‘_The right_ of the troops which passed over to the seminary, which in fact made an admirable _tête de pont_, was protected by the passage of the Douro higher up by lieut.-general _sir John Murray and the king’s German legion, supported by other troops_.’ Armed with this authority, I did set aside the despatch, because, though it said that Murray was _sent_ with a battalion and a squadron, it _did not say_ that he was not followed by others. And in lord Londonderry’s narrative I found the following passage:— ‘General Murray, too, who had been detached with _his division_ to a ferry higher up, was fortunate enough to gain possession of as many boats as enabled him to pass over with _two battalions of Germans and two squadrons of the fourteenth dragoons_.’ And his lordship, further on, says, that he himself charged several times and with advantage at the head of those squadrons. His expression is ‘_the dragoons from Murray’s corps_.’ With respect to the loss of the dragoons sustained by having to fight their way back again, I find the following account in the narrative of sir James Douglas, written, as I have before said, expressly for my guidance:— ‘Young soldiers like young greyhounds run headlong on their prey; while experience makes old dogs of all sorts run cunning. Here _two squadrons_ actually rode over the _whole rear French guard_, which laid down upon the road; and was, to use their own terms, _passé sur le ventre_: but no support to the dragoons being at hand no great execution was done; and the _two squadrons themselves suffered severely in getting back again through the infantry_.’ Thus, even in this small matter, the reviewer is not right. And now with the above facts fixed I shall proceed to rebut the charge of having calumniated sir John Murray.