PETITION OF THE IRISH CATHOLICS, ETC.
During this session, a petition was presented from the Irish Catholics by Mr. Grattan; but after a long and animated debate it was rejected by a large majority. A motion by Mr. Brande on the subject of parliamentary reform was also negatived by a large majority; as was likewise a resolution, moved in the upper house by Lord Grey, “to take into consideration the state of the nation.” Lord Grey prefaced his motion by an eloquent and argumentative speech, in which he dwelt upon the power of Napoleon; the mismanagement of our internal resources; the expediency of conciliating the Roman Catholics; the subjects of parliamentary privileges and reform, &c. On the subject of parliamentary reform he remarked:—“This question has long been one of my most serious contemplation. I took an active part in it at an early age: I pursued my object with all that eager hope and sanguine expectation so natural to the ardour of youth. I will not say that in subsequent times there have not been some differences from my former impressions; but of this I assure your lordships, that on its great grounds it has never been abandoned by me. To the temperate and judicious reformation of abuses I am now a decided friend; and whenever it shall be brought forward, it shall receive from me my most anxious assistance. I never did, nor ever will, rest my views of salutary reform on the ground of theoretic perfection; though I am always ready to correct by the constitution a practical inconvenience when it is practically felt. On this point I was formerly misrepresented by that description of persons who at this day continue the same course. The folly and presumption of the present day have taken up a new doctrine—that every branch and exercise of our constitution was defined by law, and only to be found in the statute-book: but I have understood from the most able men, that the great and fundamental blessing of the British constitution was fixed in the co-operation and harmony of its powers, all leading to free and efficient government.”
PROROGATION OF PARLIAMENT.
During this session motions were made by Mr. Parnell on the subject of Irish tithes; by Mr. Grattan and Lord Donoughmore on Catholic emancipation; and by Sir Samuel Romilly on the reform of our sanguinary criminal laws. These subjects will receive attention in a future page. Beyond this there was nothing of importance taken into consideration this session, which terminated on the 21st of June. The royal speech was again delivered by commission: and it affirmed that Portugal was exerting herself with vigour and energy; and that in Spain, though the French were victorious, the spirit of resistance was unsubdued.
CAMPAIGN IN PORTUGAL.
When Lord Wellington moved his troops from the banks of the Guadiana, he placed them in quarters along the valley of the Mondego. His head-quarters in January were at Viseu; General Hill being left with 10,000 men, half British and half Portuguese, at Abrantes, in order to watch Badajoz and protect Lisbon; while Marshal Beresford was stationed at Thomar. In the meantime the French armies had fully established themselves in Spain. Cadiz indeed defied the proud enemy, and the highest junta retired to the island of Leon, while the wild Sierra Morena carried on a guerilla warfare against the French; but there was no real army to oppose them, and the country might therefore be considered for the time being as conquered. Lord Wellington foresaw that the conquest of this country would lead to the invasion of Portugal; and he turned his whole attention to the defence of that country. And what the English general foresaw soon came to pass. The peace with Austria had enabled Napoleon to send large re-enforcements from Germany into Spain, audit was rumoured that he himself was coming. By the beginning of the month of April, Ney, Kellermann, and Loison, with about 60,000 men, were in Old Castile and Leon, threatening the Portuguese frontier in that direction: as a preliminary step they had captured Astorga, and had made preparations for the siege of Ciudad Rodrigo. General Meigner was also at this time on the borders of Spanish Estramadura, menacing the frontier of Portugal on that side. Subsequently, as Napoleon was now engaged with his bride of Austria, he sent Massena to take the command of the forces in Old Castile and Leon, which now assumed the name of “The army of Portugal,” thereby declaring its destination. Massena arrived at Valladolid about the middle of May; and he not only assumed the command over the forces of Ney, Kellermann, and Loison, but also over those of Junot and Drouet, which had recently crossed the Pyrenees from German. In the whole, Massena had a force of 80,000 men under arms for the field; but the corps of Drouet, about 18,000 strong, and the forces of Régnier in Estramadura did not immediately join him in his expedition into Portugal. As it was, however, Massena had a force of about 62,000 men when he first put himself in motion against Lord Wellington. Against these Wellington could only bring about 24,000 British troops, and from 28,000 to 30,000 Portuguese regulars; a part of which he was compelled to leave south of the Tagus, in order to guard against any sudden movement of Soult’s army of Andalusia. Moreover, Lord Wellington could only confidently rely on the British forces, as the Portuguese soldiers, whether regulars or militia men, were as yet untried. On the other