Disorder and panic spread on the Plain du Nord, and the frightened blacks came pouring into Cap, crying for arms. Christophe ordered all the unarmed inhabitants to leave the town; he took under his protection 2,000 whites, men, women, and children, and sent them to the interior. He steeled his heart, he was inexorable, he prepared for desperate measures:—“Go, tell your General,” he said, “that the French shall march here only over ashes, and that the ground shall burn beneath their feet.” Le Clerc feared delay; he put his ships in motion, and the noise of his cannon spread tumult and alarm. Christophe knew he could not successfully resist the combined attack, so he furnished his soldiers with torches, took one in his hand, and, raising it to Heaven, called God to witness, that he was driven to extremity! His own house, costly and beautiful, was his first sacrifice; then burst over the city an ocean of flame: it revealed the dismay of the whites, the bitter and silent fury of the blacks. They retired to the hights above Cap, the French marched over the burning ashes, and the explosion of the magazine completed the work of despair. Port au Prince came nigh sharing the same fate. General Agé (a white), to whom it was entrusted, was not proof against persuasion or fear; but in Lamartinière, a quarteron, there was a determined soul. When Lacomb, who insisted upon admitting the French, refused to give up the keys of the magazine and arsenal, Lamartinière shot him through the head; such was his power of persuasion in extreme cases. “If the French land before we can be informed of the resolution of Toussaint, three cannon shot shall be the signal for destruction!” That was his reply. They did land, and the three cannon boomed over the plain. Flames arose on every hand and frightful disorder—the infuriated blacks fell upon the whites, and slaughtered them even to the gates of the church. The French charged up, rushed into the city and stayed the conflagration. Lamartinière fell back towards General Dessalines, afflicted at his failure to destroy the city rather than at his defeat. In the East, the city of St. Domingo, under Paul Louverture, yielded to Kerverseau. In the South, the seat of Rigaud’s triumphs and defeats, La Plume, the mulatto leader, had been treacherous to Toussaint; so had Clervaux. The principal towns were thus in the hands of Le Clerc: but was the island won? Toussaint, with Dessalines and Christophe, now retired toward the mountains, burning whatever might be a solace to the French. He knew, and the blacks now knew, what they were to look for from the invaders: the mask was torn away. There would be small chance for the blacks, when once they were disarmed; small chance, with a powerful French force in all the strongholds of the island, and with them, Rigaud, Petion, Boyer, and Chanlette, vindictive opponents of Toussaint. In the mountains, therefore, Toussaint gathered his shattered forces; but, the island was not yet won.