Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia Part 18

Twice, practicable breaches were effected, and the Spaniards, bravely mounting to the a.s.sault, which lasted several days, were repulsed with severe loss; the women of Bonifacio, as well as the priests and monks, vyeing with the townsmen in heroic courage while defending the breaches.

Then, both s.e.xes and every age worked night and day in throwing up barricades and repairing the walls.

In the face of this obstinate defence, Alfonso, despairing of being able to carry the place by a.s.sault, determined on forcing the enemy to surrender from starvation, during a protracted siege; and, still pouring missiles incessantly into the place, he maintained a close blockade by sea and land, drawing chains across the harbour to prevent supplies being thrown in. The corn magazine had been burnt; and the besieged, reduced to the last extremity, were compelled to devour the most loathsome herbs and animals. Many, wounded and helpless, would have been carried off by hunger had not the compa.s.sion of the women afforded them relief; for the kind-hearted women of Bonifacio, we are told, actually offered their b.r.e.a.s.t.s to their brothers, children, blood-relations, and sponsors; and there was no one during the terrible siege of Bonifacio who had not sucked the breast of a woman. They even, it is said, made a cheese of their milk, and sent it to the king, as well as threw bread from the walls, to disguise their state of distress from the Spaniards.

The republic of Genoa, receiving intelligence of the extremity to which its faithful town was reduced, lost no time in fitting out a fleet to convey to its aid a strong reinforcement, with supplies of arms and food; but the season was so stormy that for three months, between September and January (1421), the expedition was detained in the harbour of Genoa.

Meanwhile, the townsmen, almost in despair, listened to the honourable terms offered by the King of Arragon, and at last agreed to capitulate if no relief arrived within forty days. But the king refusing to allow them to send messengers to Genoa, they hastily built a small vessel, and lowering it by ropes from the rock, then let down the devoted crew, who, at every peril, were to convey the magistrates' letters to the senate of Genoa. Followed to the point of rock by mult.i.tudes of the citizens, the women, it is said, by turns offered them their b.r.e.a.s.t.s: food there was little or none to take with them.

After fifteen days of terrible suspense, during which the churches were open from early morning till late at night, the people praying for deliverance from their enemies and for forgiveness of their sins, and going in procession, barefoot, though the winter was severe, from the cathedral of St. Mary to St. Dominic and the other churches, chanting litanies;-at last, when hopes were failing, the little vessel crept under the rock by night, and the crew, giving the signal and being drawn up by ropes, brought the joyful news to the anxious crowd that the Genoese fleet was close at hand. The period for the surrender was come, when sorrow was turned to joy. The bells pealed, fire signals were lighted on all the towers, and shouts of exultation rose to heaven. The Arragonese thundered at the gates, demanding the surrender, for the relieving fleet was not yet descried. The Bonifacians a.s.serted that relief had arrived in the night; and, to countenance the a.s.sertion, there appeared bands of armed men, who marched round the battlements, with glittering lances and armour, and the standard of Genoa at their head; for the women of Bonifacio had put on armour, so that, like the female peasantry of the coast of Cardigan, in their red whittles, when the French landed during the war of the revolution, the force opposed to the enemy was apparently doubled or tripled.

Alfonso of Arragon, seeing this, exclaimed, "Have the Genoese wings, that they can come to Bonifacio when we are keeping a strict blockade by land and by sea?" And again he gave orders for the a.s.sault, and his engines shot a storm of missiles against the place. Three days afterwards, the relieving fleet anch.o.r.ed off the harbour, and some brave Bonifacians, swimming off to the ships, horrified the Genoese by their haggard and famine-worn features. After a terrible fight, which lasted for seven hours-ship jammed against ship in the narrow channel, and the Bonifacians hurling firebrands, harpoons, and all kinds of missiles on such of the enemy's ships as they could reach from the walls and towers-the Genoese burst the chain across the harbour, and unbounded was the joy of the famished townsmen when seven ships, loaded with corn, were safely moored along the Marino. Alfonso of Arragon raised the siege, and, abandoning his enterprise in deep mortification, sailed for Italy.

