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Books. Change. Lives.

Copyright © 2016, 2018, 2023 by Alexis Hall
Cover and internal design © 2023 by Sourcebooks
Cover design and Illustration by Elizabeth Turner Stokes
Sourcebooks and the colophon are registered trademarks of
Sourcebooks.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any
form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information
storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations
embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing
from its publisher, Sourcebooks.
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are
used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is
purely coincidental and not intended by the author.
All brand names and product names used in this book are
trademarks, registered trademarks, or trade names of their
respective holders. Sourcebooks is not associated with any product
or vendor in this book.
Published by Sourcebooks Casablanca, an imprint of Sourcebooks
P.O. Box 4410, Naperville, Illinois 60567-4410
(630) 961-3900
[Link]
Originally self-published in 2013 by Alexis Hall.
Cataloging in Publication Data is on file with the Library of Congress.
 Contents

Front Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Foreword

Content Guidance

9
10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

Bonus Material

Darian’s Nanny Dot’s Cottage Pie

Aftermath

From the Author

Shadowland

From the Author

 The Glass Menagerie

Author Annotations

About the Author

Back Cover
To C—it’s not the same without you.
 Foreword

I’ve always wanted to be able to write a foreword for one of my

books because, if nothing else, it implies the book has stuck around
for a while. Except here I am, finally getting to write one, and I have
no idea what to say.
Glitterland wasn’t the first book I wrote but—by a commodius vicus
of recirculation—it was the first that got published, which means it
seems like the first in retrospect. And now it’s nearly ten years old
and that’s really gratifying and really terrifying at the same time. Not
least because it means I’m ten years older than I was when I started
writing and I felt pretty old at the time.
Because I relentlessly second-guess myself, I can’t quite tell the
best tone to strike when talking about an early work. If I imply I’ve
got better since, it suggests the book you’ve just paid money for
isn’t as good as another one you could have chosen to purchase. If I
imply I haven’t, then that suggests I’ve spent the past decade
stagnating creatively. Although actually, I think “better” is a
somewhat pointless term when you’re talking about art in general
(and, God, I find it difficult to refer to my own books as “art”).
Ultimately, everything is a combination of contexts. I don’t think I
could write Glitterland today, but I couldn’t have written the book
I’m currently working on a decade ago and wouldn’t be able to write
it a decade from now either.
 I kind of like that in a way, though. It means every book you write
(or, for that matter, read) has its own place in time. I do, however,
quietly think of Glitterland as the book that taught me how to write
(inasmuch as you feel I can write—as always, I’m the person least
qualified to judge that). From the absolute basics of how to plan a
character arc and use dialogue tags to more up-in-the-air things like
“how do you emotions”. That last remains the most fascinating to
me. One of the complaints often levelled at romance by, well,
wankers is that it’s a genre where nothing ever happens. And while
that’s manifestly untrue (romantic suspense is a thing, for a start) it
also wouldn’t be a bad thing even if it was. There’s a power and a
challenge and a complexity in both creating and reading stories that
are almost entirely grounded in emotional journeys rather than in,
say, who done a murder or who can blow up the most space aliens.
Not that I don’t like (and, indeed read, and occasionally write)
murdery-alien-explodey books too. But I think what I found in
Glitterland was a kind of freedom.
My agent likes to talk about authors having “core stories,” which I
think is her polite way of reassuring me that I’m not just being
repetitive. Looking back, I think you can see a lot of my core stories
in Glitterland. It’s written in deep POV with an unsympathetic
protagonist; it explores mental health; it focuses a lot on dialect and
the complexities of the British class system; there’s prominent
cooking and board gaming scenes; and of course people do have a
tendency to go on about Barthes. It also has quite an abrupt ending.
As does this foreword.
Alexis Hall
October 2022
 Content Guidance

Glitterland includes sexual content, a character with bipolar

depression, past hospitalisation due to a suicide attempt, talk of past
suicide, suicidal ideation, discussion of self-harm, some self-directed
ableist language, attempted on-page drug use, parental neglect,
panic attacks, and outing of a character’s mental health.
 The whole seems to fall into a shape
As if I saw alike my work and self
And all that I was born to be and do,
A twilight-piece.
Robert Browning, “Andrea del Sarto”

We dress classy, we’ve got the nice handbags, we like our surgery,
hair extensions, big eyelashes—we’re very glitzy. It’s the most
important thing in the world, to look glamorous.
Amy Childs
 1
Now

My heart is beating so fast it’s going to trip over itself and stop.
Everything is hot and dark. I’ve been buried alive. I’m already dead.
I have just enough grip on reality to discard these notions, but it
doesn’t quell my horror. My mouth is dry, strange and sour, my
tongue as thick as carpet. Alcohol-heavy breath drags itself out of
my throat, the scent of it churning my stomach. I’m pickled in sweat.
And there’s an arm across my chest, a leg across my legs. I am
manacled in flesh.
god, god, fuck, god, fuck
My body is far too loud. Blood roaring, heart thundering, breath
screaming, stomach raging, head pounding.
I’m going to have a full-blown panic attack.
The first in a long time. Except that’s not much consolation.
Where am I? What have I…
out, fuck, have to get out
I twist away from the arm and the leg, rolling off a bare mattress
onto bare floorboards. Maybe my first instinct was right. I am dead
and this is hell. The darkness scrapes against my eyes. Where are
the rest of my clothes?
And breathe, I need to breathe more. Or breathe less. Stop the
light show in my head. My vision sheets red and black, like a roulette
wheel spinning too fast, never stopping.
god, fuck, clothes
Scattered somewhere in the void. Trousers, shirt, waistcoat, jacket,
a single sock. My fingers close over my phone. A cool, calming
talisman.
Half-dressed, everything else bundled in my arms, I ease open the
door, dark spilling into dark and, like Orpheus, I’m looking back. The
shadows move across his face, but he doesn’t stir. He sleeps the
perfect, heedless sleep of children, drunkards, and fools.
My footsteps creak along a narrow hallway of peeling paintwork
and I let myself out onto a wholly unfamiliar street.

***

Next

Breathe, just keep breathing. Keep breathing, and get away.

