renewing the combat; but Moreau retreated in the night, and commenced the passage of the Rhine. Desaix passed that river at Old Brisach, while the general-in-chief took post in the strong position of Schliengen, determined to accept battle, in order to gain time to defile in tranquillity by the bridge of Huningen. The valley of the Rhine is there cut at right angles by a barrier of rocky eminences, which stretch from the mountains of Hohenblau to the margin of the stream. It was on this formidable rampart that Moreau made his last stand, his left resting on the Rhine, his centre on a pile of almost inaccessible rocks, his right on the cliffs of Sizenkirch. The Archduke divided his army into four columns. The Prince of Condé on the right drove in the Republican advanced posts, but made no serious impression; but Latour in the centre, and Nauendorf on the left, gallantly scaled the precipices, drove the Republicans from their positions, and, chasing them from height to height, from wood to wood, threw them before nightfall into such confusion, that nothing but the broken nature of the ground, which prevented cavalry from acting, and a violent storm which arose in the evening, saved them from a complete overthrow. Moreau retreated during the night, and on the following day commenced the passage of the Rhine, which was effected without molestation from the Imperialists. 61. After having thus effected the deliverance of Germany from both its invaders, the Archduke suggested to the Aulic Council to detach a powerful reinforcement by the Tyrol into Italy, in order to strengthen the army of Alvinzi, and effect the liberation of Wurmser in Mantua, -a measure based on true military principles, and which, if adopted by the Imperial government, would probably have changed the fate of the campaign. Moreau, on his side, proposed an armistice to the Austrians, on condition that the Rhine should separate the two armies, and the Republicans retain the têtes-de-pont of Huningen and Kehl; a proposal which the Archduke received with secret satisfaction, as it promised him the means of securely carrying into effect his meditated designs for the deliverance of Italy. But the Austrian government, intent upon the expulsion of the French from Germany, and deeming the forces put at the disposal of Alvinzi adequate for the relief of Mantua, declined both propositions, and sent positive orders for the immediate attack of the fortified posts possessed by the Republicans on the right bank of the Rhine. 62. The conduct of the siege of Kehl, during the depth of winter, and with an open communication between the besieged and the great army on the op-. posite bank, presented obstacles of no ordinary kind; but the perseverance and energy of the Austrians ultimately triumphed over all difficulties. Thirty thousand men, under the command of Desaix and St Cyr, were destined for the defence of the works, while a powerful reserve was stationed in the islands of the Rhine; and the troops engaged in the defence were changed every three days, to prevent their being overwhelmed with the fatigues of the service. Forty thousand Austrians, under Latour, formed the besieging force, while the remainder of the army was cantoned in the valley of the Rhine. Though the fort was invested on the 9th October, no material progress was made in the siege, from the extreme difficulty of bringing up the battering-train and heavy stores till the end of November. This long delay gave time to the indefatigable Desaix to complete the defences, which, when the Imperialists first sat down before the place, were in a very unfinished state. The trenches were opened on the 21st November; and about the same time a grand sortie was attempted, under the command of Moreau in person, to destroy the works, and gain possession of the Austrian park of artillery. This attack was at first successful; the Republicans carried the intrenchments of Sundheim, and had nearly penetrated to the magazines and parks; but the Archduke and Latour having come up with reinforcements to the menaced point, they were at length repulsed with severe loss, though not without carrying with them nine pieces of cannon, which they had captured during the affray. Moreau and Desaix exposed themselves to the hottest of the fire, and were both slightly wounded. After this repulse, the labours of the siege were continued without any other interruption than that arising from the excessive severity of the weather, and the torrents of rain, which, for weeks together, filled the trenches with water. On the night of the 1st January, the Imperialists carried by assault the first line of intrenchments round the Republican camp, and a few days afterwards the second line was also stormed after a bloody resistance. Kehl was now no longer defensible; above 100,000 cannon-balls, and 25,000 bombs, projected from forty batteries, had riddled all its defences. The Imperialists, masters of the intrenched camp, enveloped the fort on every side; and the Republicans, after a glorious defence, which does honour to the memory of Desaix and St Cyr, who directed it, evacuated the place by capitulation on the 9th January. 