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Before quitting that post, he had written to Marshal Soult, continually occupied in Andalusia: "I beseech you, Monsieur le Marechal, in the name of a sentiment sacred to all French hearts of the sentiment which inflames us all for the interests and glory of our august master to present at the soonest possible moment a corps of troops upon the left bank of the Tagus, opposite to the mouth of the Zezere.
Patrick's Day. I and Prince Talleyrand danced a double hornpipe with Pauline Bonaparte and Madame de Stael; Marshal Soult went down a couple of sets with Madame Recamier; and Robespierre's widow an excellent, gentle creature, quite unlike her husband stood up with the Austrian ambassador.
On the fourteenth Soult triumphed at Memingen, capturing a corps of 6000 Austrians; and on the same day Ney literally overran the territory which was soon to become his Duchy of Elchingen. Napoleon out-generaled the main division of the enemy at Ulm. The Austrians, under General Mack, 33,000 strong, were cooped up in the town and, on the seventeenth of October, forced to capitulate.
"That settles the question, Herrara. The French are retracing their steps, and bound for Orense. Soult has not let the grass grow under his feet, and the cavalry are evidently sent on to clear out any bands of peasants that may be gathering at the rivers." La Houssaye, indeed, twice in the course of the day broke up irregular bands, and burned two villages.
The great Warwick of England, the putter-up and the puller-down of kings, did not know his letters; Marshal Soult, the greatest of Napoleon's marshals, could not write a correct sentence in French; and Stevenson, the greatest engineer the world ever saw the inventor of the locomotive engine did not know his letters at twenty-one years of age, and was always illiterate.
The army of Wellington, formerly kept immovable by Massena at Torres Vedras, became every day a danger for those who had not been able, or who had not been willing, to go to the aid of the expedition in Portugal. Our forces, everywhere dispersed, were everywhere insufficient. Marshal Soult, justly uneasy, demanded reinforcements from all sides.
Meantime Wellington defeated Soult in the Pyrenees, and invaded France from that side. But the preponderance of numbers on the side of the allies was too great. Their bold decision to march on Paris secured their triumph. Napoleon had lost his hold on the ruling bodies.
When hostilities were resumed in the middle of February, 1814, the Anglo-Portuguese and Spanish force combined outnumbered the French by nearly five to three, but Soult retained the decisive advantage of having a strong point d'appui in Bayonne at the confluence of the Nive and Adour.
It will also be remembered that Marshal Soult to his lasting disgrace be it recorded treated the ashes of Cervantes in a similar manner; a most petty and disgraceful meanness for a marshal of France to be guilty of. The Mahawanso, "Genealogy of the Great," a native chronicle, contains a history of the several dynasties which have controlled the island from B. C. 543 down to A. D. 1758.
Thus while Napoleon was gasping at Moscow, his brother was expelled from Madrid, until the recall of Soult from Andalusia gave the French a superiority in the centre of Spain which forced Wellington to retire to Ciudad Rodrigo. He lost the fruits of his victory, save that Andalusia was freed: but he saved his army for the triumphant campaign of 1813.
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