napoleon's designs on spain—the continental system—treaty of fontainebleau—junot marches on portugal—flight of the royal family—the milan decree—the pope imprisoned in the quirinal—imbecility of the spanish government—quarrels of the spanish royal family—occupation of the spanish fortresses—the king's preparations for flight—rests at madrid—abdication of charles iv.—murat occupies madrid—the meeting at bayonne—joseph becomes king of spain—insurrection in spain—the junta communicates with england—ferocity of the war—operations of bessières, duchesne, and moncey—dupont surrenders to casta?os—joseph evacuates madrid—siege of saragossa—napoleon's designs on portugal—insurrection throughout the country—sir a. wellesley touches at corunna—he lands at figueras—battle of roli?a—wellesley is superseded by burrard—battle of vimiera—arrival of dalrymple—convention of cintra—inquiry into the convention—occupation of lisbon—napoleon's preparations against spain—wellesley is passed over in favour of moore—moore's advance—difficulties of the march—incompetency of hookham frere—napoleon's position in europe—the meeting at erfurth—napoleon at vittoria—destruction of the spanish armies—napoleon enters madrid—moore is at last undeceived—the retreat—napoleon leaves spain—moore retires before soult—arrival at corunna—the battle—death of sir john moore—the ministry determine to continue the war—scandal of the duke of york—his resignation—charges against lord castlereagh—wellesley arrives in portugal—he drives soult from portugal into spain—his junction with cuesta—position of the french armies—folly of cuesta—battle of talavera—state of the commissariat—wellesley's retreat—french victories—the lines of torres vedras—the walcheren expedition—flushing taken—the troops die from malaria—disastrous termination of the expedition—sir john stuart in italy and the ionian islands—war between russia and turkey—collingwood's last exploits—attempt of gambier and cochrane on la rochelle.

the restless spirit of buonaparte did not allow him any repose, even after his subjugation of the greater part of the north of europe. whilst he had been contending with the russians, he had been planning fresh campaigns—fresh conquests at the opposite extremity of the continent. godoy, the favourite of the king of spain, and the paramour of his dissolute queen, who had professed great admiration of buonaparte, seeing him so deeply engaged in germany, had suddenly called out a considerable army, and addressed it in a vaunting but mysterious way. the news of this reached buonaparte on the field of jena, and, discovering by this means the real sentiments of the spanish favourite towards him, he vowed vengeance on spain. it was by no means the first time that he had contemplated the conquest of spain and portugal, but this circumstance inspired him with a new impulse in that direction, and a plausible excuse. in his interviews with alexander of russia, these views had been avowed; and now, no sooner had he returned to paris than he commenced his operations for that purpose. he blended this scheme, at the same time, with his great one of shutting out the british trade from the whole continent. russia had, by the treaty of tilsit, entered into a compact to enforce his system in her ports. holland was compelled to submit to it. the kingdom of westphalia was now in the hands of his brother jerome, who had been forced to separate from his american wife, elizabeth paterson, and had been married to a daughter of the king of würtemberg, so that the territories now comprised in the new kingdom of westphalia were under the same law of exclusion. he had extended it to the prussian ports since his conquest of that country, and to the hanseatic towns. denmark was ready to comply, and the treaty with russia extended his embargo ostensibly to the whole western shores of the baltic. sweden refused to accept it, and the foolhardy king christian iv. declared war on russia, and invaded norway. he promptly lost finland and pomerania. sir[547] john moore, with an army of 10,000 men, was sent to his assistance, but found him so unreasonable that he thought it better to return without landing the troops. christian was soon afterwards deposed, and his uncle established in his place, who accepted the continental system. but alexander was as little faithful in this part of the treaty as in other parts. in fact, he dared not strictly enforce the exclusion of british trade, were he so disposed. nearly the whole heavy produce of russia—hemp, iron, timber, wax, pitch, and naval stores, which constituted the chief revenues of the russian nobles—was taken by the british, and paid for in their manufactures. to have cut off his trade would have made the life of alexander as little secure as that of his father, paul, had been. the russian and british trade therefore continued, under certain devices, and notwithstanding the decrees of the czar to the contrary. buonaparte knew it, but was not prepared to open up a new war with russia on that account—at least, at present. he was now turning his attention to the south.

spain and portugal—still nominally existing under their native princes, but very much under the influence of buonaparte—admitted british goods to a great extent. buonaparte himself had winked at the introduction of them into portugal, because that country had paid him large sums to permit it. but now he determined to enforce a rigid exclusion, and to make the breach of his dictated orders a plea for seizure of the country. in fact, he had long resolved to seize both spain and portugal, but to employ spain first in reducing her neighbour, and by that very act to introduce his troops into spain herself. he complained, therefore, that portugal had refused to enforce the berlin decree; and he entered into a treaty with spain at fontainebleau, which was signed on the 29th of october. by this infamous treaty, spain agreed to assist france in seizing portugal, which should be divided into three parts. the province of entre minho y douro, with the town of oporto, was to be given to the king of etruria, the grandson of the king of spain, instead of etruria itself, which buonaparte wanted to annex to france, and this was to be called the kingdom of northern lusitania. the next part, to consist of alemtejo and algarve, was to be given to godoy, who was to take the title of prince of algarve. the third was to remain in the hands of the french till the end of the war, who would thus be at hand to protect the whole. in fact, it never was the intention of buonaparte that either godoy or the king of etruria should ever be more than a temporary puppet; but that the whole of spain and portugal should become provinces of france under a nominal french king.

no sooner was this treaty signed than junot was ordered to cross the bidassoa with thirty thousand men, and march through spain for the portuguese frontier. two additional armies, partly of french and partly of spaniards, supported him, and another army of forty thousand was stationed at bayonne, intended, it was said, to act as an army of reserve, in case the british should land and attempt to defend portugal, but in reality it was intended for the subjugation of spain itself. junot, who had formerly been buonaparte's ambassador at the court of lisbon, made rapid marches through spain. the prince regent of portugal, knowing that resistance was in vain, sent the marquis of marialva to state to the courts of france and spain that he had complied with the whole of their demands, as regarded the admission of british goods, and demanded the arrest of the march of the invading army. but no notice was taken of this, and junot pushed on with such speed as to exhaust his troops with fatigue. he was anxious to seize the persons of the royal family, and therefore this haste, accompanied by the most solemn professions of his coming as the friend and ally of portugal—as the protector of the people from the yoke of the british, the maritime tyrants of europe.

but the royal family put no faith in these professions; they resolved not to wait the arrival of the french, but to muster all the money and valuables that they could, and escape to their south american possessions. whilst these preparations were being made in haste, the british traders collected their property and conveyed it on board british vessels. the inhabitants of the british factory, so long established in lisbon, had quitted it on the 18th of october, amid the universal regret of the people. the ambassador, lord strangford, took down the british arms, and went on board the squadron of sir sidney smith, lying in the tagus. on the 27th of november the royal family, amid the cries and tears of the people, went on board their fleet, attended by a great number of portuguese nobility; in all, about one thousand eight hundred portuguese thus emigrating. the prince regent accompanied them, sensible that his presence could be of no service any longer. the fleet of the royal emigrants was still in the tagus, under the safe[548] protection of sir sidney smith's men-of-war, when junot and his footsore troops entered lisbon, on the 1st of december. he was transported with rage when he saw their departing sails, for he had received the most imperative injunctions to secure the person of the prince regent, from whom napoleon hoped to extort the cession of the portuguese american colonies. junot declared that the prince regent and royal family, having abandoned the country, had ceased to reign, and that the emperor napoleon willed that it should henceforth be governed, in his name, by the general-in-chief of his army. this proclamation of the 2nd of february set aside at once the conditions of the treaty of fontainebleau; the imaginary princedom of godoy was no more heard of, and the kingdom erected for the king of etruria remained a mere phantom at the will of buonaparte. the property of the royal family, and of all who had followed them, was confiscated; a contribution of four million five hundred thousand pounds sterling was laid on a people of less than three millions, and as there was not specie enough to pay it, plate and every kind of movable property was seized in lieu of it, without much regard to excess of quantity. the officers became money-brokers and jobbers in this property, much of which was sent to paris for sale, and the whole unhappy country was a scene of the most ruthless rapine and insult.

flight of the royal family of portugal. (see p. 547.)

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whilst these abominations were being done in portugal, buonaparte had proceeded to italy to prosecute other parts of his one great design. he determined, in the first place, to shut the trade of britain out of all the italian ports, as he had now, in imagination, done in nearly all the other ports of europe. accordingly, at milan, on the 17th of december, he issued his celebrated decree, which took its name from that city, as his northern decrees had taken their name from berlin. henceforward the berlin and milan decrees acquired great notoriety. to counteract the ordinances of the berlin decrees, which forbade any ship of any nation to be admitted into continental ports without certificates of origin—that is, without certificates showing that no part of their cargo was of british produce—various orders in council had been issued by britain, permitting[549] all neutral vessels to trade to any country at peace with great britain, provided that they touched at a british port, and paid the british duties. thus, neutrals were placed between scylla and charybdis. ii they neglected to take out british certificates they were captured at sea by the british cruisers; if they did take them, they were confiscated on entering any continental port where there were french agents. this led to an enormous system of bribery and fraud. the prohibited goods were still admitted by false papers, with respect to which the french officers, men of the highest rank, were well paid to shut their eyes. all the ports of italy were now subjected to this system, and buonaparte immediately seized a great number of american vessels, on the ground that they had complied with the british orders in council. it might be thought that america would so far resent this as to declare war on france, but buonaparte calculated on the strength of american prejudices against britain and for france at that time, that the united states would rather declare war against britain, which, by its orders in council, brought them into this dilemma. the ports of the pope alone now remained open, and these buonaparte determined forthwith to shut.

but, in the first place, he announced to the queen of etruria, whom he had hitherto allowed to retain her italian territory in right of her infant son, that she must give that up and accept the kingdom of northern lusitania in portugal. this princess had an ominous persuasion that her son would never possess, or, if he possessed, would never retain this northern lusitania; but she had no alternative and, in the month of june following, the kingdom of etruria was converted into three new departments of france. this having been arranged, this setter-up and puller-down of kingdoms proceeded to compel the pope to adopt his system. pius vii. did not seem disposed to comply. he had no quarrel with britain; had no advantage, but much the contrary, in depriving his subjects of articles of british manufacture; besides that, amongst the numerous adherents of the church in ireland he would create great prejudice. but all these reasons had no more weight with the haughty egotism of buonaparte than so much air. he forced his troops into the papal territories; threw a strong body into ancona on the adriatic, and another into civita vecchia, and at the mouth of the tiber. the pope protested against the violent invasion of his principality, but in vain; buonaparte insisted that he should declare war against britain. pius then consented to close his ports, but this did not satisfy napoleon; he demanded that war should be declared, pronouncing himself the heir of charlemagne, and therefore suzerain of the pope, and he demanded compliance. on the pope continuing obstinate, buonaparte forced more troops into his states, and sent general miollis to take possession of rome. this accordingly was done in february, 1808. the pope shut himself up in the quirinal palace, and the french surrounded him with troops and cannon, and held him prisoner to compel him to comply. the pope, though shut up in the quirinal and deprived of his cardinals, remained unshaken, and protested solemnly against this violent usage and robbery by the man whom he had consented to crown and to make a concordat with. when the magistrates and priests of the marches were called on to take the oath of allegiance to napoleon, they refused almost unanimously, and were driven out of the states, or shut up in prisons and fortresses in the alps and apennines.

the government of spain was sunk into the very deepest degradation and imbecility. charles iv. was one of the weakest of bourbon kings. he was ruled by his licentious wife, maria luiza, and she by manuel de godoy, a young and handsome man, who, about the year 1784, had attracted her eye as a private in the royal guards. by her means he was rapidly promoted, and at the age of twenty-four was already a general. he was soon created a grandee of spain, and the queen married him to a niece of the king. he was made generalissimo of all the spanish forces, and, in fact, became the sole ruling power in the country. he was styled the prince of the peace—a title acquired by his having effected the pacification of basle, which terminated the revolutionary war between france and spain. by the subsequent treaty of st. ildefonso he established an offensive and defensive alliance with france, which, in truth, made spain entirely subservient to napoleon.

whilst the french were seizing on portugal, the spanish royal family was convulsed by quarrels. ferdinand, the prince of asturias, and heir to the throne, hated godoy, as usurping the power which he himself ought to enjoy, and, stimulated by his friends, who shared in his exclusion, appealed to napoleon for his protection, and to win his favour requested him to choose a wife for him out of his own family. this[550] at one time would have been a subject of the highest pride to buonaparte, that a member of the bourbon family, and future king of spain, should solicit a personal alliance with his; but that day was gone by. buonaparte had determined to make himself master of spain, and he left the request of the prince without any answer. urged on by his party, the prince seems to have determined to do without buonaparte, and to depose his father, but the plot was discovered, and the person of the prince secured. the imbecile king, instead of contenting himself by the exercise of his own authority, appealed to napoleon; and at the same time, to make the disgrace of his family as public as possible, he appealed to the spanish people, by a proclamation against the conduct of his son, and informing them that he had put the prince under arrest. but the appeal to buonaparte did not succeed; for his own purposes, the french emperor appeared to take part with the prince, and caused his ambassador, beauharnais, to remonstrate with the king on his severity towards him. charles iv. wrote again to napoleon, and ventured to mention the prince's private application to him for a wife, hoping, the king said, that the emperor would not permit the prince to shelter himself under an alliance with the imperial family. buonaparte professed to feel greatly insulted by such allusions to his family, and the poor king then wrote very humbly, declaring that he desired nothing so much as such an alliance for his son. ferdinand, through this powerful support, was immediately liberated. but these mutual appeals had greatly forwarded buonaparte's plans of interference in spain. he levied a new conscription, and avowed to talleyrand and fouché that he had determined to set aside the royal family of spain, and to unite that country to france. both those astute diplomatists at once disapproved, and endeavoured to dissuade him from the enterprise. they reminded him of the pride of the spanish character, and that he might rouse the people to a temper of most stubborn resistance, which would divide his attention and his forces, would be pretty certain to bring britain into the field for their support, and unite britain again with russia, thus placing himself between two fires. talleyrand, seeing that buonaparte was resolutely bent on the scheme, dropped his opposition, and assisted napoleon in planning its progress; thus enabling the emperor afterwards to charge talleyrand with the responsibility of this usurpation, as he had before charged him with counselling the death of the duke d'enghien. in after years, napoleon used to denounce his own folly in meddling with spain, calling it "that miserable war" and describing it as the origin of his ruin.

buonaparte very speedily matured his plans for the seizure of spain, and he began to put them into execution. from italy, where he was violating the territories of the pope, and compelling the reluctant queen of etruria to give up her kingdom, he wrote to the king of spain, her father, that he consented to a marriage between the prince of asturias and a lady of his family. whilst he thus gave assurance of his friendship, he ordered his army, lying at bayonne, to enter spain at different points, and possess themselves of the strong positions along its frontier. by this means the french were received as friends by the people, and neither the king nor godoy complained of this gross breach of the treaty of fontainebleau. the impudent tricks by which the great fortresses were secured, each of which might have detained an army for years, have scarcely any parallel in history. at pamplona, on the 9th of february, 1808, the french troops commenced a game of snowballing each other on the esplanade of the citadel, when suddenly they occupied the drawbridge, entered the fortress gate, and admitted a body of their countrymen, who had been placed in readiness, and the fortress was secured. at barcelona the french gave out that they were about to march. duchesne, the general, drew up his men before the citadel, on pretence of speaking with the french guard, near the citadel gate, passed suddenly in, followed by an italian regiment, and the place was their own. st. sebastian was captured by a number of french being admitted into the hospital, who let in their fellows, and mountjoy was taken by a like ruse.

