-spring, on the
sudden; wherefrom, were it once ours, the very heart of Toulon might be
battered, the English Lines were, so to speak, turned inside out, and
Hood and our Natural Enemies must next day either put to sea, or be
burnt to ashes. Commissioners arch their eyebrows, with negatory sniff:
who is this young gentleman with more wit than we all? Brave veteran
Dugommier, however, thinks the idea worth a word; questions the young
gentleman; becomes convinced; and there is for issue, Try it.

On the taciturn bronze-countenance, therefore, things being now all
ready, there sits a grimmer gravity than ever, compressing a hotter
central-fire than ever. Yonder, thou seest, is Fort l'Eguillette; a
desperate lion-spring, yet a possible one; this day to be tried!--Tried
it is; and found good. By stratagem and valour, stealing through
ravines, plunging fiery through the fire-tempest, Fort l'Eguillette is
clutched at, is carried; the smoke having cleared, wiser the Tricolor
fly on it: the bronze-complexioned young man was right. Next morning,
Hood, finding the interior of his lines exposed, his defences turned
inside out, makes for his shipping. Taking such Royalists as wished
it on board with him, he weighs anchor: on this 19th of December 1793,
Toulon is once more the Republic's!

Cannonading has ceased at Toulon; and now the guillotining and
fusillading may begin. Civil horrors, truly: but at least that infamy
of an English domination is purged away. Let there be Civic Feast
universally over France: so reports Barrere, or Painter David; and the
Convention assist in a body. (Moniteur, 1793, Nos. 101 (31 Decembre),
95, 96, 98, &c.) Nay, it is said, these infamous English (with an
attention rather to their own interests than to ours) set fire to our
store-houses, arsenals, warships in Toulon Harbour, before weighing;
some score of brave warships, the only ones we now had! However, it did
not prosper, though the flame spread far and high; some two ships were
burnt, not more; the very galley-slaves ran with buckets to quench.
These same proud Ships, Ships l'Orient and the rest, have to carry this
same young Man to Egypt first: not yet can they be changed to ashes, or
to Sea-Nymphs; not yet to sky-rockets, O Ship l'Orient, nor became the
prey of England,--before their time!

And so, over France universally, there is Civic Feast and high-tide:
and Toulon sees fusillading, grape-shotting in mass, as Lyons saw; and
'death is pour