s; and while _Te Deum_ was sung in both capitals alike for the
"victory" of neither, the ministers of both were constructing an
armistice, a negotiation, and a peace--each and all to be null and
void on the first opportunity.

But the war of England was a war of the nation--a war of wrath and
indignation--a war of the dangers of civilized society entrusted to a
single championship--a great effort of human nature to discharge, in
the shape of blood, a disease which was sapping the vitals of Europe;
or in a still higher, and therefore a more faithful view, the
gathering of a tempest, which, after sweeping France in its fury, was
to restore the exhausted soil and blasted vegetation of monarchy
throughout the Continent; and in whose highest, England, serene and
undismayed, was to

"Ride in the whirlwind, and direct the storm."

I must acknowledge, that I looked upon the coming conflict with a
strange sense of mingled alarm and rejoicing. For the latter feeling,
perhaps I ought to make some apology; but I was young, ardent, and
ambitious. My place in life was unfixed; standing in that unhappy
middle position, in which stands a man of birth too high to suffer
his adoption of the humbler means of existence, and yet of resources
too inadequate to sustain him without action--nay, bold and
indefatigable exertion. I, at the moment, felt a very inferior degree
of compunction at the crisis which offered to give me at least a
chance of being seen, known, and understood among men. I felt like a
man whose ship was stranded, and who saw the storm lifting the surges
that were to lift him along with them; or like the traveller in an
earthquake, who saw the cleft in the ground swallowing up the river
which had hitherto presented an impassable obstacle--cities and
mountains might sink before the concussion had done its irresistible
will, but, at all events, it had cleared his way.

In thoughts like these, rash and unconnected as they were, I spent
many a restless day, and still more restless night. I often sprang
from a pillow which, if I had lived in the days of witchcraft, I
should have thought spelled to refuse me sleep; and walking for
hours, endeavoured to reduce into shape the speculations which filled
my mind with splendours and catastrophes worthy of oriental dreams.
Why did I not then pursue the career in which I had begun the world?
Why not devote myself to diplomacy, in which I had hitherto received
honour? Why not enter i