At the moment when the insurrection occurred, 20,000 Spanish troops were in Portugal under the orders of Junot; 15,000 more, under the Marquis de Romana, were serving Napoleon in Holstein.

There remained 40,000 Spanish regulars, 11,000 Swiss, and 30,000 militia; but of the best of these the discipline, when compared with French or English armies, was contemptible.

The nobility, to whose order the chief officers belonged, were divided in their sentiments--perhaps the greater number inclined to the interests of Joseph.

Above all, the troops were scattered, in small sections, over the face of the whole country, and there was no probability that any one regular army should be able to muster so strong as to withstand the efforts of a mere fragment of the French force already established within the kingdom.

The fleets of Spain had been destroyed in the war with England: her commerce and revenues had been mortally wounded by the alliance with France and the maladministration of Godoy.