The citizens of Bonifacio displayed equal heroism in defence of their town in 1554. It was then the turn of Henry IV. of France to invade Corsica. Invited by Sampiero and the other patriot chiefs, the French troops, acting in concert with the island militia, drove the Genoese from all their positions except some fortified places on the coast; while the Turks, the natural enemies of the republic, co-operating with the French, appeared off the island with a powerful fleet, under the command of their admiral, Dragut, and laid siege to Bonifacio.

The defence offered by the townsmen was all the more obstinate from their being inspired with the sentiment that it was a religious duty to fight against the Infidel. Again the women rushed to the ramparts, and fell gloriously in the breach. The Turks had been repulsed with great slaughter in repeated a.s.saults, and Dragut had drawn off his forces to some distance, disconcerted, and almost resolved to raise the siege, when an unexpected occurrence brought it to an end. An inhabitant of Bonifacio was entrusted by the senate of Genoa to carry over a sum of money, and announce the approach of succour to the besieged town.

Landing at Girolata, he was making his way through the island, when, betrayed by one of his guides, he was arrested, and brought to De Thermes, the French general. Means were found of inducing the Genoese emissary to betray his employers. He was instructed to proceed to Bonifacio with Da Mare, a Corsican n.o.ble, and engage the authorities to surrender, informing them that the Genoese could afford them no relief.

The stratagem succeeded. The letters of credence with which the traitor had been furnished at Genoa satisfied the commandant of the truth of his mission, and he consented to deliver up the place to Da Mare, on condition that the town should be saved from pillage, and the soldiers conducted to Bastia, and embarked for Genoa. But when the Turks saw those brave men, who had foiled all their a.s.saults by an obstinate defence, file out of the place, they fell on them, and ma.s.sacred them without mercy. Moreover, Dragut demanded that Bonifacio should be put into his hands, or that he should receive an indemnity of 25,000 crowns. It was impossible to deliver up a town to be sacked by the Turks, the inhabitants of which it was policy to conciliate, nor could De Thermes provide the sum required. He promised, however, speedy payment, and sent his nephew to the Turks as an hostage. Dragut then sailed for the Levant, in dudgeon with his allies, and disgusted with an enterprise which had terminated so little to his honour. Bonifacio, with the rest of Corsica, was soon afterwards restored by the treaty of Chateau-Cambresis to the Genoese, who repaired and considerably added to the fortifications.

One easily conceives that the rock fortress must have been impregnable in ancient times, if bravely defended. Even now it is a place of considerable strength, garrisoned by the French, who have erected barracks and improved the works. But the place still singularly preserves the character of a fortified town of the Middle Ages. Nothing seems changed except that French sentries pace the battlements instead of Genoese. There are the old towers, walls, churches, and houses;-the houses, tall and gloomy, many of them having the arms of Genoese families carved in stone over the portals. A network of narrow and irregular streets spreads over the whole _plateau_ within the walls, which rise from the very edge of the cliffs. There is not a yard of vacant s.p.a.ce, except an esplanade and _place d'armes_, where the promontory narrows at its southern extremity. The only entrance is under the vaulted archway of the barbican, still as jealously guarded as if Saracen, Turk, or Spaniard threatened an attack. This tower commands the approach from the Marino by the broad ramp, a long inclined plane, at a sharp angle, the ascent of which, _en echelon_, by the troops of diminutive mules and a.s.ses employed for conveying all articles necessary for subsistence and use in the town, it was painful to witness. The streets are as void of every kind of vehicle as those of Venice, and almost as unsavoury as its ca.n.a.ls. There is scarcely room for two loaded mules to pa.s.s each other. Every morning, nearly the whole population pours forth, with their beasts of burthen, to their labour in the country, there being no villages in the canton; returning to their homes in the evening. They are an industrious race, s.n.a.t.c.hing their subsistence from a barren soil.

