_ BOOK XIX. FRIEDRICH LIKE TO BE OVERWHELMED IN THE SEVEN-YEARS WAR--1759-1760
(Chapter VIII cont.)
__GRAND FRENCH INVASION-SCHEME COMES ENTIRELY TO WRECK (Quiberon Bay, 20th November, 1759): OF CONTROLLER-GENERAL SILHOUETTE, AND THE OUTLOOKS OF FRANCE, FINANCIAL AND OTHER
On the very day of Maxen, Tuesday, November 20th, the grand French Invasion found its terminus,--not on the shores of Britain, but of Brittany, to its surprise. We saw Rodney burn the Flat-bottom manufactory at Havre; Boscawen chase the Toulon Squadron, till it ended on the rocks of Lagos. From January onwards, as was then mentioned, Hawke had been keeping watch, off Brest Harbor, on Admiral Conflans, who presides there over multifarious preparations, with the last Fleet France now has. At Vannes, where Hawke likewise has ships watching, are multifarious preparations; new Flat-bottoms, 18,000 troops,--could Conflans and they only get to sea. At the long last, they did get;--in manner following:--
"November 9th, a wild gale of wind had blown Hawke out of sight; away home to Torbay, for the moment. 'Now is the time!' thought Conflans, and put to sea (November 14th); met by Hawke, who had weighed from Torbay to his duty; and who, of course, crowded every sail, after hearing that Conflans was out. At break of day, November 20th [in the very hours when poor Finck was embattling himself round Maxen, and Daun sprawling up upon him through the Passes], Hawke had had signal, 'A Fleet in sight;' and soon after, 'Conflans in sight,'--and the day of trial come.
"Conflans is about the strength of Hawke, and France expects much of him; but he is not expecting Hawke. Conflans is busy, at this moment, in the mouth of Quiberon Bay, opening the road for Vannes and the 18,000;--in hot chase, at the moment, of a Commodore Duff and his small Squadron, who have been keeping watch there, and are now running all they can. On a sudden, to the astonishment of Conflans, this little Squadron whirls round, every ship of it (with a sky-rending cheer, could he hear it), and commences chasing! Conflans, taking survey, sees that it is Hawke; he, sure enough, coming down from windward yonder at his highest speed; and that chasing will not now be one's business!--
"About 11 A.M. Hawke is here; eight of his vanward ships are sweeping on for action. Conflans, at first, had determined to fight Hawke; and drew up accordingly, and did try a little: but gradually thought better of it; and decided to take shelter in the shoaly coasts and nooks thereabouts, which were unknown to Hawke, and might ruin him if he should pursue, the day being short, and the weather extremely bad. Weather itself almost to be called a storm. 'Shoreward, then; eastward, every ship!' became, ultimately, Conflans's plan. On the whole, it was 2 in the afternoon before Hawke, with those vanward Eight, could get clutch of Conflans. And truly he did then strike his claws into him in a thunderously fervid manner, he and all hands, in spite of the roaring weather:--a man of falcon, or accipitral, nature as well as name.
"Conflans himself fought well; as did certain of the others,--all, more or less, so long as their plan continued steady:--thunderous miscellany of cannon and tempest; Conflans with his plan steady, or Conflans with his plan wavering, VERSUS those vanward Eight, for two hours or more. But the scene was too dreadful; this ship sinking, that obliged to strike; things all going awry for Conflans. Hawke, in his own Flagship, bore down specially on Conflans in his,--who did wait, and exchange a couple of broadsides; but then sheered off, finding it so heavy. French Vice-Admiral next likewise gave Hawke a broadside; one only, and sheered off, satisfied with the return. Some Four others, in succession, did the like; 'One blast, as we hurry by' (making for the shore, mostly)! So that Hawke seemed swallowed in volcanoes (though, indeed, their firing was very bad, such a flurry among them), and his Blue Flag was invisible for some time, and various ships were hastening to help him,--till a Fifth French ship coming up with her broadside, Hawke answered her in particular (LA SUPERBE, a Seventy-four) with all his guns together; which sent the poor ship to the bottom, in a hideously sudden manner. One other (the THESEE) had already sunk in fighting; two (the SOLEIL and the HEROS) were already running for it,--the HEROS in a very unheroic manner! But on this terrible plunge-home of the SUPERBE, the rest all made for the shore;--and escaped into the rocky intricacies and the darkness. Four of Conflans's ships were already gone,--struck, sunk, or otherwise extinct,--when darkness fell, and veiled Conflans and his distresses. 'Country people, to the number of 10,000,' crowded on the shore, had been seen watching the Battle; and, 'as sad witnesses of the White Flag's disgrace,' disappeared into the interior." [Beatson, ii. 327-345: and Ib. iii. 244-250. In
Gentleman's Magazine, (xxix. 557), "A Chaplain's Letter," &c.]
