When sir Arthur Wellesley retired from Jaraceijo, the junta in the same manner asserted that the French were upon the point of retiring from Spain, and general Equia proposed offensive operations. In explaining his motives, and discussing the treatment he had met with, sir John Moore wrote thus to his own government: “The British were sent to aid the Spanish armies, but they are not equal to encounter the French, who have at least eighty thousand men, and we have nothing to expect from the Spaniards, who are not to be trusted; they are apathetic, lethargic, quick to promise, backward to act, improvident, insensible to the shame of flying before the enemy, they refuse all assistance, and I am obliged to leave ammunition, stores, and money, behind. The Spanish armies have shewn no resolution, the people no enthusiasm nor daring spirit, and that which has not been shown hitherto, I know not why it should be expected to be displayed hereafter.” Such were his expressions.
When sir Arthur Wellesley had proved the Spaniards, he, also, writing to his government, says:—“We are here worse off than in a hostile country;—never was an army so ill used;—the Spaniards have made all sorts of promises;—we had absolutely no assistance from the Spanish army; on the contrary, we were obliged to lay down our ammunition, to unload the treasure, and to employ the cars in the removal of our sick and wounded. The common dictates of humanity have been disregarded by them, and I have been obliged to leave ammunition, stores, and money behind. Whatever is to be done must be done by the British army, but that is certainly not capable, singly, to resist a French army of at least seventy thousand men.”
The last advice given to the government, by sir John Moore, was against sending an auxiliary force to Spain. Sir Arthur Wellesley, in the same spirit, withdrew his troops; and, from that moment, to the end of the struggle, he warred, indeed, for Spain, and in Spain, but never with Spain. “I have fished in many troubled waters, but Spanish troubled waters I will never try again,” was his expression, when speaking of this campaign; and he kept his word. That country became, indeed, a field, on which the French and English armies contended for the destiny of Europe; but the defeats or victories, the promises or the performances of the Spaniards scarcely influenced the movements. Spain, being left to her own devices, was beaten in every encounter, foiled in every project, yet made no change in her policy; and while Portugal endeavoured to raise her energy on a level with that of her ally, Spain sought to drag down England to the depth of folly and weakness, in which she herself was plunged. The one would not sacrifice an atom of false pride to obtain the greatest benefits; the other submitted, not with abject dependence, but with a magnanimous humility, to every mortification, rather than be conquered; and the effects of their different modes were such as might be expected. Portugal, although assaulted by an infinitely greater number of enemies, in proportion to her strength, overthrew the oppressors the moment they set foot upon her soil; while in Spain, town after town was taken, army after army dispersed, every battle a defeat, and every defeat sensibly diminished the heat of resistance. Napoleon once declared that a nation resolved to be free could not be conquered; and the Spaniards re-echoed the sentiment in their manifestos, as if to say it was all that was necessary. But Napoleon contemplated a nation, like the Portuguese, making use of every means of defence, whether derived from themselves or their alliances; not a people puffed with conceit, and lavish of sounding-phrases, such as “perishing under the ruins of the last wall,” yet beaten with a facility that rendered them the derision of the world; a people unable to guide themselves yet arrogantly refusing all advice. Such a nation is ripe for destruction, and such a nation was Spain.
The campaign of 1809 finished the third epoch of the war, and it was prolific of instruction. The jealousy of the French marshals, the evils of disunion, the folly of the Spanish government, and the absurdity of the Spanish character, with respect to public affairs, were placed in the strongest light; while the vast combinations, the sanguinary battles, the singular changes of fortune, the result so little suitable to the greatness of the efforts, amply demonstrated the difficulty and the uncertainty of military affairs. It was a campaign replete with interest; a great lesson from which a great commander profited. Sir Arthur Wellesley had now experienced the weakness of his friends and the strength of his enemies, and he felt all the emptiness of public boasting. Foreseeing that if the contest was to be carried on, it must be in Portugal, and that unless he himself could support the cause of the Peninsula, it must fall, his manner of making war changed. His caution increased tenfold; yet, abating nothing of his boldness, he met and baffled the best of the French legions in the fulness of their strength. He was alike unmoved by the intrigues of the Portuguese regency, and by the undisguised hatred of the Spanish government; and when some of his own generals, and one of them on his personal staff, denouncing his rashness and predicting the ruin of the army, caused the puny energy of the English ministers to quail as the crisis approached, he, with gigantic vigour, pushed aside these impediments, and, steadily holding on his own course, proved himself a sufficient man, whether to uphold or to conquer kingdoms.
APPENDIX.
APPENDIX.