sprang from all sources. Never was commander so entirely thrown upon his own resources, so entirely dependent upon the rectitude of his own purposes, and upon the wisdom of his own counsels.

The career of Napoleon exhibits no war in all respects resembling that of the Peninsula. His continental conflicts, in fact, were not so much wars as battles, of which each, or nearly so, decided the fate of a country, and finished a campaign. It was the doom of the Peninsula to be the grand theatre of a continuous, a terrible struggle. There the choicest troops, and all the greatest generals of France, were collected. There Laborde, Junot, Ney, Soult, Victor, Lannes, Jourdan, Massena, Marmont, and the mighty master of them all, Napoleon himself, led on the imperial armies. All that could be done by science, numbers, bravery, pride, and desperation, to crush the inhabitants, and to dislodge the British troops, was attempted. It is to be recollected, too, that the invasion of the Peninsula succeeded the general subjugation of Europe. The terror of the French preceded their march, and paralyzed the hearts of their trembling victims. The sound of their fame, in proportion as it depressed the minds of the Spaniards and Portuguese, elevated their own spirits, and filled them with pride and confidence. The French generals and armies had been so accustomed to victory, that they everywhere looked for it as a matter of course. All these generals had acquired renown prior to their appearance in Spain and Portugal, and they headed their troops with all the advantages which renown imparts. Before the arrival of Wellington, they had also possessed themselves of all the forts, and overrun the entire country. Such were the adversaries of the English commander, and such their advantages.

The Duke of Wellington, on the contrary, when called to oppose this dread array, appeared under great

disadvantages. He was but little known, either in England or on the Continent. In 1805, he returned from India, where, for eight or nine years, he had done good service; for which he was, on his arrival, made a knight of the Bath, and received the thanks of Parliament. It was not till after three years of repose and civil employment that he was sent to Portugal to command the British forces. He was also comparatively young; he bore but little military name, and the English Government itself showed its utter ignorance of his character, and its want of confidence, by giving the command, almost immediately, to Sir Harry Burrard, an officer whose first and almost only act was to check the victorious career of Wellington, who had already gained two battles. Burrard, in turn, was superseded by Dalrymple, who was soon removed; and, in 1809, Wellington was proclaimed Marshal-General of the Forces. His wonderful talents had now a fair field for their development. Now commenced his difficulties, his dangers, his conflicts, his glories, and that marvellous display of moral greatness which gives him the pre-eminence among his peers. Here, then, I begin my inquiry into the moral and military greatness of the Duke of Wellington, endeavouring to ascertain the measures, absolute and comparative, in which both kinds of greatness were manifested, and which preponderated.

To the superficial reader of history, the Duke of Wellington may, for several reasons, appear but a third or fourth-rate soldier. The first of these reasons is, the

brevity of his career. From the time that he received the command till his triumphal entry into Paris, only five short years elapsed. Turenne, from the time that he became Marshal of France, spent thirty-one years in the camp, and died on the field. Marlborough, from the time at which he became Commander-in-Chief, was occupied in wars, with occasional intervals of peace,

twenty-one years. Napoleon, from the time that he became Commander-in-Chief of the Army of the Interior, to his abdication, was nineteen years engaged in constant conflict. The second reason, which has misled common minds in their estimate of Wellington as a commander, is, the small number of his battles. When Lord Chancellor Eldon addressed his Grace on his personal introduction into the House of Lords, in June, 1814, he could enumerate only four victories-Vimeira, Talavera, Salamanca, and Vittoria,- and two sieges, Ciudad Rodrigo, and Badajos; and these, undoubtedly, were his Grace's principal achievements prior to Waterloo, the crowning event of his life. In this last great battle, he probably did all that a general could do; and, certainly, after allowing whatever can be claimed for either his allies or adversaries, he did enough to stamp his fame with such glory as can redound from such enterprises. The third reason is, that his conflicts, with the exception of the short campaign of 1815, were confined to the small territory of the Peninsula, which gave little room for the display of military resources and skill, as compared with contests spread over large regions, and involving many nations,- -an observation full of plausibility, but void of force.

