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III.

1808.

BOOK mass, would cause the total destruction of the French army. The only fear entertained was, that a hasty flight into France would save it from Spanish vengeance! Thus captain Whittingham, echoing the sentiments of the Spanish generals with reference to this plan, writes, "As far as my poor judgment leads me, I am satisfied that if the French persist in maintaining their present position, we shall, in less than six weeks, have a second edition of the battle of Baylen!" But to enable La-Peña and Llamas to march, pecuniary aid was requisite. There was a difficulty in raising money at Madrid, and the maritime provinces interSir H. Dal- cepted all the English supplies. In this dilemma, Corresp. colonel Doyle drew bills upon the English treasury, Doyle's Letters. and upon the government at Seville, making the Cox's Do. latter payable out of two millions of dollars, just transmitted to the junta through Mr. Duff.

rymple's

It is probable that such an unprincipled body would not have hesitated to dishonour the bills, but major Coxe, before they were received, made energetic remonstrances upon the subject of the wants of the army; at first he received a haughty and evasive answer, but his representations were strongly seconded by a discovery made by the junta, that a plot against their lives, supposed to have been concocted at Madrid, was on the eve of execution. In fact, they had become hateful from their domineering insolence and selfishness, and the public feeling was strongly against them. Alarmed for the consequences, they sent off 200,000 dollars to Madrid, and published a manifesto, in which they inserted a letter, purporting to be from themselves to Castaños, dated on the 8th, and giving him full powers to act as he judged fitting for the public good. Their objects were to pacify the people, and to save their own dignity, by appearing to have acted voluntarily; but Castaños pub

I.

lished the letter in Madrid with its true date of the CHAP. 11th, and then it became manifest, that to major Coxe's remonstrance, and not to any sense of duty, this change of conduct was due.

1808.

Doyle's bills having been negotiated, the troops were put in motion, and 40,000 fresh levies were enrolled, but the foresight and activity of Napoleon in disarming the country had been so effectual, that only 3,200 firelocks could be procured. A curious expedient then presented itself to the imagination of the duke of Infantado, and other leading persons in Madrid: colonel Doyle, at their desire, wrote to sir Hew Dalrymple in the name of the supreme council, to request that the firelocks of Junot's army, and the arms of the Portuguese people, might be forwarded to the frontier, and from thence carried by post to Madrid; a novel proposition, and made at a time when England had already transmitted to Spain 160,000 muskets; a supply considerably exceeding the whole number of men organized throughout the country; 50,000 of these arms had been sent to Seville, but the junta shut them up in the arsenals, and left the armies Parliamentary Papers, defenceless; for to neglect or misuse real resources, 1810. and to fasten with avidity upon the most extravagant projects, is peculiarly Spanish. No other people could have thought of asking for a neighbouring nation's arms at such a conjuncture; no other than Spanish rulers could have imagined the absurdity of supplying their levies (momentarily required to fight upon the Ebro) with the arms of a French army still unconquered in Portugal. But this project was only one among many proofs afforded at the time, that Cervantes was as profound an observer as he was a witty reprover of the extravagance of his countrymen.

CHAPTER II.

INTERNAL POLITICAL TRANSACTIONS.

BOOK
III.

1808.

Letters.

mentary Papers.

WITH the military affairs thus mismanaged, the civil and political transactions proceeded step by step, and in the same crooked path. Short as the period was between the first breaking forth of the insurrection, and Mr.Stuart's the arrival of Mr. Stuart at Coruña, it was sufficient Parlia- to create disunion of the worst kind. The juntas of Leon, of the Asturias, and of Gallicia, were at open discord, and those provinces were again split into parties, hating each other with as much virulence as if they had been of a hundred years growth. The money and other supplies sent by the English ministers were considered, by the authorities into whose hands they fell, as a peculiar donation to themselves, and appropriated accordingly. The junta of one province would not assist another with arms when there was a surplus, nor permit their troops to march against the enemy beyond the precincts of the particular proIbid. vince in which they were first organized. The ruling power was in the hands of the provincial nobility and gentry, men of narrow contracted views, unused to business, proud, arrogant-as extreme ignorance suddenly clothed with authority will always be-and generally disposed to employ their newly-acquired power in providing for their relations and dependants at the expense of the common cause, which with them was quite subordinate to the local interests of their own particular province. Hence a jealousy of their neighbours regulated the proceedings of all the juntas,

II.

1808.

Letters,

and the means they resorted to for increasing their CHAP. own, or depressing a rival government's influence, were equally characterised by absurdity and want of principle. The junta of Gallicia did their utmost to isolate that province, as if with a view to a final separation from Spain and a connexion with Portugal. They complained, as of an injury, that the army of Estremadura Mr. Stuart's had obeyed the orders of the junta of Seville; they at MS. once struck up an independent alliance with the junta and bishop of Oporto, and sent troops, as we have seen, under Valladeras, to aid the war in Portugal, but, at the same time, refused to unite in any common measure of defence with the provinces of Castille, until a formal treaty of alliance between them was negotiated, signed, and ratified. In the mean time their selfishness and incapacity created so much disgust in their own district, that plots were formed to overthrow their authority. The bishops of Orense and St. Jago became their decided enemies; and the last named prelate, an intriguing man, secretly endeavoured to draw Blake, with the army, into his views, and even wrote to him, to desire that he would lead the forces against the government of Coruña; but the junta having in- Ibid. tercepted the letters, arrested the bishop. Their own stability and personal safety were however still so insecure, that many persons applied to Mr. Stuart to aid in changing the form of government by force. The Asturians were even worse, they refused to assist Blake when his army was suffering, although the stores required by him, and supplied by England, were rotting in the harbours where they were first landed. Money also that was sent out in the Pluto frigate for the use of Leon was detained at Gihon, and Leon itself never raised a single soldier for the cause: and thus, only two months after the first burst of the in

III.

BOOK surrection, corruption, intrigue, and faction even to the verge of civil war, were raging in the northern parts of Spain.

1808.

The same passions were at work in the south, and the same consequences followed. The junta of Seville, still less scrupulous than that of Gallicia, made no Appendix, secret of their ambitious views; they stifled all local section 5. publications, and even suppressed the public address

No. 13,

of Florida Blanca, who, as president of the Murcian junta, had recommended the formation of a supreme central government. They wasted their time in vain and frivolous disputes, and neglecting every concern of real importance, sacrificed the general welfare to views of private advantage and interest. They made promotions in the army without regard to public opinion or merit; they overlaid all real patriotism; bestowed on their own creatures places of emolument, to the patronage of which they had not a legal right; and even usurped the royal prerogative of appointing canons in the church, for their cupidity equalled their ple's Pap. ambition. They intercepted, as I have already related, responde. the pecuniary supplies necessary to enable the army

Ibid.

Sir Hew
Dalrym-

Coxe's Cor

to act; they complained that La Mancha and Madrid, in whose defence they said "their troops were sacrificing themselves," did not subsist and supply the force under Cataños; under the pretence of forming a nucleus for disciplining thirty thousand levies as a reserve, they retained five battalions at Seville, and, having by this draft weakened the army in the field, they neglected the rest, and never raised a man. The canonries filled up by them had been vacant for several years, and the salaries attached to those offices were appropriated to the public service. The junta now applied the money to their own and their creatures' emolument; and at one period they appear to

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