THE MEDITERRANEAN IN 1797 AND 1798.
BONAPARTE'S EGYPTIAN EXPEDITION.—THE RETURN OF THE BRITISH TO THE
MEDITERRANEAN AND THE BATTLE OF THE NILE.—GREAT BRITAIN RESUMES CONTROL
OF THE MEDITERRANEAN, AND THE SECOND COALITION IS FORMED.
The Preliminaries of Leoben silenced the strife of arms and permitted
all eyes to turn to the field of diplomacy, upon which, for the twelve
months following, the interest of Europe was chiefly fixed. Moreau
and Hoche, commanding the two armies of France upon the Rhine, had
crossed the river, to enter upon a campaign in Germany, at the very
moment when Bonaparte was signing the articles. On the 22d of April,
a courier, bearing news of the suspension of hostilities, arrived at
the headquarters of each general, and put an immediate stop to their
advance. War continued only upon the sea, between Great Britain and the
nations allied with France against her.
The confidence of the Directory had grown with each successive
victory of Bonaparte, and had induced a tone in their transactions
with foreign governments which the latter looked upon as arrogant, if
not presumptuous. Yielding to politic considerations of effect upon
popular opinion, Pitt had sent to France, in October, 1796, a practised
diplomatist, Lord Malmesbury, to treat for peace. The terms proposed
by Great Britain were substantially a restitution of conquests on
both sides. If France would give back to the emperor the Netherlands
and Lombardy, Great Britain, who had lost nothing of her own, would
return to France her possessions in the East and West Indies, as well
as in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, with the _status ante bellum_ of the
fisheries. As regards the colonies taken from Holland, the disposition
would be to restore them, if the government of the stadtholder were
replaced; but if the republic set up by the assistance of French arms
were maintained, Great Britain and the emperor, from whom the former
refused to dissociate herself, would insist upon indemnification
elsewhere for the injury thus done to their political position in
Europe. With these understandings as a basis, the British government
would be willing to enter upon negotiations for a general peace; to
which it expressly required that Russia and Portugal, as well as the
emperor, should be admitted. The French government replied that Great
Britain had no authority to speak here for her allies; and further,
that to cede territory which had been incorporated by the edicts of the
Convention, as the Netherlands had, was inconsistent with the organic
law of the republic. This latter plea was treated by the British
government as trifling; no negotiation to close a war could go on,
if results, favorable to one party, were secluded from discussion by
the _ægis_ of its constitution. As the case stood, France and Great
Britain were both conquerors; the chief allies of each were losers.
Great Britain proposed that each should surrender its winnings for
the benefit of its allies. France refused, because its conquests
were now part of the national territory, and as such inalienable.
Taking exception, moreover, to delays caused by Malmesbury's frequent
references to his government for instructions, the Directory, on the
20th of December, ordered him to leave Paris, within the not very civil
space of forty-eight hours.
Similar cavalier treatment was at the same time experienced by the
United States. Our government, after the maritime war began, had
frequent disputes with both belligerents,—concerning the treatment
of American ships by the British and French cruisers,—the protection
of enemies' goods by the neutral flag,—the stipulations of Jay's
treaty of commerce and navigation, in 1794, regarded by France as
unduly favorable to Great Britain,—and the attitude of the United
States towards French privateers, which were at first allowed and
afterwards forbidden to sell prizes in her ports. These difficulties
were fundamentally due to the fact that, the United States having
practically no navy, neither belligerent felt under any bonds to
respect her rights. To Great Britain, however, friendly relations
were important on account of trade interests; while France, having no
merchant ships, found an advantage in using Americans as carriers,
and their ports as bases from which her cruisers could harass British
commerce. The former of these benefits Great Britain curtailed by the
claim that enemy's goods were, by international law, seizable under
a neutral flag. The United States admitted this, and also, in the
interests of her own peace and neutrality, declined longer to favor
French commerce-destroying. Mutual discontent followed, and resulted
in the recall of the French embassy from America, in November, 1796.
At the same time President Washington, being dissatisfied with Munroe,
the minister at Paris, removed him. When the latter, on the 30th
of December, took his leave, the President of the Directory made a
speech, highly complimentary to him personally, but offensive to the
United States government; and evinced, as President Adams justly said,
"a disposition to separate the people of the United States from the
government, and thus to produce divisions fatal to our peace." The
same theory of the divergent interests of rulers and people, with
which the French republic started on its self-imposed mission forcibly
to regenerate ancient despotisms, was thus impartially applied to
the free American people under the government of their chosen and
beloved fellow-citizen, Washington. The Directory refused to receive
Pinckney, the new envoy from the United States. He remained in Paris,
unrecognized, for a month; but the morning after hearing of the
victory of Rivoli, the Directory ordered him to leave France.
By a somewhat singular coincidence, while the republic was thus
embroiling itself with the two chief maritime states, a change of
rulers took place in Russia; which, if not strictly a maritime power,
was yet well placed, through her preponderance on the Baltic, to affect
the naval interests of the world. The Empress Catherine II. died on
the 17th of November, 1796, when about to conclude an agreement with
the courts of London and Vienna to abandon her rather passive attitude
of hostility towards France, and send an army of sixty thousand men to
the support of Austria. Her successor, Paul I., allowed this treaty
to drop, and resumed a bearing of cold watchfulness, until Bonaparte,
by the seizure of Malta, and the Directory by a threat of war if
commerce were permitted between his empire and Great Britain, drove his
half-insane temper into open hostilities. But this was a year later.
These events at the end of 1796 coincided in time with the close
alliance of the republic with Spain and Holland and its formal treaties
of peace with the Italian states. By these and by the preliminaries of
Leoben were defined the external relations of France in April, 1797.
At the same moment her internal condition became alarming. The time
had come to choose new members to replace one third of each body of
the legislature; and the elections, still influenced by the memory
of the Terror, resulted in the return of so many reactionaries as
to give these a majority in both houses, especially in the lower.
The latter at once showed its spirit by electing for speaker, by a
large majority, General Pichegru, who was in open quarrel with the
Directory; and followed up this significant act by a series of measures
calculated to thwart the executive power and enfeeble its action. The
opposition between the legislature and the Directory grew more and
more pronounced throughout the summer months; but the reactionists
failed to read aright the signs of the times. They allowed themselves,
by the machinations of the royalists and through injudicious acts of
their own, to seem enemies of republican government, which aroused the
anxiety of Hoche, commanding the army of the Sambre and Meuse; and
they directly brought into question the conduct of Bonaparte towards
Venice, thus stirring up the more personal and violent enmity of the
brilliant conqueror of Italy. The legislature thus found itself opposed
by the two generals who stood highest in public esteem as essential
to the safety of France, and who, each according to his own nature,
transmitted his feelings to the troops under his command, and prepared
them for a _coup d'état_. Inflammatory speeches and toasts prevailed
throughout the armies, to which the republic was dear rather as a name
than as a reality, and they were easily led to think that the two
houses were contemplating a return to royalty.
The majority of the Directory, half-believing the same thing, and
chafed by an opposition which seriously hampered the working of the
government, were ready for violent measures. Two of its members,
however, were not prepared for such action; and one of these, Carnot,
the organizer of the republic's early victories, was then serving his
turn as president of the Directory. Unknown to him the three plotters
matured their scheme, and called upon Bonaparte to send them Augereau,
the most revolutionary of the generals in Italy, to direct the troops
in such forcible proceedings as might be necessary. Upon his arrival
he was made commandant of the military division of Paris, despite the
opposition of Carnot. The latter's presidency expired on the 24th of
August, and he was succeeded by one of the conspirators. On the night
of September 3d Augereau surrounded the castle and garden of the
Tuileries with twelve thousand troops and forty cannon, driving out
the legislators who were then there, together with their guard. The
Directory ordered the arrest, by its own guard, of the two members
not in the plot. Carnot escaped into Switzerland; but Barthélemi,
their other colleague, was seized. The next day the members of the
two houses who had not been imprisoned met and passed a resolution,
invalidating a number of the recent elections, and exiling to Cayenne
the two directors and fifty-three representatives. The legislature,
thus purged, was brought into harmony with the executive. An address
was next issued to the departments and to the armies, declaring that
the country had been invaded and disorganized by the Counter-Revolution
and that patriotism, with the social and public virtues, had taken
refuge with the armies. "In this," says a republican historian, "there
was unhappily some truth. The middle class had become reactionary or
inert; the populace now intervened but little in political movements;
active democracy scarcely showed itself out of the armies. But if
armies can defend liberty, they cannot put it in practice and maintain
its life when abandoned by civil society. The revolution just effected
with the consent of the soldiery was leading to another revolution
to be effected by and for the soldiers."[153] The 18th of Fructidor,
1797, was the logical forerunner of the 18th of Brumaire, 1799, when
Bonaparte seized the reins of government.
