There was a young Scot, by name Clarke, ill-favoured in his person, with a cast in his eyes, of intellects not very sound, but quick, bold, adventurous. At the siege of Berg-op-zoom, being pursued into a house where the enemies fired at him through a door, he opened it and told them he was related to Marshal Lowendahl, who would reward them for saving him. Being conducted to the Marshal, with the same readiness he avowed the deceit, urging that he had no other method of saving his life. Lowendahl was pleased with the man, and gave him money. Not rising in England to his expectation, he attempted to advance himself in Ireland under the Duke of Devonshire; where miscarrying too, he imputed his disappointment to Mr. Conway, who equally incapable of disserving any man, or of enduring a false imputation, took Clarke to task, and convinced him of his error. Clarke, in the interval of some of these adventures, had rambled into France, and passing through Rochfort, observed a bank to which there was no ditch, and one part of the fortification left quite open. The adjacent country, called Little Holland, was flat, and cut with dykes, but which he persuaded himself were easily passable. Four years had passed since he made these remarks, and that in a time of profound peace. He did not pretend to know the strength of the garrison, nor what troops were stationed on the coast since the declaration of war--and unfortunately a plan of the place procured by the late Lord Albemarle from the King’s closet, since Clarke’s survey, differed from his description. Yet communicating these observations to Mr. Pitt, the latter was captivated with the idea. The man and the project struck his notions of performing some action of _éclat_, that might revive our sinking affairs, and throw a lustre on the dawn of his own Administration.