begged to correct a misconception, which, from what he had said on a former evening respecting the obnoxious bye-law of the Lincoln's Inn benchers, had gone abroad. It would appear from his former statement, that lord Erskine had given his assent to that resolution, whereas the fact was, that that noble lord was only present on the 5th of February, when it was first proposed for consideration, but was not present when it was subsequently decided upon.

stated, that he had it in authority from the noble lord, to say, that he had never given his concurrence to this order, and even, if under any impression at the time he had given such consent, from what had since come to his knowledge, he was most anxious to have it withdrawn.

rose in pursuance of his notice to submit certain Resolutions to the House founded upon the evidence taken at its bar, during the laborious but important investigation, which had occupied so much of their attention since the commencement of the present session. He was fully aware, that in endeavouring to lay before the House a clear and comprehensive analysis of that evidence the task he had undertaken was difficult, and was afraid he should weary the attention of the House by the details, which it would be absolutely necessary for him to go into, in order to the complete developement of the question which they would have to decide upon, and to lay an irrefragable ground for the motion with which he was to conclude. Difficult, however, as he felt the task he had undertaken, he also felt that it was as painful as it was arduous.—Painful to review a campaign, in the conduct of which, there was so much to wonder at, to lament, and to condemn—a campaign which had equally astonished Europe by the magnitude of its preparation, as by the extent of its failure. Notwithstanding such failure, and such a calamitous issue, he had still hoped that in proceeding to analyse the evidence, he would have been able to extract from this mass of national misfortune, something that might by its eventual consequences amidst the present cheerless gloom, afford even partial grounds for national consolation. He had hoped to find that such dreadful failures were, at least in part, attributable to those uncontrollable causes which are incident to all the operations of war, and are inseparable from enterprises dependent for their success, upon the state and condition of the elements. But what had the disastrous issue of this Expedition proved? It had proved to be the result of predicted and anticipated causes. It had verified every prediction, and realized every fear expressed by all those best competent to decide upon its policy and practicability, but whose opinions upon this occasion, most fatally for the honour and interests of the country, his Majesty's ministers did not deem it expedient to follow.

Before he should trace this ill-judged end disgraceful Expedition from its monstrous birth to its most horrible catastrophe, he felt it necessary to advert to another abortive enterprise, which was previously in the contemplation of his Majesty's government, but with which, from the reasons he was about to state, they were wholly unable to proceed. They would find from the evidence of the commander in chief, sir D. Dundas, that so early as the the 22d of March last, a communication was made to him, directing him to attend a cabinet council on the 24th. Having so attended, he was there informed, that the enemy had a force of nine or ten sail of the line at Flushing, and he was required to say, whether a number of troops, competent for a successful attack against these shipping, could be then furnished. Here, then, was an opportunity for carrying into effect that object against the growing naval force of France, which his Majesty's Government professed to have had so long in contemplation. Had it succeeded at that period, what a proud theme for triumph; what a consoling source for national exultation? But why did it not succeeed, or why was it not attempted? It could net succeed, it could not be attempted; because, as the commander in chief himself told them, it was absolutely impossible, from the whole regular army of this country, to furnish even 15,000 men. And on what grounds did he give that opinion? Upon the well-known shattered State, in which a great portion of our disposable force returned from Spain after the battle of Corunna? The men, for the most part, unfit for duty, with arms and equipments in the most defective state. General Calvert corroborated that statement, and fully coincided in the impossibility of providing so small a force as 15,000 men at that period.

Here he must intreat the House to recal to its recollection the barefaced assertions, the confident assurances so frequently repeated by his Majesty's ministers during the last session of parliament. Let them compare the lamentable truths Which the commander in chief had communicated, and which would never have been disclosed but for this inquiry, with the statements that were re-echoed from the opposite side of the House and the returns which were officially laid upon their table during the last session. Why, he would ask, had statements and returns so contradictory to truth thus been made? Was it not to disguise the nature and extent of the nation's afflictions, to gloss over the misconduct of ministers, and by keeping from view the just description of such lamentable occurrences to confirm that House in a fatal and ruinous delusion?—[Hear! hear!] What answer could ministers make to this charge? Here they had the undeniable information before them that although in the month of January last, 23,000 men re-embarked at Corunna, still in the month of March, it was impossible out of the whole regular army to furnish 15,000 men for the purpose of effecting a most desirable object.

He should now proceed to take a view of the first overt act in this Expedition. In order to form any thing like a correct judgment upon the subject, it would be necessary to trace it through every part of its history and progress; to expose the gross ignorance and improvidence of its authors throughout every part of the detail, before any opinion should be formed upon their aggregate imbecility and incompetence. The first overt act then in the history of this most disastrous Expedition was the Letter of Lord Castlereagh to the commander in chief, dated May 29th. That Letter conveyed to the commander in chief the following statement: "The naval establishment which the enemy has created in the Scheldt, has already led to the construction of not less than twenty ships of the line in different stages of equipment, and promises to receive at no distant period an extension in point of number of ships, and a solidity in point of defence, which must render it, as a maritime position, not only extremely formidable to the security of Great Britain, but still more invulnerable to attack. The intelligence received from the northern parts of France, from Flanders, and from Holland, although not such as will enable me to furnish you with any precise statement of the enemy's force on that line, represents them as drained as low, if not lower, than at any former period, of the regular troops; and I apprehend it may be generally assumed that we can never expect to find the enemy more exposed or more assailable in that quarter." In this they had the first overt-act of the noble lord, who, though obviously ignorant of the real strength or actual situation of the force of the enemy in that quarter, still advised, planned and carried into execution an Expedition, in the disastrous consequences of which the dearest interests of the nation were most wantonly sacrificed. Willing however as he was to allow every credit to ministers, where credit was justly due to them, he was free to acknowledge the propriety of their conduct, so far as that propriety was discernible in their application for advice and intelligence to the best sources of authority; but here their title to credit terminated. For when gentlemen read the opinions of those officers to whom ministers applied for information, and contrasted the course determined upon with those opinions, it was absolutely impossible even to conjecture, much more to ascertain their motives at all for making the application. This attempt upon the shipping and arsenals of Antwerp, ministers told them was a plan long considered and fully matured, and yet, strange to say, in this letter to the commander in chief, they found him called upon not to state his opinion as to the best means of carrying into effect this long considered and determined project, but his sentiments "upon the practicability of such an attempt, the means required, and the mode of carrying it into execution." The noble lord (Castlereagh) admitted in this letter too his inability to afford a precise statement of the enemy's force upon that line of operation, but he assured the commander in chief, that that part of the enemy's territories was never more exposed, nor more assailable, and that this country had never at its command a greater disposable force. Upon the receipt of this communication, with a most laudable attention to the interests of the country, and to the protection of that army at the head of which his Majesty was pleased to place him, the commander in chief felt it to be his duty to consult with other officers of high and distinguished character, and qualified from talents, experience and many other particular circumstances to afford him most able assistance, in returning the fullest information to his Majesty's government. His own and their opinions he delivered to the noble lord, in official documents dated the third of June.

Before he should proceed to an analysis of these opinions, he wished to advert to the last sentence in Lord Castlereagh's letter, which he must contend, did not afford the information that was necessary, and ought to be afforded in order to enable the gallant officers who had been consulted to form a definite and conclusive opinion. Instead of such general indefinite statements as the noble lord's letter contained positive denned intelligence ought to have been communicated, but, above all, the safety of so large, and, perhaps, the last army of this country ought not to have been risqued upon such desultory arguments. But, returning to the opinions of the five military officers, it was evident from their tenor, that in putting into practice their plan of attack upon the naval resources of the enemy at Antwerp his Majesty's ministers had in their own contemplation two plans. One to proceed by way of Ostend, and the other, that is the one attempted, by naval and military operations in the Scheldt. Extravagant as was the one which, in their wisdom, they had adopted, ten times more so was that which they had abandoned. But the commander in chief stated in his answer, that if the attack was to be made at all, it should be a combined naval and land operation, and he proposed, that the relative strength of our force, and the presumed amount of the enemy, should be determined as a question of calculation, and, not of surmise.

The commander in chief wrote as follows: "Horse Guards, June 3, 1809. The object to be attained is a most important and desirable one, but the force we have to employ must be considered, and the difficulties and risks they have to encounter from the enemy's strength and advantages must be well weighed. Every calculation or prospect of successful attack can only be foreseen on a knowledge of the relative situations and strength of the enemy's country, fortresses, and armed men that can be brought in defence of both. If the route of the army is therefore to be taken, as in the first case, though Flanders, the country is known to be one of the most intricate in Europe for military operations. With our state of preparation and numbers, an attempt by this route of marching through Flanders to arrive at Antwerp would be most singular, and perhaps without example. In whatever way Antwerp is to be approached or taken, the service is one of very great risk; and in which the safe return of the army so employed may be very precarious, from the opposition made and the length of time consumed in the operation, which enables the enemy in a short time to assemble a great force from every part of the Netherlands and Holland, and even from Westphalia, and from the course of the Rhine, as well as from the frontier of France."

Here was the opinion of an old, an able and experienced military man, which one might suppose would have arrested even the rapid progress of the noble lord's (Castlereagh) enthusiastic mind—an opinion, that ought to have created in him a distrust of his frantic project, and let in such light upon him, that he must have almost anticipated that issue which in the destruction of our army and the disgrace of our character, has far exceeded even the forlorn and disastrous expedition, which, under the same auspices, had but just preceded it.

The next opinion delivered was, that of general Calvert—an opinion deserving of the most serious attention because he had what his Majesty's ministers had not, a knowledge of the local. That officer stated the utter impossibility of laying down any thing decisive in the shape of detailed reasoning, without being in possession of that knowledge, which most people imagine an indispensable preliminary, but which, important as it must appear to all others, was by his Majesty's ministers, through the whole arrangement of this project, considered highly superfluous, namely a knowledge of local circumstances and to what extent those circumstances would admit of a naval co-operation. After describing the means possessed by the enemy in drawing from various quarters reinforcements, he concluded with an opinion, that, one should have supposed, would have operated with ministers against the adoption because it must have proved to them the inexpediency of this project. Before he read that conclusion he must say, that he was not aware of the extent of their want of that description of information, without which his Majesty's government should not have ventured to risque the safety of a gallant army. For what said general Calvert upon that point. He told them that having no data to go on in respect of the enemy's force, no argument could be entered in to upon that point. Would the noble lord or any one of his former colleagues say, that they should have committed the honours and interests of this country, the blood of its defenders, and the product of its industry, upon an enterprize, the success of which must have depended upon a state of things, of which they themselves now stood so confessedly ignorant? Yet even upon the presumptions that the case itself afforded, they were told by general Calvert that the service would be arduous, and that the troops employed upon it must be exposed to considerable risk.

He next came to an opinion which was almost impossible to believe to have been received by ministers, or if it had been received, that it was ever read by them, for most assuredly had any attention been paid to its most impressive and unanswerable inferences, they never would in contradiction to its purport have conveyed a British army to almost certain destruction. Need he say, that he alluded to the military opinion of colonel Gordon? (Hear, hear!) That officer stated the previous consideration necessary in weighing the practicability of this project, to be "the extent of our means compared with the means of the enemy, and the obstacles we should have opposed to us;" and in continuation observed," that there does not appear to be any datum that can lead to any probable guess at the extent of the force which the enemy may have at Antwerp and the strong towns adjacent, or even at the extent of the armed population or militia of the neighbouring districts; but it is imagined from various concurring testimonies, that the whole regular force has been drawn off towards Germany, and that the country in the vicinity of Antwerp has been left more destitute of troops than at any former period. This appears to be the utmost extent of our information, and upon the accuracy of which must depend the success or failure of our project." Upon his receiving this opinion it was really astonishing to think that the noble lord did not pause before he ventured to send an army, such as this was, out of the country, to certain destruction. The whole of that officer's opinion went most conclusively, in his mind, to deter any man or set of men, but his Majesty's late minister of war, and those who acted with him, from encountering the hazardous and horrible enterprize.

From what had transpired during the inquiry, it was apparent that his Majesty's ministers intended resting a part of their defence upon information alledged to have been received subsequent to the delivery of these military opinions. But in answer to such an extenuation, he would challenge his Majesty's government to state one single proof of such subsequent information. Was there any thing in the documents submitted to the secret Com- mittee which could authorise that House to believe that the army in the vicinity of Antwerp were, in any considerable force, drawn off into Germany? In this opinion, dated so far back as the 29th of May it was also to be recollected, that colonel Gordon considered that the first operation necessary would be to get possession of Cadsand and South Beveland. And yet it was not until the Expedition had in part actually sailed, that it had ever occurred to his Majesty's ministers to consider of the necessity of taking possession of these places or of hinting at it in the instructions given to the officers entrusted with the execution of this project. But it was impossible to put the nature of the Expedition in a stronger light, than as stated in the emphatic words of colonel Gordon, when he summed up with his concluding inference. "That this attempt would be a most desperate enterprise cannot be doubted; and that in the attempt, whether successful or otherwise, a very large proportion of our navy, and military means, would be put to imminent hazard."

The next opinion taken by the commander in chief was that of general Brownrigg, who agreed with all the other military authorities, that the line of operations through Flanders was not to be thought of and for the following reasons:

"But if the enemy is enabled to assemble a force sufficient materially to obstruct the progress of the march at particular points, and that the people of the country are hostile, which may also be expected, it is hardly probable that the Army can reach Antwerp in less than fifteen days after its landing. That it may penetrate that distance, under the presumption of the absence of the French armies in Germany, cannot be doubted; but so much time would be afforded to the enemy to assemble troops from Holland, and the fortified places immediately in the vicinity of Antwerp, that it being able to effect its object is by no means certain; should it not do so, a retreat by the route which it took in its advance seems nearly impossible, as an army must be expected to be formed in its rear, of the Militia and Gens d' Armes of the country, and from the garrisons of at least twenty fortified towns of West Flanders, none of which are at a greater distance than seven days march from Ghent, which Would be retaken, and would probably be the point of assembly, while it would be pursued by that which opposed it at Antwerp."

pon the conjoint operations in the Scheldt general Brownrigg proceeded to state his opinion.

"If I am justified in the foregoing reasoning, it appears that the loss of the whole force is risked by such an undertaking; but if the destruction of the enemy's arsenals at Antwerp, and his fleet in the Scheldt, is the object in view, I am humbly of opinion, that this can only be effected by our fleet being able to sail up the Scheldt, 10,000 troops on board, to land occasionally, to possess forts and batteries placed to obstruct the navigation. Should this be deemed impracticable, the possession of the island of Walcherea seems the most likely step to lead to the accomplishment of what is so much desired. By possessing the anchorage of Flushing, the enemy's fleet in the Scheldt would be rendered useless, and exposed to such modes of attack as might from that point be devised for its destruction."

As to the accomplishment of the ulterior and main object of the Expedition general Brownrigg thus expressed him self:

"Should it be thought right from thence to attempt the destruction of the arsenals at Antwerp, a force passing over to South Beveland would take possession of Sandvliet and the main land, and from thence, the distance to Antwerp being about six leagues, might succeed in taking it by a coup-de-main; or being masters of the Western Scheldt, the force of this enterprise might proceed by sea to Sandvliet.—I have, &c."

Of all the plans proposed, this was by far the most extravagant and impracticable. Flushing having been taken, general Brownrigg really thought that a force passing over to South Beveland, would take possession of Santvliet on the main land, and the distance from thence to Antwerp being only six leagues, might succeed in taking the latter place by a coup-de-main.

The House would perceive, that although this opinion was not as adverse as the preceding ones to the ministerial project, still it was far from very encouraging. The next opinion taken was that of general Hope. He began with making several assumptions, and after dilating upon the impracticability of effecting any part of the objects of the Expedition by an attempt to penetrate to Antwerp through Flanders, he proceeded to consider the chances of success in the other mode of proceeding. He supposed Walcheren and the other Islands betwen the East and the West Scheldt to be previously reduced, and then went on to say respecting the great object of attacking Antwerp:

"Should this operation (meaning the attempt to capture the Islands between the East and West Scheldt,) succeed, and a considerable quantity of schuyts and boats be collected, it might then be investigated how far it was practicable to take advantage of a flowing tide; and by an embarkation from the point of South Buveland, highest up the river, attempt Antwerp by a coup-de-main, landing, at the same time, smaller bodies of troops at Zandvliet on the right, and some corresponding point on the left bank of the Scheldt, to spread alarm; and operate as a diversion in favour of the main operation.

"The flotilla on its progress up the Scheldt would necessarily be accompanied by gun boats, which should attempt to check the forts and batteries on either side of the river.—The capture of forts Lillo and Liefkenshoeik would be of great importance to the security of retreat.

"Such an operation, it is evident, would be attended with great risk to the force employed, without, perhaps, any adequate security to the attainment of its object."

Here, then, were five military opinions, four of them decidedly adverse, and the fifth not favourable to the Expedition. Having thus bottomed their project upon the opinions of five military officers, his Majesty's Government next applied to two naval officers, sir Home Popham and sir Richard Strachan. In sir Home Popham's interview with lord Mulgrave, he stated, that he conceived there were greater objects in view than the possession of Walcheren.—Indeed it was perfectly plain from the equipments of the Expedition, that it was principally intended for the ulterior object of destroying the naval resources and arsenals of the enemy; but even if any doubt existed before, it must have been wholly dissipated by the opinions of the military officers, who all concurred in considering the great and ultimate object of the Expedition to be the attack upon Antwerp. In the memoranda of sir Home Popham, he particularly presses two points, namely, that the troops should be embarked in ships of war, as transports were a great impediment to promptitude and attack, and that as the season was advancing, the Expedition should be ready to sail by the 26th or 27th of June, about the time of the full moon. Here, then, was their first naval opinion treated with the same disregard as those of their military advisers; first, the ships of war were not to proceed up the Scheldt, and the hopes of promptitude were increased by the vast number of horses that were sent out, as well as by not dispatching the Expedition, which, ought to have sailed on the 27th June, untill the 28th July. Sir Richard Strachan, with whom they next advised, assured the noble lord at the head of the Admiralty, that he entertained little prospect of ultimate success at Antwerp. In his conversation with lord Mulgrave, he perceived that his lordship did not then know that the French ships could go above Antwerp. When asked whether he had ever any communication either with lords Castlereagh or Mulgrave relative to the difficulties he might be subject to in going up to Antwerp, he said that he did not recollect that they communicated to him any thing upon the subject, but he remembered that when he remarked, that all he thought could be done would be taking Walcheren, the noble lord at the head of the Admiralty replied, in anticipation of what I trust the constitutional organ of the nation will at the end of this discussion declare, that the country would be little satisfied with such an extensive armament doing nothing more than taking Walcheren. Upon the repetition of his fears, the noble lord assured him that he had the fullest confidence of success, and that he had reason to think they should do very well.

