wounded, including among the latter her captain and 1802 first lieutenant.

Agreeably to the instructions he had received, lieutenant Sterrett ordered the guns, swords, pistols, and ammunition of his prize to be thrown overboard, and both her masts to be cut away by the board. A spar was then raised to serve for a mast, and an old tattered sail hung to it as a flag. In this condition the corsair was sent to Tripoli; and it is related that, on her arrival there, the bashaw marked his indignation by ordering the wounded captain to be paraded through the streets mounted upon an ass, and then to receive 500 bastinadoes. This was a fine reward, certainly, for having held out, against a very superior antagonist, until nearly two thirds of his crew were killed or disabled.

Aug.

On the 21st of August commodore Dale put to sea from Malta with his squadron, and on the 30th captured a greek ship from Smyrna bound to Tripoli, having on board one officer and 20 soldiers, 14 merchants, and some women and children, all Tripolitans. Considering this a good opportunity to negotiate an exchange with the bey for some Americans whom his cruisers had taken, the commodore proceeded straight to Tripoli; and, arriving off the port on the 3d of September, sent on shore a message to that effect. Sept The bey said he would not give one American for all the soldiers; that only eight of the merchants were his subjects; and that he cared very little about any of them. He at length, however, agreed to give three Americans for the 21 soldiers, and three more for the eight merchants. With this the american commodore was obliged to be satisfied. Soon afterwards, finding his crew getting very sickly and his provisions very short, commodore Dale raised the blockade of Tripoli, and steered for Gibraltar. During the winter months the american squadron visited Tripoli only occasionally. In March, 1802, having had all their arrears of presents paid up, the regencies of Algiers and Tunis became satisfied with the

1802. United States. Nothing, however, during the whole of this year, appears to have been done against Tripoli, although the cruisers of that regency were capturing american vessels wherever they could find them.

FRENCH EXPEDITION TO ST.-DOMINGO.

We have already noticed the bustle of preparation going on in the continental ports, just when a treaty of peace had apparently set fleets and armies to at least a temporary rest. An expedition to the island of Saint-Domingo was the plan in agitation. Previously to any account of occurrences on the shores of that ill-fated island, we will bestow a glance upon the changes which the preceding two or three years had effected in a colony that, when France owned it, was the most profitable of any in the West Indies.

Buonaparte, as soon as he had got himself placed at the head of the french government, sent out to Saint-Domingo, an arrêté, containing the programme of a constitution for the government of the island; and, by way of gilding the pill, he appointed the celebrated black general Toussaint-Louverture, commander in chief of the colonial army; of which, owing to the unhealthy state of the island and the impossibility of sending out reinforcements, a very small portion were natives of France. Before the close of the year 1799 Toussaint possessed himself of the spanish part of the island, including the city of Santo-Domingo. Shortly afterwards this gifted negro drew up, and finally got adopted, the plan of a colonial constitution, in which he named himself governor of the island and president for life, with the right of appointing his successor. Toussaint probably would not have ventured to take so bold a step, had he been aware that the war was so near its close: he knew that, while it continued, he should have the protection of the English; and that the ships of the latter would prevent those of France from transporting any troops to recapture the island, or from otherwise molesting him in his possession.

As soon as the negotiation between France and 1802. England had assumed a favourable appearance, the ex-proprietors of estates in Saint-Domingo, strengthened by the whole body of french merchants, who keenly felt the loss of so fair a portion of their trade, applied to the first-consul to send out an army and retake the island. The nation at large seemed to have but one feeling on the subject; and Buonaparte, in despite, as he had himself declared, of his better judgment, gave orders to equip an expedition suitable to the magnitude of the undertaking. The army was to be composed of 21200 men, under general Leclerc ; and the fleet to convey them to the Antilles was to consist of 33 sail of the line, and nearly an equal number of frigates, ship and brig corvettes, and flûte-transports, under the command of vice-admiral Villaret-Joyeuse

