discoloured-tobacco pegs; I can call them nothing else, in short. In a moment, they dispelled my celestial delusion, and called up hideous images to my mind, which Holbein or Fuseli would have delighted in transferring from the palette to the canvas, could their genius have attained the full amount of my horror.

I had heard of women who were said to be beautiful in spite of their teeth, but I rejected the theory as untenable. I thought of strange, repulsive images, and I could think of nothing else; of painted sepulchres-of green mossy banks, that so often spring from a putrid source-of skeletons clothed with transparent flesh. I thought of the apples of the Dead Sea, and of those waxen representations of plague, which I had then read of, and have since seen in such perfection at the Boboli Palace (if I mistake not) at Florence. In the midst of these horrible images, I was presented to 66 mon mari." "Monsieur," said my fair hostess, "has been kind enough to lay out ever so many guilders in refreshments for the camp."

دو

"I am much obliged to him," said mon mari; “but don't you think, my dear, he looks ill or frightened at something or other?" "Poor young gentleman!" she replied, "I fear he is going to have an attack of our terrible endemic."

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Well," said the elderly gentleman, "he does look as if he was going to have the cold fit."

"I have it already,” I replied, "and with a vengeance too."

"I was not wrong then," said the elderly gentleman, as he handed me a paper of bark: "chew this, my dear sir," he continued, your way back to camp, and you'll get over it.'

on

I took my leave at length, and marching off with my fatigue men, arrived in due time at our encampment.

And now arose a difficulty which I had never anticipated. In the midst of my delirium, I had lost the memorandum of my various commissions, and it was in vain I strove to recollect its items. I could think of nothing but Dead Sea apples and painted sepulchres. What was to be done? I might, it is true, have asked all my friends to come and select their own; but some were on picket, some were foraging, and some were visiting friends in other parts of the alignment; so, in my anxiety to get rid of my cargo, I sent it off haphazard, and made, of course, a variety of blunders. To one who wanted a pound of coffee, I sent an equal quantity of snuff; to another who was dying for a Stilton cheese, I sent a roll of tobacco, and so on: all these mistakes were soon rectified, amidst laughable explanations, but one was nearly productive of mischief.

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Arthur of ours had given me money to buy him a telescope; but this, in the confusion of my mind, I sent to another, supplying him instead with a bottle of brandy. Now, poor Arthur was terribly addicted," as the saying is; and, taking my innocent mistake for a deliberate insult, he sent me a message. Some of my friends would have had me pooh-pooh the affair; but at that time there was no such thing as a newspaper correspondence, to patch up a hole in a man's honour; so I went out with him, but with a firm determination not to return his fire.

Fortunately for all parties, Arthur's hand was very unsteady from his overnight's potations: instead of me, therefore, he hit his own second, as he was gracefully retiring from the line of fire; and hit him, too, in that part of the human frame which is said to have formerly so much redounded to the honour and profit of the learned Taliocotius. As soon as he had performed this notable exploit, Arthur turned on his heel and marched off, declaring that his honour was satisfied; while I took deliberate aim at a crow that came sailing along over his head, and brought it down, in spite of my laughter.

CHAPTER XVII.

THE BOMBARDMENT.

BUT now, at length, the tug of war came on, at least for the poor inhabitants of Flushing, which we bombarded for three or four days, by sea and land, with four or five hundred pieces of ordnance, more or less; exclusive of Shrapnell-shells and Congreve-rockets, which had just then come into fashion, and made a pretty flare-up in the night, to the admiration of all unconcerned spectators.

The Shrapnell-shell, or, as it is technically called, spherical-case shot, has this advantage over the ordinary canister, that, whereas the latter explodes immediately on leaving the gun, and spreads its bullets so wide that few of them will take precise effect at three hundred yards, the Shrapnell may be thrown two miles, and then explode within a calculated distance of the object to be attained; scattering, with murderous effect, not only its own splinters, but the two or three hundred musket balls with which it is charged. These terrible missiles were principally directed, at Flushing, against any uncovered bodies of the enemy's troops who might have been within range; and who were sorely galled and sadly puzzled by such excellent rifle practice, as they deemed it to be, from an outlying picket a couple of miles distant from them.