It was such a night as men never witnessed before. Walpole says: "The roaring of the elements was redoubled by the thunder from our ships; and both concurred in that scene of horror to put a period to the Navy and hopes of France. Seven ships of the line got into the River Vilaine [lay there fourteen months, under strict watching, till their backs were broken, "thumping against the shallow bottom every tide," and only "three, with three frigates," ever got out again]; eight more escaped to different ports," into the River Charente ultimately. "Conflans's own ship and another were run on shore, and burnt. One we took." Two, with their crews, had gone to the bottom; one under Hawke's cannon; one partly by its own mismanagement. "Two of ours were lost in the storm [chasing that SOLEIL and HEROS], but the crews saved. Lord Howe, who attacked LA FORMIDABLE, bore down on her with such violence, that her prow forced in his lower tier of guns. Captain Digby, in the DUNKIRK, received the fire of twelve of the enemy's ships, and lost not a man. Keppel's was full of water, and he thought it sinking: a sudden squall emptied his ship; but he was informed all his powder was wet; 'Then,' said he, 'I am sorry I am safe.' They came and told him a small quantity was undamaged; 'Very well,' said he; 'then attack again.' Not above eight of our ships were engaged in obtaining that decisive victory. The Invasion was heard of no more." [Walpole,
George Second, iii. 232.--Here is the List, accurately riddled out: 1. FORMIDABLE, struck (about 4 P.M.): 2. THESEE, sunk (by a tumble it made, while in action, under an unskilful Captain): 3. SUPERBE, sunk: 4. HEROS, struck; could not he boarded, such weather; and recommenced next day, but had to run and strand itself, and be burnt by the English;--as did (5.) the SOLEIL ROYAL (Conflans's Flagship), Conflans and crew (like those of the HEROS) getting out in time.]
Invasion had been fully intended, and even, in these final days, considerably expected. In the old London Newspapers we read this notice: MONDAY, NOVEMBER 19th: "To-day there came Three Expresses,"--Three Expresses, with what haste in their eyes, testifying successively of Conflans's whereabouts. But it was believed that Hawke would still manage. And, at any rate, Pitt wore such a look,--and had, in fact, made such preparation on the coasts, even in failure of Hawke,--there was no alarm anywhere. Indignation rather;--and naturally, when the news did come, what an outburst of Illumination in the windows and the hearts of men!
"Hawke continued watching the mouths of the Vilaine and Charente Rivers for a good while after, and without interruption henceforth,--till the storms of Winter had plainly closed them for one season. Supplies of fresh provisions had come to him from England all Summer; but were stopped latterly by the wild weather. Upon which, in the Fleet, arose this gravely pathetic Stave of Sea-Poetry, with a wrinkle of briny humor grinning in it:--
Till Hawke did bang Monsieur Conflans [CONGFLANG],
You sent us beef and beer;
Now Monsieur's beat, we've nought to eat,
Since you have nought to fear." [Beatson, ii. 342 n.]
The French mode of taking this catastrophe was rather peculiar. Hear Barbier, an Eye-witness; dating PARIS, DECEMBER, 1759: "Since the first days of December, there has been cried, and sold in the streets, a Printed Detail of all that concerns the GRAND INVASION projected this long while: to wit, the number of Ships of the Line, of Frigates, Galiots,--among others 500 Flat-bottomed Boats, which are to carry over, and land in England, more than 54,000 men;--with list of the Regiments, and number of the King's Guards, that are also to go: there are announced for Generals-in-Chief, M. le Prince de Conti [do readers remember him since the Broglio-Maillebois time, and how King Louis prophesied in autograph that he would be "the Grand Conti" one day?]--Prince de Conti, Prince de Soubise [left his Conquest of Frankfurt for this greater Enterprise], and Milord Thomont [Irish Jacobite, whom I don't know]. As sequel to this Detail, there is a lengthy Song on the DISEMBARKMENT IN ENGLAND, and the fear the English must have of it!" Calculated to astonish the practical forensic mind.
