defeated them with considerable slaughter, and pillaged the place. He had eighty men killed or wounded, and General Thiebault writes, that an obstinate combat took place in the streets. But the Portuguese never made head for a moment against a strong body during the whole course of the insurrection; how, indeed, was it possible for a collection of miserable peasants, armed with scythes, pitchforks, a few old fowlingpieces, and a little bad powder, under the command of some ignorant countryman, or fanatic friar, to maintain a battle against an efficient and active corps of French soldiers? For there is this essential difference to be observed in judging between the Spanish and Portuguese insurrections; the Spaniards had many great and strong towns free from the presence of the French, and large provinces in which to collect and train forces at a distance from the invaders; while in Portugal, the naked peasants were forced to go to battle the instant even of assembling. The loss which Maransin sustained must have arisen from the stragglers, who in a consecutive march of forty miles would have been numerous, having been cut off and killed by the peasantry.

This blow quieted the Alemtejo for the moment, and Kellerman having cleared the neighbourhood of Elvas of all Spanish parties, placed a commandant in La Lippe, concentrated the detachments under Maransin and Avril, and proceeded himself towards Lisbon, where the Duke of Abrantes was in great perplexity. The intercepting of his couriers and isolated officers being followed by the detection of all his spies, had exposed him, without remedy, to every report which the fears of his army, or the ingenuity of the people could give birth to; and there are few nations that can pretend to vie with the Portuguese and Spaniards in the fabrication of plausible reports. Among those current, the captivity of Loison was one; but as nothing was certainly known, except that the insurgents from the valley of the Mondego were marching towards Lisbon, General Margaron was ordered to disperse them, and, if possible, to open a communication with General Loison. He advanced, with three thousand men and six pieces of artillery, to Leiria, whither the patriots had retired, in disorder, when they heard of his approach; the greater part dispersed at once, but those who remained were attacked on the 5th of July, and a scene similar to that of Beja ensued; the French boasted of victory, the insurgents called it massacre and pillage." In a combat with armed peasantry, it is difficult to know where the fighting ceases and the massacre begins; men dressed in peasant's clothes are observed firing and moving about without order from place to place,-when do they cease to be enemies? They are more dangerous when single than together; they can hide their muskets in an instant and appear peaceable; the soldier passes, and is immediately shot from behind.

*

The example at Leiria did not however deter the people of Thomar from declaring against the French, and the neighbourhood of Alcobaça rose at the same time. Margaron was thus placed between two new insurrections at the moment he had quelled one; English fleets, with troops on board, were said to be hovering off the coast, and as the most alarming reports relative to Loison were corroborated, his safety was despaired of, when, suddenly, authentic intelligence of his arrival at Abrantes revived the spirits of the general-in-chief and the army.

After arranging all things necessary for the security of Almeida, he

*Thiebault-Accursio de Neves.

had quitted that town the 2d of July, at the head of three thousand four hundred and fifty men, and arrived at Abrantes upon the 8th; having in seven days passed through Guarda, Attalaya, Sarsedas, Corteja, and Sardoval. During this rapid march he dispersed several bodies of insurgents that were assembled on the line of his route, especially at Guarda and Attalaya, and it has been said that twelve hundred bodies were stretched upon the field of battle near the first town; but twelve hundred slain would give five thousand wounded, that is to say, six thousand two hundred killed and wounded by a corps of three thousand four hundred and fifty men in half an hour! and this without cavalry or artillery, and among fastnesses that vie in ruggedness with any in the world! The truth is, that the peasants, terrified by the reports that Loison himself spread to favour his march, fled on all sides, and if two hundred and fifty Portuguese were killed and wounded during the whole passage, it was the utmost. The distance from Almeida to Abrantes is more than a hundred and eighty miles, the greater part is a mountain pathway rather than a road, and the French were obliged to gather their provisions from the country as they passed; to forage, to fight several actions, to pursue active peasants well acquainted with the country so closely as to destroy them by thousands, and to march a hundred and eighty miles over bad roads, and all in seven days, is impossible.

The whole French army was now concentrated. But though Kellerman had quelled the insurrection at Alcobaço, and that of Thomar was quieted, the insurgents from Oporto were gathering strength at Coimbra, and the last of the native soldiers deserted the French colours; the Spanish troops at Badajoz, strengthened by a body of Portuguese fugitives, and commanded by one Moretti, were also preparing to enter the Alemtejo, and that province was again in commotion; for the English admiral had opened a communication with the insurgents on the side of Setuval, and the patriots were assembled in considerable numbers at Alcacer do Sal.*

