y kept secret from him, and assign the whole merit of its
completion to the army which his vacillation and incompetence were
holding in unwelcome inactivity.

Lord Cochrane was too much accustomed to personal injustice, however,
to be very greatly troubled by that fresh indignity. It was a far
heavier trouble to him that his first triumph was not allowed to be
supplemented by prompt completion of the work on which, and not on
any individual aggrandisement, his heart was set--the establishment of
Peruvian as well as Chilian freedom.

San Martin, having done nothing hitherto but allow his army to waste
its strength and squander its resources, first at Pisco and afterwards
at Ancon, now fixed upon Huacha as another loitering-place. Thither
Lord Cochrane had to convey it, before he was permitted to resume the
blockade of Callao. This blockade lasted, though not all the while
under his personal direction, for eight months.

"Several attempts were now made," said Lord Cochrane, with reference
to the first few weeks of the blockade, "to entice the remaining
Spanish naval force from their shelter under the batteries by placing
the _Esmeralda_ apparently within reach, and the flagship herself in
situations of some danger. One day I carried her through an intricate
strait called the Boqueron, in which nothing beyond a fifty-ton
schooner was ever seen. The Spaniards, expecting every moment to see
the ship strike, manned their gunboats, ready to attack as soon as she
was aground; of which there was little danger, for we had found, and
buoyed off with small bits of wood invisible to the enemy, a channel
through which a vessel could pass without much difficulty. At another
time, the Esmeralda being in a more than usually tempting position,
the Spanish gunboats ventured out in the hope of recapturing her, and
for an hour maintained a smart fire; but on seeing the _O'Higgins_
manoeuvring to cut them off, they precipitately retreated."

In ways like those the Spaniards were locked in, and harassed, in
Callao Bay. Good result came in the steady weakening of the Spanish
cause. On the 3rd of December, six hundred and fifty soldiers deserted
to the Chilian army. On the 8th they were followed by forty officers;
and after that hardly a day passed without some important defections
to the patriot force.'

Unfortunately, however, there was weakness also among the patriots.
San Martin, idle himself, determined to profit by the advantages,
d