The strife between the Directory and the legislature kept all Europe
in suspense; for its result would profoundly affect the course of
existing discussions. The emperor, repenting of his precipitation at
Leoben, kept holding off from a final treaty, seeking to introduce
Great Britain as a party to the deliberations. This Bonaparte
indignantly refused; for it would defeat his principal aim of separate
negotiations. Pitt, more desirous than before of peace, again sent
Malmesbury. The Directory kept him dancing attendance at Lille, the
appointed place of meeting, during its struggle with the Councils.
It made several demands most unlikely to be conceded, and upon these
prolonged a discussion, to which the ministry, who now really wished
a favorable termination, patiently submitted. A week after the _coup
d'état_ the French negotiators were recalled, and in their place were
sent others, who immediately upon arrival demanded of the British
ambassador whether he had "powers to restore to France and its allies
_all_ the possessions which since the beginning of the war have passed
into the hands of the English." An answer was required in the course
of the same day. Malmesbury coolly replied that he neither could, nor
ought to, treat on any other principle than that of compensations.
The French envoys then sent him orders from the Directory to return
within twenty-four hours to his Court and get powers to make those
restorations. This, of course, put an end to the conference, and the
war went on for four years more.
During these eventful months Bonaparte, already the most influential
man in the nation through his hold upon men's imaginations, was
ripening projects deeply affecting the control of the sea and the
future direction to be given the gigantic efforts of which France had
shown herself capable. On the 5th of April, under his management, there
had been concluded with the king of Sardinia, subject to ratification
by the Directory, a treaty of offensive and defensive alliance, to
which was prefixed a secret article ceding to France the island of
Sardinia upon condition of compensation on the continent.[154] Soon
after, however, events occurred which opened to his penetrating genius
a more satisfactory combination. During his invasion of Carinthia the
people in his rear, throughout the possessions of Venice on the Italian
mainland, rose against the French, massacring several hundred soldiers
who fell into their hands. This gave him a pretext for disposing of
these territories, as already stated,[155] in the secret articles of
Leoben, and at the same time drew from him the sinister prediction that
the government of Venice, shut up to its small island, would not be
of long duration.[156] On the 2d of May, having returned to Italy, he
issued a proclamation,[157] setting forth his many causes of complaint
for the commotions excited in his rear, endangering the army "then
plunged in the gorges of Styria." He ordered the French minister to
leave Venice, all Venetian agents to quit Lombardy and the Venetian
possessions, and the French general to treat the troops of the republic
as enemies, and to tear down her standard throughout the mainland.
This declaration of war was followed, on the 16th of May, by the
abdication of the ancient oligarchy in favor of a provisional
government, which requested the presence of a French division in the
city to maintain order during the transition period. This Bonaparte
granted, sending five thousand men, and observing cynically in his
despatch to the Directory that it would thus be possible to avoid the
odium attendant upon the execution of the secret preliminaries with
Austria, and at the same time to quiet the clamors of Europe; since
"it is apparent that the occupation is only temporary and at the
demand of the Venetians themselves."[158] Ten days later he despatched
General Gentili, recalled from Corsica, to Corfu with some two thousand
troops, directing him to secure his hold both upon the islands and the
Venetian squadron lying there, but always to act as though supporting
the Venetian commissioners who were to accompany him. "If the islanders
incline to independence," wrote he, "flatter them, and talk about
Greece, Athens, and Sparta."[159] To the Venetian government he wrote
that the expedition was sent to second its commissioners; and on the
same day to the Directory, that Corfu ought to be irrevocably possessed
by the French. "The island of Malta," he added, "is of the utmost
importance to us.... Why should not our fleet seize it before entering
the Atlantic? That little island is priceless to us. Secret articles
with the king of Sardinia stipulate for us the occupation of the little
islands of San Pietro. Now is the moment to fortify them;"[160] for the
British Mediterranean fleet was before Cadiz, and the Channel fleet in
full mutiny.
Four months later Bonaparte again wrote, "With San Pietro, Corfu,
and Malta, we shall be masters of the whole Mediterranean."[161]
"The islands of Corfu, Zante, and Cephalonia are of more consequence
to us than all Italy. If we had to choose, better restore Italy to
the emperor and keep the four islands.... The empire of the Turks
crumbles daily. The possession of the four islands will enable us to
sustain it, or to take our share. The time is not far distant when we
shall feel that, truly to destroy England, we must take possession
of Egypt. The vast Ottoman Empire, which is perishing daily, puts on
us the obligation to take means for the preservation of our Levant
trade."[162] "If at the peace we have to consent to the cession of the
Cape of Good Hope to England, we should seize Egypt. That country has
never belonged to a European nation. It does not now belong to the
Grand Turk. We could leave here with twenty-five thousand men, convoyed
by eight or ten ships-of-the-line, and take possession of it. I wish
you would inquire, Citizen Minister, what effect upon the Porte would
result from our expedition to Egypt."[163] "Our occupation of Corfu and
the other islands entails relations with the pashas of Albania. These
are well affected to the French. In vain should we seek to sustain the
Turkish Empire; we shall see its fall in our day. Corfu and Zante give
us mastery of the Adriatic and the Levant."[164] In these quotations,
which could be multiplied, is seen the genesis of the great Egyptian
expedition, to which, until it was carried into effect, Bonaparte
recurred again and again with the persistency characteristic of his
conceptions.
While he was thus employed, on the one hand flattering Venice with
the hope of continued national existence, and on the other treating
with Austria for her extinction and a division of the spoil, in which
France was to have the Ionian Islands and the Venetian navy,[165]—while
Malmesbury was negotiating at Lille, and the Directory was in bitter
conflict with the Councils,—there was painfully sailing for England,
crippled and suffering, the man who was destined to dispel the gorgeous
dreams of Eastern achievement which filled Bonaparte's brain, and to
shatter the French navy,—the all-essential link which alone could knit
together these diverse maritime possessions, the one foundation upon
which stood the whole projected fabric of Mediterranean control. During
the wearing times of the Cadiz blockade, Lord St. Vincent, aware how
much the listlessness of such inactive service contributed to foment
mutiny, endeavored ingeniously to contrive fighting to occupy the minds
of the seamen. For that purpose, largely, he bombarded Cadiz; and for
that purpose he sent Nelson, with a detached squadron, to seize the
town of Santa Cruz in the Canary Islands by a sudden and vigorous
assault, hoping also there to take the rich cargo of a galleon, laden
on account of the Court of Spain. The attack was made on the night
of July 24, with all the vigor to be expected of Nelson, but under
great disadvantage. It resulted in a disastrous repulse with heavy
loss; and the admiral himself suffered amputation of the right arm. It
became necessary for him to go to England, where he remained through
a long and painful convalescence until the following April; when he
again sailed to join the Mediterranean fleet, arriving just in time to
command the squadron sent in pursuit of Bonaparte.
The dissensions which weakened the external action of the French
government having been silenced by the _coup d'état_ of September
4, Bonaparte rapidly drew to an end the negotiations with Austria.
On the 17th of October, 1797, he, as sole representative of France,
signed the treaty of Campo Formio; which followed the general lines
of the Leoben preliminaries, yet with important differences. The
dissimulation concerning Venice was thrown aside, and the ancient state
wholly disappeared. The city, with the mainland as far as the Adige,
were given to Austria. West of the Adige, the old Venetian provinces
went to the Cisalpine Republic, which was also dowered with the papal
legations attributed for a brief moment to Venice. The countries and
islands east of the Adriatic which had belonged to her were divided at
the Gulf of Drino. All inside that point went to Austria; all outside,
to France, which thus became possessed of the desire of Bonaparte's
heart, Corfu and its sister islands, with some slight territory on
the adjacent mainland. The cession of the Netherlands to France was
confirmed, and provision was made for a Congress to be held at Rastadt
for the pacification and rearrangement of the German Empire; for
Bonaparte had persisted in treating with the emperor on account only
of his own dominions, and apart from the rest of the empire. By secret
stipulations, the two great powers agreed to support each other's
demands and interests in the Congress; where France wished to secure
a certain line of the Rhine, and Austria to indemnify herself, at the
expense of some German minor states, for the losses undergone by the
treaty.
The salient features of this treaty were therefore the cession of
Belgium; the annihilation of Venice; the settlement of the Cisalpine
Republic as a powerful dependency of France; the strengthening of the
latter as a Mediterranean state by the gain of the Ionian Islands;
and, finally, the loosing of her hands against Great Britain, which
now stood without a strong ally in all Europe. Bonaparte justified his
action to his critics on these grounds, but especially on account of
the necessity of dealing with Great Britain single-handed. "When the
Cisalpine has the best military frontier in Europe, when France gains
Mayence and the Rhine, when she has in the Levant Corfu, extremely well
fortified, and the islands, what more would you wish? To scatter our
force, in order that England may continue to take from us, from Spain,
from Holland, our colonies, and postpone yet further the restoration
of our trade and our navy?... Either our government must destroy
the English monarchy, or must expect itself to be destroyed by the
corruption and intrigue of those active islanders. The present moment
offers us a fine game. Let us concentrate all our activity upon the
navy, and destroy England. That done, Europe is at our feet."[166]
Thus did Bonaparte demonstrate that the scene of strife was to be
transferred to the sea.