Few strangers visit Bonifacio, and those who do must be content with very indifferent accommodations. We were lodged _au premier_ of a gaunt _locanda_, our last resource, after exploring the place for better quarters. Its best recommendation was the zeal and kindness of the host; and even the resources of his culinary skill, which, I believe, could have produced a _ragout_ from a piece of leather, failed for want of materials on which to exercise it. The supplies of flesh, fowl, and-strange to say-fish, were scanty and bad. The French officers in garrison messed, _en pension_, at our hotel, but their fare, limited by a close economy, was not only meagre, but, with all the accompaniments of the table, absolutely disgusting.

To make matters worse, we were detained several days beyond our allotted time in this ill-provisioned fortress by an unexpected mischance. Armed with Foreign Office pa.s.sports, current at least through the friendly states of France and Sardinia without the slightest hindrance, we had taken the additional precaution of proposing to have them _vise_ by the French and Sardinian Legations in London, that there might be no sort of obstacle to our crossing from one of the two islands in our route to the other. The _vise_ was refused as perfectly unnecessary; and even at Ajaccio, where we pa.s.sed some hours at the _Prefeture_, our pa.s.sports were returned to us on mere inspection. Greatly, however, to our mortification, we discovered, at Bonifacio, that international conventions between friendly governments had no force in this out-of-the-way corner of the civilised world. We could not be allowed to embark for Sardinia without authority from the Administration at Ajaccio, which it would take at least forty-eight hours to procure. All arguments were vain; the Foreign Office pa.s.sport could not be recognised; the orders were precise for a strict _surveillance_ of all persons endeavouring to cross the Straits. As private individuals and English gentlemen, we were on particularly pleasant terms with the _maire_ and his son; but, officially, such was their language, they had nothing to show that we were not brigands meditating escape. Officials generally, and foreign officials especially, are not to be moved by any force of circ.u.mstances from their regular track.

Unwilling to submit, and anxious to get forward, we lost twenty-four hours of precious time in vainly negotiating with the master of a small vessel to smuggle us over. He would be well paid, and we proposed going to some unfrequented part of the coast, from whence he could take us off. But, tempting as the offers were, after much deliberation, they were rejected. Such things were common a short time before, and hundreds of the banditti had been ferried over to the coast of Sardinia; but now there was a sharp look-out, and discovery would be ruin. Insignificant as is the commerce of Bonifacio, it is well watched by a staff of _douaniers_, consisting of a captain, four _sous-officiers_, and thirteen or fourteen _preposes_, _matelots_, &c., besides _officiers de sante_ and swarms of _gendarmes_. They were everywhere: at our landing; while sketching; always in pairs; and seeming to dodge our steps. Two presented themselves while we were at supper the evening after our arrival. The pa.s.sports had been exhibited;-what could they want with us?

what offence had we committed? Their business was with the innkeeper; he had omitted to fix a lantern at his door! He hated the French like a true Corsican. He would not pay even decent respect to the officers, his guests, and boasted of starving them to the last fraction his contract for the mess allowed; while nothing was good enough for the Englishmen.

Pietro was, indeed, a true Corsican; had killed his man, given a _coup_, as he called it, to his enemy, was condemned to death, but bought off.

_Encore_; a man he had offended came to his hotel, and called for food.

They sat down to table in company, Pietro observing that his enemy frequently kept his hand on a side-pocket. After supper, the man asked for a chamber to sleep. Pietro replied that they were all occupied, but he might sleep with him. The other was staggered at his coolness, and, hesitating to comply, Pietro seized him, and finding a pistol secreted on his person, doubled him up, and kicked him down stairs.

Our host was not singular in his disaffection to the French. The Bonifacians feel their thraldom more perhaps than any other people in Corsica, overshadowed as their small population is by a strong garrison and a host of _douaniers_ and _gendarmes_. Republican ideas prevail; and they have not forgotten the days when their important town was more an ally, than a dependance, of Genoa. Now, from their small population, a single deputy represents them in the departmental council, while Ajaccio sends twenty-nine and Bastia twenty-five members. The Bonifacians despise their masters. "The French are inconstant," said an inhabitant, high in office, with whom I was talking politics; "they have _tant de pet.i.tesses_; they have no national character: we have, and you;-our very quarrels, which are deep and lasting, show it."

