Arrival at Jaffa—­The siege—­Beauharnais and Croisier—­Four thousand prisoners—­Scarcity of provisions—­Councils of war—­Dreadful necessity—­The massacre—­The plague—­Lannes and the mountaineers—­ Barbarity of Djezasi—­Arrival at St Jean d’Acre, and abortive attacks—­Sir Sidney Smith—­Death of Caffarelli—­Duroc wounded—­ Rash bathing—­Insurrections in Egypt.

On arriving before Jaffa, where there were already some troops, the first person.  I met was Adjutant-General Gresieux, with whom I was well acquainted.  I wished him good-day, and offered him my hand.  “Good God! what are you about?” said he, repulsing me with a very abrupt gesture; “you may have the plague.  People do not touch each other here!” I mentioned the circumstance to Bonaparte, who said, “If he be afraid of the plague, he will die of it.”  Shortly after, at St. Jean d’Acre, he was attacked by that malady, and soon sank under it.

On the 4th of March we commenced the siege of Jaffa.  That paltry place, which, to round a sentence, was pompously styled the ancient Joppa, held out only to the 6th of March, when it was taken by storm, and given up to pillage.  The massacre was horrible.  General Bonaparte sent his aides de camp Beauharnais and Croisier to appease the fury of the soldiers as much as possible, and to report to him what was passing.  They learned that a considerable part of the garrison had retired into some vast buildings, a sort of caravanserai, which formed a large enclosed court.  Beauharnais and Croisier, who were distinguished by wearing the ‘aide de camp’ scarf on their arms, proceeded to that place.  The Arnauts and Albanians, of whom these refugees were almost entirely composed, cried from the windows that they were willing to surrender upon an assurance that they would be exempted from the massacre to which the town was doomed; if not, they threatened to fire on the ‘aides de camp’, and to defend themselves to the last extremity.  The two officers thought that they ought to accede to the proposition, notwithstanding the decree of death which had been pronounced against the whole garrison, in consequence of the town being token by storm.  They brought them to our camp in two divisions, one consisting of about 2500 men, the other of about 1600.

I was walking with General Bonaparte, in front of his tent, when he beheld this mass of men approaching, and before he even saw his ’aides de camp’ he said to me, in a tone of profound sorrow, “What do they wish me to do with these men?  Have I food for them?—­ships to convey them to Egypt or France?  Why, in the devil’s name, have they served me thus?” After their arrival, and the explanations which the General-in-Chief demanded and listened to with anger, Eugene and Croisier received the most severe reprimand for their conduct.  But the deed was done.  Four thousand men were there.  It was necessary to decide upon their fate.  The two aides de camp observed that they had found