The Duke of Wellington thus commenced his military career in India. He returned to England in 1805, to take the command of a brigade in the army about to proceed to the Continent, under Lord Cathcart; Germany being now the destination of the general who had lately gathered laurels on the burning plains of Hindostan. The expedition, however, was recalled, in consequence of the glorious victory obtained by Napoleon at Austerlitz, which caused the death of Mr. Pitt; for in England, that country of noble and elevated feelings, the destruction of a great enterprise breaks the heart of a statesman. The political life of Wellington dates its commencement from this period. The English aristocracy are filled with devotion to their country, and the Tories enter into her interests with their whole hearts; indeed, it is by no means a rare occurrence in England to see a man at the same time a member of parliament and employed on active service, for the life of Toryism is essentially patriotic. This intermingling of political situations and duties with military customs leads to the habits of order and method observable in the majorities and minorities that occur upon parliamentary questions; people obey their party or their opinions as they would their commanding officer. In 1806 the town of Newport, in the Isle of Wight, elected Sir Arthur as their representative in the House of Commons, and in the same year he married Miss Pakenham, sister to the Earl of Longford; shortly after which he was appointed secretary to Ireland under the Duke of Richmond. He commanded the reserve of the army under Lord Cathcart during the expedition to Copenhagen, which occasioned such stormy debates in parliament; and the capitulation of the city, an affair discussed, settled, and signed in the course of one night, was entrusted to him. By the terms of this capitulation the whole of the Danish fleet fell into the hands of the English. Upon this occasion an unanimous vote of thanks to the army was passed in both houses of parliament, and the Speaker of the House of Commons addressed the general individually when he again took his seat after his return to England.
The theatre of war was gradually increasing, and, in 1808, Sir Arthur received orders to embark for Corunna and oppose the victorious armies of France, now assembled under chiefs whose fame resounded through the whole of Europe; for Spain had been invaded, and England sought to measure her strength in the field with that of Napoleon. The fleet was directed towards Oporto, and Sir Arthur effected his landing in Portugal in the face of the brave regiments of the great army, at the time when Junot was assuming a regal position at Lisbon: the monarchy of the house of Braganza appeared at this period like a brilliant ring, which was successively fitted on the finger of all the adventurous chiefs, despatched as a sort of disgrace to Portugal by Napoleon. General Junot compromised the army by his want of capacity and his vain pretensions, and the 21st of August was marked by the battle of Vimiera, where the attack was commenced by the French. The complete destitution of the army rendered a treaty necessary, and by the miserable capitulation, called the Convention of Cintra, it was agreed that the French should evacuate Portugal and return into France with their arms and baggage. Sir Arthur did not sign this convention, and the real author of it, Sir Hew Dalrymple, being violently attacked by the opposition, Sir Arthur quitted the army to be present at the debates, and at the trial of Sir Hew by a court-martial. The Convention of Cintra has been greatly blamed by Lord Byron in his poem of "Childe Harold." Dalrymple was deprived of his command, and he was succeeded by Sir Arthur Wellesley, who landed at Lisbon on the 22d of August, 1809. By the direction of Napoleon, the most bitter ridicule was cast upon him in the _Moniteur_; those wretched declamations against his adversaries were a weak and contemptible trait in the emperor's character, shewing a spirit of littleness in the midst of all his great qualities. The following is the article he dictated in Paris, with a mixture of folly and presumption:--