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As the ships from Ireland reached Brest and the ports of Brittany, James himself came down from Saint Germain to receive them. They were at once granted the rights of French citizenship without undergoing the forms of naturalization.
Accordingly I there passed the Campaigns above mention'd untill wee suffer'd shippwreck at the Isle D'ane, from which being escaped, I returned with the rest of the Army unto Brest, in the moneth of July, having lost all my Equipage in this disaster.
The telegraph carried the happy news in every direction; and at two o'clock in the afternoon replies had already been received from Lyons, Lille, Brussels, Antwerp, Brest, and many other large towns of the Empire, which replies, as may well be imagined were in perfect accord with the sentiments entertained at the capital.
The king had returned to Dublin with a view to embark for England, but receiving notice that the designs of his domestic enemies were discovered and frustrated, that the fleet was repaired, and the French navy retired to Brest, he postponed his voyage and resolved to reduce Limerick; in which Monsieur Boisseleau commanded as governor, and the duke of Berwick and colonel Sarsfield acted as inferior officers.
We spent a month together as a family, at the end of which my elder brother had to report to Brest, where he was soon embarked for Pondichery in the "Marengo." As for me, I went to settle in at the School of Cavalry, whose barracks were in the great stables of Versailles. I was lodged on the first floor, in apartments which had once been occupied by the Prince de Lambesc, the master of horse.
Looking towards Brest, it seemed to extend indefinitely; but on the other side, it projected its sinuosities into the land, between short hills covered with underwood. Each gulf is ensconced between two mountains; each mountain is flanked by two gulfs, and nothing can equal the beauty of those vast green slopes rising almost in a straight line out of the sea.
The fallacious advantage of a short passage was dropped, and the army was to start from three widely separated points all in more open waters a diversionary raid from Dunkirk and two more formidable forces from Havre and the Morbihan in South Brittany. To secure sufficient control there was to be a concentration on the Brest fleet from the Mediterranean and the West Indies.
The actual disposition of the home fleet was designed so as to preserve its offensive activity, and at the same time to ensure superiority in any part of the home waters in which the enemy might attempt a counterstroke. It was distributed in three active squadrons, one in the North Sea, one before Brest, and one cruising to the westward, with a strong reserve at Portsmouth.
Somehow my coat was jerked off, the brest-pocket of which contained my pocket-book, and it parsed away like the brest pin. Then they sorter quietly hustled me into the street. It was about 12 at night when I reached the Green Lion. "Ha! ha! you sly old rascal, you've been up to larks!" said the lan'lord, larfin loudly, and digging his fist into my ribs.
At the end of March, 1781, the Comte de Grasse sailed from Brest with twenty-six ships-of-the-line and a large convoy. When off the Azores, five ships parted company for the East Indies, under Suffren, of whom more will be heard later on. De Grasse came in sight of Martinique on the 28th of April.
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