The English troops are excellent; but as they are only raised by voluntary enlistment, and as this becomes difficult in time of war, they are forced to admit married men, who are allowed to be accompanied by their families. Consequently the regiments took along with them a great number of women and children; a serious disadvantage which Great Britain has never been able to remedy. Thus, just as the corps of Soult and Ney were marching past the Emperor outside Astorga, cries were heard from a great barn. The door was opened, and it was found to contain 1000 to 1200 English women and children, who, exhausted by the long march of the previous days through rain, mud, and streams, were unable to keep up with the army and had taken refuge in this place. For forty-eight hours they had lived on raw barley. Most of the women and children were good-looking, in spite of the muddy rags in which they were clad. They flocked round the Emperor, who was touched by their misery and gave them lodging and food in the town; sending a flag of truce to let the English general know that when the weather permitted they would be sent back to him.

Marshal Soult came up with the enemy in the mountains of Leon and beat his rear-guard at Villafranca, where we lost General Colbert and his aide-de-camp Latour-Maubourg. The English army reached the port of Corunna after a hasty march, but a terrible storm made its embarkation very difficult, and it was compelled to give battle to Marshal Soult's troops who were close on its heels. The commander-in-chief, Sir John Moore, was killed, and his army only succeeded in reaching its vessels after immense loss. 1This event, which the French at first regarded as an advantage, turned out unlucky, for General Moore was replaced by Wellington, who afterwards did us so much harm.

At Astorga my brother, who was on Berthier's staff, was captured by guerrillas when on his way to Madrid with despatches. I shall have more to say about this.

While Soult was pursuing the retreating enemy towards Corunna, the Emperor, accompanied by Marshal Lannes, went back to Valladolid to get on the road to France. He stayed two days in that town, ordering Lannes to go and take command of the two corps which were besieging Saragossa, and after taking that place to rejoin him at Paris. But before leaving us, the Emperor, wishing to show his satisfaction with Lannes' staff, invited the marshal to hand in a scheme of recommendations for promotion with regard to his officers. I was entered for the rank of major and quite expected to get it, especially when I heard that the marshal on leaving the Emperor's study had asked for me. But my hopes were cruelly overthrown. The marshal said to me kindly that when he was asking for a step for me, he thought he ought also to recommend his old friend Captain Dagusan, but that the Emperor had begged him to choose between Dagusan and me. 'I cannot make up my mind,' said the marshal, 'for the wound which you received at Agreda and your behaviour in that difficult business put the right on your side; but Dagusan is old, and is making his last campaign. Still I would not commit an injustice for the world, and I leave it to you to settle which of the two names I shall have entered on the commission which the Emperor is about to sign.' It was an embarrassing position for me; my heart was very full. However, I answered that he must put M. Dagusan's name on the commission. The marshal embraced me with tears in his eyes, promising that after the siege of Saragossa I should certainly get my step. That evening the marshal called his officers together to announce the promotions. Guéhéneuc had his colonelcy confirmed, Saint-Mars was appointed lieutenant-colonel, Dagusan major, d'Albuquerque and Watteville got the Legion of Honour, de Viry and Labédoyère were captains; I got nothing.

Next day we left Valladolid, riding by short stages to Saragossa. Lannes took the command of the whole besieging force to the number of 30,000 men, who were under the orders of Marshal Mortier, Junot replacing Moncey.

Before the great insurrection which followed the captivity of Ferdinand VII., the town of Saragossa had been unfortified, but on learning what had happened at Bayonne, and the violence which Napoleon was doing to Spain in placing his brother Joseph on the throne, Saragossa gave the signal for resistance. Its population rose as one man; monks, women and children took up arms. The town was surrounded by immense and solidly-built convents; these were fortified, and guns placed in them. All the houses were loopholed, and the streets barricaded; powder, cannon-balls, and bullets were manufactured, and great stores of food collected. All the inhabitants enrolled themselves, and took as their commander Count Palafox, one of the colonels of the body-guard and a devoted friend of Ferdinand, whom he had followed to Bayonne, returning to Aragon after the King's arrest. It was during the summer of 1808 that the Emperor heard of the revolt, and the intention to defend Saragossa, but, being still under the delusion to which Murat's despatches had given rise, he regarded the insurrection as a fire of straw which the presence of a few French regiments would put out. Still before employing force he thought to try persuasion. He applied to Prince Pignatelli, the greatest Aragonese noble, who was then in Paris, begging him to use his influence in the province to calm the excitement. Prince Pignatelli accepted this pacific duty, and went to Saragossa. The people ran to meet him, not doubting but that like Palafox he was come to fight the French. But no sooner had he spoken of submission than he was assailed by the mob, who would have hanged him if Palafox had not put him in a dungeon, where he remained eight or nine months.

