LIV. 1808. charge of Barcelona, was in no condition to oppose their CHAP. passage almost within range of the guns of the fortress; for the troops he commanded, hardly four thousand strong, were barely adequate to guard its extensive works, and the Miquelets, stationed on the heights which overhang the city, had carried their audacity to such a pitch, as not only to keep up a constant fire on the French sentinels, but even to make signals to the multitude in the streets to revolt. When this force approached Gerona, the besieged made a general sally on the French lines, and with such vigour, that they penetrated into the batteries through the embrasures, spiked the guns, and set fire to the works; while Duhesme, with the great body of the besiegers' force, was sufficiently engaged in observing the enemy which threatened them from the outside. Finding it totally impossible to continue the siege, Duhesme broke up in the night, and, dividing his force into two columns, sent Reille back to Figueras, while he himself took the road for Barcelona. But here fresh difficulties awaited him two English frigates, under the able direction of Lord Cochrane, cannonaded and raked the road by the sea-coast; overhanging cliffs prevented them from getting out of the destructive range; while the route by the mountains in the interior, besides being closed by the cannon of Hostalrich, was in many places steep and intersected by ravines, and beset by armed peasants, who, from the rocks and woods above, kept up a destructive fire upon the troops beneath. In these circumstances the French general did not hesitate to sacrifice his artillery and stores; and thus lightened, he succeeded in fighting his way back, by mountain-paths on the summit 1 Cabanes, of the cliffs which overhang the sea, amidst a constant Foy, iv. 172, ii. 62, 81. fire, to Barcelona. In this disastrous expedition above two thousand men and thirty pieces of artillery, besides extensive stores, were lost; and at its conclusion, the 40, 47. French possessed nothing in Catalonia but the town of 28, 39. Barcelona and the citadel of Figueras.1 193 Tor. i. 37, 40. Nap. i. 85, 86. St Cyr, Duhesme, CHAP. 1808. 50. transports in the Peninsula. Entry of troops into Unbounded was the joy which these extraordinary successes in every part of Spain excited among its inhabitants. The variety of quarters in which they had Universal arisen augmented their moral effect; it was supposed that popular energy was irresistible, when it had triumphed over its enemies at once in Andalusia and the Spanish Aragon, Valencia and Catalonia. Abandoning themthe capital. selves to a pleasing and allowable, though short-lived illusion, the Spaniards generally believed that the war was at an end; that the Castilian soil was finally delivered from its invaders; and that, relieved of all disquietude as to the defence of their own country, the only question was, when they should unite their victorious arms to those of the English, and carry the torrent of invasion across the Pyrenees into the French plains. These enthusiastic feelings rose to a perfect climax when the Spanish army from Andalusia entered the capital, in great pomp, with Castanos at their head, under a majestic triumphal arch, erected by the citizens to do honour to their arrival; and the whole of Spain, now delivered from the enemy, with the exception of the small portion 85. Nap. i. occupied by the French army in Navarre and on the ii. 287. Ebro, joined in one universal chorus of national exulta Aug. 25. 1 Tor. ii. 82, 287. South. 51. any efficient tion and hatred of the invaders.1 The press joined its influence to increase the exciteNeglect of ment. Newspapers, warmly advocating the patriotic measures in cause, were established at Madrid, Seville, Cadiz, and the general the other chief towns of Spain; and by their vehement exultation. Aug. 5. declamation added to the general enthusiasm, as much as, by their extravagant boasting, they weakened the sense of the necessity of present exertion, and thus diminished the chance of bringing the contest in the end to a successful issue. But in the midst of the universal exultation, it was observed with regret that few vigorous or efficient measures were adopted by the many separate and independent juntas to prosecute the war against the enemy; a feeling increased by the calamitous issue of the revolt LIV. 1808. of Bilbao, which had taken up arms upon receipt of the CHAP. glorious news from Andalusia. The inhabitants, in the first instance, had succeeded in expelling the French garrison; but being unsupported by any aid from Asturias or Galicia, the place was quickly recaptured, with Aug. 16. great slaughter, by the French division of Merle. This was done by the express commands of Joseph Buonaparte, to whom this dangerous movement, in a town of such importance, so near his line of communication with France, had been the subject of no small disquietude; 1 South. ii. and who boasted in his despatches, that "the fire of the Tor. ii. 82, 85. Nap. i. insurrection at Bilbao had been extinguished in the blood 287, 288. of twelve hundred men." 1 287, 288. 52. Portugal, Spanish that coun Plate 48. Meanwhile events of a still more glorious and decisive character had liberated the kingdom of Portugal from its Affairs of oppressors. In every phase of modern history it has been and disarmobserved that Portugal has, sooner or later, followed the ing of the course of changes which public feeling had established in troops in Spain; and it was hardly to be expected that so great try. and heart-stirring an event as the resurrection of Casti- Atlas, lian independence was not to find a responsive echo in a kingdom so closely neighbouring, and equally suffering under the evils of Gallic oppression. At a very early period, accordingly, symptoms of an alarming effervescence had manifested themselves in Portugal; and Napoleon, appreciating more justly than Junot the probable course of events in that kingdom, strongly enjoined him to abandon the pompous proclamations in which he was endeavouring to win the affections of the people, and in good earnest to prepare for military operations.