The Directory at once ratified the Treaty of Campo Formio, and named
Bonaparte one of three plenipotentiaries to the Congress of Rastadt.
The general remained in Italy for a month longer, organizing the
new state, and distributing the army with a view to support the
interests of France, while withdrawing some thirty thousand men for
the intended army of England. On the 17th of November he left Milan,
and on the 25th arrived at Rastadt. He remained there, however, but
a week; and then, apparently at the call of the Directory,[167]
started for Paris, which he reached on the 5th of December. He was
avowedly to command the army of England, and during the two following
months his correspondence betrays no sign of any other purpose; his
orders to various subordinates, and especially to Berthier, his
celebrated chief-of-staff, at the time commanding in Italy, abound with
dispositions and instructions to transfer troops thence towards the
Channel. Particularly significant of such intention were the orders
sent from him to Admiral Brueys, commanding the French division in
Corfu, to start for Brest,[168]—a mission which would make his force
inaccessible for the Egyptian expedition. Too much stress, however,
cannot be laid upon such indications coming from so crafty a nature;
and the first intimation of a change of purpose has more the appearance
of stripping off a mask than of awakening from a dream. "Make what
efforts we will," wrote he to the Directory, on February 23, 1798, "we
shall not for many years acquire the control of the seas. To make a
descent upon England, without being master of the sea, is the boldest
and most difficult operation ever attempted."[169] Most true, but not
new. Nor was the veil under which he covered his change of attitude
very difficult to pierce. On the 7th of February, 1798, he wrote to
the Minister of War that he was about to visit the Channel coast, near
Dunkirk, sending Kleber and Desaix to Havre and Brest. On the 12th from
Dunkirk he sends engineers to examine Boulogne, Etaples, Ambleteuse,
and Calais,—ports on which he, five years later, based his more serious
projects of invasion; and at the same time two others are dispatched to
Holland to demand help of various kinds. The very next day, February
13, he sends orders to Toulon, in the name of the Directory, not only
to hold on to the ships ordered for Brest, but to send despatch vessels
in every direction to recall to Toulon all ships-of-war cruising in the
Mediterranean.[170] Returning to Paris, he addressed a letter to the
government, setting forth what needed to be done by the month of April
in order to make the attempt upon Great Britain even possible,—a long
array of requirements, which only he, if his heart were in the matter,
was capable of accomplishing. He concluded by saying there were but
three ways of reaching England. One was by direct invasion; the second,
by an attempt upon Hanover and Hamburg,—the continental centres of her
trade; the last, by an expedition to the Levant.
On the 5th of March Bonaparte communicated to the government a note
containing the dispositions necessary for an expedition to seize Egypt
and Malta. The same day the Directory issued a number of decrees,
constituting a commission on the Coast Defences of the Mediterranean,
under cover of which the needed preparations were to be carried on,
and defining the various steps to be taken. The ships at Toulon were
required to be ready for sea on the 4th of April. Admiral Brueys, who
had been unable to sail for Brest on account of want of provisions, was
on February 12 ordered to Toulon. He arrived there with, his squadron
on the 2d of April, and was appointed to command the naval part of
the expedition, to consist of thirteen ships-of-the-line with smaller
vessels. All arrangements were pushed with the greatest activity
possible, though much retarded by the extreme want of naval stores,
of provisions, and of money. Still greater difficulty was experienced
from scarcity of sailors; the inducements offered by privateers having
drawn away almost all the seamen of the republic, and landed great
numbers of them in British prisons,—a sad result of the much-vaunted
commerce-destroying. Through all, the pretence of invading England
was maintained; and Bonaparte himself, to mislead opinion, stayed
till the last moment in Paris. The Spanish fleet at Cadiz was, by
the urgent demands of the Directory, made to assume positions which
threatened an approaching departure, in order to fasten St. Vincent's
ships to the port and foster in British minds the easily aroused fear
of an invasion of Ireland. But measures so extensive could not long
escape comment and suspicion. The actual intentions of the Directory
were kept so impenetrably secret that, after the expedition sailed,
the senior naval officer at Toulon wrote to the Minister of Marine, "I
know no more of the movements of the squadron than if it did not belong
to the republic;"[171] but it was not possible to conceal the patent
fact that Marseille, Toulon, Genoa, Civita Vecchia, and Corsica were
alive with hurried preparations for a great naval undertaking, whatever
its destination might be. It was evident, therefore, that France was
about to expose herself for a time upon the sea to the blows of Great
Britain, and the ministry determined not to let such an opportunity
slip.
During the year 1797 no British fleet, and, with the rare exception of
one or two scattered cruisers, no British ship-of-war, had entered the
Mediterranean. The gathering of the Spanish navy at Cadiz, and of the
greater part of the French in Brest, with the apparent design to invade
Ireland or England, had dictated the concentration of the British navy
before those two ports; either immediately, as St. Vincent at Cadiz, or
by the dispositions—less fitted to compass their purpose—of the Channel
fleet, by which bodies of ships were gathered at points other than
Brest, with the hope of combining them against any sortie from that
port. Great Britain, during the time following St. Vincent's retreat
from the Mediterranean, was in the position of a nation struggling
for existence,—for so she felt it,[172]—which had been compelled to
contract her lines through loss of force, due to the gradual submission
of her allies to her enemies. To this had further conduced the
threatening attitude of the Dutch navy in the Texel, requiring a strong
North Sea fleet. To her other embarrassments had been added, in this
year of distress, the extensive mutinies in the navy. Though appeased
in some instances and quelled in others, the spirit which caused them
still existed. Under these circumstances Bonaparte, in 1797, had met
no naval obstacle to his plans for the control of the Mediterranean,
which had, moreover, been so covert as to escape detection. Admiral
Brueys had gone from Toulon to the Adriatic, remained there several
months, and returned in peace; and all minor naval movements went on
undisturbed. The destiny of Corfu was not revealed till the end of the
year; the purpose to get hold of Malta, seriously entertained by Brueys
at the instigation of Bonaparte,[173] never transpired; and the talk
about the army of England combined with the actual positions of the
allied fleets to retain the British in the same stations. Toward the
end of 1797 several circumstances occurred to relieve the pressure. In
October Admiral Duncan inflicted upon the Dutch fleet, off the Texel,
a defeat so decisive and complete as to throw it out of the contest
for a long time. Of fifteen ships opposed to him, nine were taken. The
condition of the French fleet in Brest, if not accurately known to
be as bad as Bonaparte represented it,[174] was still sufficiently
understood. No attempt had been made during the summer or winter of
1797 to renew the Irish expedition; and when the opening spring of 1798
permitted the Channel fleet in a body to keep the sea, the ministry
felt it safe to detach a force to the Mediterranean.
Sir Horatio Nelson sailed from England on the 10th of April, and
joined the fleet off Cadiz on the 30th. Lord St. Vincent welcomed
him gladly, and at once sent him with three ships-of-the-line to the
Mediterranean, to watch the impending armament, and, if possible, learn
its destination. Nelson left the fleet on the 2d of May, the day before
Bonaparte quitted Paris. On the 17th, having been unavoidably delayed
at Gibraltar, he was in the neighborhood of Toulon, and captured a
French corvette just leaving port; from which he learned particulars
as to the naval force of the enemy, but nothing as regarded its
destination. On the night of the 20th, in a violent gale of wind, his
own ship was dismasted and with difficulty saved from going ashore.
By great exertions she was towed by her consorts into the San Pietro
Islands, at the south end of Sardinia, where she anchored on the
23d. On the 19th Bonaparte had sailed with the Marseille and Toulon
divisions of the expedition. He was to be joined on the way by the
detachments from Genoa, Corsica, and Civita Vecchia,—the total number
of troops amounting to between thirty and thirty-five thousand.
On the same day that Nelson parted from St. Vincent, May 2, the
admiralty wrote to the latter that it was essential to send twelve
ships-of-the-line into the Mediterranean to counteract the French
armament; and that to replace them eight ships had been ordered from
England. A private letter from the First Lord, by the same mail,
authorized St. Vincent to take his whole force for this object, if
necessary, but hoped a detachment would be sufficient. In the latter
case, while the choice of its commander was left to the admiral, it was
intimated that Nelson, though junior to two other flag-officers, was
by all means the proper man. Jervis had already made the same decision;
and now at once told off and prepared the nine ships-of-the-line,
forming the inshore squadron of the blockade, to start the moment the
expected re-enforcement arrived. The junction of the latter with the
main fleet was made May 24, out of sight of the port; and during the
night Captain Troubridge sailed with the inshore ships, their places
being taken by vessels similarly painted, so that no suspicion of the
transaction might arise in Cadiz. On the 7th of June Troubridge joined
Nelson, having picked up two more ships by the way; so that the British
were now thirteen seventy-fours and one of fifty guns. By a very
strange fatality, however, the frigates at first with Nelson had parted
company the night his ship was dismasted, and had never rejoined.
Troubridge brought only one little brig; and, as it was inadmissible to
scatter the ships-of-the-line, the want of lookout vessels seriously
affected all Nelson's movements in the long and harassing pursuit,
covering nearly eight weeks, that lay before him.