I stumbled down the pavement, the awfulness of this—this and
everything—hanging off my shoulders like a rucksack full of rocks.
Still no idea where I was. Suburbia spiralling away in all directions.
And, at the horizon, a haze of pale light where the distant sea met
the distant sky. I fumbled for my phone. 3:41.
god, fuck, god
There was a single blip of battery left. I called Niall. He didn’t
answer. So I called again. And this time he did. I didn’t wait for him
to speak.
“I don’t know where I am.” My voice rang too high even in my own
ears.
“Ash?” Niall sounded strange. “What do you mean? Where are
you?”
“I just said. I don’t know. I… I’ve been stupid. I need to get
home.”
 I couldn’t control my breathing. The most basic of human functions
and even that was beyond me.
“Can’t you call a cab?”
“Yes…no… I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know the number.
What if it doesn’t come? I don’t know.” Anxieties were swimming
around inside me like jellyfish, but I was usually better at not
confessing them aloud.
It hadn’t occurred to me to get a taxi, but even the idea of it
seemed overwhelming in its magnitude. A quagmire of potential
disaster that was utterly terrifying.
“Can you come and get me?” I asked.
Later I would see how pathetic it was, my desperate pleading, the
weasel thread of manipulative weakness running through my words.
Later, I would remember that calling for a taxi was an everyday
event, not an ordeal beyond reckoning. Later, yes, later I would
drown in shame and hate myself.
Niall’s hollow sigh gusted over the line. “Oh God, Ash, can’t you—”
“No, no, I can’t. Please, I need to go home.”
A pause. Then the inevitable, “Okay, okay, I’m coming. Can you at
least find a street sign? Give me some idea where you are?”
Phone clutched in my sweat-slick hand, I ran haphazard along the
houses. The curtains were shut as tight as eyes.
“Marlborough Street,” I said. “Marlborough Street.”
“All right. I’ll be there. Just… I’ll be there.”
I sat down on a wall to wait, irrational panic eventually giving way
to a dull pounding weariness. There was a packet of cigarettes in my
jacket pocket. I wasn’t supposed to have cigarettes, but I was
already so fucked that I lit one, grey smoke curling lazily into the
grey night.
Another Random Scribd Document
with Unrelated Content
Bayonne. They were wrathful that Godoy had been carried beyond
the reach of their vengeance, and every day they were on the look-
out for news from Bayonne as to the cause of Ferdinand, and this
news grew even more unfavourable. On the evening of the 30th of
April the populace had retired in gloomy discontent, because no
courier had arrived bringing intelligence of Buonaparte's intentions
towards Ferdinand. On the morning of the 1st of May numbers of
men assembled about the gate of the inn and the post-office, with
dark looks, and having, as was supposed, arms under their long
cloaks. The French mustered strongly in the streets, and the day
passed over quietly. But the next morning, the 2nd of May, the same
ominous-looking crowds, as they assembled, were agitated by
reports that the only remaining members of the royal family, the
widowed Queen of Etruria and her children, and the youngest son of
King Charles, Don Francisco, were about to be sent off also to
Bayonne. They presently saw these royal personages conducted to
their carriages; Don Francisco, a youth of only fourteen, weeping
bitterly, and the sight roused the people to instant fury. They fell on
the French, chiefly with their long knives, massacred seven hundred
soldiers of the line, and wounded upwards of twenty of the Imperial
Guard. The French, in return, fired on the people, and killed a
hundred and twenty of them. Murat poured in troops to suppress the
riot, but could not disperse them till after several volleys of grape-
shot and repeated charges of cavalry. Unprepared as the country
was, the people felt by no means daunted. The Alcalde of Mostoles,
about ten miles south of Madrid, hearing the firing, and
understanding the cause, sent a bulletin to the south in these words,
"The country is in danger: Madrid is perishing through the perfidy of
the French: all Spaniards come to deliver it!" That was all that was
necessary. The fact of being in possession of Madrid was a very
different thing to being in possession of Paris, Spain consisting of
various provinces, having their separate capitals, and everywhere
was a martial people, just as ready and able to maintain a struggle
against an invader as if Madrid were free. At Valencia, the populace,
headed by a priest, fell on the French, and massacred two hundred
of them. Solano, the governor of Cadiz, suspected of favouring the
French, was dragged out of his house and murdered. Even before
the insurrection at Madrid there had been one at Toledo, and the
French had been menaced with destruction.
Amid these popular outbursts the great body of the Spaniards were
calmly organising the country for defence. A junta or select
committee was elected in each district, and these juntas established
communications with each other all over the land. They called on the
inhabitants to furnish contributions, the clergy to send in their
church plate to the mint, and the common people to enrol
themselves as soldiers and to labour at the fortifications. The
Spanish soldiers, to a man, went over to the popular side, and in a
few days the whole nation was in arms. The crisis of which
Buonaparte had warned Murat was come at once, and the fight in
Madrid on the 2nd of May was but the beginning of a war which was
to topple the invader from his now dizzy height. This made
Buonaparte convene a mock national junta, or Assembly of Notables,
to sanction the abdication, and the appointment of Joseph
Buonaparte as the new monarch. Joseph entered Madrid on the 6th
of June, and proclaimed a new constitution.
No sooner had the insurrection of Aranjuez taken place, and
Ferdinand been proclaimed king, than, so early as April the 8th,
General Castaños informed Sir Hew Dalrymple, the governor of
Gibraltar, that there was an end of the policy of Godoy, which had
made Spain the slave of France and the foe of Britain. Sir Hew sent
a prompt dispatch to England with the news, and, till he could
receive instructions from the British Government, he maintained
friendly relations with the Spaniards. When the junta of Seville was
formed, and there was every reason to believe that Spain would
make a determined resistance, on his own responsibility he
encouraged the merchants of Gibraltar to make a loan of forty
thousand dollars to the junta without premium; and Captain
Whittingham, an officer well acquainted with Spain, went to Seville
to assist in planning the best means of preventing the French from
passing the Sierra Morena. On the 8th of June Sir Hew received a
dispatch from Lord Castlereagh, informing him that the British
Government had determined to send ten thousand men immediately
to the assistance of the Spanish patriots. But this was preceded four
days by a proclamation which had outstripped Lord Castlereagh's
dispatch, stating that his Majesty had ordered all hostilities towards
Spain to cease, and all Spanish ships at sea to be unmolested.
Admiral Collingwood took the command of the whole British fleet on
the coast of Spain, ready to co-operate. He landed Mr. Cox to
proceed to Seville as confidential agent, and about the middle of
June General Spencer arrived at Cadiz with five thousand British
soldiers. About the same time, the junta of Seville declared
themselves at peace with Great Britain, and sent four commissioners
to England to settle diplomatic relations between the countries.
Meanwhile the French generals, though they saw insurrections rising
in every quarter, and though they themselves were located in
different parts of the country, distant from each other, entertained
no fear but that the steady discipline of their troops, and their own
experience, would easily put them down. Murat had quitted Spain to
proceed to his kingdom of Naples, which he had received on the
15th of July, and Savary was left at Madrid as Commander-in-Chief,
and he found himself in a most arduous and embarrassing post, with
so many points to watch and to strengthen for the suppression of
the insurrection. The Spanish junta recommended their country, very
prudently, to avoid regular engagements, with their yet raw forces,
against the veteran armies of France, but to carry on a guerilla
warfare, waylaying the enemy in mountains and defiles, cutting off
their supplies, and harassing their rear, their outposts, and their
foraging parties. The ardour and pride of the Spaniards only too
much tempted the men to despise this advice, and whenever they
did they severely paid for it. The relentless spirit of the people
against the lawless invaders, on the other hand, incited the French
to equal ferocity. They treated the Spaniards as rebels in arms
against their king; the villages were given up to the plunder and
licentiousness of the soldiers. This again fired the Spaniards to
retaliation, and they put to death sick and wounded when they fell
into their hands. The war thus commenced with features of peculiar
horror. The character of the country rendered the conflict the more
desperate to the invaders; the fertile regions were separated from
each other by vast desert heaths and barren mountains, so that
Henry IV. had said truly, if a general invaded Spain with a small army
he would be defeated; if with a large one, he would be starved. To
collect provisions, the French had to disperse themselves over wide
tracts, and thus exposed themselves to the ambuscades and
surprises of the Spaniards, every peasant carrying his gun.
