Before entering Washington, General Ross sent in a flag of truceor, rather, he carried one himself, for he accompanied itto see that all was done that could be done to arrange terms, without further mischief or bloodshed. He demanded that all military stores should be delivered up, and that the other public property should be ransomed at a certain sum. But scarcely had they entered the place, with the flag of truce displayed, whenwith total disregard of all such customs established by civilised nations in warthe party was fired upon, and the horse of General Ross killed under him. There was nothing for it but to order the troops forward. The city was taken possession of, under strict orders to respect private property, and to destroy only that of the State. Under these orders, the Capitol, the President's house, the Senate-house, the House of Representatives, the Treasury, the War-office, the arsenal, the dockyard, and the ropewalk were given to the flames; the bridge over the Potomac, and some other public works, were blown up; a frigate on the stocks and some smaller craft were burnt. All was done that could be done by General Ross, and the officers under him, to protect private property; but the soldiers were so incensed at the treachery by which the Americans had sought to blow up the seamen, by the firing on the flag of truce, and the unprincipled manner in which the Americans had carried on the war in Canada, as well as by the insults and gasconading of the Americans on all occasions, that they could not be restrained from committing some excesses. Yet it may be said that never was the capital of a nation so easily taken, and never did the capital of a nation which had given so much irritating provocation escape with so little scathe. The following evening it was evacuated in perfect order, and without any enemy appearing to molest the retreat. On the 30th the troops were safely re-embarked.In Ireland the administration of the law was becoming daily more difficult. Mr. Steele and Mr. O'Gorman Mahon were magistrates, and yet they were actively engaged in exciting the people to the very highest pitch, and urging them to defy the constituted authorities. On a day when a riot was expected at Ennis, county Clare, and the high sheriff made preparations to prevent it, both these gentlemen appeared there, decorated with the order of "Liberators," and followed by a mob. Mr. O'Gorman Mahon held very improper language to the high sheriff in presence of the troops. All this was certified to by sixteen magistrates, and by the commanding officer; yet Lord Anglesey, with the advice of the Lord Chancellor, decided on not depriving them of the commission of the peace. This conduct greatly disappointed the Duke of Wellington, and on the 11th of November he wrote a strong letter to him, in which he said: "I cannot express to you adequately the extent of the difficulties which these and other occurrences in Ireland create in all discussions with his Majesty. He feels that in Ireland the public peace is violated every day with impunity by those whose duty it is to preserve it; that a formidable conspiracy exists; and that the supposed conspiratorsthose whose language and conduct point them out as the principal agitators of the countryare admitted to the presence of his Majesty's representative, and equally well received with the king's most loyal subjects." The Duke also, as we have already observed, strongly censured the conduct of the Viceroy and the Lord Chancellor for visiting Lord Cloncurry, a member of the Association, remarking, "The doubts which are entertained respecting the loyalty of the Roman Catholic Association, the language which has been held there respecting the king himself, his Royal Family, the members of his Government, your colleagues in office, and respecting nearly every respectable member of society, and the unanimously expressed detestation of the violence of the Association, might be deemed reasons for omitting to encourage any of its members by the countenance or favour of the king's representative."
ONE:RETREAT OF THE HIGHLANDERS FROM PERTH. (See p. 31.)
ONE:The plan of the campaign is said to have been laid down by Bernadotte, and adopted, after some slight revision, by General Moreau. That general, whom the jealousy of Buonaparte had expelled from France, and who had retired to America, now returned in the hope of seeing the fall of Buonaparte effected, and peace and a liberal constitution given to his country. He came not to fight against France, but against Buonaparte. The plan showed that they who devised it knew Napoleon's art of war. It was to prevent him from attacking and beating them in detail. Whichever party was first assailed was to retire and draw him after them, till the other divisions could close round him, and assail him on all sides. Blucher was the first to advance against Macdonald and Ney. As had been foreseen, Buonaparte hastened to support these generals with the Imperial Guard and a numerous cavalry, under Latour-Maubourg. But Blucher then retired, and, crossing the Katzbach, sat down near Jauer, so as to cover Breslau. The purpose was served, for Schwarzenberg, accompanied by the sovereigns of Russia and Prussia, as well as by Moreau, had rushed forward on Dresden, driving St. Cyr and twenty thousand men before them, who took refuge in Dresden. The Allies were at his heels, and on the 25th of August began to attack the city. They hoped to win it before Buonaparte could return, in which case they would cut off his line of communication with Francestopping the advance both of his[69] supplies and reinforcements. But the very next day, whilst they were in vigorous operation against the city, and had already carried two redoubts, Buonaparte was seen advancing in hot haste over the bridges into Dresden. Warned of its danger, he had left Macdonald to defend himself, and now led his troops across the city and