SEVENTH SIEGE, A.D. 1799.
Buonaparte, imitating Alexander, with a view of clearing a passage from Egypt to the possession of India, embarked with a large force, and after having treacherously obtained Malta, appeared off Alexandria. It is rather a singular circumstance, that more than a century before this expedition took place, Leibnitz, a German philosopher, addressed a long and interesting document to Louis XIV., pointing out to him the great advantages that would result to France from the conquest of Egypt. This document was still in existence, and it is believed that it assisted in inducing Buonaparte to leave his European conquests and achieve something extraordinary in the East. His career in Egypt was successful, and, among other places, he took Alexandria, our present subject; but there was nothing in the details of the short siege of it interesting enough to stop us. Nelson’s defeat of his fleet, and his check by Sir Sidney Smith, at Acre, sent the great conqueror of the age back again to his country, with a far smaller crop of laurels than he had anticipated.