turn out well. He has a glorious game in his hands, if he has spirit and talent to play it. If he succeeds, it will immortalize him." The want of spirit and decision in this officer, which afterward lost the battle of Waterloo, caused the failure of the expedition. "Twice," says Shiel, “had this man the destinies of nations in his hand, and twice he abused his trust."

Grouchy afterward felt bitterly at the thought of the great opportunity which had escaped him. He was all eagerness for a second expedition. He said to Tone, that "he had shed tears of rage and vexation fifty times since, at the recollection of the opportunity of which he had been deprived; and there was one thing which he would never pardon himself that he did not seize Bouvet* by the collar, and throw him overboard, the moment he attempted to raise a difficulty as to the landing."

The instructions to the fleet were, in case of separation, that the ships which arrived first should cruise off the shore, till the other ships joined them. Accordingly, when close in shore, they tacked out again, and thus stood off and on. They were instructed to land in Bantry Bay. They were now off the mouth, and began to move leisurely up the bay. Tone was raging with impatience. There lay that mighty fleet, a long line of dark hulls resting on the green water, tossing up their huge bows into the air, like so many black war-horses impatient for the battle. Three or four days passed, when a council of war was called, and it was proposed to land with the portion of the army then in the bay. "I must do Grouchy the justice,"

*Bouvet was the Rear Admiral who now commanded the fleet.

DRIVEN OFF BY A GALE OF WIND.

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says Tone, "to say, that the moment we gave our opinion in favor of proceeding, he took his part like a man of spirit; he instantly set about preparing the order of battle." Men and guns were got ready, and the disembarkation was to take place the next morning. But at two o'clock in the night, Tone was awakened by the wind. "I rose immediately, and walked for an hour in the gallery, devoured by the most gloomy reflections. The wind continues right ahead, so that it is absolutely impossible to work up to the landing-place." The wind increased to a gale. The sea ran high. A landing was impossible. The gale became terrific. All day and all night it blew right off shore, and finally drove them to sea. The fleet was now so scattered, as to render a landing in force impracticable, and the dispersed ships made their way back to France.

In reading the account of this expedition, it seems as if Ireland had been saved to England by a miracle. Had the fifteen thousand men on board landed, with Hoche at their head, the island would have been inevitably lost. There was no force in the south of Ireland that could have resisted for a moment. A large part of the population were ready to join an invading army, and Hoche would have marched in triumph to Dublin. The young commander in one campaign would have conquered a kingdom. Such was the opinion of the highest military authority of the age. Said Bonaparte, "Hoche was one of the first generals that ever France produced. He was brave, intelligent, abounding in talent, decisive and penetrating. If he had landed in Ireland, he would have suc

ceeded. He was accustomed to civil war, had pacified La Vendée, and was well adapted for Ireland. He had a fine, handsome figure, a good address, and was prepossessing and intriguing.

As it was, this expedition produced a powerful sensation throughout Great Britain. The people of England had long felt secure in their insular situation, and guarded by their invincible fleets. "That confidence in the inviolability of their shores was now startled by the incontestable fact, that with two British fleets in the channel, and an admiral stationed at Cork, the coasts of Ireland had been a whole fortnight at the mercy of the enemy."+ What rendered it more remarkable, was that neither in going nor returning did the French fleet meet a single English ship. It is not too much to say, that it was the narrowest escape which any part of the United Kingdom has had since the Spanish Armada.

* A Voice from St. Helena.

Moore's Life of Fitzgerald, vol. i. p. 207.

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CHAPTER XI.

TONE GOES WITH HOCHE TO THE RHINE.-DUTCH FLEET IN the Texel.-MUTINY AT THE NORE.--EXPEDITION FROM HOLLAND.-DEATH OF HOCHE.— FORMATION OF THE ARMY OF ENGLAND.-NAPOLEON SAILS

FOR EGYPT.

THE failure of this expedition did not break the spirit of Tone. At first the reaction of his mind was great. He says, "I feel this moment like a man who is just awakened from a long, terrible dream."* But it has been said that none can feel themselves equal to the execution of a great design who have not once witnessed with firmness and equanimity its failure." The Directory were not at all disheartened at the result. Indeed the safety with which their fleet had traversed the seas afforded them a new evidence of the practicability of an invasion. Hoche told Tone to assure his friends that both the French government and himself, individually, were bent as much as ever on the emancipation of Ireland; that preparations were making for a second attempt, which would be concluded as speedily as the urgency of affairs would admit;

*“I see by an article in the English papers, that they were in hopes to catch the vessel on board of which I was embarked, in which case they were kind enough to promise that I should be properly taken care of."-Tone's Journal, Jan. 1797.

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that it was a business which the Republic would never give up; and that if three expeditions failed, they would try a fourth, and ever until they succeeded. For the present, however, it was necessary that the expedition should be abandoned. The Republic had need of Hoche elsewhere. He was immediately appointed to the command of the army of Sambre and Meuse. He invited Tone to accompany him, as adjutant-general, and made him a present of a beautiful horse. Tone accordingly left Paris for the Rhine. Here he was in an excellent military school, under one of the best masters of war in Europe. Hoche was now in a position to display his great military genius, no longer conducting a civil war, but at the head of an army of 70,000 men, matched with an equal foe.. The hostile armies were separated only by a river. Tone was stationed at Bonn, on the banks of the "castled Rhine," opposite the famous Seven Mountains. "From the windows of the dining-room I saw the advanced posts of the enemy on the other side of the Rhine.”

It was not the least curious circumstance in the history of this family, who seemed born to adventure, that, on the voyage from America, an attachment had sprung up between a Swiss merchant and Tone's sister. On their arrival in Europe they were married, and were now living at Hamburg. Tone says, "They will, I believe, settle in Hamburg; so there is one more of our family dispersed. I am sure if there were five quarters of the globe, there would be one of us perched on the fifth." Tone's family, who had landed at the mouth of the Elbe, were with them. As soon as he could be spared from the