724 ANNUAL REGISTER, 1809. 



has been enabled to reach the 

 highest pinnacle of success and of 

 glory, without making any of those 

 ruinous sacrifices which destroy her 

 enemies. In fact, notwithstanding 

 the successive calls, up to the pre- 

 sent moment, made upon the dif- 

 ferent classes of conscripts, scarcely 

 have one-fourth of those who com- 

 posed them, taken the field. 



In considering the situation of 

 your majesty's armies and the re- 

 Bults of the English expedition, can 

 we, without a degree of satisfaction, 

 behold England, in imitation of 

 Austria, making efforts dispropor- 

 tionate to her means, and the wants 

 of her navy ? What can she expect 

 from this contest upon land, and 

 man to man with France, that shall 

 not redound to her own injury and 

 disgrace f 



Sire, the French people will have 

 to thank your majesty for the inex- 

 pressible advantage and glory of a 

 peace, conquered without maritime 

 expeditions, from an enemy who, 

 by his situation, thought himself 

 free from all attack. Every serious 

 attempt upon the continent, on the 

 part of the English, is a step to- 

 wards a general peace. 



The Ei'glish ministers, who pre- 

 ceded the members of the present 

 government, a more able set of men 

 than the latter, were well convinced 

 of this truth, and took good care 

 rot to commit themselves in an un- 

 equal contest. It did not escape 

 their observation, that to carry on 

 a long war, it was necessary that it 

 should press lightly upon the peo- 

 ple who had to support it. 



Within the last twelve months, 

 the war has cost England more 

 blood than she had previously shed 

 from the period when she broke the 

 peace of Amiens; committed in the 



battles of Spain and Portugal, 

 whence her duty and her interest 

 forbid her to recede, she will see 

 those countries become the tomb of 

 her bravest warriors. Sorrow for 

 their loss will at length produce in 

 the minds of the English people a 

 well-founded abhorrence of those 

 cruel men, whose ambition andfran- 

 tic hatred dared to pronounce the 

 expression of eternal war. It will 

 excite in that people the wish for a 

 general peace, which every man of 

 good sense may predict to be near 

 at hand, if the English persist in a 

 continental contest. 

 I am with respect, &c. 

 The Minister at War, 

 Count De Hunneburgh. 



Report of the Motives of the Pro- 

 ject of the Senatus Constdtum, 

 relative to a Levy of 36,000 

 Conscripts, on the classes of 

 1806, 1807, 1808, 1809 and 

 1810, 1)1/ the Count de Cessac, 

 Orator of the Council of State. 



This Report, after many adula- 

 tions on the genius of the emperor 

 and king, and a high-coloured pa- 

 negyric on the loyalty andexertions 

 of the French nation, proceeds to 

 explain the causes of the levy : 



•' The enemies of France," says 

 the orator, " observing that we le- 

 vied the classes of 1809 and 1810, 

 before the period in which they 

 were to be called into action, 

 thought, without doubt, that we 

 had recourse to that mode, because 

 none of the resources of former 

 years were left to us. How great 

 was their mistake ! If the French 

 government had adopted that line 

 of conduct, it was because it could 



never 