In this dilemma Junot resolved to leave the northern people quiet for a while, and attack the Alemtejo, because that was his line of retreat upon Spain, from thence only he could provision the capital, and there also his cavalry could act with the most effect. Accordingly, Loison, with seven thousand infantry, twelve hundred cavalry, and eight pieces of artillery, crossed the Tagus the 25th of July, and marched by Os Pegoens, Vendanovas, and Montemor. At the latter place he defeated an advanced guard, which fled to Evora, where the Portuguese General Leite had assembled the mass of the insurgents, and assisted by three or four thousand Spanish troops under Moretti, had taken a position to cover the town. When Loison discovered them, he directed Margaron and Solignac to turn their flanks, and fell upon their centre himself; the battle was short, for the Spanish auxiliaries performed no service, and the Portuguese soon took to flight; but there was a great and confused concourse, a strong cavalry was let loose upon the fugitives, and many being cut off from the main body, were driven into the town, which had been deserted by the principal inhabitants; there, urged by despair, they endeavoured to defend the wall and the streets for a few moments, but were soon overpowered, the greater part slain, and the houses pillaged. The French lost two or three hundred men, and the number of the Portuguese and Spaniards that fell was very considerable ;† disputes also

* Thiebault-Parliamentary Papers, 1809.

+ Thiebault.

arose between them, and the latter ravaged the country in their retreat with more violence than the French.*

accu

Loison, after resting two days at Evora, proceeded to Elvas, and drove away the numerous Spanish parties which had again infested the neighbourhood of that fortress, and were become obnoxious alike to Portuguese and French. He then scoured the country round, and was mulating provisions to form magazines at Elvas, when he was suddenly interrupted by a despatch from the Duke of Abrantes, recalling him to the right bank of the Tagus, for the British army, so long expected, had, at last, descended upon the coast, and manly warfare reared its honest front amidst the desolating scenes of insurrection.

OBSERVATIONS.

1o. Loison's expedition to the Alemtejo was an operation of military police, rather than a campaign. Junot wished to repress the spirit of insurrection by sudden and severe examples, and hence the actions of his lieutenant were of necessity harsh; but they have been represented as a series of massacres and cruelties of the most revolting nature, and Loison disseminated such stories to increase the terror which it was the object of his expedition to create. The credulity of the nation that produced the Sebastianists was not easily shocked, the Portuguese eagerly listened to tales so derogatory to their enemies, and so congenial to their own revengeful dispositions; but the anecdotes of French barbarity current for two years after the convention of Cintra were notoriously false, and the same stories being related by persons remote from each other is no argument of their truth. The report that Loison was captured, on his march from Almeida, reached Junot through fifty different channels; there were men to declare that they had beheld him bound with cords; others to tell how he had been entrapped; some named the places he had been carried through in triumph, and his habitual and characteristic expressions were quoted; the story was complete, and the parts were consistent, yet the whole was not only false, but the rumour had not even the slightest foundation in truth.†

2o. The Portuguese accounts of the events of this period are angry amplifications of every real or pretended act of French barbarity and injustice; the crimes of individuals are made matter of accusation against the whole army. The French accounts are more plausible, yet scarcely more safe as authorities, seeing that they are written by men who, being for the most part actors in the scenes they describe, are naturally concerned to defend their own characters; their military vanity also has had its share in disguising the simple facts of the insurrection; for willing to enhance the merit of the troops, they have exaggerated the numbers of the insurgents, the obstinacy of the combats, and the loss of the patriots. English party writers, greedily fixing upon such relations, have changed the name of battle into massacre; and thus prejudice, conceit, and clamour, have combined to violate the decorum of history, and to perpetuate error.

3°. It would, however, be an egregious mistake to suppose, that because the French were not monsters, there existed no cause for the acrimony with which their conduct has been assailed. The Duke of Abrantes, although not cruel, nor personally obnoxious to the Portuguese,

* Appendix, No. XII.

+ Thiebault.

was a sensual and violent person, and his habits were expensive:* such a man is always rapacious, and as the character of the chief influences the manners of those under his command, it may be safely assumed that his vices were aped by many of his followers. Now the virtuous General Travot was esteemed, and his person respected, even in the midst of tumult, by the Portuguese, while Loison was scarcely safe from their vengeance when surrounded by his troops; the execrations poured forth at the mere mention of "the bloody Maneta," as, from the loss of his hand, he was called, proves that he must have committed many heinous acts; and Kellerman appears to have been as justly stigmatized for rapacity, as Loison was for violence.

4°. It has been made a charge against the French generals, that they repressed the hostility of the Portuguese and Spanish peasants by military executions; but in doing so, they only followed the custom of war, and they are not justly liable to reproof, save where they may have carried their punishments to excess, and displayed a wanton spirit of cruelty. All armies have an undoubted right to protect themselves when engaged in hostilities. An insurrection of armed peasants is a military anarchy, and men in such circumstances cannot be restrained within the bounds of civilized warfare. They will murder stragglers, torture prisoners, destroy hospitals, poison wells, and break down all the usages that soften the enmities of modern nations; they wear no badge of an enemy, and their devices cannot, therefore, be guarded against in the ordinary mode; their war is one of extermination, and it must be repressed by terrible examples, or the civilized customs of modern warfare, must be discarded, and the devastating system of the ancients revived. The usage of refusing quarter to an armed peasantry, and burning their villages, however unjust and barbarous it may appear at first view, is founded upon a principle of necessity, and is in reality a vigorous infliction of a partial evil, to prevent universal calamity: but however justifiable it may be in theory, no wise man will hastily resort to it, and no good man will carry it to any extent.

