According to
the law of the country every man was liable for service, and had the
corrupt Junta been dismissed, and full power been given to the British, an
army of 250,000 men might have been placed in the field for the defence of
the country, with a proper supply of arms and money.
But so far from assisting, the Junta threw every possible impediment in
the way. They feared that any real national effort, if successful, would
get altogether beyond their control, and that they would lose the power
that enabled them to enrich themselves at the expense of the people. Not
only that, but they were engaged in a struggle for supremacy with the
Junta of Oporto, which was striving by every means to render itself the
supreme authority of the whole of Portugal.
Terence had hoped that when he arrived at Lisbon he should meet the army
he had left at Corunna, for Sir John Moore's instructions had been precise
that the fleet was to go thither. These instructions, however, had been
disobeyed, and the fleet had sailed direct for England. It had on the way
encountered a great storm, which had scattered it in all directions.
Several of the ships were wrecked on the coast of England, and the army
which would have been of inestimable service at Lisbon, now served only,
by the tattered garments and emaciated frames of the soldiers, to excite a
burst of misplaced indignation against the memory of the general whose
genius had saved it from destruction.
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