‘Under these circumstances the enterprise was one of the most difficult, considering the nature of the obstacles to be surmounted, the _shattered and exhausted state_ (“delabrement et epuisement”) of the “_corps d’armée_,” and the insufficiency of the means of which it could dispose. But the order was positive; it was necessary to obey.’... ‘The march was directed upon St. Jago, where the troops took the first repose it had been possible to give them since they quitted the Carion River in Castile.’... ‘Marshal Soult rested six days at St. Jago, during which he distributed some shoes, had the artillery carriages repaired and the horses shod; the parc which since the Carion had not been seen now came up, and with it some ammunition (which had been prepared at Coruña), together with various detachments that the previous hardships and the exhaustion of the men had caused to remain behind. He would have prolonged his stay until the end of February because he could not hide from himself that his troops had the most urgent need of it; but his operations were connected with the duke of Belluno’s, &c. &c., and he thought it his duty to go on without regard to time or difficulties.’ _Extract from Le Noble’s History._ ‘The army was without money, without provision, without clothing, without equipages, and the men (personnel) belonging to the latter, not even ordinarily complete, when they should have been doubled to profit from the feeble resources of the country.’ Who now is the false colourist? But what can be expected from a writer so shameless in his statements as this reviewer? Let the reader look to the effrontery with which he asserts that I have _celebrated marshal Soult_ for the reduction of two fortresses, Ferrol and Coruña, which were not even defended, whereas my whole passage is a censure upon the Spaniards for not defending them, and without one word of praise towards the French marshal.