[Illustration: Mediterranean Sea.]
After leaving Toulon, Bonaparte directed his force along the Gulf of
Genoa, where, on the night of May 20, he experienced the same gale that
dismasted Nelson. The next day the convoy from Genoa joined. Steering
south along the east coasts of Corsica and Sardinia, the division from
Corsica met him on the 26th off the south end of the island, but that
from Civita Vecchia failed to appear. Here the French first heard that
Nelson was in the Mediterranean with three ships, and expected ten
more. Bonaparte then continued on for Malta, which he reached on the
9th of June, and found there the division from Civita Vecchia, thus
bringing his whole force under his hand. The island was immediately
summoned, and after a faint show of resistance capitulated on the 12th;
the French fleet and convoy, numbering four hundred sail, entering the
port of La Valetta on the 13th. Bonaparte remained the time necessary
to secure his conquest temporarily; then leaving a garrison of four
thousand men, and notifying the Directory that at least four thousand
more with ample supplies were needed, he sailed again on June 19 for
Egypt.
The British fleet, after its junction, was becalmed for several days.
It then made the best of its way round the north end of Corsica, and
thence south between Italy and the islands. Not till June 14, off
Civita Vecchia, was probable information received that the French
had been seen ten days before off the south-west point of Sicily,
steering to the eastward. As yet there was no certainty as to their
destination, and Nelson had no light vessels for scouts. St. Vincent
in his instructions had said, reflecting the ideas of the government,
that the enemy's "object appears to be either an attack upon Naples
or Sicily, the conveyance of an army to some part of Spain to invade
Portugal, or to pass through the Straits with the view of proceeding
to Ireland." The whole situation vividly illustrates the difficulty
of pursuit by sea, and the necessity of stationing and keeping the
detaining force near the point of the enemy's departure before he can
get away. By whatsoever fault, certainly not that of Nelson or St.
Vincent, the British fleet was a fortnight too late in entering the
Mediterranean. It would have been yet more so, had the resources of the
French dockyards answered to the spur of Bonaparte's urgency; but it is
ill goading a starved horse.
An easterly course, however, with a fresh north-west wind, indicated
that neither Spain nor the Atlantic was the destination of the French
armament; and Nelson at once decided it must be Malta, to be used as a
base of operations against Sicily. "Were I," said he, "the admiral of
the fleet attending an army for the invasion of Sicily, I should say to
the general: 'If you can take Malta, it secures the safety of the fleet
and the transports, and your own safe retreat, if necessary;' _Malta is
in the direct road to Sicily_."[175] Pausing a moment to communicate
with Naples, he there heard, on the 17th of June, that the French had
landed at Malta; and pushing on, received off Messina the news of its
surrender. This was on the 20th, the day after Bonaparte sailed from
the island for Egypt. On the 22d, off Cape Passaro, the south-east
extremity of Sicily, a vessel was spoken, from which Nelson gained the
information of Bonaparte's departure, supposed to be for Sicily; but he
had meantime learned from Naples that the French had no intention of
molesting any part of that kingdom. Utterly in the dark, and without
frigates, he concluded, after weighing all the chances, that Egypt
was the enemy's destination, and with a fair wind and a press of sail
shaped his course for Alexandria. On the 28th the fleet came off the
port, and sent a boat ashore. No French vessels had been seen on the
coast.
This remarkable miscarriage, happening to a man of so much energy and
intuition, was due primarily to his want of small lookout ships; and
secondly, to Bonaparte's using the simple, yet at sea sufficient,
ruse[176] of taking an indirect instead of a direct course to his
object. This, however, in a narrow sea, with so numerous a body of
vessels, would not have served him, had the British admiral had those
active purveyors of information, those eyes of the fleet, which are so
essential to naval as to land warfare.[177] On leaving Malta, Bonaparte
directed the expedition to steer first for Candia. After a week's quiet
navigation he was off the south side of the island, and on the 27th of
June was joined by a frigate from Naples, to tell him of Nelson, with
fourteen sail, being off that port ten days before. At this moment the
British admiral had already outstripped his chase. On the 25th the two
fleets had been about sixty miles apart, the French due north of the
British, steering in nearly parallel directions.[178] When Bonaparte
knew that his enemy was somewhere near upon his heels, he again changed
the course, ordering the fleet to make the land seventy miles west of
Alexandria, and sending a frigate direct to the port to reconnoitre. On
the 29th of June, the day Nelson sailed away from Alexandria, the light
squadron signalled the coast, along which the fleet sailed till July
1st, when it anchored off the city. Determined to run no chance of an
enemy's frustrating his objects, the commander-in-chief landed his army
the same evening.
If, in this celebrated chase, Nelson made a serious mistake, it was
upon his arrival at Alexandria. He had reasoned carefully, and, as the
event proved, accurately, that the French were bound to Egypt; and had
justly realized the threat to the British supremacy in India contained
in such an attempt. Knowing the time when the French left Malta, as he
did, and that they were accompanied by so great a train of transports,
it seems a fair criticism that he should have trusted his judgment a
little further, and waited off the suspected port of destination to
see whether so cumbrous a body had not been outsailed by his compact,
homogeneous force. He appears, on finding his expectations deceived,
to have fallen into a frame of mind familiar to most, in which a false
step, however imposed by the conditions under which it was taken, can
be seen only in the light of the unfortunate consequences, and therein
assumes the color of a fault, or at best of a blunder. "His active
and anxious mind," wrote Sir Edward Berry, who, as captain of the
flag-ship, was witness of his daily feelings, "would not permit him to
rest a moment in the same place; he therefore shaped his course to the
northward for the coast of Caramania."[179] His one thought now was to
get back to the westward, taking a more northerly course on the return,
so as to increase the chance of information. The fleet accordingly
stretched to the northward until the coast of Asia Minor was made, and
then beat back along the south shore of Candia, not seeing a single
vessel until it had passed that island. On the 19th of July it reached
Syracuse, whence Nelson wrote to the British minister at Naples that,
having gone a round of six hundred leagues with the utmost expedition,
he was as ignorant of the situation of the enemy as he had been four
weeks before. The squadron now filled with water, which was running
short, and on the 24th again sailed for Alexandria; the admiral having
satisfied himself that the French were at least neither in Corfu nor to
the westward. On the 1st of August the minarets of the city were seen,
and soon after the port full of shipping, with the French flag upon the
walls, but, to Nelson's bitter disappointment, no large ships of war.
At one in the afternoon, however, one of his fleet made signal that
a number of ships-of-the-line were at anchor in Aboukir Bay, twelve
or fifteen miles east of Alexandria; and Nelson, prompt to attack as
Bonaparte had been to disembark, gave slippery fortune, so long unkind,
no chance again to balk him, but with a brisk breeze flew at once upon
the foe.
Neither by the character of the anchorage nor by its own dispositions
was the French fleet prepared for the attack thus suddenly, and most
unexpectedly, precipitated upon it. Two days after the army landed,
the commander-in-chief gave Admiral Brueys explicit and urgent orders
at once to sound the old port of Alexandria, and, if possible, take
his ships in there; if not, and if Aboukir Bay would admit of defence
at anchor against a superior force, he might choose a position there.
Failing both, he was to go with his heavy vessels to Corfu.[180] That
and the other Ionian Islands were within Bonaparte's district, by the
decree of April 12 making him commander of the Army of the East. In a
much later dispatch, which Brueys did not live to receive, he explains
that it was indispensable to preserve the fleet from serious injury
until the affair in Egypt was settled, in order to check any movement
of the Porte; for, though the allegiance of the Mamelukes was but
nominal, it was possible the Sultan might resent the French invasion.
The justice of this cautious view was shown by the action of the Porte
as soon as the destruction of the fleet became known. Brueys ordered
the necessary soundings, and the report which he received on July 18,
a fortnight before the battle, was favorable; with good weather it
was possible to take the ships-of-the-line inside.[181] The admiral,
however, was an invalid, and of a temper naturally undecided; unable
to make a choice of difficulties, he hung on the balance and remained
inactive, taking refuge in a persuasion that the British would not
return. Bonaparte thought the same. "All the conduct of the English,"
wrote he on the 30th of July, "indicates that they are inferior in
number, and content themselves with blockading Malta and intercepting
its supplies." But the great soldier, prone as he always was to tempt
fortune to the utmost for a great object, found in this opinion no
reason for running unnecessary risks and in the same breath insisted
upon Alexandria or Corfu for the fleet. Brueys had taken his ships
to Aboukir Bay on the 8th of July, and there remained. He had the
orders of his commander; but the latter, at a distance and absorbed
in the cares of his operations ashore, could not communicate to his
vacillating subordinate the impulse of his own energy. All the work of
the squadron proceeded listlessly; the belief that the British fleet
would not return sapped every effort; carelessness, indiscipline and
insubordination, among officers and men, caused constant complaint and
trouble. In such delusion and lethargy went by the priceless days which
were passed by Nelson in unresting thought and movement, in "a fever of
anxiety"[182] that scarcely allowed him to eat or drink.