Meanwhile, several French divisions under General Verdier appeared in June before Saragossa. The fortifications were still incomplete, and an attempt was made to carry the place by assault. But no sooner were our columns in the streets than a murderous fire from windows, towers, roofs, and cellars caused them such losses that they were obliged to retreat. Then our troops surrounded the place, and began a more methodical siege. This would probably have succeeded, had not King Joseph's retreat compelled the army before Saragossa to retreat, also abandoning part of their artillery.

The first siege thus failed, but when our troops had returned to Aragon victorious, the marshal came in 1809 to attack Saragossa afresh. The town was by this time in a much better state of defence, for the fortifications were completed, and all the warlike population of Aragon had thrown itself into the place. The garrison had been further strengthened by a large part of the army of Castaños, which we had beaten at Tudela, so that Saragossa was defended by more than 80,000 men, while the marshal had only 30,000 with which to besiege it. But our officers were excellent, order and discipline reigned in our ranks, while in the town all was inexperience and confusion. The besieged only agreed on one point—to defend themselves to the death. The peasants were the most determined; they had entered the town with their wives, their children, and even their herds, and each party of them had a quarter of the town or a house assigned to it for its dwelling-place, which they were sworn to defend. The people lived mixed up with their beasts in the most disgusting state of filth, the entrails of slaughtered animals lay about in the courtyards and in the rooms, and the besieged did not even take the trouble to remove the bodies of men who had died in consequence of the epidemic which this carelessness speedily developed. Religious fanaticism and the sacred love of country exalted their courage, and they blindly resigned themselves to the will of God. The Spaniards have preserved much of the Arab character; they are fatalists constantly repeating, 'Lo que ha de ser no puede faltar' ('That which is to be cannot fail'). Accordingly they took no precaution.

To attack such men by assault in a town where every house was a fortress would have been to repeat the mistake committed during the first siege, and to incur heavy losses without a chance of success. Accordingly, Marshal Lannes and General Lacoste, the commanding engineer, adopted a prudent method, which, though tedious, was the best way to bring about the surrender or destruction of the town. They began in the usual way by opening trenches, until the first houses were reached, then the houses were mined and blown up, defenders and all; then the next were mined, and so on. These works, however, involved considerable danger for the French, for as soon as one showed himself he was a mark to musket-shots from the Spaniards in the neighbouring buildings. General Lacoste fell in this way, at the moment when he was taking his place in front of a window to examine the interior of the town. Such was the determination of the Spaniards that while a house was being mined, and the dull sound of the rammer warned them that death was at hand, not one left the house which he had sworn to defend. We could hear them singing litanies, then at the moment when the walls flew into the air, and fell back with a crash, crushing the greater part of them, those who had escaped would collect about the ruins, and sheltering themselves behind the slightest cover would recommence their sharpshooting. Our soldiers, however, warned of the moment when the mine was going off, held themselves in readiness, and no sooner had the explosion taken place than they dashed on to the ruins, and, after killing all whom they found, established themselves behind bits of wall, threw up entrenchments with furniture and beams, and in the middle of the ruins constructed passages for the sappers who were going to mine the next house. In this way a good third of the town was destroyed, and the passages established among the ruins formed an inextricable labyrinth, through which one could only find one's way by the help of stakes which the engineer officers placed. Besides the mines, the French used artillery freely, and threw 11,000 shells into the town.

