Lord Wellington had the farther mortification of knowing that the army, satisfied as he was with its conduct in all respects, partook that despondency which the pestilent activity of a faction at home was continually labouring to produce, and which the events of the campaign had hitherto tended to confirm. His plans had been long meditated and wisely formed; but the reasonable expectations which he founded upon them were disappointed by the accident that drew after it the fall of Almeida. That place might easily have held out till the autumnal rains should have rendered it impossible for the French to advance, and scarcely practicable for them to have subsisted their army upon that frontier. To gain time at this juncture was for him to gain every thing: here he thought to have wintered in the sure expectation that every day would render the Portugueze troops more efficient, and with the reasonable hope that, through Marquis Wellesley’s influence in the cabinet, he should receive such reinforcements as would enable him to act upon the offensive. Accident had frustrated this intent; the enemy were enabled to advance, elated with their fortune, and relying upon it as the only divinity in which they were encouraged to trust; and Massena, whose plans had hitherto succeeded beyond his calculations, and even to the extent of his hopes, had the advantage of relying upon the disposition as well as the efficiency of his army, and the full support of a government which placed ample means at his command, crippled him with no restrictions, and threatened him with no responsibility. ♦MOVEMENTS OF REGNIER’S CORPS, AND OF GENERAL HILL.♦