by G. A. Henty
The roar of the distant guns around Barcelona came distinctly to his ears, and he was almost wild with impatience and anxiety. On reaching the shore again he found that a fast sailing felucca had just come in from Barcelona. She had managed to evade the blockading fleet, and bore an urgent letter from the king, praying Peterborough to come to his assistance. The earl did not hesitate a moment, but determined to set sail at once to find the fleet, and to bring it on to Barcelona with all speed.
The astonishment and dismay of his officers at the news that their general was about to leave them and embark on such an enterprise were very great, but the earl explained to the leaders the reasons for his anxiety to gain the fleet. His commission appointed him to the command at sea as well as on land, and on joining the fleet he would be its admiral in chief. He feared that at the sight of so powerful an armament the Count of Toulouse would at once decline battle and make for France. He determined, therefore, to advance only with a force considerably inferior to that of the French, in which case Toulouse, rather than abandon the siege of Barcelona just when success seemed assured, would sail out and give battle.
Should he do so the earl, however inferior his force, had no doubts as to obtaining victory. Accompanied only by Jack Stillwell and by Captain Humphrey, who had taken the place of Graham, he embarked on board the little felucca and put to sea. The weather was cold and stormy, and the master of the boat did not like putting out far from shore; but the earl was peremptory, and the felucca stood well out to sea. Night came on without any signs of the fleet being discovered. The hours of darkness passed slowly, for the boat was undecked and afforded no shelter, and the heavy seas which broke over her kept all on board wetted to the skin.
At daybreak, to their great joy, they perceived a British man of war approaching. They at once made for her, and found she was the Leopard, commanded by Captain Price. The astonishment of that officer, and of all on board, was unbounded at being boarded at break of day almost out of sight of land from an open boat by the admiral of all the fleets. The earl's stay on board was but a short one. As soon as he had learned the whereabout of the rest of the fleet, and given instructions to Captain Price, he again embarked in the felucca, and sailed for Sitjes.
The joy of the troops was great at the return of their general, for the night had been so stormy that there were great fears for his safety; but he was not to remain with them long, for, having given orders that the whole disposable force, about fourteen hundred men, should embark in the boats before daybreak next morning, and follow the fleet to Barcelona, he again with his aides de camp took his place in the felucca and sailed for the fleet.
In the middle of the night he came across them, and boarding the Prince George, hoisted his flag as admiral of the fleet on the maintop, and took the command. He then sent a boat to Sir John Leake to acquaint him with his orders and intentions, and another boat to advise General Stanhope of his arrival; but the darkness delayed the delivery of these messages till nearly morning, and when day appeared the whole fleet was amazed at seeing the flag of the admiral in chief flying on the Prince George. The wind was strong and favorable, and the fleet crowded on all sail; but when within about eighteen miles of Barcelona one of the French lookout ships sighted them, and made a signal to a consort further along. She in turn passed on the news until it reached the Count of Toulouse, who, without waiting to ascertain the strength of the approaching squadron, at once signaled to his fleet to weigh anchor, and, putting to sea, sailed for France.
The disappointment of the earl was great, as he had fully calculated upon gaining a great naval battle in sight of the city he had come to relieve. On the afternoon of the 8th of May the leading vessels anchored off Barcelona, and preparations were at once made for the landing of the troops. The first to set foot on shore were the earl's veteran troops, who had according to his orders accompanied the fleet from Sitjes. The succor was welcome, indeed; the breaches were no longer defensible, and an assault was hourly expected. The king himself came down to receive the earl and his army; the city went wild with joy.
For a few days the French made a show of carrying on the siege. They were still enormously superior in force; but the energy and skill of Peterborough counterbalanced the inequality. He worked day and night in superintending the works of defense, and in placing the troops in readiness for the expected assault. Philip and many of his officers were still in favor of an attack upon the city; but Tesse as usual was opposed to anything like vigorous measures, and his views were adopted by a council of war.
At one o'clock on the morning of the 11th of May the besiegers broke up their camp, and in great confusion made their way toward the French frontier, for Tesse preferred even the ignominy of falling back into France with his unsuccessful and dispirited army to retracing his steps toward Saragossa, where his devastations and cruelty had caused the whole population to rise in insurrection as soon as his army had passed into Catalonia. Besides which, he had received news that Peterborough had caused every pass and town on his way to the west to be fortified and held by the Miquelets. Philip accompanied the retreating army to Roussillon. The downfall of his hopes had been utter and complete. But a few weeks before it had seemed that Spain was his, and that the forces at his disposal were ample to crush out the insurrection in Barcelona, and to sweep into the sea the handful of the invaders. But all his plans had been baffled, all his hopes brought to naught by the genius and energy of one man, in spite of that man being thwarted at every turn by the imbecile German coterie who surrounded the king, and by the jealousy and ill will of his fellow generals.
Bad news met the fugitive at Roussillon. There he heard that his countrymen had suffered a disastrous defeat at Ramillies; that nearly all the Netherlands had been wrested from France; that a heavy defeat had been inflicted upon her at Turin, and that Italy was well nigh lost. It needed, indeed, but the smallest amount of unanimity, enterprise, and confidence on the part of the advisers and generals of King Charles to have placed him securely and permanently upon the throne of Spain.