In spite of all Saragossa still held out. In vain did the marshal, touched by the heroism of the defence, send a flag of truce to propose a capitulation. It was refused, and the siege continued. The huge fortified convents could not be destroyed, like the houses, by mining; we, therefore, merely blew up a piece of their thick walls, and when the breach was made sent forward a column to the assault. The besieged would flock to the defence, and in the terrible fighting which resulted from these attacks we suffered our principal losses.

The best fortified convents were those of the Inquisition and of Santa Engracia. A mine had just been completed under the latter when the marshal, sending for me in the middle of the night, told me that in order to hasten my promotion to the rank of major he designed for me a most important duty. At daybreak,' said he, 'the mine which is to breach the wall of Santa Engracia will be fired. Eight companies of grenadiers are to assault; I have given orders that the captains should be chosen from those junior to you; I give you the command of the column. Carry the convent, and I feel certain that one of the first messengers from Paris will bring your commission as major.' I accepted with gratitude, though suffering at the moment a good deal from my wound. The flesh in cicatrising had formed a lump which prevented me from wearing military headgear, so Dr. Assalagny, the surgeon-major of the chasseurs, had reduced it with lunar caustic. This painful operation had been performed the day before; I had been feverish all night, and consequently was not in very good condition for leading an assault. No matter; there was no room for hesitation, and I can admit, too, that I was exceedingly proud of the command entrusted to me. Eight companies of grenadiers to a mere captain was magnificent.

I hastened to get ready, and as day dawned I went to the trenches. There I found General Rasout, who, after having handed over the command of the grenadiers to me, observed that, as the mine could not be fired for an hour, I should do well to use this time in examining the wall which was to be blown up, and in calculating the width of the resulting breach so as to arrange my attack. I started, with an adjutant of engineers to show me the way, through the ruins of a whole quarter which had already been thrown down. Finally, I reached the foot of the convent wall where the territory conquered by us came to an end. I found myself in a little court; a light infantry picket, which occupied a sort of cellar hard by, had a sentry in this court, who was sheltered from musket-shots by a heap of planks and doors. The engineer officer, showing me a thick wall in front of us, said that was the one which was to be blown up. In one of the corners of the court whence a pump had been torn away, some stones had fallen out, and left a gap. The sentry showed me that by stooping down one could see through this opening the legs of a stormy force of the enemy posted in the convent garden. In order to verify his statement and notice the lie of the ground on which I was going to fight, I stooped down. At that moment a Spaniard posted on the tower of Santa Engracia fired a shot at me, and I fell on the stones.

I felt no pain at first, and thought that the adjutant standing by me had inadvertently given me a push. Presently, however, the blood flowed copiously; I had got a bullet in the left side very near the heart. The adjutant helped me to rise, and we went into the cellar where the soldiers were. I was losing so much blood that I was on the point of fainting. There were no stretchers, so the soldiers passed a musket under my arms, another under my knees, and thus carried me through the thousand-and-one passages which had been made through the debris of this quarter to the place where I had left General Rasout. There I recovered my senses. The general wished to have me attended to, but I preferred to be under Dr. Assalagny, so, pressing my handkerchief on the wound, I had myself taken to Marshal Lannes' headquarters, a cannon-shot from the town. When they saw me arrive, all covered with blood, carried by soldiers, one of whom was supporting my head, the marshal and my comrades thought I was dead. Dr. Assalagny assured them to the contrary, and hastened to dress my wound. The difficulty was where to put me, for, as all the furniture of the establishment had been burnt during the siege, there was not a bed in the place. We used to sleep on the bricks wherewith the rooms were paved. The marshal and all my comrades at once gave their cloaks: these were piled up, and I was laid on them. The doctor examined my wound, and found that I had been struck by a projectile which must have been flat because it had passed between two ribs without breaking them, which an ordinary bullet would not have done. To find the object Assalagny put a probe into the wound, but when he found nothing his face grew anxious. Finding that I complained of severe pain in the loins, he turned me on my face, and examined my back. Hardly had he touched the spot where the ribs are connected to the spine than I involuntarily gave a cry. The projectile was there. Assalagny then took a knife, made a large incision, perceived a metallic body showing between two ribs and tried to extract it with the forceps. He did not, however, succeed, though his violent efforts lifted me up, until he made one of my comrades sit on my shoulders, and another on my legs. At length he succeeded in extracting a lead bullet of the largest calibre. The Spaniards had hammered it flat till it had the shape of a half-crown, across was scratched on each face and small notches all round gave it the appearance of the wheel of a watch. It was these teeth which had caught in the muscles, and rendered the extraction so difficult. Thus crushed out, the ball presented too large a surface to enter a musket, and must have been fired from a blunderbus. Striking edgewise, it had acted like a cutting instrument, passed between two ribs, and travelled round the interior of the chest to make its exit in the same way as its entry, fortunately preserving sufficient force to make its way through the muscles of the back. The marshal, wishing to let the Emperor know with what fanatical determination the inhabitants of Saragossa were defending themselves, sent him the bullet extracted from my body. Napoleon, after examining it, had it brought to my mother, at the same time announcing to her that I was about to be promoted to major.

