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miffioners being nominated to fucceed Camus and his colfeagues, omitted no means of reftoring order, and invigo rating the spirit of the French army. General Dampierre, who had evinced his patriotism by his refiftance to the orders of Dumouriez, was provisionally appointed to the chief command, and in a very fhort time was fo fuccessful in his exertions as to be enabled to lead them with confidence into action. From the middle of April to the 8th of May, a variety of partial, though sharp and bloody, engagements took place between the two armies, in which no decifive advantage was gained. On that general Dam pierre advanced in person to dislodge a large body of the enemy posted near the wood of Vicoigne; but martial ardor prompting him to expofe his person too rafhly to the enemy's fire, his thigh was carried off by a cannon-ball, and he died the following day, deeply regretted, leaving the command in the hands of general Lamarche. In this action the English troops were engaged in the field for the first time in this war, and behaved with all their characteristic intrepidity; but by the inexperience of the duke of York, their commander (for there is no royal road to the knowledge of military tactics any more than of geometry), being ordered to the attack of a strong poft in the wood, where they were expofed to the fire of some masked batteries, they fuffered fo much, that it was not thought expedient to make any official return of the killed and wounded.

"Great God!" exclaimed on this occafion one of the French generals to an English officer taken prifoner in the engagement, "Why do you gallant Britons come hither to deflroy us, or be yourfelves deftroyed? We have no quarrel with you; and are fighting only in defence of that liberty which was purchased for you by the beft blood of your ancestors."

The fiege of Valenciennes being now in contemplation of the prince of Cobourg, it was determined by the allies

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to attempt an attack upon the fortified camp of Famars, which protected and covered that important fortress, Condé being already invested. At day-break, on the

23d of May, the British and Hanoverians under their royal commander, and the Auftrians and German auxiliaries under the prince of Cobourg and general Clairfait, made a joint affault upon the advanced pofts of the French. The conteft was fevere; but the French were evidently worsted, and, in the courfe of the night, they abandoned their camp, retreating towards Bouchain and Cambray. This fuccefs enabled the allies to lay fiege in form to Valenciennes. On the ift of June general Custinė arrived to take the command of the armies of the North and the Ardennes; but he deemed himself unequal to the task of rendering effectual relief to that fortrefs, before which the trenches were opened on the 14th of that month; and, towards the beginning of July, the befiegers were able to bring 200 pieces of heavy artillery to play upon it. Mines and counter-mines innumerable were formed alfo in the courfe of this fiege, both by the af failants and the garrifon; and many fierce fubterranean conflicts were carried on with various fuccefs. But on the night of the 25th July thofe under the glacis and horn-work of the fortrefs were fprung, on the part of the befiegers, with complete fuccefs, and the English and the Auftrians feized the favourable moment for attacking the covered-way, of which they made themselves mafters. On the next day the place furrendered on honorable terms of capitulation, the duke of York taking poffeffion of it in behalf of the emperor of Germany. Nearly at the fame time the garrifon of Condé yielded themselves prifoners of war, after enduring all the rigors of famine; and Mentz fubmitted, not without a long and refolute refiftance, to the arms of Pruflia.

On the 8th of Auguft the French were driven from the strong pofition they occupied behind the Scheld, which

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was known by the name of Cæfar's Camp: after which a grand council of war was held, wherein it was determined that the British, Hanoverians, Dutch, and Heffians, fhould feparate from the Austrians, and form a distinct army, not dependent upon the co-operation of the Auftrians. This was ftrongly oppofed by the prince of Cobourg and general Clairfait, who clearly faw the fatal confequences of a fyftem fo different from that which had been adopted with fuch glorious fuccefs by the duke of Marlborough and prince Eugene. The British army, conducted by the duke of York, immediately decamped; and, on the 18th of Auguft, arrived in the vicinity of Menin, where fome fevere contefts took place, and the poft of Lincelles, loft by the Dutch, was recovered by the English, at the point of the bayonet, led on by general fir John Lake, though very inferior in force, with a fignal display of fpirit and intrepidity.

