iv PREFACE. 



British officers and soldiers in Egypt, Italy, Spain and Por- 

 tugal, and wherever they were not overpowered by supe- 

 riority of numbers, will not be lost to his country. It ex- 

 cites confidence as well as admiration ia our allies, and 

 those who may be disposed to become our allies, and 

 in the same proportion tends to check and awe the con- 

 quering boldness of the enemy. Nor will even our dis- 

 comfitures and sufferings be wholly lost, if the experi- 

 ence of what is past inspire greater wisdom into our fu- 

 ture councils. Our losses, great £s they are in blood and 

 treasure, may be in some degree compensated by an aug- 

 mentation of moral power, greater political prudence and 

 sagacity, and a thorough conviction on the part of both 

 ministers and generals, that nothing succeeds in war 

 without a plan, a plan profoundly combined, and well 

 digested. 



The event most auspicious to the British empire, in 

 1809, is one of an incidental nature, and which it does 

 not appear that government had at all in contemplation. 

 We allude to the liberation of some islands on the west 

 of Greece, from the oppression of France, and the resto- 

 ration of the Government of the Septinsular Republic* 

 This achievement, followed up by such measures as may 

 Britannize, as it were, all the other Grecian islands, may- 

 prevent the French interest from ever becoming para- 

 mount in that quarter. By pursuing a system of maritime 

 and insular policy, a system not of conquest, but of 

 friendship and alliance with the vast continent of Ame- 

 rica, 

 * Vide Hist, of Europe, p. 228. 



