the resultless maneuvers of Lord Loudon aroused a storm of indignation in England. Enormous preparations had proved fruitless, a vast force had warred only against the hardships of the wilderness or the dangers of the ocean. Twenty thousand regular troops, with a large Provincial army, had wasted the precious season of action in embarkations and disembarkations, disgraceful retreats, and advances almost equally disgraceful. Twenty magnificent ships of the line had left. the British ports for the American shore in the pride of irresistible power, and, without firing a gun for the honor of their flag, returned to whence they came, or, maimed and dismantled, sought refuge in friendly ports. England had to lament her gallant children, her stately ships, her hardearned treasures, and, above all, her military glory, lost in the Western deserts or swallowed up in the waters of the Atlantic.

CHAPTER IV.

DURING the disastrous campaign of 1757, a strife of greater importance than that on the American continent was carried on in the English House of Commons. In the preceding year, the falsehood and incompetency of the Duke of Newcastle, prime minister of England, had aroused a storm of indignation, to which the shameful losses of Minorca and Oswego had given overwhelming force. Mr. Fox, the only commoner of character and ability who still adhered to the ministry, determined to lend his name no longer to the premier's policy, and in the month of October resigned the seals of office. This blow proved fatal for the tottering cabinet. To the almost universal joy of the people, the Duke of Newcastle did not dare the encounter with his gifted rival in the approaching session of Parliament, and reluctantly yielded up those powers the exercise of which, in his hands, had led the nation to embarrassment and shame.

By the wish of the king, Mr. Fox endeavored to induce

Mr. WILLIAM PITT to join him in the conduct of the national councils. The "Great Commoner," however, decisively rejected this overture.* The Duke of Devonshire, lord lieutenant of Ireland, a man more remarkable for probity and loyalty than for administrative capacity, next received the royal commands to form a ministry; he sacrificed his personal predilections toward Mr. Fox to the public good, and at once appointed Pitt Secretary of State, with Legge as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Most of the subordinate members of the cabinet retained their places, but several of Pitt's relatives received appointments to important offices.

Almost the first step of the new cabinet was to apply to Parliament for the means of aiding the King of Prussia against “the vindictive designs of France." Notwithstanding the great popularity of the ministry, and the general confidence in its capacity and integrity, the apparent contrast between this proposition and former protestations against continental interference excited the hostility of many, and the observation of all. The supplies, however, were voted to

the full extent demanded by the minister. Despite these concessions to the king's Hanoverian interests, nothing could overcome the personal dislike of his majesty to Pitt, and to his brother-in-law Lord Temple. The appointment of the Duke of Cumberland to command the British force on the Continent gave opportunity for the manifestation of this royal hostility. The duke refused to undertake his duties while such an anti-Hanoverian as Pitt remained as virtual head of the ministry. The king's love for his son, and hatred of his gifted servant, combined to prompt him to the decided step of dismissing the great minister from his councils. An interval of nearly three months elapsed in vain attempts to form a cabinet from which Pitt should be excluded. There was, however, another party

* "But though Pitt desired high office, he desired it only for high and generous ends. He did not seek it for patronage like Newcastle, or for lucre like Fox. Glory was the bright star that ever shone before his eyes, and ever guided him onward—his country's glory and his own. My lord' he once exclaimed to the Duke of Devonshire, 'I am sure that I can save this country, and that no one else can.'". Lord Mahon's Hist. of England, vol. iv., p. 77.

interested in these arrangements, which neither prerogative nor parliamentary influence might long venture to oppose-the British nation. As with one voice, all ranks and classes spoke out their will that Pitt should hold the helm. His rivals saw that it was impossible to stem the stream, and wisely counseled the king to yield to the wishes of his people. In June the patriot minister was once again the ruler of England's destiny.*

This illustrious man knew no party but the British nation, acknowledged no other interest. To exalt the power and prosperity of his country, and to humble France, was his sole aim and object. Personally disagreeable to the highest power in the state, and from many causes regarded with hostility by the several aristocratic confederacies, it needed the almost unanimous voice of his countrymen, and the unacknowledged confidence of those powerful men whose favor he neither possessed nor desired, to sweep away these formidable difficulties, and give to England in the hour of need the services of her greatest son.

For the remainder of the campaign of 1757, however, the energy and wisdom of Pitt were too late brought to the council, and the ill-conducted schemes of his predecessors bore, as has been shown, the bitter fruit of disaster and disgrace. But no sooner was he firmly established in office, and his plans put in execution, than the British cause began to revive in the Western hemisphere, and, although still checkered with defeat, glory and success rewarded his gigan

* At this period commenced the brilliant era justly called MR. PITT'S ADMINISTRATION, in which he became the soul of the British councils, conciliated the good-will of the king, infused a new spirit into the British nation, and curbed the united efforts of the house of Bourbon.

