The employment was highly perilous, not only from the hazards of being blown up, or buried in the conflagration, but from the resistance of the populace and galley-slaves, besides that of the troops, who, on the retreat of the English, were ready to pour into the town. His force, too, was trifling, consisting only of the little vessel which he had purchased at Smyrna, three British gun-boats, and three Spanish. But the operation was gallantly performed. The stores of the arsenal were set on fire; a fireship was towed into the middle of the French fleet, and all was soon one immense mass of flame: perhaps war never exhibited a scene more terribly sublime. Thirteen sail of the line, with all the storehouses, were blazing together. The French, too, began to fire from the hills, and the English gun-boats returned the fire with discharges of grapeshot on the troops as they came rushing down to the gates of the arsenal. All was uproar and explosion.
The most melancholy part of the whole narrative is the atrocious vengeance of the Republicans on gaining possession. An anecdote of this scene of horror, and of the especial treachery of Napoleon, is given on the authority of Sir Sidney.
"The Royalist inhabitants, or the chief portion of them, had been driven into the great square of the town, and compressed there into one huge mass. Napoleon then discharged his artillery upon them, and mowed them down. But as many had thrown themselves on the ground to escape the grapeshot, and many were only wounded, this villain of villains cried out aloud,--'The vengeance of the Republic is satisfied, rise and go to your homes.' But the wretched people no sooner stood up than they received another discharge of his guns, and were all massacred. If any one act of man ever emulated the work of the devil, this act, by its mingled perfidy and cruelty, was the one."
It is impossible to read the life of this intrepid and active officer, without seeing the encouragement which it holds forth to enterprise. In this sense it ought to have a part in the recollections of every soldier and sailor of England. Sir Sidney had perhaps rivals by the thousand in point of personal valour and personal intelligence; but the source of all his distinctions was, his never losing sight of his profession, and never losing an opportunity of service. On this principle we may account for every step of his career, and on no other. He appears to have had no parliamentary interest, no ministerial favour, no connexion of any kind which could essentially promote his interest, and even to have been somewhat neglected by admirals under whom he served. But he never lost an opportunity of being present where any thing was to be done, and of doing his best. It was this which produced even from the formal English admiral a note of this order, written on the evening of the conflagration,--