[551]

reproduced by andré & sleigh, ltd., bushey, herts.

naples, from the mergellina.

after the painting by birket foster, r.w.s.

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nothing could exceed the consternation and indignation of the spanish people when they found their great strongholds guarding the entrances from france into the country thus in the hands of the french. had there been a king of any ability in spain, an appeal to the nation would, on this outrage, have roused it to a man, and the plans of buonaparte might have been defeated. but godoy, knowing himself to be the object of national detestation, and dreading nothing so much as a rising of the people, by whom he would most certainly be sacrificed, advised the royal family to follow the example of the court of portugal, and escape to their trans-atlantic dominions; which advice could only have been given by a miscreant, and adopted by an idiot. to surrender a kingdom and a people like those of spain, without a blow, was the extreme of cowardice. but, as if to urge the feeble king to this issue, at this moment came a letter from buonaparte, upbraiding him with having received his acceptance of the match between their houses coldly. charles, terrified in the extreme, wrote to declare that nothing lay so near his heart, and at the same time made preparations to be gone. the intention was kept as secret as possible, but the public soon became aware of the court's proposed removal from madrid to cadiz, in order then to be able to embark for america. the prince of asturias and his brother protested against the project; the council of castile remonstrated; the populace were in a most tumultuous state, regarding the plan as originating with godoy, and surrounded the palace with cries and gestures of dissatisfaction. the king was in a continual state of terror and irresolution, but godoy pressed on matters for the flight.

on the 17th of march a proclamation was placarded at the gates of the palace, announcing that the king was resolved to remain and share the fate of his people. great were the acclamations and rejoicings; but, towards evening, the crowds that still lingered around the royal residence saw unmistakable signs of departure: there was an active movement amongst the guards; carriages and baggage were becoming apparent, and the agitation of the people grew intense. the prince of asturias and his brother protested against the departure; bodies of soldiers, in open revolt, began to assemble, and the people cried that they would have the head of the traitor, godoy. from angry words the populace and revolted soldiers came to blows with the household troops. godoy's brother led up a regiment against the rioters, but the men seized him, and joined the people. whilst one crowd surrounded the palace of aranjuez, another rushed to the house of godoy to seize and kill him. they ran all over his house, but could not discover him. the tumult continued all night, but was somewhat appeased the next morning by a royal proclamation, which announced that the king had dismissed him from his offices. this did not, however, prevent the people continuing the search for godoy, who was at length discovered by a life-guardsman in a garret of his own house, where he had been concealed between two mattresses. compelled to come forth by heat and thirst, he was dragged into the street, soundly beaten, and would soon have been put to death, had not the prince of asturias, at the urgent entreaty of the king and queen, interceded, declaring that he should be tried for his crimes, and duly punished. godoy was committed to custody, in the castle of villaviciosa: his property was confiscated; and, on the 19th, the king, terrified at the still hostile aspect of the people, proclaimed his own resignation in favour of ferdinand, their favourite; in truth, as little deserving of their favour, by any moral or intellectual quality, as the king himself. the abdication was formally communicated by letter to napoleon, whose troops, under murat, were, during these tumults, now rapidly advancing on madrid.

on the 23rd, only four days after the abdication of the king, murat entered madrid with a numerous body of infantry and cuirassiers, attended by a splendid train of artillery. ferdinand entered the city the same day. he had formed an administration wholly opposed to godoy and his policy. the ambassadors of the other powers presented themselves to offer their congratulations; but beauharnais, the french ambassador, preserved a profound silence. murat, also, though he professed himself friendly to ferdinand, said not a word implying recognition of his title. still more ominous, the news arrived that buonaparte himself was on the way with another powerful army. murat took up his residence in the palace of the prince of the peace, and greatly alarmed ferdinand and his courtiers by addressing him, not as "your majesty," but merely as "your royal highness." he counselled him to wait, and do nothing till he could advise with napoleon, and, in the meantime, to send his brother, don carlos, to greet the emperor on his entrance into spain. to this ferdinand consented; but when murat recommended him also to go, and show this mark of respect to his ally, ferdinand demurred, and by the advice of cevallos, one of his wisest counsellors, he declined the suggestion. to complicate matters, murat opened communication with the king and queen, and, not content with that, with godoy also, assuring him that his only hope of safety lay in the friendship of the emperor. by this means murat learned all the accusations that each party could make against the other, so that these things might serve buonaparte to base his measures, or, at least, his pretences upon. encouraged by this, charles[552] wrote to napoleon to declare his abdication entirely forced, and to leave everything to the decision of his good friend, the emperor.

capture of godoy. (see p. 551.)

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the suggestions of murat had failed to induce ferdinand to leave his capital and go to meet napoleon; but a more adroit agent now presented himself in the person of savary, the delegated murderer of the duke d'enghien. savary paid decided court to ferdinand. he listened to all his statements of the revolution of aranjuez and the abdication of the king. he told him that he felt sure napoleon would see these circumstances in the same favourable light as he did, and persuaded him to go and meet the emperor at burgos, and hear him salute him ferdinand vii., king of spain and of the indies.

savary accompanied ferdinand to conduct him safely into the snare. he spoke positively of meeting napoleon at burgos; but when they arrived there, they received the information that napoleon was only yet at bordeaux, about to proceed to bayonne. savary seemed so sure of his victim, that he ventured to leave ferdinand at vittoria, and went on to see napoleon and report progress; probably, also, to receive fresh instructions. the opportunity was not lost by some faithful spaniards to warn ferdinand to make his escape during savary's absence, and to get into one of his distant provinces, where he could, at least, negotiate with napoleon independently. ferdinand was astounded, but persuaded himself that napoleon could not contemplate such treachery. although the people opposed the prince's going, savary prevailed, and on they went.

when buonaparte heard that ferdinand had arrived, he is said to have exclaimed—"what! is the fool really come?" he received him, however, with courtesy, invited him to dinner, and treated him with all the deference of a crowned head; but the same evening he sent savary to inform him that he had determined that the bourbons should cease to reign, and the crown should be transferred to his own family. possessed of the prince of asturias, buonaparte proceeded to complete his kidnapping, and make himself master of the king and queen. he was sure that if he brought godoy to bayonne he should draw the infatuated queen after him, and that she would[553] bring the king with her. he therefore ordered murat to send on godoy under a strong guard. this was executed with such rapidity that he was conveyed from aranjuez to the banks of the bidassoa in a couple of days. buonaparte received godoy in the most flattering manner, told him that he regarded the abdication of charles as most unjustifiable, and that he would be glad to see the king and queen at bayonne, to arrange the best mode of securing them on the throne. godoy communicated this intelligence with alacrity, and napoleon very soon had the two remaining royal fools in his safe keeping. on the 30th of april a train of old, lumbering carriages, the first drawn by eight biscayan mules, was seen crossing the drawbridge at bayonne. the arrival consisted of the king and queen of spain, with three or four unimportant grandees. godoy welcomed charles and his queen, and assured them of the friendly disposition and intentions of buonaparte. having the family in his clutches, napoleon had little difficulty in compelling ferdinand to restore the crown to his father, who abdicated a second time, and placed his crown in the hands of the emperor.

having now kidnapped and disposed of the whole dynasty of spain, buonaparte had to inaugurate the new one by the appointment of a king. for this purpose he pitched on his brother lucien, who, next to himself, was the ablest of the family, and who had rendered him signal services in the expulsion of the council of five hundred from st. cloud. but lucien was of too independent a character to become a mere puppet of the great man, like the rest of his brothers. as napoleon grew haughty and imperious in the progress of his success, lucien had dared to express disapprobation of his conduct. he declared that napoleon's every word and action proceeded, not from principle, but from mere political considerations, and that the foundation of his whole system and career was egotism. he had married a private person to please himself, and would not abandon his wife to receive a princess and a crown, like jerome. lucien had, moreover, literary tastes, was fond of collecting works of art, and had a fortune ample enough for these purposes. when, therefore, napoleon sent for him to assume the crown of spain, he declined the honour. napoleon then resolved to take joseph from naples, and confer on him the throne of spain and the indies. joseph, who was indolent and self-indulgent, and who at naples could not exempt himself from continual fears of daggers and assassination, received with consternation the summons to assume the crown of spain, as ominous of no ordinary troubles. he declared that it was too weighty for his head, and showed no alacrity in setting out. napoleon was obliged to summon him several times, and at length to dispatch one of his most active and trusted aides-de-camp to hasten his movements.

and truly the prospects of the reign before him were such as might have daunted a much bolder and wiser man than joseph. the people of madrid had watched with increasing resentment the spiriting away of the different members of the royal family to bayonne. they were wrathful that godoy had been carried beyond the reach of their vengeance, and every day they were on the look-out for news from bayonne as to the cause of ferdinand, and this news grew even more unfavourable. on the evening of the 30th of april the populace had retired in gloomy discontent, because no courier had arrived bringing intelligence of buonaparte's intentions towards ferdinand. on the morning of the 1st of may numbers of men assembled about the gate of the inn and the post-office, with dark looks, and having, as was supposed, arms under their long cloaks. the french mustered strongly in the streets, and the day passed over quietly. but the next morning, the 2nd of may, the same ominous-looking crowds, as they assembled, were agitated by reports that the only remaining members of the royal family, the widowed queen of etruria and her children, and the youngest son of king charles, don francisco, were about to be sent off also to bayonne. they presently saw these royal personages conducted to their carriages; don francisco, a youth of only fourteen, weeping bitterly, and the sight roused the people to instant fury. they fell on the french, chiefly with their long knives, massacred seven hundred soldiers of the line, and wounded upwards of twenty of the imperial guard. the french, in return, fired on the people, and killed a hundred and twenty of them. murat poured in troops to suppress the riot, but could not disperse them till after several volleys of grape-shot and repeated charges of cavalry. unprepared as the country was, the people felt by no means daunted. the alcalde of mostoles, about ten miles south of madrid, hearing the firing, and understanding the cause, sent a bulletin to the south in these words, "the country is in danger: madrid is perishing through the perfidy of the french: all spaniards come to deliver it!" that was all that was necessary. the fact of being in possession of[554] madrid was a very different thing to being in possession of paris, spain consisting of various provinces, having their separate capitals, and everywhere was a martial people, just as ready and able to maintain a struggle against an invader as if madrid were free. at valencia, the populace, headed by a priest, fell on the french, and massacred two hundred of them. solano, the governor of cadiz, suspected of favouring the french, was dragged out of his house and murdered. even before the insurrection at madrid there had been one at toledo, and the french had been menaced with destruction.

amid these popular outbursts the great body of the spaniards were calmly organising the country for defence. a junta or select committee was elected in each district, and these juntas established communications with each other all over the land. they called on the inhabitants to furnish contributions, the clergy to send in their church plate to the mint, and the common people to enrol themselves as soldiers and to labour at the fortifications. the spanish soldiers, to a man, went over to the popular side, and in a few days the whole nation was in arms. the crisis of which buonaparte had warned murat was come at once, and the fight in madrid on the 2nd of may was but the beginning of a war which was to topple the invader from his now dizzy height. this made buonaparte convene a mock national junta, or assembly of notables, to sanction the abdication, and the appointment of joseph buonaparte as the new monarch. joseph entered madrid on the 6th of june, and proclaimed a new constitution.

no sooner had the insurrection of aranjuez taken place, and ferdinand been proclaimed king, than, so early as april the 8th, general casta?os informed sir hew dalrymple, the governor of gibraltar, that there was an end of the policy of godoy, which had made spain the slave of france and the foe of britain. sir hew sent a prompt dispatch to england with the news, and, till he could receive instructions from the british government, he maintained friendly relations with the spaniards. when the junta of seville was formed, and there was every reason to believe that spain would make a determined resistance, on his own responsibility he encouraged the merchants of gibraltar to make a loan of forty thousand dollars to the junta without premium; and captain whittingham, an officer well acquainted with spain, went to seville to assist in planning the best means of preventing the french from passing the sierra morena. on the 8th of june sir hew received a dispatch from lord castlereagh, informing him that the british government had determined to send ten thousand men immediately to the assistance of the spanish patriots. but this was preceded four days by a proclamation which had outstripped lord castlereagh's dispatch, stating that his majesty had ordered all hostilities towards spain to cease, and all spanish ships at sea to be unmolested. admiral collingwood took the command of the whole british fleet on the coast of spain, ready to co-operate. he landed mr. cox to proceed to seville as confidential agent, and about the middle of june general spencer arrived at cadiz with five thousand british soldiers. about the same time, the junta of seville declared themselves at peace with great britain, and sent four commissioners to england to settle diplomatic relations between the countries.

meanwhile the french generals, though they saw insurrections rising in every quarter, and though they themselves were located in different parts of the country, distant from each other, entertained no fear but that the steady discipline of their troops, and their own experience, would easily put them down. murat had quitted spain to proceed to his kingdom of naples, which he had received on the 15th of july, and savary was left at madrid as commander-in-chief, and he found himself in a most arduous and embarrassing post, with so many points to watch and to strengthen for the suppression of the insurrection. the spanish junta recommended their country, very prudently, to avoid regular engagements, with their yet raw forces, against the veteran armies of france, but to carry on a guerilla warfare, waylaying the enemy in mountains and defiles, cutting off their supplies, and harassing their rear, their outposts, and their foraging parties. the ardour and pride of the spaniards only too much tempted the men to despise this advice, and whenever they did they severely paid for it. the relentless spirit of the people against the lawless invaders, on the other hand, incited the french to equal ferocity. they treated the spaniards as rebels in arms against their king; the villages were given up to the plunder and licentiousness of the soldiers. this again fired the spaniards to retaliation, and they put to death sick and wounded when they fell into their hands. the war thus commenced with features of peculiar horror. the character of the country rendered the conflict the more desperate to the invaders; the fertile regions were separated from each other[555] by vast desert heaths and barren mountains, so that henry iv. had said truly, if a general invaded spain with a small army he would be defeated; if with a large one, he would be starved. to collect provisions, the french had to disperse themselves over wide tracts, and thus exposed themselves to the ambuscades and surprises of the spaniards, every peasant carrying his gun.

at first victory seemed to attend the french. lefebvre defeated the spaniards in aragon, on the 9th of june, and general bessières beat the insurgents, in several partial actions, in navarre and biscay. but his great success was over the united forces of generals cuesta and blake, on the 14th of june, at medina de rio seco, a few leagues from the city of valladolid. duchesne thought he should be able to send reinforcements to assist in reducing valencia and aragon; but he soon found that he had enough to do in his own district. marshal moncey, all this time expecting the co-operation of duchesne, had advanced into valencia. for a time the country seemed deserted; but as he advanced he found the hills and rocks swarming with armed people, and he had to force his march by continual fighting. there were swiss troops mingled amongst the spanish ones opposed to him, and whilst they attacked him in front, the spaniards assaulted his flanks and rear. when he arrived before the city of valencia, on the 27th of june, he found the place well defended. on the 29th moncey retired from before the walls, despairing of the arrival of duchesne. moncey, like bessières, now found himself called to madrid to defend the new king, who, it was clear, could not long remain there; and already the british were landing on the shores of the peninsula, to bring formidable aid to the exasperated inhabitants.

but the most important operations were at this moment taking place in the south between dupont and casta?os. casta?os was quartered at utrera with twenty thousand men. dupont had been ordered by murat to march from madrid into the south-west, and make himself master of the important post of cadiz. after a countermand, he again advanced in that direction, and had crossed the sierra morena, so celebrated in the romance of "don quixote," and reached the ancient city of cordova. there he received the news that cadiz had risen against the french, and had seized the french squadron lying in the bay, and, at the same time, that seville was in the highest state of insurrection. whilst pausing in uncertainty of what course to pursue, casta?os advanced from utrera towards the higher part of the guadalquivir. if dupont had rushed forward to attack casta?os at utrera, he would have done it under great disadvantages. he was cut off from the main french army by the sierra morena, and these mountains being occupied by the insurgent inhabitants, he would have no chance of falling back in case of disaster. he now advanced to andujar, which he reached on the 18th of june, having had to fight his way through bands of fiery patriots.

