General Howorth, on his arrival in Lisbon in the beginning of April, arranged, with Colonel Robe’s assistance, the equipment of five brigades of guns, to take the field with the army, viz., one brigade of heavy 6-pounders, three of light 6-pounders, and one of 3-pounders. These were all he could equip; and, notwithstanding the opportune arrival, from Ireland, of 170 drivers and 298 excellent horses, he yet complained of the want of mobility from which they suffered, mixed as they were with the horses of the country, mules, and oxen. However, like Colonel Harding, he took a cheerful view of matters, and pronounced the mules to be very fine [Sidenote: To D.-A.-G. Lisbon, 8 April, 1809.] animals, and “the oxen, though slow, a steady, good draught.” The development of the Field Artillery during the Peninsular War, from the wretched batteries employed at its commencement to those which attracted such admiration at its close, will appear in the course of this work. Suffice it, at present, to remind the Artilleryman, by way of contrast, while the picture of the batteries of 1809 is yet fresh in his recollection, that before the conclusion of the Peninsular War, it was admitted by the artillerymen of the country with which England was engaged in hostilities, [Sidenote: ‘Le passé et l’avenir de l’Artillerie,’ tom. v. p. 64.] that “the English _matériel_ might have been taken as a model by any nation in Europe;”--that, shortly before Waterloo, Marshal Marmont remarked that the equipment of the English Field Artillery was in every respect very superior to anything he had ever seen; and that the French Committee appointed in 1818 to compare the Artillery of [Sidenote: Hime.] the various countries represented in the review held that year in Paris, expressed unqualified delight with that of England. On Sir Arthur Wellesley’s arrival in Lisbon, he found that Soult was in possession of Oporto, and Victor in Estremadura. He promptly resolved to attack them in detail; and, making Lisbon the base of his operations, he requested the Spanish General, Cuesta, to watch Victor’s movements, while he himself should march to the north against Soult. The moral effect of driving the French out of Portugal would, he felt, be very great--all the more so as his arrival had produced a sudden hopefulness among the Portuguese, which it was desirable not to disappoint. Accordingly, on the 1st May, he moved his head-quarters to Pombal and Coimbra, and found himself in command of an army which, after deducting the sick and absent, numbered [Sidenote: Napier.] 20,653 rank and file, with 30 guns. On the 9th he left Coimbra with the main body, and arrived on the Douro, opposite Oporto, on the 12th, after a march of eighty miles [Sidenote: To D.-A.-G. Oporto, 14 May, 1809.] over infamous roads. “But,” wrote General Howorth, “neither difficulty nor danger impedes Sir Arthur: he is all fire, and establishes confidence in the troops.”