Everything is primitive in Bonifacio, except the emblems of French domination. On the evening of our arrival, having threaded my way alone with some difficulty through a labyrinth of dark streets and lanes to the Post Office, I found it closed; and there being no apparent means of announcing my errand, was departing in despair, when a neighbour good-humouredly cried out, "_Tirate la corda, signore!_" After some search, for it was getting dark, I discovered a string, running up the wall of the house to the third story. Pulling it l.u.s.tily, at last a window opened, and an old woman put her head out, inquiring, in a shrill voice, "_Que volete?_" Having made known my wants, after some delay, steps were heard slowly descending the stairs. Admitted at length into the _bureau_, the old crone, spectacle on nose, proceeded very deliberately to spell over, by a feeble lamplight, the addresses of a bundle of letters taken from a shelf. The process was excruciating, anxious as we were for news from home. She could make nothing of my friend's truly Saxon name;-what foreign official can ever decipher English names? Mine was more p.r.o.nounceable, and as I kept repeating both, she caught that, and, incapable as I should have thought her of making a pun, she exclaimed at last, in despair, "_Forestier, ecco! sono tutti forestiere_," tossing me the whole bundle to choose for myself.

Happily, I was not disappointed.

We shall not easily forget Bonifacio. Our detention within the narrow bounds of the fortress-town afforded us leisure to realise the scenes which the crowded _enceinte_ must have offered during its memorable sieges. The combined effects, too, of loathsome smells-the filth of the purlieus being indescribable-of bad diet, confinement, and the irritation natural to Englishmen under detention, brought on suddenly severe attacks of diarrha, though we were both before in robust health.

Our sufferings shadowed out, however faintly, the miseries endured by a crowded population during the sieges, and again when half the inhabitants of Bonifacio became victims to the plague in 1582-a scourge which then devastated Corsica and parts of Italy.

Gasping for pure air, we were forbidden by the everwatchful _gendarmes_ to walk on the town ramparts. From early dawn till late evening, the eternal clang of hand cornmills forbade repose in our _locanda_. The neighbouring country has few attractions, even if we had been in a state to profit by them. All interest is concentrated in the place itself. Our steps were therefore especially attracted to the open area forming the southern extremity of the Cape, as already mentioned. There at least we could breathe the fresh air, look down on the blue Mediterranean washing the base of the chalk cliffs, far beneath, and trace the outline of the coast of Sardinia across the Straits. The Gallura mountains rose boldly on the horizon, and the low island of Madalena, our proposed landing-place, was distinctly visible. It needed not that we should indulge imagination in picturing to ourselves Castel Sardo, and other places along the coast, which we hoped soon to visit. The esplanade was generally solitary, and suited our musings. One evening, the silence was broken by a melancholy chant from the chapel of a ruined monastery within the guarded _enceinte_. It was a service for the dead, at which a prostrate crowd a.s.sisted in deep devotion. The sentries on the walls rested on their arms, and we stood at the open door, facing the western sky and the rolling waves, listening to strains of wailing which would have suited the times of the siege and the plague.

[Ill.u.s.tration: OUTLINE OF SARDINIA FROM BONIFACIO.]

Nearer the town stands the old church of the Templars, dedicated to St.