On the 14th of December, 1801, after a long delay by contrary winds, a fleet composed of 10 french sail of the line, under the commander in chief, and of five spanish, under vice-admiral Gravina, accompanied by six frigates, four corvettes and smaller vessels, and two transports, containing altogether 7000 men, set sail from the road of Brest. On the morning of the 17th, off Belle-Isle, one french sail of the line, one frigate, one corvette, and one flûte, with 900 men on board, joined from Lorient; and a squadron from Rochefort, under rear-admiral La Touche-Tréville, consisting of six sail of the line, six frigates, two corvettes, and two despatch-vessels, and having on board 3000 men, was expected to join, but did not until the combined fleet, on the 29th of January, 1802, reached Cape Samana on the island of its destination. One 74, the Duquesne, and one frigate, the Cornélie, having on board 700 men between them, had parted company; which left 10500 as the number of men to be disembarked from the first division of the fleet.

* See O'Meara's Napoléon in Exile, vol. ii. p. 199.

1802.

The following were the dispositions for landing the troops; 1000, under general Kerverseau, at Santo-Domingo; 3000, under general Boudet, at Port-au-Prince; 2500, under general Rochambeau, in Mancenille bay, to attack Fort-Dauphin, and, on carrying it, to proceed to the mole Saint-Nicolas, there to be joined by 4000 men under general Hardy. While the ships were proceeding to their assigned points of debarkation, two other french squadrons arrived at the rendezvous; one from Toulon, of four sail of the line and one frigate, under rear-admiral Ganteaume, with 2300 men; the other from Cadiz, of three sail of the line and three frigates, under rear-admiral Linois, with 1500 men on board. In the mean time, the 10500 troops that had arrived in the first division, partly by intrigue and partly by. force, had effected their landing.

It is foreign to these pages to enter upon the details of the military operations which, after a brave and protracted resistance on the part of the indigenes, led to their dispersion or surrender; but even this did not take place until the remaining 6900 of the 21200 french troops ordered upon the expedition arrived at the island. The black chief, who had exhibited so many traits of moderation and generalship, after capitulating and being allowed to return to his home, was suddenly arrested and conveyed on board the Héros 74, lying off Gonaïves. On being brought on board the french ship, this extraordinary man is said to have uttered these words: "En me renversant, on n'a abattu que le tronc de l'arbre de la liberté des noirs, il repoussera par les racines parcequ'elles sont profondes et nombreuses."

Having been thus illegally dragged on board the Héros, Toussaint was most inhumanly, and contrary to all the assurances held out to him by general Leclerc, transported to France, to end his days in a prison. He was shut up in Fort de Joux, and died six months afterwards in rather a mysterious way. On this subject the following appears in a work of

considerable notoriety: "I mentioned Toussaint- 1802. Louverture, and observed that, amongst other calumnies, some of his (Buonaparte's) enemies had asserted that he had caused him to be put to death privately in prison. It does not deserve an answer,' replied Napoléon, 'what possible interest could I have in putting a negro to death after he had arrived in France? Had he died in St.-Domingo, then indeed something might have been suspected, but, after he had safely landed in France, what object could have been in view?'"*

Whatever, in reality, was the mode by which Toussaint ended his days, the act of forcibly withdrawing him from Saint-Domingo, after he had honourably capitulated, proved in the end as impolitic as it was cruel. Several enterprising black chiefs still remained on the island: Clerveaux, Christophe, Paul-Louverture, (nephew to Toussaint,) and Dessalines; and who, with the whole of their countrymen, were exasperated at the treachery which had deprived them of their gallant leader. Part of the french troops were sent away to aid in subduing the revolted negroes at Gaudeloupe; and, among the remainder, as the summer advanced, the yellow fever made dreadful ravages.

of gen.

Leclerc.

About the middle of August accounts reached Death Saint-Domingo, of the success of the French at Gaudeloupe, and that slavery, in all its horrors, had been reestablished in the colony. This news spread like wildfire among the negroes, at the first-named island, and, operating upon minds already smarting under their own wrongs, determined them to revolt. The first eruption broke out about the middle of September. The death of general Leclerc of the fever on the 2d of November+ conferred on general Rochambeau the command of the french forces on the island; but all the efforts of these, ably directed

* O'Meara's Napoléon in Exile, vol. ii. p. 198.

† His body, after being embalmed, was conveyed to France on board the (late british) Swiftsure 74.