Moving, with little refiftance, towards Dunkirk, the trenches were opened before that fortrefs on the 24th; and the duke of York, having entertained a fecret correspondence with the governor-general, O'Moran, flattered himself with obtaining speedy poffeffion of the place. On the other fide, general Clairfait invested the town of Quefnoy; and the prince of Cobourg, who commanded the covering army, having defeated a body of troops which had been fent for its relief, the place furrendered on the 11th of September.

With these achievements the fucceffes of the allies may be faid to have terminated; and Quefnoy was the extreme point of the progrefs made in the course of this memorable campaign by the combined powers against France. We must now once more change the fcene, and revert to the state of affairs in England.

It is a fact moft memorable in the hiftory of this eventful period, that, on the fecond of April, M. Le Brun, minifter of foreign affairs in France, addreffed a letter to

lord

lord Grenville, in which, ftating that the French republie was defirous to terminate all its differences with Great Britain and to end a war dreadful to humanity, and requefting a paffport for a person vested with full powers for that purpose to the court of London; and, in a separate letter, he named M. Maret as the propofed plenipotentiary of France, if this intimation produced the defired effect. This letter was delivered to lord Grenville by a Mr. John Saller, notary-public, who formally attefted the receipt of them from M. Le Brun. To this noble advance on the part of the French government the British ministry, obftinate in their errors, paid no kind of attention. From this early conceffion it is probable that the French perceived their mistake in supposing (as they had, indeed, a good right to do, from the tenor of the exifting treaty of 1786) that the difmiffion of the ambafador Chauvelin was intended by the court of London as a declaration of war; whereas it fubfequently appeared, from the fecret negotiation which Mr. Pitt was at the fame time carrying on with general Dumouriez, that this famous difmiffion was a mere act of pride and passion, and by no means of deliberate and premeditated policy. It is even not improbable that, in the thoughtless precipitation of the moment, the fecond article of the treaty was not at all adverted to by politicians of fuch a defcription as now compofed the British cabinet. But the hopes of the enemies of France were now high and fanguine; and although the French executive government unquestionably would. not have made any fuch overture in present circumstances, had they not been previously determined to give ample fatisfaction to England, whofe friendship and fupport must have been of the utmost confequence to the reigning party, this confideration had no weight with the British ministry, who would not even deign, in this fecond paroxyfm of blind prefumption, to hearken to what M. Maret had to propofe.

Far

Far from feeling the flightest inclination to encourage an overture so confonant to the dictates of policy and humanity, a treaty was about this time concluded with the king of Sardinia, by which England bound herself not only to furnish to his Sardinian majesty a subsidy of 200,000l. per annum, to be paid three months in advance," which was an article of trivial moment, but also "not to conclude a peace with the enemy without comprehending in it the entire restitution of all the dominions belonging to this monarch previous to the commencement of the war;" although it had never been pretended that it was incum→ bent upon Great Britain to enter into the war against France for any fuch prepofterous purpose.

On the re-affembling of parliament after the Eafter recess, the attention of the legiflature was forcibly attracted by the unparalleled number and extent of the bankruptcies which had taken place fince the commencement of the war, as the first bleffed fruits of it, and the almoft total ftagnation and paralyfis of commercial credit. A felect committee was immediately appointed to report their opinion to the houfe on the beft means of applying a remedy to this tremendous evil, which originated, as there was good reason to believe, in the alarm occafioned by the invasion of Holland. The report of the committee ftated, that it would be advifable to iffue Exchequer-bills, to the amount of five millions, to commiffioners nominated for the purpofe, for the affistance and accommodation of such mercantile perfons as may apply, and who fhall give proper fecurity for the fums that may be advanced on interest, for a time to be limited. This mode of relief, dangerous in its ultimate tendency and liability of abuse, was found extremely beneficial in its immediate operation, and the tide of commerce foon returned to its accustomed channel.

On the 25th of April Mr. Sheridan called the attention of the houfe to the late extraordinary memorial of lord Aukland to the States General; and made, in the course of

VOL. III.

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