military or civil; yet such was the force of jealousy, and so stubborn were the tools of the different juntas, that in despite of the exertions of Mr. Stuart and Lord William Bentinck, and the influence of the British Cabinet, the generals were all confirmed in their separate and independent commands. The old and miserable system of the Dutch deputies in Marlborough's time, and of the commissaries of the Convention during the French revolution, was partially revived; and the English government were totally disregarded, at a time when it had supplied Spain with two hundred thousand muskets, clothing, ammunition of all kinds, in proportion, and sixteen millions of dollars.* Such ample succors, if rightly managed, ought to have secured unlimited influence; but as the benefits came through one set of persons, and the demands through another, the first were taken as of right, the last unheeded, and thus the resources of Great Britain were wasted without materially improving the condition of Spain. The armies were destitute, the central government was without credit, and notwithstanding the ample subsidies, had contracted a large debt; yet with an insolence of tone appertaining rather to conquerors dictating terms, than to grateful allies demanding further assistance, they required from England an instant gift of ten millions of dollars, and stores to an amount that would have sufficed a well-governed army for many years.

The provisional juntas were still permitted to retain their power within their own districts, and the greatest timidity marked all the proceedings of the central government in relation to those obnoxious bodies. Attentive, however, to their own interests, the members of the Supreme Junta decreed, 1st, that their persons should be inviolable; 2d, that the president should have the title of Highness, with a salary of 25,000 crowns a year; 3d, that each of the deputies, taking the title of Excellency, should have a yearly salary of 5000 crowns; lastly, that the collective body should be addressed by the title of Majesty. Thinking that they were then sufficiently confirmed in power to venture upon a public entry into Madrid, they made preparations to insure a favorable reception from the populace; that is, they resolved to declare a general amnesty, to lower the duties on tobacco, and to fling large sums among the people during the procession; and in the midst of all this pomp and vanity, the presence of the enemy on the soil was scarcely remembered, and the details of business were totally neglected. This last was a prominent evil, which extended to the lowest branches

*Mr. Canning's Instructions to Mr. Duff, MS.

+Mr. Stuart's Correspondence. Lord W. Bentinck's ditto. Lord W. Bentinck's Correspondence.

of administration. Self-interest, indeed, produced abundance of activity, but every department, almost every man, seemed struck with torpor when the public welfare was at stake—and, withal, an astonishing presumption was common to the highest and the lowest.

To supply the place of a generalissimo, a council or board of general officers was projected, on whose reports the Junta proposed to regulate the military operations. Castaños was destined to be president, but some difficulty arising relative to the appointment of the other members, the execution of the plan was deferred, with the characteristic remark, "that when the enemy was driven across the frontier, Castaños would have leisure to take his seat."* The idea of a defeat, the possibility of failure, never entered their minds; the government, evincing neither apprehension, nor activity, nor foresight, were contented if the people believed the daily falsehoods they promulgated relative to the enemy; and the people, equally presumptuous, were content to be so deceived: in fine, all the symptoms of a ruined cause were already visible to discerning eyes. The armies neglected even to nakedness; the soldiers' constancy under privations cruelly abused; disunion, cupidity, incapacity, in the higher orders; the patriotic ardor visibly abating among the lower classes; the rulers grasping, improvident, boasting; the enemy powerful, the people insubordinate, the fighting men without arms or bread; as a whole, and in all its parts, the government unfitted for its task; the system, cumbrous and ostentatious, was, to use the comprehensive words of Mr. Stuart, "neither calculated to inspire courage nor to increase enthusiasm."

The truth of this picture will be recognized by men who are yet living, and whose exertions were as incessant as unavailing to remedy those evils at the time; it will be recognized by the friends of a great man, who fell a victim to the folly and base intrigues of the day; it will be recognized by that general and army who, winning their own unaided way through Spain, found that to trust Spaniards in war was to lean against a broken reed. To others it may appear exaggerated, for without having seen, it is difficult to believe the extent of a disorder that paralyzed the enthusiasm of a whole people.

EXTERNAL POLITICAL RELATIONS OF SPAIN.

At first these were of necessity confined to England, Sicily, and Portugal; the rest of the Old World was either subject to Bonaparte or directly under his influence, but in the New World it was different. The Brazils, after the emigration of the royal family of * Lord W. Bentinck's Correspondence.

Braganza, became important under every point of view, and relations were established between the Junta and that court, that afterwards, under the Cortes, created considerable interest, and threatened serious embarrassments to the operations of the Duke of Wellington. The ultra-marine possessions of Spain were also, of course, a matter of great anxiety to both sides, and Napoleon's activity balanced the natural preponderance of the mother country. The slowness of the local juntas, or rather their want of capacity to conduct such an affair, gave the enemy a great advantage, and it was only owing to the exertions of Mr. Stuart in the north, and of Sir Hew Dalrymple and Lord Collingwood in the south, that, after the insurrection broke out, vessels were despatched to South America to confirm the colonists in their adherence to Spain, and to arrange the mode of securing the resources of those great possessions for the parent_state.* The hold which Spain retained over her colonies was, however, very slight; her harsh restrictive system had long before weakened the attachment of the South Americans, and the expedition of Miranda, although unsuccessful, had kindled a fire which could not be extinguished; it was apparent to all able statesmen, that Spain must relinquish her arbitrary mode of governing, or relinquish the colonies altogether; the insurrection at home only rendered this more certain. Every argument, every public manifesto put forth in Europe, to animate the Spaniards against foreign aggression, told against them in America; yet for a time the latter transmitted the produce of the mines, and many of the natives served in the Spanish armies.