In developing the consequences which followed this ruinous ministerial project, it was most natural to enquire, and if possible to ascertain, first, whether there was any settled plan of operations at all, and secondly, whether there had been any plan concurred in by the different departments of the cabinet, and fully communicated to the officers entrusted with the command? He must confess that, with all his anxiety to learn, and all his industry to obtain the information, he was yet to hear what was the nature of the arrangement proposed. Were he to deliver his own conviction, it would be that there were as many plans as there were departments engaged in the Expedition;—that the noble lord (Castlereagh) had his plan—that the admiralty had theirs, and that the right hon. gent. opposite (Mr. Perceval) had his, each distinct from the other. The plan of the noble lord, if one might guess from the outline, was to make a dash, which disdained to stop at even the most desperate risks, and appalling dangers. The plan of the admiralty, at least fixed upon at the sailing, though hostile to the romantic notions of the noble lord, was much more prudent. It would not hazard the navy in a most intricate navigation. The right hon. the Chancellor of the Exchequer's plan was not how he should support the cause of his allies; not how the operations of the Expedition should affect the scale of the war in Germany; not how it should tend to turn in favour of Austria, the equally poised fortune of that awful campaign, but all his attention was absorbed in calculating upon that arrangement which should convey your Expedition with the least possible quantity of dollars. The right hon. Gent. totally overlooked that axiom in war, that bullion was as necessary as powder and shot, and was, when well applied, not less operative. (Hear, hear!) What plan the secretary of state for foreign affairs was more particularly attached to, he could not tell; but it was probable, that just at that time, he had some little plan of his own which he did not communicate to his colleagues. The admiral appeared to have a plan; but the commander in chief appeared to have no plan at all. Throughout the whole of his examination it was clear that he had at no time during the campaign considered of any plan at all, neither was there any pointed out to him in the instructions of the government? The noble lord here declared that he felt it difficult to settle what plan he should proceed to discuss on the present occasion; but he should at all events endeavour to follow up what seemed to have been the intention of the government. The general understanding of the business seemed to be, that part of our army was in the first instance to take possession of the island of Walcheren, and another corps to take Cadsand. The main body was to advance to Santvliet to about the number of 22,000, including however eight detachments to be sent to South Beveland. This was so far the apparent plan, which, however, related, according to some of the documents before the House, in not very intelligible language, to "a second, ulte- rior, simultaneous, subsequent operation.!"—Now to have any chance of success, it was necessary that the main body should have got to Santvliet as speedily as possible; and accordingly four days were calculated for its passage from the Downs to Santvliet. Sir R. Strachan had said, that if wind and weather were favourable, it might be done in a week; but after all, with every precaution that could have been taken, some vessels were behind, and some had been stranded. In addition to that cause of delay, it was found quite necessary to take South Beveland, since the enemy had batteries on that island all up the river as far as it extended; and, besides, Bathz might have been expected to hold out for some time. The noble lord then referred to a letter of lord Castlereagh to the commander in chief, of the 23d of June, stating that on the 21st he had received the King's pleasure that the Expedition should go forward. The ardent zeal of the secretary of state had outrun the royal sanction; for he had, previously to obtaining it, directed sir D. Dundas to hold the army in readiness. The great objects of the Expedition were stated to be, the capture or destruction of the enemy's ships at Antwerp, at Terneuse, and in the Scheldt, and, it possible, the rendering of the river Scheldt no longer navigable; and this they now told us was to be done by a coup-de-main. He doubted much, after all, that there were in existence such arsenals as those at Terneuse here directed to be destroyed. As for the "powerful diversion in favour of our allies," how could the noble lord expect it to be so, when he knew, that, after the coup-de-main, our force, for want of foreign coin, must return immediately? This was the object on which the eyes of his Majesty's ministers had been fixed for so long a period. As to the scheme of destroying the navigation of the Scheldt, it was impracticable.

The noble secretary of state, however, hoped confidently that all the difficulties would be overcome. How? Not by methods provided or foreseen by government, but forsooth, by the valour and energy of his Majesty's troops. He could not, however in this place omit a principal point, the probability of those ships being protected by the enemy. And here for the first time the noble lord prudently considered difficulties and possible failure, and yet pointed out no method by which to overcome them. He had however followed this consideration of difficulties up by saying, although the objects of our Expedition could be removed farther from us at the discretion of the enemy, yet upon the whole it was deemed necessary to recommend the undertaking of the Expedition.

The House should bear in mind, that we could not go from Santvliet to Antwerp with safety, but with the possession of one of the banks of the Scheldt. The north bank of that river, and the possession of South Beveland, were also thought to be indispensable. Sir H. Popham had given it as his opinion, that with every circumstance of wind, &c. being favourable, we might be on the coast from the Downs in 24 hours, and in 48 hours afterwards at Santvliet. Sir R. Strachan had said, that we could not do it without great danger and loss to our ships and boats from Bathz, which must therefore be taken, and where sir J. Hope had stated, that there were 14 or 15 guns mounted. South Beveland and Bathz must therefore have been taken. Sir R. Keats, one of the most experienced naval officers, held a high command in the Expedition; but it did not appear that he was in any respect ever previously consulted. That gallant officer nevertheless had made a communication to lord Castlereagh, who shewed but little disposition to consult with him. Sir R. Keats, it seemed, was in favour of proceeding to the ulterior objects at once, and against wasting time or troops in Walcheren: This circumstance would prove material, in some respects, in reviewing the whole case. When asked as to the time that might be occupied in advancing to Antwerp, the main object of the Expedition, sir Richard said it depended entirely on the state of the weather, and was subject to many chances; that if Bathz were defended, it might have retarded the Expedition a few days: That unless we landed with great celerity, the efforts of the enemy might make ultimate success doubtful, and even though we arrived in time off Santvliet, yet the nature of the Expedition was peculiarly subject to chances; and the probability was, that those chances might happen which would render success very uncertain. He said likewise that we could not go up the Scheldt with less than eighty gun-boats, to enable us to cope with the numerous French flotilla in that river. You might pass over from Deal to Santvliet in four days, but you are reminded by sir Richard, that you must stop in the Scheldt and wait to arm your gun-boats. He armed but six and twenty of them in one day. His Majesty's ministers, in their calculations, had reckoned on no such impediments; there was to be the easiest and quickest of passages over, and on the land there were to be found the most excellent roads. They calculated the progress of the Expedition by a sort of time-keeper without friction; but a little friction occurred on entering into the Scheldt, which they never dreamed of: a ship laden with guns to arm the gun-boats was behind hand, and impeded their proceedings.

He now came to the intelligence submitted to the secret Committee; a person it appeared whom ministers represented as one well acquainted with the navigation of the Scheldt, and worthy of the firmest reliance being placed on his statements, described the Slough Passage as difficult for even small single vessels, and declared it to be necessary to have a pilot in every line-of-battleship and frigate in order to effect that passage with safety. How were our fleet provided in this respect? They had only one pilot; and sir R. Strachan declared that he could not get one bold enough to venture to carry his ship safe up this dangerous and difficult navigation. It was true the river might be buoyed, but this would occupy a week, and preclude all possibility of a rapid advance.—It also appeared, from the testimony of this person, that it was only possible to proceed to Bathz with the wind in two points of the compass, between the South and West, and perhaps with a scant wind in two other points. But ministers did not care for these difficulties; they proceeded, as if they could have relays of favourable winds at every corner of this winding river. The time necessary to take possession of South Beveland, and to reduce Bathz, they left entirely out of their consideration. Sir John Hope had declared, that it might hare held out several days, if defended, and in this opinion he was confirmed by lord Rosslyn. The speedy surrender of both these places therefore was very unexpected, and could never have been anticipated in any preliminary view taken by ministers, if they did ever take any preliminary general view of the matter. Bathz in particular was capable of a resistance sufficiently long to have disconcerted their whole plan of operations. Lillo and Liefkenshoeik were also by many deemed indispensable and capable of similar resistance. To man the flotilla in the river—to take possession of Beveland—to reduce Bathz—and to have wind and weather for all occasions, presented to our ministers neither difficulty nor subject for deliberation. General Brownrigg, who seemed somewhat to participate in the sanguine expectations of lord Castlereagh, in his evidence, stated, that, if the army could have landed on the 1st, 2nd, or 3rd, of August, they might have been successful. Being further examined, he said, that, taking possession of Cadsand would be but the work of an hour. But he, like ministers, forgot that the north-western wind, an unruly spirit, must blow before they could undertake or attempt to accomplish their object. Gen. Brownrigg imputed the failure of the whole to the unfortunate necessity which obliged the armament to take shelter and assemble in the Roompot. Lord Castlereagh, when examined, would not fix dates so nearly as general Brownrigg; but he was of opinion, that, under favourable circumstances, the armament might have arrived early, and been succesful. On being questioned as to the force and dispositions of the enemy, his answer was, that he could not presume to judge what might be the movements of the enemy. As a member of that House the noble lord might have declined answering this question, when pressed on him, but since he had answered it, he stood condemned out of his own mouth.—What! was he not to calculate on the resistance likely to be offered to his Expedition—to ascertain as far as possible, the movements likely, or in the power of the enemy to be made? Was he to send troops, not alone to learn whether they could proceed, but whether they could ever return? This was a point he ought most decidedly to have ascertained, as the fate of the army, of the Expedition, and eventually of the kingdom, whose last and greatest hopes were thus embarked upon the issue, depended upon it.

The noble lord (Porchester) came next to the examination and evidence of a noble earl (Chatham) who was the commander in chief of this Expedition. The noble earl was certainly very prudent and cautious in respect to giving any opinion; he had no wish to engage in that sort of campaign: but what had come from him was certainly, in its effect, very like a sarcasm upon his colleagues in the ministry. Some facts, indeed, and those of importance, the noble earl had stated to the House; one of which was, that you could not proceed up the Scheldt, unless you had the advantage of a westerly wind: and he had also added, that with that desired westerly wind you were under the necessity of meeting with a high surf, that rendered your landing extremely difficult. Being asked further respecting the difficulties of going up the river Scheldt, he had told them, that he had always understood that the entering and advancing with an armament up a winding river, where navigation was not perfectly known to those who wished to go up, was an undertaking of very great difficulty and of danger. His lordship, however, had further stated and seemed astonished at any question being put to him on the subject, that in his opinion it was not possible to have landed the army with its artillery, its stores, &c. at Santvliet on the sixth; but general Macleod and general Fyers thought of being being before Antwerp on the 10th, and presumed the landing at Santvliet on the 4th. The House then would see how these great characters agreed as to the efficiency of the means, and the practicability of the object.

He had thus endeavoured to shew, that four days were not sufficient for the purpose intended, and in this his opinion he was corroborated by that of the earl of Chatham, the commander in chief; but ministers had evidently calculated, without considering any of the three or four preliminary circumstances (which he had already noticed) and an intricate, dangerous, and difficult navigation. The same sort of rashness and precipitation which was evident in the plan of ministers, was also a distinguished feature in the mode of carrying it into execution. They had formed a great plan for attacking Antwerp, for the capture and destruction of the French ships, the arsenals, depots, &c. and various other important objects; and yet it was not until after orders were given to prepare the troops, for this service, that they had begun to arrange a plan of operations for making good their entrance into the Scheldt. They never contemplated the obstacles in their way, nor the sufficiency of the means of attaining their object. He could compare the undertaking to nothing but the instance of the architect, who was said to have built his chamber-floor, before he recollected the necessity of planning a stair-case. If the instructions were scrutinised, they would be found inconsistent with the state of the place, and those of one officer at variance with those of another. The instructions given to the marquis of Huntley were in the teeth of what was afterwards performed by the division placed under the command of that noble officer.

In the secret Committee however the House had been told that our men of war might pass Flushing; but that transports could not go by in the face of the enemy's fire from that place. The naval establishment at Antwerp, ministers said, had been growing for years; the late unfortunate attempt had long been with them a favourite object, and yet they had not attended to the preliminary and indispensable consideration, whether the defences of the river Scheldt could be passed, or whether they could easily be forced! (Hear!) The occupation of Cadsand was considered to be essential, and so it was; and it gave him some kind of pleasure to mention it; because it brought to mind the meritorious conduct of part of the naval service in the affair there. He meant the gallant conduct of captain Hanchett, of the Raven sloop of war, who bravely engaged the enemies batteries at Flushing and Cadsand for four hours in protecting a division of gun boats, and how did he represent the matter? The shells of Flushing, said the truly gallant captain, came aboard him, while the round shot from Cadsand went through him! (Hear!) Sir R. Strachan told them farther, that in this daring and perilous service the ship was crippled and grounded! Thus then an Expedition had been sent by ministers to force that passage without considering the means of effecting it! Then we came at last to Santvliet, another step in this romance of a campaign; for a romance it was, and, like a very celebrated production of that nature, contained, among other curious particulars, something about an attack on a wind-mill. (Hear!)

Sir Home Popham had stated, truly enough, that fort Lillo was a desirable object in making way to Antwerp; and that officer seemed to think that the introduction of a few rockets and shells would have influence enough with the people of that city to induce them to press for the surrender of the place: but it had not been shewn how (commanded as they were by a garrison and a citadel, and even by those very ships, which, by taking out their guns, could be carried above the city towards Dendermonde) the rockets were to persuade them to press the military for this surrender! Sir Home Popham, it appeared, would first mask Lillo; then perhaps, he would mask Antwerp, and go after the ships and attack them, if they were moved up the river. The opinion of gen. Sontag was also pretty sanguine. The general had been, he understood, in foreign as well as in the British service, and was said to have seen military operations upon a large scale; but his lordship did not know that his opinion in this case was much better for that circumstance. He had been at Antwerp in the times of Pichegru: but they were in this instance only considering the case of an Expedition of 17,000 men against Antwerp. The French empire could not have been so low in respect to military resources in this quarter, as to be unable to collect a considerable force speedily from Holland, from Flanders, from Westphalia, or from the vicinity of the capital itself, in a quarter, too, where it was acknowledged there were so many channels of communication. It was reported that there were very few troops left in Antwerp, but was that a sufficient reason for undertaking such an Expedition? Why, there might possibly not be more than one regiment in Portsmouth; but would Buonaparté send such an Expedition, if he could, to attack Portsmouth upon such information? Could we not, even though, perhaps, we have not above 10,000 regular effective troops in the country, collect our militia and other means of resistance in sufficient time and force to defeat his enterprize? Of our great army not more than 17,000 could ever get to Antwerp; and yet they had been told, that 40,000 men would be requisite to besiege it.

General Don undoubtedly had said, that great alarm was excited in Antwerp by the terror of the British fleet. As for the people the civil inhabitants of Antwerp, they were not so formidable from their numbers. The population, which had long been falling off, could not have received any great recent increase, unless we considered the number of military or naval persons stationed there, who were not ever included in the usual estimate of resident population. Every body knew that Antwerp was for a long time past the monument of departed greatness. But a gallant general (Sontag) being asked how he could have reduced Antwerp, answered, by vigorous attacks on all the weak points: then came something about the windmill. But had we an army of such an amount to carry, on the battering in breach? Was all this to be attempted on the faith, of recollection, not quite accurate, of gen. Sontag? It was said, by bringing up a great number of guns. Very proper certainly! Then, how take Lillo? Why with cannons and mortars! and could not the enemy make use of dykes, and inundate a considerable part of the land in their defence? Oh! that was a circumstance never contemplated nor inquired into. But then, by what vigour, under, all these circumstances, we were to get up to the ships and destroy them, if they were moved higher up the river, was a poser that had not been distinctly answered by any of the persons examined.

General Brownrigg was the only officer Who considered the mode of attack likely to succeed.

In all his calculations, gen. Brownrigg proceeded upon the supposition that 30 pieces of ordnance were to be employed, In one instance, however,, that, officer had stated, that of, these 15 should be heavy artillery and 15 mortars. But this division seemed only to have been adopted for the purpose of introducing, a high sounding expression in the sentence immediately following, namely, that it would be necessary for the reduction, of Antwerp, to assail it by "a vigorous bombardment and blockade." In the same examination, gen. Brownrigg, arguing hypothetically as to the arrival of the different divisions of the army, with their ordnance and stores at the intended points, gave it as his opinion, that Antwerp might have been taken by assault, if the army, &c. had been up on the 6th; and so far he sanctioned the confident expectations of the noble lord as to the mode of conducting the operations of the campaign, and participated in the sanguine views entertained by him respecting the effects of the bombardment, and the early arrival of the troops. It would be recollected, what impression this opinion, when stated, had made on the House, as to the, practicability of the object of the Expedition; but then, afterwards, that officer had stated in answer to another question, that it had never been his opinion, that Antwerp could have been certainly reduced by a bombardment; and as to the ships, he admitted that he thought it would be difficult to destroy them at all, as they could be taken up the river, above the citadel of Antwerp. In another part of his evidence too, he had stated, that by a bombardment some of the materials for shipbuilding might be destroyed; but that it was not possible to destroy the docks or the arsenal by such an operation. In this evidence, therefore, they had the opinion of gen. Brownrigg positively stated that the great objects of the Expedition were impracticable, so far as respected the destruction of the ships and the demolition of the arsenal.

The next part of the evidence which it was necessary for him to notice; was, that of, General Macleod, who seemed to think that if the whole army had been, as it was projected, up by the 4th, the objects of the Expedition might have been, attained; but it had been stated by the commander in chief of the Expedition, that it was impossible for the army to have arrived at Santvliet before the 6th. When asked as to the practicability of taking Antwerp by a bombardment, General Macleod stated, that on that point he could not be certain; but as to the destruction of the ships, he had given it as his, opinion, that by the terror and effects of a bombardment the inhabitants of the town and the garrison might be so overawed, as to induce them to surrender the ships; though he admitted that object to be hopeless, when the ships had been taken up above the town. As to the idea of over awing the inhabitants and the garrison, could it be for a moment supposed, that, in the present state of military strictness and discipline in the French territory, any such event could take place? or that the inhabitants and the military of Antwerp Would, in order, to escape the danger of our bombardment, expose themselves to the dreadful vengeance of their master? Besides, all General Macleod's calculations were founded on the supposition of good roads, of which, however, he knew nothing, and of which none had been found; as it was since known, that out of twenty-five miles of road, five miles were over a causeway, and the rest a deep sand. When asked what his opinion would be of the success of the Expedition, if the roads had been as good as he supposed, and the other circumstances favourable, under the actual state of preparation of the enemy. General Macleod answered, that he had put the enemy entirely out of the question. The House could not but perceive, that to leave the enemy out of the question in calculating respecting the operations of war, was a very accommodating principle. It also appeared, from General Macleod's evidence, that considering the length of the town, and the distance at which alone batteries could be constructed, there could be little chance of destroying the arsenal or docks, when the shells should be thrown a distance of above one mile and a half at objects not distinctly discernible: that the place was not to be taken by a coup-de-main, assailable only by a bombardment, and then not to be expected to surrender till a lodgment should be made on the glacis.

Having thus disposed of the different plans of attack as shewn in the evidence, he had next to observe upon the plan of Lord Castlereagh, which, according to that noble lord's own statement, was not to consist of long protracted operations, and yet was to have a powerful effect upon the affairs of the Continent; which was not to be directed to remote objects or a distant scene, and yet was amazingly to derange all the projects of Buonaparte; which was to take effect by a coup-de-main as a diversion in favour of Austria and yet the troops were to be brought away in the moment of success. The noble lord, relying on the information he had received, expected that Antwerp could have been taken by assault; a circumstance actually impossible, according to the evidence of sir Wm. Erskine. The information received and acted upon by the noble lord had been produced before the secret Committee, and by them reported to the House. Though it appeared by that information, that the ditch of Antwerp was in some parts dry, owing to the falling in of the revetement, yet in other parts there was water, and sir W. Erskine had given it as his opinion that the breaches in the revetement might, in twenty-four hours, be repaired by the masons of the town, and the water in the ditch might in one tide be raised from three to five feet deep, which that officer would consider a wet ditch. When they considered also that there existed but one or two passes in the works made use of particularly by smugglers, practicable for the purposes of assault, and that these passes could so easily be secured, the House would be sensible that there never had been a chance of success by assault. But the noble lord stated, that in the event of the assault proving unsuccessful, the object was to be attained by a bombardment. And here the noble lord, with his accustomed versatility, was determined to have two strings to his bow; he was to have a bombardment, and a battering in breach; and whilst sending the whole disposable force of the country on a hopeless Expedition, employed himself in devising the means of executing his vigorous projects in every alternative. With this impression, the noble lord must in every case have his train of thirty pieces of artillery: and with them proposed to effect his coup-de-main; but when asked what his idea of a coup-de-main was, it appeared that it was to include an investment, a battering train, and a bombardment. It had been asked by the noble lord, whether the fortress of Schweidnitz had not been taken by a coup-de-main; but he might as well have asked, whether Troy had not been taken in that manner, as apply the term coup-de-main to such a military operation as he had had in view.