Dominic, of fine Gothic architecture, full of interest for its armorial and other memorials of the knightly defenders of the faith, and of n.o.ble Genoese families. Over the edge of the cliff towers the ma.s.sive _Torrione_, the original fortress of the Marquis Bonifacio, consecrated in memory as long the bulwark of the island against the incursions of Saracen corsairs. Here, is the spot where the hastily-built galley, with its adventurous crew, was lowered down the face of the cliff, to convey to Genoa the intelligence of the extremity to which the citizens of Bonifacio were reduced when besieged by Alfonso of Arragon. There, is a ladder of rude steps, cut in the chalk cliffs to the edge of the water, two hundred feet beneath, the descent of which it made one dizzy to contemplate. Perhaps, under cover of night, the now ruinous steps have been boldly trodden in a sally for surprising the enemy, or stealthily mounted by emissaries from without, conveying intelligence to the beleaguered party. Perhaps, in the Genoese times, some Romeo and Juliet, of rival families, found the means of elopement by this sequestered staircase. One could imagine shrouded figures gliding from the convent church close by-the perilous descent, the light skiff tossing beneath, with its white sails a-peak, waiting to bear off the lovers to freedom and bliss. For what legends and tales of romance, real or imaginary, have we materials here!

[Ill.u.s.tration: CAVE UNDER BONIFACIO.]

It is by sea only that one can escape from Bonifacio, except by miles of dreary road. To the sea we looked for ours. _En attendant_, we tried our wings to the utmost length of the chain which bound us to the rock.

Procuring a boat, we pulled out of the harbour, and round the jutting points crowned by the fortress, half inclined to pitch the _padrone_ overboard, and make a straight course for the opposite coast of Sardinia. Not driven to that extremity, we wiled away the time pleasantly enough in a visit to the caverns worn by the sea in the chalk cliffs, which front its surges. Some of these are exceedingly picturesque. Their entrances festooned with hanging boughs, they penetrate far into the interior of the rocks, and the water percolating through their vaulted roofs, has formed stalact.i.tes of fantastic shapes.

The boat glides through the arched entrance, and we find ourselves in the cool and grateful shade of these marine grottoes. Fishes are flitting in the clear water; limpid streams oozing through the rocks form fresh-water basins, with pebbly bottoms; and the channels from the blue sea, flowing over the chalk, become cerulean. These are, indeed, the halls of Amphitrite, fitting baths of Thetis and her nymphs. Poetic imagination has never pictured anything more enchanting.

[Ill.u.s.tration: BONIFACIO FROM THE CONVENT IN THE VALLEY.]

One afternoon, we walked a mile out of the town, up a narrow valley in the limestone cliffs, to the ruined convent of St. Julian. The bottom of the valley is laid out in gardens, with cross walls, and channels for irrigation. The gardens appeared neglected, but there were some vines and fig-trees, pomegranates, and crops of a large-growing kale. The ruins lie at the head of the glen, facing Bonifacio and the sea; the walls of the convent and church still standing, approached by a broad paved way on a flight of marble steps. Seated on these, we enjoyed at leisure a charming view.

Vineyards and plots of cultivated land overspread the slopes on either side of the valley. There were scattered olive-trees, and bamboos waving in the wind. The old convent walls, mantled with ivy, contrasted with a chapel at the foot of the steps, having a handsome dome, covered with bright glazed tiles of green, red, and black, and surmounted by a cross-the only portion of the conventual buildings still perfect. In the distance was the little landlocked haven, with a brig and some small lateen-sailed vessels moored alongside the Marino. Above it rose the fortress-town, with its towers and battlements. The sound of the church bells tolling for vespers rose, softened by distance, up the valley.

Ravens were croaking over the ruins of the convent, and lizards frisking on the banks and the marble steps on which we reposed. It was a fitting spot for a Sunday afternoon's meditation-our last in Corsica!

CHAP. XXV.

ISLAND OF SARDINIA.-_Cross the Straits of Bonifacio.-The Town and Harbour of La Madelena.-Agincourt Sound, the Station of the British Fleet in 1803.-Anecdotes of Nelson.-Napoleon Bonaparte repulsed at La Madelena._

Released, at length, from our irksome detention by the return of the courier with the pa.s.sports _vises_ from Ajaccio, and a boat we had hired, meanwhile, lying ready at the Marino to carry us over to Sardinia, not a moment was lost in getting under sail to cross the straits.