[Illustration: Coast Map from Alexandria to Rosetta Mouth of the Nile.]
The Bay of Aboukir,[183] in the western portion of which the French
fleet was anchored, and where was fought the celebrated Battle of the
Nile, is an open roadstead, extending from the promontory of Aboukir,
fifteen miles east of Alexandria, to the Rosetta mouth of the Nile. The
distance between the two extreme points is about eighteen miles. In
the western part, where the French were lying, the shore-line, after
receding some distance from Aboukir Point, turns to the south-east and
continues in that direction in a long narrow tongue of sand, behind
which lies the shallow Lake Madieh. North-east from the point is a line
of shoals and rocks, rising at two and a half miles' distance into a
small island, then bearing the same name, Aboukir, but since known as
Nelson's Island; beyond which the same stretch of foul ground continues
for another mile and a quarter. Behind this four-mile barrier there
is found fair shelter from the prevailing north-west summer wind; but
as, for three miles from the beach, there were only four fathoms of
water, the order of battle had to be established somewhat beyond that
distance. The north-western ship, which with the prevailing wind would
be to windward and in the van, was moored a mile and a half south-east
from Aboukir Island, in five fathoms of water.[184] This was scant for
a heavy vessel, but it does not seem that she was carried as close to
the shoal as she might have been. As the van ship in the column, she
was on one flank, and that the most exposed, of the line-of-battle,
whose broadsides were turned to the sea. She should, therefore, have
been brought so near the shoal as not to leave room to swing, and
there been moored head and stern. So placed, the flank could not have
been turned, as it actually was. This was the more necessary because
the few guns established by Brueys on the island were so light as to
be entirely ineffective, in range and weight, at the distance between
them and the flank they pretended to strengthen. They were a mere toy
defence, as futile as the other general dispositions taken. This being
so, it would seem that the frigates might have been placed along the
shoal ground ahead, where the enemy's ships-of-the-line could not reach
them, and thence have supported the flank ship. From the latter, the
line extended south-east to, and including, the eighth in the order,
when it turned a little toward the beach; making with its former
direction a salient angle, but one very obtuse. The distance from ship
to ship was about one hundred and sixty yards; from which, and from the
average length of the ships, it may be estimated that the whole line
from van to rear was nearly a mile and three quarters long. In case of
expecting attack, a cable was to be taken from ship to ship to prevent
the enemy passing through the intervals; and springs also were then to
be put upon the cable by which each vessel was anchored.[185]
It will be instructive to a professional reader to compare the
dispositions of Admiral Brueys, in Aboukir Bay, with those adopted by
Lord Hood in 1782, at St. Kitt's Island, when expecting an attack at
anchor from a very superior force.[186] The comparison is historically
interesting as well as instructive; for it has been said that Nelson
framed his own plan, in the cogitations of his long chase, upon Hood's
scheme for attacking the French fleet under Admiral DeGrasse while
lying at the anchorage from which he first drove it, before occupying
it himself. The parallel is quite complete, for neither at St. Kitt's
nor Aboukir was the anchored fleet able to get substantial assistance
from batteries. The decisively important points in such a disposition,
as in any order of battle, land or sea, are—(1) that the line cannot
be pierced, and (2) that the flanks cannot be turned. Hood thrust one
flank ship so close to the shore that the enemy could not pass round
her, and closed up his intervals.[187] Brueys left the same flank—for
in both cases it was the van and weather ship—open to turning, with
long spaces between the vessels. In his arrangement for the other
flank, for the lee ships, Brueys was equally inferior. Hood threw his
eight lee ships at right angles to the rest of the fleet, so that their
broadsides completely protected the latter from enfilading fire. Brueys
simply bent his line a little, with a view of approaching the rear
to shoal water. Failing thus to obtain a fire at right angles to the
principal line of battle, the rear did not contribute to strengthen
that; while, not actually reaching to shoal water, it remained itself
in the air, if attacked by the enemy in preference. This was the more
singular, as Brueys had expected the rear to be the object of the
British efforts. "I have asked," he wrote, "for two mortars to place
upon the shoal on which I have rested the head of my line; but I have
much less to fear for that part than for the rear, upon which the enemy
will probably bring to bear all their effort."[188] Nelson, however,
whether illumined by Hood's example, through that historical study of
tactics for which he was noted, or inspired only by his own genius, had
well understood beforehand that, if he found the French in such order
as they were, the van and centre were at his mercy; and he had clearly
imparted this view to his captains. Hence, when the enemy were seen, he
needed only to signal "his intention was to attack the van and centre
as they lay at anchor, according to the plan before developed,"[189]
and could leave the details of execution to his subordinates.
[Illustration: Battle of the Nile.]
The evening before the eventful first of August, as the British
fleet expected to make Alexandria the next day, the "Alexander" and
"Swiftsure" were sent ahead to reconnoitre. In consequence of this
detachment, made necessary by the want of frigates, these ships,
when the main body at 1 P.M.[190] sighted the French fleet, were
considerably to leeward, and did not get into action until two hours
after their consorts. As soon as the enemy were seen, the British fleet
hauled sharp up on the wind, heading about north-east, to weather
Aboukir Island and shoal; the admiral at the same time making signal
to prepare for action, anchoring by the stern. As they drew by the
shoal, being in eleven fathoms,[191] Nelson hailed Captain Hood, of the
"Zealous," and asked if he thought they were far enough to the eastward
to clear it; for the only chart in the fleet was a rough sketch taken
from a captured merchant vessel, and no British officer knew the
ground. Hood replied that he would bear up, sounding as he went, so
that the other ships keeping outside of him would be safe. Thus the
fleet was piloted into action; one ship, the "Goliath," being ahead
of the "Zealous," but on her outer bow, and the admiral very properly
allowing others to pass him, until he was sixth in the order, so as
to be reasonably certain the flag-ship would not touch the bottom.
Captain Foley of the "Goliath," still keeping the lead, crossed ahead
of the French column, over the ground left open by Brueys's oversight,
intending to attack the van ship, the "Guerrier;" but the anchor hung
for a moment, so that he brought up on the inner quarter of the second,
the "Conquérant," while Hood, following close after, anchored on the
bow of the "Guerrier." These two British ships thus came into action
shortly before sundown, the French having opened fire ten minutes
before. Five minutes later, just as the sun was sinking below the
horizon, the foremast of the "Guerrier" went overboard. "So auspicious
a commencement of the attack was greeted with three cheers by the whole
British fleet."[192] The "Orion" followed with a much wider sweep,
passing round her two leaders, between them and the shore, and anchored
on the inner side of the fifth French ship; while the "Theseus," which
came next, brought up abreast the third, having gone between the
"Goliath" and "Zealous" and their antagonists. The "Audacious," the
fifth of the British to come up, chose a new course. Steering between
the "Guerrier" and the "Conquérant," she took her place on the bow of
the latter, already engaged on the quarter by the "Goliath." These five
all anchored on the inner (port) side of the French. Nelson's ship,
the "Vanguard," coming next, anchored outside the third of the enemy's
vessels, the "Spartiate," thus placed between her and the "Theseus."
The "Minotaur," five minutes later, took the outer side of the fourth,
heretofore without an opponent; and the "Defence" attacked, also on the
outer side, the fifth ship, already engaged on her inner side by the
"Orion." Five French seventy-fours were thus in hot action with eight
British of the same size, half an hour after the first British gun was
fired, and only five hours from the time Brueys first knew that the
enemy were near.
This most gallant, but most unfortunate, man had passed suddenly
from a condition of indolent security face to face with an appalling
emergency. When Nelson's fleet was first reported, numbers of men were
ashore, three miles or more away, getting water for the ships. They
were recalled, but most of them did not return. Brueys still cherished
the belief, with which indeed he could not have parted without despair,
that the enemy would not brave the unknown perils of the ground with
night falling; nor could he tell their purpose until they had passed
Aboukir Island and opened the bay. A hurried council of senior officers
renewed the decision previously reached, to fight, if fight they
must, at anchor; but Brueys betrayed the vacillations of an unsteady
purpose by crossing the light yards, a step which could have no other
significance than that of getting under way. Still, he hoped for the
respite of a night to make the preparations so long neglected. Little
did he know the man whom England herself still hardly knew. Without
a moment's pause, without a tremor of uncertainty, yet with all the
precautions of a seaman, Nelson came straight onward, facing with mind
long prepared the difficulties of navigation, the doubts and obscurity
of a night action. Hurriedly the French prepare for battle; and, secure
that the enemy will not dare go within the line, the batteries on that
side are choked with the numerous encumbrances of ship economy, the
proper disposal of which is termed "clearing for action."