63. During the siege of Kehl, the Imperialists remained "in observation before the tête-de-pont of Huningen; but no sooner were they at liberty, by the surrender of the former place, than they prosecuted the siege of the latter with extraordinary vigour. Ferino had been left with the right wing of the French to superintend the defence of that important post, but notwithstanding all his exertions he was unable to retard their advances; the trenches were opened in form on the 25th of January, and, a sortie having been repulsed on the night of the 31st, the place was evacuated by capitulation on the 1st of February, and the victors found themselves masters of a heap of ruins. 64. This last success terminated the campaign of 1796 in Germany-the most remarkable, in a military point of view, which had occurred, with the exception of that of Napoleon in the same year in Italy, since the commencement of the war. The conquerors in both triumphed over superior forces by the application of the same principles-viz. the skilful use of a central position, and interior line of communication, and the rapid accumulation of superior forces against one of the assailing armies, at a time when it was so situated that it could not receive any assistance from the other. The movements of the Archduke between the armies of Moreau and Jourdan, and the ability with which, by bringing a preponderating force against the decisive point, he compelled their vast armies to undertake a disastrous retreat, are precisely parallel to the blows struck by Napoleon from the interior line of the Adige, on the converging forces of Quasdanovich and Wurmser on the opposite sides of the lake of Garda; and of Alvinzi and Provera, on the plateau of Rivoli and the shores of the Mincio. The difference only lies in the superior energy and activity with which the Republican general flew from one menaced point to another, the accurate calculation of time on which he rested, and the greater difficulties with which he had to struggle from the closer proximity of the attacking forces to each other. 65. The results of this campaign proved the justice of the observation of Napoleon, that the decisive blows against Austria were to be struck in the valley of the Danube; and that Carnot's plan of turning both flanks of the Imperialists at once, along the vast line from the Maine to the Alps, was essentially defective. In truth, it offered the fairest opportunity to an enterprising general, aware of the importance of time and rapid movement in war, to fall with a preponderating force first on the one and then on the other. If, instead of dispersing the invading host into two armies, separated from each other by above a hundred miles, and acting without concert, he had united them into one mass, or moved them by converging lines towards Ulm, the catastrophe of 1805 to Austria at that place, or of Leipsic in 1813 to France, might have been anticipated with decisive effect upon the issue of the war. And after giving all due praise to the just views and intrepid conduct of the Austrian hero, the deliverer of Germany, it must be admitted that he did not carry his enlightened principles into practice with such vigour as might have been done; and that, had Napoleon been in his place on dards. the Murg and at Amberg, he would | cient attachment to the Imperial stanhave struck as decisive blows as at Medola and Rivoli. 67. The same causes which thus weakened the predilection of the lower orders in Germany for French principles, operated most powerfully in rousing the ancient and hereditary loyalty of the Austrian people to their own sovereign. When the Republicans approached Bohemia, and had well-nigh penetrated through Bavaria to the Hereditary States, the Emperor issued an animating appeal to his subjects in the threatened provinces, and, with the spirit of Maria Theresa, called on them to repel the renewed Gallic aggression. Austria, in this trying emergency, relied on the constant success which has so long attended its house through all the vicis defeat, maintained that unconquerable 66. The unsuccessful irruption of the French into Germany was attended with one important consequence, from the effectual manner in which it withdrew the veil from the eyes of the lower classes as to the real nature of democratic ambition, and the consequences with which it was attended to the inhabitants of the vanquished states. The Republicans, being destitute of everything, and in an especial manner denuded of money, when they crossed the Rhine, immediately put in practice their established principle of making war support war, and oppressed the vanquished people by the most enormous contributions. The lesser German states only pur-situdes of fortune, and, unsubdued by chased neutrality by the heaviest sacrifices.