as secretary-at-war, in his very orders to Don to destroy the works, told that general that it was now determined to evacuate the island of Walcheren, unless some new circumstances should occur in the progress of the operation, which might render expedient an alleration in this decision. When secretaries of state and secretaries-at-war send such orders as these, generals and admirals may be expected to make blunders. General Don was an excellent man, and a sensible and good officer, but Lord Liverpool's riddle perplexed him in the extreme, and so he destroyed with one hand, and continued building up with the other-for, although the work of destruction was commenced on the 26th of November upon the parapet of the sea lines, at that very time, and for many days afterwards, six or seven hundred labourers were employed in carrying on the line of redoubt between Veere and Arnemuiden. At length, however, the labour of construction was suspended, and the labour of destruction prosecuted with more vigour. Possibly the noble secretary-at-war had been informed of the dilemma in which he had placed the general. The piers of the flood-gates of the basin at Flushing were blown up with gunpowder; the strong and costly pile-work on the east side was destroyed, that on the west side being left, as it could not be destroyed without risking the destruction of a part of the town; the arsenal and magazines in Bonaparte's new dockyard were burned; but very little was done to damage the land fortifications of the place, lest the houses and property of the townspeople should be injured by the explosion. The 6000 prisoners who surrendered in Flushing had been shipped off for England long ago. The ships on the stocks were destroyed; but one fine new frigate was brought away, as were also the timbers of a seventy-four, which, being put together at Woolwich, produced in 1812 a good ship, which was called the Chatham,' to preserve, we suppose, the memory of that earl's Walcheren exploits. These things and the fever were about all we brought back from an expedition which cost us several thousands of lives, and many millions of money.*

་

The St. Giles' songster, or laureat of the expedition, to keep his

Our diversion on the side of Italy cost no such enormous sacrifices, and yet it too was attended with some advantages to our allies, for it tended to deprive Bonaparte of the services on the Danube of his most brilliant and best cavalry general, his brother-in-law, Joachim Murat, by virtue of Bayonne decrees, now King of Naples. Our movements, moreover, along the whole extent of the Neapolitan coasts obliged Murat to reinforce marches hither and thither, as the danger seemed his army in Calabria, to wear it out with long more imminent on this point or on that, and to keep on the shores of the Mediterranean and Adriatic both French and Italian troops which would otherwise have been employed against the Austrians in Upper Italy, and in the Tyrol or the Illyrian previnces. It is true that with all these stoppages Bonaparte contrived to beat the Emperor Francis, but his work would have been much easier and more speedy if even this our Italian diversion had not been made. It was not for even a wiser ministry than our own to calculate that Austria, after beginning the struggle so energetically, would end it so feebly, and that, after gaining so many successes, and putting her assailant within an inch of ruin, she would allow herself to be trampled upon, and give up all for lost.

The crowned dragooner had signalized his accession to the Neapolitan Bourbon throne, or his arrival at Naples, by recovering from the English possession of the isle of Capri. His unwarlike predecessor and brother-in-law, Joseph, after ordering two attempts, which turned out deplorable failures, contented himself with sitting down quietly, and seeing every day, whether in his palace at

verse in measure, greatly diminished the amount of the money: instead of 12,000,000l., the Walcheren expedition is said to have cost 20,000,000/., and thus to have imposed on the nation a perpetual burthen of 1,000,000l. of annual taxes. If one half of this enormous sum had been sent into Austria, Bohemia, Hungary, the Tyrol, and Italy. the chances are that the Emperor Francis would not have been ernshed; and it is quite certain that, it the other half of the money had been spent on our own navy, we might have built with it ten times as many line-of-battle ships as we could have seized or destroyed by getting into our hands all that were in the Scheldt.