For half an hour Brueys was a helpless and hopeless, though undaunted,
spectator of an overwhelming attack, which he had never expected at
all, delivered in a manner he had deemed impossible upon the part of
his order he thought most secure. Soon he was freed from the agony
of mere passive waiting by the opportunity to act. The "Bellerophon"
and "Majestic," both seventy-fours, anchored outside and abreast,
respectively, of the flag-ship "Orient," of one hundred and twenty
guns, and of the "Tonnant," eighty, next astern. Darkness had just
settled down upon the water as the arrival of these two ships completed
the first scene of the tragedy; and the British vessels, which were
fighting under their white ensign,[193] as more easily seen at night,
now hoisted also four lanterns, horizontally arranged, whereby to
recognize each other.
Meanwhile a woeful mishap had befallen Nelson's chosen brother-in-arms,
Troubridge. His ship, the "Culloden," had been some distance from the
main body of the fleet when the latter rounded the shoal, and, doing
her own piloting, ran upon its outer extremity at a quarter before
seven. There she stuck, despite all the efforts of her most able
commander, until two o'clock the next morning, when the battle was
over. There also, however, she served as a beacon to the two remaining
ships, "Alexander" and "Swiftsure," who had to make the perilous
passage in the dark. These vessels, with the "Leander," fifty, arriving
after eight o'clock, at a critical moment of the battle, played the
part of a reserve in a quarter where the British were meeting with
disaster.
Neither the "Bellerophon" nor the "Majestic" was equally matched with
the French ship opposed to it; but the "Bellerophon" especially, having
to do with a vessel double her own force and having brought up fairly
abreast, where she got her full fire, was soon nearly a wreck. In
three quarters of an hour her main and mizzen masts were shot away,
and in thirty minutes more, unable longer to endure her punishment,
the cable was cut and she wore out of action. As she did so, the
foremast also fell, and, with forty-nine killed and one hundred and
forty-eight wounded, out of a ship's company of six hundred and fifty
men, the "Bellerophon" drifted down the line, receiving the successive
broadsides of the French rear. As she thus passed, without flag or
light, the "Swiftsure" came up. Withholding his fire, Captain Hallowell
hailed, and finding her to be a British ship, let go at once his
anchor, bringing up on the starboard bow of the "Orient." Immediately
afterwards the "Alexander" arrived and anchored on the port quarter of
the three-decker, while the "Leander," with the discretion becoming
her size, placed herself on the port bow of the "Franklin," the next
ahead to the "Orient," in a position of comparative impunity, and thus
raked both the French ships. The French centre was thus in its turn the
victim of a concentration, similar to that with which the action began
in the van, and destined to result in a frightful catastrophe.
At about nine in the evening the French flag-ship was observed to be
on fire, from what cause has never been certainly known. The British
guns, trained on the part in flames, helped to paralyze all efforts
to extinguish them, and they gained rapidly. The brave and unfortunate
Brueys was spared the sight of this last calamity. Already twice
wounded, at half-past eight a cannon-ball carried away his left leg at
the thigh. He refused to be taken below, and passed away calmly and
nobly a few moments before the fire broke out. At ten the "Orient" blew
up. Five ships ahead of her had already surrendered, and the eighty-gun
ship "Franklin" also hauled down her flag before midnight.
Six of the French still had their colors flying; but either from their
cables being cut by shot, or from the necessity of slipping to avoid
the explosion of the "Orient," they had drifted far astern. The three
in the extreme rear had been but slightly engaged; of the others, the
"Tonnant" was totally dismasted, while the "Heureux" and "Mercure" had
received considerable injury.[194] The following morning these vessels
were attacked by some of the least injured of the British, with the
result that the "Tonnant," "Mercure," "Heureux" and "Timoléon," the
last of which had been the extreme rear, or flank, ship of the original
order, ran ashore. There the three first named afterwards hauled down
their flags, and the fourth was burned by her officers. The two other
French ships, "Guillaume Tell" and "Généreux," escaped. The former bore
the flag of Rear-Admiral Villeneuve, who had commanded the rear in this
battle, and was hereafter to be commander-in-chief of the allied fleet
at the memorable disaster of Trafalgar. His inaction on this occasion
has been sharply criticised, both in his own time and since. Upon the
whole, the feeling of later French professional writers appears to be
that his courage, though unquestionable, was rather of the passive than
the active type; and that in Aboukir Bay there was afforded him a real
opportunity and sufficient time to bring the rear ships into action,
which he culpably failed to improve.[195] Bonaparte, on the contrary,
wrote to Villeneuve, soon after the battle, that "if any error could
be imputed to him, it was that he had not got under way as soon as the
'Orient' blew up; seeing that, three hours before, the position Brueys
had taken had been forced and surrounded."[196]
Such was, in its main outlines, the celebrated Battle of the Nile, the
most complete of naval victories, and among the most decisive, at least
of the immediate course of events. In it the French lost eleven out of
thirteen ships-of-the-line[197] and thirty-five hundred men, killed,
wounded, or drowned;[198] among them being the commander-in-chief
and three captains killed, a rear-admiral and six captains wounded.
The British loss was two hundred and eighteen killed—-of which one
captain—and six hundred and seventy-eight wounded, among whom was the
admiral himself, struck in the head by a heavy splinter. The hurt,
which he at first thought fatal, disabled him for the moment and
seriously affected his efficiency for some days. "I think," wrote he,
four weeks later, "that if it had pleased God I had not been wounded,
not a boat would have escaped."[199]
The particular circumstances under which the British attack was
undertaken, the admirable skill as well as conduct shown by all the
captains, and the thoroughly scientific character of the tactical
combination adopted, as seen in its execution, unite with the
decisiveness of the issue to cast a peculiar lustre upon this victory
of Nelson's. Lord Howe, inferior to none as a judge of merit, said
to Captain Berry that the Battle of the Nile "stood unparalleled
and singular in this instance, that every captain distinguished
himself."[200] It has been disputed how far belongs to the admiral
the credit of the bold manœuvre, whereby the leading ship, passing
ahead of the French line, showed to her successors the open path
through which the operation of doubling on the enemy could be most
effectually carried out. Into this discussion the author has no
intention of entering, beyond noting an omission in the full treatment
of the question made by the careful and laborious editor of Nelson's
correspondence, Sir Harris Nicolas, who was not able to reach a
decision.[201] In Ross's "Life of Admiral Saumarez" it is stated
that, while discussing the various modes by which the enemy might be
attacked, Saumarez offended Nelson by saying that he "had seen the evil
consequences of doubling upon an enemy, especially in a night action;"
and had differed with the admiral in the plan of attack, because "it
never required two English ships to capture one French, and that the
damage which they must necessarily do each other might render them
both unable to fight an enemy's ship which had not been engaged."[202]
Saumarez's objection, though not without some foundation, was justly
over-ruled; but it could scarcely have been raised had Nelson never
contemplated the precise method of doubling employed,—a British ship on
each side of a single enemy,—for in no other position could the risk
of mutual injury have been serious.
It is in entire keeping with Nelson's well-known character, that, after
discussing all likely positions and ascertaining that his captains
understood his views, he should with perfect and generous confidence
have left all the details of immediate action with them. In the actual
case he could not, without folly, have rigorously prescribed to Captain
Foley what path to follow. Only the man on the "Goliath's" deck,
watching the soundings, could rightly judge what must each instant be
done; and it was no less a transcendent merit in Nelson that he could
thus trust another, than that, with falling night and unknown waters,
he could reach the instant decision to attack an enemy of superior
force, in an order which he must have supposed to be carefully and
rationally assumed. In fact, however, the operation of doubling on
the enemy,—in contradistinction to doubling the head of the line,—was
really begun by Nelson himself; for his ship was the first to anchor
on the side opposite to that taken by her five predecessors. It was
open to him to have followed them, for the same reasons that prompted
Foley's action.[203] Instead of that, he deliberately anchored outside
the third French ship, already engaged on the inside by the "Theseus;"
thus indicating, as clearly as example can, what he would have those
succeeding him to do. The first two French ships were already so
engaged or crippled as to be properly passed. The fullest credit
therefore can be allowed to Captain Foley for a military decision of a
very high order, without stripping a leaf from Nelson's laurels.[204]
"The boldness and skill of Admiral Nelson," says Captain Chevalier,
"rose to a height which it would have been difficult to surpass."[205]
"The action of Nelson," said Napoleon, "was a desperate action which
cannot be proposed as a model, but in which he displayed, as well
as the English crews, all the skill and vigor possible."[206] This
sentence is susceptible of a double construction. The condemnation, if
the words be meant as such, comes ill from the man who pushed on his
desperate advance to Leoben in 1797, who at Marengo stretched his line
till it broke, and who in 1798 ventured the Mediterranean fleet and the
Army of Italy on the Egyptian expedition, with scarce a chance in his
favor, except a superstitious reliance upon a fortune which did not
betray him. The arrangements of Brueys being what they were, the odds
were with the British admiral.
