Although the following short passage cannot be said to relate to a
siege, yet as it concerns the introduction of an _arm_ employed in
sieges, particularly such as are maritime, it becomes our duty to
repeat it.
Louis XIV., ever anxious to extend what he and his nation called his
_glory_, turned his attention to the sea. He saw what the Dutch,
Portuguese, Spaniards, and English were doing; he knew what Venice,
Genoa, and other Italian states had done on that element; and he
deemed it inconsistent with that universal fame to which he aspired,
to neglect this wide field of enterprise. With her coasts, and her
possessions on so many seas, France is legitimately a naval power, and
Colbert was not a minister to leave natural advantages unemployed.
When the reader of history pauses at this period of the reign of Louis
XIV., and contemplates his grandeur,--we may say true grandeur,--the
principal thing he must be struck with is the astonishing influence
of one great master mind. When Mazarin died, he bequeathed Colbert
to Louis XIV., and never did dying minister bestow a richer treasure
upon his master: the portion of their ill-got wealth, which Richelieu
and Mazarin left to Louis XIII. and Louis XIV., as an indemnity for
the rest, was nothing when compared with a bequest which we strongly
suspect the cunning Italian would not have ventured to make a gift
whilst living: he might avail himself of Colbert’s talents, and take
the credit of their efforts, but he would not have proposed that he
should assume the place while he lived, which he knew it was for the
king’s interest he should occupy when he was gone. The date standing at
the head of this passage is only one year before the death of Colbert,
and of the decline of all that was great in the reign of Louis XIV.
Mazarin died in 1661, Colbert in 1683; and in these twenty-two years
alone, out of a reign of more than seventy, did Louis XIV. earn any
part of the proud title which is claimed for him.
Under the auspices of Colbert, Louis had a hundred ships of the line
built, and engaged sixty thousand sailors. Although he restrained as
much as possible these rude men by stringent laws, he did not think
it prudent to let them remain idle in port. His squadrons, commanded
by Duquesne, swept the seas infested by the pirates of Algiers and
Tunis. To punish Algiers, he employed a new invention. This fatal but
admirable means of destruction was that of _bomb-vessels_, with which
maritime cities may be reduced to ashes. There was a young man named
Bernard Renaud, known by the name of _Little Renaud_, who, without
having served, had become, by the influence of genius, an excellent
shipbuilder. Colbert, who always knew how to discern and employ merit
wherever he found it, had often consulted him upon naval affairs, even
in the king’s presence. It was by the cares and from the intelligence
of Renaud that a better plan of shipbuilding was shortly adopted. He
ventured to propose in council to have Algiers bombarded by a fleet.
Till that time no idea was entertained that bomb-mortars could be
placed upon anything but solid ground. This proposition appeared
ridiculous, and Renaud met with all the contradictions and railleries
that every inventor must expect; but his firmness, and that eloquence
which men properly impressed with their inventions generally have,
made the king determine to permit a trial of this novelty. Renaud had
some vessels constructed, smaller than usual, but stronger with regard
to wood, without upper decks, but with a false deck at the bottom of
the hold, upon which hollows were built for the reception of mortars.
He set sail with this preparation, under the orders of old Duquesne,
who was charged with the enterprise, but who anticipated no success
from it. But Duquesne and the Algerines were equally astonished at the
effects of these bombs; a large part of the city was quickly battered
to pieces and consumed by them.