A proposal to prepare the Portuguese vessels for sea was acceded to, without any apparent dissatisfaction; but the government, secretly jealous of their allies, fomented or encouraged discontent and suspicion among the people. No efforts were made to improve the regular force, none to forward the march of troops to Alcantara; and so inactive or so callous were the regency to the rights of humanity, that a number of French prisoners, captured [Appendix, No. 3], section 4. at various periods by the Portuguese, and accumulated at Lisbon, were denied subsistence. Sir John Cradock, after many fruitless representations, was forced to charge himself with their supply, to avert the horrors of seeing them starved to death. The [Appendix, No. 3], section 5. provisions necessary for Fort La Lippe were also withheld, and general Leite, acting upon the authority of the regency, strenuously urged that the British troops should evacuate that fortress.
The march of the reinforcements for sir John Moore left only three hundred dragoons and seven battalions available for the defence of Portugal, of which four were necessarily in garrison, and the remainder were unable to take the field, in default of mules, of which animal the country seemed bereft; yet, at this moment, as if in derision, Mr. Frere, the central junta, the junta of Badajos, and the regency of Portugal, were, with common and Sir J. Cradock’s Correspondence, MSS. characteristic foolishness, pressing sir John Cradock to march into the south of Spain, although there was scarcely a Spanish soldier there in arms to assist him; and such a movement, if it had been either prudent or practicable, was directly against his instructions.
Towards the end of December, the communication with sir John Moore was suddenly interrupted, and the line of the Tagus acquired greater importance. The troops going from Elvas to the army in Spain were, therefore, directed to halt at Castello Branco, and general Richard Stewart, who commanded them, being reinforced with two hundred cavalry, was ordered, for the moment, to watch the Sir J. Cradock’s Correspondence, MSS. roads by Salvatierra and the two Idanhas, and to protect the flying bridges at Abrantes and Vilha Velha from the enemy’s incursions. At the same time, a promise was obtained from the regency that all the Portuguese troops in the Alemtejo should be collected, at Campo Mayor and Portalegre.
Sir John Cradock fixed upon Sacavem as the position in which his main body should be concentrated, intending to defend that point as long as he could with so few troops; and, as he knew that Almeida, although full of British stores, and important in every way, was, with respect to its own defence, utterly neglected by the regency, and that even the presence of a British force there was viewed with jealousy, he sent brigadier-general A. Cameron, with instructions to collect the convalescents of Moore’s army, to unite them with the two battalions still at Almeida, and then to make his way to the army in Spain; but if the attempt should be judged too dangerous, Cameron was to return to Lisbon. In either case, the stores and the sick men lying at Almeida were to be directed upon Oporto.
The paucity of cavalry was severely felt on the frontier. It prevented the general from ascertaining the real strength and objects of the enemy’s parties, and the Portuguese reports were notoriously contradictory and false. The 14th dragoons, seven hundred strong, commanded by major-general Cotton, had been disembarked since the 22d of December, Sir J. Cradock’s Correspondence, MSS. and were destined for the army in Spain; but such was the penury of the country, or the difficulty of drawing forth its resources, that the commissary-general doubted if he could forward that small body, even by detachments. Nor is this surprising, for many of the debts left by Moore’s army were yet unpaid, and sufficient confidence was not established among the peasantry to induce them to bring forward the necessary supplies upon credit.
Rumours of reverses in Spain were now rife, and acquired importance, when it became known that four thousand infantry, and two thousand cavalry, the advanced guard of thirty thousand French troops, were actually at Merida, on the road to Badajos, which town, as I have already said, was not only in a state of anarchy, but destitute of provisions, arms, and ammunition. If, at this time, the Portuguese force had been assembled at Alcantara, sir John Cradock would have supported them with the British brigades, at Abrantes and Castello Branco; but not a man had been put in motion, and he, feeling no confidence either in the troops or in the promises of the regency, resolved to concentrate his own army near Lisbon. General Stewart was, therefore, directed to destroy the bridges of Vilha Velha and Abrantes, and to fall back to Sacavem.
Meanwhile, the Lisbon populace, supposing that the English general designed to abandon them without necessity, were violently excited. The regency, either from fear or folly, made no effort to preserve tranquillity, and the people, feeling their own strength, proceeded from one excess to another, until it become evident that, in a forced embarkation, the British would have to fight their allies as well as their enemies. At this gloomy period when ten marches would have brought the French to Lisbon, when a stamp of Napoleon’s foot would have extinguished that spark of war which afterwards blazed over the Peninsula, sir John Moore made his daring movement upon Sahagun; and Portugal, gasping as in a mortal agony, was instantly relieved.
CHAPTER II.
It was the advanced guard of the fourth corps that had approached Merida with the intention of proceeding to Badajos, and the emperor was, as we have seen, preparing to follow: but, in the night of the 26th of December, an officer carrying [Appendix, No. 2], sections 1 and 2. the intelligence of Moore’s movement, reached Merida, and, next morning, the French fell back, and marching hastily to the Tagus, crossed it, and rejoined their main body, from which another powerful detachment was immediately directed upon Placentia. This retrograde movement obviated the immediate danger; and sir John Cradock endeavoured to pacify the people of Lisbon.