It has been said that, with better gunnery on the part of the French,
disaster must have resulted to the attacking force; and precisely the
same criticism has been applied to Trafalgar.[207] Now, putting out
of consideration that Great Britain had at this date been for five
years at war with France, and that British seamen had thus gained
an experience of French gunnery upon which Nelson could reckon, the
justice of this criticism further depends upon the circumstances of
the wind and the character of the approach. An attack made with a very
light wind, leaving the assailant long under the enemy's fire, or
with a fresh breeze on a course that lies close to the wind, thereby
bringing the greatest strain upon the spars, is a very different thing
from one made with a good working breeze well abaft the beam, which
was the case at the Nile. One cannot dogmatize on probabilities when,
from the nature of the case, there are few precedents on which to rest
an opinion. In bearing down against a fleet under way, of which there
are many instances, the experience in scarcely any case was that so
many spars were lost as to prevent the assailant reaching the hostile
line; and at the Nile, once the anchor was down, the loss of a spar
or two was of little consequence. It seems altogether probable that,
had the French gunnery been much better than it was, the British ships
would yet have reached their station; and once there, the tactical
combination adopted would still have given them the victory, though
more dearly bought. If, however, Brueys's arrangements had been more
skilfully made, resembling those of Hood at St. Kitt's, and if the
French gunnery had been very good, it may safely be conceded that the
British admiral would have needed more circumspection in making his
attack. To say that under totally different circumstances different
results will obtain, is a species of prophecy with which no one need
quarrel. If, in the shock of war, all things on both sides are exactly
equal,—if the two admirals, their captains and crews, the ships of
the fleets, the tactical arrangements, are equal, each to each,—there
can be no result. When inequality, whether original or induced by
circumstance, enters in any one of these factors, a result will follow
proportional to the disparity. When this is great, the result will be
great; when small, small. At the Battle of the Nile, the difference
in admirals, in captains, in crews, in gunnery, and in tactical
combination, were all greatly against the French, and the result was a
disaster more than usually complete.
During the month passed by Brueys in indolent security, Bonaparte
had advanced steadily in his projected conquest of Egypt. On the
21st of July the battle of the Pyramids was fought, the next day
Cairo submitted, and on the 25th the general-in-chief entered the
city. Remaining there a few days to repose his troops and secure his
position, he departed again on the 7th of August to complete the
conquest of lower Egypt; leaving Desaix to take care of Cairo and
prepare the corps destined for the subjugation of the upper Nile. By
the 12th of August the Mamelukes, still under arms in the Delta, had
been driven into the Isthmus of Suez, whence they retired to Syria; and
there, on the borders of the desert, Bonaparte received from Kleber
the news of the disaster in Aboukir Bay. Under this tremendous reverse
he showed the self-control of which he was always capable at need. The
troops gave way to despair. "Here we are," said they, "abandoned in
this barbarous country, without communication with home, without hope
of return." "Well," replied their general, "we have then laid on us the
obligation to do great things. Seas which we do not command separate us
from home; but no seas divide us from Africa and Asia. We will found
here an empire."
The magical influence he exerted over the soldiers, most of whom
had followed him to victory in Italy, restored their courage, and
French lightheartedness again prevailed over despondency. The blow,
nevertheless, had struck home, and resounded through the four quarters
of the world. The Mamelukes, Ibrahim Bey in Syria, and Mourad Bey
in upper Egypt, cast down by their reverses, were preparing to
treat; upon the news of Nelson's victory they resumed their arms.
The Porte, incensed by the invasion of Egypt, but still hesitating,
notwithstanding the pressure exerted by the ministers of Great Britain
and Russia, took heart as soon as it knew that the French fleet was no
more. Bonaparte had rightly warned Brueys that the preservation of his
ships was necessary to hold Turkey in check. The Sultan and his Pashas
of Egypt and Syria rejected the French advances. On the 2d of September
a memorial was sent to all the foreign ministers in Constantinople,
expressing the surprise of the Porte at Bonaparte's landing, and
stating that a considerable force had been despatched for Egypt to
stop his progress. On the 11th of the month war was formally declared
against the French Republic.[208]
Throughout the year 1798 the state of affairs on the continent of
Europe had grown continually more threatening. The politico-military
propagandism of the Revolution had given birth to, and was now being
replaced by, an aggressive external policy, to which the victories of
Bonaparte gave increased vigor and extension. It became the recognized,
if not the avowed, aim of French diplomacy to surround France with
small dependent republics, having institutions modelled upon the same
type as her own, with all local powers merged in those of a central
government.[209] The United Provinces, in becoming a republic, had
retained their federal constitution; but in January, 1798, they
underwent a revolution, promoted by the French Directory, which did
away with the provincial independence inherited from past ages. The
Cisalpine Republic and Genoa had received a similar organization at the
hands of Bonaparte. In many of the cantons of Switzerland there were
discontent and disturbance, due to the unequal political conditions of
the inhabitants. The Directory made of this a pretext for interference,
on the plea of France being interested both in the internal quiet of a
neighboring country and also in the particular persons whose discontent
was construed as evidence of oppression. French troops entered
Switzerland in January, 1798. The canton of Berne fought for its
privileges, but was easily subdued; and a packed convention, assembled
at Aarau, adopted for Switzerland a centralized constitution in place
of the old cantonal independence. This was followed some months later,
in August, 1798, by an offensive and defensive alliance between the
Helvetian and French republics.
The invasion of Berne had had another motive than the political
preponderance of France in the councils of her neighbors. The revenue
of the Directory still fell far short of the expenditure, and money was
particularly wanted for Bonaparte's approaching expedition. Seventeen
million francs were found in the Bernese treasury and appropriated.
Eighteen million more were raised by requisitions, and other cantons
were drained in proportion.[210] The same motive contributed,[211] at
the same instant, to the occupation of Rome, for which a more plausible
pretext was found. In the papal states, as elsewhere throughout Europe,
French agents had secretly stirred up a revolutionary movement. On the
28th of December, 1797, this party had risen in Rome, and a collision
between it and the papal troops had occurred in the neighborhood of
the French embassy. General Duphot, who was then residing there, was
killed while attempting to interpose between the combatants. The
French ambassador at once left the city; and the Directory, refusing
all explanations, ordered Berthier, Bonaparte's successor in Italy, to
advance. On the 10th of February he entered Rome, recognized the Roman
Republic, which was proclaimed under his auspices, and forced the Pope
to retire to Tuscany. It was owing to this occupation that a contingent
of the Egyptian expedition embarked at Civita Vecchia, as the most
convenient point.
Neither Naples nor Austria ventured on overt action in behalf of
the Pope; but the dissatisfaction of both was extreme. Never under
Bonaparte himself had French troops come so near to the kingdom of the
Two Sicilies, whose importance to the common cause of the Continent,
from its geographical position, was perfectly understood. But while the
situation of Naples at the far end of the peninsula made it a serious
danger to the flank and rear of the French, when engaged with an enemy
in upper Italy, its remoteness from support, except by way of the sea,
was a source of weakness to a state necessarily dependent upon allies.
This was especially felt in February, 1798, when the British fleet,
after a year's absence, had as yet given no sign of returning to the
Mediterranean, and the ships which accompanied Bonaparte to Egypt were
still in Toulon. The latter would doubtless have been directed upon
Naples, had Naples moved against Rome. The Bourbon kingdom therefore
swallowed its vexation, but drew closer to Austria; which, in addition
to the affront offered to the Pope, had its own motives for discontent
in the occupation of Switzerland by the French, and in the changes
introduced into the political complexion of the Continent by these
aggressive actions of the republican government. The course of the
Directory during the continental peace of 1797 and 1798 was closely
parallel to that of Bonaparte four years later, which made impossible
the continuance of the Peace of Amiens. With less ability and less
vigor, there was the same plausible, insidious, steady aggression,
under color of self-protection or of yielding to popular demand,
which forced on the power of France at the expense of other states.
An occurrence in Vienna at this moment came near to produce war and
stop the Egyptian expedition. When Bonaparte entered Germany in April,
1797, the youth of Vienna had offered themselves in mass to defend the
country. In April, 1798, the anniversary of the day was celebrated
with a popular demonstration, which the French ambassador resented
by hoisting the tricolor. The crowds in a rage broke into and sacked
the embassy.[212] So great was the excitement over this affair that
the troops in Toulon and other ports were ordered not to embark, and
Bonaparte himself was directed to go as plenipotentiary to Rastadt; but
the emperor made explanations, and the incident passed. Still, as a
French historian says, "things were getting spoiled between Austria and
France."[213]
Russia at the same time was fairly forced from her attitude of reserve,
maintained since the death of Catherine II., by the same policy which
drove the United States into the _quasi_ war of 1798 with France.[214]
A decree of the French legislature had made lawful prize any neutral
ship which had on board, not merely British property, but any goods
of British origin, even though the property of a neutral. This was
given a special application to the Baltic by a notification, issued
January 12, 1798, that "if any ship be suffered to pass through the
Sound with English commodities, of whatever nation it may be, it
shall be considered as a formal declaration of war against the French
nation."[215] Although immediately directed against Sweden and Denmark,
as the two countries bordering the Sound, this was resented by the
Czar, in common with all neutral governments; and on the 15th of May,
he "ordered twenty-two ships-of-the-line and two hundred and fifty
galleys to proceed to the Sound, to protect trade in general against
the oppression of the Directory."[216]
Once enkindled, the violent and erratic temper of Paul I. soon rushed
into extremes; and he received further provocation from the capture
of Malta. When Bonaparte took possession of that island, he found
there a treaty, just signed, by which the Czar stipulated a payment
of four hundred thousand rubles to the Order, in which to the end
of his days he preserved a fantastic interest. As a measure of
precaution, the French general decreed that any Greeks in Malta or
the Ionian Islands maintaining relations with Russia should be shot,
and Greek vessels under Russian colors sunk.[217] Hence the members
of the Order in Russia made, in August, a violent protest against
the seizure, throwing themselves upon the Czar for a support which
he eagerly promised.[218] He then drew near to Great Britain, and
offered to aid Austria with troops. The emperor at first answered that
nothing could be done without Prussia; and the three governments then
applied themselves to obtain the accession of this kingdom to a new
coalition. On the 19th of May—the very day, it may be observed, that
Bonaparte sailed from Toulon—Austria and Naples signed a defensive
alliance.[219] The conferences at Rastadt, so far as the emperor was
concerned, were broken off on the 6th of July, although those with the
empire dragged on longer. The imperial envoy, Cobentzel, at once went
to Berlin, where he entered into cordial relations with the British
and Russian plenipotentiaries. On the 10th of August a convention was
signed between the two emperors, by which the Czar undertook to send
thirty thousand troops into Galicia to support the Austrian army. Great
Britain, as ever, was ready to help the cause with ships and money.
