The feeble and dilatory operations of the armies, were partly owing to the ineptitude of the generals; but the principal causes were the unbounded vanity, arrogance, and selfishness of the local governments, among whom the juntas of Gallicia and Seville were remarkable for their ambition. The time which should have been passed in concerting measures for pushing the victory of Baylen was spent by them in devising schemes to ensure the permanency of their own power, and the money and resources, both of England and Spain, were applied to further this pernicious object. In every part of the country a spirit of interested violence prevailed; the ardour of patriotism was chilled, and the exertions of sensible men were rendered nugatory, or served as a signal for their own destruction. [Sidenote: Appendix, No. 6.] [Sidenote: Appendix, No. 4.] The argument to be drawn from this state of affairs is conclusive against the policy of Joseph’s retreat. Without drafting a man from the garrisons of Pampeluna, Tortosa, and St. Sebastian; without interfering with the moveable columns employed on the communications of Biscay and Navarre; that monarch drew together about fifty thousand good troops, in twenty days after he had abandoned his capital. At the head of such a force, or even of two-thirds of it, he might have bid defiance to the inactive, half-organized, and scattered Spanish armies. It was so necessary to have maintained himself in Madrid, that scarcely any disproportion of numbers should have induced him to abandon it without an effort; but the disaster of Dupont had created in Joseph’s mind a respect for Spanish prowess, while from his sagacious brother it drew the following observation: “_The whole of the Spanish forces are not capable of beating twenty-five thousand French in a reasonable position._” The error of abandoning the capital would, if the Spaniards had been capable of pursuing any general plan of action, been fatal; but as if the stone of Cadmus had been cast among them, the juntas turned upon one another in hate, and forgot the common enemy.