Ruffo, who was then at the gates of the city with an army which he had collected and maintained in Calabria, aided by a division of 2000 English, and 500 Russians troops. They withdrew, therefore, into the forts, in order to secure at least an honourable capitulation. They were several times attacked, but repulsed the assailants with great courage. After continued hostilities for ten days, the cardinal sent flags of truce to the members of the government who were in the Castello Novo, and to them who had taken refuge in the castle of St. Elmo. In concert with Megeout, commander of St. Elmo, they entered into capitulation with Ruffo, who took the title of Vicar of the King of Naples. One of the principal articles of the capitulation stated, that "the members of the government and the patriots in the fortresses, as well as the French garrison and the national troops, should march out with the honours of war, with arms and baggage, and should be conducted to Toulon." It was also agreed, that individuals comprehended in this capitulation should be permitted to go every where in the city, to settle their private affairs. The castle of St. Elmo was not to be evacuated until the entire execution of the capitulation in order to guarantie themselves by force against any violation of the faith of the treaty.

By a fatal combination of contrary winds and other circum. stances, the republicans remained in the roads seventeen days, during which time they were no way molested; but the English fleet under lord Nelson appearing before the port of Naples, began by blockingup the whole of the vessels destined to convoy them to Toulon. Soon

after arrived a frigate, escorted by two English ships of the line, on board of which was the king. Scarcely had he cast anchor, than he published an edict, by which he declared that no permission had been given to enter into a negotiation with rebels, and that cardinal Ruffo had not the faculty of derogating from this principle of sovereignty. He annulled, conseqently, the convention which had been made, and ordered the punishment of the rebels. The execution of this edict took place immediately. The vessels were instantly boarded; the republicans were dragged to the prisons, their houses were pillaged, and, an inquisition was set on foot for the discovery of all such as had manifested sentiments favourable to the new order of things. Some of the most celebrated of the republican party were hung up on the spot.

Amidst the transactions, the French who had embarked, and the garrison still in the castle of St. Elmo, received orders to depart instantly. The republicans who had taken refuge in the fortress. hoped to have saved themselves by taking the French uniform, and mingling in the ranks; but the appetite for blood was too keen; each soldier was examined with the scru- · tinising eye of vengeance,-such as were not French were dragged out of the ranks, and fell the victims of the royal edict. As soon as the French were gone, the city (as is asserted) was delivered up to every kind of excess and outrage. More than 800 houses were given up to pillage and to the flames. The Lazzaroni became once more the instruments of royal vengeance. A special commission was appointed, which pronounced sentence of

death,

death without much formality, on such as had taken an active part in the late government: little other formality, indeed, was necessary, than the identification of their persons, since the crime stated in the royal edict was but too apparent. Almost the whole of the members of the executive and legislative commissions perished by the hands of the executioner. Exaggeration of evil is natural to the wretched. Those who had the good fortune to escape the massacre speak of horrors unexampled in those times, which scarcely find a name among a civilised people, and with which the cruelties exercised under the reign of terror in France bear no kind of competition. The court of Naples, scandalised at the reports which had circulated through foreign countries, published officially what it deemed a refutation of those calumnies: asserting, that the persons accused of having exerted themselves in favour of French liberty had been tried by competent tribunals and by upright magistrates; that all those who were accused had not been put to death; and that this punishment had been reserved only for the most atrocious criminals; in justification of which a list was published of part of the proceedings of this supreme tribunal. Among other names in this official scroll were inscribed those of Julian Colonna, prince of Stigliano, and the duke of Cas sano, who were beheaded; Eleonora Fonseca, the marchioness of Piemontello, and eigthen other women of rank, with the bishop of Vico, who were hanged; the duke of Carraciolo, major-general Spano, and others, colonels, majors, and ecclesiastics, sent to work in the galleys; the duchesses of Cassano

and Popoli, shut up for life in the Penitentiary Hospital. This sapreme tribunal had been erected to prevent the repetition of the hor rors which had taken place in the first weeks of vengeance. In the official account, after declaring the names of the criminals who had been punished, it is observed, that in this list were not comprehended a greater number of different ranks and qualities who perished in the first moments of the re-establishment of order, and before the formation of the supreme tribunal, The people, it was added, knew how to distinguish the enemies of their king, and execute due justice towards them.

The protestations of the cardinal Ruffo against the violation of the capitulation which he had made with the republicans, and his hav ing been authorised, by a letter from the principal minister, to grant the condition specified in the treaty, had no effect. The prisons continued to be filled by thousands, and the tribunal remained faithful to the execution of the royal edict. The authority of Ruffo, as viceroy, was restrained by a junto of nine counsellors, whose votes guided his operations, his zeal in which was so much the more to be suspected, as he had not been discreet in his murmurs against these violations, and had indulged feelings of resentment beyond what was suitable to those who thought that faith was no more to be kept with rebels than with heretics, and that the will and interests of sovereigns were paramount to every other consideration,

It is doubtful whether this mode of re-establishing order was the wisest which this court could have adopted in the present state of political change and fermentation in

Europe.