on the evening of the 16th of july casta?os appeared on the argonilla, directly opposite to andujar; the river was fordable in many places from the drought, and the different divisions of the spaniards crossed in the night. vedel, seeing the critical situation of the french army, made a rapid movement to regain and keep open the mountainous defile by which he had arrived, but dupont remained at andujar till the night of the 18th. vedel remaining at the pass for dupont, the latter found himself intercepted at baylen by the swiss general, reding, and whilst engaging him his own swiss troops went over to reding. he sent expresses to vedel to return to his aid, but before this could be accomplished he was defeated, and compelled to surrender. he was enormously encumbered by baggage; for the french, as usual, utterly regardless of the necessity of keeping on good terms with a people over whom they wished to rule, had been pillaging churches and houses of all plate and valuables that they could find. in endeavouring to defend the baggage, dupont had weakened his front, and occasioned his repulse. casta?os had not perceived the march of the french; but, by the time his van came up with reding, he found the french army prisoners. the terms proposed by the french were that they should be allowed to retire upon madrid with all their arms and baggage. but casta?os was too well acquainted with the necessities of the french through the intercepted letter to savary. he insisted that they should pile their arms, give up the greater part of their spoil, and be sent down to san lucar and rota, where they should be embarked for france. whilst dupont was hesitating on these conditions, he received a note from vedel, proposing that they should make a simultaneous attack on the spaniards, and thus have a fresh chance of turning the scale in their own favour. but dupont saw that this was hopeless; and, moreover, it is said that casta?os insisted that if vedel himself did not immediately[556] lay down his arms, he would shoot dupont. vedel, who now saw little hope of cutting his way through the mountains, was compelled to obey. the french piled their arms on the 22nd of july, the prisoners amounting to between eighteen and nineteen thousand. they gave up also thirty pieces of cannon.

the news of this great victory, which at once freed from the french armies the rich province of andalusia and the cities of cadiz and seville, spread joy and exultation over spain, and filled buonaparte, who received it at bordeaux, with the deepest anxiety, but the spaniards were led into a confidence which brought its subsequent chastisement. the news no sooner reached madrid than the king ceased to feel himself safe there. he determined to retire to vittoria, which was at a convenient distance from the french frontier. on the 3rd of july he quitted the city by night, and, guarded by french troops, took the road to vittoria, leaving grouchy and marshal bessières to cut off any pursuit of the spaniards. grouchy then despatched a letter requiring casta?os to send an officer to take charge of the city, and to protect the french invalids in the hospitals. he sent general moreno, and himself arrived to hold the city on the 23rd of august. such of the spanish grandees as had encouraged the french fled, with joseph, for safety, and obtained the name of "josepinos," or "infrancsados;" the rest joined the spanish cause.

but the event which, far more than the battle of baylen, showed buonaparte and the world the sort of war he had provoked, was the siege of saragossa. this ancient city, the capital of aragon, stands on the right bank of the ebro, with a suburb on the left bank connected with it by a bridge. another river, a small one, called the cozo, flowed into the ebro, close under the city walls. the immediate neighbourhood of saragossa is flat, and, on one side of the river, marshy; its walls were of brick, about ten feet high, old and ruinous, but in places they were only of mud. it might seem that no strong defence of such a place could be made against an army of thirteen thousand men—veterans who had served in germany and poland, and who were furnished with battering trains and every means of assault. but the streets of the city were narrow and crooked, the houses strong and lofty, the rooms being almost all vaulted, and therefore almost impervious to shell. the inhabitants were sixty thousand. saragossa raised the flag of resistance the moment that murat issued his proclamation on the 20th of may, informing the spanish people of the abdication of charles and ferdinand, and calling on the spaniards to submit to the new government. on the 16th of june general lefebvre commenced the attack by driving in the outposts of palafox, the spanish general, and establishing strong guards before the gates, but the spaniards fought him street by street. as fast as they knocked down the walls and scattered the sandbags, they were repaired again by the spaniards. at this stage of the siege, augustina, "the maid of saragossa," a handsome woman of the lower class, of about twenty-two years of age, arrived on one of the batteries with refreshments, and found every man who had defended it lying slain. the fire was so tremendous that the citizens hesitated to re-man the guns. augustina sprang forward over the bodies of the dead and dying, snatched a match from the hand of a dead artilleryman, and fired off a six-and-twenty-pounder. she then jumped upon the gun, and vowed never to quit it alive during the siege. such an example added new courage to the defenders; and the siege proceeded with incessant fury. at this juncture buonaparte withdrew a part of the troops, ordering lefebvre to join bessières with them, and verdier was left to continue the siege with about ten thousand men. the saragossans, encouraged by this, and assisted by some regular troops, not only defended the town more vigorously than ever, but sent out detachments to cut off verdier's supplies. after several determined assaults he raised the siege on the 13th of august.

the success of the revolt against the french in spain was certain to become contagious in portugal. junot was holding the country with an army of thirty thousand men, amongst whom there was a considerable number of spanish troops, who were sure to desert on the first opportunity after the news from spain. what buonaparte intended really to do with portugal did not yet appear. the conditions of the treaty of fontainebleau remained a dead letter. he had established neither the queen of etruria nor the prince of the peace in their kingdoms there. the likelihood was that, as soon as spain was secure, he would incorporate portugal with it. this seemed very probably his intention, from words that he let fall at an assembly of portuguese notables, whom he had summoned to meet him at bayonne. the count de lima, the president of the assembly, opened it with an address to napoleon, who listened with great nonchalance, and then said, "i hardly know what to make of you, gentlemen; it must depend on the events in spain. and, then, are you of consequence sufficient to constitute a separate people? have you enough of size to do so? what is the population of portugal? two millions, is it?" "more than three, sire," replied the count. "ah, i did not know that. and lisbon—are there a hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants?" "more than double that number, sire." "ah, i was not aware of that. now, what do you wish to be, you portuguese? do you desire to become spaniards?" "no!" said the count de lima, bluntly, and drawing himself up to his full height. then buonaparte broke up the conference.

[557]

heroism of the maid of saragossa. (see p. 556.)

[see larger version]

[558]

the spanish junta sent an officer to lisbon to consult with general caraffa, the commander of the spanish auxiliaries, on the best means of withdrawing the troops from that city. caraffa, who was an italian, did not seem to fall into the proposal; but this was of less consequence, for his men took the liberty of deserting, first in small numbers and secretly, but soon by a whole regiment at a time, and openly. junot sent out six hundred men to stop them; but they attacked, killed, and wounded nearly half the detachment, and pursued their march. general bellesta, who commanded the spanish troops at oporto, seized the french general, quesnel, who had but a small number of men, and marched away for corunna, carrying quesnel and his few soldiers prisoners with him. no sooner were the spaniards gone, however, than the cowardly governor of oporto put down the rising and declared for the french. but the fire of revolt was flying too fast all over the kingdom for this to succeed. in a few days the people rose again, seized on the arsenal, and armed themselves. they were encouraged by the monks, who rang their bells to call the people out, and by the bishops, who blessed the banners, and offered up public prayers for the enfranchisement of the country in the cathedrals. there was a similarly successful outbreak at braganza. from one end of the country to the other the rising was complete and enthusiastic. deputies were dispatched to england to solicit assistance and arms. for a time junot managed to keep down the population of lisbon by collecting troops into it, seizing, altogether, four thousand five hundred of the spaniards, and making them prisoners. alarmed, however, at his position, and fearing to move any of his forces from the capital, he ordered loison, who lay at the fortress of almeida, on the frontiers, to march to oporto, and suppress the revolt; but general silviera, a portuguese nobleman, put himself at the head of the armed population, and successfully defended oporto. at beja, leiria, evora, and other places, the french managed to put down the insurgents, but not without much bloodshed and severe military executions. but the hour of retribution was fast approaching. spanish as well as portuguese deputies appeared in london soliciting aid. they did not ask for men; for, in the pride of their temporary success, they imagined themselves amply able to drive out the french; but they asked for arms, clothes, and ammunition; and they prayed that an army might be sent to portugal, which would act as a powerful diversion in their favour.

both the government and people of britain responded to these demands with enthusiasm. war with spain was declared to be at an end; all the spanish prisoners were freed from confinement, and were sent home in well-provided vessels. the ministers, and canning especially, avowed their conviction that the time was come to make an effectual blow at the arrogant power of buonaparte. sir arthur wellesley was selected to command a force of nine thousand infantry and one regiment of cavalry, which was to sail immediately to the peninsula, and to act as circumstances should determine. this force sailed from cork on the 12th of july, and was to be followed by another of ten thousand men. sir arthur reached corunna on the 20th of the same month, and immediately put himself in communication with the junta of galicia. all was confidence amongst the spaniards. they assured him, as the deputies in london had assured the ministers, that they wanted no assistance from foreign troops; that they had men to any amount, full of bravery; they only wanted arms and money. he furnished them with a considerable sum of money, but his experienced mind foresaw that they needed more than they imagined to contend with the troops of buonaparte. they wanted efficient officers, and thorough discipline, and he felt confident that they must, in their overweening assurance, suffer severe reverses. he warned the junta that buonaparte, if he met with obstructions in reaching them by land, would endeavour to cross into asturias by sea, and he advised them to fit out the spanish ships lying at ferrol to prevent this; but they replied that they could not divert their attention from their resistance by land, and must leave the[559] protection of their coasts to their british allies. sir arthur then sailed directly for oporto, where he found the portuguese right glad to have the assistance of a british force, and most willing to co-operate with it, and to have their raw levies trained by british officers. on the 24th of july he opened his communication with the town. the bishop was heading the insurrection, and three thousand men were in drill, but badly armed and equipped. a thousand muskets had been furnished by the british fleet, but many men had no arms except fowling-pieces. wellesley made arrangements for horses and mules to drag his cannon, and convey his baggage, and then he sailed as far as the tagus, to ascertain the number and condition of the french forces about lisbon. satisfied on this head, he returned, and landed his troops, on the 1st of august, at figueras, in mondego bay. this little place had been taken by the portuguese insurgents, and was now held by three hundred mariners from british ships. higher up the river lay five thousand portuguese regulars, at coimbra. on the 5th he was joined by general spencer, from cadiz, with four thousand men; thus raising his force to thirteen thousand foot and about five hundred cavalry. the greatest rejoicing was at the moment taking place amongst the portuguese from the news of general dupont's surrender to casta?os.

junot had from sixteen to eighteen thousand men in portugal, but a considerable number of them were scattered into different garrisons; his hope of reinforcements from spain was likewise cut off by the surrender of dupont, and by the fact of the spaniards being in possession of andalusia, estremadura, and galicia. thus the numbers of the two armies which could be brought into the field against each other were pretty equal, except that junot had a fine body of cavalry, of which arm the british were nearly destitute. on the 9th of august general wellesley commenced his march southward, in the direction of lisbon, to encounter junot. on the 16th wellesley came in contact with the van of junot's army. on the landing of the british, junot had called in his different garrisons, and concentrated his troops about lisbon. he also dispatched general laborde to check wellesley's march, and ordered loison to support him. but before loison could reach laborde, wellesley was upon him, and drove in his outpost at the village of obidos, and forced him back on roli?a. at that place laborde had a very strong position, and there he determined to stand. he was located on a range of rocky hills, the ravines between which were thickly grown with underwood and briars. up these the british must force their way, if they attacked, and must suffer severely from the riflemen placed in the thickets and on the brows of the hills. but wellesley knew that loison with his detachment was hourly expected, and he determined to beat laborde before he came up. he therefore placed his portuguese division on his right to meet laborde, and ordered his left to ascend the steep hills, and be prepared for the appearance of loison's force, which was coming in that direction. his middle column had to make its way up the steepest heights, in front of laborde's centre. all three columns executed their movements, however, with equal valour and spirit. the centre suffered most of all, both from the nature of the ground, and from a rifle ambuscade placed in a copse of myrtle and arbutus, which mowed our soldiers down in heaps, with their gallant colonel, the son of lord lake, of indian fame, at their head. notwithstanding all difficulties, our soldiers scaled the heights, formed there, and the centre charged laborde's centre with the bayonet and drove them back. as the french had been taught that the british soldiers were of no account, and their general only a "sepoy general," they returned several times to the attack, but on every occasion found themselves repulsed as by an immovable wall. then, seeing the right and left wings bearing down upon them, they gave way, and ran for it. they were equally astonished at the terrible charges with the bayonet, at the rapidity and precision of the firing, and the general arrangement of the battle, and the exactitude with which it was carried out.

the french left six hundred killed and wounded on the field; the british had four hundred and eighty killed or disabled. laborde retreated amongst the hills to the village of azambugueira, and thence to torres vedras, where he looked for the junction of loison, and where that general really appeared. still the british force was equal, if not superior, in numbers to the french, and sir arthur wellesley advanced along the sea-coast to vimiera, where he was joined by generals anstruther and acland. unfortunately, at this moment arrived sir harry burrard, whom the ministry had ordered to supersede sir arthur wellesley in the chief command till the arrival of sir hew dalrymple, who was to be the general-in-chief; burrard, second in command; and wellesley, sir john moore, lord paget, sir john hope, and macdonald frazer, to command different[560] divisions. thus, by the old system of routine, the real military genius was reduced from the first to the fourth in command. sir arthur went on board sir harry burrard's vessel on the evening of his arrival, the 20th of august, and explained to him the positions of the armies, and his plan of advancing along the coast to mafra, thus turning the flank of laborde and loison, and compelling them to fight or retreat on lisbon. this was clearly the view of every one of the officers, who were eager to press on; but sir harry, old and cautious, was of opinion that nothing more should be risked till sir john moore arrived with his reinforcements. sir arthur must have returned under a sense of deep disappointment, but, fortunately for him, the enemy did not allow of his waiting for sir john moore. at midnight he received a hasty message that the french were in motion, and coming in one dense mass of twenty thousand men to surprise and rout him. sir arthur was strongly posted in the village of vimiera and on the hills around it. he sent out patrols, and ordered the pickets to be on the alert, and he then called out his troops, and had them in good fighting order by the dawn of day. at about seven o'clock the advance of the enemy was perceived by the clouds of dust that rose into the air, and soon they were seen coming on in columns of infantry, preceded by cavalry. by ten o'clock the french were close at hand, and made an impetuous attack on the british centre and left, to drive them into the sea, according to a favourite french phrase, the sea actually rolling close to their rear. the first troops which came into collision with them were the 50th regiment, commanded by colonel walker. seeing that the intention of the french, who were led by laborde himself, was to break his line by their old method of pushing on a dense column by a momentum from behind, which drove in the van like a wedge, in spite of itself, colonel walker instantly changed the position of his regiment so as, instead of a parallel line, to present an oblique one to the assailing column. this was, therefore, driven on by the immense rear, and, instead of breaking the british line, was actually taken in flank by it, and the musketry and grape-shot mowed down the french in a terrible manner. this was at once succeeded by a rapid charge with the bayonet; and so astonishing was the effect of this unexpected movement, that the french were thrown into irretrievable confusion, and broke on every side. whilst this was the effect on the centre and left, general sir ronald fergusson was attacked with equal impetuosity by loison: bayonets were crossed, and the same result as took place at maida occurred—the french fell back and fled. nothing was wanted but a good body of cavalry to follow up the flying foe, and completely reduce them to surrender. the small body of horse, commanded by colonel taylor, fought with an ardour that led them too far into the centre of margaron's powerful cavalry, and colonel taylor was killed, and half of his little troop with him. kellermann, to stop the pursuit, posted a strong reserve in a pine wood, on the line of retreat, but they were driven out at the point of the bayonet. had the orders of general wellesley now been carried out, the french would have been cut off from much further retreat. general hill was commanded to take a short cut, and interpose between the french and the strong position of torres vedras, and general fergusson was directed to follow sharply in their rear. in all probability they must have capitulated at once; but here the evil genius of sir harry burrard again interfered to save them. he appeared on the field and thought sufficient had been done till sir john moore arrived. it was not enough for him that the french had now been twice put to rout within a few days, and were in full flight, and that they were found not to be twenty thousand, but only eighteen thousand strong. he ordered the pursuit to cease, and the army to sit down at vimiera till the arrival of moore. to the great astonishment of the french, and the equal mortification of the british, the retreating enemy was thus allowed to collect their forces and take possession of the heights of torres vedras.

