rits of the assembly into account, we need not be surprised at their yielding unanimous consent to his proposal. A flag of truce was sent out accordingly, and on condition that the Austrians should evacuate the bridgehead and retire to the left bank of the Bormida, Napoleon granted a suspension of arms for forty-eight hours, willing to enter into a negotiation that promised far greater results than any which had yet been achieved in the field.

The Austrian negotiator had, at first, only authority to offer the restitution of Piedmont and Genoa, and as an English army was daily expected to arrive at the latter place, these terms would probably have been accepted had further concessions been resolutely declined; but Napoleon insisting on the line of the Po and the Mincio, his demand was complied with, and the convention of Alessandria signed on the very day after the battle. By this act, Lombardy, Piedmont, and the Riviera, together with the fortresses of Turin, Coni, Alessandria, Tortona, Genoa, Pizzightone, Savona, Piacenza, Mailam, Čeva, Arona, and Urbino, which, if properly defended, might have arrested armies during entire campaigns, were given up without a blow or effort. Nothing equal to this illfated convention had ever before been known in military history; it remained for subsequent events to give it the appearance of an absolute deed of heroism.

The result of this treaty, which again placed Italy under the dominion of France, lent a lustre to the battle of Marengo and the passage of the Alps far exceeding any reflected from the brightest military actions performed in modern times. And Napoleon, conscious that arms could effect nothing greater for the moment, made from the very battlefield itself proposals of peace to the Austrian government. Having despatched these by Count St. Julian, an Austrian officer, he set out for Milan to reorganise the Cisalpine republic. He was received with acclamations, and attended divine service in the cathedral, when Te Deum was sung for the victory gained. "It was the first religious ceremony," says Norvins, "at which he had been present, since he presided in Egypt

over the festival of Mahommet." During his stay at Milan, the restorer of the liberties of nations and the reformer of morals, acted in a manner hardly consistent with the character so liberally ascribed to him by biographers. Marchesi, a wretched singer, refused to sing before the First Consul, and having expressed himself with silly impertinence on the occasion, was, properly enough, perhaps, kicked out of the apartment. Not satisfied with this, however, Napoleon sent an order for him to be thrown into prison :—a regular lettre de cachet, worthy of the old Bastile days, sent by the chief magistrate of one republic and the restorer of others, to punish a musician for refusing to sing a song!

The attention publicly shewn to Madame Grassini, the celebrated vocalist, we should not have noticed, had it not been the custom of biographers to extol Napoleon for his scrupulous attention to decorum.

Resuming his journey, the Consul reached the Tuileries on the 3d of July. The enthusiasm of the Parisians was boundless. Success so vast, brilliant, and unexpected, seemed to change all political opinions and animosities into an idolatrous admiration of the fortunate conqueror. Day after day the palace was surrounded by crowds cager to obtain a moment's sight of the man whose actions, seen through the dazzling halo that victory casts around the events of war, appeared to border almost on the fabulous.

As the campaign of Marengo is generally looked upon as furnishing brilliant evidence of the great military genius ascribed to the French emperor, it will be right here to enter into some examination of its merits.

Early in May, and a month before the fall of Genoa, the Consul had assembled 60,000 men on the Swiss side of the Alps. He knew how long Massena would be able to hold out, and was, of course, fully aware that 60,000 men, mostly tried soldiers, thrown into the scale, would be sure, as affairs stood in Italy, to turn the balance at once in favour of the French. On this point there could not be a shadow of doubt. Under these circumstances, the shortest, simplest, and most evident course seemed to be a junction with Thurau

and Suchet, and an advance with these united forces to the relief of Genoa, leaving Moncey to cross the St. Gothard. As Melas could not, after the reduction of Genoa and his junction with Ott and Kaim, assemble more than 30,000 men for the battle of Marengo, it is evident that he would not before the surrender of Massena, and before Ott's troops were disposable, have been able to collect a force capable of facing the army that might have been brought to act against him.

