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moment; threatening the duke's safety; for at the moment the guns reached 
the summit; the gunners were still labouring; breathless, only half-way up the 
ascent. The enemy, from some inexplicable reason, failed to charge or move 
till the guns opened fire." 1 2 History repeats itself. The very self-same 
incident happened, forty-two years afterwards, on the knoll above the river 
Alma! 
It was fortunate for the duke that the Peninsula is, in general, a country 
ill-adapted for artillery, for his artillery was constantly inferior to that of the 
enemy. In 1812, he complained that his army had never had with it “an 
equipment of ordnance at all consistent with its numbers;" 3 and in 1813, he 
wrote to Government that owing to the deficiency in the number of horses, he 
would be obliged, “ as usual," not only to take the field with an equipment 
of artillery far inferior to that of the French, but without a single spare 
horse ! 3 Finally, the driver corps, on which the success of the field artillery 
so essentially depended, “ was a perfect military anomaly, so constituted as to 
render its own discipline or efficiency unattainable." 4 These were serious 
obstacles to success: but no clanger could disturb, no difficulty could delay, 
no discouragement could arrest the victorious progress of the Boyal Artillery; 
and its conduct in the field drew from General Foy the noblest meed of praise 
that has ever been bestowed on any branch of the British army by a foreigner 
and an enemy :—“ Les canonniers Anglaises se distinguent entre les autres 
soldats par le bon esprit qui les anime. En bataille, leur activite est judicieux, 
leur coup-d'oeil parfait, et leur bravoure sto'ique." These words, be it 
remembered, were written in no times of friendly alliances and commercial 
treaties, but at a moment when, with Napoleon chained, like Prometheus, to 
a rock in mid-ocean, and with the disaster of Waterloo still fresh in their 
memories, the French were our bitterest enemies in Europe. 5 
I have already explained that, previous to the French Bevolution, not only 
was the English artillery influenced by the same general causes that depressed 
the service throughout Europe, but, in addition, by the evil pressure of the 
navy. If, under such circumstances, the English artillery kept pace with the 
continental artilleries, it might be inferred that on the removal of the influence 
of the navy at the breaking out of the French Bevolution, the English artillery 
would shortly outstrip its neighbours. And such was in reality the case, if we 
may trust—and there is no reason to distrust—French officers. The English 
artillery, says Gen. Fave, which was inferior to most others in the first 
campaigns of the Bevolution, made such extraordinary advances during the 
progress of the war, that before the conclusion of the Peninsular War, the 
English materiel might have been taken as a model by any nation in Europe. 6 
General Foy, who saw the English artillery after the Convention of Cintra, 
1808, declares that no artillery could compare with the English in the light- 
1 “ Notes on the Organisation, &c., of the Artillery,” 1856. p. 16. 
2 Dispatch, Villa Toro, 18th Oct. 1812. 
3 Dispatch, Frenada, 14th April, 1813. 
4 “ Report on the Numerical Deficiency, &c., of the Royal Artillery,” by Sir Robert Gardiner, 
X.C.B., R.H.A., 1848, p. 15. Wellington’s Judge-Advocate-General pronounced the drivers to be 
“ the greatest blackguards in the army.”—Larpent’s “Journal, &c.” 
3 Foy’s “Hist, de la Guerre de ia Peninsule,” though not published till 1827, was written 
in 1817. 
6 “Le Passe et l’Avenir de 1’Art.” Tom,. V, p. 64. 
