are in its
government. It was confided to three Commissioners--Sir Gilbert Elliot,
Hood, and O'Hara, Elliot being virtually Governor.

In one other matter the Courts of St. James and of Madrid were at
variance. The latter urged the need of speedily removing the French
warships from Toulon to a Spanish port, or of making preparations for
burning them. Whereas Pitt, who regarded Toulon, not as a windfall, but
as a base of operations for a campaign in Provence, maintained that such
conduct must blight their prospects. With phenomenal stupidity, Langara
allowed his secret instructions on this topic to leak out, thereby
rousing the rage of the Toulonese and the contempt of his British
colleagues. The Duke of Alcudia (better known as Godoy) expressed
sincere regret for this _betise_. But the mischief was done. The French
royalists thenceforth figured as traitors who had let in a band of
thieves intent only on the seizure of the French warships.

As if this were not enough, Hood quarrelled with our military officers,
with results highly exasperating to our land forces.[263] These last did
not shine during the siege. True, in the sortie of 29th November they
captured a battery recently erected north of Malbosquet; but, their
eagerness exceeding their discipline, they rushed on, despite orders to
remain in the battery, like a pack of hounds after a fox (wrote
Hood);[264] whereupon the French rushed upon them, driving them back
with heavy loss. O'Hara, while striving to retrieve the day, was wounded
and captured. His mantle of gloom devolved upon Major-General David
Dundas, a desponding officer, who had recently requested leave to return
on furlough on the ground of ill health and inability to cope with the
work. This general's letters to his ever confident relative, Henry
Dundas, at Whitehall, were always in a minor key. In his eyes the
Spanish troops were "everything that is bad"; half of the Toulonese were
hostile to the Allies; and the latter were heavily handicapped by having
to defend their own fleets. There was some truth in this; but the
whining tone of the letters, due to ill health, drew from the Minister a
stinging retort, to the effect that the occupation of Toulon had taken
Ministers wholly by surprise; that they had done their best to comply
with the new demands for troops, and expected their general not to look
at his own difficulties alone, but to remember those of the enemy and
endeavour to beat him.[265]

Thi