the next day, the 21st, sir hew dalrymple arrived from gibraltar, and superseded sir harry burrard. but the mischief was done; the enemy had gained the strong position from which wellesley would have cut them off. what would have been the effect of sir arthur's unobstructed orders was clearly seen by what did take place; for, notwithstanding the possession of the strong post of torres vedras, junot saw that he could not maintain the conflict against the british, and on the 22nd he sent general kellermann with a flag of truce to propose an armistice, preparatory to a convention for the evacuation of portugal by the french.

the terms which junot required were that the french should not be considered as prisoners of war, but should be conveyed to france by sea, with all their baggage; that nothing should be detained. these would, in fact, have allowed[561] them to carry off all the plunder of churches and houses, and to this sir arthur objected. he said that some means must be found to make the french disgorge the church plate. but the convention was signed, subject to the consent of the british admiral, sir charles cotton, a condition of importance, seeing that junot had stipulated that the russian fleet in the tagus, commanded by admiral siniavin, should not be molested or stopped when it wished to go away. admiral cotton objected to these terms, and it was agreed that the russian fleet should be made over to britain till six months after the conclusion of a general peace. commissioners were appointed to examine the french spoil, who recovered the property of the museum and royal library, and some of the church plate; but the french were allowed to carry off far too much of their booty. the definitive treaty was signed at cintra on the 30th of august, much to the disgust of sir arthur wellesley, who, however, signed it as a matter of form. he then wrote to lord castlereagh, to say that he desired to quit the army; that matters were not prospering, and that he had been too successful to allow him to serve in it in any subordinate situation. indeed, he saw that, left to himself, he could carry victory with the british standard, but that it was impossible to do any good under incompetent men.

sir john moore.

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the indignation of all parties in england was unbounded. they were persuaded that junot might have been compelled to surrender with all his army as prisoners of war; that his arms and booty ought to have been given up entirely, as[562] well as the russian fleet; and the army prevented from taking any part in the after war, except upon a proper exchange. and no doubt this might have been the case had wellesley been permitted to follow his own judgment. a court of inquiry was appointed to sit in the great hall of chelsea college, which opened on the 14th of november and closed on the 27th of december. yet matters were so managed that scarcely any blame was cast on sir harry burrard, and all the generals were declared free from blame. sir harry was, indeed, included in the praise bestowed by the committee—that sir hew dalrymple, sir harry himself, and sir arthur wellesley, as well as the rest of the officers and men, had displayed an ardour and gallantry on every occasion during the expedition that reflected the highest lustre on his majesty's troops. but the public was not at all mystified by this strange sentence.

the convention being ratified, the british took possession of all the forts on the tagus on the 2nd of september, and the port of lisbon was opened to our shipping. on the 8th and 9th the british army entered lisbon in triumph, amid the acclamations of the people. transports were collected and the embarkation of the french army commenced, and before the end of the month they were all shipped off, except the last division, which was detained by an order from england. the colours of the house of braganza were hoisted on all the forts which we had taken possession of, and a council of government was established, which ruled in the name of the prince regent of portugal.

the system of buonaparte, by which he endeavoured to prevent the knowledge of these events in spain and portugal from spreading through france, was one of unscrupulous lying. he took all sorts of false means to depress the spirits of the insurgents by mere inventions, which he had inserted in the spanish and portuguese gazettes under his influence. at one time it was that george iii. was dead, and that george iv. was intending to make peace with napoleon. but whatever effect he might produce by such stories for a time in the peninsula, the truth continued to grow and spread over france. it became known that junot and his army were driven from lisbon; that dupont was defeated and had surrendered in the south of spain; then that king joseph had fled from madrid; and that all the coasts of the peninsula were in possession of the british, who were received by the spaniards and portuguese as friends and allies. compelled to speak out at length, on the 4th of september a statement appeared in the moniteur mentioning some of these events, but mentioning only to distort them. it could not be concealed that britain was active in these countries, but it was declared that the emperor would take ample vengeance on them. in order to silence the murmurs at the folly as well as the injustice of seizing on spain, which was already producing its retributive fruits, he procured from his slavish senate a declaration that the war with spain was politic, just, and necessary. buonaparte then determined to put forth all his strength and drive the british from the peninsula; but there were causes of anxiety pressing on him in the north. austria and russia wore an ominous aspect, and a spirit of resistance showed itself more and more in the press of germany, and these things painfully divided his attention. his burden was fast becoming more than he could bear.

meanwhile ministers had not yet perceived the military genius of sir arthur wellesley, notwithstanding his services in india, at copenhagen, and his brilliant victories at roli?a and vimiera. instead of making him at once commander-in-chief of the forces destined to co-operate in spain—for they now resolved to make a decided movement in favour of the spanish patriots—they gave that post to sir john moore. sir arthur had assured ministers that he was far better qualified for the chief command than any of the superior officers then in the peninsula. he had now displayed the qualities necessary for a great general: prudence as well as daring, and the sagacious vision which foresees not only difficulties, but the means of surmounting them. sir arthur had carried victory with him everywhere, a circumstance one would have thought sufficient to satisfy the dullest diplomatist that he was the man for the occasion. but there was one thing which demanded attention, without which the successful operation of our armies was impossible—the thorough reform of the commissariat department. this department was at that time in a condition of the most deplorable inefficiency. the commissariat officers had no experience; there was no system to guide and stimulate them. sir arthur had learned the necessity, in india, of the most complete machinery of supply; that it was of no use attempting to advance into a hostile country without knowing how and whence your troops were to be provisioned, and to have always ammunition in plenty, and tents for shelter. this machinery all wanted organising—the absolute necessity of its[563] perfect action impressing itself on every individual concerned in it. until this were done, sir arthur would never have advanced into the heart of spain as sir john moore did. considering the state of the roads, and the want of mules, horses, and waggons to convey the baggage, he would not have proceeded till he had first brought these into existence. still more, sir arthur would not have marched far without securing, by one means or other, correct information of the real state and localities of the spanish armies. on all these things depended success, and no man was more alive to the knowledge of this than sir arthur wellesley. he had already pressed these matters earnestly on the attention of government, and had they had the penetration to have at once selected him for the command, they would have spared the country the disasters which followed.

on the 6th of october sir john moore received instructions from lord castlereagh that his army was to advance into spain, and co-operate with the spanish armies for the expulsion of the french. he was informed that his twenty-five thousand men would receive a reinforcement of ten thousand men under sir david baird, who was on his voyage to corunna. when sir john prepared to march, the most serious difficulties presented themselves. even at lisbon it was found impossible to procure conveyance for the necessary baggage, and therefore the supplies of provisions and stores were cut down extremely—a great mistake. there was one species of baggage—women and children—who, according to the wretched practice of the time, were allowed to accompany the troops, and would not be left behind, though the army was going into immediate active service against the enemy. sir john directed the commanding officers to order that as many as possible of these should stay behind, especially such women as had very young children, or infants at the breast, as there would not be found sufficient carts for them; and in the mountainous tracks at that season, and the horrible roads, they must suffer the most exhausting fatigues and hardships. but sir john had not the commanding firmness of wellesley, and his orders in this respect were, for the most part, neglected. very proper orders were also issued by sir john regarding the behaviour of the soldiers towards the natives. they were informed that the spaniards were a grave and very proud people, readily offended by any disrespect towards their religion or customs; and the soldiers were desired to behave courteously, and to wear the cockade of king ferdinand vii. as well as their own.

the army set out in successive divisions, and by different routes, in consequence of the exhausted state of the country, which had been stripped by the french as by an army of locusts. the roads were intolerable, and the weather was vile. wading through mud, and dragging their artillery through bogs and sloughs, they struggled on to castello branco, which the first division reached on the 4th of december. by the 11th sir john had crossed the portuguese frontier, and entered ciudad rodrigo. there he was received with great demonstrations of joy; and on the 13th he arrived at salamanca. here he had to remain for the coming up of his artillery, which, under a guard of three thousand foot and one thousand horse, had been conducted, by sir john hope, round by elvas, as the only road, according to the portuguese, by which heavy cannon could be conveyed. this was a proof of the great need of those arrangements so strongly urged by sir arthur wellesley. proper inquiries, through proper officers, would have ascertained beforehand the actual state of the roads and passes. here sir john, too, had to wait for sir david baird's detachment, which had arrived at corunna on the 13th of october, but had found the greatest difficulty in being allowed to land and proceed. this was refused by the junta of galicia, out of that ignorant and inflated pride of the spaniards, which persuaded them that, because they had compelled dupont to surrender, they could drive the french out of their country without any assistance of the british, whom they regarded not as saviours, but as intruders. whilst application was made to the central junta, at madrid, for the troops to land, they had to remain for a fortnight cooped up in the transports. there was still another hindrance, which the sound sense and foresight of wellesley would not have permitted. though the british government had forwarded to spain two hundred thousand muskets, with all requisite ammunition, and sixteen millions of hard dollars, sir john moore was entrusted with only twenty-five thousand pounds of it, and sir david baird with none at all. when, therefore, permission was obtained, from madrid, for the allies, who were bringing them all the arms and all the material of war, to land, baird had no money to pay his way on the march with ten thousand men, and sir john moore had to remit him eight thousand pounds. this was sufficiently bad management, but this[564] was far from the worst. sir john moore, in the most critical circumstances, was left without the necessary information regarding the real strength of the enemy, and without the influence which the british ambassador should have exerted to have the army supplied with the necessary means of conveyance for its baggage, ammunition, and artillery. the spaniards obstructed rather than helped the british army. they did not know themselves that the french were pouring reinforcements through the pyrenees to the amount of seventy thousand men, soon to be followed by buonaparte himself. the british ambassador, at such a time, ought to have taken measures for knowing the truth; but the ambassador was, just at this moment, the most unfit person that could possibly have been pitched upon. sir charles stewart, who had been for some time ambassador at madrid, was well acquainted with the spaniards, and had energy and intelligence enough to have operated upon them. but as, with new changes of ministry, everything must be changed by the british government, even if it be for the worse, so here, not only had the generals been changed three times in four-and-twenty hours, but the active and well-informed minister was withdrawn, and a most indolent and useless man sent in his place. this was mr. john hookham frere, great in the quarterly review, and connected with canning and his party. he either sent sir john no information as to the state and position of the spanish armies or of the advance and numbers of the french, or he sent him erroneous intelligence. lord william bentinck, who was in spain, exerted himself to rouse the spanish junta to a proper sense of their real position, and of the necessity for affording the british army, which had come to assist them, all the information and support that they could; and he himself sent word that the french were crossing not merely the pyrenees, but the ebro. at length, a dispatch to marshal jourdain, being accidentally intercepted by a guerilla party on the frontiers, startled the junta with the news that immense bodies of french were advancing into spain; and they began to appreciate the value of their british allies, but would do nothing to facilitate their march, or to direct them to the quarter where they would be most useful; and frere, who should have stimulated them to a sense of their duty, did just nothing at all.

the royal palace, madrid. (from a photograph by frith & co.)

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[565]

sir john moore entered spain under the impression that several brave and victorious spanish armies were to co-operate with him; but he looked in vain for any such armies. nay, on the very day of his arrival at salamanca he heard of the defeat of the count de belvedere, near burgos; and only two days afterwards that general had also been defeated at espinosa, on the frontiers of the province of biscay. he demanded from the junta to know with whom he was to co-operate for the conduct of the campaign, and he was referred to casta?os. but casta?os had already lost the confidence of the proud and ignorant junta, and had little information to give. on the 15th of november the governor of the province announced to him that the french had taken possession of valladolid, only twenty leagues from salamanca; from the dormant mr. frere he heard nothing. this was startling intelligence; for he had only a small portion of his army yet with him. sir david baird was still struggling with the obstructive junta at corunna, and sir john hope was wandering near madrid with the artillery. moore began to have a very gloomy idea of the situation, not only of spain, but of his situation in it. he wrote that there was no unity of action; no care of the juntas to promote it, or to furnish arms and clothing to the soldiers; that he was in no correspondence with the generals of the other armies, and knew neither their plans nor those of the government. he declared that the provinces around him were not armed; and as for the national enthusiasm of which so much had been said, that he saw not a trace of it; that, in short, the british had no business there; but he would still try to do something, if possible, for the country, since he was there.

meanwhile, buonaparte was preparing to descend like an avalanche on this absurdly inflated nation. to set himself at ease with the north, whilst thus engaged in the peninsula, he deemed it first necessary, however, to have an interview with the emperor of russia in germany. the spirit of the germans was again rising; and notwithstanding the spies and troops of buonaparte, his paid literati—like johannes müller,—and his paid princes—like those of the rhenish confederation, bavaria, baden, and würtemberg,—the germans were beginning to blush at their humiliation, and to lament the causes of it, their effeminacy, and their division into so many states, with all the consequent prejudices and intestine feuds. prussia, which had suffered so severely for its selfish policy, and had been so cut down in territory and insulted in its honour by napoleon, began to cherish the hope of yet redeeming itself, by a more manly spirit and a more cordial co-operation with the rest of germany. in this work of regeneration—which is sure to take place sooner or later, when nations have been well beaten and humiliated, and which then, in their renewed manhood, require no foreign aid for the accomplishment of their freedom—all classes laboured. the king, under the inspiration of his patriotic minister, von stein, began most essential reforms. he abolished the feudal servitude and forced labour under which the peasantry groaned; he made a thorough moral re-organisation of the army, admitting of promotion from the ranks; he allowed any man that had the money to purchase baronial estates; and he deprived the higher nobility of the exclusive right of possessing landed property, and of appointment to the higher civil and military posts. von stein, too, commenced the work of inspiring the mass of the people with a new soul of patriotism. he established a secret society, called the tugend bund, or union of virtue, which was to unite nobles, statesmen, officers, and literati in one common confederation for the rescue of the country. amongst those who entered the most enthusiastically were colonel schill, who had headed with great effect his troop of volunteer cavalry, jahn, a professor at berlin, and moritz arndt, a professor of bonn, the author of the famous national song, "was ist der deutschen vaterland?" in which he maintained that it was not prussia, nor austria, nor any other particular state, but all germany, so far as the language extended. scharnhorst, the commander of the prussian army, though restricted to the prescribed number of troops, created a new army by continually exchanging trained soldiers for raw recruits, and secretly purchased an immense quantity of arms, so that, on emergency, a large body of men could be speedily assembled. he had also all the brass battery guns converted into field-pieces, and replaced by iron guns. but napoleon's spies were everywhere. they discovered the existence of the tugend bund, and of the secret societies of the students, which they carried on under the old name of the burschenschaft, or association of the students. though napoleon pretended to ridicule these movements, calling it mere ideology, he took every means to suppress them. the minister, von stein, in consequence[566] of the contents of an intercepted letter, was outlawed; scharnhorst, and grüner, the head of the police, were dismissed from their offices; but it was all in vain—the tide of public feeling had now set in the right way. the same spirit was alive in austria. abuses were reformed; a more perfect discipline was introduced. john philip von stadion, the head of the ministry, encouraged these measures; the views of the archduke charles were carried out on a far wider basis. a completely new institution, that of the landwehr, or armed citizens, was set on foot. the austrian armies were increased greatly. in 1807 the hungarian diet voted twelve thousand recruits; in 1808, eighty thousand; while eighty thousand organised soldiers, of whom thirty thousand were cavalry, constituted the armed reserve of this warlike nation. napoleon remonstrated, and received very pacific answers, but the movement went on. von stein, now a refugee in austria, fanned the flame there, and he and count münster, first hanoverian ambassador, and afterwards british ambassador at st. petersburg, were in constant correspondence with each other and with the government of great britain.

