ten fathom from the wall, and stretching from the margin of the river to the foot of the elevated flat, or table-ground, called the Plateau D'Orleans, an extent of 250 fathom. And at the same time, on the right bank of the Ebro, a trench was opened at the distance of 90 fathom from the Tete de Pont, and batteries were erected and raised on it for flanking the principal attack. On the 22d General Frêre's division of the any of Catalonia, arrived to join the besieging army. He was stationed on the Ebro, at the distance of one league below Tortosa to have an eye on the route towards Tarragona, and the sea coast. A battalion of observation was detached from Frêre's division to Col. de L'Alba. On the seventh night of the siege, the covert-way was crowned, even before the batteries were completed; a circumstance which Suchet considered as altogether singular, perhaps, in the history of sieges. But not a few of those employed in this work were killed; among whom were five officers of artillery. On three different nights, viz. the 17th, the 24th, and 27th of December, the Spaniards, in columns of about 400 men each, rushed out on the assailants with incredible impetuosity, and for some little time carried all before them. But the flower of the besieging army coming up to the aid of their fellow soldiers, at the critical moment when one party of Spaniards had penetrated, and were burning some gabions in a lodgment in the covert-way, and another advancing in great force by the Plateau D'Orleans, drove them back within their walls, kill

ing numbers of them and making others prisoners. In the mean time the artillery, after surmounting multiplied difficulties, succeeded in bringing over the park of battering cannon to the left bank of the Ebro. The navigation of the river, which varied in its current and depth of water every hour, was extremely difficult; and the erection of batteries was greatly counteracted by a fire from the garrison, which raked all the right bank of the river. A battery, within 50 fathoms of Fort Orleans, was erected in broad day-light, with the aid of a hot fire of musketry, directed against the embrasures of the besieged On the 29th, by break of day, 45 pieces of cannon, from ten batteries raised on both sides of the river, commenced a fire, which in the space of two hours silenced all that was opposed to them; on the same day the bridge was cut, and the day thereafter entirely broken down. the night between the 29th and 30th the Spaniards evacuated the Tete de Pont, which was taken possession of by the French. the 30th there was no firing but from the castle, and on the 31st none at all. The parapets were destroyed; the embrasures were unfit for receiving cannon: two breaches had begun to be made in the wall; parties had descended and passed the ditch; and the miners commenced their subterraneous operations. In these circumstances, in the morning of the 1st of January, 1811, a flag of truce was seen on the summit of the castle. Two officers came to the French General with a letter from the Governor, authoriz

In

On

IT

T had been determined in a council of war held in July or August, 1809, that Marshal Soult should attack Ciudad Rodrigo: the reduction of which would cut off the only communication in the hands of the Spanish government with the Northern provinces of the country. And this was to be followed by the siege of the strong fortress of Almeida, which would open an entrance into Portugal. *The Frontiers of which, accordingly, as Mortier had before been sent against, Badajoz, it now became the great theatre of war in the peninsula. The army destined for this warfare was called the central army.

Among the maxims that appear to have been a lopted by Bugnaparte, it is one to accomplish as many objects as possible by the same troops which maxim again is intimately connected with the most prominent feature in all his military operations, namely, rapidity of motion. The siege of Badajoz was suspended until the insurrections should be quelled in the south-east of Spain. That of Ciudad Rodrigo supended until Leon should be complely subdued, Astarias overrun, and Gallicia held in check by a formidable force near its frontiers. A small

body of French, three or four thou sand, towards the end of December, 1809, entered the capital of Leon, from whence, on their approach, the Spaniards retreated. A corps, which was the 8th, under General Junot, laid siege to Astorga, and held other places in subjection, by a proper distribution of garrisons. A strong division under General Bonnet took possession of Oviedo the capital, extended itself over the whole province of Asturias, and threatened again to penetrate into Gallicia. General Bonnet, though engaged in continual encounters with the Guerillas, established communications both with Leon and St. Andero. He could have easily advanced into Gallicia, but he received orders to wait in his present positions until his further movements should be determined by future events. Astorga was taken, after a short siege, on the 12th of April. Three thousand five hundred Spaniards, with English firelocks, and wearing English clothes, laid down their arms, and were conducted in two columns to Barneza, from whence they were sent to France. But the whole of the prisoners taken during the siege of Astorga, according to the dispatch of Junot to

Berther,

Berthier, amounted to about 5000. The number of the Spaniards kill. ed at the siege, was 1500, and 500 wounded were left in the hospitals. The French found at Astorga 20 pieces of cannon and two mortars. The loss of the French, as stated by Junot, in all the different encounters with the enemy, both in Astorga and the territory around it, was only about 160 killed and 400 wounded. The Spaniards stated, probably with equal exaggeration, that the loss of the French in killed and wounded was not less than 4000. ter the fall of Astorga, and not a little subsequent skirmishing with the Guerillas, the 8th corps joined that of Marshal Ney, alias the Duke of Echlingen, before Ciudad Rodrigo.

Af

Marshal Ney entertained a considerable degree of apprehension that General Junot, between whom and himself there was not a good understanding, might not co-operate with him for the reduction of Ciudad Rodrigo with that cordiality and promptitude which circumstances demanded. In the first week of May the half of Ney's corps had already sat down before that place, and for opening trenches he only wanted to know if the Duke of Abrantes was willing to aid him with the garrisons of Zamora and Toro, to rc

lieve his posts of communication, and if it was his intention to support him substantially in case of need. But if the Duke (Junot) should not agree to any of these propositions, then Marshal Ney was determined to undertake the

siege alone, establishing his communication by the Avila. Marshal Soult (Duke of Dalmatia) had written a letter to Ney, April 30, to send a stong party as far as the Tagus for clearing his left. The answer to this letter gives an accurate idea of Ney's situation at this period, and also conveys some notion of that kind of irregular and mountainous warfare, in which the French were now involved.

Such a detachment as was required, Marshal Ney observed, must be 1500 men at least, which he was not, at the present moment, in a condition to spare, as the whole of the troops under, his command scarcely sufficed to cover the immense range they occupied. He was under the necessity of detaching 3000 men as auxiliaries to the artillery train, for guarding the ovens and magazines he had constructed behind the line of blockade, and protecting convoys from Salamanca. It was necessary to have a strong post at St. Felix, for observing Almeida, and a detachment on the left of the Agueda to cut off all communication between that place and the country around, and counteract the movements of the English. The trenches, too, before Ciudad Rodrigo, for the space of four days, would require 4000 men to work at them; on the whole, there would not remain to him more than 12,000 men in camp ready for fighting, if a battle should become necessary. Yet, under all these disadvantages, he was deter mined to go on with the siege, and he hoped with success.*