* Not * "What is the use," said he, "of promising to the Portuguese what you will never have the means of fulfilling? Nothing is more praiseworthy, without doubt, than to gain the affections of the people; but it should never be forgotten, that the primary object of a general should be the safety of his soldiers. Instantly disarm the Portuguese; watch over the soldiers who have been sent to their homes, in order that their chiefs may not form so many centres of insurrection in the interior. Keep your eye on the Spanish troops; secure the important fortresses of Almeida and Elvas. Lisbon is too large and VOL. VIII. 2 K LIV. 1808. June 5. CHAP. anticipating, however, any immediate hostilities, he ordered him to detach four thousand men to support Bessières in Leon, and three thousand to co-operate with Dupont in Andalusia. But these detachments were rendered impossible by the pressure of events in Portugal itself. No sooner did the intelligence of the massacre at Madrid and the insurrection in Galicia reach Oporto, than the Spanish troops there, ten thousand strong, dispossessed the French authorities and marched off in a body towards Galicia, from whence, as already mentioned, they were forwarded to Leon in time to share in the disaster of RioSeco. The inhabitants, in the first moment of enthusiasm, installed insurrectionary authorities in room of the French ones who had been dispossessed. But after the departure of the Spanish troops, they became alarmed at their own boldness, and hastened to reinstate the tricolor flag, and to renew their protestations of fidelity to the French general at Lisbon. The moment, however, that he was apprised of the events at Oporto, Junot made preparations to effect the disarming of the Spanish troops in the capital; and with such secresy and decision were his measures taken, that before they were well aware of the danger impending over them, they were all surrounded 117, 119. by greatly superior masses of French troops, and com47. Nevis, pelled to surrender. By this able stroke nearly five thousand Spanish troops were made prisoners, who might have been highly prejudicial to the French cause, if they had succeeded in withdrawing and forming the nucleus of an insurrection in the interior of the country.1 June 9. 1 Lond. i. South. ii. 41, 99, 109. Foy, iv. 202, 210. Thiers, ix. 205, 207. 53. The flame, however, excited by the glorious intelligence Progress of of popular successes, which daily came pouring in from the insur rection. all parts of Spain, could not so easily be suppressed. The students at Coimbra were among the first to take up arms; populous a city; its population is necessarily hostile. Withdraw your troops from it; place them in barracks on the sea-coast. Keep them in breath-wel disciplined, massed, and instructed, in order to be in a condition to combat the English army, which sooner or later will disembark on the coasts of Portugal.” --NAPOLEON to JUNOT, May 24, 1808; Foy, iv. 198, 199. The LIV. the mountaineers of Tras-os-Montes speedily followed the CHAP." example; the tocsins were heard in their lovely hills, arms and torches gleamed in their vine-clad vales; Algarves 1808. was speedily in open revolt; the Alentejo was known to be ripe for insurrection, and, at the summons of Colonel June 11. Lopez de Souza, soon after took up arms. Encouraged by this revolt in the south, the inhabitants of Oporto a second time hoisted the standard of independence. A junta was June 9. speedily formed in that opulent city, which shared the supreme direction of affairs with the bishop, who early signalised himself by his zeal in the patriot cause. insurrection in the province of Entre-Douro-e-Minho appeared so formidable, that Junot directed General Loison with a strong division to proceed against it from Almeida. But though he at first obtained some success, yet, as he advanced into the mountains, his communications were so completely cut off, and the insurrection appeared so formidable on all sides, that he was obliged to fall back towards Almeida by Celorico and Guarda, at which places he routed the peasantry with great slaughter. Being now recalled by Junot to Lisbon, he left his sick, wounded, and weak men to garrison Almeida, and set out by Guarda and Abrantes for the capital. In the south, the patriots gained considerable successes against the French detachments which endeavoured to penetrate into the Alentejo; Abrantes was threatened by the insurgents of the valley of the Tezers; the revolt at Bija was only extinguished by a bloody nocturnal assault of the town,+ after a rapid "In this expedition," says Thiébault, we lost sixty men killed and one hundred and forty wounded: of the insurgents at least four thousand were killed or wounded on the different fields of battle."-THIÉbault, 155. The French general, Thiébault, boasts of this as a great exploit. "Twelve hundred Portuguese were put to death in the conflict: no quarter was shown to any one with arms in his hands." The town was afterwards set on fire and plundered; and the worst military excesses were perpetrated against the wretched inhabitants. Kellermann shortly afterwards said, in a proclamation to the people of Alentejo-" Bija had revolted; Bija is no more. Its guilty inhabitants have been put to the sword; its houses delivered up to pillage and the flames. Thus shall all those be treated who listen to the counsels of a perfidious rebellion, and with a senseless hatred take up arms against us."Thiébault, 135, 136; SOUTHEY, i. 105. |