Note 73 — CONNECTING CHAPTER.

Disastrous as Sir John Moore’s campaign proved, the French accounts circulated over the continent grossly exaggerated the real loss of our army, and heavy indeed it was. “Three British regiments,” they said, “the 42nd, 50th, and 52nd, had been entirely destroyed in the action—and Sir John Moore killed in attempting to charge at their head with the vain hope of restoring the fortune of the day. The English had lost every thing which constitutes an army, artillery, horses, baggage, ammunition, magazines, and military chests. Of eighty pieces of cannon they had landed, they had re-embarked no more than 12,—200,000 weight of powder, 16,000 muskets, and 2,000,000 of treasure (about 83,000l.), had fallen into the hands of the pursuers, and treasure yet more considerable had been thrown down the precipices along the road between Astorga and Corunna, where the peasantry and the soldiers were now collecting it. Five thousand horses had been counted which they had slaughtered upon the way—five hundred were taken at Corunna, and the carcases of twelve hundred were infecting the streets when the conquerors entered that town. The English would have occupied Ferrol, and seized the squadron there, had it not been for the precipitance of their retreat, and the result of the battle to which they had been brought at last. Thus, then, had terminated their expedition into Spain! Thus, after having fomented the war in that unhappy country, had they abandoned it to its fate! In another season of the year not a man of them would have escaped; now, the facility of breaking up the bridges, the rapidity of the winter torrents, shortness of days, and length of nights, had favoured their retreat.”