* The people contrasted these cruel exactions with the seductive promises of war to the palace and peace to the cottage; and all learned at length, from bitter experience, the melancholy truth, that military violence, under whatever names it may be veiled, is the same in all ages; and that none are such inexorable tyrants to the poor, as those who have recently revolted against authority in their own country. Although, therefore, the terror of the Republican arms at first superseded every other consideration, and detached all the states whose territory had been overrun from the Austrian alliance, yet this was merely the effect of necessity; the hearts of the people remained faithful to the cause of Germany, their exasperation broke out in unmeasured acts of violence against the retreating forces of Jourdan, and they waited only for the first opportunity to resume their an* The Duke of Würtemberg was assessed at 4,000,000 francs, or £160,000 sterling; the circle of Suabia at 12,000,000, or nearly £500,000, besides 8000 horses, 5000 oxen, 150,000 quintals of corn, and 100,000 pairs of shoes. No less than 8,000,000, or £320,000, was demanded from the circle of Franconia, besides 6000 horses; and immense contributions from Frankfort, Würtzburg, Bamberg, Nuremberg, and all the towns through which they passed. These enormous exactions, which amounted in all to 25,000,000 francs, (£1,000,000), 12,000 horses, 12,000 oxen, 500,000 quintals of wheat, and 200,000 pairs of shoes, excited universal indignation. 68. This year witnessed the still closer drawing together of the unhappy bands which united Prussia to France, and so long aided to perpetuate on the Continentthe overwhelming influence of Gallic power. Hardenberg and Haugwitz, who directed the cabinet of Berlin, and who, notwithstanding their differences on many other points, were cordially united in all measures calculated to augment the influence of Prussia in the north of Germany, had laboured assiduously all the summer to form a federal union for the protection of the states in that portion of the Empire; and they had suc ceeded in obtaining a convocation of the circle of Lower Saxony and of Westphalia on the 20th June, to arrange the formation of a formidable army of observation, of which Prussia was the head, to cause their neutrality to be respected by the belligerent powers. The French minister at Berlin, artfully improving upon the terrors produced by Napo- | events of another kind, but not less leon's successes in Italy, and Jourdan's important in their future effect upon irruption into Franconia, easily per- the fate of the war, were preparing upon suaded Haugwitz that the period had another element. now arrived when the interests of Prussia indispensably required the breaking up of the old Germanic Empire, and the cession of the left bank of the Rhine as the boundary of France. In consequence, two conventions, one public, the other secret, were signed at Berlin on the 5th August. By the first, which alone at that time was published, the line of demarcation, beyond which hostilities were not to pass, was extended, and made to run from Wesel on the Rhine, following the frontiers of the mountains of Thuringia, stretching along the North Sea, including the mouths of the Elbe, the Weser, and the Ems, and so round by the frontiers of Holland to Wesel again. Beyond this, in addition to the line already agreed to by the treaty of Bâle, the Directory became bound not to push their military operations. By the second, which was kept secret, Prussia recognised the extension of France to the Rhine; and the principle, that the dispossessed German princes were to be indemnified at the expense of the ecclesiastical princes of the Empire. The third article provided an indemnity to the Prince of Orange, now evidently and apparently finally expelled from his dominions: and Prussia engaged to endeavour for this purpose to procure the secularisation of the bishoprics of Bamberg and Würtzburg. "Such was the Secret Convention," says Hardenberg, "which in a manner put the cabinet of Berlin at the mercy of France in the affairs of Germany." It may be added, such was the commencement of that atrocious system of indemnifying the greater states at the expense of the lesser, and satisfying the rapacity of temporal powers by the sacrifice of the Church, which soon after not only shook to its foundation the constitution of the Germanic Empire, but totally overturned the whole balance of power and system of public rights in Europe. While these important transactions were in progress in the heart of Europe, 69. Three years of continued success had rendered the British flag omnipotent upon the ocean. Britannia literally ruled the waves; the enemies' colonies successively fell beneath her strokes; and the fleets of France, blockaded in her harbours, were equally unable to protect the commerce of the Republic, or acquire the experience requisite for maritime success. The minister of the marine, Truguet, in proposing a new system for the regulation of the navy, gave a gloomy but faithful picture of its present condition. "The deplorable state of our marine,” said he, " is well known to our enemies, who insult us in our very harbours. Our fleets are humiliated, defeated, blockaded in their ports; destitute of provisions and naval equipments; torn by internal faction, weakened by ignorance, ruined by desertion: such is the state in which the men, to whom you have intrusted its direction, have