At first victory seemed to attend the French. Lefebvre defeated the
Spaniards in Aragon, on the 9th of June, and General Bessières beat
the insurgents, in several partial actions, in Navarre and Biscay. But
his great success was over the united forces of Generals Cuesta and
Blake, on the 14th of June, at Medina de Rio Seco, a few leagues
from the city of Valladolid. Duchesne thought he should be able to
send reinforcements to assist in reducing Valencia and Aragon; but
he soon found that he had enough to do in his own district. Marshal
Moncey, all this time expecting the co-operation of Duchesne, had
advanced into Valencia. For a time the country seemed deserted; but
as he advanced he found the hills and rocks swarming with armed
people, and he had to force his march by continual fighting. There
were Swiss troops mingled amongst the Spanish ones opposed to
him, and whilst they attacked him in front, the Spaniards assaulted
his flanks and rear. When he arrived before the city of Valencia, on
the 27th of June, he found the place well defended. On the 29th
Moncey retired from before the walls, despairing of the arrival of
Duchesne. Moncey, like Bessières, now found himself called to
Madrid to defend the new king, who, it was clear, could not long
remain there; and already the British were landing on the shores of
the Peninsula, to bring formidable aid to the exasperated
inhabitants.
But the most important operations were at this moment taking place
in the south between Dupont and Castaños. Castaños was quartered
at Utrera with twenty thousand men. Dupont had been ordered by
Murat to march from Madrid into the south-west, and make himself
master of the important post of Cadiz. After a countermand, he
again advanced in that direction, and had crossed the Sierra Morena,
so celebrated in the romance of "Don Quixote," and reached the
ancient city of Cordova. There he received the news that Cadiz had
risen against the French, and had seized the French squadron lying
in the bay, and, at the same time, that Seville was in the highest
state of insurrection. Whilst pausing in uncertainty of what course to
pursue, Castaños advanced from Utrera towards the higher part of
the Guadalquivir. If Dupont had rushed forward to attack Castaños at
Utrera, he would have done it under great disadvantages. He was
cut off from the main French army by the Sierra Morena, and these
mountains being occupied by the insurgent inhabitants, he would
have no chance of falling back in case of disaster. He now advanced
to Andujar, which he reached on the 18th of June, having had to
fight his way through bands of fiery patriots.
On the evening of the 16th of July Castaños appeared on the
Argonilla, directly opposite to Andujar; the river was fordable in
many places from the drought, and the different divisions of the
Spaniards crossed in the night. Vedel, seeing the critical situation of
the French army, made a rapid movement to regain and keep open
the mountainous defile by which he had arrived, but Dupont
remained at Andujar till the night of the 18th. Vedel remaining at the
pass for Dupont, the latter found himself intercepted at Baylen by
the Swiss General, Reding, and whilst engaging him his own Swiss
troops went over to Reding. He sent expresses to Vedel to return to
his aid, but before this could be accomplished he was defeated, and
compelled to surrender. He was enormously encumbered by
baggage; for the French, as usual, utterly regardless of the necessity
of keeping on good terms with a people over whom they wished to
rule, had been pillaging churches and houses of all plate and
valuables that they could find. In endeavouring to defend the
baggage, Dupont had weakened his front, and occasioned his
repulse. Castaños had not perceived the march of the French; but,
by the time his van came up with Reding, he found the French army
prisoners. The terms proposed by the French were that they should
be allowed to retire upon Madrid with all their arms and baggage.
But Castaños was too well acquainted with the necessities of the
French through the intercepted letter to Savary. He insisted that they
should pile their arms, give up the greater part of their spoil, and be
sent down to San Lucar and Rota, where they should be embarked
for France. Whilst Dupont was hesitating on these conditions, he
received a note from Vedel, proposing that they should make a
simultaneous attack on the Spaniards, and thus have a fresh chance
of turning the scale in their own favour. But Dupont saw that this
was hopeless; and, moreover, it is said that Castaños insisted that if
Vedel himself did not immediately lay down his arms, he would
shoot Dupont. Vedel, who now saw little hope of cutting his way
through the mountains, was compelled to obey. The French piled
their arms on the 22nd of July, the prisoners amounting to between
eighteen and nineteen thousand. They gave up also thirty pieces of
cannon.
The news of this great victory, which at once freed from the French
armies the rich province of Andalusia and the cities of Cadiz and
Seville, spread joy and exultation over Spain, and filled Buonaparte,
who received it at Bordeaux, with the deepest anxiety, but the
Spaniards were led into a confidence which brought its subsequent
chastisement. The news no sooner reached Madrid than the king
ceased to feel himself safe there. He determined to retire to Vittoria,
which was at a convenient distance from the French frontier. On the
3rd of July he quitted the city by night, and, guarded by French
troops, took the road to Vittoria, leaving Grouchy and Marshal
Bessières to cut off any pursuit of the Spaniards. Grouchy then
despatched a letter requiring Castaños to send an officer to take
charge of the city, and to protect the French invalids in the hospitals.
He sent General Moreno, and himself arrived to hold the city on the
23rd of August. Such of the Spanish grandees as had encouraged
the French fled, with Joseph, for safety, and obtained the name of
"Josepinos," or "Infrancsados;" the rest joined the Spanish cause.
But the event which, far more than the battle of Baylen, showed
Buonaparte and the world the sort of war he had provoked, was the
siege of Saragossa. This ancient city, the capital of Aragon, stands
on the right bank of the Ebro, with a suburb on the left bank
connected with it by a bridge. Another river, a small one, called the
Cozo, flowed into the Ebro, close under the city walls. The
immediate neighbourhood of Saragossa is flat, and, on one side of
the river, marshy; its walls were of brick, about ten feet high, old
and ruinous, but in places they were only of mud. It might seem
that no strong defence of such a place could be made against an
army of thirteen thousand men—veterans who had served in
Germany and Poland, and who were furnished with battering trains
and every means of assault. But the streets of the city were narrow
and crooked, the houses strong and lofty, the rooms being almost all
vaulted, and therefore almost impervious to shell. The inhabitants
were sixty thousand. Saragossa raised the flag of resistance the
moment that Murat issued his proclamation on the 20th of May,
informing the Spanish people of the abdication of Charles and
Ferdinand, and calling on the Spaniards to submit to the new
government. On the 16th of June General Lefebvre commenced the
attack by driving in the outposts of Palafox, the Spanish General,
and establishing strong guards before the gates, but the Spaniards
fought him street by street. As fast as they knocked down the walls
and scattered the sandbags, they were repaired again by the
Spaniards. At this stage of the siege, Augustina, "the Maid of
Saragossa," a handsome woman of the lower class, of about twenty-
two years of age, arrived on one of the batteries with refreshments,
and found every man who had defended it lying slain. The fire was
so tremendous that the citizens hesitated to re-man the guns.
Augustina sprang forward over the bodies of the dead and dying,
snatched a match from the hand of a dead artilleryman, and fired off
a six-and-twenty-pounder. She then jumped upon the gun, and
vowed never to quit it alive during the siege. Such an example
added new courage to the defenders; and the siege proceeded with
incessant fury. At this juncture Buonaparte withdrew a part of the
troops, ordering Lefebvre to join Bessières with them, and Verdier
was left to continue the siege with about ten thousand men. The
Saragossans, encouraged by this, and assisted by some regular
troops, not only defended the town more vigorously than ever, but
sent out detachments to cut off Verdier's supplies. After several
determined assaults he raised the siege on the 13th of August.
The success of the revolt against the French in Spain was certain to
become contagious in Portugal. Junot was holding the country with
an army of thirty thousand men, amongst whom there was a
considerable number of Spanish troops, who were sure to desert on
the first opportunity after the news from Spain. What Buonaparte
intended really to do with Portugal did not yet appear. The
conditions of the Treaty of Fontainebleau remained a dead letter. He
had established neither the Queen of Etruria nor the Prince of the
Peace in their kingdoms there. The likelihood was that, as soon as
Spain was secure, he would incorporate Portugal with it. This
seemed very probably his intention, from words that he let fall at an
Assembly of Portuguese Notables, whom he had summoned to meet
him at Bayonne. The Count de Lima, the president of the Assembly,
opened it with an address to Napoleon, who listened with great
nonchalance, and then said, "I hardly know what to make of you,
gentlemen; it must depend on the events in Spain. And, then, are