The Bocche di Bonifacio were called by the Romans _Fossa Fretum_, and by the Greeks _Tappros_, a trench, from their dividing the islands of Corsica and Sardinia like a ditch or d.y.k.e. These straits are considered dangerous by navigators, from the violence of the squalls gushing suddenly from the mountains and causing strong currents, especially during the prevalence of winds from the north-west during nine months of the year. Lord Nelson describes them during one of these squalls as "looking tremendous, from the number of rocks and the heavy seas breaking over them." In another letter he says, "We worked the 'Victory'

every foot of the way from Asinara to this anchorage, [off La Madelena,]

blowing hard from Longo Sardo, under double-reefed topsails." The difficulties of the Bonifacio pa.s.sage can hardly be understood by a landsman who has not visited the straits, but they are stated to have been so great, "and the ships to have pa.s.sed in so extraordinary a manner, that their captains could only consider it as a providential interposition in favour of the great officer who commanded them."[42]

[Ill.u.s.tration: LOOKING BACK ON CORSICA.]

It has been my fortune to pa.s.s these straits on three several occasions when they were perfectly calm. During the pa.s.sage from Corsica in an open boat, which I am now relating, there was so little wind that, with all the spread of high-peaked sails a Mediterranean boat can carry, we made but little way, and the surface was so unruffled that my friend was able to sketch at ease the outline of the Corsican mountains, from which we were slowly receding. It was, however, pleasurable to linger midway between the two islands, retracing our route in the one by the lines of its mountain ranges, and antic.i.p.ating fresh delight in penetrating those of the Gallura now in prospect. The appearance of a French revenue cutter to windward tended to reconcile us to the failure of our plan of getting smuggled across the straits, which might have led to more serious consequences than the detention we suffered.

The coast line on both sides of the channel, as on all the sh.o.r.es of the two islands, is remarkably bold; and the scene was diversified by the groups of rocky islets scattered across the straits, and described in a former chapter as the broken links of a chain which once united Corsica with the mountain system of the north-east-portion of the island of Sardinia. They are composed entirely of a fine-grained red granite.

In some of the islets lying nearest the Corsican coast quarries were worked to supply blocks and columns for the temples and palaces of imperial Rome. Quarries of the same material were also worked by the Romans, as we shall find presently, on the coast of Sardinia, opposite these islands.

With two exceptions, these "Intermediate Islands" are uninhabited. They were considered of so little importance that, till the middle of the last century, it was considered a question which of them belonged to Sardinia and which to Corsica. It was then easily settled by drawing a visual line equidistant from Point Lo Sp.r.o.no on the latter, and Capo Falcone on the former; it being agreed that all north of this line should belong to Corsica, and all south of it to Sardinia.

The distance between the two capes is about ten nautical miles. To the westward of Capo Falcone lies the small harbour of Longo Sardo, or Longone, the nearest landing-place from Bonifacio, from which it has long carried on a contraband trade; its proximity to Corsica also making it the asylum of the outlaws exiled from that island. A new town, called Villa Teresa, built on a more healthy spot on the neighbouring heights, has received a considerable access of population from the same source.

The Capes Falcone, with La Marmorata close by, and La Testa forming the north-west point of Sardinia, are all of the same formation as the rocky islands in the straits already mentioned, and, like them, this district furnished the Romans with many of the granite columns which still form magnificent ornaments of the Eternal City. Those of the Pantheon are said to have been excavated near Longone; and several similar ones, as well as rude blocks, may still be seen in the quarries on the promontory of Santa Reparata, near which the remains of some Roman villas have also been discovered. In later days we find the value of the Gallura granite appreciated by the Pisans. Their Duomo, built by Buschetto in 1063, soon after their possession of Sardinia, shows the beauty of the Marmorata rocks; and the Battisterio, built in 1152 by Dioti Salvi, has also much of Gallura material in its construction.

