The French, at the commencement of their revolutionary war, sent every unsuccessful general to the scaffold, the Convention in its bloody acts keeping pace with the bloodiest desires of a deceived and infuriated populace. The Central Junta contracted no such guilt, though humanity is not the characteristic of the Spaniards, and justice in state affairs had in that country for centuries been unknown. They gave ♦1809.♦ no ear to vulgar or malignant accusations; but, on the other hand, they allowed their generals no opportunity of vindicating themselves. Upon this ground Castaños, as well as Infantado, had cause to complain. The order which called him from the command of the central army during its retreat intimated no dissatisfaction at his conduct; on the contrary, it summoned him to take the presidency of the Military Junta, saying that the fate of armies depended upon the plans which were laid down for them. That restless intriguer, the Conde de Montijo, who had visited him at his head-quarters at Tudela, professed the warmest friendship towards him, and spoken of him in the language of unbounded admiration, left the army suddenly two days before the battle, and wherever he went reported that Castaños was a traitor, and had sold the country to the French. This nearly proved fatal to the General, when, in obedience to his summons, he set out to join the Central Junta, taking with him merely such an escort as his rank required: for he soon found that fifteen horse and thirty foot were not sufficient to protect him from imminent danger; the clamour which Montijo raised had spread far and wide, and they could not enter a village without preparations as serious as if they were about to engage in action. At Miguel-turra, in La Mancha, the Junta exerted themselves ineffectually to restrain the populace, who were crying out, Kill him! kill him! The members of that body, the better to secure him, gathered round his person, and accompanied him on foot; the rabble pressed upon them with blind fury, and their lives, as well as that of Castaños, would have been sacrificed, if his cavalry had not charged the multitude sword in hand, and opened the way. But the danger was not over when he had been housed; the house was beset, and it was only by the exertions of the better classes, and especially of a priest, that he was enabled to leave the place before daybreak the following morning. It became necessary for them to avoid all populous places, and take up their lodging in the smallest and most retired hamlets; and yet with these precautions his life was frequently threatened. In addition to this evil there was the uncertainty of knowing whither to direct his course: three times on his journey he found that the Central Junta had changed their place of residence; and when he finally made for Seville, it was with a belief that they had removed to Puerto de Santa Maria. Upon approaching Seville, he was ordered to take up his abode in the monastery of S. Geronimo de Buenavista, and there await the farther determination of the government. Montijo had accused him as an instrument of Tilly, engaged with him in treasonable designs, and also in a scheme for rendering Andalusia independent, and making it the head of a confederacy of ♦Castaños, Representacion, 15–18.♦ provinces. This was the mere fabrication of a man who scrupled at no means for promoting his own insane ambition, and as such the Junta received it; but they deemed it expedient to treat the general as if he were under their displeasure, lest a suspicion, which in its consequences might be most fatal to the country, should be raised against themselves.
♦His memorial to the Junta.♦
Castaños was not aware of the accusation which had been thus preferred; least indeed of all men could he have supposed that a charge of federalism would have been brought against him, who had with so much decision and effect opposed the dangerous disposition of the provincial authorities to consult their own security alone. But he complained of the injurious restraint in which he was placed, and in an able and temperate memorial appealed to his past services, showed that the defeat at Tudela was not imputable to any error or indiscretion on his part (his opinion having been over-ruled by their representative, D. Francisco Palafox), and required that his conduct might be judged of by the circumstances in which he was placed, and the actual condition of his army, not as if he had commanded 80,000 effective men. An army in the field, he said, was like a musical instrument with many keys and many registers: if these did not answer to the touch, if many strings were wanting, and the others not in tune, the best musician would be deemed a sorry performer by those who heard the broken and jarring sounds which he produced, and knew not the state of the instrument. Still, he maintained, the French were far from being able to subdue Spain. Castaños was not unsupported while he thus defended himself with the confidence of an innocent and injured man. The Junta of Seville honourably espoused his cause, and the government allowed him to remove to his own house at Algeciras, there to remain while the inquiry into his conduct which he demanded should be carried on.
♦Intrigues of Montijo.♦
Montijo was one of those men who in disordered times are intoxicated with ambition and vanity. His object in seeking the ruin of Castaños was to obtain a command for himself. He represented to the Junta that the resources by which the miracle of restoring the country might be effected could only be drawn from Andalusia; but that to call them forth activity, energy, patriotism, and above all the confidence of the public were required. Under any other circumstances he should have blushed to designate himself as the person in whom these qualifications were united, and unhappily the only person who possessed the last; but in such an emergency a good Spaniard must sacrifice even his modesty. Spain might still be saved if he were commissioned to take what cavalry he could raise, put himself at the head of the forces in La Mancha, and march upon Madrid; and he pledged his sacred word of honour that he would resign the command as soon as the French should be driven back to the Ebro.
♦1809.
January.♦ This proposal met with as little attention as it deserved; and Montijo then joined the army of Carolina, there to sow fresh intrigues, and meet with deserved humiliation.
♦Progress of the French in Castille and Leon.♦
The French themselves were at this time in such a situation, that the desultory and harassing warfare which the Junta of Seville advised at the commencement of the struggle might now have been pursued against them with great effect. A disposition in some of the marshals to disregard Joseph, and act without any deference to his wishes or commands, had shown itself before Buonaparte left Spain; the attention of the French cabinet was directed toward Austria, and the affairs of Spain were left to the intrusive government, which had in fact no control over the armies by whom alone it was to be supported. But as there was no enemy in the field alert and able enough to take advantage of the fair occasions which offered, the French commanders believed the struggle was at an end, and that they had only to march over the country and receive the submission of the inhabitants. While Victor occupied Toledo, waiting only a convenient season to disperse the hasty levies which were brought together for the defence of Andalusia, General Dorneau marched against Zamora, scaled the walls of that ancient city, and put to death those inhabitants who, in the flagitious language of the French bulletin, were called the most guilty. Castille and Leon were overrun, and wherever they went those scenes of profanation, violence, and murder were exhibited, in which Buonaparte’s soldiers were systematically allowed to glut the worst passions of corrupted and brutalized humanity.
♦New levies raised by the Spaniards.♦
Yet while the country was thus at the mercy of the French, the panic which their appearance every where excited extended nowhere beyond their immediate presence. In all places which were not actually occupied by the enemy, the local authorities acted as if no enemy had been at hand, and their own government had been as efficient as it was legitimate. The enlisting went on, and promises of speedy triumph and sure deliverance were held forth with a confidence which no reverses could shake. The fugitives from the different armies no sooner reached their own homes than they were again enrolled to be embodied, and exposed again to privations and sufferings such as those from which they had so hardly escaped. Before their strength was recruited, they were sent off to form new armies, neither better disciplined, better commanded, nor better provided than those which had been routed and dispersed. They went hungered, half naked, and cursing their fortune, without confidence in their officers, each other, or themselves, yet believing fully that the deliverance of Spain would be effected with a faith which seemed to require and perhaps very generally expected miracles for its fulfilment. Human means indeed seem to have been provided as little as if they had not been taken into the account.