Prussia refusing to join, the Russian envoy took his leave, saying: "We
will make war on France with you, without you, or against you."[220]
On governments so prepared to be enkindled, yet hesitating before the
prestige of French success and feeling the mutual distrust inseparable
from coalitions, the news of the battle of the Nile fell like a brand
among tinder. The French fleet was not only defeated, but annihilated.
The Mediterranean from the Straits to the Levant was in the power of
the British navy, which the total destruction of its enemy relieved
from the necessity of concentration and allowed to disperse to every
quarter where its efforts were needed. The greatest general and thirty
thousand of the best troops France possessed, with numbers of her most
brilliant officers, were thus hopelessly shut off from their country.
After the victory, conscious of its far-reaching importance, Nelson
took measures to disperse the news as rapidly as his want of small
vessels would permit. The "Leander" sailed on the 5th of August with
the first despatches for Lord St. Vincent off Cadiz, but was on
the 18th captured by the "Généreux," seventy-four, one of the two
ships which had escaped from Aboukir Bay. To provide against such an
accident, however, the brig "Mutine" had also been sent on the 13th to
Naples, where she arrived on the 4th of September, bringing the first
news that reached Europe, and which Nelson asked the British minister
to see forwarded to all the other courts. The captain of the "Mutine"
started the next day for England, by way of Vienna, and on the 2d of
October, 1798, two full months after the battle, reached London with
the first accounts.
Conscious of the effect which events in Egypt might have upon British
influence in India, Nelson also sent a lieutenant, on the 10th of
August, to make his way overland through Alexandretta and Aleppo to
Bombay. This officer bore dispatches to the governor, informing him
both of the landing and numbers of Bonaparte's expedition, and also of
the fatal blow which had just befallen it. The news was most timely.
The French had been actively intriguing in the native courts, and
Tippoo Saib, the son and successor of Hyder Ali, Sultan of Mysore,
their former ally in the days of Suffren, had openly committed himself
to his father's policy. It was too late for Tippoo to recede, and he
was erelong embarked in a war, which ended in April, 1799, in his death
at the assault of Seringapatam and the overthrow of his kingdom; but
on the other native states the striking catastrophe produced its due
impression. In their operations against Tippoo the British were not
embarrassed by troubles in other quarters.
"The consequences of this battle," sums up a brilliant French naval
writer, "were incalculable. Our navy never recovered from this terrible
blow to its consideration and its power. This was the combat which
for two years delivered the Mediterranean to the English, and called
thither the squadrons of Russia; which shut up our army in the midst of
a rebellious population, and decided the Porte to declare against us;
which put India out of the reach of our enterprise, and brought France
within a hair's-breadth of her ruin; for it rekindled the scarcely
extinct war with Austria, and brought Suwarrow and the Austro-Russians
to our very frontiers."[221] Great Britain, the Sea Power so often and
so idly accused of backwardness in confronting France, of requiring
continental support before daring to move, was first to act. Long
before news of the battle, before even the battle was fought, or the
alliance of Austria and Russia contracted, orders had been sent to
St. Vincent to detach from Nelson's force to the support of Naples,
hoping there to start the little fire from which a great matter should
be kindled. These "most secret orders" reached Nelson on the 15th of
August.[222] He had just dispatched to Gibraltar seven of the British
fleet with six of the captured French vessels, the whole under charge
of Sir James Saumarez. Setting fire to the three other prizes, he
intrusted the blockade of Alexandria to Captain Hood, with three
ships-of-the-line, and with the three then remaining to him sailed for
Naples on the 19th. From the wretched condition of his division[223]
the passage took over a month; but on the 22d of September he anchored
in the bay, where the renown of his achievement had preceded him.
On his way, Nelson had been informed that a Portuguese squadron,
commanded by the Marquis de Niza, had entered the Mediterranean to
support his operations. At his request this division, which had
appeared off Alexandria on the 29th of August,[224] but refused to
remain there, undertook the blockade of Malta, until such time as the
repairs of the British ships should allow them to do so. The natives
of the island had risen against the French on the 26th of August, and
driven them from the open country into the forts of La Valetta. Niza
took his station off the port, about the 20th of September, and on the
24th Sir James Saumarez appeared with his division and the prizes.
The following day the two officers sent General Vaubois a summons to
surrender, which was as a matter of course refused. Saumarez went on
to Gibraltar; but before doing so gave the inhabitants twelve hundred
muskets with ammunition, which materially assisted them in their
efforts, finally successful, to deprive the enemy of the resources
of the island. Nelson sent off British ships as they were ready, and
himself joined the blockading force on the 24th of October, though only
for a few days, his presence being necessary in Naples. The garrison
was again by him formally summoned, and as formally rejected his
offers. From that time until their surrender in September, 1800, the
French were in strict blockade, both by land and water.
In October of this year Lord St. Vincent went to live ashore at
Gibraltar, both on account of his health, and because there, being the
great British naval station of the Mediterranean, he was centrally
placed to receive information, to give orders, and especially to
hasten, by his unflagging personal supervision, the work of supply
and repair upon which the efficiency of a fleet primarily depends.
The division off Cadiz, numbering generally some fifteen of the line,
kept its old station watching the Spaniards, under the command of
Lord Keith,—one of the most efficient and active of the generation of
naval officers between St. Vincent and Nelson, to the latter of whom
he was senior. Within the Mediterranean Nelson commanded, under St.
Vincent. The blockade of Egypt and Malta, and co-operation with the
Austrian and Neapolitan armies in the expected war, were his especial
charge. He was also to further, as far as in him lay, the operations
of a combined Russian and Turkish fleet, which had assembled in the
Dardanelles in September, 1798, to maintain the cause of the coalition
in the Levant. This fleet entered the Mediterranean in October; but
instead of assuming the blockade of Alexandria and the protection of
the Syrian coast, it undertook the capture of the Ionian Islands. All
of these, except Corfu, fell into its power by October 10; and on the
20th Corfu, the citadel of the group, was attacked. Nelson saw this
direction of the Russo-Turkish operations with disgust and suspicion.
"The Porte ought to be aware," he wrote, "of the great danger at a
future day of allowing the Russians to get a footing at Corfu."[225]
"I was in hopes that a part of the united Turkish and Russian squadron
would have gone to Egypt,—Corfu is a secondary consideration.... I
have had a long conference with Kelim Effendi on the conduct likely
to be pursued by the Russian Court towards the unsuspicious (I fear)
and upright Turk.... A strong squadron should have been sent to Egypt
to have relieved my dear friend Captain Hood; but Corfu suited Russia
better."[226] At the same time Turkish troops, under the pashas whose
good dispositions Bonaparte had boasted, swept away from France the
former Venetian territory on the mainland, acquired by the treaty of
Campo Formio.
While Bonaparte's Oriental castles were thus crumbling, through
the destruction in Aboukir Bay of the foundation upon which they
rested,—while Ionia was falling, Malta starving, and Egypt isolated,
through the loss of the sea—the Franco-Spanish allies were deprived of
another important foothold for maritime power. On the 15th of November
Minorca with its valuable harbor, Port Mahon, was surrendered to a
combined British military and naval expedition, quietly fitted out by
St. Vincent from Gibraltar.
The year 1798 in the Mediterranean closed with these operations
in progress. At its beginning France was in entire control of the
land-locked sea, and scarcely a sail hostile to her, except furtive
privateers, traversed its surface. When it closed, only two French
ships-of-the-line fit for battle remained upon the waters, which
swarmed with enemy's squadrons. Of these two, refugees from the fatal
bay of Aboukir, one was securely locked in Malta, whence she never
escaped; the other made its way to Toulon, and met its doom in a vain
effort to carry relief to the beleaguered island.