La Madelena is the largest island in the Sardinian group, and while Porto Longone is a poor place, the town and harbour of La Madelena are much frequented in the communications and trade between Corsica and Sardinia. Our course therefore was shaped for the latter, though twice the distance from sh.o.r.e to sh.o.r.e. The island of La Madelena, the _Insula Ilva_, or _Phintonis_, of the Romans, is about eleven miles in circ.u.mference. Till about a century ago it was only inhabited or frequented by shepherds, natives of Corsica, who led a nomad life, and by their constant intercourse with Corsica and Sardinia, and by intermarriages with natives of both, formed a mixed but distinct race, as the Ilvese are still considered. The town of La Madelena was only founded in 1767, some Corsican refugees being among its first settlers; but from its fine harbour, the healthiness of its site, and its convenience for commerce with Italy, it rapidly became a place of considerable population and trade.

There are numerous channels and many sheltered bays frequented by ships between the group of islands of which La Madelena is the princ.i.p.al. Our own course from the north-west led us through a strait between the main land of Sardinia and the islands of Sparagi, Madelena, and Caprera, which opened to view all the points of interest in its most celebrated harbour. Right ahead, it was almost closed by the little rocky islet of Santo Stefano, now defended by a fort, and remarkable for having been the scene of a severe repulse received by Napoleon at the outset of his long successful career. A point to the south, on the main land of Sardinia, marking the entrance of the Gulf of Arsachena, is called the Capo dell'Orso, from a ma.s.s of granite so exactly resembling the figure of a bear rec.u.mbent on its hind legs, that it attracted the notice of Ptolemy 1400 years ago. The island of Caprera, probably deriving its name from the wild goats till lately its sole inhabitants, presents a ridge of rugged mountains, rising in the centre to a ridge called Tagiolona, upwards of 750 feet high, with some little sheltered bays, and a few cultivated spots on its western side.

Sheltered by Caprera, La Madelena, and Santo Stefano, we find the fine anchorage of Mezzo Schifo; the town of La Madelena, for which we are steering, lying about half a mile south-west of the anchorage. This harbour, named by Lord Nelson "Agincourt Sound," was his head-quarters while maintaining the blockade of Toulon, from 1803 to 1805. He formed the highest opinion of its position for a naval station, as affording safe and sheltered anchorage, and ingress and egress with any winds. His public and private correspondence at that period shows the importance he attached to its possession, and his anxiety that it should be secured permanently to the crown of England.

"If we could possess the island of Sardinia," he says, in a letter to Lord Hobart, "we should want neither Malta nor any other island in the Mediterranean. This, which is the finest of them, possesses harbours fit for a.r.s.enals, and of a capacity to hold our navy,-within twenty-four hours' sail of Toulon,-bays to ride our fleets in, and to watch both Italy and Toulon." In another letter, he says:-"What a n.o.ble harbour is formed by these islands! The world cannot produce a finer. From its position, it is worth fifty Maltas." This opinion we find repeated in a variety of forms, and with Nelson's characteristic energy of expression.

When at anchor in Agincourt Sound, he kept two or three frigates constantly cruising between Toulon and the Straits of Bonifacio, to signal any attempt of the enemy to leave their port; occasionally cruising with his whole fleet, and then retreating to head-quarters. His sudden appearance and disappearance off Toulon, in one of these exercises, with the hope of alluring the French to put to sea, led their admiral, M. Latouche-Treville, to make the ludicrous boast, that he had chased the whole British fleet, which fled before him. This bravado so irritated Nelson, that it drew from him the well-known threat, contained in a letter to his brother: "You will have seen by Latouche's letter how he chased me, and how I ran. I keep it; and, if I take him, by G.o.d, he shall eat it!"

Our boatman pointed out to us the channel through which Lord Nelson led his fleet when at length, after more than two years' watching, the object of all his hopes and vows was accomplished by the French fleet putting to sea. This, the eastern channel, of which the low isle of Biscie forms the outer point, is the most dangerous of all, from the sunken rocks which lie in the fairway, and its little breadth of sea room. Yet Nelson beat through it in a gale of wind, in the dusk of the evening, escaping these dangers almost miraculously. Our sailor pointed out all this with lively interest, for Nelson's name and heroic deeds are still household words among the seafaring people of La Madelena.