hoped to take the island before they should return to that sea. On the 26th of March, twelve gun-boats and twelve transports sailed from Gierrilo Bay. Captain Maurice, who commanded at Anholt, had received information of the intended attack, and prepared for it as well as he could with a garrison consisting only of 350 men. The Tartar frigate, and Sheldrake brig, arrived from Yarmouth on the very day that the Danish expedition left their own shores. Just before daybreak, the out-piquets on the south side of the island made signal that the enemy were in sight. CapMarch 27. tain Maurice hastened to oppose their landing; but he perceived that this had been effected in the darkness; that they were advancing rapidly and in great num. bers; that they out flanked him on both wings; and that if he did not retreat they would get between him and the works. He fell back therefore in good order, and when they attempted to storm the batteries, they were beaten off, and compelled to shelter themselves under the sand-hills, which on that island are thrown up by every gale. As the morning opened it was seen that their flotilla had taken up a position within point-blank shot on the south side of the island: they opened a heavy fire, while a column of about six hundred men crossed the island to the westward and took post on the northern shore, where sand-hills and the inequality of the ground covered them. Another column made many attempts to carry the Massareene battery by storm, but they were as often repulsed. It was feared that the advanced post had been cut off; but the officer who commanded there, finding that his retreat was intercepted by land, launched a boat, brought off his party in safety, and landed them under Fort Yorke, amid the acclamations of the garrison. The Tartar and Shel

drake had weighed at daybreak, as soon as they heard the first firing. As soon as it was light enough signal was made to them; but their anchorage was on the north side of the island, the wind was westward, and they had either to run ten or eleven miles to leeward, to get round the reef which extends from the east end of the island, or beat up a still greater distance, to weather that which branches out from its north-west point. Captain Baker resolved to go with the Tartar to leeward, that he might the sooner come in sight of the enemy; for as they were ignorant of the frigate's arrival, the sight of her might well be expected to make a considerable impression upon them; and he directed the Sheldrake to keep on the north side, where the telegraph had signified that she might be useful.

Meantime the Danish column on the south brought up a field-piece; that on the north made another desperate effort to storm the Massareene battery, and the reserve appeared upon the hills to support them. Their commander, Major Von Melsted, fell at the head of his troops; Captain Von Reydz succeeded to the command, a ball carried away both his legs; and Lieutenant Holsten, who commanded the seamen, fell also. These losses confused the enemy; they again retired to the shelter of the sand-hills, but these no longer availed them; for the Anholt schooner, which had gone in search of the flotilla to their own ports, arrived at this critical point of time, anchored on their flank, and open ed her fire. At the same time the Sheldrake appeared, and to their utter dismay the frigate hove in sight. This column now surrendered; that on the south side followed its example. Maurice then marched against the reserve; but this body had formed on the beach under protection of fourteen gun-boats, and it would have been an unjustifiable

sacrifice of brave men's lives to have attacked them with the handful of troops who could be spared from the charge of guarding prisoners, far more numerous than the whole garrison. The reserve therefore re-embarked, and their flotilla immediately dispersed. Two of them were captured by the Sheldrake, and a third received such damage that she never reached the shore. The defeat of so brave an enemy, and so superior in numbers, was singularly honourable to the British name. It was achieved with the loss of 30 wounded, and only two killed. The Danes left behind them about 40 dead, and 23 desperately wounded: a great number of their wounded they

carried off. The prisoners were be tween 4 and 500 taken in the island, and 125 in the two vessels.

A mournful catastrophe awaited our naval operations in the Baltic. The admiral had given orders that the last homeward convoy should not be delayed later than the 1st of November. It was, however, driven back and detained by heavy gales, so that it could not finally leave its anchorage before the middle of the month. On their passage they encountered the most tempestuous weather: the St George and the Defence were wrecked on the coast of Jutland, and of 1400 men, only 18 were saved. The Hero was lost on the Dutch coast.

Ar the beginning of the year Mas sena was at Santarem, in a position strong by nature, and strongly forti fied. Drouet had established his head quarters at Leyria, and communicated with him by a chain of posts. Another division, under Claparede, had entered Portugal. This general made it his first and especial business to destroy the force under Silveira, from whose activity and enterprize the French were suffering so severely. Silveira, little disposed to shrink from danger, thought himself strong enough to become the assailant, and attacked the enemy at Ponte de Almargem, unaware perhaps of their force his militia were thrown into confusion, and he was repulsed with some loss. For nineteen days Claparede pursued him, without being able to gain any decisive advantage over troops, who were, both in number and discipline, far inferior to his own. The Portugueze retreated to Lamego, evacuated that city at the time when the French were entering it; and effected this with so much coolness and resolution, that, having no other means of transport, they carried off 140 soldiers, whom they found in the hospital there, on their backs, removed thirty-five cart loads of ammunition in the same man. ner, and brought away four Jan. 13. pieces of artillery. They then crossed the Douro, to cover the province between the rivers;

here they were enabled to make a stand, owing to the movements of General Bacellar on the enemy's left, and those of Colonel Wilson upon his rear, at Castro Diaro Claparede would willingly have pursued Silveira beyond the river, that he might obtain the resources of a province which had not been exhausted; but these active offi. cers harassed him too much on his flanks and rear: he therefore retired, and took up a position at Guarda, with his advanced guard at Belmonte, to keep open the communication with the main army.

