Rash as he was, even Cuesta would hardly have been so deluded. Upon his resignation Eguia had only held the command while the government could look about for a successor. Castaños was under a cloud; the inquiry which he demanded had never been granted, and though public opinion was beginning to regard him as his past services and real worth deserved, there was no thought of again employing him. Alburquerque was an object of jealousy; Romana of dislike and fear. Areizaga therefore, who had been highly commended by Blake for his conduct in the battle of Alcañiz, was removed from the command at Lerida to be placed at the head of 50,000 men. Alburquerque, who had from 9000 to 10,000 in Extremadura, was ordered to join Parque, and place himself under his orders; while Areizaga, with the greatest force that they could collect, was instructed ♦STATE OF MADRID.♦ to advance upon Madrid. What they knew concerning the state of that city might well excite their feelings, and raise in them a strong desire of delivering its inhabitants from their bondage; but there was nothing to encourage the extravagant hopes which they entertained. The national feeling existed nowhere in greater strength, though there was no other place wherein so many traitors were collected; all who in other parts of the country had made themselves conspicuous as partizans of Joseph, having fled thither when they could not abide in safety elsewhere. To leave the capital was an enterprise of the utmost danger for those who were willing to sacrifice every thing, and take their chance in the field against the invaders: any one might enter; but in the course of a few hours it was known who the stranger was, whence he came, where he was harboured, what was his business, and who were his connexions, ... every thing which the most vigilant police, and the most active system of espionage could discover. The tradesmen and those whose means of subsistence were not destroyed by the revolution were oppressed by heavy and frequent exactions; the Intruder’s ministers knew the impolicy of this, but nevertheless were compelled to impose these burdens; and after the atrocities which they had sanctioned, they could suffer nothing more either in character or in peace of mind. Otherwise, even in Madrid, where a strong military force kept every thing in order, and where none of the immediate evils of war were felt, there were sights which might have wrung the heart. Men and women, who had been born and bred in opulence, begged in the streets, as soon as evening had closed, ... the feelings of better times preventing them from exposing their misery in the daylight. But what most wounded the Spanish temper was the condition of their clergy, and monks, and friars, who, suffering as it were as confessors under the intrusive government, worked as daily labourers for their support, employing in hard and coarse labour hands which, the Spaniards said, were consecrated by the use of holy oil, and by contact with the Body of our Lord!