Note 653 — SECTION XXVIII: CHAPTER II

See especially Schepeler (i. 438). Arteche (x. 317) grants that he had not the iron resolution of Alvarez, the governor of Gerona, but thinks that he did his honest best, and this I think can hardly be denied. His own narrative is simple and modest, but does not conceal the fact that he was from the first downhearted, and feared the worst. Napier (iii. 240) calls him vacillating and deceitful. There is some foundation for the former charge (see p. 513 below), but the latter seems unjustifiable. The only evidence brought to justify the accusation can be explained away (see Codrington’s letters in the appendix to Napier, vol. iii).