two principal assistants, one being
taken, and the other disabled.

The enemy having made themselves masters of Anstruther's and the
queen's redoubts, from which perhaps they might have been dislodged, had
a vigorous effort been made for that purpose before they had leisure to
secure themselves; the duke de Richelieu ordered a parley to be beat,
in order to obtain permission to bury the dead, and remove the wounded.
This request was granted with more humanity than discretion, inasmuch
as the enemy took this opportunity to throw a reinforcement of men
privately into the places where the lodgements had been made, and these
penetrated into the gallery of the mines, which communicated with
all the other outworks. During this short cessation, general Blakeney
summoned a council of war to deliberate upon the state of the fort and
garrison; and the majority declared for a capitulation. The works were
in many places rained; the body of the castle was shattered; many guns
were dismounted, the embrasures and parapets demolished, the palisadoes
broken in pieces, the garrison exhausted with hard duty and
incessant watching, and the enemy in possession of the subterranean
communications. Besides, the governor had received information from
prisoners, that the duke de Richelieu was alarmed by a report that
the marshal duke de Belleisle would be sent to supersede him in the
command, and for that reason would hazard another desperate assault,
which it was the opinion of the majority the garrison could not sustain.
These considerations, added to the despair of being relieved, induced
him to demand a capitulation. But this measure was not taken with the
unanimous consent of the council. Some officers observed, that the
garrison was very little diminished, and still in good spirits; that no
breach was made in the body of the castle, nor a single cannon erected
to batter in breach; that the loss of an outwork was never deemed
a sufficient reason for surrendering such a fortress; that the
counterscarp was not yet taken, nor, on account of the rocky soil, could
be taken, except by assault, which would cost the enemy a greater number
than they had lost in their late attempt; that they could not attack the
ditch, or batter in breach, before the counterscarp should be taken, and
even then they must have recourse to galleries before they could pass
the fosse, which was furnished with mines and countermines; finally,
they suggested, that in all pr