The toilsome march over the St. Bernard, the difficult passage under Fort Bard, and all the hazards encountered in this boasted undertaking, only brought Napoleon into the plains of Chiavasso, which he could have reached with far greater facility, and with greater numbers, by joining Thurau. The march upon Milan is still more extraordinary. It allowed Genoa to fall, placed the remnants of Ott's corps at the disposal of Melas, and gave the Austrian time to collect his dispersed forces, while it did not place an additional soldier at the disposal of Napoleon, who fought his decisive battle with 28,000 men, while he had 80,000 scattered up and down the country. That by the position of these detached corps he cut off Melas' retreat to Mantua is probably true; but by his own position he also cut himself off from all communication with France: and in a hostile country, surrounded by numerous fortresses, it is not easy to see what could have saved his army from complete destruction had the battle of Marengo been lost, as so nearly proved the case. All these boasted strategical movements tended in nothing whatever to augment the chances of victory in the field, where their value was ultimately to be tried; and not effecting this object, they must naturally be condemned, independent of the hazards to which they exposed the army and the success of the enterprise. That the circumstances under which the battle was fought-Moncey on the Adda, Napoleon to the south of Alessandria-the results of victory were sure to be heightened is certain; but the results must have been heightened to either party, and Napoleon's previous movements tended in nothing to augment his chances of success,

and to double the stakes is no proof of the skill of the player.

As to the battle itself, it offers no evidence whatever of military skill, nor of anything but great gallantry on the part of the French officers and soldiers, and a firm resolution to fight it out to the last. The slow pursuit of the Austrians, which allowed Dessaix to arrive and the retiring troops to form around him, together with a single charge of cavalry, which Napoleon did not even order, decided the fate of the day and of the campaign. The Austrians were guilty of some extraordinary faults. By an unaccountable miscalculation of time and distance they believed Suchet, who was before Savona, to be at Aqui, and, as we have seen, detached 2300 cavalry in that direction on the very morning of the battle. About noon, and after the first success had been gained, Count O'Reily with his division of infantry proceeded to Frugarolo, to observe the same phantom host. And, lastly, when fortune had turned, and when the French army were in pursuit, and, as eye-witnesses allow, in such total confusion that 2000 men could nowhere be assembled round their colours, the flanking corps of Ott and O'Reily, that were in perfect order, retired without striking one blow at the disordered mass, which, in the darkness of night, that always magnifies the foe, and in a state of complete disorganisation into which their hurried advance had thrown them, would probably have been dispersed by the slightest effort. Add to these great errors on the part of the Austrians the advantages which, in point of personal position and the description of his troops, Napoleon formerly possessed over Beaulieu, and which he now possessed in a far greater degree over Melas, and we shall easily understand how his army vanquished an equal number of adversaries, without any great degree of military genius being necessarily evinced on the occasion. The shameful and now well-known attempt to forge a little fame on this occasion, shews that he was not altcgether unconscious of this himself. In General Berthier's Relation de la Bataille de Marengo, written by Napoleon's order, and under his very inspection, the flight, or rather the

retreat, of the French from Marengo to San Giuliano, is neither flight nor retreat, but a grand conception of the Consul's, who threw back the left of the army towards San Giuliano while resting the right on the village of Castel-Ceriolo. In all languages a number of writers have repeated this idle fable, though its utter folly should have been apparent at the very first glance; and not only were the Austrians in possession of Castel-Ceriolo, but General Ott's division, which had captured it in the morning, was actually advancing along the road from the village to La Ghilina at the very time this pretended movement must have been made. The Austrians must, therefore, as a single look at the map will shew, have passed close along the rear of this new French line must have brushed the very knapsacks of the soldiers of whom it was composed!

