The French cannoniers who handled them were brave fellows, for they killed several men on board the _Success_, nor were they silenced, and the beach swept of the inhabitants, till the commodore's ship, together with the _Rose_, _Flamborough_, and _Diligence_, opened their broadsides to the land, and filled the whole bay with smoke, making every rock and mountain echo to the reverberations of a cannonade that lasted till seven in the evening, for we had a dread of masked batteries among the shrubberies and hedgerows near the shore. Under cover of this fire, the flat-bottomed boats, with three battalions of the Guards, and eleven grenadier companies of the Line, commanded by Lord George Sackville (son of Lionel, Duke of Dorset) and General Dury, rowed inwards, and landed on the beach in safety. Those ships which contained the cavalry and artillery were now ordered to draw closer inshore. Our horses were slung over into the flat-bottomed boats alongside--each trooper, fully accoutred, standing in the wooden stall by his charger's head. It was about eleven at night before the light troop of the Greys, in four large flat barges, put off for the harbour, towards which we were slowly towed by the boats of the _Brilliant_. The night was a lovely one. High sailed the moon in heaven, with clouds of fleecy whiteness flying past her silver disc. The beach and the blue sea were light as if at noonday, and on the far expanse of yellow sand, in that secluded cove, where the aged oak and lime trees spread their summer foliage on the ripples--sand so soft, so smooth and golden that one could only think of nymphs or fairies disporting in fantastic dances there--we were disembarking Horse, Foot, and Artillery, with loaded arms and lighted matches, in all the grim array of war. Slowly the huge boats, with their freight of Cavalry crept inshore. Streaming from behind the dark mountains, the moonlight fell in long and tremulous lines of silver sheen, in which our weapons and the trappings of man and horse glittered gaily, and the whole scene was picturesque and impressive. Each after each, the lights that whilome twinkled in the little town went out, as we supposed the people were taking to flight, and soon obscurity veiled it all, save where one or two tapers seemed to indicate a sick room, or a student's vigil--if, indeed, at such a time, one could be philosopher enough to study. Our Foot, already formed in quarter distance columns, after their colours were uncased, their flints and priming inspected, were silent and still; thus, save the occasional neigh of our horses, as they snuffed the land, with necks outstretched and nostrils quivering, there was no sound along the bay, but the murmur of the rising tide, when it chafed on the steep Rock of Cancalle.