The last campaign of 1806 left the family of Hapsburg indignant at their reverses, and on their vanquisher becoming entangled by his unjust aggression of Spain, they hoped a fit opportunity was offered for redeeming their character and importance in Europe. If the bold advance of Sir J. Moore into the heart of Spain, and his demonstration on Carrion, had made Buonaparte direct the most considerable portion of his armies on the front or flanks of the English, thus interrupting for a time, in other quarters, the rapidity of conquest, not less did the Austrian declaration of war, drawing off a portion of the resources of France, tend materially to the ultimate advantage of the rightful cause. Buonaparte was not only personally arrested from overrunning Spain by his return to France, but from directing a just combination among his dispersed marshals, which circumstance fortunately allowed England to regain a firm footing in the Peninsula, and, by the events of the succeeding campaign, an opportunity of renewing a good feeling and confidence in the people. Considering the reorganized Austrian as a more dangerous enemy than the broken Spaniards or expelled English, Buonaparte, on withdrawing from Astorga, only passed through Madrid, and returned to Paris. He, however, left (with the exception of the Imperial Guard, about 15,000 of whom had accompanied him across the Pyrenees,) his armies entire, under the command of his various marshals, to complete the subjugation of Spain. Of these eight _corps d'armée_, (each equal to the whole British army in Spain in 1809,) which had crossed the frontier, five had co-operated directly or otherwise against Sir J. Moore. The sixth, commanded by the gallant Ney, was ordered to remain in and reduce to control Galicia and the Asturias. The fourth, under Mortier, with a vast body of cavalry commanded by Kellerman, was to overawe Leon and Castille; while Victor, with the first corps, was at once to complete the ruin of the beaten Spanish armies, and to threaten the line of the Tagus, the south of Portugal, and eventually its capital. The eighth corps, which had, under Junot, served in 1807-8 in Portugal, and according to the convention of Cintra been carried to Rochelle, and subsequently recrossed Spain, and met their old antagonists before Corunna, was broken up, and its _débris_ added to the second corps under Soult.[27] This force was intended to take the active part of the campaign against Portugal, which country was to be immediately attacked, the orders to that effect being received within ten days after the embarkation of the British. So certain was Buonaparte of Soult's conquest, that he fixed the 5th of February for the arrival of his troops at Oporto—and the 16th of the same month for his triumphant entrance into Lisbon!