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in order to land, a fresh gale grew into a storm, our transports ran foul of each other, all our ships were exposed to the dangers of a lee-shore, and the disembarkation was given up. By this time the soldiers and the horses had consumed nearly all their food and provender, and began to fall sick. There was nothing for it but to return to Portsmouth.

The good sense of George II. had been opposed to these descents on the French coasts with inadequate forces. He had said to Lord Waldegrave that he had never any opinion of this expedition-that it would end as others of the same sort had done-that we should brag of having burned their ships, and the French of having driven us away. But the king had been overruled by his ministers, who, even after his prediction had been verified, persisted in repeating the experiment in the course of the same summer, and with a force far inferior to that which had just failed.

This time the command of our land forces was given to General Bligh, a very old cavalry officer. Bligh effected a landing, under a loose fire from the French, at Cherbourg, on the 8th August, and took the town with little difficulty. He set his men to work upon the dockyard, the basin, and the forts upon which the French government had been spending very large sums; and they were soon destroyed or rendered useless. While this work was in progress parties of English light horse scoured the country to the distance of some four leagues, and had several little skirmishes with the French troops who were waiting in the neighbourhood for reinforcements. As soon as intelligence reached Bligh that these reinforcements were at hand, he levied a military contribution upon the unfortunate town, carried off some brass cannons and mortars, re-embarked his little army, and sailed back to England. But in about a fortnight Bligh returned to the French coast to make another attempt upon St. Malo. That town was again found much too strong. The English armament had been greatly weakened; but as it had been so long hovering about, it was not likely that the French would weaken the garrison and defences of St. Malo. General Bligh, however, resolved to land his troops in the bay of St. Lunaire, about two leagues to the westward. The landing was rapidly and beautifully performed under the eye

of Howe; but it would be difficult to discover what it was intended the men should do when landed. They were scarcely on shore when an autumnal gale made it impossible for Howe to keep the ships where they were. Perhaps it was not easy to re-embark the troops, who had finished all the work that could be done on that point when they had burned some fifteen or twenty sloops and fishing boats. Howe went away with the fleet to the more secure bay of St. Cas, a few leagues off, arranging with Bligh that the troops should be marched by land to that bay. The old general, instead of making a forced march of it, loitered on the road, as if in contempt of the superior forces under the Duke of Aiguillon that were looking after him. The French, however, paid the valour of the English troops the compliment of not attacking them until two-thirds of them were re-embarked. But then they pounced upon the remaining third, as they were engaged among the rocks on the sea-shore, or in a hollow way that led down to them. The rear-guard, consisting of the British grenadiers and half of a regiment of guards, under the command of General Dury, fought for a short time with wonderful bravery; but General Dury was shot, and, running into the sea, perished there. Sir John Armitage, a volunteer of fortune, met with the same fate; many of the gallant young officers of the guards were picked out by French musketeers standing on rocks right above their heads; and, after a frightful carnage, the men broke away from their ranks, and were nearly all either slaughtered or made prisoners. Most unhappily, not even this deplorable result had the effect of curing our governments of their mania for sending inadequate expeditions to the coast of France -expeditions which frittered away our strength without deciding anything. The name of the late Lord Castlereagh ought to be revered by every British soldier as the first war minister that saw through the absurdity of this system, and really adopted and enforced a better one.

In this contest-the Seven Years' War-the French and English fought in all the four quarters of the globe. Everywhere out of Europe our soldiers, as well as our seamen, had the better of the contest. In Asia Clive had achieved the wonders which have been related; in Africa the French were dispossessed of Goree, Fort Louis, and all their settlements on

the river Senegal; in the West Indies they lost Guadaloupe and other islands; but on the American continent they were for some time very successful. Commencing hostilities before any declaration of war, they gained several advantages in the country which lay nearest to their Canadian frontier. In 1755 Colonel Monckton defeated a body of French and Indians, and took the fort of Beau-Sejour, on the confines of Nova Scotia; but Sir William Johnson failed completely in an expedition against the French fort at Crown Point, and General Shirley was not more successful in a design to carry their fort at Niagara. In another direction, in America, General Braddock was defeated and slain.

After General Braddock's defeat, the elder Pitt devised a bold plan for securing our colonies in North America. Reinforcements were sent out from England; but Lord Lauden, who was appointed to the command, achieved little or nothing, and soon returned home, leaving the command to General Abercromby. Abercomby soon gave place to General Amherst. Our troops sustained a repulse and the loss of 800 men at Ticonderago; but they took Fort Frontenac on the northern bank of the St. Lawrence, and some other places.

THE HEIGHTS OF ABRAHAM AND CAPTURE OF QUEBEC.

A. D. 1759. September 13.

THE Canadas had been left open to attack the year before, and the defeated, impoverished, bankrupt Louis XV., had not been able to succour them. The time was come for executing Pitt's great scheme; and he had now wisely insisted. that the execution of it should be entrusted to a hero. The king, who thought only of antiquity and seniority in the service, selected old Hopson, who may have been a very respectable, jog-trot veteran, though he had certainly never done anything to distinguish himself as a general. Pitt, who would have his own way, put forward Wolfe, now a major-general of his own promoting; and never was choice more fortunate to a minister, though it sent his admired soldier to an early grave. "Ambition, activity, industry, passion for the service, were conspicuous in Wolfe; he seemed to breathe for nothing but fame, and lost no moments in qualifying himself to compass his object." The military scheme, after being subjected to various alterations, was finally arranged thus:-Wolfe was to advance with a part of our forces and seize Quebec, the capital of the French provinces; General Amherst, with a second division, was to occupy Crown Point, reduce Fort Ticonderago, then cross Lake Champlain, fall down the St. Lawrence, and join Wolfe under the walls of Quebec: while General Prideaux, with a third division and a considerable body of wild Indians, was to invest Niagara, then embark on Lake Ontario, besiege and carry Montreal, and then form his junction with Wolfe and Amherst under the capital.

These combined movements had generally failed, even

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