Foy, in his excellent history of the Spanish War, emits an opinion in words curiously similar to those of Wellington, stating that for practical purposes the English troopers were inferior to the French on account of their headlong impetuosity and want of power to manœuvre[95]. When two such authorities agree, there must clearly have been some solid foundation for their verdict. Yet it is hard to quote many combats in their support: there were cases, no doubt, where English regiments threw their chances away by their blind fury in charging, as did the 23rd Light Dragoons at Talavera, the 13th Light Dragoons near Campo Mayor on March 25, 1811, and Slade’s brigade at Maguilla on June 11, 1812. Yet with the memory before us of Paget’s admirable operations at Sahagun and Benavente in December, 1808, of Lumley’s skilful containing of Latour Maubourg’s superior numbers at Albuera, and his brilliant success at Usagre over that same general in 1811, as well as Cotton’s considerable cavalry fight at Villa Garcia in 1812, it seems strange to find Wellington disparaging his own troopers. No doubt we must concede that the British horsemen did not show that marked superiority over their rivals of the same arm which Wellington’s infantry always asserted. But fairly balancing their faults and their merits, it would seem that there was something wanting in their general no less than in themselves. A lover of the cavalry arm would have got more profit out of the British horse than Wellington ever obtained. It is noticeable that not one of the successful fights cited above took place under the eye or the direction of the Duke. [95] Foy, i. 288-90. As to the Spanish cavalry, it was (as we have already had occasion to remark) the weakest point in the national army. In the first actions of the war it appeared on the field in such small numbers that it had no chance against the French. But later on, when the juntas succeeded in raising large masses of horsemen, their scandalous conduct on a score of fields was the despair of Spanish generals. We need only mention Medellin and Ocaña as examples of their misbehaviour. No French cavalry-general ever hesitated to engage with double of his own number of Spanish horse. When vigorously charged they never failed to give way, and when once on the move it was impossible to rally them. It was often found on the night of a battle that the mass of the cavalry was in flight twenty miles ahead of the infantry, which it had basely deserted.