before buonaparte, therefore, could proceed to spain, he determined to meet the czar at erfurth, in germany, by their open union to overawe that country, and to bind alexander more firmly to his interest by granting him ampler consent to his designs on turkey and on finland. the meeting took place on the 27th of september, and terminated on the 17th of october. both emperors returned in appearance more friendly and united than ever, but each in secret distrusting his ally. buonaparte, who was now intending in earnest to divorce josephine, and marry a daughter of a royal house, by whom he might have issue, and thus league himself with the old dynasties, made a proposal for one of the russian archduchesses, which was evaded by alexander, on the plea of the difference of religion. such a plea did not deceive the keen sagacity of buonaparte; he felt it to result from a contempt of his plebeian origin, and a belief in the instability of his giddy elevation; and he did not forget it. to impress on europe, however, the idea of the intimate union of the czar and buonaparte, they addressed, before leaving erfurth, a joint letter to the king of great britain, proposing a general peace. to this letter canning answered to the ministers of russia and france, that sweden—against whom the czar had commenced his war of usurpation—spain, portugal, and sicily, must be included in any negotiations. the french and russian ministers, on the contrary, proposed a peace on the principle of every one retaining what they had got. this, canning replied, would never be consented to; and the two emperors knew that very well, but the letter had served buonaparte's purpose. it enabled him to tell france and the world how much he was disposed to peace, and how obstinate was britain; it served to make the world believe in the close intimacy of the czar and himself. he now hurried back to france, and, opening the session of the corps législatif, on the 25th of october, he announced that he was going to spain to drive the "english leopards"—for such he always absurdly persisted in calling the lions in the royal arms of great britain—out of both spain and portugal. on the 27th he set out.

buonaparte determined to overwhelm both spanish and british by numbers. he had poured above a hundred thousand men across the pyrenees, and had supplied their places in france by two enormous conscriptions of eighty thousand men each. he now followed them with the rapidity of lightning. from bayonne to vittoria he made the journey on horseback in two days. he was already at vittoria a week before the british army, under sir john moore, had commenced its march from lisbon. it was his aim to destroy the spanish armies before the british could come up—and he accomplished it. the spanish generals had no concert between themselves, yet they had all been advancing northward to attack the french on different parts of the ebro, or in the country beyond it. it was the first object of napoleon to annihilate the army of blake, which occupied the right of the french army in the provinces of biscay and guipuzcoa. blake was attacked by general lefebvre on the last of october, on ground very favourable to the spaniards, being mountainous, and thus not allowing the french to use much artillery; but, after a short fight of three hours, he was compelled to fall back, and for nine days he continued his retreat through the rugged mountains of biscay, with his army suffering incredibly from cold, hunger, drenching rains, and fatigue. there was said to be scarcely a shoe or a greatcoat in the whole force. having reached espinosa de los monteros, he hoped to rest and recruit his troops, but lefebvre was upon him, and he was again defeated. he next made for reynosa, a strong position, where he hoped to recollect his scattered army; but there he received the news of the[567] defeat of belvedere, from whom he hoped for support. the french were again upon and surrounding him, and he was compelled to order his army to save themselves by dispersing amongst the mountains of asturias, whilst himself and some of his officers escaped, and got on board a british vessel.

buonaparte had arrived at vittoria on the 8th of november, between the defeat of blake at espinosa and his dispersion at reynosa, and he immediately dispatched soult to attack belvedere. this self-confident commander of two-and-twenty—surrounded by as self-confident students from salamanca and leon—instead of falling back, and forming a junction with casta?os, stood his ground in an open plain in front of burgos, and was scattered to the winds. between three and four thousand of his men were killed, wounded, or taken prisoners, and all his cannon and baggage captured. buonaparte had now only to beat casta?os, and there was an end to the whole spanish force. that general was much more cautious and prudent than the rest, and he fell back on the approach of marshal lannes, at the head of thirty thousand men, to tudela. but buonaparte had sent numerous bodies of troops to intercept his course in the direction of madrid, and, unfortunately for casta?os, he was joined by palafox, who had made so successful a stand against the french at saragossa. casta?os was for retreating still, to avoid lannes in front, and ney and victor, who were getting into his rear; but palafox, and others of his generals, strongly recommended his fighting, and a commissioner sent from the junta in madrid, in the french fashion, to see that he did his duty, joined in the persuasion, by hinting that to retreat would give suspicion of cowardice and treachery. against his better judgment, casta?os, therefore, gave battle on the 22nd of november, at tudela, and was completely routed. palafox hastened back to saragossa, which was destined to surrender after another frightful siege. the road was now left open to madrid, and the french troops had orders to advance and reduce it; and they did this with a fiendish ferocity, burning the towns and villages as they proceeded, and shooting every spaniard that they found in arms.

as the french approached madrid, whither buonaparte was coming in person, the junta, which had taken no measures to render it defensible while they had time, were now all hurry and confusion. they began to collect provisions; the stones were torn up to form barricades. a desperate resistance might have been made, as there had been at saragossa, but there was treachery in the city. the wealthy inhabitants, merchants and shopkeepers, as well as the aristocracy, were far more anxious to save their property than their country; the cowardly junta having issued orders, lost heart, and fled for badajos. on the 2nd of december, the anniversary of his coronation, buonaparte arrived before madrid, and summoned it to surrender; and this being unheeded, he prepared to storm it the next morning. had palafox been there, there would have been, probably, a brave defence. the next morning the storming commenced, and the french forced their way as far as the palace of the duke de medina celi, the key of the whole city. the place was then summoned afresh, and the governor now proposed a surrender. the fact was, that he had already settled in his mind to go over to the french, as the strongest party, and he gave no encouragement or assistance to the citizens, who still continued from behind their walls and barricades to fire on the french. on the 4th he declared that the city must surrender; and the french marched in. many of the people fled and the rest were disarmed; but buonaparte, who wanted to keep madrid uninjured and in good temper for king joseph, gave strict orders that the city should not be plundered, nor the people treated with rudeness. he fixed his residence about four miles from madrid, and issued thence imperial decrees and a proclamation, informing the spaniards that all further resistance was useless; that he wanted his brother to reign in quiet, but that if this were not permitted, he would come and reign there himself, and compel submission; for god had given him the power and inclination to surmount all obstacles. he then set out to drive the "english leopards" from the peninsula—a task that was to try him to the uttermost.

sir john moore was left in a most critical situation. all those fine armies, which were to have enfranchised spain without his assistance, were scattered as so much mist; but this he only knew partly. he knew enough, however, to induce him to determine on a retreat into portugal, and there to endeavour to make a stand against the french. he wrote to sir david baird and sir john hope—both of them still at a great distance—to retreat too: sir david, with his division, to fall back on corunna, and then sail to lisbon to meet him; sir john to await him at ciudad rodrigo. had moore carried out this plan whilst buonaparte and his troops were[568] engaged with the army of casta?os, and with madrid, his fate might have been very different. but here again he was the victim of false information. mr. frere, who seems to have really known nothing of what was going on, and to have believed anything, wrote to him from aranjuez, on the 30th of november, protesting against his retreat, and assuring him that he had nothing to do but to advance to madrid, and save spain. he expressed his most unbounded faith in the valour and success of the spaniards. he talked to moore of repulsing the french before they collected their reinforcements. on reflecting on the statements of mr. frere, sir john concluded that madrid was still holding out, and thought it his duty to proceed to its rescue. he was joined, on the 6th of december, by hope and the artillery, and he wrote again to sir david baird to countermand his retreat, and order him to come up with dispatch. thus precious time was lost, and it was not till the 9th that he was undeceived. he had sent colonel graham to madrid with a reply to morla, and to procure intelligence of the real state of affairs. graham now came back with the alarming and astonishing truth that the french were in madrid; that it had held out only one day. it is strange that sir john did not instantly commence his retreat; but he was still misled by false accounts of the strength of the french, and actually resolved to proceed to madrid. on the 11th he sent forward his cavalry, under general stewart, when they came upon the advanced post of the enemy occupying the village of rueda. it was but about eighty men, infantry and cavalry. they were quickly surrounded by the british dragoons, and the whole killed or taken prisoners. on the 14th, an intercepted letter of berthier to soult fell into moore's hands, by which he learned that various french divisions were moving down upon him, and that soult was in advance. he thought that he might meet and beat soult before the other divisions arrived, and he therefore, after sending a dispatch to general baird to warn him of soult's approach, crossed the tordesillas, and continued his march as far as mayorga, where he was joined by sir david baird and sir john hope, so that his army now amounted to twenty-three thousand five hundred and eighty on the spot. he had other regiments in portugal and on the road, making up his total to thirty-five thousand.

on the 23rd moore was obliged to halt for the coming of his supplies; and whilst doing so, he received the intelligence that no fewer than seventy thousand men were in full march after him, or taking a route so as to cut off his rear at benevento, and that buonaparte himself headed this latter division. there was no further thought of advancing, but of retreat, before the army was completely surrounded. by the 26th the whole army was beyond astorga, but the french were now close behind them. buonaparte, indeed, hoped to have rushed on by the guadarama, and to have cut off his retreat at tordesillas, but he was twelve hours too late. on the last day of december, 1808, buonaparte was pressing close on the british rear in the vicinity of astorga, and thus closed the year on the fortunes of the spaniards and their british allies. the boastful spanish armies, too proud to think at first that they needed assistance, too unskilful, when they did see the need of it, to co-operate with it, and who had afforded nothing but indifference and false intelligence to their benefactors, were dispersed like so many clouds, and their allies were flying from an overwhelming foe.

but the year 1809 opened with one auspicious circumstance. there was no relief from the necessity of continuing the flight; but the proud corsican, who hoped to annihilate the "english leopards," was suddenly arrested in his pursuit, and called away to contend with other foes. on the 1st of january he was in astorga, and from the heights above it could see the straggling rear of the british army. nothing but the most imperative urgency prevented him from following, and seeking a triumph over the hated british—but that urgency was upon him. pressing dispatches from france informed him that the north was in ferment, and that austria was taking the field. the intelligence was too serious to admit of a moment's delay; but he made sure that soult could now conquer the british, and on the 2nd he turned his face northward, and travelled to paris with a speed equal to that with which he had reached spain.

soult, indeed, had sixty thousand men and ninety-one guns to deal with the flying and now greatly disorganised army of the british. at first the retreat had been made with much discipline and order, but the miserable weather, the torrents of rain, and heavy falls of snow, the roads rough with rocks, or deep with mud, tried the patience of the men. so long as they were advancing towards the enemy they could bear all this with cheerfulness, but the british are never good-humoured or patient under retreat. sullen and murmuring, they struggled along in the[569] retreat, suffering not only from the weather, but from want of provisions, and the disgraceful indifference of the people to those who had come to fight their battles. whenever a halt was made, and an order given to turn and charge the enemy, they instantly cheered up, forgot all their troubles, and were full of life and spirit. but their gloom returned with the retreat; and, not being voluntarily aided by the spaniards, they broke the ranks, and helped themselves to food and wine wherever they could find them. such was now the state of the weather and the roads, that many of the sick, and the women and children, who, in spite of orders, had been allowed to follow the army, perished. the french pressed more and more fiercely on the rear of the british, and several times sir john was compelled to stop and repel them. on one of these occasions the french general, colbert, was killed, and the six or eight squadrons of horse led by him were, for the most part, cut to pieces. at lugo, on the 5th of january, sir e. paget beat back a very superior force. again, on the 7th, sir john moore halted, and repulsed the advanced line of soult, killing four or five hundred of the french. the next morning the armies met again in line of battle, but soult did not attack; and as soon as it was dark sir john quietly pursued his march, leaving his fires burning to deceive the enemy.

burial of sir john moore. (see p. 570.)

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on the 10th of january the army came in sight of corunna and the sea, but no transports could be seen in the bay. they were detained by contrary winds at vigo, and the last hope of safety seemed cut off. sir john, however, quartered his troops in corunna, and determined to defend it manfully till the transports could get up. but great was his chagrin at the proofs of the miserable management of the commissariat department. on a hill above the town were four thousand barrels of gunpowder, which had been sent from england, and had been lying there many months, and the town was a great magazine of arms. sir john replaced the weather-worn muskets of his troops with new ones, supplied them with fresh, good powder, and, after removing as many barrels of powder into the town as the time would allow, he blew up the rest, producing a concussion that shook the place like an earthquake.

[570]

on the morning of the 14th the transports, to their great relief, hove in sight, and sir john hastened to get on board the sick, the horses, and the dismounted cavalry, and to prepare for a fight, for soult was now close upon the town; the hills were crowded with his troops, and they were already skirmishing with his outposts. in these skirmishes colonel mackenzie was killed in endeavouring to seize some of the french cannon, planted on the same spot where the powder had just been blown up. the morning of the 16th passed without any attack from soult, and sir john proceeded with his arrangements for embarkation; but about noon the battle began. soult had erected a powerful battery on some rocks at the extremity of his left, and commanding the village of elvina, occupied by our troops. sir david baird was posted on the british right, opposite to the battery, and at no great distance from the village. the french made a dash at the village, under cover of the battery, and drove our men from it. the fight then became general. soult had twenty thousand men, sir john about fourteen thousand five hundred; but soult had far more and heavier cannon, for sir john had shipped all his artillery except twelve light guns. it was soon seen that the french cannon did vastly more execution than ours; and as the whole line was engaged, sir john sent sir e. paget, with the whole of his reserve, to turn the left of a column that was outflanking baird on the right, and to silence the battery, if possible. another division, under general frazer, was sent to support paget, and the battle now raged furiously on the right, and about the village of elvina, which was lost and taken once or twice. in this conflict sir david baird had his arm shattered by a cannon-ball, and was taken off the field. major stanhope was killed, and major, afterwards general sir charles, napier was wounded. but paget drew back on the british right, and sir john, seeing the 42nd highlanders engaged, rode up to them and shouted, "highlanders! remember egypt!" and they rushed forward, driving all before them, till they were stopped by a stone wall. the battle, however, still raging, and the french bringing up reserves, the furious contest was renewed around the village of elvina. sir john then dispatched captain, afterwards lord, hardinge, to bring up the guards to support the 42nd highlanders. whilst awaiting their arrival, a cannon-ball, which had struck the ground, glanced forward again, and wounded sir john on the right shoulder and breast. he was dashed from his horse, and was supposed to be killed; but the force of the ball having been partly spent, before captain hardinge could reach him he had raised himself, and was gazing earnestly after the 42nd and the other troops engaged. when he had seen his soldiers driving the french before them, he consented to be borne to the rear. he was carried away by a highland sergeant and three soldiers, in a blanket, his wound bleeding very much, and himself satisfied that his hurt was mortal. as he went, however, he repeatedly made the soldiers halt, that he might have another view of the battle. by night the french were beaten back in every direction; but the british general was dead, having lived only to receive the tidings of victory. during the night the troops were, most of them, got on board, and at midnight sir john's remains were committed to the ground—as he had always wished them to be, should he be killed in battle—on the ramparts in the old citadel of corunna. no coffin was to be procured, for coffins were not a spanish fashion; but he was buried dressed as he was, and wrapt in his military cloak, literally as described in wolfe's popular poem on his death. the chaplain read the burial service, and there his officers "left him alone with his glory," to make their own embarkation.