When the flight of the besieging army was discovered after daybreak by the besieged, they poured out from Barcelona into the deserted camp. All the ordnance and stores of the French had been abandoned. Two hundred heavy brass guns, thirty mortars, and a vast quantity of shot, shells, and intrenching tools, three thousand barrels of powder, ten thousand sacks of corn, and a vast quantity of provisions and stores were found left behind in the camp. Tesse had left, too, all his sick and wounded with a letter to the Earl of Peterborough begging him to see that they were well cared for.
The news of the hasty retreat of Marshal Tesse from before Barcelona caused a shock of surprise throughout Europe. In France it had never been doubted that Barcelona would fall, and as to the insurrection, it was believed that it could be trampled out without difficulty by the twenty-five thousand French veterans whom the marshal had at his disposal. As to the handful of British troops whose exploits had occasioned such astonishment, none had supposed for a moment that they would be able to effect anything when opposed to so overwhelming a force of the disciplined troops of France.
Peterborough himself had hardly hoped to save Barcelona, but, unlike his enemies, he had not considered that the fall of that city would necessarily entail the final defeat of the cause for which he fought. While busying himself with the marches and achievements of the troops under his command, he had never ceased to take measures to provide for the future. His marches and counter marches had made him thoroughly acquainted with the country, and he had won the entire confidence of the people.
He had, therefore, taken measures that even if Barcelona fell Philip should not march back again to his capital. From the day Tesse advanced he had had thousands of the country people at work, under the direction of a few of his own officers, rendering each of the three roads by which the French army could march from Barcelona to Madrid impracticable. Gorges were blocked with vast masses of rock rolled down from the mountain side at spots where t
he road wound along on the face of precipices; and where it had only been made by blasting, it was by similar means entirely destroyed. Bridges were broken down, every castle and town on the lines of retreat placed in a state of defense, and the cattle and provisions driven off to places of safety.
Thus while the earl was himself engaged in the most perilous adventures, he neglected nothing that the most prudent and cautious general could have suggested to insure the success of his plans. Even when affairs looked most unpromising in Barcelona the earl wrote cheerfully to the Duke of Savoy, saying that the circumstances were much better than were generally supposed; and that the French officers, ignorant of the situation of the country, would be astonished at the difficulties that would be opposed to them on advancing even after success; and that if the siege were raised they would be forced to abandon Spain, while all the western frontier would be clear for the progress of Lord Galway and Das Minas to Madrid.
A few days after the retreat of Marshal Tesse, to Jack's great pleasure Graham came into Barcelona. He had, in the confusion of the retreat, had little difficulty in slipping away from his captors. His only danger had been from the peasantry, at whose hands he had narrowly escaped death, as they took him for a French officer; but, upon being convinced by his assurances that he was an Englishman and an aide de camp of the Earl of Peterborough, they had provided him with a horse to make his way back to Barcelona.
CHAPTER XVI: INGRATITUDE
Barcelona rescued, Peterborough at once urged the king to march upon Madrid and have himself proclaimed king in his capital. There was no force which could oppose his advance, and Lord Galway and the Portuguese could move unresisted from the west and meet him there. But it was a long time before Charles and his counselors would listen to his advice; and although at last they agreed to follow it, their resolution was short. In the first place, they determined to leave so large a force to garrison Catalonia that the army available for the advance on Madrid would be very seriously weakened--fifteen hundred English and eleven hundred Spaniards were to be left at Barcelona, sixteen hundred English and Dutch and fifteen hundred Spanish at Gerona, eight hundred and fifty Spanish and Dutch at Lerida, and five hundred Spanish at Tortosa.
This left but sixty-five hundred men available for service in the field, and even this number was subsequently diminished by the vacillating Charles to forty-five hundred.
As Peterborough wrote to Lord Halifax: "We have saved kingdoms in spite of the king, who would abandon them, and we have waged more dangerous war with ministers than with enemies. Lord Galway and the Portuguese generals pass all understanding."
No wonder the earl was astounded by the incompetence of Lord Galway and the Portuguese generals. They had twenty thousand men, while to oppose them there were but five thousand under the Duke of Berwick; and yet after entering Spain they fell back, without doing anything, into Portugal--their retreat beginning on the 11th of May, the day on which Philip retreated from Barcelona. So that on the opposite side of Spain two large armies simultaneously retired before others vastly weaker than themselves. When the news of Tesse's retreat to France reached Portugal they again advanced. Berwick was too weak to oppose them, and on the 25th of June the advance guard of the allies occupied Madrid, and there proclaimed Charles as king.
Had Galway and his colleagues now shown the slightest energy, and moved against Berwick's little force, with which was Philip himself, they could have driven them across the frontier without striking a blow, and the French cause would have been lost in Spain; but, having reached Madrid, they remained there doing absolutely nothing --leaving ample time to Philip to repair his misfortunes, receive aid from France, and recommence the campaign with vigor. As Peterborough wrote indignantly to General Stanhope: "Their halt is as fatal as was Hannibal's at Capua."
