he Court of Vienna struggled hard to gain
the Ionian Islands; but on these, and on Malta, the young general had
set his heart as the natural stepping-stones to Egypt. At the close of
the year he returned to Paris in triumph, and was invited by the
Director, Barras, to go and conquer England.

Some such effort, either directly against London, or by a deadly
ricochet through Ireland, would have been made, had not Duncan, on 11th
October, crushed the Dutch off Camperdown, taking nine ships out of
fifteen. The consequences were far reaching. The Dutch navy was
paralysed; and without it the squadrons at Cherbourg and Brest were not
yet strong enough to attack our coasts, until the Toulon and Cadiz
fleets sailed northwards. Bonaparte, who was sent to survey the ports in
Flanders and the north of France, reported to the Directory on 23rd
February 1798 that there were fitting out at Brest only ten
sail-of-the-line, which moreover had no crews, and that the preparations
were everywhere so backward as to compel Government to postpone the
invasion until 1799. The wish was father to that thought. Already he had
laid his plans to seize Egypt, and now strongly advised the orientation
of French policy. A third possible course was the closing of all
continental ports against England, an adumbration of the Continental
System of 1806-13 for assuring the ruin of British commerce.

The news of Camperdown and Campo Formio added vigour to Pitt's appeal
for national union in his great speech of 10th November, in which he
gave proofs of the domineering spirit of the party now triumphant at
Paris. Very telling, also, was his taunt at the Whig press, "which knows
no other use of English liberty but servilely to retail and transcribe
French opinions." Sinclair, who had moved a hostile amendment, was so
impressed as to withdraw it; and thus at last the violence of the French
Jacobins conduced to harmony at Westminster.

Already there were signs that the struggle was one of financial
endurance. At the close of November 1797 Pitt appealed to the patriotism
of Britons to raise L25,500,000 for the estimated expenses of the next
year, in order to display the wealth and strength of the kingdom. He
therefore proposed to ask the Bank of England to advance L3,000,000 on
Exchequer bills; and he urged the propertied classes to submit to the
trebling of the Assessed Taxes on inhabited houses, windows, male
servants, horses, carriages, etc. The trebling of t