found the French marine." The ruin of the French navy was not the consequence merely of the superior skill and experience of the British sailors; it arose necessarily from the confusion of finances, loss of colonies, and failure of resources, which were the result of the revolutionary convulsion. Fleets cannot be equipped without naval stores, nor navigated but by a body of experienced seamen: it is impossible, therefore, to become a powerful maritime state without a regular revenue and an extensive commerce, both of which had disappeared during the distractions of the Revolution. Severe internal distress, by filling the ranks of the army, may form a formidable military power, and destitute battalions may issue from a convulsed state to plunder and oppress the adjoining nations; but a similar system will never equip a fleet, nor enable a revolutionary to contend with a regular government on the ocean. From the very elements by which the contest was carried on, it was already evident that, though France might defeat the land forces of Europe, Britain would acquire the dominion of the waves. 70. The hostilities carried on by the naval and military forces of Great Britain in the West and East Indies, were attended with the most decisive success. The island of Granada, which had long been in a state of revolt, yielded to the perseverance and ability of General Nicols: Ste Lucie was reduced in May by General Abercromby, and Essequibo and Demerara by General White; while the French could only set off against these losses the destruction of the merchandise and shipping at Newfoundland by Admiral Richery. In the Indian seas, the successes of the British were still more important. A Dutch squadron of three ships of the line, three frigates, and many vessels of inferior size, having on board two thousand land troops, destined to retake the Cape of Good Hope, was captured by Admiral Elphinstone in the bay of Saldanha; while the Batavian settlements of Ceylon, the Malaccas, and Cochin, with the important harbour of Trincomalee, were, early in the year, taken possession of by the British forces. Thus was the foundation laid, in both hemispheres, of the colonial empire of Great Britain, which has subsequently grown up to such an extraordinary magnitude, and promises, in its ultimate results, to exert a greater and more widespread influence on mankind than any which has been effected by human agency, since the Roman legions ceased to conquer and civilise the world. conquests of the British at sea, as likely to counterbalance the acquisitions of the Republicans at land. They observed that Rhodes long maintained a doubtful contest with Rome after its land forces had subdued Spain, Carthage, and part of Gaul; and that, in a similar contest, Great Britain would have incomparably greater chances of success than the Grecian commonwealth, from the superior internal strength which the population of its own islands afforded, and the far more extensive commerce which enriched it from every quarter of the globe. "Athens," said Xenophon, "would have prevailed over Lacedæmon, if Attica had been an island inaccessible save by water to the land forces of its opponent;" and it was impossible not to see that nature had given that advantage to the modern, which she had denied to the ancient maritime power. The formation of a great colonial empire, embracing all the quarters of the globe, held together and united by the naval power of Britain, and enriching the parent state by its commerce, and the market it would open for its manufactures, began to engage the thoughts not only of statesmen, but of practical men ; and the Cape and Ceylon were spoken of as acquisitions which should never be abandoned. 72. St Domingo still continued in the distracted and unfortunate state into which it had been thrown by the visionary dreams of the French Republicans, and the frightful flames of a servile war which had been lighted up by their extravagant philanthropists. All the efforts, both of the French and British, to restore anything like order among its furious and savage population, had proved unsuccessful. The latter had 71. These important successes, particularly the reduction of the Cape, formerly detailed, that of Ceylon, and the Malaccas, diffused general joy through the British nation. It was justly observed, that the first was a halfway-never been in sufficient force to make house to India, and indispensable to the mighty empire which we had acquired in the plains of Hindostan; while the last secured the emporium of the China trade, and opened up the vast commerce of the Indian Archipelago. The attention of the people, by these great acquisitions, began to be turned towards the probable result and final issue of the war: they looked to the any serious impression on its numerous and frantic inhabitants; and the former were hardly able to retain a scanty footing in the northern part of the island, far less to attempt to regain the splendid and prosperous colony which they had lost. The blacks, taught by experience, perfectly acquainted with the country, and comparatively unaffected by its climate, maintained a suc |