Next in the order of succession he had to notice lord Chatham's projects. That noble lord, however, as appeared had no fixed plan at all. He had been, to be sure, at Bathz; but though he had remained a month in the country, he had never formed any plan whatever. He had himself stated, that he had not formed any plan in detail; that the mode of attack upon Antwerp was to depend upon circumstances; and that he had not thought of any plan for that purpose, because the army had not landed on the continent. Strange it appeared to him that a general should defer devising any plan until he approached the end of his operations. But the ulterior objects had been given up, because the commander apprehended that before he could proceed to accomplish them, he should have to undertake perhaps two or three preliminary sieges. The Expedition, he contended, ought never to have been sent out, unless his Majesty's ministers had been well informed of the actual state of Antwerp, as well as the number of sieges that must necessarily have been undertaken, before operations could be commenced against that city. One might have thought that a general, sent out at the head of such an Expedition as that in which the whole disposable force of the nation was employed, should have formed some idea of the operations he was to conduct, and the sieges he had to undertake. It never had entered into the heads of any set of men but his Majesty's ministers to send out an Expedition in such a way. The whole army, he apprehended, was sacrificed, by its having been sent out without knowing that the Expedition could not succeed but after several sieges, when the only chance of success rested upon the possibility of accomplishing its object without such previous sieges or rather without any siege at all.

The ground stated by lord Chatham for relinquishing the ulterior objects, was the information he received that Antwerp was not in the state he supposed on his departure with the Expedition, its works having been repaired about the period of the sailing of the Expedition. The House had seen, by the evidence of lord Chatham, what respect he paid to the information upon which his colleagues had acted, when he stated, that, on his arrival at his destination he saw no reason to believe or disbelieve the information upon which his colleagues had decided to put to hazard the whole of the disposable force of the country. Lord Chatham had said also and it was essential to bear that statement in recollection, that if even the whole of the information were true, much of the probability of success against Antwerp would have depended on the circumstance of its being attacked without the intervention of preliminary sieges, as the army was not in a state to undertake sieges, and a coup de main was not practicable. The same was the opinion of general Hope, respecting the coup de main. Sir William Erskine, whose professional knowledge, displayed in his examination at the bar, intitled him to the admiration of that House—an admiration that must be enhanced by the consideration of the early age at which he acquired that knowledge, and the accurate recollection he preserved of the result of his practical observations after the lapse of a long period of time, had stated that, having been at Antwerp in 1794, he knew it to be secure against a coup-de-main, and that in one week it might be put in a situation to stand a siege.

It had been much insisted upon in the oral testimony at the bar, that as there were no guns on the ramparts, Antwerp was incapable of defence. But did gentlemen not bear in mind that Antwerp had now been made a great naval depot; that it contained a vast naval arsenal, and could, consequently, not be deficient in the ordnance necessary for its defence? Sir William Erskine, too, had said that it was not unusual to preserve the artillery, provided for the defence of fortified towns, by removing them till wanted to a place of shelter, from a state of exposure to the injuries of the weather. This led him to notice how little his Majesty's ministers seemed to have attended to the use which might have been made of the seamen and marines of the French fleet, for the defence of Antwerp; how little they seemed to be aware that this description of persons were the best calculated to serve on a breach! if they doubted of the fact, let them ask sir Sydney Smith—let them ask Buonaparté how small a party of seamen and marines from a single ship, at the memorable defence of Acre, arrested the victorious career of the French army, and obliged it to retire in disgrace from before that town.

But in order at once to shew the absurdity of any expectation of success from a coup de main, it was only necessary to state, that they had it in evidence, that by means of a line of telegraphs, information could be conveyed to Antwerp of the approach of our Expedition before their anchors could be dropped in the Roompot. Sir William Erskine, too, mentioned his doubts to sir Richard Strachan before the Expedition sailed; which were by him communicated to lord Castlereagh, and it had since appeared that all the predictions of sir William Erskine had been verified. Sir Eyre Coote likewise considered the attempt at a coup de main difficult and hazardous: the marquis of Huntley did not think it practicable; and general Calvert was of the same opinion with sir Eyre Coote.

The noble lord then proceeded to make some observations on the defective arrangements which had been made for the attack upon Cadsand, and the utter impossibility that lord Gardner could conform to his instructions by going into the Wieling passage without pilots. It had been said, that the French force appeared at Cadsand by a fortuitous circumstance. But that was a species of accident that generally happened to the French armies. They had always a force sufficiently strong, and at the proper time, in every place where it was wanted. These, however, were fortuitous circumstances which seldom occurred in our Expeditions. But in reverting to the information upon which his Majesty's ministers had acted, it appeared to him that there were peculiarities in it, which ought to hare led them not to depend upon it. The person employed to procure this information, had stated the number of troops that could be collected at Antwerp in five days or one week, but the result of such information went only to shew, that the towns were not garrisoned, not that a considerable force might not in a larger period of time be assembled. In proof of this they had the report of the French general to his government, stating, that so early as the 3d of Aug. he bad collected a considerable force at a point, where it might be seasonably directed to any quarter attacked. By perusing that report of the French minister, it would be seen that they contemplated the attack on Walcheren, and provision was made to defend Cadsand, without leaving Boulogne destitute. The enemy contemplated every attack which could have been made, and they anticipated our taking of Walcheren; but it was evident they never dreamt of any attack upon Antwerp.

He had thus shewn, upon all the data which formed the foundation of all the calculations, respecting the Expedition against Antwerp, that it was morally, if not absolutely, impossible that it should succeed. It then rested with him to shew, that if it was not really impossible for the Expedition to succeed, the nature and character of the arrangements made by his Majesty's ministers for conducting it rendered success actually impossible. Upon this point the evidence would bear him out, by shewing that neither a soldier nor a sailor could have gone up to Santvliet within four days after the arrival of the Expedition.

The noble lord then took a review of the various particulars in the instructions to the different divisions to prove this point, by shewing, that the division of gen. Coote was ordered to Walcheren; that of sir John Hope to the East Scheldt, to wait till a solid footing should be made in Walcheren by the reduction of Veere, Armeyden, and Haak, and then to take up a defensive position in South Beveland; that the division of the marquis of Huntley was ordered against Cadsand, and then to cut off the retreat of the French from Flushing, by effecting a landing between Zoutland and Flushing; and that the divisions of lord Rosslyn and gen. Grosvenor were ordered to remain in the rear for twenty hours, and not to proceed to the ulterior objects till the investment of Flushing should be completed. The artillery too had been divided into two parts for the first and second objects; and the second part had not sailed from the the Downs till the 3d of August. From all these circumstances, and a variety of other passages in the evidence to the same effect, the noble lord inferred, that the army could not have proceeded to the ulterior objects according to the arrangements of his Majesty's ministers until after that period, when even the most sanguine looked upon success as impossible. These arrangements were, first that the ulterior objects were not to be prosecuted till the investment of Flushing was completed; 2dly, That sir J. Hope was ordered to take a defensive position in South Beveland; 3dly, that the war ships should not be involved in the narrow and intricate navigation of the Scheldt; and 4thly, that the artillery and ordnance had been divided into two parts, and the second had not sailed from the Downs till the 3d of August. As to the preparation for carrying this plan into execution, he should not think it necessary to refer to the evidence, but leave it to the House to decide, whether, on the suppositions, the romancing suppositions on which it had been formed, it was possible that the Expedition could have ever reached Antwerp. But if the noble lord had ever entertained that expectation, the passage he had quoted from the evidence must shew him that there was no ground whatever to calculate upon such an operation. Upon the subject of the conduct of the naval and military part of the Expedition, he was of opinion that no blame rested with either. But if any blame was to apply, that House had no right to interfere, unless it should be necessary to apply, by address, that the matter should be referred to the proper tribunal. He had a full persuasion, that the House would agree in the resolution, that no blame was imputable to the naval or military commanders.

He had, until then, considered the Expedition in a military point of view. It had been said that it had the elements to encounter, but it had a much more dangerous enemy to contend with in the disease brought on by its having been sent to that pestilential climate at that pestilential season. That disease was well known to professional men; it must have been known to his Majesty's ministers also. Lord Mulgrave, in the year 1794, commanded in Walcheren, when the brave troops he commanded suffered under the same disease, and that noble lord knew that on their return they fell equally victims to the destructive influence of the disease. Ministers had, however, not consulted one medical man either as to the mode of cure, or what would be better, as to the best course for the prevention of this dreadful malady. It might be said, however, in their justification, that secrecy was necessary in the first instance; but what excuse could they plead for not having taken such advice on the repeated applications for medical aid, medicines, and warm clothing for the suffering sick in the pestilential marshes of Walcheren. The noble lord then read extracts from the various pressing letters received on this subject from sir Eyre Coote, inclosing the urgent applications of Mr. Webbe for assistance to be sent out in a fast sailing vessel, from the second of September, downwards, till at length, when half of the army had perished, two medical men were sent out to investigate the nature of a malady which had been long a matter of notoriety in this country. He came in the next place to consider the last, though not the least important part of the question. He wished to ask his Majesty's ministers, for in the evidence was contained no information, with what hope, with what prospect, with what possible chance of public advantage, they kept our brave troops in that pernicious climate, perishing ingloriously by the destructive ravages of its peculiar malady? He wished to ask how they could have reconciled such conduct to any notions of public duty, or national interest, after the information received from sir Eyre Coote, that there were eight thousand sick in the island in the month of September? How could the delay in sending out relief have happened, when sir Eyre Coote wrote so pressingly for blankets, warm clothing, and medicines; communicating at the same time that the sick were lying in hospitals without roofs, and almost without medicines, and would actually have perished for want of these necessaries if they had not been relieved by the smugglers.

Was this a situation for an English army to be placed in? However severe the task was, he felt it his duty to expose the authors of these calamities. A country, the only free one in the annals of history, should not submit without a severe retribution to have its blood lavished, its treasure wasted, without an expectation of advantage to the mother soil. He unfortunately was not endowed with sufficient talents to be eloquent, but he wished he was possessed of those of Cicero, that he could picture, in its true light, the losses his country had sustained from a weak and imbecile ministry. His country was not to blame; he did not believe there was a stain upon it; and if there were, he would put his foot on it, and alone by his efforts endeavour to erase it: Englishmen were too free to be impure, they possessed that which made them not only the dread, but the admiration of the world. (Hear, hear!)—It was, to rescue such men and that country from the direction of persons who had shewn their incapability, that he called upon the House to give him their assistance on this important occasion.

As to the unprecedented delay in sending out medicines and medical assistance to our suffering army, he was not disposed to attribute alt the blame to government, but to the effect of that miserable subordination of departments which required that such applications should pass through three or four offices before it could arrive at the department whose duty it was to comply with them. The secretary who conducted the affairs of the war, should possess a controul over every inferior department, and issue the necessary orders directly to each. If the medical board had been efficient, he should not blame his Majesty's ministers so much; but that board was known to have been divided; and he believed the determination had been taken to get rid of it before the Expedition sailed.

When it was known that our soldiery were perishing in such a manner, why had they been left to the ravages of the malady without immediate and effectual relief? When lord Chatham relinquished the ulterior objects of the Expedition, why had not Flushing been completely destroyed, and the army withdrawn from that frightful scene of contagion and death, whilst it could yet be called an army? They could not be told that it was necessary to keep Walcheren as a military position, because it would cost more to retain it than it was worth; because our frigates could not at any time remain in the Vere Gat, Ter Vere being within range of the shot and shells of the enemy; and because the island could never be maintained unless by keeping up a large permanent naval force to secure it. Could the population of this country supply the waste that would be the consequence of retaining possession of that unhealthy position? Gen. Don, had, in the end, been obliged to apply for reinforcements, in order to enable him to bring off his hospitals, which would have been in danger of falling into the hands of the enemy, if the naval line had been forced. What could have induced the ministers to be so callous to the representations of the sufferings of the army, which all the country sympathized in with the most painful feelings? Why had they delayed till the winter the evacuation, which should have taken place as soon as the ulterior objects of the Expedition had been given up? Were his Majesty's ministers occupied in considering the means of retaining Walcheren, or of retaining their own offices? (Hear, hear!) Had the heart-rending accounts of the sickness of the troops made any impression upon their minds, they never would have exposed the army to the calamities it had endured. That intelligence would have induced any other men to use their efforts to save a sinking, a perishing army; but it was the signal to them to renew their own disunion. (Hear, hear!) It was not against the enemy that they directed their powers, they employed them only in preying upon themselves.

"Validas in viscera vertere vires."

That time which they should have devoted to the public interests, and the preservation of the army, they employed in their paltry intrigues and cabinet bickerings. The intelligence of the calamitous sickness of the troops was received on the 2d of September; on the 8th lord Castlereagh resigned; and on the I7th lord Liverpool's letter was dated, so that the whole of that period, which should have been taken up in devising measures for the restoration of the health of the army, was consumed in the most disgraceful squabbles for office. It could not be denied that the secretary for the home department thought that the secretary for the war department was inefficient; it was proved; for the country, and all Europe knew they had come to action; it was not for him to set forth who had conquered. Another engagement subsequently took place, not so bloody indeed, although perhaps the main object was greater: it was no less than a contest who should be premier; and there finesse conquered diplomatic abilities. The House and the country were already in full possession of the facts; at least of the first fracas; as the noble lord and the hon. gentleman had not only displayed their literary abilities on the occasion, but had become their own publishers.

The noble lord had but one more remaining topic to touch upon, respecting the defence set up by ministers, on the ground that they had retained Walcheren to effect a diversion in favour of Austria. He then commented upon the letter of Mr.Bathurst, and shewed from the date that it could not have had any effect in inducing the retention of Walcheren; as the Austrian minister did not even know where Walcheren was, and the letter from the court of Buda did not desire the continuance of hostilities on our part in Holland, but a diversion in the north of Germany. His Majesty's ministers could not but be sensible then, that the question respecting the diversion was not made out by the papers. General Don had stated that this Expedition would have operated as a great diversion in favour of Austria, by making it incumbent on the French to send a large force to Brabant, which would otherwise have marched to the Danube: as if any feeble efforts of ours could, at that dreadful period, have controuled the destinies of the continent. There was also another opinion in favour of its having operated as a diversion, that of colonel Mosheim. The only instance, however, of its having operated in that way, which he was able to mention, was the return of a battalion or two from Louvain. But at this very moment that ministers were speculating in diversions, France had every where as great a force as was necessary for the complete defence of her vast empire. In estimating the value of these diversions, it was the duty of the House to consider whether the advantages, likely to result from them to our allies, were sufficient to outweigh the calamities which they had inflicted on our own country.

It had been held out too that the Low Countries would have risen in our favour, but, unfortunately, the, reverse was the case; they were as cold as icicles, and it would have taken more bullion, than England possessed, to thaw them; not a soldier had it drawn from the army opposed to Austria; so far from it, it gave Buonaparté possession, or a knowledge of a force, that he was almost ignorant before he did possess: the steady attachment and unvarying zeal of the vast population over which he ruled.

In stating by way of analysis as briefly as he could the evidence on this subject, he had necessarily gone to great length, but the importance of the question he trusted would entitle him to the indulgence of the House. It was now his wish to turn his eyes away from the contemplation of the most calamitous and disgraceful Expedition in which this country had ever been involved: an Expedition which failed not through any defect of courage in the men who were employed in it, or of precaution or talents in the persons who commanded but entirely through the ignorance, rashness, and impotence of those who planned it. This fatal Expedition had terminated in national disgrace, almost in national despondency. It was the bounden duty of the House to visit such impolicy and misconduct with its utmost indignation. If hon. members only read the evidence attentively, they would see such cause of censure, that they would think the resolutions which he had to propose were not only just, but most lenient. He would rather be censured for not moving resolutions strong enough, than for proposing those of a contrary nature. He boasted with his fellow countrymen, that he had an inclination to mercy; but if he were to ask for justice, his ability would not allow him to word his resolutions strong enough: men who had suffered their countrymen to fall victims to an unwholesome clime, without a prospect of their country being benefitted; men who saw this, knew it better than he could repeat; yet, for the sake of a little pelf or power, grinned at it without remorse; men who daily told them they were the only fit persons to govern the country; they were the friends of Majesty, had the confidence of their Sovereign, and were the only fit persons to rally round him—There was not a particle of evidence delivered at the bar of that House, that did not go to prove their incapacity, and that they were the very reverse of every thing they had laboured to make the House and the country believe. (Hear! hear!)—The Gazette even proved that the Expedition was not intended as a diversion in favour of Austria; that country was sensible it was never intended as such. The world knew it was not; and there was hot a cabinet in Europe that did not laugh at those who could have been so weak and imbecile as to have projected it. Under all those considerations, he would now submit a set of Resolutions for the adoption of the House; to the greater part of these he could anticipate no possible objection, as they were founded on the minutes of evidence, in the possession of members. His lordship requested that the clerk, as he himself was almost exhausted, might be permitted to read the Resolutions; but this being against order, lord Temple kindly undertook the task. They were as follow:—

"1. That on the 28th of July last, and subsequent days, an armament, consisting of 39,000 land forces 37 sail of the line, 2 ships of 50, 3 of 44 guns, 24 frigates, 31 sloops, 5 bomb vessels, 23 gunbrigs, sailed on the late Expedition to the Scheldt, having for its object the capture or destruction of the enémy's ships, either building at Antwerp or Flushing, or afloat on the Scheldt; the destruction of the arsenals and dockyards at Antwerp, Torneux, and Flushing; the reduction of the island of Walcheren; and the rendering, if possible, the Scheldt no longer navigable for ships of war.

"2. That Flushing surrendered on the 15th of August, whereby the reduction of the island of Walcheren was completed: and that o the 27th of August, all attempts on the fleet and arsenals of the enemy at Antwerp, were, by the unanimous opinion of the lieutenant-generals, declared to be impracticable, and were abandoned.

"3. That the destruction of the basin, dock-yard, arsenal, magazines and naval store-houses of the town of Flushing, and of such part of the sea defences as it was found proper to destroy, having been effected on the 11th of December, the island of Walcheren was on the 23d of December evacueated by his Majesty's forces, and the Expedition ended.

"4. That it does not appear to this House, that the failure of this Expedition is imputable to the conduct of the army or the navy in the execution of their instructions, relative to the military and naval operations in the Scheldt.

"5. That on the I9th of August a malignant disorder shewed itself amongst his Majesty's troops; and that, on the 8th of September, the number of sick amounted to upwards of 10, 948 men.

