It was on the 8th of August, 1808—­a day ever memorable in the history of Britain—­that Sir Arthur Wellesley effected his debarkation in the bay of Mondego.  He immediately commenced his march towards Lisbon, and on the 17th came up with the enemy under General Laborde, strongly posted on an eminence near Rorica.  The French contested their ground gallantly, but were driven from it at the point of the bayonet, and compelled to retreat.  The British General, having hardly any cavalry, was unable to pursue them so closely as he otherwise would have done:  and Laborde succeeded in joining his shattered division to the rest of the French forces in Portugal.  Junot (recently created Duke of Abrantes) now took the command in person; and finding himself at the head of full 24,000 troops, while the English army were greatly inferior in numbers, and miserably supplied with cavalry and artillery, he did not hesitate to assume the offensive.  On the 21st of August he attacked Sir Arthur at Vimiero.  In the language of the English General’s despatch, “a most desperate contest ensued”; and the result was “a signal defeat,” Junot, having lost thirteen cannon and more than two thousand men, immediately fell back upon Lisbon, where his position was protected by the strong defile of the Torres Vedras.

This retreat would not have been accomplished without much more fighting, had Sir Arthur Wellesley been permitted to follow up his victory, according to the dictates of his own understanding and the enthusiastic wishes of his army.  But just as the battle was about to begin, Sir Harry Burrard, an old officer of superior rank, unfortunately entitled to assume the chief command, arrived on the field.  Finding that Sir Arthur had made all his dispositions, General Burrard handsomely declined interfering until the fortune of the day should be decided; but he took the command as soon as the victory was won, and more cautiously than wisely, prevented the army from instantly advancing, as Sir Arthur Wellesley proposed, upon the coast road towards Mafra, and thus endeavouring to intercept the retreat of Junot upon Lisbon.  Sir Harry, having made this unhappy use of his command, was, the very next day, superseded in his turn by Sir Hew Dalrymple, the Governor of Gibraltar; another veteran more disposed to imitate the prudence of Burrard than the daring of Wellesley.

Shortly after the third general had taken the command, Junot sent Kellerman to demand a truce, and propose a convention for the evacuation of Portugal by the troops under his orders.  Dalrymple received Kellerman with more eagerness of civility than became the chief of a victorious army, and forthwith granted the desired armistice.  Junot offered to surrender his magazine, stores, and armed vessels, provided the British would disembark his soldiers, with their arms, at any French port between Rochefort and L’Orient, and permit them to take with them their private property; and Dalrymple did not hesitate to agree to these terms,