The Congreve-rockets were equally new and astounding to the garrison of Flushing, but infinitely more destructive. The tremendous rush with which they soared aloft, and the trail of flame that marked their course during the night, must have had a terrifying effect on the trembling inhabitants of that doomed city; but when they saw their pointed tubes irrevocably fixed wherever they struck, pouring forth innumerable jets of fire that ignited everything inflammable within their terrible compass, they must indeed have looked upon them as a rare production of that infernal gentleman who, according to Milton, astonished the angels themselves with the invention of gunpowder. Such, in fact, was the horror they occasioned, that General Monnet, the French commandant, made a formal remonstrance to Lord Chatham against their being used in the bombardment; which, however, his lordship paid very little attention to.

While these and the ordinary shells, and guns of every calibre,

kept up an incessant fire upon Flushing from the land side, our numerous ships of war assailed it on the sea-face, which extended the whole length of the city; pouring in a perpetual succession of broadsides, with showers of shells from the bomb-ketches, whose repeated explosions among the streets and houses increased the infernal din, and materially added to the wide-spread destruction. The result was, that this most unfortunate city was knocked all to atoms, to the consternation and dismay of its helpless inhabitants, with whom we all the while expressed repeated wishes to be on the most friendly terms; though doubtless, as they crept from the fiery torrent, into holes, and cellars, and bomb-proofs, they uttered curses, both loud and deep, at such overtures of friendship.

Meanwhile, we, who were committing all this havoc, suffered literally nothing from the fire of the enemy, which was speedily silenced; but, with the unreflecting curiosity of youth, I fear we rather enjoyed the novelty and martial splendour of the bombardment, especially as we were too far off to witness its frightful results to the inhabitants, or to hear the groans and shrieks of the mutilated and wretched sufferers.

Certain it is, that, during the night, we all crowded upon the roofs of the neighbouring farm-houses, to witness the star-like progress and the final bursting of the shells, the rushing flame of the Congreve-rockets, and the numerous fires that were constantly breaking out in every part of the town, shooting up their spiral volumes of smoke and flame to heaven; while, at intervals, the dreadful explosion of a magazine would send a thrill of mingled pity, awe, and admiration through our hearts. One casualty we particularly lamented, which was occasioned by an unlucky shell, that carried off the belfry of the principal church, and effectually silenced its beautiful chimes, which had often soothed our angry spirits in the trenches with a celestial melody very different, indeed, from those triple bob-majors that make such a savage disturbance in this unmusical island of ours.

The town at length becoming too hot for the garrison, they hung out the white flag, and beat the chamade on the ramparts. After a parley, they agreed to surrender with the honours of war; and the principal gateway was put in possession of Pack's gallant corps, the 71st, till the definitive treaty should be signed by the respective commanders-in-chief.

In the afternoon of the same day, three or four brother officers and myself, urged by an unconquerable curiosity to see the town in its actual condition, walked out of the trenches, and made the best of our way through ruined farm-houses, and over the dead bodies of once jolly tars, fatigue-men, and out-lying pickets, in all stages of decomposition, till we arrived at the Middleburg gate. There, with some difficulty, we obtained permission to enter, from Captain Law, the officer in command; who cautioned us, however, to avoid carefully anything that might lead to a misunderstanding with the French troops, still in possession of the arsenal and other strong positions in the town; and especially to shun the Dutch, who were fearfully

exasperated against the English, for what they deemed a cruel and wanton destruction of their families and property.

Thus warned, we proceeded with due circumspection through streets and lanes, blocked up with fragments of ruined houses, broken furniture, and shattered property of every description: sad tokens of the destructive nature of our cannonade. Very few human beings were visible; for the frightened inhabitants had not yet ventured out of their hiding holes, and the French troops were kept close in their quarters, until the final arrangement took place.

Occasionally we met a small picket, or working party, carrying ammunition or dead bodies from one place to another; and whether it was that they had not shaved for a week, or were terribly gruelled at the idea of surrendering to the sacrés Godams," as they very politely called us, they all looked as savage as if they could have eaten us without salt.

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It being near the end of August, the weather was excessively hot; and the stench and dust arising from the smouldering ruins, added to the fiery nature of the atmosphere, caused a most intolerable thirst amongst us; which, with all our prying, we could not perceive any feasible mode of allaying.

