Buonaparte found that, during his absence in Syria, Egypt had been disturbed by insurrections, which Desaix had put down, and had again defeated, and driven back into Upper Egypt, Murad Bey, who had made a descent thence. Soon after his return, however, Murad was once more in motion, descending the Nile in two bodies, and Ibrahim Bey was moving on the frontiers of Syria, as if to form a union with Murad. Lagrange was despatched against Ibrahim, and Murat against Murad. Scarcely were they repulsed when the cause of their man?uvres became evident. A Turkish fleet, containing eighteen thousand men, appeared in the Bay of Alexandria, commanded by Mustapha Pacha. They seized the fort, and, landing, began to fortify themselves, expecting the arrival of the Mamelukes, as had been concerted. On the 25th of July Buonaparte attacked them, and drove in all their outposts; but on coming within reach of their batteries and their gunboats in the bay, the French were checked, and the Turks, rushing out, with their muskets slung at their backs, made terrible havoc amongst them with their sabres, poniards, and pistols. The defeat of Napoleon must have been complete had not the Turks stopped to cut off the heads of the slain, for which they were offered a reward. This gave time for the French to rally. It was now the turn of the Turks to give way, and Murat, who had fought at the head of the troops, followed them so impetuously with the bayonet that the confusion and panic became general. The Turks threw themselves en masse into the sea to regain their ships; and by drowning and the bayonets and bullets of the French, ten thousand out of the eighteen thousand perished. Mustapha Pacha himself was taken, and carried in triumph before[472] Buonaparte. This battle had been fought at Aboukir, near the spot where Nelson had so signally triumphed over them. The victory was the event which Buonaparte needed to enable him to return with credit to France. He immediately embraced it. All his plans and brilliant visions of empire in the East had perished for the present, and private letters from his brothers in Paris, and a number of newspapers, which Sir Sidney Smith had furnished him with to mortify him, roused him to instant action. From these he learnt that the Directory had, as he expected, consummated their unpopularity; that Italy, which he had won to France, was again lost by the other generals. To remain in Egypt was to sink into a sort of provincial or proconsular general; to return to Paris was, by a bold and adroit stroke, to make himself the master of France. He immediately ordered Admiral Gantheaume to have ready a couple of frigates, which lay in the harbour of Alexandria; and, taking with him his favourite generals, Murat, Lannes, Marmont, Berthier, Desaix, Androssy, and Bessieres, and the two principal savants, Monge and Denon, to give an account of the scientific results of the expedition, he rushed on board. He had left the care of the army to Kleber and Menou; and he issued a short proclamation, saying that events in Paris demanded his presence there, but that he would return with all possible expedition. He arrived in Paris without mishap.
SURRENDER OF BAILLIE TO HYDER ALI. (See p. 330.)During this time Britain was suffering severely from the effects of the war. The nation was indignant under the disgrace of the complete defeat of its army on the Continent, at the defection of those very Allies who had been so profusely subsidised, at the perfidy by which these despot Powers had made Britain the efficient party in the dismemberment of Poland, and at the heavy taxes imposed in consequence. Political meetings were held in most large towns and in the metropolis, expressing the most decided disapprobation of the policy of Ministers and at the refusal of all reforms. At the end of June a monster meeting had been held in St. George's Fields, and on the 26th of October, another, of fifty thousand people, near Copenhagen House, at which the lately prosecuted but acquitted agitators, Thelwall, Gale Jones, and others, were the speakers. The numbers and tone of these meetings, which were accompanied with loud cries of "Bread! Bread!" and "Down with Pitt!" greatly alarmed Government, and there was a summons of Parliament at the unusually early date of October 29th, only three days after the meeting in Copenhagen Fields. On going to the House to open the session, the kingwho had become very unpopular from his eager support of the war, and his going about saying, "The French won't leave a single crowned head in Europe!"was shot at with an air-gun in Margaret Street, opposite to the Ordnance Office, the ball from which passed through the windows of the carriage, between his Majesty and the Earl of Westmoreland. The king on entering the House, exclaimed to the Lord Chancellor, "My lord, I have been shot at!" As the king returned, he was again furiously hissed; there was the same vociferous shouting of "Bread! Bread!" and "No Pitt!" Stones were thrown at the royal carriage; and, in the haste and confusion to escape into the palace of St. James's, one of the royal grooms was thrown to the ground, and had his thigh broken. The king got into a private coach to regain Buckingham House, where his family was; but he was recognised, and pursued by the same cries of "Bread! Bread!" and "Peace!" That evening the king, who had[449] behaved throughout with great courage, accompanied the queen and three of his daughters to Covent Garden Theatre, where he was received with zealous acclamations; the actors sang "God save the king!" three times over. Some of the people in the gallery were, however, pretty vehement in their hisses, but were attacked and turned out.
The fall of Robespierre produced a marked change in the policy of the Convention towards the Royalists of this district, and they were promised, on laying down their arms, that they[445] should enjoy their country and their religion in peace. On this assurance, Charette signed a treaty of pacification with the agents of the Government at Nantes, in February, 1795. But scarcely was the peace signed, when Charette received a letter from Monsieurbrother of the late king, and now appointed by the Royalist party Regent to the Dauphin, now styled by them Louis XVII.assuring him of his confidence, declaring him the second founder of the monarchy, and appointing him his Lieutenant-General. Charette wrote back to inform him that he had been compelled to sign a peace, but that his submission was only apparent, and when the Royalist affairs were somewhat reinstated, he should be ready to take up arms and die in the service of his prince. The young General Hoche, who was sent to reduce the insurgents of Brittany, whilst Canclaux reduced those of La Vende, did not for a moment believe in the sincerity of the peace. He was aware that Puisaye, the chief of the insurgents in Brittany, was gone to England, to endeavour to induce Pitt to do what all the efforts and importunities of the Bourbon princes and Emigrant nobles had failed to doto send an expedition to the coast of Brittany, with another to the coast of La Vende, in which the British fleet should support the bodies of Emigrants who had, in England and the Channel Islands, formed themselves into regiments for the purpose. Aware of this, he still did all he could to reconcile the peasantry to the peace, and very soon they would have been pacified by this judicious treatment, and been averse from rising again, with a prospect of re-experiencing their former sufferings; but the Bourbon princes and the tribes of Emigrants now driven from the Rhine did not allow them that chance.Others of the troops were ordered in, and among them was Landor's. It had gone out for a twenty days' scout, and had been in the field two months. It was ragged and all but barefoot, and its pack-train was in a pitiable way. Weeks of storm in the Mogollons and days of quivering heat on the plains had brought its clothing and blankets to the last stages.
