While, by land, the fortune of war was thus chec quered, at sea the French experienced nothing but disasters. Eight ships of the line in Brest, eluding our blockade, sailed southward to Basque Roads near Rochefort, where they were joined by four sail of the line from that port. Our fleet blockaded them in their new station, and preparations having been made to attempt their destruction by fire-ships, Lord Cochrane sailed in with these dreadful engines on the evening of the 11th April 1809. Our sea men broke the boom in front of the French line, dill regarded the fire from the forts, and, after bringing the fire-ships as near to the enemy as possible, set fire to the fusses and withdrew in their boats. The French, surprised and alarmed, cut their cables and run on shore. Four sail of the line that had ac companied Lord Cochrane attacked them, and though the main body of our fleet was prevented by the wind and tide from coming up, the result of our attack, and of the effect of the fire-ships, was the loss of four sail of the line, and one frigate burned or destroyed. At a later period of the year, a French convoy of three sail of the line and eleven transports, proceeding from Toulon to Barcelona, was attacked and destroyed by a division from Lord Collingwood's fleet.
Doubtful as was the aspect of the great contest in Spain, it employed a large portion of military establishment, and revived the hope of in dependence in Germany. Prussia was too recently humbled, and too closely connected with Russia,_ at that time the ally of France, to take up arms ; but Austria was unrestrained, and thought the season favourable for a renewal of the contest. Her troops took the field in April, and invaded Bavaria, under the Archduke Charles, but were worsted at Eck muhl, and Vienna was a second time entered by Bonaparte. His impatience to attack the Austrian army on the north side of the Danube, led to his failure in the sanguinary battle of Aspern ; and ne cessitated the advance of almost all his regular troops into the heart of Germany, at a distance of several hundred miles from the coast.
Of the naval stations thus exposed, by far the most important was Antwerp, situated on a part of the Scheldt, of as great depth, and as acces sible to ships of the line as the 'Thames at Wool wich. From Antwerp to the mouth of the Scheldt is a distance of about 50 miles. The first fortified town, on coming in from the sea, is Flushing, the batteries of which, though formidable, are not capa ble of preventing the passage of ships of war through a strait of three miles in width. Our armament, consisting of nearly forty sail of the line and 38,000 military, was the most powerful that ever left our shores. It crossed the narrow sea with a fair wind, and, in the morning of 30th July, the inhabitants of the tranquil coast of Zealand were astonished by an , unparalleled display of men of war and transports. Our troops landed and occupied forthwith Wal. cheren and the islands to the north. No resistance was offered except at Flushing ; and our commander, the Earl of Chatham, showed himself wholly inca pable of discriminating the causes of success or fail ure, when he stopped to besiege that place ; it ought only to have been watched, while the main body of the troops should have landed in Dutch -Flanders, on the south of the Scheldt, and marched straight to Antwerp, which, even with artillery, might have been readied in a few days. The French, never
doubting the adoption of this plan, and conscious of their weakness, had moved their men of war up the river, beyond the town, previous to setting them on fire. But a delay of a fortnight took place before Flushing, and time was thus given to the enemy to strengthen the forts on the river, and to collect what ever force the country afforded. Still, as an attack by water was not indispensable to success, there yet remained a chance ; ten days more, however, were lost ; the relinquishment of the main object of the expedition became unavoidable, and the only farther measure was to leave a body of 15,000 men in the island of Walcheren. There, they remained during several months, suffering greatly from an unhealthy atmosphere, and doing nothing except destroying, on their departure, the dockyards of Flushing. Ne ver was a gallant force more grossly misdirected ; the choice of our general was as unaccountable as the choice of Mack in 1805 ; and the historian, were he to reason from the inferior numbers of the ene my, might pronounce this expedition as inglorious to our arms as the battles of Poitiers and Agincourt to our enemies of a former age.
We turn, with impatience, from the banks of the Scheldt to a scene more honourable to our arms. Our troops,-under (Sir A. Wellesley) Lord Welling ton, had passed the winter in the ipterior of Portugal, moving northward as spring advanced, but delaying active operations: offensive war was unsuited to our situation, and the French awaited reinforcements from the north. Bonaparte's determination now was to make Massena penetrate into Portugal, and to expel those auxiliaries who were the main spring of the obstinate resistance experienced by him in Spain. The first enterprise of the French army was the siege of the frontier fortress of Ciudad Rodrigo, which surrendered on 10th July. The next object of attack was the Portuguese fortress of Almeida, which was invested in the end of July, and taken un fortunately too soon, in consequence of the explo. sion of the magazine. Soon after, the French army, now a formidable body, advanced into Portugal, Lord Wellington retiring before them, but deter mined to embrace the first opportunity of fighting on favourable ground. This occurred when occu pying the highest ridge of the mountain of Busaco, directly in face of the enemy. The French. always impetuous, and not yet aware of' the firmness of our men, marched up the mountain ; one division reach ed the top of the ridge, where they were immediate ly attacked by a corps of' British and Portuguese, and driven from the ground. In other parts the same result took place before the French reached the top. The loss on our side was 1000 men ; that of the enemy between 2000 and 3000. Massena desisted from farther attacks, but, turning the flank of our position, Lord Wellington necessarily retreat-' ed in the direction of Lisbon, till he reached the ground where he had determined to defend that ca pital.