The next morning the French squadron was seen in a very disastrous state; they had cut their cables, and run on shore in every direction, with the exception of the flag ships of the admiral and rear-admiral, which lay at their anchors, and could not move till high water; it was then first quarter flood, so that they had five good hours to remain. I refer my readers to the court-martial for a history of these events: they have also been commented on, with more or less severity, by contemporary writers. I shall only observe, that had the captains of His Majesty's ships been left to their own judgment, much more would have been attempted; but with what success I do not presume to say. My captain, as soon as he could see his mark, weighed, ran in, and engaged the batteries, while he also directed his guns at the bottoms of the enemy's ships, as they lay on shore on their beam ends. Isle d'Aix gave us a warm reception. I was on the forecastle, the captain of which had his head taken clean off, by a cannon-ball; the captain of the ship coming forward at the same moment, only said, "Poor fellow! throw him overboard; there is no time for a coroner's inquest now." We were a considerable time engaging the batteries, and the vessels near them, without receiving any assistance from our ships. While this was going on, a very curious instance of muscular action occurred: a lad of eighteen years of age was on the forecastle, when a shot cut away the whole of his bowels, which were scattered over another midshipman and myself, and nearly blinded us. He fell--and after lying a few seconds, sprang suddenly on his feet, stared us horribly in the face, and fell down dead. The spine had not been divided; but with that exception, the lower was separated from the upper part of the body. Some of our vessels seeing us so warmly engaged, began to move up to our assistance. One of our ships of the line came into action in such gallant trim, that it was glorious to behold. She was a beautiful ship, in what we call "high kelter;" she seemed a living body, conscious of her own superior power over her opponents, whose shot she despised, as they fell thick and fast about her, while she deliberately took up an admirable position for battle. And having furled her sails, and squared her yards, as if she had been at Spithead, her men came down from aloft, went to their guns, and opened such a fire on the enemy's ships and batteries, as would have delighted the great Nelson himself, could he have been present. The results of this action are well known, and do not need repeating here; it was one of the winding-up scenes of the war. The French, slow to believe their naval inferiority, now submitted in silence. Our navy had done its work; and from that time, the brunt of the war fell on the army.