train, for the reduction of London, should the capita resolve to hold out.
As soon as a sufficient force had been landed to enable the Commander-in-Chief to march, he ordered the advance of two army corps of 120,000 men, one corps going by Chatham, and the other by Maidstone, while a third was left as a reserve at Dover. No attempt was made to impede the advance of this imposing force, for the uselessness of such an effort was clearly recognised. But in the British metropolis an army was assembled scarcely inferior in numbers to the enemy, while the most elaborate preparations were made for the defence.
At Liverpool, Hull, Bristol, and Southampton the most feverish activity prevailed in converting every available ship into a fighting vessel, as it was hoped that thus reinforced the men-of-war, which were harassing the enemy in the Channel, might be able to break the blockade of the British ports, and cut the enemy’s lines of communication between their own ports and Dover. This was the last and only hope that remained to the sorely-pressed people of England, and it is probable that it would have been realised had the British navy not been so lamentably and shamefully weak, and so utterly inadequate to the task of protecting the country, and its widely scattered interests, all over the world.
The Maidstone division of the invading army met with no check nor obstacle of any description during its advance on the metropolis; but the Chatham division was considerably harassed. It kept parallel to the London, Chatham, and Dover Railway, which had been totally destroyed by the English. During its march it had to exercise the utmost vigilance, and to beat off incessant attacks that were made upon it by large bodies of Volunteers, which had the Thames as their base. These Volunteers displayed the greatest courage and good military discipline, and they inflicted great loss on the enemy, necessitating his detaching considerable bodies of men from the main army in order to protect its communications. When the division reached Bromley, a flying column was sent forward to seize and hold Norwood and Sydenham. The English had erected an earthwork here, but their numbers were too