"6. That it appears by the report of the physician appointed to investigate the nature and causes of the malady to which his Majesty's troops were thus exposed, that the disease is one which prevails periodically in the islands of Zealand, and is of peculiar malignity there, and which constantly follows a law of season, appearing towards the end of summer, becoming more severe in the autumnal months, declining in October, and nearly ceasing in November. That perfect recoveries are rare, convalescence never secure, and that the recurrence of fever quickly lays the foundation of complaints which render a large proportion of the sufferers inefficient for future military purposes.

"7. That of the army which embarked for service, in the Scheldt, 60 officers and 3,900 men, exclusive of those killed by the enemy, had died before the 1st of February last, and on that day 217 officers and 11, 269 men were reported sick.

"8. That the Expedition to the Scheldt was undertaken under circumstances which afforded no rational hope of adequate success, and at the precise season of the year when the malignant disease which has proved so fatal to his Majesty's brave troops was known to be most prevalent; and that the advisers of this ill-judged enterprize are, in the opinion of this House, deeply responsible for the heavy calamities with which its failure has been attended."

There was also a second set of Resolutions, as follows, relating to the retention of the island of Walcherem:—

"1. That lieut.-gen. Sir Eyre Coote having, on the 9th of September, been left in the command of Walcheren, with an army of about 15,000 men, did, on that day, make an official report on the state of the island, the extent of force required effectually to guard it, the nature and condition of its defences, and the number of men then sick and unfit for duty; representing that after such his exposition, his Majesty's ministers would be the best judges of the propriety or possibility of keeping the island; and adding, that the advantages must be great indeed which could compensate the loss of lives and treasure which the retention must necessarily occasion.

"2. That on the 23d of September, sir Eyre Coote stated to his Majesty's ministers, that the alarming progress of disease was such, that if it should continue in the same proportion for three weeks longer (as he added there was every probability that it would), our possession of the island must become very precarious.

"3. That on the 6th of October sir Eyre Coote, after stating that the number of sick was increasing, and that the effective force was thereby rendered so trivial, as to make the defence of the island if it should be attacked, extremely precarious, did express his anxiety to be informed of the intentions of his Majesty's government as to the future state of Walcheren.

"4. That notwithstanding these, and many other pressing representations, on the alarming condition of the troops, and the danger to which they were exposed, his Majesty's ministers did neglect to come to any decision until the 4th of November, and that the final evacuation of Walcheren did not take place until the 23d of December.

"5. That on the 10th of September, the number of sick in the island of Walcheren was, exclusive of officers, 6, 938; and that the total number of sick embarked for England, between the 15th of September and the l6th of November, was 11,199, making in that period an increase of sick of 4, 268.

"6. That although the great object of the Expedition had been abandoned as impracticable, a large proportion of the British army was (without any urgent or determined purpose in view, or any prospect of national advantage to justify such a hazard, or to compensate such a sacrifice) left by his Majesty's ministers to the imminent danger of attack from the enemy, and exposed during a period of more than three months; and under circumstances of aggravated hardships, to the fatal ravages of a disease, which on the 31st of August had been officially announced to be daily increasing to a most alarming degree.

"7. That such the conduct of his Majesty's advisers, calls for the severest censure of this House."

The first Resolution having been read from the Chair,

rose and spoke as follows:

From the share which I bore in the councils and execution of the measure, now under consideration, the House will not think it unnatural, that I should feel anxious to seize the earliest opportunity of submitting to them the grounds on which this Expedition was undertaken, and upon which I trust they will be of opinion, that it was not only justifiable, but imperiously called for by the strongest considerations of policy. I feel that I cannot discharge the task which my public duty and situation impose on me, without experiencing a large portion of the indulgence of the House. The nature of the subject itself, and the course which the noble lord has very naturally pursued in his speech, render it impossible for me to compress what I am bound to submit upon this occasion within a very narrow compass. The task that I have to perform, must be attended with additional difficulty; as the greater part of the subject is of a professional nature, to the discussion, of which I come with peculiar circumstances of personal disqualification. Solicitous to save the time of the House, I shall discharge the duty imposed upon me as briefly as circumstances will permit; and shall principally trust to the recollection of the House with respect to the general import of the evidence recorded on the Minutes, quoting those passages only, which it appears to me to be essential to consider with precision, in order to come to a conclusive judgment upon the case. I feel that I should be guilty of ingratitude to the noble lord, if I did not express to him my personal acknowledgements for the opportunity which his lordship, in the discharge of his public duty, has afforded me of laying this important transaction, in all its bearings, before the House and before the public. However the professional parts of the subject might, perhaps, have been more conveniently considered elsewhere and before another tribunal, there is no other place than this House, where it would have been possible satisfactorily to state the nature and objects of the Expedition under discussion, to separate them from the mass of calumny and misrepresentation, with which they have been enveloped, and to bring them to that point and issue in discussion upon which a rational opinion may be formed concerning them. Had the case been referred to another tribunal, the country would never have been persuaded that the accuser had elucidated those parts of the question, which might be considered as pressing with most force upon, the government. It is only to that political hostility which is interwoven in our constitution that the public can look with confidence, on occasions like the presents for the full and rigid examination of such a question. I trust the House will do me the justice to admit, that I have not personally shrunk from enquiry, or been backward in bringing forward every description of information, which could throw light upon the matter in issue; and without imputing to the noble lord, or to those who have acted with him, any spirit as actuating their proceedings of which I am entitled or disposed to complain, I think I may venture to assume that the character of the accuser has not been so entirely merged in that of the judge, as to justify apprehension in the minds of the public, that the arguments on the whole matter have not been pressed with every degree of hostility necessary for the investigation of truth. It must also be satisfactory to them to find that whatever difference may have prevailed with respect to the propriety of excluding strangers from the House, daring the progress of the enquiry, scarcely a sentence has been uttered which does not appear on the printed minutes of the evidence. I believe on no former occasion has an enquiry been conducted in a manner more creditable to those engaged in it, or better calculated to bring the whole subject into view.—Not a single question has been stopped, and on very few has any discussion taken place—I trust therefore I may assume, that the whole has been brought to a fair issue, and if in opening to the House on this day the considerations which have influenced my own conduct, I express myself in a tone of confidence, of which I cannot divest my mind, in retracing the course which I have pursued, I hope the House will not attribute it, to any feeling of unbecoming presumption, or above all to any unwillingness to submit myself with all deference to their judgment.

Having stated thus much as to the situation in which the discussion now stands, and to the manner in which it has been brought before the House, I cannot refrain from observing on the singularity of the issue, on which parliament is called upon practically to decide. I assure the noble lord, that I have no disposition to decline any species of discussion, that can be raised upon the subject, when I express my belief of its being altogether a novel proceeding to call upon the House of Commons to decide not upon the merits of a military operation, which has been actually tried and has failed, but to pronounce a speculative opinion whether if the force allotted for the main object of the Expedition, viz. the attack on Antwerp, had reached its destination, during the period within which its arrival was reasonably to be expected, it would or would not have been successful; the government is called upon to answer not for an Expepedition the principal object of which has been defeated upon trial, but for one which in its ultimate object has never been tried at all. An hon. member (Mr. Whitbread) said upon a former occasion, in describing the impotence of the attack and the power of the enemy to repel it, that the lion of France had swept off the fly with a lash of his tail, but he ought to recollect, that it was not the strength of the enemy, that swept us off; it was the force of the elements, that first thrust us aside from our object, and the overwhelming power of disease, that at a later period of the operations, stood between us and their accomplishment. The chief object of the Expedition was the reduction of Antwerp and the capture of the enemy's fleet and arsenals, and the practicability of our success mainly depended on the speedy arrival of our Expedition at Sand-fleet.

Our arrival there early or late in August constituted two distinct cases, which must never be confounded in argument or decision. As matters turned out the operations against Antwerp, &c. never were fairly brought to the test. In stating this I wish not to evade the discussion of the question even on speculative or probable grounds, I am willing to meet those who condemn the operation, on any principles of argument they may chuse to adopt. I have courted the investigation of this question not less from a sense of duty, than from a deliberate and thorough conviction, that the merits of the Expedition stand on a rock not to be shaken. I have even gone out of my way to point the attention of the House to views of the subject, which might be considered as pressing with peculiar weight upon myself, being fully satisfied that the grounds upon which my colleagues and myself have acted were wise in themselves, and wishing to owe no part of my justification to reserve or concealment.

