CAMPAIGN OF LORD WELLINGTON.
The last act of the drama was played during this year with great rapidity. At the commencement of this year the progress of Lord Wellington was retarded by the state of the weather, but as soon as it became favourable he broke up his cantonments, resolving to penetrate as far as possible into the interior of France. He first cleared the ground on his right wing by driving the enemy eastward, and by pushing forward his centre with a corresponding movement, after which he prepared with his left wing, under Sir John Hope, to invest Bayonne. Marshal Beresford was also detached with two divisions to occupy Bordeaux, the mayor and inhabitants of which, on his arrival, of their own accord, proclaimed Louis XVIII. Lord Wellington himself, with the main army, advanced to Vig Bigorre, while Soult retreated to some good positions at Tarbes, and then to Toulouse. Soult arrived at Toulouse on the 24th of March, and on the 27th Wellington was close to him in front of that city. Between them lay the deep and rapid river Garonne, and it was not till the 9th of April that Wellington was enabled to get the allied army to the right bank of that stream. On the 10th of April was fought the bloody battle of Toulouse, in which Wellington was again victorious. Soult was driven from his entrenched camp on the eastern side of the city of Toulouse with a terrible loss: the victors also suffered severely. Soult evacuated Toulouse on the 11th of April, retiring by Castlenaudry to Carcassonne. He left behind him in the town 1,600 wounded men, and three generals, besides artillery and ammunition, all of which were taken by the allies, Wellington entered the city on the 12th, when a deputation waited on him, requesting him to receive the key of the good and loyal city in the name of King Louis XVIII. The battle of Toulouse was the last real battle that Wellington had to fight during this campaign. Four days after Soult’s defeat, indeed, and when the allies were in possession of the city, and the French were flying from it, General Thouvenot, who commanded in Bayonne, chose to make a desperate sortie on the allies in their cantonments, while the troops were all buried in sleep, but though he succeeded in cutting off many, he was repulsed with an equal loss. In the meantime the English Colonel Cooke and the French Colonel St, Simon arrived from Paris with the news that the allies had entered the French capital; that a provisional government had been established in the name of Louis XVIII.; and that Napoleon had abdicated at Fontainbleau, on the 4th of April. These officers were despatched from Wellington’s head-quarters to those of Marshal Soult, and after some negociation a friendly convention was signed, and a line of demarcation drawn between the two armies. This convention was signed on the 18th of April, and on the 21st Lord Wellington, by general orders, congratulated his army on the near prospect of the termination of their toils and dangers, and thanked them for their valour in the field, and for their conciliating conduct towards the inhabitants of the country.