The following picture of affairs at the moment when Pitt became secretary of state (29th of June, 1757) is contained in a letter from Lord Chesterfield to Mr. Dayrolles: "Whoever is in or whoever is out, I am sure we are undone both at home and abroad: at home, by our increasing debt and expenses; abroad, by our ill luck and incapacity. The French are masters to do what they please in America. We are no longer a nation. I never yet saw so dreadful a prospect."--Correspondence of the Earl of Chatham, edited by William Stanhope Taylor, Esq., vol. i., note, p. 238.

VOL. II. D

tic efforts. He at once determined to renew the expedition against Cape Breton, and, warned by previous failures, urged upon the king the necessity of removing both the naval and military officers who had hitherto conducted the operations. With that admirable perception which is one of the most useful faculties of superior minds, he readily discerned in others the qualities requisite for his purpose-his judgment ever unwarped and his keen vision unclouded by personal or political considerations. In Colonel Amherst he had discovered sound sense, steady courage, and an active genius; he therefore recalled him from the army in Germany, and, casting aside the hampering formalities of military rule, promoted him to the rank of major-general, and to the command of the troops destined for the attack of Louisburg.* At the same time, from the British navy's brilliant roll, the minister selected the Hon. Edward Boscawen as admiral of the fleet, and gave him also, till the arrival of General Amherst, the unusual commission of command over the land forces. With vigorous zeal the equipments were hurried on, and on the 19th of February a magnificent armament sailed from Portsmouth for the harbor of Halifax on the Acadian peninsula. The general was delayed by contrary winds, and did not reach Halifax till the 28th of May, where he met Boscawen's fleet coming out of the harbor; the admiral, impatient of delay, having put all the force in motion, with the exception of a corps 1600 strong left to guard the post. No less than 22 ships of the line and 15 frigates, with 120 smaller vessels, sailed under his flag; and 14 battalions of infantry, with artillery and engineers, in all 11,600, almost exclusively British regulars, were embarked to form the army of General Amherst. The troops were told off in three brigades of nearly equal strength, under the brigadier-generals Whitmore, Lawrence, and JAMES WOLFE.†

* "What alarms me most, is the account Lady Hester brought of some men-of-war, a few, very few, being got into Louisburg; because, upon the issue of that attempt I think the whole salvation of this country and Europe does essentially depend." (Letter of Earl Temple to Mr. Pitt, Stowe, July 3, 1758.)-Chatham Correspondence, vol. i., p. 325.

+ See Appendix, No. LXIV.

At dawn on the 2d of June the armament arrived off Cape Breton, where the greatest part of the fleet came to anchor in the open roadstead of Gabarus Bay. Amherst entertained a strong hope to surprise the garrison of Louisburg, and with that view issued an order to forbid the slightest noise, or the exhibition of any light, on board the transports near the shore; he especially warned the troops to preserve a profound silence as they landed. But the elements rendered these judicious orders of no avail. In the morning a dense fog shrouded the rocky shore, and as the advancing day cleared away the curtains of the mist, a prodigious swell rolled in from the Atlantic, and broke in impassable surf upon the beach. Nevertheless, in the evening, the general, with Lawrence and Wolfe, approached close to the dangerous shore, and reconnoitered the difficulties which nature and the enemy might oppose to their landing. They found that the French had formed a chain of posts for some distance across the country, and that they had also thrown up works and batteries at the points where a successful debarkation seemed most probable. The next morning the sea had not abated, and for six successive days the heavy roll of the ocean broke with undiminished violence upon the rugged shore. During this interval the enemy toiled day and night to strengthen their position, and lost no opportunity of opening fire with guns and mortars upon the ships.

On the 8th the sea subsided into calm, and the fog vanished from the shore. Before daybreak the troops were assembled in boats, formed in three divisions; at dawn Commodore Durell examined the coast, and declared that the landing was now practicable. When his report was received, seven of the smaller vessels at once opened fire, and in about a quarter of an hour the boats of the left division began to row in toward the shore: in them were embarked twelve companies of Grenadiers, 550 Light Infantry men, with the Highlanders and a body of Provincial Rangers: Brigadier-general Wolfe was their chief. The right and center brigades, under Whitmore and Lawrence, moved at the same time toward other parts of the shore, and