Before I state the grounds on which the measure was originally taken up and prosecuted by his Majesty's government, it is necessary for me to advert to the professional opinions called for upon this subject and which are now before the House, and to examine whether those opinions, under the circumstances in which they were required and given, were such as ought to have induced ministers to abandon the object, which they had in view; these opinions consisted of five military opinions, given by the Commander in Chief and the principal officers of his staff. When my sentiments with respect to the effect of those opinions, were called for by a question in the Committee, I was not desirous of ultimately evading the examination of those opinions, but of reserving for more ample discussion, than could be comprised in an answer to a question put to me as a witness, a consideration that must obviously be matter of reasoning rather than of evidence. And here I must freely acknowledge, that had it not been for special circumstances, which I shall presently explain, it is probable that I should not have been enabled to bring before the House any written military opinions at all. I make this confession with less hesitation, because I never can admit the principle of its being obligatory on government to undertake no expedition against the enemy, without being possessed previously of written opinions from military authorities.—On former occasions of this nature, I am free to confess, that I should not have been enabled to produce any such sanction for the measures I pursued.—In the instances of the operations against the Cape of Good Hope, against Copenhagen, against Martinique, against Guadaloupe, and those for expelling the enemy from Portugal, I thought it my duty to bring those operations under the consideration of government, and to issue the orders for their execution, undoubtedly not without much communication and conference with military authorities, but certainly without taking or thinking it necessary to call for any formal opinion in writing. And why? because I considered the opinion of military men, given freely in discussion, to be infinitely more advantageous than any more regular or formal opinion, which they would feel themselves authorised to give upon any specific and precise case that I could state for their consideration, the technical distinction which officers take between military opinions given formally in writ- ing, and those which may be collected from them in conversation and discussion, will be best understood by reference to lord Chatham's evidence; lord Chatham says that his opinion was never given formally as an officer, on the Expedition to the Scheldt, and why? Is it to be supposed that lord Chatham was never consulted upon the Expedition; or will it be imagined that lord Chatham did not approve of the Expedition? No, it was because his Majesty's government bad the advantage of lord Chatham's opinion in a better and more satisfactory mode. If it were the object of a government to protect themselves against responsibility, then assuredly they would not move a step without formal written opinions, but if without desiring to avoid the responsibility which belongs to their situations, and from which it is their first duty not to shrink, they wished only to obtain military information, there is no mode less likely to afford it, than that of calling for written opinions, nor any method better calculated to produce it, than those conversations in which military men, divested of responsibility, will freely detail all the grounds on which their sentiments and views are founded. The distinction here taken must be obvious: when a military case is put upon paper it must be stript of all probabilities and contingencies, and stated in as strict a manner as a legal case would be stated to a lawyer. Can it be supposed that the various circumstances upon which the policy, or impolicy of a military operation hinges, can be ascertained with such accuracy previous to a decision on its expediency as to admit of their being accurately detailed and enumerated as premises from which a conclusion is to be drawn; either the case must be stated only upon such facts as are known upon clear and positive information, and the answer to it must consequently exclude all probabilities and contingencies; or what is merely probable and contingent must be assumed as certain, in which case the opinion would be given upon erroneous data, and would probably be falsified by the event.—It has therefore been my official practice, so far from endeavouring to shift responsibility upon points of this nature from my own shoulders, to relieve officers as far as possible from any participation in it; the responsibility of the execution belongs to them, but for the propriety of embarking in the undertaking his Majesty's government ought to remain alone responsible.—It is not on this account less the duty of ministers to resort to the advice of professional men, and to avail themselves of their experience and information, but certainly this duty cannot be executed in the best practical manner by calling on persons of that description to answer dry and imperfect cases stated in writing.—It is the same in other professions, for instance in that of the law, the title of an estate may be open to objections, and yet those objections may be of such a nature as not materially to detract from the value of the property; if the case on such a title were referred to counsel, his answer on strict legal grounds must necessarily be that the title is not a good one; nevertheless speaking practically he might not hesitate to represent the purchase as eligible, or even to become himself the purchaser of the estate, against his own professional opinion.—In the present case, where suppositions are put to general Calvert, of the works at Antwerp being imperfect, or the garrison inadequate, and he is asked how far his judgment of the probability of success was influenced by those circumstances, his observation immediately is, "those are considerations for the government to judge of, with which as a military man I can have nothing to do, my military opinion can only be founded upon the supposition that the place is in a proper state of defence, adequately garrisoned, and that the governor and garrison will do their duty. Having stated to the House, the reasons why I should not have felt it necessary on any general principles of ministerial practice to call for written opinions from the military officers who were consulted, I must now state the special grounds, upon which I was induced to do so in the present instance. The attention of the government had been directed for a considerable time to the growing naval power of the enemy in the Scheldt; in considering the lines of operation by which it might be assailed, two only suggested themselves for decision, viz. either a movement across Flanders to Antwerp, after landing at Ostend, or a conjoint Expedition by the Scheldt with a view of landing a considerable force higher up the river as near to Antwerp as possible. In the many conversations which took place on this subject previous to a decision, it seemed indisputable that consi- derable difficulties must attend either of these operations, but it appeared that the impediments to that by which the army must cross Flanders from Ostend, were the more serious, if not absolutely insurmountable; to bring the question distinctly to a point, I thought it material to obtain the professional opinion of the commander in chief upon this part of the subject, in order that (if adverse) the admiralty might proceed on their part to form a decisive opinion how far the conjoint operation by the Scheldt, which depended on the power of the navy to land the army at Santfleet, was, or was not practicable.—The answer of the commander in chief, which may be considered as conclusive against the operation by Ostend, was received by me on the 3d of June, and was immediately communicated to the admiralty for their consideration, this produced their memoranda of the 9th and 19th of June, in which the naval lords declare their professional opinion and undertake to carry the armament up the West Scheldt, to land the army at Santfleet and to bring it off again, provided one bank of the river should be in our possession.—It may be necessary here to observe, that my letter of the 29th May only called for the opinion of the commander in chief, and that it was at his instance, and not at mine, that the opinions of the officers of his staff were obtained.—How far these opinions were intended to be official and to be of a produceable nature it is not for me to say, but I certainly am extremely happy, that they have been brought into view, as they have served to put the question upon its true issue at the outset, and have shewn that this was not an operation which his Majesty's ministers thought themselves entitled to undertake in contemplation of certain and complete success, but an attempt which they considered themselves bound in duty to prosecute upon a balance of its advantages and risks.—The officers who gave their opinions appear by the evidence to have delivered them under the impression that an Expedition to the Scheldt had (in principle at least) been previously decided upon; a mistake into which they may very naturally have fallen from observing the preparations for service that were in progress, and from the earnestness with which the investigation of the subject was pursued, but I can assure the House that the Expedition was not finally determined upon by the King's government till the 21st of June.—It is true that on the 14th of June his Majesty's authority was received for holding the force in readiness for immediate embarkation, orders for which were signified in my letter to the commander in chief of the 18th of that month, but it was not until the decision of the admiralty of the 19th of June upon the landing at Santfleet was received that the final determination of ministers was taken and submitted to the King.—In referring to these opinions, that of the Commander in Chief naturally first attracts attention, not only as coming from a person in high official situation, but as carrying with it great authority from the military reputation and character of the individual by whom it was given. It is natural for those who argue against the expediency of this operation to contend that ministers ought to have been discouraged by the opinion in question, but admitting all the weight to which the sentiments of the commander in chief are entitled, I am prepared to maintain that this is not the conclusion fairly to be drawn from his opinion.—After examining the objections to the operation by Ostend, he proceeds as follows. "It therefore appears that the advance through Flanders is attended with Very great difficulties, and that at any rate a return by the Scheldt is most expedient and eligible, it would follow also that the attack should be directed from that side, and be a combined naval and land operation, the detail of which must be well considered and arranged by both services."—I must stop here to observe that it is not possible to conceive if the operation, alluded to, had been considered by the Commander in Chief as either impracticable in itself or inconsistent with the principles of military prudence, that he would have been disposed to point it out as requiring consideration and arrangement, it would have been more natural for him to have applied to it that language of disapprobation and of protest, which characterizes the former part of his opinion relative to the march from Ostend, and I certainly feel myself entitled to state, without throwing upon the Commander in Chief the smallest responsibility, with respect to the policy of the late Expedition; that in none of the Various communications held with him by me on this subject, did I understand him professionally to remonstrate against it, as an operation, in which the force of the country would be improperly exposed. With respect to the particular hazard which the armament might incur, the Commander in Chief proceeds to observe, "In whatever way Antwerp is to be approached or taken, the service is one of very great risk, and in which the safe return of the army so employed may be very precarious from the opposition made and the length of time consumed In the operation, which enables the enemy to assemble in a short time a great force from every part of the Netherlands and Holland, and even from Westphalia by the course of the Rhine as well as from the frontiers of France."—Here the risk In the contemplation of the Commander in Chief is obviously depending altogether upon the means which the enemy might possess of assembling a force upon Antwerp during the progress of the service. What these means were, did not constitute a question to be decided by professional judgment, but could only be collected from the information received concerning the number and description of troops which the enemy then had in the countries adjacent to the Scheldt; it was for government and not for the Commander in Chief to decide on the nature and authenticity of that information. I shall be prepared to contend hereafter that the enemy's force was not such during any period of the operation down to its close, and even subsequent to the time within which the accomplishment of all our objects might have been reasonably expected, as could have essentially endangered the safety of the army employed. I trust therefore it will appear that the only remark in the report of the Commander in Chief which can be considered as adverse to the undertaking refers entirely to a contingency, which never actually existed during the late service, and that it cannot therefore be taken as an authority against the judgment formed by the King's government upon this subject. The next opinion which has been relied upon as decisive against the undertaking, is, that of colonel Gordon. In any comment I have to offer upon that opinion, I wish to speak of it with the respect I entertain for that officer; I consider the same observation to be applicable to his opinion which I applied to that of the Commander in Chief, viz. that he would hardly have wasted his military ingenuity in contriving modes by which the government might be enabled to carry forward operations, which bad defiance to all known maxims of military prudence. After disposing of the project of operating by Ostend, Colonel Gordon proceeds to state "the second mode for consideration, is the maritime operation for acting with our land force from our ships of war on the banks of the river Scheldt. It is imagined that the disembarkation of the troops might be protected as high as Sandvliet, which is within 20 miles of Antwerp, if this could be done and a landing in some force effected at Sandvliet, it might be possible to march direct upon Antwerp, at the same time that a corps endeavoured to take possession of the forts and batteries upon the river, and that the boats of the fleet well manned, armed, and towing launches with troops proceeded with the tide direct to the city. That this would be a most desperate enterprize could not be doubted, and that in the attempt whether successful or otherwise a very large proportion of our naval and military means would be put to imminent hazard, but it appears to be an enterprize of less risk, and one which could be brought to an earlier issue and attended with less expence than that which has been considered in the first part of this paper." Now I beg leave to contend that colonel Gordon's suggestion of the enterprize being desperate is referable to his own plan of operations as suggested in this paper, and not to that which it was in the contemplation either of is Majesty's ministers or of those who were charged with the conduct of the operation, to carry into effect. I perfectly concur with colonel Gordon that the project of embarking a force in launches, and endeavouring to pass them with the tide up to Antwerp with a view of taking that city by storm on the side of the river, before the works were either carried or on the point of being carried by an army on the land side, would have been not only a desperate, but an almost impracticable undertaking, more especially in the state of the enemy's defences between the forts of Lillo and Liefken-shoeik, but it would be doing great injustice to colonel Gordon's military opinion, to suppose, that he meant to assert, independent of all consideration of relative force, that the landing a considerable corps at Sandvliet with a view to an advance by land on Antwerp must necessarily be a desperate enterprize; that such would not have been the case has been established by the evidence of every officer examined before the Committee; sir William Erskine is the only officer who contends that a landing so late even as the 25th of August would have exposed the army to risk; all concur in opinion that an advance on Antwerp early in August might have been effected with perfect facility, and without the enemy's having the power to assemble any considerable force to oppose us in the field; how long the operation might have been prosecuted and with what prospect of success it would have been attended are distinct questions, which I shall have to argue hereafter; but that this enterprize would have been in its nature most desperate is refuted by the whole current of the evidence, and is pointedly denied by the quarter master general of the army in his answer to the following question put to him on that subject. "Q. Supposing the operations of the army to have been conducted with the due precautions, do you consider that the security of the army was improvidently hazarded from the nature of the enterprize itself?—I do not." It is impossible then to understand colonel Gordon's reasoning to apply to the case upon which the House has actually to decide.—Colonel Gordon was called upon for his ideas upon the subject by the Commander in Chief, and has submitted to him a suggestion on which he reasons; his reasoning appears generally correct, as applied to the view of the question which he was induced to take; but it can by no means be considered as having any just application to that upon which the Expedition was ultimately undertaken. I shall not think it necessary to detain the House in commenting minutely upon the three other military opinions; viz. those of gen. Calvert, gen. Brownrigg, and gen. Hope; it is enough to remark, that as gen. Brownrigg and gen. Hope both contemplate a coup-de-main against Antwerp under certain favourable circumstances as possible, their opinions can scarcely be relied upon as conclusive against the practicability of such a measure; neither can gen. Calvert be considered as so stating it, who sums up his opinion in these words, "The service would be hazardous and the troops employed in it be exposed to considerable risk, but I humbly conceive the operation in this point of view does not present the same insuperable difficulties which I must be of opinion would attend an attempt to perform the same service by a debarkation at or in the vicinity of Ostead and by a movement from thence to the point of attack."—I must also observe that both gen. Brownrigg and gen. Hope in their opinions bring strongly into view the advantages to which the effort might lead, even without attaining complete success; viz. those of a diversion in favour of Austria, and the capture of Walcheren, on the importance of which I shall have to speak hereafter.—In quoting and reasoning upon the opinions of these distinguished officers, I beg it may be considered that I do not refer to them as giving such countenance to the undertaking as to bring upon them the slightest professional responsibility; they felt it to be their duty, as no doubt it was, to point the attention of government to the difficulties of such an attempt. With such opinions before them, from quarters so respectable, it became the duty of government fully to weigh the nature and magnitude of the difficulties with which they would have to combat. It rested with the King's ministers upon their own responsibility ultimately to appreciate and decide on those difficulties. Ministers did not disguise from themselves that the obstacles to success were serious in their nature, but at the same time they could not consider them as insuperable, or such as in their judgment should preclude the attempt.—It cannot be expected that at this distance of time I should furnish the House with detailed statements of all the proceedings adopted by government with a view to the investigation of the subject; but it will be recollected they had the advantage of two professional opinions within the cabinet, they had repeated communications with professional authorities in both services, they were possessed of much information respecting the state of the enemy, and I therefore contend that they were justified in forming their own decision upon the subject, and that I am entitled in defending that decision to consider the question as not disposed of upon the authority of written opinions, but as still remaining open to fair examination.—That it has not been the practice in former times for ministers to frame their decisions in all cases upon written opinions, and to consider themselves as precluded from all defence of their conduct unless they could produce opinions of that description in justification of their measures, I apprehend may be established from a reference to the history of every former administration. In support of this position, I should wish to refer the gentle- men on the other side of the House to the experience of their own administration, as likely to have most weight in their judgment. I beg it may be understood that in referring to their military operations, I do not wish to do it invidiously; whatever difference of opinion may have prevailed on those subjects at the time, and whatever may have been the merits or demerits of those measures, I am perfectly prepared to admit, that errors into which they may have fallen, can form no justification for my conduct, or that of my late colleagues, and I certainly do not wish to advert to their failures as giving me any claim to forbearance on their part on the present occasion. I feel the less disposed unnecessarily to urge any personal argument with respect to the right hon. gent. opposite (Mr. Windham,) as I know no individual in the contests of political life, who is himself a more generous opponent. He is entitled to the more consideration from the line of conduct which he has pursued on recent occasions, when although acting in opposition to the government, he did not hesitate to do justice to those transactions, which were connected with the fame and glory of the country in war, and which being praised and honoured as they deserved were calculated to excite and augment the military energies of the empire. But I should wish to ask the right hon. gent. whether the government of which he formed a part, when they determined upon the Expedition to the Dardanelles, had previously received the written opinion of the illustrious person then at the head of the army, or of other military authorities, in favour of the practicability of such an operation? Am I to understand that full information had been in that case previously collected of the precise amount and condition of the force from which opposition might be expected? of the exact state of the enemy's works? of the position of the arsenal of Constantinople? of the difficulty of passing and repassing the Dardanelles? And that upon the case so stated, ministers had received the sanction of professional judgment for sending a naval force unsupported by an army, to undertake the service in question. Will the right hon. gentlemen have the goodness to inform the House, under the sanction of what military opinion they acted, when they employed a corps of British troops, not exceeding 10,000 men, in the river Plate, for the purpose of effecting not the deliverance, but the conquest of that great portion of the continent of South America? And when with similar views they sent a corps of not half that strength to circumnavigate the globe, to reduce Chili, and to open a military communication across the Andes with the force which was to carry on its operations on the side of Buenos Ayres. Was all this undertaken upon precise information previously obtained, and were military men previously consulted upon the practicability of such an attempt? If so, I should be glad to see the written opinions upon which these operations were undertaken. I am not aware that such opinions as I have described, exist, and certainly never found any such in the records of the department which I lately filled. It is not my intention to contend, that the absence of such sanction establishes the impolicy of the operations alluded to, I only refer to that circumstance as an illustration of the practice of government upon the subject, and lay in my claim to have my conduct judged of by its own merits, and not to be condemned because I have not considered myself as fettered by a system which I am persuaded never can be strictly pursued without the most essential prejudice to the interests of the public service. I must also contend against the principle which has been maintained in argument, that government cannot be justified in undertaking any operation, the practicability of which has not been previously established on a full and minute examination at home of all the possible circumstances on which success may turn. I apprehend that this never has been, and never can be a wise principle of conduct for any great country to act upon, least of all for Great Britain, whose prospects of advantage in war so peculiarly rest upon the energy and enterprize of her operations. I am sure that such was not the rule of action by which the late lord Chatham was guided in any of the expeditions undertaken by him during the conduct of that war, which raised the military glory of this country to so high a pitch. In order to shew that lord Chatham considered the practicability of an operation to be a point, which might often most properly remain to be decided on the spot, by the judgment and observation of the officer, to whom the command was entrusted, I shall read to the House an extract from the instructions prepared by that great man, under which the Expedition to Rochfort in the year 1758 was conducted. "And whereas we are persuaded, that nothing in the present situation of affairs, can so speedily and essentially annoy and distress France as a successful enterprize against Rochfort: our will and pleasure is, that you do attempt, as far as shall be found practicable, a descent with the forces under your command on the French coast, at or near Rochfort, in order to attack if practicable, and by a vigorous impression force that place; and to burn and destroy to the utmost of your power, all docks, magazines, arsenals, and shipping, that shall be found there, and exert such other efforts, as you shall judge most proper for annoying the enemy. After the attempt at Rochfort shall either have succeeded or failed, and in case the circumstances of our forces and fleet shall, with prospect of success, still admit of further operations, you are next to consider Port L'Orient and Bourdeaux as the most important objects of our arms en the coast of France; and our will and pleasure accordingly is, that you do proceed successively to an attempt on both or either of those places, as shall be judged practicable; or on any other place, that shall be judged most adviseable, from Bourdeaux homeward to Havre, in order to carry and spread with as much rapidity as may be, a warm alarm along the maritime provinces of France."—The House will here observe that the expression "if practicable" occurs in every point of the instructions, and in order more distinctly to shew, how fatal in lord Chatham's judgment it would prove to the welfare of the service, if ministers at home were bound to foresee and to decide upon all the possible contingencies incident to operations abroad, I shall take the liberty of drawing the attention of the House, to an extract from a letter from sir J. Mordaunt, the commander in chief of that expedition, to lord Chatham previous to its departure, in the answer to which, not without some degree of rebuke to that officer, lord Chatham's opinions on this question are distinctly laid down. The extract from sir J. Mordaunt's letter is as follows.—"I must also beg leave to trouble you further on a matter which occurs to me relative to the service I am going upon; which is, that having since my arrival here conversed with sir Edward Hawke and vice admiral Knowles, who both seem of opinion, that it is possible, from the nature of the navigation to Rochfort, the fleet may be detained even in sight of the coast of France for a week or ten days, without being able to get into the Road, or off the Isle d' Aix, during which time an alarm will necessarily be given in those parts; this conjuncture and situation, if it should happen, appears to me so very delicate, and equally so to the other general officers on the expedition, who may, by accident, succeed to be first in command, and come to be under the same difficulty, (the success of our undertaking depending, as I apprehend, on the suddenness of its execution) that I should be glad, if it is thought proper, to have a direction, how I am to act in that case."—Mr. Pitt's reply is in the following words: "With regard to the supposed case as stated in your letter, I am commanded by the king to Signify to you his majesty's pleasure, that you, or such other officer, on whom the command may devolve, do, in conformity to the latitude given by his majesty's instructions, judge of the practicability of the service on the spot, according as contingent events, and particular circumstances may require; the king judging it highly prejudicial to the good of his service to give particular orders and directions with regard to possible contingent cases, that may arise."—The same principle will be found to have governed lord Chatham's conduct in all the operations of the subsequent year, viz. those against St. Maloes, against Cherbourg and St. Cas. Neither lord Chatham's principles nor failures ever excited the animadversion of parliament. Lord Chatham's conduct was never questioned, he was not considered as having acted unwisely in sending forth expediditions which though unsuccessful were calculated to distress and annoy the enemy, and to divert their force from oppressing our allies. The conduct of sir J. Mordaunt was arraigned both before a court of inquiry and a court martial, but that of lord Chatham, or of his colleagues, was never once questioned in the parliament of that day. In what I have hitherto submitted to the House, I do not feel that I have yet established any thing in favour of the policy of the conduct pursued; my object has been merely to rebut those inferences, which would deprive me of a fair hearing; and as I conceive I have satisfactorily proved that there is nothing in the military opinions before the House, when carefully examined and fairly understood, which can justify any man in bringing them forward as conclusive in point of authority against me, so, I trust, I have also shewn, that the course pursued by government in investigating and deciding upon the present Expedition, has been consistent with the best practice of the best times, and that if it varies from that practice in any respect, it is rather that the present Expedition has been taken up, upon a more deliberate examination of circumstances, than has marked former enterprizes, in which the arms of the country have been engaged. I hope therefore, that I may be permitted to enter without prejudice into a fair examination of the grounds upon which the government acted. I desire only that the opinion of the House may be formed upon a true balance of all the advantages which we were reasonably intitled to expect, weighed against the risk and expence which we were called upon to contemplate. It is upon this comparison fairly made, that the judgment of every reasonable man ought to be founded, and I hope in examining the subject, I shall not appear to the House either to evade the difficulties of the question, or to undervalue the weight of those arguments against which I shall have to contend. In arguing the grounds upon which the Expedition to the Scheldt was undertaken, I must protest against the attempt which has been made to confine them to the single object of destroying the enemy's naval resources in that river. The determination of government was taken upon more extended views, they had a duty to perform not only to their own country, but to their allies, and the motives arising from either of those considerations made it in their judgment a matter of paramount obligation to engage in the enterprize however arduous. But before I argue in more detail the grounds upon which they acted, I wish to observe, that the inquiry which has been gone into has had the good effect of stripping the question of much extraneous matter. It is no longer to be contended that the Expedition could have been prepared to act before the time at which it was actually sent forth. It has been proved, that the utmost exertions were unremittingly employed to prepare the army for service, and that neither the army itself, nor the means of transporting it, could possibly have been ready at an earlier period. The power and suffi- ciency of the armament itself has ceased to be matter of controversy. It has also been established in evidence, that all the equipments of the army were complete, that every man proceeding on the Expedition was effective and fit for duty, and that at no former period of our history has an armament been assembled for service more perfect in all its parts, or, one reflecting more credit on all the departments employed in its preparation.—It has further been distinctly proved, that to no other quarter than the Scheldt could the efforts of our arms have been directed with any thing like the same prospects of advantage, either to our own interests or to those of the common cause.—I am particularly anxious to point the attention of the House to this part of the question, as they must be aware that a great portion, of the dissatisfaction which has been expressed against the measure, has proceeded from persons who were induced to believe, either that in sending an Expedition to the Scheldt, we deserted the interest of the Peninsula, and thereby failed to carry into effect the objects for which we were contending in that quarter; or that we neglected to turn our exertions to the north of Germany, where the dispositions of the people presented a field for exertion, which under proper management might have enabled us to press more severely upon the enemy, and would have opened the most enlarged prospects of co-operation with Austria. In order the better to elucidate this important branch of the question, I was induced to call for the Austrian correspondence, to mark the more distinctly the quarter (viz. the north of Germany) to which that power wished our exertions to have been directed.—I wished to shew, that if her demands of succour were not complied with in the form in which they were expressed, the failure of compliance on our part was not a matter of choice, the military policy of the demand never became a question for discussion, as the means of compliance were not within our competence.—To establish this I examined the late secretary of the treasury, Mr. Huskisson;—Some gentlemen seem to have been most unnecessarily alarmed at the nature of the evidence he has given, and to imagine that in the facts stated by him, an unwise disclosure has been made of the weakness of our resources, but those who recollect that our means of foreign expenditure have always depended upon the state of ex- changes changes, and the supply of foreign coin to be purchased in the market, and those who remember that Mr. Pitt during the late war on more than one occasion justified the limited extent of our subsidiary advances to our allies on the continent, upon the difficulty experienced in sending remittances abroad, will easily understand, why it was not in our power to embark in the extended expenditure which would have been occasioned by a campaign in the north of Europe; and will admit that such temporary inability by no means tends to bring into question the solidity of our resources at home, or indicates any failure in the strength or credit of the country.—In truth I believe since the period of which I am speaking, much of the difficulty has been removed by importations of silver from South America; this, however, was a resource too uncertain in its nature, to justify the government in relying upon it as the ground of their proceedings—Mr. Huskisson's evidence establishes beyond a doubt, that in no quarter of the continent, neither in Italy, nor in Spain, nor in the north of Germany, could the pecuniary means have been procured for equipping and maintaining the army then disposable for a campaign, that our exertions were necessarily limited to an operation on the enemy's coast to be carried on by our own resources alone, and in connection with our shipping, and that our only option was between an effort in the Scheldt (which combined a powerful diversion with a prospect of striking a blow of the utmost importance to the immediate security of Great Britain) and a desultory attack on some other less important point of the enemy's coast, which could have presented neither of those objects in an equal degree.—I have felt it the more essential to present this view of the subject; supported as it has been by Mr. Huskisson's official opinion, not only to this country, but to Europe; because I am aware that endeavours have been made to give to the decision of government the appearance of a desertion of the interests of the continent, and to represent us as haying basely turned aside at a moment the most critical to the fate of Europe, in the selfish pursuit of separate interests.—Such a charge I should indeed feel to be of the most heavy and degrading nature, the conduct imputed would have been as derogatory to every thing we owed ourselves as it would have been injurious to the safety of those powers with whom we were connected; but I do persuade myself that I have proved to the conviction both of this country and of the continent, that we had no choice in point of fact, that we could not embark in operations upon a larger scale than those actually undertaken, and that in determining to direct the exertions which we were enabled to make (in addition to those then in progress both in the Peninsula and in Italy) to the most vulnerable point of the enemy's dominions, we were fulfilling our duty to the continent in the most liberal and effectual manner.—Independant of the pecuniary impossibility of engaging in operations in the north of Germany with the amount of force then at our command, the House must be aware how unjust it would have been to the gallant people in that quarter, who might have been disposed to rise in defence of their own liberties, had we selected that point for the seat of our operations without possessing adequate means to give effect to their exertions and to equip and arm them for the field.—Had a British army disembarked in the Elbe and Weser, without the means of creating a great native army to support their operations, menaced as they must have been upon the left by the Danish force in Holstein, how would it have been possible for them to have moved even to a small distance from the coast? Such a corps could have occasioned but little apprehension or embarrassment from its own exertions to the French armies acting upon the Danube; the enemy might safely have postponed his measures for opposing us, till the fate of his main operation was decided, when he would have had it in his power to send without inconvenience, an army more than sufficient to overwhelm or expel the British force. To have continued a corps of British troops in the north of Germany on the approach of winter, when the navigation is interrupted and consequently the means of retreat are at an end, would have been inconsistent with every military principle upon which we have hitherto acted, or could be justified in acting. On former occasions when a British army has been committed in operations on the continent, it has been employed in a friendly country, and in concert with the army of some of the great continental powers. Its resources have been secured to it upon the faith of some existing government, its rear was always open and consequently the practicability of its retreat ascertained; but in the case now in contemplation, a British corps would have been committed on, the continent, not for definite and limited purposes, but to carry on a campaign in a hostile country surrounded by powers with whom we were at war, and unsupported by any one continental slate, with whom we could come in contact, or with whose force we could unite our arms. I do therefore trust that it never can justly be imputed to the councils of this country, that in determining to direct the late armament to the Scheldt, we have either been unmindful of continental interests, or have shrunk from the performance of the duty which we owed to the continent, looking as we were bound to do, at the cause of the other European powers as identified with our own. And if we reflect upon the painful necessity, that might have compelled us, after exciting a continental insurrection, to have withdrawn the British army, we shall not be disposed to regret, that a system of measures so full of difficulty was not hastily engaged in. In establishing the absolute impracticability of carrying on continental operations on a large scale with the means we possessed at that moment, I am aware that the disclosure, although pregnant with no other inconvenience, must prove fatal to the various schemes of the military projectors of the day. An hon. general (gen. Tarleton) will find that the campaign in which he had indulged his fancy in Italy, was in its nature as well as in its object utterly impracticable. There are other authorities that have suggested the policy of employing the whole of our disposable force in the north of Spain, they also must now be convinced that their military dreams could not be realized, and as the opponents of the measure cannot rationally suggest a single operation in competition with that which was adopted, I trust that the discovery which these projectors have made on the present occasion will teach them as well as others, before they again reproach his Majesty's government for not extending the scale of their efforts, first to inquire whether they really possessed the means of doing so. I am to argue the question now upon two grounds; first as a diversion in which the interests of the continent were concerned, and secondly as an effort, in the success of which, the most important interests of the British empire were involved. That the employment of a British army of 40,000 men in the then state of the continent and in a quarter where the vital interests of France, as well as the pride of that state, must be so immediately affected by an attack, was an useful measure, seems hardly to require argument. If we recal to our recollection, the nice balance in which the contest at that time was suspended upon the continent, the uncertainty which hung over the destinies of France after the battle of Aspern, the hopes which animated every part of Europe, and which were progressively calling forth, the dormant energies of Germany in support of the Austrian arms, we cannot wonder that at such a moment the British government should feel itself compelled by the strongest incitements of duty arid interest, to strain every nerve, and to exert every effort in aid of that power, on the success of whose struggle for independance, the fate of the world might be deemed to depend. When we advert to the numbers by which the battle of Aspern was fought, recollecting that the Austrians had not above 75,000 men and the French not more than 100,000 immediately in the neighbourhood of Vienna at that period (above 40,000 of which were either killed or wounded in that memorable action) where is the man that will form so despicable an opinion of the military power of this country, as to suppose that at such a moment and under such circumstances, a British force of 40,000 men was not calculated to animate the exertions of the continent, and to have a powerful influence on the general scale of the war? That such a force arriving in the Scheldt, so immediately in the neighbourhood of one of the principal naval arsenals of the enemy, and upon the very confines of France, must at once compel the enemy, in vindication of his insulted coast and in preservation of his naval power, either to direct without delay a large portion of his exertions (to the prejudice of other objects) towards their defence, or in despair to abandon them to their fate, seems obvious. It has been asked whether we can prove that France has been obliged to withdraw a single regiment from the Danube in consequence of this Expedition; to which I should reply, that in order to establish the fact of a diversion, it is not necessary to make out that troops have actually been withdrawn from the Danube, it is enough to shew that a force has been detained for the defence of the Scheldt, which might otherwise have been applicable to the reinforcement of the principal French armies.—Inconsiderable in number and defective in quality as the force was, which France was enabled ultimately to assemble for the defence of Antwerp, it was only produced by recalling regiments then on their march to the Danube, by moving from Paris, the few troops stationed there, arid by bringing from the Rhine a force which might have been otherwise employed against the Austrians; we also find that the alarm of the British debarkation compelled the Dutch corps under gen. Gration to return from Stralsund, the Westphalian army had orders to fall back from the interior of Germany upon the Scheldt, and such was the alarm produced by our attack, that the enemy had actually ordered the French troops to evacuate the Prussian garrisons in Silesia and to proceed by forced marches against the British Army. If such was the obvious and inevitable consequence of this movement, even at the period at which it took place; when the unfortunate result of the battle of Wagram had compelled Austria to solicit an armistice, and had thereby damped the rising hopes and prospects of Europe, what might not, nay what must not have been the result, had our armament reached its destination, while the spirit of resistance was abroad, and when the influence of France was dissolved and its power disowned throughout the Northern parts of Germany. When the temper of Holland was such as to require the presence in that country of its own troops to uphold the authority of its government, and when, as we have since learned from the proceedings of the French government, some even of Buonaparte's own departments were not exempt from indications of disaffection, if they did not exhibit symptoms of actual revolt. Could he under such circumstances have collected his scattered forces to oppose us without augmenting his difficulties in some other quarter, and might we not fairly in such a state of things have flattered ourselves either that we should be successful in our immediate object, or that the enemy in order to frustrate our hopes would be compelled to weaken himself materially in the other quarters, in which he was contending. It is true that before the Expedition sailed it was known in England that Austria had been compelled to accept an armistice, but still that armistice was only concluded for a definite time, the effects of the battle of Wagram were understood to have fallen with as much severity on the troops of France as on those of her opponent; the revival of the war was looked to as a probable event, a probability which was subsequently strengthened by the communications made to this government and to the British general supposed to be serving in the North of Germany, as appears from the enclosures in my letter of the 21st August to the earl of Chatham. Would it have become the British government under these circumstances to arrest such an armament as had then been prepared, upon intelligence received on the very eve of its departure; intelligence which in some views might increase the importance of its arrival to the interests of the Continent? Such were the incidental circumstances connected with the operation to the Scheldt, the direct and immediate object of which was the destruction of the enemy's naval power in that quarter; and here I must protest against that mode of arguing the question which assumes, that unless his Majesty's ministers could look with confidence and certainty to the accomplishment of all the objects to which the effort was directed, that they could promise nothing to themselves, but total failure and disappointment; on the contrary I must contend that various stages of success presented themselves to their view, rising in importance one beyond the other, the whole furnishing a combination of objects, the most important to which the arms of the country had ever been directed, but each in succession holding out, even in its partial accomplishment, advantages of no inconsiderable moment.—The several objects to which the Expedition may be considered as directed were;—1st, The reduction of the isle of Walcheren, with a view to the occupation and eventual destruction of the port and naval arsenal at Flushing.—2dly, The capture or destruction of the enemy's ships afloat then stationed in the Lower Scheldt, before they could secure themselves beyond Lillo, and the defences in the higher part of the river, and 3dly, the destruction of the arsenal at Antwerp, of the ships building, and those afloat, if they should have succeeded in effecting their retreat. The House will best be enabled to estimate the importance of the first of these objects by turning to the evidence of commodore Owen; "that distinguished officer has declared that he considers the port of Flushing as the most dangerous to this country of the harbours in the possession of the enemy, that its basin is capable of holding 20 sail of the line; that in order effectually to watch an enemy's fleet, an equal or nearly an equal force must be stationed at Yarmouth as well as in the Downs, a circumstance which compels us to keep up a double force to oppose the enemy in that quarter; he has further stated that the possession of the port of Flushing would, in his judgment, have been of infinite importance to this country, and that it we had been enabled to have retained effectual possession of the island of Walcheren and of the port of Flushing, he dues not think that any naval force which the enemy could have assembled at Antwerp and the higher parts of the Scheldt, could have acted from thence against the naval interests of this country. "Upon being asked what he conceived would be the effect of the demolition of the basin of Flushing, on the enemy's naval establishments in the Scheldt, his answer was, "that the enemy had no other place at present to careen his ships, that they cannot be coppered or hove down in that river, for the purposes of repairing any defects in their bottoms, and that their equipment generally in the Scheldt must be materially impeded by the destruction of that basin."—The importance of reducing the island of Walcheren had, therefore, grown proportionably with the increase of the enemy's naval power in that quarter. It was an object which had frequently occupied the attention of former governments; and here it may be necessary to observe, that its not having been sooner reduced was owing to military impediments, and not to any opinion entertained that the unhealthiness of the island should have prevented its occupation. The House must be aware that no such principle has ever prevailed in the military councils of this country, as that a British force was never on any considerations of policy, to be exposed in a climate of this description.—We have frequently held the island of Walcheren itself under circumstances of policy, less pressing than those under which it was lately attacked; we had a garrison in Flushing, as one of the cautionary towns for near 30 years in the reigns of queen Elizabeth and James I; a British force was sent in 1746 to hold that island in concert with the confederates; and in the year 1794 it was again occupied by our troops; the government was certainly bound to take into their calculation the hazard to be incurred by the troops in such a station, but the same principles of public policy which has influenced the occupation of the West India islands, and many other stations injurious to the health of the soldiers, made it their duty not to forego, great national objects, to avoid evils which are more or less inseparable from a state of war As the calamitous sickness of the army has thrown over the whole of the Expedition its most painful character, I wish to take this occasion of remarking, that when the Expedition was decided upon, the apprehension of sickness was confined to that part of the force alone, which was destined to serve in Walcheren; there was no reason to entertain any particular fears on this account with respect to the troops destined to land at Sandvliet and to act against Antwerp. It has been given in evidence, indeed it is notorious, that there is not in Europe a country where troops may act with less prejudice to their health, than in the vicinity of Antwerp. The landing of so large a portion of the force with its detention for so long a time in South Beveland, a circumstance which has proved the severest source of sickness, has been shewn to have arisen entirely from unforeseen causes, and to have been utterly inconsistent with the plan of the Expedition, and with the views and expectations of those who determined upon the undertaking. However we must all deplore the sufferings with which our brave troops have been afflicted, it is unjust to charge this calamity upon the original design. In contemplating the sickness of the army, the House naturally has directed much of their attention to the arrangements which were made for the care and management of the sick. Whatever unfavourable impressions were at first entertained on this interesting subject, I trust they have been removed by subsequent explanation and enquiry; and that the House are satisfied that however partial instances of inconvenience and even of neglect, as far as relates to the conduct of individuals, may possibly have occurred, the general arrangements of government were liberal, provident, and ample, that the exertion of the medical staff abroad was unremitting and exemplary; and that upon the whole, the sick of the army have experienced every degree of attention and tenderness, of which so extensive and rapid a calamity would admit; if, however any strong impression can remain on the minds of any members of the House that serious neglect or improper management in any quarter has taken place, I should wish the subject to undergo a separate examination, I am sure the House will feel, that on the present occasion it is impossible for us to enter into it with that degree of minuteness which its importance so well deserves. If then the inconvenience of the climate did not afford any sufficient objection to the measure of reducing the island of Walcheren, the House will I trust be of opinion, considering the great naval and military importance of its conquest, that his Majesty's ministers were justified in looking upon this as an object of the greatest moment in itself; that the proportion of force requisite for its attack was judiciously applied for such a purpose, and that whilst we must deeply lament that the means of the country, occupied as they are, to so large an extent, in other quarters of the globe, have not enabled us to retain possession of so important a naval station, we ought to be sensible that, at least, a material service has been rendered to the country in cripling for a time the naval exertions of the enemy in that quarter. The second object which his Majesty's government had in contemplation was that of laying hold of the enemy's ships afloat in the lower part of the Scheldt; that such an object was constantly kept in view the House will perceive from an inspection of the disposition paper of the army by the quarter-master general, and also from the evidence of sir Richard Strachan. How nearly success had attended the attempt, may be collected from sir John Hope's statement. By the landing in the North side of South Beveland, all the enemy's batteries on that island were taken in reverse, and including Bathz were in our possession on the night of the 2nd of August. It was not until the 1st that the enemy's ships were enabled to retire above Lillo; had an adverse wind delayed their retreat, till the British troops got possession of Bathz, or even of the batteries of Warden, their retreat must have been cut off, and the whole might have been captured by our squadron, which was held in readiness to push up the Scheldt for that purpose. It remains for me now to consider the third and main ob- ject of the Expedition, viz. the destruction of the arsenal at Antwerp, of the ships building and those afloat, if they should have succeeded in effecting their retreat from the lower parts of the Scheldt. In order to form a correct estimate of the expediency of the attempt, the risks and sacrifices which it involved must be compared with the advantages in prospect. On the one hand there was in view the destruction of a most formidable arsenal, amply provided with all materials for the construction of an immense navy, as well as the destruction or capture of not less than 20 ships of the line already existing in different stages of equipment: on the other hand were to be considered the degree to which the health of the army might be endangered, the military hazard to which our force was to be exposed, and lastly the expence which such an effort must occasion. I have already observed, that there was no reason to apprehend, that the health of the army would be particularly exposed by the operation against Antwerp, the corps allotted to the capture of Walcheren was alone exposed to contract the disease arising from an unhealthy climate; the troops intended to land at Santvliet might prosecute their operations against Antwerp and reimbark with as little danger to their health as if they had been encamped in the most healthy part of England. That the army would not have been unduly exposed to military hazard by the mere operation itself has been directly proved by the evidence of the quarter-master general before referred to. It has also been established by the concurrent testimony of every officer examined, that the army might have landed at Santvliet early in August and advanced to Antwerp without opposition. The opinion of sir John Hope is to this effect. Lord Chatham and general Brownrigg have not only stated that to be their opinion; but in confirmation of it have further declared, that even so late as the 25th of that month, the army would have been landed for the purpose of attacking Lillo and Liefkenshoeik, in the hope of opening the Scheldt to further operations, if sickness had not prevailed to such an extent amongst the troops in South Beveland, as wholly to disqualify them from service. Can it then be contended that the attempt was originally of a nature too hazardous to be undertaken, when it might have been prosecuted without any apprehension of ex- traordinary risk, at a much later period than that within which it might have been expected to hare been completely terminated, under more favourable circumstances? Delay in execution might be attended with ultimate failure; but I contend that with common military prudence the army itself need never have been improvidently committed. Sir W. Erskine is the only officer who has expressed an opinion, that the retreat of the army would have been exposed to danger by a landing even so late as the 25th; but he is wholly unsupported in this view of the subject by any other authority, and the opinion itself is confined to operations commencing at the close instead of the beginning of August. I trust it is therefore clearly established that whatever grounds his Majesty's ministers might have to doubt of ultimate success, there were none, which should have induced them to hesitate as far as the safety of the army was concerned in undertaking the enterprize. The remaining question is the expence. On this head there has been no end to the absurd and exaggerated reports with which the public mind has been deluded. When the conduct of government was arraigned in the Common Hall of the City of London, and the vengeance of the country denounced against his Majesty's ministers; they were charged with having wantonly squandered, the blood and treasure of the country in pursuit of impracticable and inadequate objects, it was asserted that this Expedition had cost the nation not less than 15,000,000l. Even the gentlemen on the other side of the House, in the more sober view which they have condescended to take of the subject, have never stated the expence lower than 5 or 6 million sterling. There are now however before the House documents to prove, that the total charge has not excceded 840,000l. of which not more than 600,000l. was incident to the service as originally projected. So far from its having been the most expensive Expedition that was ever undertaken, I may safely assert, that it has been the least so, in proportion to its magnitude, which this country has ever sent forth. That such must have been the case might have occurred upon the smallest reflection to any person a customed to look at subjects of this nature. Three fourths of the force was carried in the ships of war then in commission, and nearly an equal proportion of the transports required, was at the time in the pay of government and could not have been paid off, even had this service not been undertaken. The army did not require an extent of equipment necessary for a long campaign, there was therefore little extraordinary charge beyond that which occurs when troops are in camp. Will any man then contend, even with the strongest prejudice in favour of œconomy, that in the then actual state of Europe, when we were so strongly called on to support our ally, and had at the same time such important British objects in prospect, that the expence of this Expedition taken according to its true amount was improvidently incurred? Would it not, on the contrary, even if all expectations of injury to the naval resources of France had been laid out of our contemplation, and the question had been entirely confined to the consideration of giving aid to Austria, would it not even in that case have been our bounden duty, if on any part of the enemy's coast, a port could have been found capable of giving the same security to such an armament, as was afforded by the Scheldt, instead of allowing our force to remain inactive, to have dispatched it to that point for the purpose of distracting as far as possible the attention of the enemy, and of creating at least a temporary embarrassment in his operations. If the objections then to the enterprise fairly examined appear to sink into nothing, when compared with the exaggerated statements which have been made of them, it remains for me to shew that the operation was practicable in itself, that it was not without a reasonable prospect of success, and that the best means were devised for carrying it into effect.