Napoleon, notwithstanding his activity, and the offers which he made of the viceroyalty of Mexico to Cuesta, Castaños, Blake, and probably to others residing in that country, failed to create a French party of any consequence; for the Americans were unwilling to plunge into civil strife for a less object than their own independence. The arrogance and injustice of Old Spain, however, increased, rather than diminished, under the sway of the insurrectional government; and at last, as it is well known, a general rebellion of the South American States established the independence of the fairest portion of the globe, and proved how little the abstract love of freedom influenced the resistance of the old country to Napoleon.

The Spanish intercourse with the English court, which had been hitherto carried on through the medium of the deputies who first arrived in London to claim assistance, was now placed upon a regular footing. The deputies themselves, at the desire of Mr. Canning, were recalled, Admiral Apodaca was appointed Minister Plenipotentiary at St. James's, and Mr. John Hookham Frere was accred* Mr. Stuart's Correspondence, MS. Sir Hew Dalrymple.

ited, with the same diplomatic rank, near the Central Junta. Mr. Stuart, whose knowledge of the state of the country, whose acquaintance with the character of the leading persons, and whose able and energetic exertions had so much contributed to the formation of a central government, was superseded by this injudicious appointment; and thus the great political machine, with every wheel in violent action, was, at the most critical moment, left without any controlling power or guiding influence. For Mr. Stuart, who, on his own responsibility, had quitted Coruña, and repaired to Madrid, and had remitted the most exact and important information of what was passing, remained for three months without receiving a single line from Mr. Canning, approving or disapproving of his proceedings, or giving him instructions how to act at this important crisis: a strange remissness, indicating the bewildered state of the ministers, who slowly and with difficulty followed, when they should have been prepared to lead. Their tardy, abortive measures demonstrated how wide the space between a sophist and a statesman, and how dangerous to a nation is that public feeling, which, insatiable of words, disregards the actions of men, esteeming more the interested eloquence and wit of an orator like Demades, than the simple integrity, sound judgment, and great exploits of a general like Phocion.

Such were the preparations made by Spain, in September and October, to meet the exigencies of a period replete with danger and difficulty. It would be instructive to contrast the exertions of the "enthusiastic" Spaniards during these three months of their insurrection, with the efforts of "discontented France" in the hundred days of Napoleon's second reign. The Juntas were, however, not devoid of ambition, for before the battle of Baylen, that of Seville was occupied with a project of annexing the Algarves to Spain, and the treaty of Fontainebleau was far from being considered as a dead letter

CHAPTER III.

Political position of Napoleon; he resolves to crush the Spaniards; his energy and activity; marches his armies from every part of Europe towards Spain; his oration to his soldiers-Conference at Erfurth-Negotiations for peacePetulant conduct of Mr. Canning-160,000 conscripts enrolled in FrancePower of that country-Napoleon's speech to the Senate-He repairs to Bayonne-Remissness of the English Cabinet-Sir John Moore appointed to lead an army into Spain; sends his artillery by the Madrid road, and marches himself by Almeida-the Central Junta impatient for the arrival of the English army-Sir David Baird arrives at Coruña; is refused permission to disembark his troops-Mr. Frere and the Marquis of Romana arrive at Coruña; account of the latter's escape from the Danish Isles-Central Junta resolved not to appoint a generalissimo-Gloomy aspect of affairs.

NAPOLEON, Surprised and chagrined at the disgrace which, for the first time, his armies had sustained, was yet nothing dismayed by a resistance which he had early contemplated as not improbable.* With a piercing glance he had observed the efforts of Spain, calculated the power of foreign influence in keeping alive the spirit of resistance, and assigning a just value to the succors which England could afford, foresaw the danger which might accrue, if he suffered an insurrection of peasants, which had already dishonored the glory of his arms, to attain the consistency of regular government, to league with powerful nations, and to become disciplined troops. To defeat the raw levies which the Spaniards had hitherto opposed to his soldiers was an easy matter, but it was necessary to crush them to atoms, that a dread of his invincible power might still pervade the world, and the secret influence of his genius remain unabated. The constitution of Bayonne would, he was aware, weigh heavy in the scale against those chaotic governments, neither monarchical, nor popular, nor aristocratic, nor federal, which the Spanish revolution was throwing up; but before the benefit of that could be felt by the many, before he could draw any advantages from his moral resources, it was necessary to develop all his military strength.

The moment was critical and dangerous. He was surrounded by enemies whose pride he had wounded, but whose means of offence he had not destroyed; if he bent his forces against the Peninsula, England might again excite the continent to arms, and Russia and Austria, once more banding together, might raise Prussia and renew the eternal coalitions. The designs of Austria, although covered by the usual artifices of that cunning, rapacious court, were not so hidden but that, earlier or later, a war with her * Letter to Murat. Las Casas.