As our time of morning parade in that season, was about the hour of sunrise, our march towards the mountains was a very pleasant one.
The old castle or citadel of Basse Terre, which the valiant Benbow besieged in vain, in 1702, still jutted, with its four great bulwarks, in grim strength into the water. Its walls were mounted by sixty pieces of French ordnance, but now the British flag waved above them; and as we marched on, we heard our band playing in the square,
Between St. Johnstone's and Bonnie Dundee,
I'll gar ye be fain to follow wi' me,
the old quickstep of the regiment.
A portion of this citadel was not more than thirty-five years old, for when the British forces were there in 1759, it was blown up by accident, and with it perished the Governor, Lieutenant-colonel Desbrissay of Watson's Foot, the 38th or old Staffordshire regiment. He was carried into the air, together with Major Trollop, and both being found crushed to death, were buried in the Carmelite church, were I saw their tombs.
Concerning the colonel, I remember Captain Glendonwyn relating an anecdote, as we stood by his monument one day.
"Desbrissay," said he, "was a captain of infantry at the battle of Rocaux, which was fought against Marshal Saxe, near Liege, on the 12th of October, 1746, when Sir John Ligonier, after doing all that a brave general could, posted some British battalions in hollow squares in rear of the dorpts to secure the retreat of the army, which was pressed by the splendid cavalry of Saxe, and which the Butcher of Culloden was blundering by his cowardice and inability. There Desbrissay fell wounded, and while lying on the ground was run through the body by a French officer, whose dastardly example was immediately followed by some Walloon infantry, thirteen of whom planted their bayonets in his body. Yet Desbrissay did not die; he was taken prisoner by the French, and by the skilful treatment of their surgeons he recovered, for there are some men who possess as many lives as a cat.
"One day, not long after his convalescence, being at dinner with Marshal Count de Saxe, who was deemed the mirror of military honor, and was ever kind and gentle to prisoners, the count said,—
"'Pray tell me, sir, if you know the officer who used you so barbarously on the field of Rocaux?'
"'I do, M. le Maréchal.'