Upon the latter point endeavours have been made to insinuate in the questions put to officers examined, that government proceeded without any plan, and that the attempt was undertaken without any well considered or digested conception of the mode in which it was to be prosecuted. The officers charged with the conduct of the service were called upon to state in evidence to the House the precise mode in which they were ordered to proceed, the point at which they were to make their attack; the positions they proposed to take up; in short the plan of campaign which had been formed for them in every minute particular. But with great submission I apprehend that a plan of operations, in so strict a sense, never can be made or ought to be attempted by any cabinet, that if such had been previously devised, it would probably have been rendered inapplicable or abortive by the conduct of the enemy, or the state of the elements, and that in proceeding upon a service of this nature, which is dependent on naval co-operation, nothing more can be required of his Majesty's government, than that the principles of the Expedition, and the different descriptions of attack which in various contingencies were probable, should be well considered, it being left to the officers in command to apply their means upon the spot as circumstances should point out. And first I must contend, that the principle of the Expedition, as far as the carrying the right wing of the armament at once direct to Santvliet, landing the troops there, and advancing with rapidity to Antwerp, was fully considered, and is distinctly laid down in all the instructions before the House, not only in the directions addressed to the officers employed; but in the orders issued by them in execution of the service. That a better plan could not have been devised, may I think be inferred from the circumstance of no person having yet attempted to suggest a better, or to condemn that which was decided on. General Brownrigg has regretted, that the whole of the armament destined for Santvliet was not at once carried to the entrance of the West Scheldt, instead of being directed to rendezvous at the Stone Deep, which according to the prevailing winds was to leeward of its destination; but this is a point of professional detail not appertaining to the plan, but to the execution, and cannot be considered as in any degree impeaching the grounds on which ministers acted. The two other lines of operation, viz. that which would have taken the army up the East Scheldt with a view to a landing on Tholen, and that across South Beveland according to which the troops would have been disembarked in the Sloe to be afterwards re-embarked at Bathz, have both appeared in evidence to have been wholly unadvisable; the former has been condemned by sir R. Keats himself, whose opinion before he left England, formed however without any local knowledge, had given some countenance to it; the latter has been proved by all the general officers examined to be, if not wholly impracticable, at least highly inexpedient, being calculated to retard rather than accelerate the advance upon Antwerp. I must therefore assert that no other plan stands in competition with that determined on by government, and that it has been distinctly established, by the concurring testimony of all the naval officers examined, that in the prosecution of that plan under favourable circumstances of weather, the whole of the armament destined to act against Antwerp might have been carried up the West Scheldt in four days from the period of its leaving the Downs (including the time necessary for buoying the channel) that is, that the whole might have arrived successively in divisions on the 1st 2d and 3d of August at Santvliet. I must further contend that although the particular movements against Antwerp were not, and could not, be previously determined on, the different modes of attack had been fully considered, and suitable means for each were amply provided.—The army was equipped with an effective train of heavy artillery; for the rapid movement of which against Antwerp, horses were sent from this country.—We did not proceed in contemplation of besieging Antwerp in form by investiture on both sides of the river, but we went against it upon information that its works were not only defective in construction, but neglected, and in many parts fallen into decay; that the town was feebly garrisoned, and the enemy generally weak in that quarter; under these circumstances hopes were entertained that the place might possibly be taken by assault, or that if an operation of that description should not be practicable the town would probably surrender to an effective bombardment. Such were the principles of attack, and I am now to consider, upon comparison of the enemy's means as opposed to ours, what prospect of success we had, supposing the army to have arrived at Santvliet in due time; taking the argument first upon the information in possession of government, on which the Expedition was undertaken; and secondly upon the actual state of things as proved to exist by the intelligence obtained upon the spots after the armament reached, the Scheldt. First as to the relative amount of force with which the attack was to have been made or repelled; it may be most satisfactory to take that of the enemy, as proved to exist at the period when the retreat was ordered, reserving for subsequent consideration, what proportion was assembled in the neigh- bourhood of Antwerp at any antecedent date.—On the 26th of August the enemy's force is stated in the Memorandum submitted by the quarter-master general to the lieut. generals at the council of war, to have amounted to 35,000 men. General Brownrigg, however, in his evidence describes these numbers as in his opinion exaggerated, and thinks a reduction may be fairly made from them of 5,000 men. In the numbers thus given he distinctly says that the crews of the enemy's ships and the workmen of the arsenal are included. What the precise amount of the sailors and workmen may have been (the evidence varying upon this point) it may be difficult to state; some of the intelligence carrying the sailors to 11,000, and the workmen of the arsenal to 5 or 6,000 men; other information, and that perhaps most entitled to credit, represents the numbers of the armed workmen actually present as being much lower, and states that a considerable proportion even of the ordinary establishment had been at this time detached to the Danube; the crews of the ships are also represented as not exceeding 7,000; taking these two classes of persons together at from 8 to 10,000 men, there will not remain above 20,000 troops of all descriptions at the close of the month of August, for the defence of both banks of the Scheldt, including the garrisons of Antwerp and Bergen-op-zoom; and this estimate is in a great measure corroborated by the information received by sir John Hope on the 28th of August, which describes the enemy's force, as it is slated, from an actual survey, at 21,780 men.—The propriety of including the seamen of the fleet in the means which the enemy could employ in defending Antwerp may in principle be questioned, as our operations with reference to the fleet itself, would probably have found ample occupation for them afloat, but if this mode of enumeration is to be adopted on one side, it is reasonable that it should be admitted on both; the efficiency of British seamen either on board or on shore being at least equal to the crews of the enemy's ships, composed as we know them to have been of subjects of different nations.—We shall then find the British force, which might have been assembled at Santvliet early in August to stand thus;23,000 rank, and file including the reserve under general Hope, troops certainly equal to any in Europe, composed of the flower of the British army, to be reinforced by. 5 or 6,000 men as soon as Flushing should be reduced. Of the sea-men of the fleet employed in the Expedition amounting in the gross to 35,000, it may be estimated that not less than 20,000 might have been made available on the first instance on the side of Antwerp in aid of the land force, so that an immediate force would have been assembled of 43,000 troops and seamen, subject to be encreased to 49,000 on the fall of Flushing, to be opposed to a force of not exceeding 30,000 French, Dutch, Danes, &c. We find also from the evidence of all the officers, and from all the information received, that the enemy's military force was of the very worst description, composed chiefly of depôts of regiments, conscripts recently levied, custom house officers, burghers and gens d'ármerie. Such a force might be found useful in the defence of works, but I believe no British officer would have had any hesitation, if the enemy could have drawn these 30,000 men to one point, and could have been induced to risk them in one body in the field, to have rested the fate of the undertaking upon the ability of any two British divisions of 5,000 men each to have defeated the whole. If then the British force could at the very outset have attacked with 43,000 and ultimately with 49,000 men, the enemy having after the expiration of 26 days only the means of opposing to them 30,000, what might not have been expected in point of success, had we been enabled to have commenced our operations early in August, when, as I shall hereafter have occasion to shew, the enemy were in a state of great weakness and wholly unprepared for defence. The next important head of information is that which relates to the defences of Antwerp, and the condition in which his Majesty's government had reason to suppose they would be found.—The House will recollect that it has been established in evidence that the town of Antwerp has not been defended since the year 1584, when it was attacked by the duke of Parma, that it has been always surrendered without resistance to an army superior in the field, that it is a rich and populous city of great extent, containing not less than 60,000 inhabitants, that it is between 3 and 4 miles in circumference, being surrounded by a rampart and ditch, with bastions constructed several centuries ago, that it has not been kept up as a place of defence, and that it is altogether destitute of outworks to keep an enemy at a distance; indeed it. has been distinctly proved, that under the cover of its suburbs an attacking army would find shelter close to the body of the place, under the protection of which their operations might be commenced without the necessity of breaking ground at a distance and advancing by more regular approaches.—In addition to the general weakness of the place, necessarily resulting from so extended a line of defence, long neglected and suffered to fall into decay, government had distinct information previous to the sailing of the Expedition, that the rampart and ditch were in such a defective state in particular places, ass to hold out a prospect of being successfully escaladed. This intelligence was received from various persons, and particularly from one actually sent in the month of June for the purpose of reporting upon the state and condition of Antwerp, a person of whose ability to form an accurate judgment, the members of the secret committee, who had an opportunity of examining him, have had the means of forming an opinion. Although not a scientific person he was as competent to speak to facts of this description, as if he had been an engineer. His report of the numbers of the enemy's force may be subject to doubt, and his intelligence on this head may partake of those errors, to which all information with respect to numbers, which is not strictly official, must necessarily be liable, but it is impossible to suppose, that he could have been mistaken with respect to the actual state of the fortifications of Antwerp, which he went purposely to view, and upon his veracity his Majesty's government were justified in relying not only from the repeated proofs which they had received of his fidelity and accuracy, but from the inevitable detection which must have followed any attempt on his part to practise deception in this instance.—Upon the information so received it was not thought impossible that the place might be found in a condition to admit of its being taken by assault. In forming this opinion his Majesty's ministers proceeded not simply upon the information thus recently obtained, but also upon the knowledge of the place possessed by various officers who had examined the works of Antwerp in the year 1794. The quarter master general of the army distinctly states himself, from his recollection of its condition at that period, coupled with information subse- quently received, to have thought it not impossible, that if rapidly approached it might have been assaulted with success. Now, let me ask what authority have the examinations of the Committee enabled the House to oppose to those to which I have referred? the single authority of sir William Erskine; who, as far as he professes to speak from his own knowledge, founds himself upon the recollection of what he saw sixteen years ago, having looked at the works of Antwerp in 1794 from motives of curiosity, when a very young man and aide de camp to his father, the late sir W. Erskine. With every respect for that officer's judgment and character, I must be permitted to distrust the accuracy of the opinion which he has given to the Committee upon the defence of Antwerp, when I find it decidedly at variance with that of every other officer, who has spoken on the subject, with that of sir David Dundas, of general Calvert, of general Brownrigg, and of general Son-tag. All these officers have described Antwerp as surrounded by, a rampart and ditch, but by no means as a respectable fortification; sir William Erskine, oh the contrary, has spoken of it, as only to be approached by a siege in form. He has stated, that the attack must be carried on regularly by three parallels, and he calculates, that it would require 21 days from the landing at Santvliet to put the army in a condition to break ground, and 21 days more to obtain possession of the town: and he has further stated, that he conceives the place might have been put in a state of complete defence in eight days.—In the time required to bring up the means of breaking ground he is directly contradicted by the evidence of lord Chatham, general Brownrigg, lord Roslyn, general Macleod, and colonel Fyers. The probable time allowed by them for approaching Antwerp with the means of opening fire against the town is 7 days instead of 21. General Brownrigg, general Macleod, and colonel Fyers speak to the practicability of establishing their batteries at once within 6 or 700 yards of the place, without the necessity of regular approaches; the first distinctly states his opinion of the probability that a surrender might have been inforced within three days by a bombardment: and the two last are of opinion, that the town must either have surrendered or been destroyed. The same three officers have also expressed their opinion, that even previous to the surrender of the, place, there was reason to expect, that the arsenal and the ships on the stocks might have been in a great measure destroyed by the bombardment, and involved in the general conflagration, to which the town must have been exposed; but that at all events upon the surrender of the town, notwithstanding the citadel should have remained in the possession of the enemy, it would have been practicable under the cover, which the town would have afforded, not only to destroy the arsenal and ships building, but possibly to attack with effect the enemy's ships afloat even though they should have taken an anchorage under the guns of the citadel. Such then being the information in proof of the weakness of the defences of Antwerp, let us see what contradictory information there is to shew, that its fortifications were in good repair, and had been put by the enemy in a state of complete defence. The first intelligence bearing upon this subject is that obtained by sir William Erskine, which describes the works as having been placed in a state of defence by the French, and this is said to be corroborated by a stone-mason residing at Bathz, who stated that he had been employed in their repair. That this person might have been employed upon the works is consistent with all the information received by government, as partial repairs particularly of the citadel were stated to have been made; but it is impossible to believe that a fortification of such great extent as Antwerp, so long neglected, could have undergone an effectual repair (if we consider the time and labour which the accomplishment of such an undertaking would have required) without the fact being notorious; whereas it appears, that the reverse was understood, arid declared to be the case by the leading persons at Flushing and Middleburg, with whom general Sontag, colonel Mosheim and captain Puget communicated on this subject, and was distinctly stated in all the intelligence which government received, and particularly by the individual before referred to, who inspected the fortifications so late as the 17th of July Having considered the nature of the place to be attacked, the means by which it was proposed to be assailed, and the limited force which the enemy were enabled to assemble for its defence, in the course of near a month, which they had for preparation, it is material to examine what part of this force could have been opposed to us on the first arrival of the armament in the Scheldt, and at the intervening periods, before the enterprise was abandoned. And here it may not be undeserving of remark, that the enemy appears as far as we can judge to have been wholly unprepared upon our first arrival; and that the attack was as complete a surprise as can well occur when a large armament is known to be assembled in the ports of Great Britain. It is true that an apprehension of some design on our part prevailed in the month of April in Walcheren, and that additional defensive works were established on the side of Zoutland; but this alarm was occasioned by a corps embarked under general Craufurd's orders for service in Portugal, and had subsided long previous to the sailing of the Expedition; I do not find that when we arrived off the Scheldt on the 28th of July, any extraordinary measures of defence had been taken at Walcheren; there is still less reason to believe that any had been adopted at Antwerp. My belief is, that the enemy supposed the armament to have been destined either for the Elbe and Weser, or for the peninsula, and that it was not until our fleet actually appeared for the Scheldt, and made dispositions for landing, that any steps were taken for collecting force, or placing the country in a better posture of defence to receive us. Nor is this view of the case at all shaken by the orders which the noble lord (Porchester) has read, dated at Paris on the 1st of August from the minister of war for the assembly of troops; the minister might have been apprised of the fact of our arrival in the Scheldt by telegraph on the 29th; it is not therefore an extraordinary instance of vigour that his arrangements should have been made as early as the 1st, whilst the very few corps of which the order speaks as in march towards the Scheldt furnish the most conclusive proofs of the weakness of the enemy, and of the accuracy of the intelligence which government had received. But to return to the actual force, which the enemy had to oppose to us on our arrival in the Scheldt, the House must have observed from the report of the secret Committee, that by an official document which was taken upon the person of an officer in the French staff in Spain, government were acquainted with the actual position of every regiment in the French service on the 1st of December 1808. They consequently knew the utmost amount of force possessed by the enemy on the side of Flanders, and the coasts adjacent, at a period not more than six months antecedent to the determination to undertake the Expedition; at that time it did not exceed 21 battalions and a half of infantry, and 16 squadrons of cavalry, subsequently however to that date, viz. at the commencement of the war with Austria in March, many of these corps had been ordered to the Danube, and so hard pressed was the enemy for reinforcements for their grand army, so little had their attention been turned to the defences of the Scheldt, that even as late as the 22d of June, nearly the whole of the very few regular troops at Antwerp, with a proportion of the artificers, were ordered to the same destination; and at a date still later, the 48th regiment and two or three other corps, were actually on their march in the same direction, when they were brought back in waggons to Cadsand, in order to reinforce the garrison of Flushing. In the beginning of July the government had reason to believe, upon the faith of the intelligence received from the confidential person examined before the secret committee, that exclusive of the garrison of Flushing, consisting of from 3 to 4,000 men, the regular troops in Holland did not exceed 3,000 men, that the whole number of men in Antwerp, capable of bearing arms, did not exceed 2,400, of which the regular troops; invalids included, composed about 1,500, the rest were workmen and artificers, that the crews of the ships might amount to between 5 and 6,000, and that there were few troops in any of the garrison towns in Flanders. The correctness of this intelligence appears to have been doubted by a right hon. gent. (Mr. Ponsonby) if I may judge by the questions put to me by him in the Committee, with reference to the information received from a confidential person in June and July, and given in No. 44 of the Admiralty papers. The amount of troops in Holland, as reported in that document, exceeds 10,000, the distribution of which is specified. The right hon. gent, however, will be pleased to recollect, that subsequent to the period at which that report was made, a corps of 5 or 6,000 men under general Gratien, was ordered to march against general Schill in the north of Germany, and proceeded as far as Stralsund, where they de- feated that officer; that in the beginning of August the same corps was opposed to the duke of Brunswick on the banks of the Weser, and that it did not return to the camp at Naarden in North Holland till September. It is therefore evident that the true explanation of the difference, which seems at first sight to exist between the two sources of intelligence, is to be found in these facts, as will still more clearly appear from the concluding paragraph of the papers last referred to, which is to this effect. "From Naarden 200 Dutch troops had marched towards Aunch, and it seems almost all the Dutch troops in East Friesland and Groningen will march towards Bremen in a few days," which movement actually took place as I have before described.

