pas. Dans un pays où l'ennemi n'attache aucune importance à conserver une position, il est difficile de le décider à abandonner le terrein. Ce qui assuroit nos conquêtes en Italie, c'est que l'Autrichien ne vouloit pas passer outre du moment qu'il savoit devoir rencontrer sur son passage, une forteresse occupée par les François. Les Mamelouks nous attaquent à cinquante pas, fuyent et reviennent le lendemain nous attaquer, presque dans la même position dont nous les avions chassés.

Ils s'occupent dans ce moment, à ce qu'il paroit, à réunir des forces considérables; mais rien ne peut nous intimider. Au reste, il faut rendre justice à leur peu de mérite et de talent. Si j'eusse commandé leurs troupes, qui d'ailleurs sont très-braves, les Français ne seroient pas arrivés si tranquillement au Caire. Aucune tactique ni aucun élément de l'art de la guerre ne les conduit. Ce sont des hommes bien montés à cheval, et bien armés, qui viennent se faire massacrer, Le plus grand éloge que l'on puisse faire de notre expédition, c'est de dire, que les Français ont marché pendant près de quinze jours sans presque boire ni manger. Je crois Je crois que nous sommes de ces diables qui faisoient remuer les yeux aux Madonnes de Rome; nous faisons même des miracles plus étonnants.

Adieu, mon cher papa, je vous embrasse et vous prie de vouloir bien dire à tous mes frères et sœurs que bien souvent dans les déserts de l'Afrique mon imagination s'est tournée vers eux, et que j'ai bien souvent juré que si jamais je me trouvais au milieu d'eux, je ne les quitterais jamais.

Ni les voyages ni les expéditions ne rendent heureux! Adieu.

TRANSLATION.

Grand Cairo (8 Thermidor), July 26th.

CRYING * "hunger! thirst! and heat!" We are

arrived, after beating the Mameloucs, at Grand Cairo. I have heard, my dear father, the bullets and balls whizzing very near me-happily none of them touched

Oh, how often I regretted that I did not go to Paris before I sailed! more than once or twice I' thought it quite impossible that I should ever go there again. At present' we are a little more tranquil, and our situation appears to be somewhat'improved.

It would be difficult for you, my dear father, to form an idea of the country, the people, or the customs, which we have found here. I am confident that the account

The cover of this letter, which is without any signature, is mislaid. The writer of it is a worthy disciple of the new school: ignorant, impious, and impure. The most shameless inmates of a brothel, hardened by mutual consciousness of guilt, would not dare to trust each other with the rank confessions which this miserable profligate pours, without scruple, into the ears of his wretched father.

It is unnecessary to add, that every thing of this nature is carefully suppressed, through the whole of the Correspondence. With this security, even the present letter may be read to advantage; it contains some strictures on the Mameloucs, which do credit to the writer's sagacity, and appear to have escaped the notice of his superiors.

of them, which I am at present preparing, will both interest and amuse you.

It appears, from what I can collect, that the whole army is not destined to remain here. One part of it will fall down into Lower Egypt, as far as Damietta; another will proceed to the Isthmus of Suez, and a third will ascend the Nile as high as Thebes. Such is the distribution which common report makes of the army at this instant-I will not answer for its being correct; and, indeed, it strikes me, that such a division of our forces would be rather injudicious.

The Mameloucs, though beaten, may re-assemble. Their manner of making war authorizes the idea, that the country which we have traversed, and from which we have just driven them, ought not to be looked upon as conquered; since there is nothing to prevent their re-occupying it. In a country where the enemy attaches no kind of importance to the maintaining of a particular position, it is very difficult to determine him. to quit the ground altogether. What secured our conquests in Italy, was the absolute refusal of the Austrians to advance, the moment they discovered their route lay near a fortress garrisoned by the French. The Mameloucs attack us at the distance of fifty paces, flee, and return the next day to attack us, in the very position from which we had driven them.

It appears that they are at present engaged in collecting a very considerable force-but we feel no alarm at it. For the rest; we ought to do justice to the little merit they boast; if I had been at the head of their troops, which are, after all, most gallant ones, the French would not have arrived quite so easily at Cairo. No trait of tactics, no appearance of the slightest know,

ledge of the art of war, is found in any of their movements. They are men perfectly well mounted, and well armed, who come to be massacred! Thus you see, that the greatest eulogium we have yet merited in this expedition, is for having marched near fifteen days, as it were, without eating or drinking. I fancy we are near a-kin to those devils who made the Madonnas of Rome roll their eyes.* We work miracles still more astonishing here.

The writer alludes to the commotions excited against his countrymen by the miraculous indications here attributed to the Madonna, and on every great occasion expected from her images by the Roman populace. We say nothing of the opinion itselfbut the French use of it may yet be pointed out. It is made the vehicle of every kind of vulgar abuse against religion itself, and its divine economy. The profane and senseless allusion to Moses, in another letter, and the assumption to themselves, in numberless passages, of miracles, "as good as the world ever saw"-all these are marks of the same spirit which has already met our solemn reprehension ;--a spirit which laughs at the power of Heaven, and mocks all virtue upon earth; which commits "all iniquity with greediness," and selects a parent's bosom as the depositary of its obscenities!

This imaginary interposition of Providence took place in the winter of 1797-8. Those who are in the habit of reading the Jacobin papers, cannot have forgot the dull profanity with which they abounded on the occasion. The M. C., always foremost in impiety, and yet vain of its recent triumph over the Saviour of the world, rioted in daily sarcasms on "priestcraft, “and superstition, and such-like old lumber-stuff of Christiani"ty." BACCHUS was again placed "at the right-hand of the "Father," and there appeared to be no end of the degradation and insult meditated against the persecuted JESUS, when the news happily arrived that the French had dethroned and driven the Pope from his home-and the interests of blasphemy were for awhile forgotten in the savage howl of exultation over the mis

Adieu, my dear father: I embrace you, and beg you will have the goodness to tell all my brothers and sisters that many a time, in the Deserts of Africa, my thoughts have been directed towards them, and that many a time

fortunes of an helpless old man; or, in the words of the Morning Chronicle, of "an infirm and bed-ridden dotard!"

The following account of the transaction alluded to, is from a resident on the spot. It is as simple as it is correct, and may serve to shew those who have no religion, that they should not judge from their own feelings, of the sincerity of those (whether priests or laity), who have a great deal.—

"The images of the Madonna had moved their eyes in diffe"rent parts of the town, which, by favourable exposition, was "supposed to be a manifestation of her peculiar favour to the "Roman people. This miracle, however futile or false it may "seem to men of reflection, had so powerful an influence over "the minds of the multitude, as to produce an enthusiasm little "short of madness.

"I know it is common to impute every effect of religious su"perstition to the knavery of a designing priesthood. Hence, "this popular credulity may be supposed to have originated in "artifice; but, I believe, if the whole affair were to be truly in"vestigated, it would be found to have had its origin in the belief " of a poor old man, who was paying his devotion to a Madonna "at the Fontana di Trevi—and, as in the elements of the Catholic "faith, the best informed are taught to believe (and do believe,) "those things they cannot comprehend, so it ought not to be "wondered at, that those who know less and believe more, "should have felt themselves interested in a sign, that, to them, "portended the salvation of their religion and their country." -(It should be observed here, that this was subsequent to the death of the infamous Duphot, when the French were in full march for Rome, breathing nothing but rage and revenge).— "Of this opinion I am the more strongly persuaded, as no steps "were ever taken to apply or direct this religious phrenzy to