Así pues, no es correcto relacionar la teoría literaria dieciochista con la estricta defensa de un tipo de imitación naturalista. Estamos de acuerdo con Guillermo Carnero, quien supo ver la importancia que para los neoclásicos tuvo el dogma de la Imitación de la Naturaleza: «Imitación de la Naturaleza no quiere decir reproducción realista de cualquier cosa que exista en el mundo natural o humano» (Guillermo Carnero, La cara oscura del Siglo de las Luces, Madrid, Fundación Juan March-Cátedra, 1983, págs. 19-20). Por otra parte no hemos de olvidar que nuestras conclusiones se refieren a la teoría literaria, que no necesariamente ha de coincidir con la práctica literaria del momento, ya que la teoría y la práctica de la literatura pueden recorrer contemporáneamente caminos distintos.

For a vivid first-hand account of the savage discipline enforced in Wellington’s army and the atrocious sufferings of British soldiers, especially during the retreat to Vigo, see Christopher Hibbert, ed., Recollections of Rifleman Harris, Hamden, Connecticut, Archon Books, 1970.

The American literary scholar Roger L. Utt has recently commented a clear case of historical deformation. The novelist Benito Pérez Galdós, in his episodio nacional La batalla de Arapiles (1875), following the example of Spanish historians, suppresses all mention of the contribution of the Portuguese to the allied victory in the Battle of Salamanca («Batalla de los Arapiles»). To demonstrate the non-participation of Spanish troops in this battle. Utt quotes the calculations of British historians: the British suffered 3.000 casualties, the Portuguese 1.500, the Spanish 7! See Roger L. Utt, «Sic vos non vobis: herencia historiográfica y coherencia estructural de La batalla de los Arapiles» in Peter Bly, ed., Galdós y la historia, Ottawa Hispanic Studies, 1, Ottawa, Dovehouse Editions, 1988, pp. 81-98.

The Napiers were a remarkable military family. Sir William Napier’s brother, Sir Charles James Napier (1782-1853), was the conqueror of Sind and won one of the most amazing victories in the history of the British Army in 1843, when he attacked and defeated a Baluchi army of 30.000 men with a force of 2.800. Another Napier, Baron Napier of Magdala, after a distinguished Indian career, commanded the expedition to Ethiopia in 1868, and was commander-in-chief in India (1870-76).

For a recent discussion of Galdós’s first series of episodios nacionales, see Brian J. Dendle, Galdós. The Early Historical Novels, University of Missouri Press, 1986.

I have been unable to locate a copy of Miss [Alicia] Le Fanu, Don Juan de las Sierras, or, El Empecinado. A Romance, London, 1823, 3 vols.

Valentín de Llanos Gutiérrez, Don Esteban, or Memoirs of a Spaniard, 3 vols., London, Henry Colburn, 1825. A second edition was published in 1826. A German translation appeared in the following year. For more detailed information on Llanos, see Vicente Lloréns, Liberales y románticos, Madrid, Castalia, 1968, pp. 260-67.

For a discussion of Llanos anticlericalism, see Brian J. Dendle, «Valentín de Llanos Gutiérrez’ Don Esteban (1825): An Anticlerical Novel», in Juan Fernández Jiménez, José J. Labrador Herraiz, and L. Teresa Valdivieso, eds., Estudios en Homenaje a Enrique Ruiz-Fornells, Erie, Pennsylvania, ALDEEV, 1990, pp. 142-48.

Cf. the vivid description of the murder of Mañara in Chapter XV of Benito Perez Galdós’ Napoleón en Chamartín. Llanos treats the murder of Cevallos in Valladolid. Accounts of the murders of leaders by the Spanish mob abound also in vol. I of Napier’s History of the War in the Peninsula.

For information on Trueba, see Lloréns, pp. 267-84, and Salvador García Castañeda, Don Telesforo de Trueba y Cosío (1799-1835), Santander, Diputación Provincial, 1978. I wish to thank Professor García Castañeda for providing me with a text of Salvador, the Guerilla.