But if the passage of the St. Bernard deserve far more blame than praise as a military operation, the reverse is the case if considered as a political one; for if its object were to dazzle and astonish with a view to aid in Napoleon's elevation, then certainly nothing could be better calculated. The novelty of the undertaking, its real and exaggerated difficulties, the march of an army

over the lofty barriers of snow and ice that cover the highest summits of the Alps, the breaking into the fair fields of Italy from the seats of eternal frost, and bursting on the astonished foe, as the avalanche bursts from the lofty regions whence the invaders descended, had something striking and romantic that could not, if attended with success, fail to captivate the easily excited imaginations of the French people. It offered the Parisians subjects for description and declamation; “enabled them," as the German historian, Schlösser, the extravagant admirer of Napoleon, says, "to praise their own nation, according to custom, beyond all bounds and measure;” and tended naturally to make them idolise the man who, to be the first among the French, had performed actions that, as represented, seemed almost to border on the miraculous. If looked upon in this point of view, and as a road towards a crown, for which every thing was to be risked, then the passage of the St. Bernard was a great conception. If it be examined as a strategical monument, and tried by the fate of Genoa, the small army brought into the field of Marengo, and by the situation of affairs at one o'clock on the decisive battle-day, then it is little, indeed.

SIR,-As it may not be altogether uninteresting to "gentlemen of England, who live at home at ease," to read a little of the field-sports of the land we live in, I am instructed to acquaint you that here, in Ceylon, we flatter ourselves that, amongst many other good things, we are indulged with the very best elephantshooting in the world; and that we hold it meet, with your good leave (since none of our better qualified predecessors have done so), to place on record a few observations upon the sport, illustrating the general remarks we make by a diary of one of the very best of our excursions.

Excepting for some miles inland from the line of coast between Chilaw and Tangalle, and in the immediate neighbourhood of very thickly inhabited localities, elephants are to be met with in every part of Ceylon. Not always, certainly, in the same numbers at the same places, but you will never go far without hearing of them; and there are extensive tracts of country in which they abound at almost all seasons. They are met with singly, more commonly in herds of from three to twelve or twenty, and sometimes in more numerous herds, which are spoken of as amounting even to hundreds; and they are found indifferently on all descriptions of ground-on the hills and plains in the open country, and equally in forest or in bush jungle.

The average height of the fullgrown Ceylon elephant is upwards of eight feet. Their sight is very defective, but their hearing seems good, and their sense of smell particularly acute. It is always advisable to get to leeward of them if possible; and directly you hear or approach them, even on the stillest days, you will see the natives crumbling the gossamer grass and dropping it from their raised hands, or adopting other modes of ascertaining if there be any movement in the air. They vary exceedingly in courage, from the beast which will run from any alarm, to the one which will resolutely advance on the fire of a whole party. But they are very much more commonly timid than

courageous: of course, when wounded, many of them become savage, and as troublesome as they can make themselves, though it is remarked that they are inconceivably stupid in dealing with unfortunate gentlemen, and, so far as our Ceylon records go, it is certain that (though a mere stamp of the foot would be death) at least three-fourths of those who fall into the clutches of an elephant escape with a mauling. The last gentlemen sportsmen killed by elephants in this island were Mr. Wallett and (longo intervallo) Major Haddick, while Messrs. M'Kenzie, Holyoake, George, Gallwey, and Major Rogers have been severely wounded by them, luckily escaping with more or less damage. Of course, a very great number of men are saved from accidents by their brother sportsmen. Elephants are generally bolder on open ground than in cover, but, if bold, far more dangerous in cover than in open ground. In the first instance they see their antagonist, and he looks no great things compared to themselves. Sometimes, in open ground, they appear to hesitate as you are coming up, and then turn when you are within twenty paces; but very often, if you are not followed by a posse that frightens them, they stand or huddle together, and when you are very close, one or two of them come on to meet you. In cover they most commonly hear you coming up, and at the sound, or when they see the cover stir, they go off; or if you contrive to come up very well in very thick jungle, after seeing their legs at four or five yards from you, you may, by creeping on another pace, catch their small eyes peering down to make you out; but before your gun is up to your shoulder they will be off, with a crash that seems to be levelling every thing around you. There are, however, exceptions to these rules; and they furnish most of the critical predicaments in which elephant-shots have been placed, as may be readily conceived when it is remembered how close you must be to fire, and that the jungle which hems you, and with its thorns hooks you, in all

