was done in concert with the provisional government of Spain. So far from any blame being imputable to the commissariat, so long as the troops advanced, no army was ever better or more regularly supplied. He had been attached to General Hope's brigade, and performed a march of upwards of 1000 miles with it; and he could take upon him to assure the House, that in its progress from Portugal, until it reached Salamanca, it was amply supplied through the good will of the inhabitants; as well, indeed, as if it had been marching through England. As to the danger of this march, it became critical when they approached Madrid, and learned that the army of Castanos had been beaten. With respect to the loss of the army, he would still adhere to his former statement, and assert, that from the best information he had been able to obtain, the casualties throughout the whole of the expedi tion, did not exceed 5000 men; a loss, which, in a military point of view, was more than counterbalanced by the advantages that the army obtained, in respect to experience and active service.

Mr. Colborne trusted to the candour of the House to excuse him, if, for a moment, he diverted that storm of eloquence, the effects of which a right honourable gentleman seemed so much to apprehend. It was not his wish to oppose inquiry; but after ministers had professed their readiness to lay all the information in their power before the House, he could not recognize the necessity of such a committee as that proposed in the motion. If, as the right honourable gentleman stated, we were to contend for our security on British ground, it was no small subject of consolation to know, from the late exertions of our armies in the peninsula, that we produced generals able to contend with the titled minions of Buonaparte. Was it nothing, that, in a moment of unexampled disaster, the efforts of a British army had given breathing time to our ally; that she was able to collect the remains of her > dispersed armies, and to organize and give confidence to the new levies that she was preparing to oppose the ene my. He should not consent to make individual calamities the measure of national loss. The campaign, instead of bringing disgrace upon our army, served more to exalt the character of the British army than any in which we had been engaged for many years. He could not conceive the object of the motion, as the papers tendered to

the House would give them all the information they could desire.

Lord Milton observed, that the honourable gentleman who had just sat down, had given rather a singular reason for having approved of the campaign in Spain; namely, that it would facilitate the recruiting of the army. For his own part, he was desirous that an inquiry should take place into the circumstances of that campaign. He would have been glad if such an inquiry had taken place in former wars. Had the expeditions to Ferrol and the Helder been inquired into, they should not now have to regret the failures to which the motion referred. Instead, therefore, of the inquiry proposed paralyzing the efforts of the country, it would give to the parliament the confidence of the public. The object of the expedition had been the establishment of the Spanish monarchy, and to drive the French army out of that country. Now, in spite of all the vigour and activity of the noble lord, instead of Buonaparte having been driven back to his own territory, and the whole of the peninsula recovered from his forces, his brother Joseph had been crowned at Madrid, and our army obliged to withdraw from Spain. Were not these circumstances that called for inquiry, and was parliament to be told that no such inquiry was necessary? If they were to say that they would not go into the investiga tion, the nation would decide that they had no preten sions to occupy the situations they held as representatives of the people.

Mr. Secretary Canning had given way to other honourable members, who had a wish to address the House, because he was anxious to learn their sentiments upon the important subject under consideration. He had given way to his honourable and gallant friend (General Stewart), because his acquaintance with the operations of the campaign enabled him to give satifactory information tó the House upon any question connected with them; and his honourable friend who followed had, he was sure, been heard with pleasure by the House, and given a specimen, not only of what he was capable of at present, but of what the House had to hope from him in future. Amongst all the reasons that had beeen urged for the inquiry that night, there was not one produced by the gen tlemen opposite, which was not founded in the grossest misrepresentations-misrepresentations stated in general

by the right honourable gentleman who brought forward the motion, but pressed in detail by the other right honourable gentleman who followed on the same side. The former right honourable gentleman had founded all his argument upon a misrepresentation of facts; but the right honourable gentleman who followed, had presented these facts in a more fallacious and discoloured state than, in his memory, had ever been done in parliament. He had given to the right honourable genileman, who began the discussion, the character of a stout and able reasoner, and represented him as a plain man, addressing parliament in plain and simple language; yet it was matter of surprize to him, that that right honourable gentleman had ventured to state as facts what he knew only from report, and to give to rumour the credit of undoubted authority; but in ten minutes he should shew that all his statements were unfounded. The statement of the right honourable gentleman began with the army, when, after the campaign in Portugal, it became disposable, and proceeded to Spain. His first accusation against his majesty's ministers was, for the manner in which they had assembled that army; it had been said by him, that nothing could have been more absurd than the division of that army into three parts; and that it was impossible that things could go right under such an arrangement. But the right honourable gentleman should recollect that that arrangement was not a measure of his majesty's ministers. The right honourable gentleman had said, that every twelve hours there had been a change of system and measures, in which case it would have been absurd to dictate any course of proceeding for the army in its progress in Spain; so that taking his own premises for granted, his conclusion would not follow, and his are gument fell to the ground. His majesty's ministers had not been absurd enough to dictate from home the precise instructions under which the British army was to act in all circumstances. They had sent out general instructions to the commander in chief, when the army was proceeding from Portugal to Spain, and at the same time inform ed him that they intended to dispatch a considerable force to Corunna, and that the transports which took that force out were to proceed to the Tagus, to be placed at his disposal. The option was thus left to the general, whether he should proceed to Spain by sea or by land. The adop tion of the latter course had been the choice of Sir John

