FORE:
FORE:It was not, however, till the 12th of August that they were ready with their batteries. The effect of the bombardment was almost instantaneous. Within six hours nearly all the enemy's guns were silenced, and the next day the Spaniards capitulated, agreeing to yield not only the place, and the vessels in the harbour, but the country for a hundred and eighty miles to the westward; in fact, all the best part of Cuba. The booty taken was valued at nearly three million pounds.
FORE:In the following Session Fox introduced a Bill to grant some further privileges to the Catholics, but it was rejected; but in 1793 the Catholics of Scotland were admitted, by an Act introduced by Mr. Robert Dundas, the Lord Advocate, to the same privileges as the Irish and English Catholics. The question appeared to rest till 1799, when there seems to have been a proposition on the part of the English Government to make an independent provision for the Catholic clergy of Ireland, on condition that they, on their part, should enter into certain engagements. There was a meeting of Roman Catholic prelates in Dublin at the commencement of that year on the subject, at which they agreed to accept the proposal. Pitt was favourable to the Catholic claims, though the Irish Parliament previous to the union would not hear of them. He had caused promises of Catholic Emancipation to be circulated in Ireland in order to induce the Irish to accept the union; and when he found that the king's immovable resistance to this measure would not allow him to make good his word, he resigned office. Nothing was done in it during the time that he continued out, chiefly, it is said, through his influence; and when he returned to office in May, 1804, he did so without any mention of the Catholics. In truth, he appears to have given them up for the sake of enjoying power again; for, when, on the 9th of March, 1805, the question was raised by Lord Grenville in the House of Peers, and, on the 13th, by Fox in the Commons, Pitt opposed the motion on the ground that the reasons which had occasioned him to quit office still operated against this measure, and that it was impossible for him to support it. It was negatived by three hundred and thirty-six against one hundred and twenty-four.[See larger version]
THREE:Buonaparte put his enormous masses in motion. His object was to push rapidly forward, and beat the Russians by one of those sudden and decisive blows by which he had won all his victories. He expected that he should not be able to supply his vast army with provisions in Russia, and therefore he had had thousands of waggons and carts prepared to draw his stores. He meant to seize one of the capitals of the countrySt. Petersburg or Moscow; and that, he quite imagined, would finish the campaign, the Russians being then glad to capitulate; and he resolved to concede no terms but such as should shut out the Muscovites from Europe, and replace them with Poles. "Let us march!" he said to his soldiers. "Let us cross the Niemen; let us carry war into Russia. The war will be glorious; and the peace will terminate that haughty influence which she has exercised for more than fifty years on Europe." But his old general, Bernadotte, had foreseen and defeated his plans. Alexander had commanded his generalissimo, Barclay de Tolly, to show only so much opposition as should draw the French on into the heart of Russia, and thenwhen they were exhausted by famine along a line of desolation, and by their marchto harass them on all sides. Should the French succeed in pressing so far, a Russian Torres Vedras was prepared for them on the river Düna, at Drissa, so as to protect St. Petersburg.
THREE:The left of his operations was entrusted to General Prideaux with a body of colonial militia, and Sir William Johnson with another of friendly Indians, over whom he had a wonderful ascendency. This united force was to march against the fort of Niagara, reduce it, and then, crossing Lake Ontario, advance on Montreal. The centre of his operations was entrusted to General Amherst, who superseded Abercrombie. With twelve thousand men he was again to attempt Ticonderoga, open the navigation of Lake Champlain, and then, joining Prideaux and Johnson at Montreal, descend the St. Lawrence to support Wolfe, who was to be conveyed by sea to the St. Lawrence, and to prepare for the storming of Quebec, it being hoped that, by the time of his arrival, the two other divisions of the army would have come up.