you of consequence sufficient to constitute a separate people? Have
you enough of size to do so? What is the population of Portugal?
Two millions, is it?" "More than three, sire," replied the Count. "Ah, I
did not know that. And Lisbon—are there a hundred and fifty
thousand inhabitants?" "More than double that number, sire." "Ah, I
was not aware of that. Now, what do you wish to be, you
Portuguese? Do you desire to become Spaniards?" "No!" said the
Count de Lima, bluntly, and drawing himself up to his full height.
Then Buonaparte broke up the conference.
 HEROISM OF THE MAID OF SARAGOSSA. (See p. 556.)
[See larger version]
The Spanish junta sent an officer to Lisbon to consult with General
Caraffa, the commander of the Spanish auxiliaries, on the best
means of withdrawing the troops from that city. Caraffa, who was an
Italian, did not seem to fall into the proposal; but this was of less
consequence, for his men took the liberty of deserting, first in small
numbers and secretly, but soon by a whole regiment at a time, and
openly. Junot sent out six hundred men to stop them; but they
attacked, killed, and wounded nearly half the detachment, and
pursued their march. General Bellesta, who commanded the Spanish
troops at Oporto, seized the French general, Quesnel, who had but a
small number of men, and marched away for Corunna, carrying
Quesnel and his few soldiers prisoners with him. No sooner were the
Spaniards gone, however, than the cowardly governor of Oporto put
down the rising and declared for the French. But the fire of revolt
was flying too fast all over the kingdom for this to succeed. In a few
days the people rose again, seized on the arsenal, and armed
themselves. They were encouraged by the monks, who rang their
bells to call the people out, and by the bishops, who blessed the
banners, and offered up public prayers for the enfranchisement of
the country in the cathedrals. There was a similarly successful
outbreak at Braganza. From one end of the country to the other the
rising was complete and enthusiastic. Deputies were dispatched to
England to solicit assistance and arms. For a time Junot managed to
keep down the population of Lisbon by collecting troops into it,
seizing, altogether, four thousand five hundred of the Spaniards, and
making them prisoners. Alarmed, however, at his position, and
fearing to move any of his forces from the capital, he ordered
Loison, who lay at the fortress of Almeida, on the frontiers, to march
to Oporto, and suppress the revolt; but General Silviera, a
Portuguese nobleman, put himself at the head of the armed
population, and successfully defended Oporto. At Beja, Leiria, Evora,
and other places, the French managed to put down the insurgents,
but not without much bloodshed and severe military executions. But
the hour of retribution was fast approaching. Spanish as well as
Portuguese deputies appeared in London soliciting aid. They did not
ask for men; for, in the pride of their temporary success, they
imagined themselves amply able to drive out the French; but they
asked for arms, clothes, and ammunition; and they prayed that an
army might be sent to Portugal, which would act as a powerful
diversion in their favour.
Both the Government and people of Britain responded to these
demands with enthusiasm. War with Spain was declared to be at an
end; all the Spanish prisoners were freed from confinement, and
were sent home in well-provided vessels. The Ministers, and Canning
especially, avowed their conviction that the time was come to make
an effectual blow at the arrogant power of Buonaparte. Sir Arthur
Wellesley was selected to command a force of nine thousand
infantry and one regiment of cavalry, which was to sail immediately
to the Peninsula, and to act as circumstances should determine. This
force sailed from Cork on the 12th of July, and was to be followed by
another of ten thousand men. Sir Arthur reached Corunna on the
20th of the same month, and immediately put himself in
communication with the junta of Galicia. All was confidence amongst
the Spaniards. They assured him, as the deputies in London had
assured the Ministers, that they wanted no assistance from foreign
troops; that they had men to any amount, full of bravery; they only
wanted arms and money. He furnished them with a considerable
sum of money, but his experienced mind foresaw that they needed
more than they imagined to contend with the troops of Buonaparte.
They wanted efficient officers, and thorough discipline, and he felt
confident that they must, in their overweening assurance, suffer
severe reverses. He warned the junta that Buonaparte, if he met
with obstructions in reaching them by land, would endeavour to
cross into Asturias by sea, and he advised them to fit out the
Spanish ships lying at Ferrol to prevent this; but they replied that
they could not divert their attention from their resistance by land,
and must leave the protection of their coasts to their British allies.
Sir Arthur then sailed directly for Oporto, where he found the
Portuguese right glad to have the assistance of a British force, and
most willing to co-operate with it, and to have their raw levies
trained by British officers. On the 24th of July he opened his
communication with the town. The bishop was heading the
insurrection, and three thousand men were in drill, but badly armed
and equipped. A thousand muskets had been furnished by the
British fleet, but many men had no arms except fowling-pieces.
Wellesley made arrangements for horses and mules to drag his
cannon, and convey his baggage, and then he sailed as far as the
Tagus, to ascertain the number and condition of the French forces
about Lisbon. Satisfied on this head, he returned, and landed his
troops, on the 1st of August, at Figueras, in Mondego Bay. This little
place had been taken by the Portuguese insurgents, and was now
held by three hundred mariners from British ships. Higher up the
river lay five thousand Portuguese regulars, at Coimbra. On the 5th
he was joined by General Spencer, from Cadiz, with four thousand
men; thus raising his force to thirteen thousand foot and about five
hundred cavalry. The greatest rejoicing was at the moment taking
place amongst the Portuguese from the news of General Dupont's
surrender to Castaños.
Junot had from sixteen to eighteen thousand men in Portugal, but a
considerable number of them were scattered into different garrisons;
his hope of reinforcements from Spain was likewise cut off by the
surrender of Dupont, and by the fact of the Spaniards being in
possession of Andalusia, Estremadura, and Galicia. Thus the
numbers of the two armies which could be brought into the field
against each other were pretty equal, except that Junot had a fine
body of cavalry, of which arm the British were nearly destitute. On
the 9th of August General Wellesley commenced his march
southward, in the direction of Lisbon, to encounter Junot. On the
16th Wellesley came in contact with the van of Junot's army. On the
landing of the British, Junot had called in his different garrisons, and
concentrated his troops about Lisbon. He also dispatched General
Laborde to check Wellesley's march, and ordered Loison to support
him. But before Loison could reach Laborde, Wellesley was upon
him, and drove in his outpost at the village of Obidos, and forced
him back on Roliça. At that place Laborde had a very strong position,
and there he determined to stand. He was located on a range of
rocky hills, the ravines between which were thickly grown with
underwood and briars. Up these the British must force their way, if
they attacked, and must suffer severely from the riflemen placed in
the thickets and on the brows of the hills. But Wellesley knew that
Loison with his detachment was hourly expected, and he determined
to beat Laborde before he came up. He therefore placed his
Portuguese division on his right to meet Laborde, and ordered his
left to ascend the steep hills, and be prepared for the appearance of
Loison's force, which was coming in that direction. His middle
column had to make its way up the steepest heights, in front of
Laborde's centre. All three columns executed their movements,
however, with equal valour and spirit. The centre suffered most of
all, both from the nature of the ground, and from a rifle ambuscade
placed in a copse of myrtle and arbutus, which mowed our soldiers
down in heaps, with their gallant colonel, the son of Lord Lake, of
Indian fame, at their head. Notwithstanding all difficulties, our
soldiers scaled the heights, formed there, and the centre charged
Laborde's centre with the bayonet and drove them back. As the
French had been taught that the British soldiers were of no account,
and their general only a "Sepoy general," they returned several
times to the attack, but on every occasion found themselves
repulsed as by an immovable wall. Then, seeing the right and left
wings bearing down upon them, they gave way, and ran for it. They
were equally astonished at the terrible charges with the bayonet, at
the rapidity and precision of the firing, and the general arrangement
of the battle, and the exactitude with which it was carried out.
The French left six hundred killed and wounded on the field; the
British had four hundred and eighty killed or disabled. Laborde
retreated amongst the hills to the village of Azambugueira, and
thence to Torres Vedras, where he looked for the junction of Loison,
and where that general really appeared. Still the British force was
equal, if not superior, in numbers to the French, and Sir Arthur
Wellesley advanced along the sea-coast to Vimiera, where he was
joined by Generals Anstruther and Acland. Unfortunately, at this
moment arrived Sir Harry Burrard, whom the Ministry had ordered to
