Note 723 — SECTION XVI: CHAPTER VIII

From Soult’s dispatch of Aug. 13, it appears that a Colonel Ornano, with a regiment of dragoons, was detailed to examine the banks of the Tagus in search of the ford, but failed to find it. The cause is not hard to seek, for it crosses the river diagonally on a narrow shelf of rock with deep water on either side. It is not less than four feet deep, and Leach of the 95th, who was on guard at its southern end, describes it as ‘not exactly practicable for infantry even at the driest season of the year’ (p. 94). The English, knowing its exact course, were established in positions from which they could concentrate upon it in a few minutes. We may rationally suppose, therefore, that Ney would have found the Tagus not less difficult to pass on Aug. 9, than the Oitaben had been on June 8.