ONE:[511]In the West Indies a small squadron and some land troops took the islands of Tobago, St. Pierre, and Miquelon. At the invitation of the planters, we also took possession of the western or French portion of St. Domingo; but in Martinique, where we had had the same invitation, the Royalist French did not support our efforts according to promise, and the enterprise failed from the smallness of the force employed. Besides these transactions, there occurred a severe fight between Captain Courteney, of the frigate Boston, with only thirty-two guns and two hundred men, and the Ambuscade, a French frigate of thirty-six guns and four hundred picked men, in which both received much damage, and in which Captain Courteney was killed, but in which the Frenchman was compelled to haul off. In the East Indies we again seized Pondicherry, and all the small factories of the French. TWO:In pursuance of this convention the garrison retired, and began their fatal march on the 6th of January, 1842. The army consisted of 4,500 fighting men, with 12,000 camp-followers, besides women and children. The snow lay deep upon the ground; they had scarcely commenced their march when they were attacked by the Afghans, the guns were captured, and they were obliged to fight their way, sword in hand, defending the women and children as well as they could. During the whole way through the snow the road was strewn with bodies and stained with blood. The dead and dying were immediately stripped naked by the enemy, and their corpses hacked to pieces with long knives. During all this time the perfidious Akbar Khan sent messages, professing his regret at not being able to restrain the Ghilzai tribe; and after they had got through the Pass, he made a proposal, which was accepted, to take the ladies under his protection. Accordingly, Lady Sale and Lady Macnaghten, with six others, accompanied by their husbands, were left under his charge. The British troops then halted for a day, bivouacking on the snow. The cold was so intense that the Sepoys became benumbed and paralysed, in which state the whole of them were next day attacked and cut to pieces. The Europeans managed to hold together, but when they arrived at Jugduluk, thirty-five miles distant from Cabul, only 300 out of 16,500 persons who left that city remained alive. At this place a halt was ordered, and through the interference of Akbar Khan the miserable remnant were permitted to occupy a ruined enclosure, where, worn out by fatigue and utterly helpless, they lay down to rest in the snow. General Elphinstone was detained a prisoner by Akbar Khan in a small fort, whence he dispatched a note to Brigadier Anketell, advising him to march that night, as there was treachery afoot. The wearied band, aroused from their slumbers, accordingly moved on in the dark; but their departure was noticed, they were attacked in the rear, they broke into disorder, threatened to shoot their officers, separated in small parties, and thus, scattered and confused, they were cut down almost to a man. Of the officers, however, a considerable number escaped on horseback; but they, too, were attacked wherever they appeared, until only one gentleman, Dr. Brydon, survived to tell the dreadful story, reaching Jelalabad on the 13th of January. It afterwards came out, however, that several other officers were detained in captivity. THREE:Instead of taking means to conciliate the public, Bute, stung by these testimonies of dislike, and by the pamphlets and lampoons which issued like swarms of wasps, revenged himself by others, which only intensified the hatred against him. Still worse for him, he had caused the Dukes of Newcastle and Grafton, and the Marquis of Rockingham, to be dismissed from the Lord-Lieutenancies of their respective counties, because they voted against the peace on Bute's terms. With a still more petty rancour he had visited the sins of these noblemen on the persons in small clerkships and other posts who had been recommended by them, turning them all out. Sir Henry Fox joined him relentlessly in these pitiful revenges, and would have carried them farther had he not been checked by others.From the moment that Russia was called in, under the pretext of maintaining order, she became, or aimed to become, the dominant power there. She pressed on the whole line of the Polish frontier with her armies, inundated the kingdom with her troops, and levied contributions for their support as if she had been in a conquered country. From that hour, too, the kings were elected rather by foreign armies than by the Poles themselves.[207] Stanislaus Poniatowski, the present king, was the nominee of Catherine of Russia, whose lover he had been till superseded by Orloff. She had placed him on the throne by force of arms, and he was incapable of doing anything except through her power.

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