"It is inconceivable", continues he, "how they have permitted such a Piece to be printed; still more to be cried, and sold price one halfpenny (DEUX LIARDS). This Song is indecent, in the circumstances of the actual news from our Fleet at Brest (20th of last month);--in regard to which bad adventure M. le Marquis de Conflans has come to Versailles, to justify himself, and throw the blame on M. le Marquis de Beauffremont [his Rear-Admiral, now safe in the Charente, with eight of our poor ships]. Such things are the more out of place, as we are in a bad enough position,--no Flat-bottoms stirring from the ports, no Troops of the MAISON DU ROI setting out; and have reason to believe that we are now to make no such attempt." [Barbier, iv. 336.]
Silhouette, the Controller-General, was thought to have a creative genius in finance: but in the eighth month of his gestation, what phenomena are these? October 26th, there came out Four Decrees of Council, setting forth, That, "as the expenses of the War exceed not only the King's ordinary revenues, but the extraordinaries he has had to lay on his people, there is nothing for it but," in fact, Suspension of Payment; actual Temporary Bankruptcy:--"Cannot pay you; part of you not for a year, others of you not till the War end; will give you 5 per cent interest instead." Coupled with which, by the same creative genius, is a Declaration in the King's name, "That the King compels nobody, but does invite all and sundry of loyal mind to send their Plate (on loan, of course, and with due receipt for it) to the Mint to be coined, lest Majesty come to have otherwise no money,"--his very valets, as is privately known, having had no wages from him for ten months past.
Whereupon the rich Princes of the Blood, Due d'Orleans foremost, and Official persons, Pompadour, Belleisle, Choiseul, do make an effort; and everybody that has Plate feels uneasily that he cannot use it, and that he ought to send it. And, November 5th, the King's own Plate, packed ostentatiously in carts, went to the Mint;--the Dauphiness, noble Saxon Lady, had already volunteered with a silver toilet-table of hers, brand-new and of exquisite costly pattern; but the King forbade her. On such examples, everybody had to make an effort, or uneasily try to make one. King Friedrich, eight days after Maxen, is somewhat amused at these proceedings in the distance:--
"The kettles and spoons of the French seem to me a pleasant resource, for carrying on War!" writes he to D'Argens. ["Wilsdruf, 28th November, 1759,"
OEuvres de Frederic, xix. 108.] "A bit of mummery to act on the public feeling, I suppose. The result of it will be small: but as the Belleisle LETTERS [taken in Contades's baggage, after Minden, and printed by Duke Ferdinand for public edification] make always such an outcry about poverty, those people are trying to impose on their enemies, and persuade them that the carved and chiselled silver of the Kingdom will suffice for making a vigorous Campaign. I see nothing else that can have set them on imagining the farce they are now at. There is Munster taken from them by the English-Hanoverian people; it is affirmed that the French, on the 25th, quitted Giessen, to march on Friedberg and repass the Rhine [might possibly have done so;--but the Hereditary Prince and his 12,000 come to be needed elsewhere!]--Poor we are opposite our enemies here, cantoned in the Villages about; the last truss of straw, the last loaf of bread will decide which of us is to remain in Saxony. And as the Austrians are extremely squeezed together, and can get nothing out of Bohmen,"--one hopes it will not be they!
All through November, this sending of Plate, I never knew with what net-result of moneys coinable, goes on in Paris; till, at the highest tables, there is nothing of silver dishes left;--and a new crockery kind (rather clumsy; "CULS NOIRS," as we derisively call them, pigment of BOTTOM part being BLACK) has had to be contrived instead. Under what astonishments abroad and at home, and in the latter region under what execrations on Silhouette, may be imagined. "TOUT LE MONDE JURE BEAUCOUP CONTRE M. DE SILHOUETTE, All the world swears much against him," says Barbier;--but I believe probably he was much to be pitied: "A creative genius, you; and this is what you come to?"
November 22d, the poor man got dismissed; France swearing at him, I know not to what depth; but howling and hissing, evidently, with all its might. The very tailors and milliners took him up,--trousers without pockets, dresses without flounce or fold, which they called A LA SILHOUETTE:--and, to this day, in France and Continental Countries, the old-fashioned Shadow-Profile (mere outline, and vacant black) is practically called a SILHOUETTE. So that the very Dictionaries have him; and, like bad Count Reinhart, or REYNARD, of earlier date, he has become a Noun Appellative, and is immortalized in that way. The first of that considerable Series of Creative Financiers, Abbe Terray and the rest,--brought in successively with blessings, and dismissed with cursings and hissings,--who end in Calonne, Lomenie de Brienne, and what Mirabeau Pere called "the General Overturn (CULBUTE GENERALE)." Thitherward, privately, straight towards the General Overturn, is France bound;--and will arrive in about thirty years. _