The British head-quarters were at Cartaxo; Sir W. Beresford, General Hill, and General Fane's division of cavalry were on the left bank of the Tagus, from whence the preparations of the enemy for crossing the river could distinctly be seen. Massena had undertaken the conquest of Portugal, in full expectation of out-numbering any force which could be opposed to him, and still more certainly of outmanoeuvring them; for the French government well knew with what a misplaced and ruinous parsimony the military plans of Great Britain are usually carried on, and they neither calculated upon the skill of the British general, nor the resolution of the British government, nor the spirit and exertions of the Portugueze people. The cautious system which Lord Wellington had been compelled to observe, un

der circumstances so painful to his feel ings as those of the siege of Ciudad Rodrigo, confirmed Massena in this ex pectance; and though it was by an accident of war that Almeida had fallen into his hands, the speedy reduction of that important place had naturally increased the presumption of one who was accustomed to hear himself called the Child of Victory. That presumption had received a lesson at Busaco; and when he saw the lines of Torres Vedras, he was too well versed in the science of war not to know that such works, with such men and such a general to defend them, were impreg nable. Could Lord Wellington have spared a sufficient force to have occu pied Santarem as well as Abrantes, or had the orders of the Portugueze government for removing all provisions been properly carried into effect in this part of the country, Massena must soon have been compelled to retreat. But being enabled to take a position which was not to be forced without a great er expence of life than his antagonist could afford, and finding resources on which an army capable of living upon little, and bearing great privations, might subsist for some months, he waited for assistance from the side of Andalusia. In no part of Spain had the Spaniards displayed so little energy as there. The people of Cadiz, contented with the security for which they were indebted to their situation, seemed not to be disposed to make any effort against their besiegers; Soult, therefore, might spare a sufficient force for besieging Badajoz the skill of the French engineers, and the means which they possessed, rendered the fall of that place certain, unless it were relieved by an army capable of meeting the besiegers in the field :but that force could only be drawn from the lines of Torres Vedras. If

the numbers of the allied army were thus materially diminished, their position might be attacked; or if this were still thought too hazardous, the pas sage of the Tagus might probably be effected; and this would put the invader in possession of great part of Alentejo, and open a communication with Seville and Madrid. If, on the other hand, Badajoz were suffered to fall without an effort for its relief, the same advantages would be obtained by the advance of the victorious army, which might leave Elvas behind; the possession of Badajoz and the other less important forts being sufficient. Being master of both banks of the Tagus, want of supplies would be no longer to be apprehended; and if they could obtain possession of Almada, they might from thence bombard Lisbon.

Massena, however, looked to the result of these well-concerted operations with far less confidence than was expressed by the despondents in England. They gave him gratuitously an additional army of 23,000 men, which was to join him under Bessieres, and called Sebastiani also from Malaga to co-operate in the united attack. "The whole effort," said they," will be directed against Lord Wellington; the whole force is collecting and marching to the different points of attack with the knowledge of the allies, but without any means of attacking them separately, or of warding off the blow. The battle must be fought at the time and in the way we have always presumed to foretell," these happy prognosticators added, " and he must be a man of firm nerves who can contemplate the probable issue of the fight with composure." "The crisis in Portugal," said another of these sage politicians, 66 may now be expected daily; and then let the calumniators of

Sir John Moore do justice to the memo. ry of that injured officer, who was absolutely goaded to commit his errors, and then abused for being defeated: he had not interest enough to have his errors christened exploits, and his flight victory."* But the language of virulent and malicious misrepresentation was never carried farther than by another writer of the same faction. It had been advanced, he said, among other reasons for imposing restrictions upon the prince regent, that if left uncontrolled, he might totally change the system of warfare, abandon Portugal to its fate, and undo all that Lord Talavera had done. "Alas," continued this demagogue, "the prince can never undo what that famous oriental chief has done in Portugal. His royal highness, possess what powers and prerogatives he may, cannot put Massena where he was in July last; nor can he restore any thing that has been destroyed in Portugal, nor to us any portion of the many millions of pounds that have been expended in that war, and the raising of which in England must have so largely added to the distresses of the people and to the number of paupers. None of this can he do. We have it under their own hands; we have it in the official dispatches and proclamations, that some of the fairest parts of Portugal have been by our army (for what purpose no matter) laid waste. Reader, pray think a little of that sort of thing, called laying a country waste. Think a little of the necessary consequences of burning, cutting up fields of green corn for horses and mules; of killing flocks and herds; of slaughtering the young in the mother's belly; of thus cutting off the means of restoration. Think a little of the effect of burning corn-fields, mills, homesteads, and manufactories. Think a little of the ef.

* Examiner.

fect of first gutting and then burning work-shops, and warehouses, and cel lars, and dwellings. Think of the effects of these upon a people; pray think a little of these things; and, when you have so thought, tell me what we have done in Portugal to compensate the people for their suffer. ings. Tell me what the people of Portugal must think of Talavera's campaign."

Thus did this demagogue labour to persuade the people that it was England who caused the sufferings of Portugal; that it was the English whom the Portugueze were to hate and curse as the authors of their calamities. "Let us not," said he, "forget the situation of the people of Portugal; let us not forget the situation of those, whom to deliver was the professed ob ject of Talavera's wars. The end is not yet come, to be sure; but, whọ is there mad enough to expect that we shall be able to put the French out of the peninsula, either by arms or by negociation? Where is the man, in his senses, who believes, or will say that he believes, that we shall be able to accomplish this? Suppose peace were to become the subject of discussion. Does any one believe that Napoleon would enter into negociations about Spain and Portugal? Does any one believe that we must not leave them to their fate? This is bringing the matter to the test. And, if the reader is persuaded that we should not, in a negociation for peace, be able to stipulate for the independence of the peninsula, the question is settled, and the result of the war is, in reality, ascertained."

The result of the war was happily not to be determined by the reasonings of a party out of place, nor by the wishes of a wicked faction. Lord Wellington had laid his plans

+ Cobbett.