334 THE LANDING. The cause and the nature of the change kept secret. prepare for himself any kind of defence on the high ground. The necessity of having to carry the English flotilla to a new landing-place occasioned, of course, a painful dislocation of the arrangements which had already been acted upon by the com- manders of the transports; but after much less delay and much less confusion than might have been expected to result from a derangement so great and so sudden, the position of the English vessels was adapted to the change. Meanwhile, few of the thousands on board un- derstood the change which had been effected,* or even saw that they were brought to a new land- ing-ground. They imagined that it was the better method or greater quickness of the French which was giving them the triumph of being the first to land. Both Lord Eaglan and Lyons were too steadfast in the maintenance of the alliance to think of accounting for the seeming tardiness of the English by causing the truth to be known ; and even to this day it is commonly believed
- Amongbt these uninformed thousands was Captain Mends,
Sir Edmund Lyons's flag-captain. See his letter to the news- paper in the Appendix, containing {inter alia) those words : — ' It mi(jhl mffi.cc for me simply to say, I remember nothing about ' a buoy.' The placing of a buoy for fixing the anchorage of each French column is officially narrated by the French in these words :— ' Le Primauget, le Caton, et la Mouette ontpris ' les devants, avec la mission de placer, h. petite distance de ' la plage de debarquomcnt, des bouees de couleur differente ' destinees k indiquer par leur alignement le mouillage de nos ' trois colonnes que le Primauget a detwrmiue dans I'excursion ' de la vcille.' Narrative enclosed to his Government, and de- clared accurate by Admiral Ilanielin. Note to Uh Edition.