supersede Sir Arthur Wellesley in the chief command till the arrival
of Sir Hew Dalrymple, who was to be the General-in-Chief; Burrard,
second in command; and Wellesley, Sir John Moore, Lord Paget, Sir
John Hope, and Macdonald Frazer, to command different divisions.
Thus, by the old system of routine, the real military genius was
reduced from the first to the fourth in command. Sir Arthur went on
board Sir Harry Burrard's vessel on the evening of his arrival, the
20th of August, and explained to him the positions of the armies,
and his plan of advancing along the coast to Mafra, thus turning the
flank of Laborde and Loison, and compelling them to fight or retreat
on Lisbon. This was clearly the view of every one of the officers,
who were eager to press on; but Sir Harry, old and cautious, was of
opinion that nothing more should be risked till Sir John Moore
arrived with his reinforcements. Sir Arthur must have returned under
a sense of deep disappointment, but, fortunately for him, the enemy
did not allow of his waiting for Sir John Moore. At midnight he
received a hasty message that the French were in motion, and
coming in one dense mass of twenty thousand men to surprise and
rout him. Sir Arthur was strongly posted in the village of Vimiera and
on the hills around it. He sent out patrols, and ordered the pickets to
be on the alert, and he then called out his troops, and had them in
good fighting order by the dawn of day. At about seven o'clock the
advance of the enemy was perceived by the clouds of dust that rose
into the air, and soon they were seen coming on in columns of
infantry, preceded by cavalry. By ten o'clock the French were close at
hand, and made an impetuous attack on the British centre and left,
to drive them into the sea, according to a favourite French phrase,
the sea actually rolling close to their rear. The first troops which
came into collision with them were the 50th regiment, commanded
by Colonel Walker. Seeing that the intention of the French, who were
led by Laborde himself, was to break his line by their old method of
pushing on a dense column by a momentum from behind, which
drove in the van like a wedge, in spite of itself, Colonel Walker
instantly changed the position of his regiment so as, instead of a
parallel line, to present an oblique one to the assailing column. This
was, therefore, driven on by the immense rear, and, instead of
breaking the British line, was actually taken in flank by it, and the
musketry and grape-shot mowed down the French in a terrible
manner. This was at once succeeded by a rapid charge with the
bayonet; and so astonishing was the effect of this unexpected
movement, that the French were thrown into irretrievable confusion,
and broke on every side. Whilst this was the effect on the centre and
left, General Sir Ronald Fergusson was attacked with equal
impetuosity by Loison: bayonets were crossed, and the same result
as took place at Maida occurred—the French fell back and fled.
Nothing was wanted but a good body of cavalry to follow up the
flying foe, and completely reduce them to surrender. The small body
of horse, commanded by Colonel Taylor, fought with an ardour that
led them too far into the centre of Margaron's powerful cavalry, and
Colonel Taylor was killed, and half of his little troop with him.
Kellermann, to stop the pursuit, posted a strong reserve in a pine
wood, on the line of retreat, but they were driven out at the point of
the bayonet. Had the orders of General Wellesley now been carried
out, the French would have been cut off from much further retreat.
General Hill was commanded to take a short cut, and interpose
between the French and the strong position of Torres Vedras, and
General Fergusson was directed to follow sharply in their rear. In all
probability they must have capitulated at once; but here the evil
genius of Sir Harry Burrard again interfered to save them. He
appeared on the field and thought sufficient had been done till Sir
John Moore arrived. It was not enough for him that the French had
now been twice put to rout within a few days, and were in full flight,
and that they were found not to be twenty thousand, but only
eighteen thousand strong. He ordered the pursuit to cease, and the
army to sit down at Vimiera till the arrival of Moore. To the great
astonishment of the French, and the equal mortification of the
British, the retreating enemy was thus allowed to collect their forces
and take possession of the heights of Torres Vedras.
The next day, the 21st, Sir Hew Dalrymple arrived from Gibraltar,
and superseded Sir Harry Burrard. But the mischief was done; the
enemy had gained the strong position from which Wellesley would
have cut them off. What would have been the effect of Sir Arthur's
unobstructed orders was clearly seen by what did take place; for,
notwithstanding the possession of the strong post of Torres Vedras,
Junot saw that he could not maintain the conflict against the British,
and on the 22nd he sent General Kellermann with a flag of truce to
propose an armistice, preparatory to a convention for the evacuation
of Portugal by the French.
The terms which Junot required were that the French should not be
considered as prisoners of war, but should be conveyed to France by
sea, with all their baggage; that nothing should be detained. These
would, in fact, have allowed them to carry off all the plunder of
churches and houses, and to this Sir Arthur objected. He said that
some means must be found to make the French disgorge the church
plate. But the Convention was signed, subject to the consent of the
British admiral, Sir Charles Cotton, a condition of importance, seeing
that Junot had stipulated that the Russian fleet in the Tagus,
commanded by Admiral Siniavin, should not be molested or stopped
when it wished to go away. Admiral Cotton objected to these terms,
and it was agreed that the Russian fleet should be made over to
Britain till six months after the conclusion of a general peace.
Commissioners were appointed to examine the French spoil, who
recovered the property of the Museum and Royal Library, and some
of the church plate; but the French were allowed to carry off far too
much of their booty. The definitive treaty was signed at Cintra on the
30th of August, much to the disgust of Sir Arthur Wellesley, who,
however, signed it as a matter of form. He then wrote to Lord
Castlereagh, to say that he desired to quit the army; that matters
were not prospering, and that he had been too successful to allow
him to serve in it in any subordinate situation. Indeed, he saw that,
left to himself, he could carry victory with the British standard, but
that it was impossible to do any good under incompetent men.
 SIR JOHN MOORE.
[See larger version]
The indignation of all parties in England was unbounded. They were
persuaded that Junot might have been compelled to surrender with
all his army as prisoners of war; that his arms and booty ought to
have been given up entirely, as well as the Russian fleet; and the
army prevented from taking any part in the after war, except upon a
proper exchange. And no doubt this might have been the case had
Wellesley been permitted to follow his own judgment. A court of
inquiry was appointed to sit in the great hall of Chelsea College,
which opened on the 14th of November and closed on the 27th of
December. Yet matters were so managed that scarcely any blame
was cast on Sir Harry Burrard, and all the generals were declared
free from blame. Sir Harry was, indeed, included in the praise
bestowed by the committee—that Sir Hew Dalrymple, Sir Harry
himself, and Sir Arthur Wellesley, as well as the rest of the officers
and men, had displayed an ardour and gallantry on every occasion
during the expedition that reflected the highest lustre on his
Majesty's troops. But the public was not at all mystified by this
strange sentence.
The Convention being ratified, the British took possession of all the
forts on the Tagus on the 2nd of September, and the port of Lisbon
was opened to our shipping. On the 8th and 9th the British army
entered Lisbon in triumph, amid the acclamations of the people.
Transports were collected and the embarkation of the French army
commenced, and before the end of the month they were all shipped
off, except the last division, which was detained by an order from
England. The colours of the House of Braganza were hoisted on all
the forts which we had taken possession of, and a council of
government was established, which ruled in the name of the Prince
Regent of Portugal.
The system of Buonaparte, by which he endeavoured to prevent the
knowledge of these events in Spain and Portugal from spreading
through France, was one of unscrupulous lying. He took all sorts of
false means to depress the spirits of the insurgents by mere
inventions, which he had inserted in the Spanish and Portuguese
Gazettes under his influence. At one time it was that George III. was
dead, and that George IV. was intending to make peace with
Napoleon. But whatever effect he might produce by such stories for
a time in the Peninsula, the truth continued to grow and spread over
France. It became known that Junot and his army were driven from
Lisbon; that Dupont was defeated and had surrendered in the south
of Spain; then that King Joseph had fled from Madrid; and that all
the coasts of the Peninsula were in possession of the British, who
were received by the Spaniards and Portuguese as friends and allies.
Compelled to speak out at length, on the 4th of September a
statement appeared in the Moniteur mentioning some of these
events, but mentioning only to distort them. It could not be
concealed that Britain was active in these countries, but it was