the prospects of the european war at this juncture, as observed from england, were gloomy in the extreme. the dispersion of the armies of spain, the retreat and death of sir john moore, leaving the whole of the spanish and portuguese peninsula under the feet of buonaparte, disposed many to believe the power of the conqueror unassailable. the whig opposition made every use of this feeling to damage and, if possible, drive their rivals from office. that the whigs, in power, would have refrained from continental war any more than the tories is not to be believed. they had always, when in office—except, in the case of fox, for a short interval—been as ready to fight; but they had generally conducted their campaigns with much less ability. now, their great organ, the edinburgh review, indulged in the most vehement censures on the cabinet; charged all the adverse circumstances of the spanish and portuguese war to its bad management; and intimated that it was the most wicked and idiotic folly to hope to contend with buonaparte at all. but if ever there was a time when the continuance of the war was excusable, and perhaps necessary, it was now. great britain had gone fully and freely into the conflict to assist the continental nations. she had pledged herself[571] solemnly to spain and portugal, and to have withdrawn at this crisis would have been equally treacherous to our allies and pusillanimous as regarded the enemy. it would have been, in fact, to proclaim to the world that we had been completely beaten out of the field, that we could not do what we had promised to our allies, and that napoleon must be left the master of europe, and the dictator to britain. such a confession would have destroyed for ever the prestige of great britain, and justly. ministers felt this, and never were more resolved to persevere to the end. to show that they did not for a moment despair, they signed a treaty of peace and amity with spain only five days after the arrival of the news of the retreat and death of sir john moore, binding themselves never to acknowledge the authority of buonaparte over spain, or of any family but of ferdinand vii. and his lineal successors. that they were supported in their views by parliament was soon made evident by the rejection, by a majority of two hundred and eight against one hundred and fifty-eight, of a motion of lord henry petty censuring the convention of cintra, and, by a majority of two hundred and twenty against one hundred and twenty-seven, of a motion of mr. ponsonby for inquiry into the conduct of the late campaign in spain. ministers had at length satisfied themselves that they had in sir arthur wellesley a man capable of contending against the haughty tyrant of europe. the most liberal votes were made for the prosecution of the war. the total of supplies for the year amounted to fifty-three million eight hundred and sixty-two thousand pounds, including a loan of eleven million pounds. for the army twenty-seven million pounds was voted, and for the navy nineteen million pounds. between twenty and thirty thousand men were drafted from the militia into the regulars, and thus the army was augmented to that amount by soldiers already well trained. the loan was freely taken at a lower interest than any hitherto borrowed—the opposition asserted, because trade was deranged, and capitalists were at a loss how to invest their money; but the ministers contended, on the other hand, that it was solely because the war was popular with the nation. before, however, entering into its arduous and bloody details, we must narrate some disgraceful affairs at home.

on the 27th of january colonel wardle, a militia officer, rose in his place in the house of commons and made some startling charges against the duke of york, as commander-in-chief of the army. wardle had been a zealous conservative, but had now changed his politics, and was acting with the party of extreme reformers headed by sir francis burdett, lord folkestone, and others. his charge was that the duke of york was keeping a mistress, named mary ann clarke, a married woman, to the great scandal of the nation, and was allowing her to traffic in commissions and promotions in the army. nor was this all; he asserted that, not in the army alone, but in the church, this public adulteress was conferring promotions, through her influence with the duke, and that she had quite a levee of clergy, who were soliciting and bribing her to procure livings and even bishoprics. these were sufficiently exciting statements, and the colonel demanded a committee of inquiry to enable him to prove his assertions. sir francis burdett seconded the motion; and the proposal was not met—as it should have been by ministers or the duke's friends—by a denial, but, in general, by a eulogium on the duke's excellent discharge of his duties as commander-in-chief. the house determined that, wherever the infamy was to fall, it should have the full airing of a committee of the whole house, which was appointed to commence its inquiries on wednesday, the 1st of february, the duke intimating, through his friends, that he was, on his part, desirous of the fullest investigation of the matter. from the evidence of mrs. clarke it appeared very clear that the duke had permitted her to traffic in the sale of commissions, and both mrs. clarke and mary ann taylor, whose brother was married to mrs. clarke's sister, asserted that the duke had received part of the money for some of these bargains. sums of one thousand pounds, of five hundred pounds, and two hundred pounds had been paid to her for such services.

unfortunately, however, for the continuance of the popularity of mrs. clarke, it appeared that she was now actually living in the keeping of this virtuous colonel wardle, who was thus chastising royal peccadilloes. the whole of the circumstances did not come out whilst the question was before the house of commons, but enough to injure the credit irreparably of colonel wardle, and make mrs. clarke's evidence more than ever suspicious. the full information was brought out by a trial instituted by a mr. wright, an upholsterer, in rathbone place, for furnishing a new house for her in westbourne place. she had now quarrelled with colonel wardle, and he refused to pay the bill. wardle, it appeared, had done his best to stop the coming on of the[572] trial, but in vain; mrs. clarke appeared against him, and not only deposed that he had gone with her to order the goods, but told her it was in return for her aid in prosecuting the duke of york's case. wardle was cast on the trial, with costs, having about two thousand pounds to pay, and losing all the popularity that he had gained by the investigation. he had been publicly thanked by public meetings, both in the city and the country, and now came this rueful exposé. but it was too late now to save the duke's reputation. the house of commons had concluded its examination in march. it acquitted the duke of any participation with his artful mistress in the vile profits on the sale of commissions, but that she had made such there was no question. the duke did not await the decision of the commons, but resigned his office. lord althorp, in moving that, as the duke had resigned, the proceedings should go no further, said that the duke had lost the confidence of the country for ever, and therefore there was no chance of his returning to that situation. this was the conclusion to which the house came on the 21st of march, and soon afterwards sir david dundas was appointed to succeed the duke as commander-in-chief, much to the chagrin of the army, and equally to its detriment. the duke, though, like some of his brothers, very profligate, and, like them—according to a statement made during the debates on his case—capable, as a youth, of learning either greek or arithmetic, but not the value of money, seems to have discharged his duty to the army extremely well, of which old general dundas was wholly incapable.

the corruptions connected with the duke of york and his mistress were but a small fragment of the wide and universal system which was existing. the exposures, however, made by this inquiry induced the chancellor of the exchequer to bring in a bill to prevent such abuses. he referred to the sale of commissions which had been brought to light, and which had been carried on by means of improper influence over a man in high office. his bill, therefore, went to make it penal to demand money for the appointment to office, or to issue advertisements to that effect. the bill was passed.

but fresh light continued to break on the all-pervading corruption. the commissioners of naval inquiry presented a fresh report, abounding with proofs of the villainies that had been going on in that department. the military commissioners had a like frightful exposure to make of frauds and peculations which had been going on wholesale, especially in the west indies. the same result followed the investigations of the committee that inquired into the appointment of cadets to the east india service. there was abundance of proofs of the sale of such places, and even lord castlereagh was implicated. it was found that as president of the board of control—the minister, in fact, for indian affairs—he had presented a writership to his friend, lord clancarty, which clancarty had bartered with a mr. reding for a seat in parliament, and which reding immediately sold for three thousand pounds. lord archibald hamilton immediately moved that lord castlereagh had been guilty of an abuse of his authority as president of the board of control. castlereagh replied that, when he presented his friend, lord clancarty, with the writership, he had no notion that reding was a regular broker in parliamentary seats, though he did not deny that reding had told him that he meant to make over the place to a member of parliament who had a nephew whom he wished to send to india, and that this member of parliament would vote accordingly. the virtuous wilberforce seemed to hold this easy-going morality, for he voted for lord castlereagh, and, in spite of the denunciations of sir francis burdett, mr. w. smith, and others, lord archibald hamilton's motion was rejected by two hundred and sixteen against a hundred and sixty-seven—and lord castlereagh walked away scathless. there was immediately another charge brought against him, in company with the honourable henry wellesley, the brother of general wellesley, and late secretary of the treasury, for corrupt practices in the election of members of parliament; but the ministerial majority outvoted mr. madox, the mover. about the same time mr. curwen brought in a bill to prevent such practices, and to obtain purity of parliament by extinguishing bribery, and this was suffered to pass when all vitality had been taken out of it. on the 15th of june sir francis burdett also made a motion for extensive parliamentary reform; but the greater part of the members of parliament had already left town, and the motion was rejected by seventy-four against fifteen. on the 21st the session was closed with a speech which took a hopeful view of the war in spain, and also of that which austria had again commenced. we may now return to the details of these great contests on the continent.

[573]

sir david baird.

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we have stated that the spirit rising again in germany called buonaparte suddenly from spain, even before soult had pursued sir john moore to corunna. at valladolid he met the abbé de pradt, who had risen high in buonaparte's favour. to de pradt, he said he began to suspect that he had made his brother joseph a grander present in spain than he was aware of. "i did not know," he said, "what spain was; it is a finer country than i imagined. but you will see that, by-and-by, the spaniards will commit some folly which will place their country once more at my disposal. i will then take care to keep it to myself, and divide it into five great viceroyships." such were the soaring notions of napoleon at the very moment that the man was ready who was to drive the french from spain for ever. in england, at last, almost every one had now awoke to the consciousness that sir arthur wellesley was the only man to cope with the french in the peninsula. there were a few individuals, like lord folkestone, who were blinded enough by party to oppose this general conviction; but before the close of march sir arthur was selected by the government for this command. on the 15th of april he sailed from portsmouth, and on the 22nd he arrived safely at lisbon. some regiments of both horse and foot soon followed him, and he assumed the command of the british army in portugal, which had been some time in the hands of general sir j. cradock. the command of the portuguese troops had been placed in the hands of general beresford, who had been actively drilling them; and thus general sir arthur wellesley found himself at the head of an effective army of[574] british and portuguese numbering twenty-five thousand men.

soult, on the retreat of sir john moore, had taken possession of ferrol, bilbao, and the other principal towns in the north of spain. he had then entered portugal, and had marched to oporto, which he took after a resistance of only two days; and sir j. cradock had retired to lisbon. soult was prevented from advancing farther by the rising of the spaniards behind him in galicia, who retook vigo and other places; whilst silviera, the portuguese general, interposed between him and galicia, and formed a junction with the spaniards. wellesley determined to expel soult from oporto, and did not hesitate to say that the french general could not long remain in portugal. leaving a division in lisbon to guard the eastern frontiers of portugal against the forces of victor, who lay in spanish estremadura, sir arthur advanced towards oporto with a celerity that astonished the french. he quitted lisbon on the 28th of april, reached coimbra, driving the french before him, and on the 9th of may he was advancing from that city on oporto. by the 11th he was occupying the southern bank of the douro, opposite to that city. soult had broken down the bridges and sent away the boats, so that he might be able to retire at leisure into galicia; but sir arthur managed to send across general murray with a brigade, a few miles above oporto, and a brigade of guards also passed at the suburb of villanova, and he discovered sufficient boats to carry over his main army just above the town. the french commenced a fierce attack on the british forces as they landed; but the first battalion, the buffs, got possession of a large building called the seminario, and held it till the other troops arrived. major-general hill soon brought up the 48th and 66th regiments; general sherbrooke, who crossed the river below the town with the brigade of guards and the 29th regiment, entered the town amid the acclamations of the people, and charged the french in the rear; and general murray, about the same time, showed himself on the french left, above the town. soult fled, leaving behind him his sick and wounded, and many prisoners, besides much artillery and ammunition. this taking of oporto, in the face of a french force of ten thousand men, coupled with his having to cross the broad douro, and that with very defective means of transit, was a most brilliant affair; and the most astonishing thing was, that wellesley lost only twenty-three killed and ninety-eight wounded, whilst soult's troops suffered severely.

sir arthur determined to give soult as sharp a chase as he had given sir john moore. he wrote to general beresford to hold villa real, if possible, whilst he pressed on the heels of soult. on the 16th of may he came up with soult's rear, near salamonde, defeated the rear-guard, killed and wounded a great number of men, and sir arthur wrote that, had they had half an hour's more daylight, he should have taken the whole of his rear-guard. he added: "i shall follow him to-morrow. he has lost everything—cannon, ammunition, baggage, military chest—and his retreat is in every respect, even in weather, a pendant for the retreat to corunna." in truth, had sir john moore sent a nemesis to avenge himself, it could not have executed a more complete retribution. all the horrors of sir john's retreat, and far worse, were repeated. the french had exasperated the population here, as everywhere, by their reckless cruelties and rapacity, and they surrounded the flying army, and killed every man that they could find straggling, or who was left exhausted on the road. on the other hand, the french tracked their retrograde path with equal fury. "their route," says sir arthur, "could be traced by the smoke of the villages that they set on fire." sir arthur, in his dispatches, also says that, during their abode in portugal, the french had murdered people merely because they did not like their seizure of their country; and that he saw men hanging on trees by the roadside, whom they had executed for no other reason. so the scene of soult's retreat was now one long picture of pandemonium—the whole way strewn with dead men, horses, and mules; a wasted country, and an infuriated peasantry seeking to wreak their vengeance. sir arthur stopped his pursuit near the frontiers of spain. he could not overtake soult, who fled flinging away every impediment, whilst he was compelled to carry his supplies and artillery along with him. besides, the french, since the defeat of the spaniards at tudela, had entered andalusia in great force, where there was no army to oppose them except the ill-equipped one of the proud and unmanageable general cuesta; and marshal victor, who commanded in estremadura, might readily have made a descent on lisbon, had wellesley gone far into spain. he therefore resolved to return to oporto, to make necessary inquiries as to the roads into spain; to improve his commissariat; and then, forming a junction with cuesta, to[575] advance against marshal victor. whilst at oporto he had the satisfaction to learn that frere was superseded by his own brother, lord wellesley, as ambassador for spain, a circumstance of immense importance to the cause.

towards the end of may wellesley commenced his march over the spanish frontiers; his force being about twenty thousand infantry and three thousand cavalry. he fell in with the old spanish general, cuesta, at oropesa, on the 20th of july, who was at the head of thirty thousand men, but miserably equipped, discouraged by repeated defeats, and nearly famished. sir arthur was woefully disappointed by this first view of a spanish army in the field, and here, indeed, all his difficulties began. the general was a regular spanish hidalgo—proud, ignorant, and pig-headed. he received wellesley with immense stiffness and ceremony, as if somebody immeasurably his inferior; and though he knew no english, nor sir arthur any spanish, he would not condescend to speak french with him. his army collected supplies from all the country round; and though the british were come to fight for them, the spaniards expected them to provide for themselves, and there was the greatest difficulty in inducing the people to sell the british anything except for fabulous prices. still worse, sir arthur found it impossible to get cuesta to co-operate in anything. he fancied that he knew a great deal more about military affairs than the "sepoy general," as wellesley was termed, and that he ought to direct in everything, though he had done nothing but get well beaten on every occasion. and yet, if we take a glance at the french forces now in spain, against whom they had to make head, the utmost harmony and co-operation was necessary.

