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FORE:Buonaparte had arrived at Vittoria on the 8th of November, between the defeat of Blake at Espinosa and his dispersion at Reynosa, and he immediately dispatched Soult to attack Belvedere. This self-confident commander of two-and-twenty��surrounded by as self-confident students from Salamanca and Leon��instead of falling back, and forming a junction with Casta?os, stood his ground in an open plain in front of Burgos, and was scattered to the winds. Between three and four thousand of his men were killed, wounded, or taken prisoners, and all his cannon and baggage captured. Buonaparte had now only to beat Casta?os, and there was an end to the whole Spanish force. That general was much more cautious and prudent than the rest, and he fell back on the approach of Marshal Lannes, at the head of thirty thousand men, to Tudela. But Buonaparte had sent numerous bodies of troops to intercept his course in the direction of Madrid, and, unfortunately for Casta?os, he was joined by Palafox, who had made so successful a stand against the French at Saragossa. Casta?os was for retreating still, to avoid Lannes in front, and Ney and Victor, who were getting into his rear; but Palafox, and others of his generals, strongly recommended his fighting, and a commissioner sent from the Junta in Madrid, in the French fashion, to see that he did his duty, joined in the persuasion, by hinting that to retreat would give suspicion of cowardice and treachery. Against his better judgment, Casta?os, therefore, gave battle on the 22nd of November, at Tudela, and was completely routed. Palafox hastened back to Saragossa, which was destined to surrender after another frightful siege. The road was now left open to Madrid, and the French troops had orders to advance and reduce it; and they did this with a fiendish ferocity, burning the towns and villages as they proceeded, and shooting every Spaniard that they found in arms.

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TWO:The year 1812 opened, in England, by the assembling of Parliament on the 7th of January. The speech of the Regent was again delivered by commission. The great topic was the success of the war in Spain under Lord Wellington, whose military talents were highly praised. There was a reference also to the disagreements with America, and the difficulty of coming to any amicable arrangement with the United States. Lords Grey and Grenville, in the Peers, pronounced sweeping censures on the continuance of the war with France, and on the policy of Ministers towards America, from which source they prognosticated many disasters. In the Commons, the Opposition used similar language; and Sir Francis Burdett took a very gloomy view of our relations both with France and North America, and declared that we could anticipate no better policy until we had reformed our representative system.

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FORE:Napoleon's saying about French revolutions was verified in 1830. The shock of the political earthquake was felt throughout the Continent, and severed Belgium from Holland. The inhabitants of Brussels began their revolt by resistance to local taxes, and ended by driving the[320] Dutch garrison out of the city, and proclaiming the independence of Belgium. The Duke of Wellington had no difficulty about the prompt recognition of the de facto Government of France. The change of dynasty had not been officially communicated to him many hours when he sent instructions to the British ambassador to enter into friendly relations with the new Government. He had not, however, the same facility in recognising the independence of Belgium. He had been instrumental in establishing the kingdom of the Netherlands; and he regarded the union as being a portion of the great European settlement of 1815, which ought not to be disturbed without the concurrence of the Great Powers by which it was effected. This hesitation on his part to hail the results of successful revolution added to his unpopularity. In the meantime a dangerous spirit of disaffection and disorder began to manifest itself in the south of England. Incendiary fires had preceded the Revolution in France, especially in Normandy, and they were supposed to have had a political object. Similar preludes of menaced revolution occurred during the autumn in some of the English counties nearest the French coast, in Kent, Sussex, Surrey, and Hampshire. Night after night, in the most fertile districts, the sky was reddened with the blaze of burning stack-yards. Crowds of the working classes, complaining of want of employment, went about throughout the country, breaking the threshing-machines, which had then come into extensive use. The Government were compelled to employ force to put down these disturbances��a fact which supplied inflammatory arguments to agitators, who denounced the Duke of Wellington as the chief cause of the distress of the working classes. Such was the state of things when the new Parliament met on the 26th of October.So soon as the House of Commons assembled, and before the Speaker read the Speech which had been delivered from the Throne, Mr. Brougham made the first significant move in the game that was about to be played, by announcing[322] that he would that day fortnight submit to the House a proposition on the great question of Parliamentary Reform. Having determined to give notice of his intention when there was a question before the House, he was enabled to accompany his notice with an explanation. This was his explanation:��"He had," he said, "by one party been described as intending to bring forward a very limited, and therefore useless and insignificant, plan; by another, he was said to be the friend of a radical, sweeping, and innovating, and, I may add, for I conscientiously believe it would prove so, a revolutionary reform." Both these imputed schemes he disavowed. "I stand on the ancient way of the Constitution." To explain at that moment what the details of this plan were to be would have then been inconvenient��was, indeed, impossible. "But," said Mr. Brougham, "my object in bringing forward this question is not revolution, but restoration��to repair the Constitution, not to pull it down." This notice was a master-stroke of policy.

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