How WE LOST CORSICA 31

attached to Paoli, and the violence that was threatened to his person by the French Convention was the signal for the most general and instantaneous rising among the people ever known in that country of general insurrection."1 "I do not believe there was a mao, woman, or child amongst many thousands whom we saw, that came within hail of us without calling c Viva Paoli e la natione Inglese!' "2 In less than two years from that time the island had to be given up because there had occurred a most serious revolt of practically the whole population—a revolt which in fact had forced Sir Gilbert to dismiss five of his Ministry in response to mob violence.3 The fact that the change from enthusiastic loyalty to revolt was the essential cause of our being obliged to give up what was then an all-important island, is thinly veiled in Sir Gilbert's biography. It is demonstrated in Captain Mahan's Life. Nelson and Sir Gilbert's friends attribute it to the perversity of the Corsicans. Those who follow the facts here recorded may assign another reason for it. Things looked different to those at sea no doubt. It was necessary, in order to judge of them fairly, to watch them day by day and close at hand. The actual result was reached after Moore had left the island. The successive acts of the Governor which led up to it and caused it are duly recorded in the following pages. If history be philosophy teaching by example, certainly these are lessons of what to avoid in administration. They must be here studied in detail to be appreciated. That Moore, from the reasons which he explains, became daily more anxious as to the results

1 "Life of Sir Gilbert Elliot," vol. ii. p. 214.

2 Ibid,, p. 221.

3 Ibid., p. 342.