that
inefficiency on his part--which else the persons, to whom he was
writing, would understand as charged upon themselves. Writing with such
a purpose--and under a double fettering of his faculties; first from
anxious forebodings of calamity or dishonour; and secondly from the pain
he must have felt at not being free to censure those with whom he could
not but be aware that the embarrassments of his situation had, at least
in part, originated--we might expect that it would not be difficult for
him to find, in the early events of the campaign, all which he sought;
and to deceive himself into a belief, that, in stating these events
without any commentary or even hints as to the relative circumstances
under which they took place (which only could give to the naked facts
their value and due meaning), he was making no misrepresentations,--and
doing the Spaniards no injustice.

These suggestions are made with the greater earnestness, as it is
probable that the honourable death of Sir John Moore will have given so
much more weight to his opinion on any subject--as, if these suggestions
be warranted, it is entitled on this subject to less weight--than the
opinion of any other individual equally intelligent, and not liable
(from high office and perplexity of situation) to the same influences of
disgust or prejudice.

That these letters _were_ written under some such influences, is plain
throughout: we find, in them, reports of the four first events in the
campaign; and, in justice to the Spaniards, it must be said that all are
virtually mis-statements. Take two instances:

1. The main strength and efforts of the French were, at the opening of
the campaign, directed against the army of Gen. Blake. The issue is thus
given by Sir J.M.:--'Gen. Blake's army in Biscay has been
defeated--dispersed; and its officers and men are flying in every
direction.' Could it be supposed that the army, whose matchless
exertions and endurances are all merged in this over-charged (and almost
insulting) statement of their result, was, 'mere peasantry' (Sir J.M.'s
own words) and opposed to greatly superior numbers of veteran troops?
Confront with this account the description given by an eye-witness
(Major-Gen. Leith) of their constancy and the trials of their constancy;
remembering that, for ten successive days, they were engaged (under the
pressure of similar hardships, with the addition of one not mentioned
here, viz.--a want of clothing) in cont