Blake was one of those men who would have been thought worthy of the chief command if they had never been trusted with it. His talents were considerable; he understood the theory of his profession well, and could plan an action or a campaign with great ability; but he was deficient in that promptitude and presence of mind which are the first qualifications of a commander. His own game he could play skilfully, but when the adversary disconcerted it by some unexpected movement, he was incapable of forming new dispositions to meet the altered circumstances. By persisting against a superior and continually increasing force in operations which had been calculated against an inferior one, he exposed himself to the imminent hazard of being entirely cut off; and by advancing so far into a country which had been stripped of its provisions, and with no commissariat to follow him, he exhausted his men. Under every privation he indeed set them an example of cheerfulness, and let them see that he fared as hardly as themselves; but this could not counteract the effects of inanition. They were in a state of famine when they arrived at Espinosa, and would have found nothing there to relieve them if 250 mules, laden with biscuits, had not most opportunely arrived, sent by Major-General Leith, who was forwarding partial supplies toward them by every possible way. But men thus hungered, and enfeebled also by long continued exposure to cold and rain, were ill fitted for close action, in which much depended upon personal strength. Another and more lamentable error was, that the troops from the Baltic, the only thoroughly disciplined part of his force, were brought into action after the first defeat, and exposed by single battalions to bear the brunt of every conflict; and thus they were sacrificed in detail, giving melancholy proof, by the devoted courage with which they stood their ground, of what they could have effected, if, as a body, they had been brought into some fair field of battle. ♦DISPERSION OF BLAKE’S ARMY AT REYNOSA.♦