Europe. A more solid support had been previously obtained by the conclusion of a treaty, offensive and defensive, between the government of Naples and that of Vi enna, in which it was stipulated, that the contracting parties should keep on foot, till the continental peace, and the perfect consolidation of tranquillity in Italy, the latter 60,000 troops, and the former 30,000; which troops should be held independent of other engagements, and capable, in extraordinary cases, of augmentation.

Although the council of elders had so precipitatedly adopted the law on hostages, it still continued to indulge that wise suspicion against every thing that came up from the other council, where the passions were more inflamed, and the judgment less corrected. A discussion of several days had taken place respecting the change of the form of the civic oath. The expression of hatred to anarchy" having displeased the jacobin society, and been voted, in one of their sittings, an unmeaning and unnecessary phrase, the same subject of discussion was opened in the council of five hundred, where the whole tenor of the oath was chang. ed, and the hatred to royalty and anarchy, which had hitherto been sworn indefinitely, was modified down to the opposing the re-establishment of royalty, and of every kind of tyranny in France; which change was confirmed by the elders, as more conformable to common sense, and the interests of the republic.

The proposition for the accu. sation of the four ex directors have ing undergone the three constitutional readings in secret committees of the council of five hundred, was at length rejected, notwith

standing the public voice in its favour. The apologists of those exdirectors were less anxious to defend their administration than the purity of their intentions. They insisted on the difficulty of the cir cumstances in which they were placed; on the numberless assurances they had heretofore given of devotedness to the cause of the republic; on the political consequences of a measure which, exposing before all Europe, as criminals, men by whom they had been governed since the establishment of the constitution, would seem to invalidate all the great political operations which they had directed; they represented that it was not probable that they had been influenced by treasonable motives; and that to be deceived in political opinions, to adopt false systems, to be unsuccessful, to be intoxicated with power, were misfortunes rather than crimes. They asserted, that if scaffolds were erected for the first magistrates of the republic, it was not with them that factions would stop; that the example would provoke new violence, and that less scruple would be observed towards those whom ignorance or passion should qualify as enemies of the republic; that the same scenes would be re-acted as had taken place after the events of the 31st of May, when the axe of the tyrants thinned even the benches of the national representation ; that no authority would in future be clothed with any respectability, the members of which should be given up thus hastily to punishment; that factions would never cease to threaten their successors with a similar catastrophe ; and that with such terror continually before their eyes, it would be impossible. for governors to feel confidence in

the execution of great and extraordinary projects, which might be necessary, at times, for the safety of the country.

In addition to these general considerations, several were urged that applied personally both to the exdirectors and to members of the councils, amongst which was the promise made at the tribune to the ex-directors, that if they would give in their dismission, the pursuit against them should be dropped; and that many of the measures for which they were accused had received the approbation of the councils. The general and particular considerations, not to mention others still more personal (for a considerable portion of the members had been aiders, abettors, and instruments, in part of the crimes charged against the members of the directory), led the council to put a final, and perhaps a prudent stop, to the further examination, notwithstanding the multiplied proofs of their guilt. Reveillière Lepaux, Merlin, and Rapinat, had printed pieces, which they styled justifications; Rewbell was more prudent, and had only attempted to defend himself occasionally at the tribune. The public in general acquiesced in the decision of the council, from the considerations that had been urged, but with keen regret that men, who had brought the nation into so deplorable a state, whether from incapacity or treason, should escape the punishment due to their errors or their crimes.

At a season of calmness and moderation, these ex-directors would not have had so good a deliverance; but if the discontinuance of the pursuit appeared to the public an act of cowardice, or of bending lesser considerations before the great

principles of justice, the jacobins, made of sterner stuff, were not disposed to quit ground which was so tenable, but, by anticipation, branded those as conspirators who should vote for their absolution. This society, driven from the Manège, held its assemblies in a church in the Fauxbourg Saint Germain, which had been granted them by the municipal officers of the disfrict, and the administrators of the department, the offices of which were filled with their associates. This church, like that in which they formerly sat, belonged to the religious order of the jacobins which they hailed as a favourable omen. Far from being discoun tenanced by the repulse of the council of elders, they continued their debates in the same strain of virulence and insolence against the government as had hitherto marked their proceedings. It was not in Paris alone that those jacobinical organisations took place; Lyons, Toulouse, Marseilles, Bourdeaux, Valence, and various other cities and towns throughout the republic, witnessed with terror the resurrection of those political unions, which had so lately covered their country with blood, and whose vengeance was whetted to the perpetration of new crimes from the severe pu nishment they had undergone at the time of the royalist re-action, after the fall of Robespierre, when crimes of equal magnitude and extent had shown by a dignified and regular administration of justice. The mother society at Paris had already entered into correspondence with those affiliated clubs; apostles were scouring the southern departments, to plant the jacobinical gospel; addresses were clothed with signatures, in various communes, of denunciations against members

of