Now, combining these three points, brevity of time, paucity of conflicts, and limitation of space, they seem to form but a narrow and unsubstantial foundation for the edifice of a fame so vast and towering as that of the Duke of Wellington. This has been felt by multitudes who have not reasoned about it; and hence it is a fact that his glory, to the eye of the millions, appears to rest almost wholly on the victory of Waterloo. Had his Grace not won that battle, they would have deemed him a very inferior personage compared with what they now consider him. Such is the dazzling power of success; and the deceitful force of circumstances! The battle of Waterloo was, doubtless, an awful, a sublime, an

unparalleled spectacle. Whether we look at the events and circumstances which preceded, the results which depended upon it, or at the consequences to all parties which followed it, all is grand, momentous, terrible. The battles of Issus and Arbela, which made Alexander master of Asia, the sanguinary conflict at Cannæ, which all but overthrew the Roman Republic, and Pharsalia itself, which placed in the hands of Cæsar the sceptre of the world; all these were but minor conflicts as compared with the desperate encounter of Waterloo. At that great battle were assembled the collected power and prowess of Europe,-her marshals, her princes, her kings, and her emperors; all were there-there to fight-there to conquer or to die! Against them stood their late valiant and mighty foe, roused like a lion of greatest power and fiercest spirit, who had every thing at stake,—ambition, empire, glory,—and who knew that the alternative of the battle was a palace or a prison. The conflict of Waterloo was considered the battle of the world's freedom; for, although masses of those who fought were slaves, and their rulers despots, the thraldom bore a voluntary aspect, and the tyranny was deemed legitimate. On these grounds, the Duke was viewed as the victor of the common tyrant of the earth, the cruel oppressor, equally of subjects and of princes, as the Liberator of Europe; and the peals of his glory were heard from Moscow to Madrid.

It is proper to value highly the victory of Waterloo as having given peace to the earth, a breathing time to distressed and labouring nations, and, I think, I appreciate aright the part acted on that eventful day by the British commander; yet by no means can I view it as the proper foundation of his fame. I cannot go thither in search of the proofs even of his military, still less of his moral, greatness. Nay, had he even lost that battle, I should not have thought at all the less highly of him and his having gained it does not greatly raise my pre

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vious estimate of him. 'Nothing is more common, and nothing can be more unjust, than to judge of a general's talents by the simple test of a battle lost or won A battle may be won by accident. Most battles, indeed, are so won. In the language of Scripture, "the battle is not to the strong." There is an Unseen Hand that decides the issue of human contests. Of this, no man can be more convinced than the Duke of Wellington, who, in his letter to Mr. Stewart, of Oct. 10, 1810, referring to the general question, says, "I have but little doubt of success; but I have fought a sufficient number of battles to discover that the result of any one is not certain, even under the best arrangements." Failure may result from circumstances, which it was impossible to foresee, and which, when they arose, it was equally impossible to counteract. Even at Waterloo, victory hung trembling in the balance, till the arrival of Blucher and Bulow with a force of fifty thousand fresh men. Both the Duke and the Emperor, on that dreadful day, did all that could be done by men so circumstanced: but Heaven determined the result. As that battle, however, was a brief, although a stupendous event, it furnished but small opportunity for testing, at all points, the true character of a general. It was an event most fortunate for his Grace's fame with the superficial millions; but his deeds in the Peninsula are the only sure source of proofs and illustrations of his military and moral greatness.

In all great movements, object and motive are every thing with regard to their moral character. On this head, never did general occupy higher or more substantial ground. Could any circumstances justify even a defensive war, the war in Portugal was justifiable. His Grace's views relative to that war were of a very profound and comprehensive order. He considered himself primarily as warring in defence of his own * Edinburgh Review, vol. xxxv, p. 400