hand, Massena’s soldiers were skilled in the dreadful art of war, and flushed with recent success; so that the odds against Wellington were alarmingly great. The campaign commenced in earnest early in June, when Massena invested Ciudad Rodrigo, which was defended by a Spanish garrison, but which was almost within sight of the British advanced posts on the Azava. The Spaniards made a brave defence; but on the 10th of July Massena made himself master of the place by capitulation. Lord Wellington was taunted by the French, by the Spaniards, and by many of his own officers, for suffering the siege to proceed without making an attempt to relieve the place. His lordship, however, knew his business better than to take any false step by a rash movement: his object and paramount duty was to defend Portugal, and above all Lisbon. He had, in fact, pledged himself to do this; and hence, while the French were taking Ciudad Rodrigo, he calmly retained, his position on the Coa, having his light division advanced a little beyond that river. Subsequent events justified Wellington’s line of policy. After the fall of Ciudad Rodrigo, Ney went thundering on till he came in contact with the light division, which was commanded by General Crawford; and though he succeeded in causing the English general to retreat, it cost him 1000 men in killed and wounded. Massena now crossed the frontiers of Portugal; but although he had boasted he would drive Lord Wellington out of that country in three months; he passed nearly one month on the line of the Coa in total inactivity. In the meantime General Régnier quitted Estramadura, crossed the Tagus, and established himself at Coria and Plasencia, while General Hill, making a corresponding movement, took post at Atalaya, from whence he could either join Wellington, or could be again thrown in front of Régnier. At length, on the 15th of August, the French broke ground before Almeida, which was captured on the 27th of the same month, Lord Wellington had brought his army nearer, in order to strike a blow if the enemy should afford an opportunity; but Massena let three weeks pass after the reduction of Almeida before he moved forward; and then, as the rainy season had come on, Wellington moved his army to the valley of the Mondego, and fixed his headquarters at Gouvea. The French army commenced its march down this valley on the 15th of September, taking its route along the right bank of the river, in the direction of Coimbra, through Viseu. This was the very worst road Massena could have taken; and Wellington, perceiving his error, crossed the river and took up a strong position in front of Coimbra. On the 24th, his whole army, including the Portuguese, and the corps of Generals Hill and Leith, which he had called up for the purpose of assisting in the coming struggle, were collected upon the Serra de Busaco, a lofty mountain-ridge extending from the Mondego to the northward. From these heights, on the 26th, the French army was seen advancing. One of the spectators of the imposing sight says:—“Rising grounds were covered with troops, cannon, or equipages: the widely extended country seemed to contain a host moving forward, or gradually condensing into numerous masses, checked in their progress by the grand natural barrier on which we were placed, at the base of which it became necessary to pause. In imposing appearances, as to numerical strength, I have never seen anything comparable to that of the enemy’s army from Busaco: it was not alone an army encamped before us, but a multitude—cavalry, infantry, artillery, cars of the country, horses, tribes of mules with their attendants, suttlers, followers of every description, formed the moving scene upon which Lord Wellington and his army looked down.” By the evening of the 26th this army encamped in the plains below Busaco; and on the next morning, as the mist and the gray clouds rolled away, they made two desperate simultaneous attacks on the English, the one on the right and the other on the left of Wellington’s position. These attacks were vain: the enemy was repulsed, leaving 2000 killed upon the field of battle, and having from 3000 to 4000 wounded, and several hundreds taken prisoners. Both the British and the Portuguese alike fought valorously; the latter, according to Wellington’s own statement, proving themselves on this their first trial to be worthy of contending in the same ranks with the former. Thus checked in his career, on the 28th, the day after the battle, Massena moved a large body of infantry and cavalry from the left of his centre to the rear, and his cavalry was seen marching over the mountains by another road to Oporto Colonel Trant with his Portuguese division was ordered to occupy the pass of Boyalva to the north of Busaco, through which this cavalry must pass; but a Portuguese general had previously ordered this division to inarch elsewhere; and before this could be countermanded, the French descended into the plains that lie open to the sea-coast, and seized on the road leading from Oporto to Coimbra, in the rear of the British. Massena, however, had only made the march which Wellington foresaw he would make, and he now commenced a retreat towards Lisbon. Both the British and the Portuguese effected their retreat with ease and regularity. They were followed by the French, whose van caught sight of the chain of hills behind which lay the city of Lisbon on the 7th of October:
“But in the middle path a lion lay.”