Meanwhile Soult who expected reinforcements seeing that little was to be gained by insurrection and being desirous to resume the offensive, ordered Harispe to leave only the troops absolutely necessary for the defence of St. Jean Pied de Port and its entrenched camp with a few Basques as scouts in the valleys, and to concentrate the remainder of his force at Mendionde, Hellette and La Houssoa, thus closely hemming in the right of the allies’ line with a view to making incursions beyond the Upper Nive. This was on the 14th, on the 23rd Harispe, getting information that Morillo was to forage in force on the side of Bidarray, endeavoured to cut him off, the supporting troops consisting of Spanish infantry and some English hussars repulsed his first attack, but they were finally pushed back with some loss in horses and mules. About the same time one of Hill’s posts near the confluence of the Aran with the Adour was surprised by some French companies who remained in advance until fresh troops detached from Urt forced them to repass the river again. This affair was a retaliation for the surprise of a French post a few days before by the sixth division, which was attended with some circumstances repugnant to the friendly habits long established between the French and British troops at the outposts. The value of such a generous intercourse old soldiers well understand, and some illustrations of it at this period may be quoted.
On the 9th of December, the forty-third was assembled in column on an open space within twenty yards of the enemy’s out-sentry, yet the latter continued to walk his beat for an hour without concern, relying so confidently on the customary system that he placed his knapsack on the ground to ease his shoulders. When at last the order to advance was given, one of the British soldiers stepping out told him to go away and helped him to replace his pack, the firing then commenced; the next morning the French in like manner warned a forty-third sentry to retire. But the most remarkable instance happened on the occasion of lord Wellington’s being desirous of getting to the top of a hill occupied by the enemy near Bayonne. He ordered the riflemen who escorted him to drive the French away, and seeing the former stealing up, as he thought too close, called out to commence firing; with a loud voice one of those old soldiers replied “no firing!” and then holding up the butt of his rifle towards the French, tapped it in a peculiar way. At the well-understood signal which meaned “we must have the hill for a short time,” the French who though they could not maintain would not have relinquished the post without a fight if they had been fired upon, quietly retired. And this signal would never have been made if the post had been one capable of a permanent defence, so well do veterans understand war and its proprieties.
The English general now only waited until the roads were practicable, to take the offensive with an army superior in every point of view to Soult’s. That general’s numbers were also about to be reduced. His conscripts were deserting fast, and the inclemency of the weather was filling his hospitals, while the bronzed veterans of Wellington’s army impassive to fatigue, patient to endure, fierce in execution, were free from serious maladies, ready and able to plant their colours wherever their general listed. At this time however the country was a vast quagmire; it was with difficulty that provisions or even orders could be conveyed to the different quarters, and a Portuguese brigade on the right of the Nive, was several days without food from the swelling of the rivulets which stopped the commissariat mules. At the sea-side the troops were better off, yet with a horrible counterpoise, for on that iron-bound coast storms and shipwrecks were so frequent, that scarcely a day passed but some vessel, sometimes many together, were seen embayed and drifting towards the reefs which shoot out like needles for several miles. Once in this situation there was no human help! a faint cry might be heard at intervals, but the tall ship floated slowly and solemnly onwards until the first rock arrested her, a roaring surge then dashed her to pieces and the shore was strewed with broken timbers and dead bodies. December and January were thus passed by the allies, but February saw Wellington break into France the successful invader of that mighty country. Yet neither his nor Soult’s military operations can be understood without a previous description of political affairs which shall be given in the next chapter.
CHAPTER IV.
Portugal.—It has been shewn that marshal1814. Beresford’s arrival at Lisbon put a momentary check upon the intrigues of the regency relative to the command of the troops, when he rejoined the army the vexatious conduct of the government was renewed with greater violence, and its ill-will was vented upon the English residents, whose goods were arbitrarily seized and their persons imprisoned without regard to justice or international law. The supply and reinforcing of the army were the pretences for these exactions, yet the army was neither supplied nor recruited, for though the new regulationsMr. Stuart’s Correspondence, MSS. had produced nine thousand trained soldiers, they were, in contempt of the subsidizing treaty, retained in the depôts. At first this was attributed to the want of transport to enable them to march through Spain, but though lord Wellington obtained in the beginning of 1814 shipping to convey them to the army, the Portuguese government still withheld the greatest number, alleging in excuse the ill-conduct of the Spaniards relative to the military convention established between the two countries.