declared that the Emperor would take ample vengeance on them. In
order to silence the murmurs at the folly as well as the injustice of
seizing on Spain, which was already producing its retributive fruits,
he procured from his slavish Senate a declaration that the war with
Spain was politic, just, and necessary. Buonaparte then determined
to put forth all his strength and drive the British from the Peninsula;
but there were causes of anxiety pressing on him in the North.
Austria and Russia wore an ominous aspect, and a spirit of
resistance showed itself more and more in the press of Germany,
and these things painfully divided his attention. His burden was fast
becoming more than he could bear.
Meanwhile Ministers had not yet perceived the military genius of Sir
Arthur Wellesley, notwithstanding his services in India, at
Copenhagen, and his brilliant victories at Roliça and Vimiera. Instead
of making him at once commander-in-chief of the forces destined to
co-operate in Spain—for they now resolved to make a decided
movement in favour of the Spanish patriots—they gave that post to
Sir John Moore. Sir Arthur had assured Ministers that he was far
better qualified for the chief command than any of the superior
officers then in the Peninsula. He had now displayed the qualities
necessary for a great general: prudence as well as daring, and the
sagacious vision which foresees not only difficulties, but the means
of surmounting them. Sir Arthur had carried victory with him
everywhere, a circumstance one would have thought sufficient to
satisfy the dullest diplomatist that he was the man for the occasion.
But there was one thing which demanded attention, without which
the successful operation of our armies was impossible—the thorough
reform of the Commissariat Department. This department was at
that time in a condition of the most deplorable inefficiency. The
commissariat officers had no experience; there was no system to
guide and stimulate them. Sir Arthur had learned the necessity, in
India, of the most complete machinery of supply; that it was of no
use attempting to advance into a hostile country without knowing
how and whence your troops were to be provisioned, and to have
always ammunition in plenty, and tents for shelter. This machinery all
wanted organising—the absolute necessity of its perfect action
impressing itself on every individual concerned in it. Until this were
done, Sir Arthur would never have advanced into the heart of Spain
as Sir John Moore did. Considering the state of the roads, and the
want of mules, horses, and waggons to convey the baggage, he
would not have proceeded till he had first brought these into
existence. Still more, Sir Arthur would not have marched far without
securing, by one means or other, correct information of the real
state and localities of the Spanish armies. On all these things
depended success, and no man was more alive to the knowledge of
this than Sir Arthur Wellesley. He had already pressed these matters
earnestly on the attention of Government, and had they had the
penetration to have at once selected him for the command, they
would have spared the country the disasters which followed.
On the 6th of October Sir John Moore received instructions from
Lord Castlereagh that his army was to advance into Spain, and co-
operate with the Spanish armies for the expulsion of the French. He
was informed that his twenty-five thousand men would receive a
reinforcement of ten thousand men under Sir David Baird, who was
on his voyage to Corunna. When Sir John prepared to march, the
most serious difficulties presented themselves. Even at Lisbon it was
found impossible to procure conveyance for the necessary baggage,
and therefore the supplies of provisions and stores were cut down
extremely—a great mistake. There was one species of baggage—
women and children—who, according to the wretched practice of the
time, were allowed to accompany the troops, and would not be left
behind, though the army was going into immediate active service
against the enemy. Sir John directed the commanding officers to
order that as many as possible of these should stay behind,
especially such women as had very young children, or infants at the
breast, as there would not be found sufficient carts for them; and in
the mountainous tracks at that season, and the horrible roads, they
must suffer the most exhausting fatigues and hardships. But Sir John
had not the commanding firmness of Wellesley, and his orders in this
respect were, for the most part, neglected. Very proper orders were
also issued by Sir John regarding the behaviour of the soldiers
towards the natives. They were informed that the Spaniards were a
grave and very proud people, readily offended by any disrespect
towards their religion or customs; and the soldiers were desired to
behave courteously, and to wear the cockade of King Ferdinand VII.
as well as their own.
The army set out in successive divisions, and by different routes, in
consequence of the exhausted state of the country, which had been
stripped by the French as by an army of locusts. The roads were
intolerable, and the weather was vile. Wading through mud, and
dragging their artillery through bogs and sloughs, they struggled on
to Castello Branco, which the first division reached on the 4th of
December. By the 11th Sir John had crossed the Portuguese frontier,
and entered Ciudad Rodrigo. There he was received with great
demonstrations of joy; and on the 13th he arrived at Salamanca.
Here he had to remain for the coming up of his artillery, which,
under a guard of three thousand foot and one thousand horse, had
been conducted, by Sir John Hope, round by Elvas, as the only road,
according to the Portuguese, by which heavy cannon could be
conveyed. This was a proof of the great need of those arrangements
so strongly urged by Sir Arthur Wellesley. Proper inquiries, through
proper officers, would have ascertained beforehand the actual state
of the roads and passes. Here Sir John, too, had to wait for Sir David
Baird's detachment, which had arrived at Corunna on the 13th of
October, but had found the greatest difficulty in being allowed to
land and proceed. This was refused by the junta of Galicia, out of
that ignorant and inflated pride of the Spaniards, which persuaded
them that, because they had compelled Dupont to surrender, they
could drive the French out of their country without any assistance of
the British, whom they regarded not as saviours, but as intruders.
Whilst application was made to the Central Junta, at Madrid, for the
troops to land, they had to remain for a fortnight cooped up in the
transports. There was still another hindrance, which the sound sense
and foresight of Wellesley would not have permitted. Though the
British Government had forwarded to Spain two hundred thousand
muskets, with all requisite ammunition, and sixteen millions of hard
dollars, Sir John Moore was entrusted with only twenty-five thousand
pounds of it, and Sir David Baird with none at all. When, therefore,
permission was obtained, from Madrid, for the Allies, who were
bringing them all the arms and all the material of war, to land, Baird
had no money to pay his way on the march with ten thousand men,
and Sir John Moore had to remit him eight thousand pounds. This
was sufficiently bad management, but this was far from the worst.
Sir John Moore, in the most critical circumstances, was left without
the necessary information regarding the real strength of the enemy,
and without the influence which the British Ambassador should have
exerted to have the army supplied with the necessary means of
conveyance for its baggage, ammunition, and artillery. The
Spaniards obstructed rather than helped the British army. They did
not know themselves that the French were pouring reinforcements
through the Pyrenees to the amount of seventy thousand men, soon
to be followed by Buonaparte himself. The British Ambassador, at
such a time, ought to have taken measures for knowing the truth;
but the Ambassador was, just at this moment, the most unfit person
that could possibly have been pitched upon. Sir Charles Stewart,
who had been for some time Ambassador at Madrid, was well
acquainted with the Spaniards, and had energy and intelligence
enough to have operated upon them. But as, with new changes of
Ministry, everything must be changed by the British Government,
even if it be for the worse, so here, not only had the generals been
changed three times in four-and-twenty hours, but the active and
well-informed Minister was withdrawn, and a most indolent and
useless man sent in his place. This was Mr. John Hookham Frere,
great in the Quarterly Review, and connected with Canning and his
party. He either sent Sir John no information as to the state and
position of the Spanish armies or of the advance and numbers of the
French, or he sent him erroneous intelligence. Lord William Bentinck,
who was in Spain, exerted himself to rouse the Spanish Junta to a
proper sense of their real position, and of the necessity for affording
the British army, which had come to assist them, all the information
and support that they could; and he himself sent word that the
French were crossing not merely the Pyrenees, but the Ebro. At
length, a dispatch to Marshal Jourdain, being accidentally
intercepted by a guerilla party on the frontiers, startled the Junta
with the news that immense bodies of French were advancing into
Spain; and they began to appreciate the value of their British allies,
but would do nothing to facilitate their march, or to direct them to
the quarter where they would be most useful; and Frere, who should
have stimulated them to a sense of their duty, did just nothing at all.

