The Sun.
London, England, 1803-07-23 00:00:00

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Army to be increased by the most pronint Military
measures, and which he did not think we had hi:
therto had recourse to ; and here he must again say?.
we were beyond measure to blann hit not (Wing
every thing that was in our power to do—that Una
til we had done every thing that human wisdom
And professional skill could do, until we could with
a safe conscience say, we have done every thing in
our power to do—we have not done our duty, that -
we did not use the means which Providence had
now placed in our hands, and it was flnpiuu9 iii
•us to negleEt them. He could not feel: that
he should be able to prevail upon GoveYntnent
to adopt the measures
,which he desired, ame
of which was an extensive fortification; but talwa
ta of
fortification,do unless it was a great national work, taken up
thevtresartea:(ll;antotatgelisnilt(Silbiaetdiev'roltvtledd obi;
With a proper national spirit; he admitted that we
should unnecessarily take away men from the various
pursuits by which the strength of the Country was
kept lip, and sacrl4ee•them.for a long time to 11664.
tary measures, Vet for a while he thought we ought
not to stiffer any thing to interfete with our •military
preparation, even if every wheel in the kingdom
shOuld be made to standstill ; it would be our duty
to do so, and therefore unless His Majesty possessed •
already the power of requiring the Military Service
of every man in the kingdom, that power ought to
be speedily granted to hon.—Fie should now pro_
ceed to state the•leading points to which he wished
to called the attention of the House, and particutarty
that of His Majesty's Government. In the first place,
our Naval and Military Force, should be so •
disposed, that they could, not be stormed under
any circumstances whatever assured the
House he was not going to give any informaa •
tion whatever to the enemy :—He telt it would
be improper to give them any. He had heard
it said indeed, there wete no good secrets in wat
which we could not disclose to the -enemy ;
should therefore relate some things which he
knew would illustrate what he was saying. In the
y'eat 1799, the Archduke Charles sent hitn a payer
at the Austrian Head-quarters, which was foteld in
the pocket of a French General of distinEtion, con_
tanning a scheme for invading England, and hi
which the different spots, at which to place the -
different columns, from all parts of the coast, to •
London, %vete marked out, together with the p,„
sition to be observed by each coltimn , aed all this
was done with minute detail, and such as it was
impossible. to have been made out by any, tiody
but one who had been for sonic time upon each of thea
particular spots there stated, and who had minutely.
examined the ground with a (firma view to military
Operations. • Another instance he would givea;--•
he wits .acquainted with a General Commander,
Marshal Kahan, who had proposed the Invasion of
England. He knew 'they sent men over here to
ascertain the. State 'of the Country for the purpose
of preparing for the Invasion of this Countty. Ge-
neral Custine, who was afterwards beheaded,
,had
entertained this idea a long time : he learnt. this
from that Officer himself; for he had had a great
deal of conversation with him at the King of 'Prus-
sia's Review. That Officer told him he had been
travelling in England, and he had had the impu-
dence to say, it was for the purpose of a View of
our Coast, in order to prepare for an Invasion.
—He said that we did pot observe sufficient
caution with regard to our places of defence,
for that he was suffered to go all Over the Castle
of Dover upon merely saying that he was an
Englishman, but in this rearet the want of
caution was equally great on the other side the
water, for that he was permitted alsd to see all the:
works at Boulogne.?-He stated these things. nut
to expose any secrets, but to shew that we had nut
any upon this subjeo, and observed, that his mein:
tinning these things was only to tell ourselves what
the French knew already.. The next point to which
he wished to call the attention of the House was that
of the means to be used by us to prevent the Freud'
from landing, and this included another consideraa
tion, that of the safety of our Naval and Military
depot.—The first thing in this view of die suljeet,
to be attended to was, the
,( tritiit,)7sroCetxttes
he knew it was impossible entirely t
sive a Coast as ours, yet he could not conceive how
we could be so inattentive to our trna interest as
to negleA • that matter, altogether when so much
advantage might be gained lay it ; he,pledged Man.
self to prove, that if we, set our shoulders to this
matter properly, as a great national objet, wel
might iu the course of two month,' put the Coast,
from Yarmouth Roads to the Downs, in such a state
of security, as to bid defiance to any attack ; and
upon this subjeCt he wished that his oi mints might
be fairly and freely canvassed, nor would he. attempt
to discpialify himself in .point of judgment on this
matter, for he bad had the approbation of Lord
Cornwallis, who had been pleased to approve of
many of his notions of Military mat ters, and had
given him a letter of reoommendation to Governa
men; on that account : this he thought he to;oht
state without imputation of Egotism. Upon the •
assert,w ao l
which
hd
so
i)ehlidegi pledged bhe did and
approbationilll e gave
ei
inuella.:
e‘tvieo,s)isiltdriya"si
(;)Itrin•ki that if we
that wo
isle;
ctmt!ati;yra
insvtliitt u(e)gludarerrcds properly to the
tii!isatt:(,)ablg,r,o,rit:na
Cooley
Na.
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mouth Roads to the South Forelaint, in a atate of the
most perfect defence. As to our Navy,
have an higher opinion of it than he. had ; every
thing that a Fleet could do, would be done by (ir
Flee t ; but he would defy any gentleman in the Navy .
to lay his hand tilion his heart, and ask liiinsaf,
whether he could " I will prated you agaimt
the landing of-the French, at all events ; they shall
not land ;" on the contrary, any Naval Nrsort of
the least knowledge and refleCtion, would say eases