This convention had been concluded in 1812 to enable the Portuguese troops to establish hospitals and to draw certain resources from Spain upon fixed conditions. One of these was that all supplies might be purchased, half with ready money half with bills on the Portuguese treasury; nevertheless in December 1813 the Spanish envoy at Lisbon informed the Portuguese government, that to give up the shells of certain public buildings for hospitals was the only effect they would give to the convention. Wherefore as neither troops nor horses could march through Spain, and the supply of those already with the army became nearly impossible, the regency detained the reinforcements. Lord Wellington strongly reproached the Spanish government for this foul conduct, yet observed with great force to the Portuguese regency, that the treaty by which a certain number of soldiers were to be constantly in the field was made with England, not with Spain; and as the government of the former country continued to pay the subsidy and provided ships for the transport of the troops there was no excuse for retaining them in Portugal.
His remonstrances, Beresford’s orders, and Mr. Stuart’s exertions although backed by the menaces of lord Castlereagh, were however alike powerless; the regency embarked only three thousand men out of nine thousand, and those not until the month of March when the war was on the point of terminating. Thus instead of thirty thousand Portuguese under arms lord Wellington had less than twenty thousand, and yet Mr. Stuart affirmed that by doing away with the militia and introducing the Prussian system of granting furloughs, one hundred thousand troops of the line might have been furnished and supported by Portugal, without pressing more severely on the finances of the country than the actual system which supplied these twenty thousand. The regency were now more than usually importunate to have the subsidy paid in specie in which case their army would have disappeared altogether. Mr. Stuart firmly opposed this, knowing the money would be misapplied if it fell into their hands, and thinking their importunity peculiarly ill-timed when their quota of troops was withheld, and when lord Wellington, forced to pay ready money for his supplies in France, wanted all the specie that could be procured for the military chest. Such was the countenance assumed by Portugal towards England in return for the independence which the latter had secured for her; and it is obvious that if the war had not terminated immediately afterwards the alliance could not have continued. The British army deserted by Portugal and treated hostilely, as we shall find, by the Spaniards, must then have abandoned the Peninsula.
Spain.—The malice evinced towards lord Wellington by the Spanish government, the libels upon him and upon the Anglo-Portuguese army, the vices of the system by which the Spanish troops were supplied, and their own evil propensities fostered by long and cruel neglect and suffering, the activity of those intriguing politicians who were inimical to the British alliance, the insolence and duplicity of the minister of war, the growing enmity between Spain and Portugal, the virulence of all parties and the absolute hostility of the local authorities towards the British army, the officers and soldiers of which were on all occasions treated as if they were invaders rather than friends, drove lord Wellington in the latter end of November to extremity. He judged the general disposition of the Spanish people to be still favourable to the English alliance, and with the aid of the serviles hoped to put down the liberals; but an open rupture with the government he thought inevitable, and if the liberal influence should prove most powerful with the people he might be unable to effect a retreat into Portugal. Wherefore he recommended the British ministers to take measures with a view to a war against Spain! And this at the very moment when, victorious in every battle, he seemed to have placed the cause he supported beyond the power of fortune. Who when Napoleon was defeated at Leipsic, when all Europe and even part of Asia were pouring their armed hordes into the northern and eastern parts of France, when Soult was unable to defend the western frontier; who then looking only on the surface could have supposed that Wellington, the long-enduring general, whose profound calculations and untiring vigour in war had brought the affairs of the Peninsula to their apparently prosperous state, that he the victorious commander could with truth thus describe his own uneasy situation to his government?
“Matters are becoming so bad between us and the Spaniards that I think it necessary to draw your attention seriously to the subject. You will have seen the libels about San Sebastian, which I know were written and published by an officer of the war department and I believe under the direction of the minister at war Don Juan O’Donoju. Advantage has been taken of the impression made by these libels to circulate others in which the old stories are repeated about the outrages committed by sir John Moore’s army in Gallicia, and endeavours are made to irritate the public mind about our still keeping garrisons in Cadiz and Carthagena, and particularly in Ceuta. They exaggerate the conduct of our traders in South America, and every little concern of a master of a ship who may behave ill in a Spanish port is represented as an attack upon the sovereignty of the Spanish nation. I believe these libels all proceed from the same source, the government and their immediate servants and officers; and although I have no reason to believe that they have as yet made any impression on the nation at large they certainly have upon the officers of the government, and even upon the principal officers of the army. These persons must see that if the libels are not written or encouraged by the government they are at least not discouraged, they know that we are odious to the government and they treat us accordingly. The Spanish troops plunder every thing they approach, neither their own nor our magazines are sacred. Until recently there was some semblance of inquiry and of a desire to punish offenders, lately these acts of disorder have been left entirely unnoticed, unless when I have interfered with my authority as commander-in-chief of the Spanish army. The civil magistrates in the country have not only refused us assistance but have particularly ordered the inhabitants not to give it for payment, and when robberies have been discovered and the property proved to belong to the commissariat the law has been violated and possession withheld. This was the case lately at Tolosa.