When sir John Moore assumed the command of the army, he sent colonel Graham to reside at the Spanish head-quarters on the Ebro, and directed lord William Bentinck to remain at Madrid to forward the arrangements for commencing the campaign. Lord William found in Mr. Stuart an able coadjutor, and in the letters of these two gentlemen, and the correspondence of major Coxe, then at Seville, is to be found the history of the evils which at this period afflicted unhappy Spain, and ruined her noble cause. The power of distributing supplies, and the independent nature of their appointments, gave to those military agents immediately employed by the minister an extraordinary influence, and it was very injudiciously exercised. They forgot the real objects of their mission, and in many cases took a leading part in affairs with which it was not politic in them to have meddled at all. [Sidenote: Sir John Moore’s Correspondence. MSS.] [Sidenote: Whittingham’s Letters. MS.] Colonel Doyle having left captain Kennedy at Coruña, and placed captain Carrol at the head-quarters of Blake’s army, repaired in person to Madrid, where he was received with marked attention, and obtained the rank of a general officer in the Spanish service for himself, and that of lieutenant-colonel for captains Carrol and Kennedy. From colonel Doyle’s letters it appears that he had a large share in conducting many important measures, such as the arrangement of a general plan of operations, and the formation of a central and supreme government. He seems to have attached himself principally to the duke of Infantado, a young man of moderate capacity, but with a strong predilection for those petty intrigues which constituted the policy of the Spanish court. Captain Whittingham gained the confidence of general Castaños to such a degree that he was employed by him to inspect the different Spanish corps on the Ebro early in September, and to report upon their state of efficiency previous to entering upon the execution of the plan laid down for the campaign. Notwithstanding the favourable position in which these officers stood, it does not appear that either of them obtained any clear idea of the relative strength of the contending forces, and their opinions, invariably and even extravagantly sanguine, were never borne out by the result. [Sidenote: Mr. Stuart’s Letters. MS. Lord W. Bentinck’s Letters. MS.] [Sidenote: Appendix, No. 13. section 6.] The Spaniards were not slow to perceive the advantages of encouraging the vanity of inexperienced men who had the control of enormous supplies; but while all outward demonstrations of respect and confidence were by them lavished upon subordinate functionaries, and especially upon those who had accepted of rank in their service, the most strenuous exertions of lord William Bentinck and Mr. Stuart were insufficient to procure the adoption of a single beneficial measure, or even to establish the ordinary intercourse of official business.