Such was the state of the enemy's means of resistance when we arrived in the Scheldt. I should wish now to consider to what extent they had accumulated at subsequent dates, and particularly previous to the time at which Antwerp might, under favourable circumstances, have been actually attacked by our troops.

It has been established that in case the armament had arrived at Santvliet, in divisions on the 1st 2nd and 3d of August, the troops might have been landed and advanced to assault the place (if the defects of its defences appeared upon examination to justify such a species of attack) as early as the 6th at night, but that if Antwerp had been found not to be assailable without heavy artillery, ample Means for the bombardment and destruction of the town could have been brought up, the batteries completed, and fire opened against the place on the 10th.

What then do we find to be the course of the enemy's preparations? It appears that they shewed no troops on the opposite coast for several days after our being in possession of Bathz. It further appears that the ditch at Antwerp was not cleared out till the 10th, and was not filled with water till the 14th, before which dates our operations against the town might not only have been begun, but successfully terminated. We learn from intelligence procured by the earl of Roslyn, that a person employed by him, in the accuracy of whose report he places confidence, saw one side of the works of Antwerp, between the 9th and 13th of August, and that at that time, he did not observe any guns mounted. It was not till the 17th (as reported also to his lord- ship) that the enemy began to construct batteries on the river face of Antwerp. The inundations in the neighbourhood of Lillo and Leifkenshoeik were not begun till the middle of August. The enemy were observed to be at work, even on the fortifications at Lillo, long subsequent to Our arrival at Bathz, and it was not till the very close of the month, that they found themselves at leisure to establish batteries at Doel, and Frederick Henrick, which works were demolished by the fire of our shipping nearly as fast as they were constructed.

Is it then too much to suppose, looking at the late period at which these preparations were successively made, that if we could have acted in force early in August, the enemy might have been surprized and overpowered?

With respect to the number of troops collected by the enemy at different periods, the garrison of Bergen-op-Zoom is reported by intelligence transmitted by sir John Hope to the quarter master-general on the 7th not to exceed 3,080 men, on the 8th sir William Erskine reports that it consisted of 8 battalions, which he describes in his evidence to be weak in numbers, probably not exceeding materially the numbers reported by sir John Hope; these troops had been moved from the camp at Naarden into Bergen-op-Zoom on the arrival of the Expedition; the same intelligence reports, that 10 squadrons of cavalry and 3 battalions of infantry lay between Bergen-op-Zoom and Antwerp at the same date, and that the garrison of Antwerp consisted of about 2,000 French and 1,000 Dutch troops; this is all the force which it positively alledges to have been assembled at that period. The workmen of the arsenal and the crews of the ships are referred to; I have before stated my reasons for considering the number of the former as extremely exaggerated, and I shall hereafter prove the utter improbability that the enemy could under the circumstances have availed themselves of the services of the crews of the fleet on shore. Supposing then this intelligence not exaggerated, it is obvious that on the 7th of August, before which time the place might have been assaulted, the enemy had not, exclusive of workmen and sailors, above 8 or 9,000 men for garrisoning both Antwerp and Bergen-op-Zoom; whereas sir David Dundas states in his evidence that a force of less than 10,000 men could not be considered in the light of a garrison for the former of these places only. It is true, that in the intelligence referred to as transmitted by sir William Erskine on the 8th between 4 and 5,000 Dutch infantry and 5 squadrons of cavalry are said to be on their march from North Holland; it is added that all the waggons in Brabant were put in requisition to bring 15,000 of the French Westphalian army, and that within ten days the French would have an army of 40,000 men in the field, not including the garrisons of Antwerp and Bergen-op-Zoom. The House must now be aware, that all these details turned out to be gross exaggerations. Instead of 40,000 men, exclusive of those garrisons, it is clear that there never were more than 20,000 troops brought together, by the enemy, including those garrisons; the troops announced as on their march from North Holland were not in that country at the time spoken of, but were then employed upon another service as I have before stated, and in point of fact never arrived on the Scheldt; in truth their approach is contradicted by intelligence transmitted by sir William Erskine himself on the l1th, which says that their march had been countermanded. The same observation applies to the Westphalian force; whatever orders were given for their return towards Holland they were at too great a distance to take any share in these operations. I cannot therefore help regretting from the false impression it was calculated to create that the gallant officer by whom this intelligence was procured through channels as he represents entitled to his implicit confidence, should not have taken the same care in his evidence before the Committee which was shewn by sir John Hope to caution the House against relying upon the accuracy of details so received. It is difficult to trace the precise dates at which the enemy's force was progressively assembled: but there is no reason to presume that, the garrison of Antwerp was formidable in numbers between the 10th and 15th of August, by which time the bombardment might have been in full operation. Gen. Brownrigg in his evidence says that the enemy's force was not considerable till towards the 20th of August. I think it necessary for the purpose of discrediting the information to which I am now going to allude, to point the attention of the House to an article of intelligence transmitted by lord Roslyn on the 10th of August, which describes the enemy's force to be 25,000 troops of the line at Antwerp and in the adjoining cantonments, all French at that date. Sir John Hope in his evidence before the Committee particularly refers to this communication as transmitted by him with the view of marking his disbelief that the enemy had any such force at that time, and of expressing his opinion that intelligence of numbers so procured ought always to be received with the utmost caution.

Having brought under the observation of the House the relative force and means of the contending parties at different periods during the month of August, I shall now consider what would have been the probable course of our operations, supposing the armament to have been assembled at Santvliet by the 3d. I allude to this date not because I conceive that any moderate delay to which the arrival of our force at that point might have been exposed from unfavourable circumstances of weather was likely to defeat its objects, and that success could only result from contigencies more favourable than ought perhaps in reason to have been counted upon, but I take that period as being that, within which, by the concurring judgment of all the professional men who have been examined, the fleet might have reached its destination, and upon which our reasoning and calculations of its ulterior movements must be framed in argument, it being impossible to make any precise supposition in respect to the length of contingent delays.

There were two distinct plans of operation upon which the army might have acted; the whole of the force might have been moved at once upon Antwerp, with a view to the immediate assault or bombardment of the town, passing by the lower defences of the river; or their operations might have been directed in the first instance against Lillo and Liefkenshoeik for the purpose of getting the complete command of the Scheldt, and of opening that river to the unfettered co-operation of the navy.

Perhaps it would have been found most expedient, in some measure to combine both these plans. It has been stated in evidence by sir Richard Keats and commodore Owen that if the fort of Liefkenshoeik had been reduced, the boom established across the Scheldt must have fallen in our possession, and might have been destroyed. That this obstacle being re- moved, the fort of Lillo being masked, the right bank of the river being also in our possession, which must have resulted from the advance of the main body of our army upon Antwerp, the corps employed in the reduction of Liefkenshoeik giving support on the left bank, the naval force might have passed up the Scheldt, and co-operated with the army against Anttwerp, notwithstanding the fire from Lillo. General Brownrigg in his evidence has stated, that without interfering with the movement of the army in force upon Antwerp, immediately on its debarkation a corps of 2,000 men might have been appropriated to the attack of Liefkenshoeik, which with the aid to be derived from the fleet, would in his judgment have secured the reduction of the place in less than ten days. The House will therefore see that we were not restricted in our operations against Antwerp to a simple military operation without the power of bringing our naval superiority to bear in the upper Scheldt, but that we had the prospect of effectually uniting the energies of both services in the prosecution of our ulterior object. I leave them then to judge whether the crews of the enemy's ships, menaced by an attack of this description, could have been available for land service, and without their aid, what would have been the enemy's means of defending Antwerp against our attack between the 10th and 15th August?