Moore, as would appear by one of the papers on the table, which the right honourable gentlemen might have had produced, if they had thought proper, to move for it. It was not because Sir John Moore could not proceed by sea that he had adopted that course, but because he thought it better to procced by land. What then was to become of the fact of the right honourable gentleman? The division of Sir John Moore's army into two bodies was not the act of his majesty's ministers. The sending of the infantry by one route, and the cavalry and artillery by another, was solely the adoption of Sir John Moore himself, and had not arisen from any want of communication or knowledge, but was resorted to in consequence of communications with a Spanish general officer sent by the Central Junta. This was a specimen of the facts of the right honourable gentleman; but as he had already, in one part of his speech, retracted one part of his statement, he would, he was sure, retract upon hearing this circumstance, the remainder. The right honourable gentleman had stated, that on hearing of the defeat of Castanos's army, Sir John Moore had determined to fall back upon Portugal. In this fact he coincided, though' he must contend that the right honourable gentleman drew from it a false conclusion. For fear he should have one' incontestable fact in this statement, the right honourable" gentleman had said, that after this circumstance Sir John Moore was forced to advance. The fact was, that SirJohn Moore had been informed of the determination of the inhabitants of Madrid to defend that city to the last extremity. This information he had received from those whose duty it was to direct the efforts of the people, and he was convinced that the inhabitants of Madrid had been at that time sincere in their determination of defending their city, or burying themselves under its ruins, if they had not been frustrated in their intentions by the weakness, or the treason of some of those in whom they had confided, particularly of Don Thomas Morla, who had distinguished himself by his patriotism in the early period of the Spanish struggle. Sir John Moore might have questioned the courage of the inhabitants of a luxurious capital; but informed as he had been of their determined resolution, and by his majesty's accredited minister to the Spanish government, he might have expected Madrid to follow the example of Saragossa, and its inhabitants to emulate the intrepidity of the compatriots of the gallant

Palafox. It was not his intention to blame Sir John Moore for the course he had pursued: ou the contrary, he should have thought him blameable if he had not adopted it. Here the agency of Mr. Frere ended; and he must be allowed to add, that nothing had been done by that gentleman, but what was calculated to raise the character of this country, and to conciliate the attachment of that. But the chief reason for Sir John Moore's advance was not founded on any external agency. It rose out of information_received through an intercepted letter from Berthier to Soult, directing that General to be at a particular place on a particular day, which led him to hope that by advancing he should be able to cut off that General's corps. At that time he had been joined by General Hope, and expected to be joined by Sir David Baird, and in consequence advanced to Sahagun. In this movement he acted as a statesman no less than as a soldier; because, even though he might fail, he must have gained an ad ́vantage for the south of Spain, whose exertions had never been relaxed. The right honourable gentleman had complained that no force had been sent to support the army at Corunna, and that troops, which had been on board transports, had been relanded. The fact was true, but the right honourable gentleman's inference, as to the relanding these troops, was unfounded. They had been relanded in consequence of a distinct requisition from Sir David Baird, that he wanted a certain number of transports, and the transports were sent out pursuant to that requisition. It was an afflicting circumstance that it should have been necessary to reland these troops, and to send out empty, for the purpose of bringing off the British army, those transports which had been fitted up for the purpose of reinforcement and assault. Would the right honourable gentleman say, that at this distance from the scene, his majesty's ministers should have refused to send out these transports? He could assure that right honourable gentleman, that the sending the transports empty from this country, had cost his majesty's ministers a severe pang. He was not aware, that there was any thing more in the right honourable gentleman's speech, which it would be necessary for him to reply to particularly. He could not, however, pass from it without noticing the animation, rather more than usual with the right honourable gentleman, with which he began it, no less than the