Yet while the country was thus at the mercy of the French, the panic which their appearance every where excited extended nowhere beyond their immediate presence. In all places which were not actually occupied by the enemy, the local authorities acted as if no enemy had been at hand, and their own government had been as efficient as it was legitimate. The enlisting went on, and promises of speedy triumph and sure deliverance were held forth with a confidence which no reverses could shake. The fugitives from the different armies no sooner reached their own homes than they were again enrolled to be embodied, and exposed again to privations and sufferings such as those from which they had so hardly escaped. Before their strength was recruited, they were sent off to form new armies, neither better disciplined, better commanded, nor better provided than those which had been routed and dispersed. They went hungered, half naked, and cursing their fortune, without confidence in their officers, each other, or themselves, yet believing fully that the deliverance of Spain would be effected with a faith which seemed to require and perhaps very generally expected miracles for its fulfilment. Human means indeed seem to have been provided as little as if they had not been taken into the account. ♦TEMPORIZING CONDUCT OF CERTAIN MAGISTRATES.♦ This unreasoning confidence brought with it evil as well as good. Many of those who had something to lose, and hoped that part at least might be saved by submission, took either side according as the scale inclined. When the enemy was absent, they joined the national voice, which expressed what were their real feelings: if the French appeared, they were ready to take the oaths, and act under them, as far as was necessary for their own safety or advantage, longing at the same time and looking for the day of deliverance and vengeance. In many places, the magistracy acted with no other view than that of averting from themselves and their immediate jurisdiction as much of the common misery as they could. This was particularly the case in those parts of Leon and Castille which lay most open to the enemy. The enrolment was rigorously enforced there, and men were hurried off: but any means of local defence were rather dreaded than desired. Offers of assistance were made from Ciudad Rodrigo to Ledesma and Salamanca, and both cities declined the proffered aid, as unnecessary; but in truth, because they believed it to be unavailing, and had determined not to provoke the enemy by resistance. ♦SIR ROBERT WILSON.♦