the french army in spain numbered more than two hundred thousand men, and of these more than one hundred and thirty thousand lay in the provinces bordering on portugal, or between it and madrid. victor had thirty-five thousand in estremadura; and close behind him, in la mancha, sebastiani had twenty thousand more. northward, in old castile, leon, and asturias, kellermann and bonnet had ten thousand. soult, in galicia, was joined by ney and mortier, making his army again upwards of fifty thousand, with whom he contemplated returning into portugal. general dessolles had fifteen thousand men at madrid to protect the intrusive king joseph; and suchet and augereau, in aragon and catalonia, commanded fifty thousand. almost all the strong fortresses in the country were in their hands. the only circumstances favourable to the allies were that the french generals were at variance amongst themselves; that none of them paid any deference to the commands of king joseph, who was nominally generalissimo; and that the spaniards were, everywhere where woods and mountains favoured them, harassing the french in a manner that made them very sick of the country, and that often reduced them to a state of severe privation.

sir arthur was anxious to engage and defeat victor before he was joined by the forces of joseph from madrid, and of sebastiani from la mancha. he therefore dispatched sir robert wilson, at the head of a considerable body of spanish and portuguese troops, on the way towards madrid; and sir robert executed this duty with so much promptitude and address that he threw himself into the rear of victor at escalona, only eight leagues from the capital. on the 22nd of july the united armies of britain and portugal attacked victor's outposts at talavera, and drove them in. the stupid old cuesta was nowhere to be seen; and the next day, the 23rd, when the british were again in position, ready to attack the french, the day was lost, because cuesta said he would not fight on a sunday. this tried sir arthur's patience past endurance, for every moment was precious, and he wrote on the occasion—"i find general cuesta more and more impracticable every day. it is impossible to do business with him, and very uncertain that any operation will succeed in which he has any concern. he has quarrelled with some of his principal officers, and i understand they are all dissatisfied with him." the opportunity of beating victor was thus lost. at midnight he quitted talavera, and retreated to santa olalla, and thence towards torrijos, to form a junction with sebastiani. the next morning wellesley took possession of talavera, but he could not pursue the enemy, for he says, "he found it impossible to procure a single mule or a cart in spain." neither could he procure food for his army. he says his troops had actually been two days in want of provisions, though cuesta's camp abounded with them. he declared that, under such treatment by those that he had come to save, he would return to portugal before his army was ruined. on this, cuesta became as wildly and madly active as he had been before stubbornly passive. he dashed forward after victor alone, never stopping till he ran against the rear of the[576] united army of victor and sebastiani, at torrijos. wellesley was quite sure what the result would be, and in a few days cuesta came flying back with a confused mass of men, bullocks, flocks of sheep, baggage waggons, and artillery, beaten and pursued by the enemy.

map of spain and portugal to illustrate the peninsular war.

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sir arthur knew that at least one hundred thousand french were on the march to take him at once in flank and front; that soult was advancing from salamanca, mortier from valladolid; and, besides—which he did not know—ney was en route from astorga. he must, therefore, retreat at once or fight, and the enemy saved him the trouble of deciding. king joseph, afraid of sir robert wilson being joined by general venegas, who had shown himself on the road towards aranjuez, and of then falling on madrid, ordered victor to attack wellesley at once, without waiting for any further reinforcements. accordingly, sir arthur was attacked by victor in front of talavera. he had placed cuesta and his spaniards on his right, abutting on the tagus, and protected by old enclosure walls and olive gardens; and his own troops on the left, on the open plain. the attack began on the evening of the 27th of july, on the outposts, which gradually fell back, and the battle was renewed the next day. the position of the spaniards being found unapproachable, the whole fury of the french fell on the british, and the contest was kept up till it was pitch dark.[577] about midnight there was a tremendous firing on the spanish side, and sir arthur rode there to ascertain the cause. no cause was visible, but the spaniards were flying in great haste, and it was with difficulty that he and cuesta could stop the rout. next day the british line was attacked on all points by the troops of both victor and sebastiani, but they were repelled, and driven down the hills at the point of the bayonet. at one time the british centre was driven in, but it was re-established by the 48th, while the 23rd dragoons, by a reckless charge, paralysed a whole division of the french army. in the words of sir arthur, the british everywhere maintained their positions gloriously, and gave the french a terrible beating. out of the fifty thousand pitched against the less than twenty thousand british—for the spanish were scarcely engaged at all—they lost in killed and wounded seven thousand men. general lapisse was killed, and many prisoners were taken, besides seventeen pieces of artillery, with tumbrils and ammunition complete. the british lost eight hundred and fifty-seven killed, and had three thousand nine hundred and thirteen wounded. major-general mackenzie and brigadier-general langworth were killed.

the bayonet charge at talavera. (see p. 577.)

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the next morning, by daybreak, the french were in full retreat over the river alberche, and sir arthur employed the two following days in getting his wounded into hospital in talavera, and in procuring provisions for his victorious but starving army. sir arthur complains that, though he had thus repulsed the french for them, neither the spanish authorities nor the spanish people did anything to assist him in this respect. they were very willing that the british should fight their battles, but they must provide for themselves, or starve. the state of our own commissariat aggravated this evil. it had long been a department of the most corrupt kind, the duties of which were neglected, and little was thought of by its officers but the enriching of themselves at the expense of our government and our soldiers. these swindlers, long after this, continued to pay the contractors and muleteers in notes payable at lisbon, or at headquarters; these the receivers[578] had often to get changed into coin at a monstrous discount, and jews and jobbers flocked after the army for this purpose. to add to the mischief, some of these villains introduced loads of counterfeit dollars, merely copper-plated, so that, after losing enormously on the exchange of the paper, the receivers found themselves utterly defrauded of their payment. it was no wonder that the trading part of the spanish population should feel shy of supplying us, more especially as sir john moore—from the money which should have been in his chest having been, by mr. frere, carelessly handed over to the spanish junta—had had to pay in paper which the british government had not yet redeemed. the reform of such abuses as these was one of the great things which wellesley did for the british army, but at present he was suffering the extremest difficulties from them. he wrote sternly to mr. frere, who had not yet been superseded by the arrival of lord wellesley, that he (sir arthur) was blamed by the junta for not doing more, whilst they were allowing his army, which had beaten twice their own number in the service of spain, to starve. "it is positively a fact," he wrote, "that during the last seven days the british army have not received one-third of their provisions; that, at this moment, there are nearly four thousand wounded soldiers dying in the hospitals in this town from want of common assistance and necessaries, which any other country in the world would have given even to its enemies; and that i can get no assistance of any description from this country. i cannot prevail on them to even bury the dead carcases in the neighbourhood, the stench of which will destroy themselves as well as us." all this while, he added, don martin de garay was urging him to push on, and drive the french over the pyrenees; "but," added sir arthur, "i positively will not move; nay, more, i will disperse my army till i am supplied with provisions and means of transport as i ought to be."

and, in fact, circumstances rendered it advisable to retreat. joseph buonaparte, with the reinforcements of sebastiani, had joined victor, and that general felt ready to advance. at the same time wellesley learned that soult had arrived in palencia, in the british rear. he desired cuesta to guard the pass of puerto de ba?os, but this he did so ineffectually that both soult and mortier marched through it. ney also reached palencia, and thus fifty-three thousand men were threatening to cut off sir arthur's route to portugal. he determined to fall back on oropesa, leaving cuesta to defend talavera, and protect the two thousand british wounded in the hospitals; but cuesta speedily abandoned the place, leaving one thousand five hundred of the wounded behind, whom victor, to his honour, treated in the most humane manner. with the road of the enemy thus left open in his rear in two directions, sir arthur, at the same time, learned that soult's division had got between him and the bridge of alvarez, in the direct line of his march into portugal. his situation, thus hemmed in by overwhelming forces, was most critical, and he informed cuesta that he must file off for badajos. he reached badajos safely on the 2nd of september, carrying the one thousand five hundred wounded with him. these he sent to the strongly fortified town of elvas, in portuguese territory, which now became the great hospital of the army. sir arthur, on the 7th of september, was informed of the arrival of sir robert wilson at castello branco. he had conducted his little force almost to the gates of madrid, and had made a powerful diversion in favour of the main army, by keeping king joseph and the french general in constant fear of his joining venegas and attacking the capital. on his return, by order of wellesley, he had gallantly fought his way against vastly superior forces, always contriving to make the enemy believe that his strength was double what it was. his conduct of this expedition elicited the most cordial praises from the commander-in-chief. at this juncture napoleon sent a dispatch, ordering the army in spain to cease further offensive operations till the conclusion of the austrian war enabled him to send fresh reinforcements into spain. this was a proof that buonaparte no longer hoped to beat the british army by any but the most preponderating masses. he had in spain ten times the forces of the british, yet he could not hope for victory from this vast disproportion. wellesley, at this very time, in one of his dispatches, had observed this great fact. "i conceive," he said, "that the french are dangerous only in large masses." the british army was therefore quartered on the line of the guadarama, to protect portugal from soult, and remained undisturbed till the following may. whilst the hostile forces were thus resting, the news reached sir arthur that he had been created baron douro of wellesley, and viscount wellington of talavera. this honour had been conferred upon him on the 4th of september, as soon as possible after the arrival of[579] the news of his brilliant and memorable victory at talavera.

if there wanted anything to prove the truth of lord wellington's warnings to the spanish authorities of the undisciplined condition of their armies, and the incompetency of their generals, it came quickly. whilst they continued to treat him more like an enemy than a friend, and had issued orders throughout the province where he lay, forbidding the sale of provisions and forage for his army, their own armies were again annihilated. the army of venegas, which had retreated, on the advance of sebastiani towards madrid, into the sierra morena, had been taken from him, and given to a young, inexperienced man, general areizaga. cuesta, also, had been set aside for one still more incapable, a general eguia, of whom lord wellington had already pronounced that he was a fool. areizaga, instead of maintaining his strong post in the hills, being joined by the greater part of the army of estremadura, now commanded by eguia, imagined that he could beat the united forces of mortier and sebastiani, and drive them out of madrid. with fifty thousand men and sixty pieces of artillery he descended from his hills into the open plains of oca?a, where he was beaten on the 20th of november, with the loss of all his artillery but five guns, his baggage, military chest, provisions, and everything. there was immense slaughter of his soldiers, and the rest fled into the mountains. the duke del parque, who was placed for the protection of the line of the tagus with another large army, was marching to support this intended conquest of madrid, when, in the month of october, being strongly posted on the heights of tamames, he encountered general marchand, and defeated him. elated by this success, he no longer trusted to hills and strong positions, but, like areizaga, advanced boldly into the plains, and on the 28th of november he encountered kellermann at alba de tormes, and received a most thorough defeat. his men, both cavalry and infantry, scarcely stayed to cross swords or bayonets with the french, but, flinging down their arms, and leaving all their baggage and artillery behind them, they fled in every direction. kellerman pursued and cut them down without mercy—according to his own account, killing three thousand men and making three hundred prisoners.

lord wellington, notwithstanding that the destruction of these armies, on which the defence of andalusia and the provinces of the south depended, completely proved the justice of his statements to the junta, was deeply chagrined by the circumstance. "i lament," he said, in his despatches, "that a cause which promised so well a few weeks ago, should have been so completely lost by the ignorance, presumption, and mismanagement of those to whose direction it was entrusted. i declare that, if they had preserved their two armies, or even one of them, the cause was safe. the french could have sent no reinforcements which could have been of any use; time would have been gained; the state of affairs would have daily improved; all the chances were in our favour; and, in the first moment of weakness, occasioned by any diversion on the continent, or by the growing discontent of the french themselves with the war, the french armies must have been driven out of spain." lord wellington's position was, by the destruction of these armies, left totally open, and he had for some time resolved to retire wholly into portugal, and had been planning that system of defence which afterwards proved so astonishing to the french. though he was left with about twenty thousand men to maintain himself against the whole french host in spain, he never for a moment contemplated quitting the peninsula, nor despaired of the final result. the experienced eye of lord wellington, after the battle of vimiera, had, at a glance, seen the admirable capability of the mountain ranges of torres vedras for the construction of impregnable lines of defence for lisbon. so far from holding any notion of being driven to his ships, like sir john moore, he was satisfied that, by fortifying the defiles through these hills, and keeping our ships on the tagus and on the coast, he could defy all the armies of france. he proceeded now to lisbon, where he arrived on the 10th of october, reconnoitred the hills, and, having done so, left with colonel fletcher, of the engineers, a clearly written statement of all that he desired to be done, so as to make the double line of defences complete: to erect batteries on each side of the defiles through which the necessary roads ran, to erect breastworks and entrenchments where required, and to break down the bridges in front of them. he ascertained the precise time it would require to accomplish all this, and, ordering all to be carried on with the utmost quickness, he returned to badajos, and next proceeded to seville, to join his brother in urging on the spanish government the necessary measures for the defence of the country. after visiting cadiz[580] with his brother, he returned to his headquarters, where he had scarcely arrived on the 17th of november, when he received the news of the total overthrow of the spaniards at oca?a. he then made a deliberate and orderly retreat from spain, crossing the tagus at abrantes, where he left general hill with his division, supported by general fane's brigade of heavy horse, and marched to almeida, and quartered his army there in a more healthy situation. his troops were now also well supplied with provisions. during the long interval of repose—that is, till the following may—wellington actively employed himself in putting life and order into the commissariat, baggage, and conveyance departments; and general beresford, to whom the important function of disciplining the portuguese troops was assigned, laboured in that with such effect, that he produced at the next campaign troops which, led by british officers, and mixed with british regiments, fought admirably. the portuguese were wise enough to allow the british commander full control, and by this means they avoided those defeats and calamities which fell long and heavily on the spaniards.

whilst these events had been taking place in spain and portugal, great britain had been sending money and troops to oppose buonaparte in other quarters. early in the spring austria was in the field; in july a powerful fleet, carrying an army, sailed from the downs, to create a diversion on the coast of the netherlands, and other operations were commenced in the south of italy. the army destined for the netherlands amounted to forty thousand men, attended by a fleet of thirty-five sail of the line and twenty frigates, to assist where they might be needed. buonaparte had contemplated making a great port of antwerp, and had expended much money and labour in docks and fortifications there; but finding that the port of antwerp was not deep enough for first-rate ships of war, he undertook to render flushing capable of receiving and protecting a large fleet. he still contemplated, by the co-operation of denmark and russia, the sending forth a fleet, some day, which might cope with the british navy, or enable him to invade england. for this purpose he was building ships at antwerp and flushing; and it was, no doubt, these circumstances which determined the british to direct their attack on flushing and antwerp. captain, afterwards sir george cockburn, was of opinion that these preparations of napoleon could never affect england; that no possession of zealand, or any part of it, could be kept by england, from its extreme unhealthiness to foreigners, and even to dutchmen; and that it was much better for britain to let buonaparte build ships, and take them whenever they came out to sea, than to sacrifice the lives of our troops for no permanent benefit in this region of bogs, stagnant water, and malaria. had these forty thousand troops been sent to support wellington, and half the money that this fatal expedition cost, they would have enabled him to drive the french triumphantly out of spain, and create the most magnificent diversion for austria, as well as the most honourable to england.

but the surprise of antwerp and the destruction of the docks of flushing were determined upon; and lord chatham, rather for his name than for any military talent that he possessed, was appointed the commander of the forces. lord chatham was so notorious for his sluggish and procrastinating nature, that he had long been nicknamed the late lord chatham; the justice of this epithet had been too obvious in all the offices that he had hitherto held; and yet this expedition which demanded the utmost promptness and active skill, was entrusted to him. at the head of the fleet was placed sir richard strachan, a man of no energy. the commander of the ships on such an occasion should have been lord cochrane, for sir sidney smith was already engaged on the coast of italy. the orders for each commander were extremely loose and indefinite thereby leaving every chance of disputes and consequent delays and mishaps; and, to complete the disgraceful management of the government, no inquiries had been made as to the healthiness or unhealthiness of the district where the army would have to encamp. though the island of walcheren had been occupied by our troops under william iii., no record was to be found, or, indeed, was sought for, as to the cost of life to our men on that occasion from the climate. the whole plan was laid in ignorance and carried out with carelessness, and it was no wonder, therefore, that it ended in misery and disgrace.

