in London takes for granted an embarkation in September.
Wellington has not even taken his Government into his confidence. That
is the sort of man he is. Now these fortifications have been building
since last October. Best part of eight months have already gone in their
construction. It may be another two or three months before the French
army reaches them. I do not say that the French cannot pass them, given
time. But how long will it take the French to pull down what it will
have taken ten or eleven months to construct? And if they are unable
to draw sustenance from a desolate, wasted country, what time will they
have at their disposal? It will be with them a matter of life or
death. Having come so far they must reach Lisbon or perish; and if the
fortifications can delay them by a single month, then, granted that all
Lord Wellington's other dispositions have been duly carried out, perish
they must. It remains, Monsieur le Major, for you to determine whether,
with all their energy, with all their genius and all their valour, the
French can--in an ill-nourished condition--destroy in a few weeks the
considered labour of nearly a year."

The major was aghast. He had changed colour, and through his eyes, wide
and staring, his stupefaction glared forth at them.

Minas uttered a dry cough under cover of his hand, and screwed up his
eyeglass to regard the major more attentively. "You do not appear to
have considered all that," he said.

"But, my dear Marquis," was the half-indignant answer, "why was I
not told all this to begin with? You represented yourself as but
indifferently informed, Monsieur de Samoval. Whereas--"

"So I am, my dear Major, as far as information goes. If I did not use
these arguments before, it was because it seemed to me an impertinence
to offer what, after all, are no more than the conclusions of my own
constructive and deductive reasoning to one so well versed in strategy
as yourself."

The major was silenced for a moment. "I congratulate you, Count," he
said. "Monsieur le Marechal shall have your views without delay. Tell
me," he begged. "You say these fortifications lie in the region of
Torres Vedras. Can you be more precise?"

"I think so. But again I warn you that I can tell you only what I infer.
I judge they will run from the sea, somewhere near the mouth of the
Zizandre, in a semicircle to the Tagus, somewhere to the south of
Santarem. I know that they do not reach as far north as San, be