THE ROYAL PALACE, MADRID. (From a Photograph by Frith & Co.)

[See larger version]
Sir John Moore entered Spain under the impression that several
brave and victorious Spanish armies were to co-operate with him;
but he looked in vain for any such armies. Nay, on the very day of
his arrival at Salamanca he heard of the defeat of the Count de
Belvedere, near Burgos; and only two days afterwards that general
had also been defeated at Espinosa, on the frontiers of the province
of Biscay. He demanded from the Junta to know with whom he was
to co-operate for the conduct of the campaign, and he was referred
to Castaños. But Castaños had already lost the confidence of the
proud and ignorant Junta, and had little information to give. On the
15th of November the governor of the province announced to him
that the French had taken possession of Valladolid, only twenty
leagues from Salamanca; from the dormant Mr. Frere he heard
nothing. This was startling intelligence; for he had only a small
portion of his army yet with him. Sir David Baird was still struggling
with the obstructive junta at Corunna, and Sir John Hope was
wandering near Madrid with the artillery. Moore began to have a
very gloomy idea of the situation, not only of Spain, but of his
situation in it. He wrote that there was no unity of action; no care of
the juntas to promote it, or to furnish arms and clothing to the
soldiers; that he was in no correspondence with the generals of the
other armies, and knew neither their plans nor those of the
Government. He declared that the provinces around him were not
armed; and as for the national enthusiasm of which so much had
been said, that he saw not a trace of it; that, in short, the British
had no business there; but he would still try to do something, if
possible, for the country, since he was there.
Meanwhile, Buonaparte was preparing to descend like an avalanche
on this absurdly inflated nation. To set himself at ease with the
North, whilst thus engaged in the Peninsula, he deemed it first
necessary, however, to have an interview with the Emperor of Russia
in Germany. The spirit of the Germans was again rising; and
notwithstanding the spies and troops of Buonaparte, his paid literati
—like Johannes Müller,—and his paid princes—like those of the
Rhenish Confederation, Bavaria, Baden, and Würtemberg,—the
Germans were beginning to blush at their humiliation, and to lament
the causes of it, their effeminacy, and their division into so many
States, with all the consequent prejudices and intestine feuds.
Prussia, which had suffered so severely for its selfish policy, and had
been so cut down in territory and insulted in its honour by Napoleon,
began to cherish the hope of yet redeeming itself, by a more manly
spirit and a more cordial co-operation with the rest of Germany. In
this work of regeneration—which is sure to take place sooner or
later, when nations have been well beaten and humiliated, and
which then, in their renewed manhood, require no foreign aid for the
accomplishment of their freedom—all classes laboured. The king,
under the inspiration of his patriotic Minister, Von Stein, began most
essential reforms. He abolished the feudal servitude and forced
labour under which the peasantry groaned; he made a thorough
moral re-organisation of the army, admitting of promotion from the
ranks; he allowed any man that had the money to purchase baronial
estates; and he deprived the higher nobility of the exclusive right of
possessing landed property, and of appointment to the higher civil
and military posts. Von Stein, too, commenced the work of inspiring
the mass of the people with a new soul of patriotism. He established
a secret society, called the Tugend Bund, or Union of Virtue, which
was to unite nobles, statesmen, officers, and literati in one common
confederation for the rescue of the country. Amongst those who
entered the most enthusiastically were Colonel Schill, who had
headed with great effect his troop of volunteer cavalry, Jahn, a
professor at Berlin, and Moritz Arndt, a professor of Bonn, the author
of the famous national song, "Was ist der Deutschen Vaterland?" in
which he maintained that it was not Prussia, nor Austria, nor any
other particular State, but all Germany, so far as the language
extended. Scharnhorst, the commander of the Prussian army,
though restricted to the prescribed number of troops, created a new
army by continually exchanging trained soldiers for raw recruits, and
secretly purchased an immense quantity of arms, so that, on
emergency, a large body of men could be speedily assembled. He
had also all the brass battery guns converted into field-pieces, and
replaced by iron guns. But Napoleon's spies were everywhere. They
discovered the existence of the Tugend Bund, and of the secret
societies of the students, which they carried on under the old name
of the Burschenschaft, or association of the students. Though
Napoleon pretended to ridicule these movements, calling it mere
ideology, he took every means to suppress them. The Minister, Von
Stein, in consequence of the contents of an intercepted letter, was
outlawed; Scharnhorst, and Grüner, the head of the police, were
dismissed from their offices; but it was all in vain—the tide of public
feeling had now set in the right way. The same spirit was alive in
Austria. Abuses were reformed; a more perfect discipline was
introduced. John Philip von Stadion, the head of the Ministry,
encouraged these measures; the views of the Archduke Charles
were carried out on a far wider basis. A completely new institution,
that of the Landwehr, or armed citizens, was set on foot. The
Austrian armies were increased greatly. In 1807 the Hungarian Diet
voted twelve thousand recruits; in 1808, eighty thousand; while
eighty thousand organised soldiers, of whom thirty thousand were
cavalry, constituted the armed reserve of this warlike nation.
Napoleon remonstrated, and received very pacific answers, but the
movement went on. Von Stein, now a refugee in Austria, fanned the
flame there, and he and Count Münster, first Hanoverian
Ambassador, and afterwards British Ambassador at St. Petersburg,
were in constant correspondence with each other and with the
Government of Great Britain.
Before Buonaparte, therefore, could proceed to Spain, he
determined to meet the Czar at Erfurth, in Germany, by their open
union to overawe that country, and to bind Alexander more firmly to
his interest by granting him ampler consent to his designs on Turkey
and on Finland. The meeting took place on the 27th of September,
and terminated on the 17th of October. Both Emperors returned in
appearance more friendly and united than ever, but each in secret
distrusting his ally. Buonaparte, who was now intending in earnest to
divorce Josephine, and marry a daughter of a royal house, by whom
he might have issue, and thus league himself with the old dynasties,
made a proposal for one of the Russian archduchesses, which was
evaded by Alexander, on the plea of the difference of religion. Such a
plea did not deceive the keen sagacity of Buonaparte; he felt it to
result from a contempt of his plebeian origin, and a belief in the
instability of his giddy elevation; and he did not forget it. To impress
on Europe, however, the idea of the intimate union of the Czar and
Buonaparte, they addressed, before leaving Erfurth, a joint letter to
the King of Great Britain, proposing a general peace. To this letter
Canning answered to the Ministers of Russia and France, that
Sweden—against whom the Czar had commenced his war of
usurpation—Spain, Portugal, and Sicily, must be included in any
negotiations. The French and Russian Ministers, on the contrary,
proposed a peace on the principle of every one retaining what they
had got. This, Canning replied, would never be consented to; and
the two emperors knew that very well, but the letter had served
Buonaparte's purpose. It enabled him to tell France and the world
how much he was disposed to peace, and how obstinate was Britain;
it served to make the world believe in the close intimacy of the Czar
and himself. He now hurried back to France, and, opening the
session of the Corps Législatif, on the 25th of October, he
announced that he was going to Spain to drive the "English
leopards"—for such he always absurdly persisted in calling the lions
in the royal arms of Great Britain—out of both Spain and Portugal.
On the 27th he set out.
Buonaparte determined to overwhelm both Spanish and British by
numbers. He had poured above a hundred thousand men across the
Pyrenees, and had supplied their places in France by two enormous
conscriptions of eighty thousand men each. He now followed them
with the rapidity of lightning. From Bayonne to Vittoria he made the
journey on horseback in two days. He was already at Vittoria a week
before the British army, under Sir John Moore, had commenced its
march from Lisbon. It was his aim to destroy the Spanish armies
before the British could come up—and he accomplished it. The
Spanish generals had no concert between themselves, yet they had
all been advancing northward to attack the French on different parts
of the Ebro, or in the country beyond it. It was the first object of
Napoleon to annihilate the army of Blake, which occupied the right
of the French army in the provinces of Biscay and Guipuzcoa. Blake
was attacked by General Lefebvre on the last of October, on ground
