noble and sacred: a standing army
of 200,000 of the best troops in the world, an immense recruiting
establishment, and a system of militia which enabled her to swell her
muster to any limit. Her colonies occupied a large share of this army;
but there remained at her immediate command a force at least equal to
that with which Buonaparte had conquered Austria and Prussia. Her credit
was unbounded; and her commerce not only supplied means of information
altogether unrivalled, but secured for her the secret goodwill of whole
classes in every country. England possessed Generals worthy to cope with
the best of Buonaparte's Marshals, and in the hour of need discovered
that she possessed one capable of confronting, and of conquering, the
great Emperor himself. Finally, she possessed the incalculable
advantage of warring on the side of justice and freedom, against an
usurper, whose crimes were on the same gigantic scale with his genius.
The remembrance of their leader's perfidy weighed heavily on the moral
strength of the French army throughout the approaching contest; while a
proud conviction that their cause was the right sustained the hearts of
the English.

Upon them, ultimately, the chief burden and the chief glory of the war
devolved: yet justice will ever be done to the virtuous exertions of
their allies of the Peninsula. At the moment when the insurrection
occurred, 20,000 Spanish troops were in Portugal under the orders of
Junot; 15,000 more, under the Marquis de Romana, were serving Napoleon
in Holstein. There remained 40,000 Spanish regulars, 11,000 Swiss, and
30,000 militia; but of the best of these the discipline, when compared
with French or English armies, was contemptible. The nobility, to whose
order the chief officers belonged, were divided in their
sentiments--perhaps the greater number inclined to the interests of
Joseph. Above all, the troops were scattered, in small sections, over
the face of the whole country, and there was no probability that any one
regular army should be able to muster so strong as to withstand the
efforts of a mere fragment of the French force already established
within the kingdom. The fleets of Spain had been destroyed in the war
with England: her commerce and revenues had been mortally wounded by the
alliance with France and the maladministration of Godoy. Ferdinand was
detained a prisoner in France. There was no natural leader or chief,
around whom the whole energies of the nation