But have they, on this account, ever neglected to calculate upon the advantages which might fairly be anticipated from future warfare?
Or, in a treaty of to-day, have they ever forgotten a victory of yesterday?
Eager to grasp at the double honour of captain and negociator, have they ever sacrificed the one to the other; or, in the blind effort, lost both?
Above all, in their readiness to flourish with the pen, have they ever overlooked the sword, the symbol of their power, and the appropriate instrument of their success and glory?
I notice this assumption of a double character on the part of the French, not to lament over it and its consequences, but to render somewhat more intelligible the conduct of our own Generals; and to explain how far men, whom we have no reason to believe other than brave, have, through the influence of such example, lost sight of their primary duties, apeing instead of imitating, and following only to be misled.
It is indeed deplorable, that our Generals, from this infirmity, or from any other cause, did not assume that lofty deportment which the character and relative strength of the two armies authorized them, and the nature of the service upon which they were sent, enjoined them to assume;--that they were in such haste to treat--that, with such an enemy (let me say at once,) and in such circumstances, they should have treated at all.

Is it possible that they could ever have asked themselves who that enemy was, how he came into that country, and what he had done there?
From the manifesto of the Portugueze government, issued at Rio Janeiro, and from other official papers, they might have learned, what was notorious to all Europe, that this body of men commissioned by Bonaparte, in the time of profound peace, without a declaration of war, had invaded Portugal under the command of Junot, who had perfidiously entered the country, as the General of a friendly and allied Power, assuring the people, as he advanced, that he came to protect their Sovereign against an invasion of the English; and that, when in this manner he had entered a peaceable kingdom, which offered no resistance, and had expelled its lawful Sovereign, he wrung from it unheard-of contributions, ravaged it, cursed it with domestic pillage and open sacrilege; and that, when this unoffending people, unable to endure any longer, rose up against the tyrant, he had given their towns and villages to the flames, and put the whole country, thus resisting, under military execution .-- Setting aside all natural sympathy with the Portugueze and Spanish nations, and all prudential considerations of regard or respect for _their feelings_ towards these men, and for _their expectations_ concerning the manner in which they ought to be dealt with, it is plain that the French had forfeited by their crimes all right to those privileges, or to those modes of intercourse, which one army may demand from another according to the laws of war.

They were not soldiers in any thing but the power of soldiers, and the outward frame of an army.

During their occupation of Portugal, the laws and customs of war had never been referred to by them, but as a plea for some enormity, to the aggravated oppression of that unhappy country! Pillage, sacrilege, and murder--sweeping murder and individual assassination, had been proved against them by voices from every quarter.

They had outlawed themselves by their offences from membership in the community of war, and from every species of community acknowledged by reason.