measures by its deliberate supineness; echoes might reach him of
the voices at St. Stephen's that loudly dubbed his dispositions rash,
presumptuous and silly; catch-halfpenny journalists at home and men
of the stamp of Lord Grey might exploit their abysmal military
ignorance in reckless criticism and censure of his operations; he
knew what a passionate storm of anger and denunciation had arisen
from the Opposition when he had been raised to the peerage some
months earlier, after the glorious victory of Talavera, and how,
that victory notwithstanding, it had been proclaimed that his
conduct of the campaign was so incompetent as to deserve, not reward,
but punishment; and he was aware of the growing unpopularity of the
war in England, knew that the Government - ignorant of what he was
so laboriously preparing - was chafing at his inactivity of the
past few months, so that a member of the Cabinet wrote to him
exasperatedly, incredibly and fatuously -- "for God's sake do
something -- anything so that blood be spilt."

A heart less stout might have been broken, a genius less mighty
stifled in this evil tangle of stupidity, incompetence and
malignity that sprang up and flourished about him can every hand.
A man less single-minded must have succumbed to exasperation, thrown
up his command and taken ship for home, inviting some of his
innumerable critics to take his place at the head of the troops,
and give free rein to the military genius that inspired their
critical dissertations. Wellington, however, has been rightly
termed of iron, and never did he show himself more of iron than in
those trying days of 1810. Stern, but with a passionless sternness,
he pursued his way towards the goal he had set himself, allowing no
criticism, no censure, no invective so much as to give him pause in
his majestic progress.