round, is trampled down like stubble by the elephant that rushes on you. It is, in truth, a very uncertain sport as regards danger; but in open ground, if all fails, you have free and fair use of your legs, and a man in elephant-shooting may calculate on having sometimes to run, for reasons quite as satisfactory to his amour propre as Bardolph's at Gad's or Claverhouse's at Loudon Hill. The most favourable ground for shooting is very open jungle, where you can approach without being heard or seen, and make way through it in the event of a retreat. Opinions differ widely as to the pace of the elephant; but I find all men who have been chased unanimously agree that they run fast, and that he does cleverly who gets away from them.

The practice in Ceylon is to fire invariably at the head, the favourite shots being above the trunk, at the temples, the hollow over the eye, and the hollow at the back of the ear; in all cases bearing in mind the size and position of the brain, and levelling so as to go directly to it through these weaker parts of the skull. In the opinion of the first shot in Ceylon, fifteen paces is decidedly the best distance to fire. It gives time for a second shot; whereas, when you let an elephant come quite close, if the first shot does not drop him, and he rushes on, the second will be a very hurried and most likely ineffectual one, and if not effective, the retreat will commence with the disadvantage of a very short start. It is, however, certain that, what with the closeness of cover and the desire in open ground to be sure of your bird, most first shots are fired at about ten paces, and occasionally closer. Men don't like to hear their friends say, "It's a pity you didn't go a little nearer before you fired." A shot that goes true to the brain drops an elephant off the gun; but nothing is more common than to see them take a dozen shots and go away, and they have been known to take many more, and afterwards fairly to defeat the party opposed to them. There is a wide difference of opinion as to the most deadly shot. I think the temple the most certain; but authority in Ceylon says the fronter. It is the prettiest shot, no

doubt, but I have seen it very often fail. Behind the ear, they say, is deadly; but I never fired it, or saw it fired, that I remember. If the ball go critically true to its mark, all shots are certain; but the bones on either side of the honeycomb passages to the brain are so thick that there is in all a glorious uncertainty, which keeps a man on the qui vive till he sees his elephant down, and even that does not insure results. Elephants, after being left for dead, and their tails cut off, are often seen up again, and, like "the Old Original Coach and Horses new revived" on the Harrow Road, flourishing in active business.

There are not many elephant-shots who have not been foolish enough in their day to go up to an elephant with a single and only barrel; but this is generally before they have seen a scrape. I should say a man was perfectly gunned for elephantshooting with three doubles, carrying balls fourteen or sixteen to the pound, with the same bore, nipple, &c. The ball, one-third pewter, should go down with moderate pressure over a charge and a-half of powder, and the caps ought to fit exactly. I have been minus three caps out of four barrels when before a herd. Many elephant-shots affect heavy guns. I think them utter nuisances: their weight fags you and heats you, and at times you find yourself before an elephant with scarce power to lift them. I remember once coming hurriedly on an elephant with nothing but a single bush between us, and firing a shot from my heavy Nock, which, instead of the temple, struck the ear of the animal, when she turned slap on me, and I literally was not able to get the infernal patteraro up to my shoulder a second time before she almost had hold of it. I fired as I was raising it, and of course did her no harm. I had to bolt. In ten seconds I was down-her trunk twiddling about my legs, and, but for a friend who came up at the moment, and floored her as she was on her knees paying every possible attention to me, I should most probably have been expended. I have since found myself more than half dead after a pursuit, in which I had carried a heavy gun; and as light ones