The action of Monterey, the taking of Chaves, and the defeat at Braga, had so damped the bishop’s ardour that he was, at one time, inclined to abandon the defence of Oporto; but this idea was relinquished when he considered the multitudes he had drawn together, and that the English army was stronger than it had been at any previous period since Cradock’s arrival; Beresford, also, was at the head of a considerable native force behind the Mondego; and, with the hope of their support, the bishop resolved to stand the brunt.
He had collected, in the entrenched camp, little short of forty thousand men; and among them were many regular troops, of which two thousand had lately arrived under the command of general Vittoria. This general was sent by Beresford to aid Sylveira: but when Chaves surrendered, he entered Oporto.
The hopes of the people, also, were high, for they could not believe that the French were a match for them; the preceding defeats were attributed each to its particular case of treason, and the murder of some innocent persons had followed as an expiation. No man but the bishop durst thwart the slightest caprice of the mob; and he was little disposed to do so, while Raymundo, and others of his stamp, fomented their fury, and directed it to gratify personal enmities. Thus, the defeat of Braga being known in Oporto, caused a tumult on the 22d; and Louis D’Olivera, a man of high rank, who had been cast into prison, was, with fourteen other persons, haled forth, and despatched with many stabs; the bodies were then mutilated, and dragged in triumph through the streets.
See [Plan 5].
The entrenchments extending, as I have said, from the Douro to the coast, were complete, and armed with two hundred guns. They consisted of a number of forts of different sizes, placed on the top of a succession of rounded hills; and where the hills failed, the defences were continued by earthen ramparts, loop-holed houses, ditches, and felled trees. Oporto itself is built in a hollow; a bridge of boats, nearly three hundred yards in length, formed the only communication between the city and the suburb of Villa Nova; and this bridge was completely commanded by batteries, mounting fifty guns, planted on the bluff and craggy heights that overhang the river above Villa Nova, and overlooked, not only the city, but a great part of the entrenched camp beyond it. Within the lines, tents were pitched for even greater numbers than were assembled; and the people ran to arms, and quickly manned their works with great noise and tumult, when the French columns, gathering like heavy thunder clouds, settled in front of the camp.
The duke of Dalmatia arrived on the 27th. While at Braga he had written to the bishop, calling on him to calm the popular effervescence; and now, beholding the extended works in his front, and reading their weakness even in the multitudes that guarded them, he renewed his call upon the prelate, to spare this great and commercial city the horrors of a storm. A prisoner, employed to carry the summons, would have been killed, but that it was pretended he came with an offer from Soult to surrender his army; and notwithstanding this ingenious device, and that the bishop commenced a negotiation, which was prolonged until evening, the firing from the entrenchments was constant and general during the whole of the 28th.
The parley being finally broken off, Soult made dispositions for a general action on the 29th. To facilitate this, he caused Merle’s division to approach the left of the entrenchments in the evening of the 28th, intending thereby to divert attention from the true point of attack: a prodigious fire was immediately opened from the works; but Merle, having pushed close up, got into some hollow roads and enclosures, and maintained his ground. At another part of the line, however, some of the Portuguese pretending a wish to surrender, general Foy, with a single companion, imprudently approached them; the latter was killed, and Foy himself made prisoner, and carried into the town. He was mistaken for Loison, and the people called out to kill “Maneta,” but with great presence of mind he held up his hands; and the crowd, convinced of their error, suffered him to be cast into the jail.
The bishop, having brought affairs to this awful crisis, had not resolution to brave the danger himself. Leaving generals Lima and Pareiras to command the army, he, with an escort of troops, quitted the city, and, crossing the river, took his station in Sarea, a convent, built on the top of the rugged hill which overhangs the suburb of Villa Nova, from whence he beheld in safety the horrors of the next day.
The bells in Oporto continued to ring all night; and about twelve o’clock a violent thunder storm arising, the sound of the winds was mistaken in the camp for the approach of enemies. At once the whole line blazed with a fire of musketry; the roar of two hundred pieces of artillery was heard above the noise of the tempest, and the Portuguese calling to one another with loud cries, were agitated at once with fury and with terror. The morning, however, broke serenely; and a little before seven o’clock the sound of the Frenchmen’s trumpets and drums, and the glitter of their arms, gave notice that the whole army was in motion for the attack.