out at two different gates upon the enemies. The battle continued that day, and was resumed the next, by Buonaparte pushing forward immense bodies of troops from different gates, and concentrating them on the Allies. The attempt to take the city in Buonaparte's absence had failed, and now they saw themselves in danger of being enclosed by Muratwho had again been induced to join the Emperoron the Freiberg road, and by Vandamme on the road to Pirna, by the Elbe. They were, therefore, compelled to fall back, and the withdrawal soon proved a flight. Napoleon pursued them hotly amid torrents of wind and rain, and made great slaughter, especially of the Austrians, who were seized with a panic of the enemy who had so often beaten them. Seven or eight thousand French were killed and wounded; but of the Allies, chiefly Austrians, more than twenty thousand were killed or disabled. During the engagement Moreau had both his legs shot away by a cannon ball, and died in a few days.[See larger version]
TWO:Nothing could exceed the indignation of the public at the attempt that was being made by the Court, in league with an intriguing faction, to resist the national will. All classes, high and low, rich and poor, nobles and commoners, Churchmen and Dissenters, were roused into a state of wild excitement and fierce determination. Indignation meetings were everywhere held and threatening resolutions passed. The House of Commons was called upon to stop the supplies; placards were put up in the windows of shops expressing the determination of the inhabitants to pay no taxes. This determination was not confined to the middle classes; men of the highest rank and largest property, such as Lord Milton, told the tax-collector not to call again. A complete and active organisation existed in London for the purpose of stimulating and directing public[351] feeling in the provinces, and obtaining from the people vehement petitions, which poured in to both Houses rapidly, especially to the House of Commons. The political unions were everywhere preparing for actual insurrection. In London meetings were held by day and by night, at which the most violent language was used even by persons of property and rank. The Common Council of London met, and passed resolutions denouncing those who had advised the king not to create peers as enemies of their Sovereign, who had put to imminent hazard the stability of the Throne and the security of the country. A standing committee was appointed to watch the course of events. The feeling excited by these extraordinary proceedings proved, beyond the possibility of doubt, that the whole mercantile and trading classes in the metropolis were prepared to adopt revolutionary measures, if such were necessary, for the attainment of the Reform Bill. Immense numbers of persons who had hitherto considered the proceedings of the National Political union in London too violent, were now, says the Times of the 11th of May, at their own solicitation, admitted members. Similar excitement prevailed throughout the provinces."THE POLLING."
Soon after his marriage Buonaparte made a tour with his Imperial bride. It was very much the same that he had made with Josephine shortly before their coronationnamely, through the northern provinces of France, through Belgium and Holland. He decided, during this journey, on the occasion of his uniting the part of the Low Countries called Zealand with the Department of the Mouths of the Scheldt, on annexing the whole country to France for ever. But whilst conversing with Louis Buonaparte, his Holland king-brother at Antwerp, he suddenly stumbled on a discovery of some daring proceedings of Fouch, his Minister of Police, which sent him back to Paris in haste, and ruined that subtle diplomatist with him. The arbitrary disposition displayed in this arrangement very soon produced consequences between Napoleon and his brothers which made more than ever manifest to the world that no law or consideration could any longer influence Napoleon; that his self-will was, and must be, his only guide. His brother Lucien, who had from the first refused to become one of his puppets, and who was leading a private life in Italy, received an intimation from Fouch that Napoleon meant to arrest and shut him up. In consequence of this friendly hint, Lucien fled from the Continent, and ultimately took refuge in England, where he purchased an estate near Ludlow, and there resided till 1814, when the fall of his brother permitted him to return to France. Lucien Buonaparte (the ablest of the family next to Napoleon), now styled the Prince of Canino, from an estate which he purchased in Italy, and which the Pope raised to a principality, spent the three years in England in writing a poem entitled "Charlemagne; or, the Church Delivered."Next came the declaration of war by the King of Prussia, which Buonaparte styled a treachery; but, on the contrary, the King of Prussia had only preserved faith towards his oppressor and insulter too long. Not only all Prussia, but all Germany was on fire to throw off the detested yoke of the oppressor, and Frederick William would have been a traitor to his people and to common sense to have hesitated. Yet he proposed terms of a mutual settlement. To place himself in a position of independent treaty, he suddenly left Berlin on the 22nd of January, and made his way to Breslau, where he was out of the reach of French arms, and in certainty of the arrival, at no very distant date, of Russian ones. He invited, however, the French ambassador to follow him, and he there proposed an armistice, on the conditions that the French should evacuate Dantzic and all the other Prussian fortresses on the Oder, and retire behind the Elbe, on which the Czar had promised that he would stop the march of his army beyond the Vistula. But Buonaparte treated the proposition with contempt; he was determined to give up nothingto recover everything.