CHAPTER III.

Political and military retrospect-Mr. Fox's conduct contrasted with that of his successors -General Spencer sent to the Mediterranean-Sir John Moore withdrawn from thence; arrives in England; sent to Sweden-Spencer arrives at Gibraltar-Ceuta, the object of his expedition-Spanish insurrection diverts his attention to Cadiz; wishes to occupy that city-Spaniards averse to it-Prudent conduct of Sir Hew Dalrymple and Lord Collingwood-Spencer sails to Ayamonte; returns to Cadiz; sails to the mouth of the Tagus; returns to Cadiz-Prince Leopold of Sicily and the Duke of Orleans arrive at GibraltarCurious intrigue-Army assembled at Cork by the whig administration, with a view to permanent conquest in South America, the only disposable British force-Sir A. Wellesley takes the command-Contradictory instructions of the ministers-Sir John Moore returns from Sweden; ordered to Portugal-Sir Hew Dalrymple appointed commander of the forces-Confused arrangements made by the ministers.

THE subjugation of Portugal was neither a recent nor a secret project of Napoleon's. In 1806, Mr. Fox, penetrating this design, had sent Lord Rosslyn, Lord St. Vincent, and General Simcoe, on a politico-military

mission to Lisbon, instructing them, to warn the court that a French army destined to invade Portugal was assembling at Bayonne, and to offer the assistance of a British force to meet the attack. The cabinet of Lisbon affected to disbelieve the information. Mr. Fox died during the negotiation, and as the war with Prussia diverted Napoleon's attention to more important objects, he withdrew his troops from Bayonne. The tory administration, which soon after overturned the Granville party, thought no further of this affair, or at least did not evince as much foresight and ready zeal as its predecessors. They, indeed, sent Sir Sydney Smith with a squadron to Lisbon, but their views seem to have been confined to the emigration of the royal family, and they intrusted/ the conduct of the negotiation to Lord Strangford, a young man of no solid influence or experience.

But the Russian squadron, under Admiral Siniavin, suddenly entered the Tagus, and this unexpected event produced, in the British cabinet, an activity which the danger of Portugal had not been able to excite. It was supposed, that as Russia and England were in a state of hostility, the presence of the Russian ships would intimidate the prince regent, and prevent him from passing to the Brazils, wherefore Sir Charles Cotton, an admiral of higher rank than Sir Sydney Smith, was sent out with instructions to force the entrance of the Tagus, and attack Siniavin.† General Spencer, then upon the point of sailing with five thousand men upon a secret expedition, was ordered to touch at Lisbon, and ten thousand men, under Sir John Moore, were withdrawn from Sicily to aid this enterprise; but before the instructions for the commanders were even written, the prince regent was on his voyage to the Brazils, and Junot ruled in Lisbon. When Sir John Moore arrived at Gibraltar, he could hear nothing of Sir Sydney Smith, nor of General Spencer, and proceeded to England, which he reached the 31st of December, 1807. From thence, after a detention of four months on shipboard, he was despatched upon that well-known and eminently foolish expedition to Sweden, which ended in such an extraordinary manner; and which seems from the first to have had no other object, than the factious one of keeping an excellent general and a superb division of troops at a distance from the only country where their services were really required.

Meanwhile, General Spencer's armament, long baffled by contrary winds, and once forced back to port, was finally dispersed in a storm, and a part arrived at Gibraltar, by single ships, the latter end of January, 1808. Sir Hew Dalrymple, the governor of that fortress, hearing, on the 5th of February, that a French fleet had just passed the Strait, and run up the Mediterranean, became alarmed for Sicily, and caused the first comers to proceed to that island on the 11th; but Spencer himself, whose instructions included an attack on Ceuta, did not arrive at Gibraltar, until the 10th of March, when the deficiency in his armament was supplied by a draft from the garrison, and a council was held to arrange the plan of attack on Ceuta; the operation was however finally judged impracticable.

The objects of Spencer's expedition were manifold. He was to cooperate with Moore against the Russian fleet in the Tagus; he was to take the French fleet at Cadiz; he was to assault Ceuta; and he was to make an attempt on the Spanish fleet at Port Mahon ! But the wind

* Parliamentary Papers, 1809.

+ Ibid.

Sir John Moore's Journal, MS.