General Brownrigg has certainly stated, that ten days might possibly have been required to reduce Liefkenshoeik, but does it necessarily follow that a work which was not casemated would have resisted so long? We know that in the year 1747, Lillo, which is a more respectable fort, was taken in five days, and that the whole of the forts on the river, including Liefkenshoeik, were reduced in 11 days. Why are we then to assume, that the enemy would push their resistance to the utmost? the impediment that might have been occasioned, had the fort of Bathz resisted, instead of being evacuated, has been put forward, it has been proved however, that this fort could not have resisted with any effect; and why, if the governor of Bathz thought fit to consult his safety by flight, might not other garrisons and even that of Antwerp be intimidated into a surrender? Are we to deny ourselves all the chances of war? to assume that the enemy will in all instances effect prodigies, and that nothing shall be accomplished by the enterprize and animation of British troops, which cannot be previously demonstrated to be the infallible result of military calculation? Are we to be discouraged by sir William Erskine's opinion, that it would require 28 days to reduce the fort of Lillo, when we know that the French reduced it in a fifth of that time? Are we to be alarmed by a description of the formidable defences of Antwerp, a town which no military man for the last three centuries-has ever ventured to defend, or even of the citadel, a work, which, though certainly more respectable, was originally constructed merely to repress the populace of a great city, and which was not only surrendered by an Austrian garrison, after a slight resistance in 1791, to the patriots of Brabant, but was taken in 1746 by a corps of the French army under the conte De Clermont, in five or six days after trenches were opened against it.

I need not press this view of the subject further. The House has before them a general outline of the proposed operations, the conduct of which must have been regulated by circumstances on the spot; it is only necessary for me in order to counteract the impression that there is any evidence before the House which can justify the conclusion, that tire enemy had the means of carrying their ships so high up the Scheldt, as to place them beyond the reach of our attack, to advert to the evidence on this subject. Sir William Erskine's informant states that they might be carried up to Dendermond, 20 miles above Antwerp, other intelligence obtained by lord Roslyn however limits it to four miles above Antwerp, but in point of fact it does not appear upon an attentive comparison of the evidence, that at any time any of tike ships were actually carried above the town. It is true sir William Erskine on the 11th Aug. reports nine sail of the line to be at Antwerp, taking out guns, stores and ballast with an intention of proceeding up the Scheldt to Dendermond, and that two sail had already gone up to that place, but we find this to be an error, a sir William Erskine on the 18th correct his former report upon the authority of a person, upon whose correctness he expresses his reliance, and who had been sent for the express purpose of ascertaining whether the enemy's fleet had moved up the river beyond Antwerp, by stating that on the 15th the ships were still at Antwerp ranged along the quays from he citadel downwards, in number nine sail of the line, that they had all their guns in, and that two sail of the line were below the town. This is further corroborated by intelligence transmitted by sir John Hope on the 22d, whose informant was at Antwerp on the 20th, when the ships had all their guns in, and were ranged along the town, it therefore appears to me clear that no part of the fleet ever was carried up the Scheldt beyond Antwerp, but even supposing the enemy to have had the means of so removing them, (which may be doubted) without rendering them by such removal unfit For all the purposes of defence, it remains to be proved, supposing the destruction of every thing at Antwerp to have been completed, and the British army to have remained superior in the field, that positions might not have been taken higher up the river on the right bank for the effectual attack of the fleet; more especially, if supported by our gun boats and light armed ships of war.

It has been contended that the opinion of the officers employed as given in evidence before the Committee is against the probability of success, and that an attack upon Antwerp by a coup-de-main was on the face of it absurd and impracticable. With respect to the latter point, it involves a mere discussion upon terms; if gentlemen chuse to annex to the term coup-de-main the notion of a single attack which is to be the effort of an hour or a day, they may be borne out in their assertion, but if, as I understand it, the expression, may be correctly applied to a course of proceeding more extended in point of time, and may properly be used to describe a rapid operation of several days continuance, as contradistinguished from a formal siege or a campaign, there is no absurdity in the application which has been made of it, at all events the substance of the argument cannot be affected by the term that has been used. That I am not however without professional authority for using the term coup-de-main in this sense, will appear from the evidence of lieut. col. Clarke who served as principal engineer on the Expedition to Rochfort, to whom the following questions were put on his examination on .sir J. Mordaunt's trial.

"2.Whether if he had been in Rochfort, and the defence of the place had been left to him as an engineer, and he had ten days notice of a force marching up, he could have put it in a sufficient posture of defence against a coup-de-main?

"A. No. But that depends greatly upon the number of the garrison, he explained that what he understood by a coup-de-main is taking a place in one, two, three or four days time without a regular attack.

"2. If Rochfort could not have been taken under three or four days, whether artillery would not have been necessary to facilitate the taking of the place?

"A. Undoubtedly, artillery would hare been proper, but perhaps not absolutely necessary."

As a more recent instance in point, I consider that the operation against Copenhagen was in the nature of a coup-de-main. Our prospects of success there depended upon the early effect of a bombardment, rather than a siege in form; we had in the attack of that place infinitely greater difficulties and obstacles to contend with, than could have been apprehended in the operation against Antwerp, the assailing force was kept at a distance from the place for several days by outworks, and by an extended line of water defences in front of the town; notwithstanding which, and although considerable delay was occasioned by taking up a new line of positions for our batteries, after the enemy were driven within the town the place surrendered to a bombardment, within three days after fire was opened upon it. I trust, therefore, we shall hear no more controversy either upon the term coup-de-main, or the possibility of taking a town of equal or superior strength to Antwerp by means similar to those intended to be employed against that place.

With respect to the opinions given by the officers on the probability of success, their judgment is of course entitled to due deference, but it is material to advert to the circumstances under which they were given, as well as to the nature of the opinions themselves.

The opinion of sir William Erskine is certainly unfavourable throughout. It appears that officer looked to other more advantageous modes, as he conceived, of employing the force of the country, and considered the operations against Antwerp as hopeless before the Expedition sailed. Sir Richard Strachan has stated, that he communicated to me at Deal, how little hope of success was entertained by sir William Erskine. I certainly do not at this distance of time carry in my recollection the communication alluded to, and it may have made the less impression upon my mind, as I had more than one personal conversation with the gallant general himself when at Deal, in none of which were his doubts ever communicated to me, but I have no difficulty in admitting, that I should not have been induced, when the Expedition was upon the eve of sailing, to Hesitate upon the expediency of its departure upon the mere suggestion of a single officer, more especially of one whose opinion was formed in total ignorance of the information upon which government acted, and upon a recollection of the place, not more recent than that of many of his senior officers, with whom his Majesty's ministers had had opportunities of communicating.

The next opinion to which I shall advert is that of the earl of Roslyn—I am perfectly willing to admit the weight to which it is entitled, and upon the whole it must be considered to be discouraging as to the result; but the House will be pleased to remark, that lord Roslyn's judgment was formed, without reference to the information which government had received, as will appear from the following question put, and answer given by the noble earl:

"2. At any time after the communication of the object of the Expedition to your lordship, were you of opinion that the object was attainable?

"A. I was not in possession of the intelligence upon which the Expedition was ordered, and without some knowledge of the force of the enemy, not only in the countries against which the Expedition was immediately directed, but in all the surrounding districts, it was not possible to form a decided opinion upon that subject."

His lordship is further asked as to the probability of succeeding against Antwerp, on the supposition that the armament had assembled at Santvliet on the 3rd or 4th of Aug., to which he answers:

"I do not believe from the information I have had respecting the state of the town, that it would have been possible even then to have taken it without heavy artillery."

This opinion, however, the House will observe is contingent upon the accuracy of the intelligence received of the works being repaired, and in a state of defence, the truth of which, I have before questioned, but does not even in that case negative the possibility of success upon the supposition of heavy artillery being employed, provided the attack could have been made at the early period referred to.

I am forced equally to allow that the opinion of sir John Hope, than which, none more entitled to deference can be quoted, is upon the whole unfavourable, as to the ulterior objects of the Expedition.—But I can by no means admit, that fairly understood, it is conclusively so; and this opinion also is open to the remark, that it was formed without any local knowledge of Antwerp, or its defences, or any consideration of the information which ministers had received. Sir John Hope's view of the question may best be collected from his memorandum of the 23rd of August, in which, considering the course which the operation might have taken if circumstances had admitted of an early attack, he thus expresses himself.

"I do not imagine, that Antwerp has ever been in a situation to expose it to be carried by a coup de main, nor is there I think reason to conclude from any information that has been received respecting the state of the fortifications, that at any period we could have got possession of it, without erecting works, and bringing heavy ordnance before the place.

"Supposing however that it had been practicable to push a corps of 20 or 22,000 men upon Antwerp, the labours of a siege might thereby have been much lightened, the time necessary to reduce the place much abridged, and it is not an improbable supposition that the influence of panic and surprise combined with an unprepared state of defence might have thrown it into our hands at a comparatively easy rate,"—he then proceeds to state "that if such a moment ever did exist it has now passed over."

I hope I do not presume too much in considering this reasoning as by no means decisive against the undertaking.—It rests in the first place, upon an assumption of the truth of the information obtained on the spot that the works were in repair, it next makes the event depend upon an attack with heavy artillery, a course of attack which I apprehend has been shewn by evidence to have been not only in contemplation, but within our power; and it proceeds to admit as not an improbable supposition, that so attacked, Antwerp might have surrendered.

With respect to the opinions of the chief engineer colonel Fyers, and of general Macleod, the commanding officer of artillery, they have both declared that the attack, which they had the means of making, would have been of a nature sufficiently formidable to destroy the town, if it did not surrender.—These officers were asked, whether they could take upon themselves to answer for the success of the attack? I must put it to the House whether any officer of experience would take it upon himself to answer for the success of any operation in war, and whether the expediency of an attempt can rationally be rested upon such an issue.—It does not lie particularly within the province of military men to form a judgment, whether the garrison and inhabitants of Antwerp were likely to submit to the total destruction of that city, including probably the arsenal and ships on the stocks, rather than to purchase their safety by the surrender of those naval objects for which alone we were contending.

If we advert to the evidence given by the earl of Chatham, we shall find that his lordship entertained a confident hope of success, supposing the army had arrived at Santvliet early in August, and he founded this hope upon his belief of the intelligence which government had received previous to the sailing of the Expedition and upon which the final decision on the enterprise was taken with lord Chatham's concurrence, he being then a member of the cabinet.

When his lordship was asked what was now his opinion of the probability of success supposing the army had arrived at the period referred to, his reply is, that he thinks it would have been even then doubtful, but he expressly rests this doubt upon the supposition, that the intelligence received by him alter his arrival in the Scheldt, of the works of Antwerp being completely repaired, was correct, of the truth of which his lordship does not however profess to give any opinion.

General Brownrigg's testimony is much more sanguine as the House will recollect as to the probability of success. And here I may be permitted without disrespect to the noble lord (lord Porchester) to remark on the singularity of his having closed the inquiry into this transaction (as far as depended upon him) without having deemed it necessary to examine either the quarter master general of the army, the chief engineer, or the officer commanding the artillery, every man acquainted with military subjects must be aware that without the information of the officers at the head of these departments no clear or adequate conception can be formed of any military operation, more particularly of one so complicated in its movements as that under consideration, and depending so much for its ultimate success upon the more scientific branches of the service.

The House must feel, I am persuaded, how much they would have lost had they been deprived of testimony so important and delivered with such uncommon clearness and professional ability as the evidence of gen. Brownrigg.

I think I do not assert too much in saying that without the aid of his information both parole and documentary, our means of judging upon this case would have been wholly incomplete, and it is no disparagement to the other distinguished officers, who have been examined upon this subject, to assert, that none have given, none could give a view of the subject so methodical and so comprehensive as that which fen. Brownrigg has furnished to the House. I do therefore rest and am justified in resting much, as far as authority can weigh in such a case in the opinions stated by gen. Brownrigg. The House cannot fail to have read his evidence with attention, it would be doing it injustice to attempt to give, a summary of it, but upon the point immediately under consideration, general Brownrigg has distinctly declared, that he was, previous to the sailing of the Expedition, and still continues to be of opinion, that there was a fair prospect of success, had the armament arrived early in August at Santvliet. Such is the case upon which the noble lord (Porchester) has thought fit to propose for the adoption of the House a Vote of Censure, calculated to inflict disgrace if not punishment on all concerned in advising the late Expedition to the Scheldt: and upon what ground?

Is it that we have failed of success, when it has been proved that the failure arose out of causes, which those who framed the Expedition could neither foresee nor controul?

Is it that the plan was ill imagined, or the armament defective and inadequate? That the former was the best calculated to secure success, which under all circumstances could have been devised, has never been questioned; and the latter has been admitted to have been complete and perfect in all its parts.

Is it that due diligence was not used to procure information of the numbers and defences of the enemy? No, the intelligence upon which government acted was ample; its authenticity has been confirmed, as far as it related to the force of the enemy; whilst its accuracy with respect to the defences of Antwerp, although contradicted in some points, has in no instance been actually disproved.

What then has been our offence, that we undertook an operation which we cannot now indisputably prove must have succeeded in all its parts, if prosecuted to a close; are we then to understand, that such is the principle hereafter to be imposed, under the authority of parliament, upon the military counsels of the crown? The fate that awaits the ministers who acted, in the case under consideration, is of comparatively little importance, but the effects of such a principle would be fatal indeed to the future prospects of the country.

In what page of our history, has the noble lord convinced himself, that the interests of the empire would best be consulted by banishing enterprize in war from the service? has it been by the observance of such a principle that our naval power has been raised to its present preeminence? or that the triumphs of our army have been brought to rival those of our navy? was it under the cold maxims of such cautionary principles, that Nelson fought and died, and bequeathed that example to the navy, which must make them for ever invincible? when he attacked at Copenhagen, was his decision taken upon such maxims? was it at Aboukir, when he exposed his ships on an unknown coast, between the shore and the enemy's fleet? or at Trafalgar when he bore down in two columns on the enemy, one third superior to his own fleet in number, exposing his ships to be raked during their advance, by the opposing line, and with orders not to open their fire, till they had passed through and brought up to leeward of their respective opponents?

Was it such principles as these which animated Wolfe when he ascended and stormed the heights of Quebec in presence of a superior army acting in defence of a fortified place? had such principles prevailed in the late war, would lord Melville have dared to send the army he did to expel a superior enemy from Egypt, or should we in this war have so gloriously triumphed as Maida, and at Vimiera?

Fallen indeed would be the greatness of this country, and irreparable its fate, if such notions should be tolerated. Shall a British House of Commons thus lay the chilling hand of death upon the rising energies and accumulating glories of our fleets and armies? doubly humiliating would it be to every British heart, whilst impatient; at such a doom, to learn, that they owed this act of national suicide to the degeneracy of their own councils.

I am not contending for rash and improvident exposures of the public force. I have argued that such a charge does not fairly lay against the operation in question; but what I do contend against is, the principle, that nothing shall be undertaken unless every circumstance bearing upon the operation can be previously ascertained, and that nothing shall be risked unless success can be demonstrated to be inevitable.

If you wish to know what prospect of success you really had, in the enemy's judgment at least, look at the measures of precaution he has ordered to be adopted for securing Antwerp, since the attempt was abandoned. Why all these efforts to guard against a danger which never had existence? It is natural for the French ruler to endeavour to disguise from his subjects the degree to which his improvident rashness, his licentious ambition, his usurpations in Spain and his campaigns on the Danube, have exposed the vital interests and dignity of the empire, and whilst he cannot conceal the disaffection of some even of his own departments, the Moniteur, as it is accustomed to do and as it has lately done with respect to the carripaign in Spain, will circulate those exaggerations of his power and resources, which may serve to cover his improvidence in France, and to mislead the people of England with respect to the conduct of their government.

But fortunately the essential facts of this transaction rest upon proofs not to be disputed, upon these I confidently rest the decision of the question. Had the government acted differently, heavy indeed would have been their responsibility; wich such means and such a prospect of striking a blow; what justification of inactivity could they have pleaded? What would have been the verdict of their opposers had they brought forward' such a defence, as might have been framed out of the materials upon which they are now inculpated? Could they have justified themselves upon the speculative difficulties of the attempt for having left an ally unsupported, and a naval arsenal of such magnitude unassailed? The claims of Austria alone would have justified the attempt; its naval policy, independent of all continental motives, rendered it a paramount duty; but when both considerations were combined, hesitation would have been criminal, and whatever might have been the judgment of the House upon such a case, in my own estimation I must have stood irretrievably condemned and disgraced. The government that under such circumstances would not risk the public force, must have been pronounced to be utterly unfit for their situations. I am sure it would have required more than ordinary charity not to suspect that they trembled for their offices, and dreaded the political, rather than the military consequences of failure.

Whatever may be the decision of the House (of which however I cannot bring myself to doubt,) I feel conscious that I have in common with the other servants of the crown done my duty, and however we may have failed in securing for the country all the advantages for which we contended, were it the last act of my life I should pride myself upon the share I have borne in this important transaction.

The House now resounded with cries of "Adjourn," when

rose, and remarked, that the noble lord, in the commencement of his speech, had pleased to observe, that there was a spirit existing on his side of the House, which was determined to draw out in an unfriendly manner every thing relative to the Expedition. In this assertion, however, he was not borne out, for from that side he had experienced much lenity. The noble Lord had said, that the conduct of his Majesty's ministers was to be decided by military opinion. If so, be asked why they were not guided by them? and if they differed, why not consult the practical and scientific knowledge of others? What end could be obtained, if the opinions of all were set at defiance?—The noble lord had said, that all were not encouraging; if he had said that all were discouraging it would have been more likely. There was scarce an officer in his Majesty's service who would say that the Expedition was undertaken with any probability of success. If the noble lord had received any information, and did not communicate it he was guilty of a great breach of his duty. In lord Chatham s instructions, the proposed and prime object was the attack on the fleet at Antwerp, together with the destruction of the arsenal, &c. at that place; but on the contrary, the noble lord had alleged, that it was for the purpose of giving Austria a chance of success in her struggle with France. The noble lord says that the scheme was merely tried, and the Expedition was not prosecuted. Whatever might be the consequence of lord Chatham's not landing at Bathz, whatever the combined hostility of land and sea might effect, was the House now to determine on that which had never been attempted. His feelings were excited for the inhabitants of the north of Germany, and not for the troops of his country, who were sent out to perish there, in all the miseries of neglect and sickness. The noble lord said, that no failure was to be attributed but that which must always result from risk. Here he differed from what appeared on examination, which expressly proved, that it was necessary fortune should declare in every respect on our side. Did he think that to be the common chance of war, when on the failure of one point the ruin of the whole succeeded? Can he defend the prodigality and folly of this Expedition by calling on the feelings and spirit of the House? But on this subject it was competent for every one in that House to judge. He first said that the capture of Cads and was necessary for the completion of the Expedition; this on a second assertion was contradicted. Our army cannot be trusted on the continent, for a melancholy reason, because our pecuniary circumstances are such that we cannot pay them there. The taunts of the French are now, one might say, realized, when they call us a nation of shopkeepers and money-lenders; not of warriors and lovers of our country. The noble lord had alleged that the garrison of Antwerp was composed of custom house officers and workmen, but in this he was mistaken, for an account of the 26th of Aug. states, that there were in it 26,000 of disciplined men.—Here the hon. member was interrupted with cries of "Adjourn!" when, after a few moments, he remarked that most of the members had left the House, and as he had so much to say, he should defer it till to-morrow. It was then moved that the House do adjourn; and an adjournment accordingly took place at half-past two.