[581]

the duke of wellington. (after the portrait by sir thomas lawrence.)

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the fleet sailed from the downs on the 28th of july, 1809, and on the 30th it touched at the islands of south beveland and walcheren. the orders of the government were, "the capture or destruction of the enemy's ships, building or afloat at antwerp and flushing; the destruction of the arsenals at antwerp, terneuse, and flushing; the reduction of the island of walcheren, and, if possible, the rendering of the scheldt no longer navigable for ships." nelson, who had contemplated this enterprise, had calculated that it would require four or five thousand men, and could be accomplished in a week. but now buonaparte had rendered the task more difficult, and there was no nelson to do it. the most sagacious of the officers pointed out that the first rush should be for antwerp, as the extreme point of the expedition, so as to destroy or capture the vessels there before the french could come to the rescue. the places nearer to the sea could be taken in returning. had the troops landed at blankenberg, they could have made a rapid march along a paved road through bruges and ghent, and captured antwerp, only forty-five miles distant, whilst the fleet ascended the scheldt to receive them on their return; but no such common-sense ideas found acceptance with the commanders. they determined to reduce flushing first, and the other forts on the scheldt, as lillo and liefkenshoek, in succession, by which time it was certain that the french would appear at antwerp in numbers sufficient to protect it. flushing was attacked on the 1st of august, and did not surrender till the 16th. had this been the reduction of antwerp, the rest of the objects of the expedition would have followed of course; but lord chatham and rear-admiral strachan were in no hurry. they remained signing the capitulation, securing six thousand prisoners that they had taken, and reducing two small islands to the north of the eastern scheldt, till the 21st (three whole weeks virtually wasted!), and on the 23rd they landed at ter goes, on the neighbouring island of south beveland. here, again, they delayed another precious fortnight, whilst the[582] french were planting batteries at every turn of the river between them and antwerp; had drawn a boom-chain across the channel between lillo and liefkenshoek; and had sunk vessels to obstruct the narrowest part of the channel beyond. they still talked of forcing their way to antwerp; but according to a satiric rhyme of the time—

"the earl of chatham, with his sword drawn,

stood waiting for sir richard strachan;

sir richard, eager to be at 'em,

stood waiting too, for whom? lord chatham."

meantime cambacérès and fouché had dispatched couriers to louis buonaparte, in holland, to march down troops to the defence of antwerp; and he had not only done that, but had opened the sluices on the borders of the scheldt, and laid the country under water, to prevent the march of the british. he also had ordered the erection of numerous batteries, and bernadotte arrived in about a fortnight, by orders of napoleon, to resist the advance of the british. from forty to fifty thousand troops were assembled in and around antwerp, and hosts of dutch and belgian militia swarmed over the country. this was certain to be the case if any time was allowed, and it was now agreed, in a council of war, that it was not possible to proceed further. in fact, they were no longer allowed to remain where they were. their provisions were rapidly being exhausted, sickness was spreading amongst the troops, and the fire of the enemy's batteries from both sides of the river compelled them to fall down the stream. that was the end of the campaign; the rest was a foolish and murderous delay in the island of walcheren, without any conceivable purpose. there was no use in retaining the island, for we could at any time blockade the mouths of the scheldt, and our men on board the ships were comparatively healthy; but in this swamp of death the soldiers continued dying like rotten sheep. the island of walcheren, to which they were now confined, is a spongy swamp, below the level of the sea at high water. the wet oozes through the banks, and stagnates in the dykes, and is only capable of being pumped out by windmills. the ground is covered often with mud and slime, and the inhabitants are sickly and sallow in aspect, and of loose and flaccid muscles. yet, in this den of fever and death, the commanders seemed determined to retain the army till it perished entirely. the earl of chatham himself returned to london on the 14th of september, with as many of the sick as he could take. at this time he left eleven thousand, out of the seventeen thousand quartered on the island of walcheren, on the sick-list, and rapidly dying; yet neither he nor sir eyre coote, who succeeded him, seems to have felt the necessity of saving the army by retiring from the place. they attributed the unhealthiness to the dykes being cut, and the surrounding country being flooded in the hot season. no matter what was the cause, the army was perishing, and ought to have been removed; but, so far from this, the ministers seemed determined to keep possession of this useless and pestilential swamp at any cost. as it was imagined that the drinking of the water was the cause of the fever, thames water was carried over for the troops, five hundred tons per week being required. but it was not the drinking it only that caused disease and death, but the standing and working in it, as many of them did, up to the middle for many hours together, and the malaria arising from the oozy soil. as the roofs in flushing were knocked to pieces by the storming of the town, british workmen, with bricks, mortar, tiles, and tools, were sent over to repair them, so as to protect the sick in the hospitals, though plenty of workmen and materials might have been had in the country.

as it was necessary that some doctors of note and experience should be sent over to examine the nature of the illness and the condition of the men, the surgeon-general was ordered to proceed to the spot and make the necessary inquiries; but he replied that it was not in his department, but in that of the physician-general, sir lucas pepys. sir lucas excused himself on account of his age, and recommended some other physicians to be sent out. both gentlemen were content to receive the country's money easily at home, but although a whole army was perishing, they would not risk their own precious lives. they were dismissed, and their conduct showed the necessity of a thorough reform of the medical establishment of the army. sir richard strachan, though he saw the continuous destruction of the soldiers, strongly recommended government to retain possession of walcheren, as a very important naval station, and the ministry were besotted enough to contemplate fortifying it on an extensive scale, and more men and materials were sent over for that purpose. but, fortunately for the remains of our army there, the emperor of austria had now made peace with buonaparte, and our diversion in his favour here was useless, so, on the 13th of november, orders were sent to lieutenant-general don, who had succeeded sir eyre coote, to destroy the docks and fortifications of flushing,[583] and come away. thus ended this most fatal expedition, which cost great britain twenty millions of money, and many thousands of lives. of those who survived, thousands had their constitutions broken for ever; and even such as appeared to get over the lingering and insidious walcheren fever, on being sent to the war in the peninsula, proved so liable to its return on exposure to wet or cold, that often one-third of these troops were not fit for service. so far from wishing to remove us from walcheren, buonaparte wrote to the minister of war, saying: "we are rejoiced to see that the english have packed themselves in the morasses of zealand. let them be only kept in check, and the bad air and fevers peculiar to the country will soon destroy their army." the fatal results of this expedition introduced dissensions into the cabinet, and soon after occasioned the resignation of canning.

our forces on the italian coast were met by the active spirit of the new king of naples, joachim murat. sir john stuart, who had won the splendid victory of maida, embarked, on the 13th of june, fifteen thousand british troops in sicily, and proceeded to menace naples, and create alarm in various quarters, so as to draw the french from upper italy, and thus relieve the austrians. with part of these forces siege was laid to scylla; with the other sir john anchored off cape miseno, close to bai? and puzzuoli, and directly across the bay, about a dozen miles from naples. the greatest alarm was excited, and nothing would have been easier for sir john than to have battered the town about the ears of the intruder king; but this the interests of the old king did not permit, especially as ferdinand's second son, don leopold, was present as nominal commander, but he was of no use really, being a most effeminate and incapable person. sir john then sailed to the islands of procida and ischia, compelled the garrisons to capitulate, dismantled the fortifications, and then abandoned these islands. during all this time our warships were scouring the whole of the coasts of southern italy, capturing every vessel that ventured out, and keeping the french generals on shore in constant agitation. in the encounters with the enemy's vessels on these coasts many brilliant exploits were performed by our captains, and by none more than by captain staines, of the cyane frigate, who, on the 27th of june, stood a stout but most unequal fight with a neapolitan frigate and corvette, under the very batteries of naples. the siege of scylla was raised by a strong french force, and sir john stuart returned to sicily. scylla was, however, shortly after abandoned again by the french, and its guns and stores, which appeared to have been left in some panic, fell into the hands of the british.

sir john stuart did not long remain idle at palermo. at the suggestion of lord collingwood, he sent out an expedition to seize on a number of the ionian isles, which had been taken possession of by the french, who were calculating on further conquests in that direction—namely, in continental greece itself. the warrior, commanded by captain spranger, attended by other vessels, carried over one thousand six hundred troops, under command of brigadier-general oswald. the troops were half of them british, and half corsicans, sicilians, calabrians, and other foreigners in british pay. they carried with them signor foresti and an ionian greek as interpreters and agents with their countrymen, many of whom, they were aware, had an indignant hatred of the french domination. they arrived off cephalonia on the 28th of september, and on the 1st of october, being joined by their transports and gunboats, they anchored in the bay of zante, and the following morning commenced a landing, under the cover of a brisk fire from some of the ships and gunboats. the land-batteries were soon silenced, and before night the french commander had not only surrendered the castle, but the islands of zante, cephalonia, ithaca, and cerigo. two of the seven islands remained for the time in the hands of the french—santa maura and corfu. but santa maura, after a sharp contest, was carried, in the following april, by general oswald, most brilliantly supported by lieutenant-colonel hudson lowe, major church, and other officers. general camus, the french commandant, surrendered with his garrison of one thousand men. there remained only corfu, but this, the most important island of the group, would have required a much stronger force to reduce it; and as it was completely useless to the french, being cut off from all communication with france by our ships, it remained under france till 1814, when, at the congress of paris, it was made over by louis xviii., and the whole seven islands were declared a republic, under the protection of great britain. such was the origin of our connection with the ionian islands, where we maintained a commissioner and a body of troops, much to the discontent of a party in the islands, who desired to join the kingdom of greece.

[584]

at the opening of 1810 a peace was contracted with turkey; but not with the sultan selim, with whom we had been at war, nor with his successor, mahmoud. whilst the throne of turkey was occupied by a mere boy, and whilst his regular troops were dispersed, alexander of russia, famed for his piety, thought it a fine opportunity to seize on his neighbour's lands. his ministers, at the commencement of 1809, at the congress of jassy, demanded, as a condition of peace, the cession of the turkish provinces on the left bank of the danube. the turks, of course, refused to thus dismember their empire for the aggrandisement of russia; and alexander, who was resolved to have those provinces by hook or by crook, immediately declared war on turkey, on the shameless plea that it had made peace with britain. the russians were supported by the greeks, and other inhabitants of moldavia and wallachia; but on crossing the danube and pushing forward into bulgaria they were beaten on every occasion. on the 22nd of october, 1809, a desperate conflict took place between them under the walls of silistria, which continued from morning till night, in which the russians were driven back, and, in a second engagement, routed with such slaughter that they retired from bulgaria, and went into winter-quarters in moldavia and wallachia. in this campaign it was found that the guns were served by french officers, though buonaparte professed to be willing that alexander should possess himself of constantinople. by the peace with turkey, the trading ports of that empire were again opened to us, and our manufactures, entering there, spread over all the continent, and were sold and worn in hamburg, bremen, and other towns where they were strictly excluded by sea.

the naval transactions of 1810 were almost wholly confined to watching the french, spanish, and italian coasts, to thwart the french, who, on their part, were continually on the watch for any of our blockading ships being driven by the weather, or called to some other station, in order to run out and convey men and stores into spain. the last action of lord collingwood took place in this service. though his health was fast failing, and he had repeatedly entreated the admiralty to allow him to give up the command and go home to his family—the only chance of his long survival—they always refused. his complaint was declared by the faculty to be owing to his long confinement on board ships, and he had now scarcely set foot on shore for three years. but notwithstanding all this, with a singular selfishness the admiralty kept him on board, and he was too high-minded to resign his commission whilst he could be of service to his country. in this state of health he was lying off toulon, blockading that port, when he was driven to minorca by a gale of wind. he had regained the coast of catalonia, when he heard that the french fleet had issued from toulon, and were making for barcelona. the whole british fleet were in exultation; but on sighting this supposed fleet it was found to consist only of three sail of the line, two frigates, and about twenty other vessels, carrying provisions to the french army at barcelona. they no sooner caught view of the british fleet than they made off in all haste, and the british gave chase. admiral martin was the first to come up with them in the gulf of lyons, where two of the ships of the line ran ashore, and were set fire to by the french admiral, baudin. two others ran into the harbour of cette; and eleven of the store-ships ran into the bay of rooas, and took refuge under the powerful batteries; but lord collingwood, in spite of the batteries, sent in the ships' boats, and in the face of the batteries, and of boarding nets, set fire to and destroyed them. five other store-ships were captured. this was the last exploit of the brave and worthy collingwood. his health gave way so fast, that, having in vain endeavoured again to induce the admiralty to relieve him of his command, expressly assuring them that he was quite worn out, on the 3rd of march he surrendered his post to rear-admiral martin, and set sail in the ville de paris for england. but it was too late; he died at sea on the 7th of march, 1810. very few admirals have done more signal service, or have displayed a more sterling english character than lord collingwood; and perhaps none were ever more grudgingly rewarded or so unfeelingly treated by the admiralty, who, in fact, killed him by a selfish retention of his services, when they could be continued only at the cost of his life.

[585]

the "mediator" breaking the boom at la rochelle. (see p. 585.)

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another attempt was to burn a portion of the brest fleet, which was found lying off la rochelle, in the basque roads. lord gambier, on the 11th of march, wrote to the admiralty proposing to send fire-ships amongst them and destroy them. the admiralty seized on the idea; but instead of leaving lord gambier to work out his own plan, they appointed lord cochrane to that service, under gambier. this was sure to create jealousies, not only in the mind of gambier—to whom the admiralty had written on the 19th, approving his design, and ordering him to execute it according to his own ideas—but also in the minds of other officers in gambier's fleet. lord cochrane proceeded to the basque roads in a frigate, arriving there on the 3rd of april, and presenting gambier with a letter informing him of the change of plan by the admiralty. mr. congreve, with a supply of his rockets, was to accompany the fire-ships from england; and on the 11th, these having arrived, and being joined by several large transports which lord gambier had converted into fire-ships, the attack was made. the french squadron was lying between the isle of aix and the town of la rochelle, in a narrow passage, commanded by powerful batteries both on the land and on the island of aix. besides this, numbers of gunboats were placed so as to defend the approach to the vessels; but still more, a very strong boom was stretched across the passage, formed of enormous cables, secured by equally enormous anchors, and supported by buoys. none of the officers, not even gambier or cochrane, seem to have been aware of this boom till some of the foremost fire-ships ran against it; and several of the ships, whilst thus detained, exploded, being too far off to do any harm. but captain woolridge, in the mediator, burst the boom asunder, and the fire-ships sailed up towards the french ships in the dark, and exploded, one after another, with a terrible uproar—one fire-ship alone containing fifteen hundred barrels of gunpowder, besides three or four hundred shells and three or four thousand hand-grenades. but the only mischief done was to cause the french to cut their cables, and run their ships ashore. there, the next morning, they were seen; and lord cochrane signalled to lord gambier to stand in and destroy them before the rising of the tide should float them, and enable them to run up the river charente. no ships, however, arriving, cochrane again more urgently signalled that all the fleet was aground, except two vessels, and might easily be destroyed. lord gambier paid no attention to these signals, and, as the tide rose, the vessels floated and escaped up the river, except four, which still stuck fast, and were destroyed by[586] cochrane. those which escaped were all greatly damaged. had gambier stood in with his vessels promptly, no doubt the whole squadron would have been destroyed.

on his return lord cochrane received the honour of the red riband of the bath; but he could not conceal his dissatisfaction at lord gambier's conduct, and declared that he would oppose any vote of thanks to him in parliament. on this, gambier demanded a court-martial, which was held, and acquitted him of all blame. cochrane complained that the court was strongly biassed in favour of gambier, and against himself, and the public was very much of his opinion.