As soon as the movement upon Madrid had been decided upon, Peterborough sailed with the English and Dutch infantry to Valencia, where he was received with enthusiasm by the inhabitants. He at once set to work to raise a regiment of dragoons, and organized them in three weeks. The very day they were mounted he marched them upon Castile. During this time not only had Lord Galway made no movement, but he had joined in the German intrigue by which Charles was induced to abandon the plan of marching to his capital under the escort of Peterborough.
The allied generals at Madrid were indeed basely jealous of the brilliant conqueror of Catalonia and Valencia. His deeds had thrown theirs entirely into the shade. With utterly insufficient means he had done everything; with ample means they had effected nothing, and had only been enabled to enter Madrid by the fact that he had drawn off the army which had successfully opposed them.
After incessant labor in organizing his force, the earl sent two thousand men, under the command of Lieutenant General Wyndham, to besiege the towns of Requena and Cuenca--two places of some strength which blocked the road between Valencia and Madrid.
Wyndham easily accomplished the task; and the road being thus secured, Peterborough wrote to Charles that "nothing remained to hinder him from entering Madrid with even a small escort of horse." The earl had everything prepared along the road for the passage of the king; but although he wrote over and over again urging him not to delay, Charles refused to stir, and told General Stanhope (who backed Peterborough's entreaties) that he had "no becoming equipment with which to enter his capital."
"Sire," the English general exclaimed in indignant astonishment, "our William the Third entered London in a hackney, with a cloak bag behind it, and was made king not many weeks after."
A month after the date originally settled Charles set out and proceeded to Taragona, but then, to the astonishment of the English general and envoy, they learned he had altered his mind and taken the route to Saragossa. When he heard the news, Peterborough sent couriers day after day with urgent letters to the king. He prevailed upon a deputation of the Valencian nobility to follow with the same purpose, and transmitted the opinion of a council of war, which was unanimous in entreating the king to stay his steps. The king again hesitated, and was about to follow Peterborough's advice, when a French officer in the Portuguese service arrived from Galway and Das Minas, again urging him to move by the route which they had suggested.
Charles again hesitated, the Count of Cifuentes (who was with him) gave his advice in favor of the Saragossa route, and the king decided on that line.
On the 26th of July the earl summoned a council of war, including the Governor of Valencia, two Spanish generals, and his own officers. They agreed unanimously that Peterborough should march his army to Madrid or join the army in Portugal, as circumstances might require. Just before they started letters came in from the king desiring that Peterborough should send the forces under his command either to relieve the Duke of Savoy or to capture the Balearic Isles.
The earl declined to follow this ungrateful suggestion, which was manifestly intended by Charles and his advisers, English, Portuguese, and German, to send away from his kingdom the man who had won it for him. Being fortunately independent of orders, Peterborough marched for Castile, as he and the council of war had previously determined.
Charles was not long in regretting that he had not followed Lord Peterborough's advice. Instead of the triumphant procession from Saragossa to Madrid, which he had been promised, he was met with the most determined opposition.
Every town and village in the center and south of Spain rose against him; Salamanca and Toledo declared for Philip, and Andalusia raised eighteen thousand men. The troops of Las Torres from Valencia, and those who had retreated under Tesse to Roussillon, had joined Berwick at Xadraque, and Philip had placed himself at the head of this formidable army. Charles was obliged to send in the utmost haste to ask the Earl of Peterborough to extricate him from the position in which he had placed himself by neglecting his advice.
The earl instantly complied with the request, and marching with all speed overtook the king on the 4th of August at Pastrina, and thence on the following day escorted him in saf
ety to the army of Portugal at Guadalaxara.
The total strength of the united allied army was eighteen thousand men--a force inferior, indeed, to that with which Berwick confronted them; and that portion brought by Lord Galway and the Portuguese General Das Minas was not to be relied upon, having fallen into a state of great indiscipline owing to the tedious delays, the frequent retreats, and the long inactivity to which it had been subjected by the incompetence of its leaders. That this was so was evident by the fact that the day after the king's arrival the French made a partial attack, and many of the allied battalions at once fell into complete confusion. But this was not the greatest drawback to the efficiency of the allied army; they were paralyzed by the dissensions of their commanders--Galway, Das Minas, and the Dutch Count de Noyelles. Each and all declined to acknowledge Peterborough as commander in chief. The earl then offered to waive his own rights entirely and to fight as a simple volunteer, and that Das Minas, Lord Galway, and the Dutch general should each command their own forces, receiving their orders from the king.
This offer was, however, refused by the three generals. The partisans of the various leaders shared their animosity. The English troops of Peterborough claiming, and justly, that Catalonia and Valencia had been gained and won by him, and that to him alone the king owed his crown, were furious that those who had shown naught but incapacity from the commencement of the campaign should now refuse to recognize his authority. While the disputes continued Berwick had nearly succeeded in surprising Galway, and a disastrous defeat had only been prevented by the gallant defense made by Lord Tyrawley of an outpost which he commanded, and which he held for two hours against all the efforts of the French, and so gave time for the army to make a hasty retreat.