THREE:His plan for his chef-d'?uvre, St. Paul's, like his grand plan for the City, with its principal streets ninety feet wide, its second-rate streets sixty, and its third-rate thirty, was rejected. This cathedral was a composition compact and simple, consisting of a single general octagonal mass, surmounted by a dome, and extended on its west side by a portico, and a short nave or vestibule within. The great idea of Wren was to adapt it to Protestant worship, and therefore he produced a design for the interior, the parts of which were beautifully grouped together so as to produce at once regularity and intricacy, yet without those long side aisles and recesses, which the processions and confessionals of Roman Catholic worship require. The whole long period of Wren's erection of this noble pile was one continued battle with the conceit, ignorance, and dogmatism of the commissioners, who made his life a bitter martyrdom; and when we read the admired inscription in St. Paul's, "Si monumentum requiris, circumspice," we behold, on obeying its injunction, only what Wren did, not what he suffered in doing it.And, in fact, circumstances rendered it advisable to retreat. Joseph Buonaparte, with the reinforcements of Sebastiani, had joined Victor, and that general felt ready to advance. At the same time Wellesley learned that Soult had arrived in Palencia, in the British rear. He desired Cuesta to guard the pass of Puerto de Ba?os, but this he did so ineffectually that both Soult and Mortier marched through it. Ney also reached Palencia, and thus fifty-three thousand men were threatening to cut off Sir Arthur's route to Portugal. He determined to fall back on Oropesa, leaving Cuesta to defend Talavera, and protect the two thousand British wounded in the hospitals; but Cuesta speedily abandoned the place, leaving one thousand five hundred of the wounded behind, whom Victor, to his honour, treated in the most humane manner. With the road of the enemy thus left open in his rear in two directions, Sir Arthur, at the same time, learned that Soult's division had got between him and the bridge of Alvarez, in the direct line of his march into Portugal. His situation, thus hemmed in by overwhelming forces, was most critical, and he informed Cuesta that he must file off for Badajos. He reached Badajos safely on the 2nd of September, carrying the one thousand five hundred wounded with him. These he sent to the strongly fortified town of Elvas, in Portuguese territory, which now became the great hospital of the army. Sir Arthur, on the 7th of September, was informed of the arrival of Sir Robert Wilson at Castello Branco. He had conducted his little force almost to the gates of Madrid, and had made a powerful diversion in favour of the main army, by keeping King Joseph and the French General in constant fear of his joining Venegas and attacking the capital. On his return, by order of Wellesley, he had gallantly fought his way against vastly superior forces, always contriving to make the enemy believe that his strength was double what it was. His conduct of this expedition elicited the most cordial praises from the Commander-in-Chief. At this juncture Napoleon sent a dispatch, ordering the army in Spain to cease further offensive operations till the conclusion of the Austrian war enabled him to send fresh reinforcements into Spain. This was a proof that Buonaparte no longer hoped to beat the British army by any but the most preponderating masses. He had in Spain ten times the forces of the British, yet he could not hope for victory from this vast disproportion. Wellesley, at this very time, in one of his dispatches, had observed this great fact. "I conceive," he said, "that the French are dangerous only in large masses." The British army was therefore quartered on the line of the Guadarama, to protect Portugal from Soult, and remained undisturbed till the following May. Whilst the hostile forces were thus resting, the news reached Sir Arthur that he had been created Baron Douro of Wellesley, and Viscount Wellington of Talavera. This honour had been conferred upon him on the 4th of September, as soon as possible after the arrival of[579] the news of his brilliant and memorable victory at Talavera.
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