very favourable to the Spaniards, being mountainous, and thus not
allowing the French to use much artillery; but, after a short fight of
three hours, he was compelled to fall back, and for nine days he
continued his retreat through the rugged mountains of Biscay, with
his army suffering incredibly from cold, hunger, drenching rains, and
fatigue. There was said to be scarcely a shoe or a greatcoat in the
whole force. Having reached Espinosa de los Monteros, he hoped to
rest and recruit his troops, but Lefebvre was upon him, and he was
again defeated. He next made for Reynosa, a strong position, where
he hoped to recollect his scattered army; but there he received the
news of the defeat of Belvedere, from whom he hoped for support.
The French were again upon and surrounding him, and he was
compelled to order his army to save themselves by dispersing
amongst the mountains of Asturias, whilst himself and some of his
officers escaped, and got on board a British vessel.
Buonaparte had arrived at Vittoria on the 8th of November, between
the defeat of Blake at Espinosa and his dispersion at Reynosa, and
he immediately dispatched Soult to attack Belvedere. This self-
confident commander of two-and-twenty—surrounded by as self-
confident students from Salamanca and Leon—instead of falling
back, and forming a junction with Castaños, stood his ground in an
open plain in front of Burgos, and was scattered to the winds.
Between three and four thousand of his men were killed, wounded,
or taken prisoners, and all his cannon and baggage captured.
Buonaparte had now only to beat Castaños, and there was an end to
the whole Spanish force. That general was much more cautious and
prudent than the rest, and he fell back on the approach of Marshal
Lannes, at the head of thirty thousand men, to Tudela. But
Buonaparte had sent numerous bodies of troops to intercept his
course in the direction of Madrid, and, unfortunately for Castaños,
he was joined by Palafox, who had made so successful a stand
against the French at Saragossa. Castaños was for retreating still, to
avoid Lannes in front, and Ney and Victor, who were getting into his
rear; but Palafox, and others of his generals, strongly recommended
his fighting, and a commissioner sent from the Junta in Madrid, in
the French fashion, to see that he did his duty, joined in the
persuasion, by hinting that to retreat would give suspicion of
cowardice and treachery. Against his better judgment, Castaños,
therefore, gave battle on the 22nd of November, at Tudela, and was
completely routed. Palafox hastened back to Saragossa, which was
destined to surrender after another frightful siege. The road was
now left open to Madrid, and the French troops had orders to
advance and reduce it; and they did this with a fiendish ferocity,
burning the towns and villages as they proceeded, and shooting
every Spaniard that they found in arms.
As the French approached Madrid, whither Buonaparte was coming
in person, the Junta, which had taken no measures to render it
defensible while they had time, were now all hurry and confusion.
They began to collect provisions; the stones were torn up to form
barricades. A desperate resistance might have been made, as there
had been at Saragossa, but there was treachery in the city. The
wealthy inhabitants, merchants and shopkeepers, as well as the
aristocracy, were far more anxious to save their property than their
country; the cowardly Junta having issued orders, lost heart, and
fled for Badajos. On the 2nd of December, the anniversary of his
coronation, Buonaparte arrived before Madrid, and summoned it to
surrender; and this being unheeded, he prepared to storm it the
next morning. Had Palafox been there, there would have been,
probably, a brave defence. The next morning the storming
commenced, and the French forced their way as far as the palace of
the Duke de Medina Celi, the key of the whole city. The place was
then summoned afresh, and the governor now proposed a surrender.
The fact was, that he had already settled in his mind to go over to
the French, as the strongest party, and he gave no encouragement
or assistance to the citizens, who still continued from behind their
walls and barricades to fire on the French. On the 4th he declared
that the city must surrender; and the French marched in. Many of
the people fled and the rest were disarmed; but Buonaparte, who
wanted to keep Madrid uninjured and in good temper for King
Joseph, gave strict orders that the city should not be plundered, nor
the people treated with rudeness. He fixed his residence about four
miles from Madrid, and issued thence imperial decrees and a
proclamation, informing the Spaniards that all further resistance was
useless; that he wanted his brother to reign in quiet, but that if this
were not permitted, he would come and reign there himself, and
compel submission; for God had given him the power and inclination
to surmount all obstacles. He then set out to drive the "English
leopards" from the Peninsula—a task that was to try him to the
uttermost.
Sir John Moore was left in a most critical situation. All those fine
armies, which were to have enfranchised Spain without his
assistance, were scattered as so much mist; but this he only knew
partly. He knew enough, however, to induce him to determine on a
retreat into Portugal, and there to endeavour to make a stand
against the French. He wrote to Sir David Baird and Sir John Hope—
both of them still at a great distance—to retreat too: Sir David, with
his division, to fall back on Corunna, and then sail to Lisbon to meet
him; Sir John to await him at Ciudad Rodrigo. Had Moore carried out
this plan whilst Buonaparte and his troops were engaged with the
army of Castaños, and with Madrid, his fate might have been very
different. But here again he was the victim of false information. Mr.
Frere, who seems to have really known nothing of what was going
on, and to have believed anything, wrote to him from Aranjuez, on
the 30th of November, protesting against his retreat, and assuring
him that he had nothing to do but to advance to Madrid, and save
Spain. He expressed his most unbounded faith in the valour and
success of the Spaniards. He talked to Moore of repulsing the French
before they collected their reinforcements. On reflecting on the
statements of Mr. Frere, Sir John concluded that Madrid was still
holding out, and thought it his duty to proceed to its rescue. He was
joined, on the 6th of December, by Hope and the artillery, and he
wrote again to Sir David Baird to countermand his retreat, and order
him to come up with dispatch. Thus precious time was lost, and it
was not till the 9th that he was undeceived. He had sent Colonel
Graham to Madrid with a reply to Morla, and to procure intelligence
of the real state of affairs. Graham now came back with the alarming
and astonishing truth that the French were in Madrid; that it had
held out only one day. It is strange that Sir John did not instantly
commence his retreat; but he was still misled by false accounts of
the strength of the French, and actually resolved to proceed to
Madrid. On the 11th he sent forward his cavalry, under General
Stewart, when they came upon the advanced post of the enemy
occupying the village of Rueda. It was but about eighty men,
infantry and cavalry. They were quickly surrounded by the British
dragoons, and the whole killed or taken prisoners. On the 14th, an
intercepted letter of Berthier to Soult fell into Moore's hands, by
which he learned that various French divisions were moving down
upon him, and that Soult was in advance. He thought that he might
meet and beat Soult before the other divisions arrived, and he
therefore, after sending a dispatch to General Baird to warn him of
Soult's approach, crossed the Tordesillas, and continued his march
as far as Mayorga, where he was joined by Sir David Baird and Sir
John Hope, so that his army now amounted to twenty-three
thousand five hundred and eighty on the spot. He had other
regiments in Portugal and on the road, making up his total to thirty-
five thousand.
On the 23rd Moore was obliged to halt for the coming of his
supplies; and whilst doing so, he received the intelligence that no
fewer than seventy thousand men were in full march after him, or
taking a route so as to cut off his rear at Benevento, and that
Buonaparte himself headed this latter division. There was no further
thought of advancing, but of retreat, before the army was
completely surrounded. By the 26th the whole army was beyond
Astorga, but the French were now close behind them. Buonaparte,
indeed, hoped to have rushed on by the Guadarama, and to have
cut off his retreat at Tordesillas, but he was twelve hours too late.
On the last day of December, 1808, Buonaparte was pressing close
on the British rear in the vicinity of Astorga, and thus closed the year
on the fortunes of the Spaniards and their British Allies. The boastful
Spanish armies, too proud to think at first that they needed
assistance, too unskilful, when they did see the need of it, to co-
operate with it, and who had afforded nothing but indifference and
false intelligence to their benefactors, were dispersed like so many
clouds, and their Allies were flying from an overwhelming foe.
But the year 1809 opened with one auspicious circumstance. There
was no relief from the necessity of continuing the flight; but the