Lisbon, Abrantes, and Belem Castle, on the Tagus; Figueras and Raiva de Pena Cova, on the Mondego; and, finally, Oporto and Lamego, on the Douro, were the principal depôts formed by lord Wellington, and his magazines of consumption were established at Viseu, Celerico, Condeixa, Leiria, Thomar, and Almeida. From those points four hundred miserable bullock-cars and about twelve thousand hired mules, organized in brigades of sixty each, conveyed the necessary warlike stores and provisions to the armies; when additional succours could be obtained, it was eagerly seized, but this was the ordinary amount of transport. With such means and with such preparations was the defence of Portugal undertaken, and it must be evident to the most superficial observer, that, amidst so many difficulties, and with such a number of intricate combinations, lord Wellington’s situation was not one in which a general could sleep, and that, due allowance being made for fortune, it is puerile to attribute the success to aught but his talents and steel-hardened resolution. In the foregoing exposition of the political and military force of the powers brought into hostile contact, I have only touched, and lightly, upon the points of most importance, designing no more than to indicate the sound and the diseased parts of each. The unfavourable circumstances for France would appear to be the absence of the emperor,--the erroneous views of the king,--the rivalry of the marshals,--the impediments to correspondence,--the necessity of frequently dispersing from the want of magazines,--the iniquity of the cause, and the disgust of the French officers, who, for the most part, spoiled by a rapid course of victories on the continent, could not patiently endure a service replete with personal dangers, over and above the ordinary mishaps of war, yet promising little ultimate reward. For the English, the quicksands were--the memory of former failures on the continent,--the financial drain,--a powerful and eloquent opposition pressing a cabinet so timid and selfish that the general dared not risk a single brigade, lest an accident should lead to a panic amongst the ministers which all lord Wellesley’s vigour would be unable to stem,--the intrigues of the Souza party,--and the necessity of persuading the Portuguese to devastate their country for the sake of defending a _European cause_. Finally, the babbling of the English newspapers, from whose columns the enemy constantly drew the most certain information of the strength and situation of the army.