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'Surely," said one of our party, "all the wine shops cannot be blown up or knocked down by that confounded bombardment; if we could only light upon some good fellow now, that would show us the way to one."

وو

I am absolutely suffocating," I exclaimed, as my tongue knocked like a piece of dry leather against the roof of my mouth, "and would willingly give a guinea at this moment for a bottle of sour wine." "Yonder's a Dutchman," cried Captain O'Driscoll, "standing on a bridge, and spitting into the water for want of better employment. Let us ask him the way to the nearest tavern."

Here, however, a difficulty occurred; for on comparing notes, not one of us, we found, could speak a word of Dutch.

"Never mind," said Jack Crossley, an old subaltern, who fancied himself a particularly clever fellow; come on, my boys; I'll soon make the Dutchman understand what we want."

"How so?" demanded we una voce.

"By speaking broken English to the fellow," replied Crossley, with an air of undoubting confidence.

We all laughed at the absurdity of the idea. Captain O'Driscoll, being the senior officer amongst us, said the Dutchman would take it as an insult, and we should get into a scrape in consequence.

"No such thing, my dear fellow," said Crossley. I have always found broken English a sort of universal language both with Dutchmen and Frenchmen; and I'll bet you a rump and dozen, he will understand me perfectly well, though I cannot speak a word of Dutch to him." Done!" said O'Driscoll, "I'll take your bet, just to show you what a budhgai* you're going to make of yourself." Anxious to witness the decision of a bet which now began to

* An Irish expression of ridicule; expressive, but untranslatable.

interest us for more reasons than one, we proceeded in a body towards the Dutchman, who, seeing us approach, folded his arms as he leaned against the parapet of the bridge, and reconnoitred us with an air of mingled insouciance and defiance.

He was a fine-looking man, in a sort of undress uniform, with a huge pair of moustachios, and a humourous twinkle of the eye, that seemed to encourage Crossley in his attempt, for he went boldly up, and addressed him in the following jargon, which very much deranged the gravity of our party.

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You 'standy where get eaty, drinky, brandy, cum watery wine-o?" If this specimen of Crossley's universal language excited our merriment, the answer to it threw us into convulsions of laughter,

"Och! to be sure then I do, your honour," promptly replied the supposed Dutchman. You've only to go down the kay there, to the Orange Boven,' where you'll find the best of aiting and dhrinking, and good dhry lodgings to boot, whether you're a man or a horse." There!" said Crossley, with a look of triumph that very much increased our laughter; "I told you that every Dutchman understood broken English.'

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دو

The man, on inquiry, proved to belong to the Irish Brigade in the service of Napoleon, some companies of which had been detached from Antwerp, to do duty at Flushing during the siege. My readers, perhaps, know that this gallant and distinguished corps was exclusively composed of Irishmen, whose religious scruples and disabilities had sent them into voluntary exile from their native land, to avoid the pressure of laws which now happily no longer exist-laws that had long doomed some of the best blood of Ireland to be shed in the service of France, Spain, and Austria; and had given to whole generations of Blakes and O'Donnells the wealth and honours of every country but their own. As the reader also knows that an ancestor of mine was one of the original members of this distinguished body, I felt a more than ordinary sympathy for my poor countryman; and, pressing a Spanish dollar into his hand, I passed on with my comrades to the "Orange Boven."

This patriotic sign, which had lain hidden during the domination of the French, amongst the archives of the cautious innkeeper, was hung up by him the moment the town surrendered; while its predecessor, "Napoleon le Grand," was ignominiously bundled into the coal-hole. The joy of mynheer will therefore be readily surmised, on seeing, for the first time in his life, some English officers under his hospitable roof; and he accordingly treated us to everything excellent in the way of refreshment, duly charging for the same six times as much as he would have dared to demand from the French during their day of power.

In a week after this, the besieging force was drawn up on a range of sandhills extending in a northerly direction from the walls of Flushing; the original foundation on which this artificial island may be said to have been constructed. In their presence the garrison marched out with the honours of war; and I felt, in common with my brothers-in-arms, a justifiable triumph in seeing six thousand