Nempe, qui aliis iter rectum ostendere solebamus, nunc (quod exitio proximum est) coeci coecis ducibus per abrupta rapimur; alienoque circumvolvimur exemplo; quid velimus, nescii.  Nam (ut coeptum exequar) totum hoc malum, seu nostrum proprium seu potius omnium gentium commune, IGNORATIO FINIS facit.  Nesciunt inconsulti homines quid agant:  ideo quicquid agunt, mox ut coeperint, vergit in nauseam.  Hinc ille discursus sine termino; hinc, medio calle, discordiae; et, ante exitum, DAMNATA PRINCIPIA; et explete nihil.’

As an act of respect to the English reader—­I shall add, to the same purpose, the words of our own Milton; who, contemplating our ancestors in his day, thus speaks of them and their errors:—­’Valiant, indeed, and prosperous to win a field; but, to know the end and reason of winning, injudicious and unwise.  Hence did their victories prove as fruitless, as their losses dangerous; and left them still languishing under the same grievances that men suffer conquered.  Which was indeed unlikely to go otherwise; unless men more than vulgar bred up in the knowledge of ancient and illustrious deeds, invincible against many and vain titles, impartial to friendships and relations, had conducted their affairs.’

THE END.

APPENDIX.

* * * * *

A (page 67).

When this passage was written, there had appeared only unauthorized accounts of the Board of Inquiry’s proceedings.  Neither from these however, nor from the official report of the Board (which has been since published), is any satisfactory explanation to be gained on this question—­or indeed on any other question of importance.  All, which is to be collected from them, is this:  the Portugueze General, it appears, offered to unite his whole force with the British on the single condition that they should be provisioned from the British stores; and, accordingly, rests his excuse for not co-operating on the refusal of Sir Arthur Wellesley to comply with this condition.  Sir A.W. denies the validity of his excuse; and, more than once, calls it a pretence; declaring that, in his belief, Gen. Freire’s real motive for not joining was—­a mistrust in the competence of the British to appear in the field against the French.  This however is mere surmise; and therefore cannot have much weight with those who sincerely sought for satisfaction on this point:  moreover, it is a surmise of the individual whose justification rests on making it appear that the difficulty did not arise with himself; and it is right to add, that the only fact produced goes to discredit this surmise; viz. that Gen. Friere did, without any delay, furnish the whole number of troops which Sir Arthur engaged to feed.  However the Board exhibited so little anxiety to be satisfied on this point, that no positive information was gained.

A reference being here first made to the official report of the Board of Inquiry; I shall make use of the opportunity which it offers to lay before the reader an outline of that Board’s proceedings; from which it will appear how far the opinion—­pronounced, by the national voice, upon the transactions in Portugal—­ought, in sound logic, to be modified by any part of those proceedings.