Assalagny was one of the first surgeons of the day, and thanks to him, my wound, which might have been mortal, was a case of rapid cure. The marshal had a folding bedstead which he took on campaign. This he lent me, with mattress and sheets; my valise served me for pillow, my cloak for blankets. Still, I was not well off, for my room had neither door nor window, and wind and rain entered. The ground floor of the house, too, was used for a hospital, the sounds and odours of which reached my room; more than two hundred sutlers had set up their booths round the head-quarters. The camp was close by; so that there was eternal singing, shouting, drumming, and the bass to this fiendish concert was supplied by numerous cannon, booming night and day. I got no sleep; but at the end of a fortnight my vigorous constitution got the upper hand, and I was able to leave my bed.

The climate being mild, I was also able to take short walks, leaning on the arm of Dr. Assalagny or my friend, de Viry; but their duties did not allow of their staying with me long, and I suffered much from ennui. One day my servant came in to say that an old hussar, with tears streaming down his face, was asking to see me. As you will guess, it was my old tutor, Sergeant Pertelay. His regiment had just come to Spain, and hearing that I had been wounded, he came straight to me. I was glad to see the good man again, and gave him a cordial greeting. After this he often came to visit me, and divert me by his interminable yarns and the quaint advice which he still thought himself entitled to give me. My convalescence did not last long, and by March 15 I was nearly well, though weak.

Typhus, famine, fire, and sword had destroyed nearly a third of the inhabitants and garrison of Saragossa, and still no thought of surrender entered the minds of the survivors. The principal forts had been taken, and the mines had destroyed a very large portion of the town. The monks had persuaded the poor folk that the French would massacre them, and none dared come out. Good luck and Lannes' kindness at last put an end to this memorable siege. On March 20 the French carried a nunnery by assault. Besides the nuns, they found three hundred women of all classes who had taken refuge in the church. They were treated with respect, and brought to the marshal. The poor creatures, having been surrounded for several days, had received no food, and were famishing. Lannes led them himself to the camp market, where, summoning the carabiniers, he ordered them to bring food for the women, making himself responsible for payment. Nor did his generosity stop there; he had them all taken back to Saragossa. On their return the inhabitants, who had followed their movements from roofs and towers, rushed forward to hear their adventures. They all spoke well of the French marshal and soldiers, and from that moment the excitement subsided and a surrender was decided upon. That evening Saragossa capitulated.

Lannes' first condition was, that Prince Fuentes-Pignatelli should be given up to him alive. The poor man arrived escorted by a savage-looking gaoler with pistols in his sash, who had the impudence to bring him to the marshal's room, demanding a receipt from the hand of the French commander-in-chief. The marshal had him turned out; but as the man would not go without his receipt, Labédoyère, never very patient, lost his temper, and literally kicked him downstairs. As for Prince Pignatelli, he was indeed a painful sight, owing to his sufferings in prison. He was devoured by fever, and we had not a bed to offer him; for, as I have said, the marshal was lodging in a house utterly unfurnished, the sole advantage of which was that it lay near the point of attack. Junot meanwhile, being less conscientious, had established himself a league away in a rich convent, where he lived very comfortably. He offered hospitality to the prince, who, fatally for himself, accepted it. Junot gave him such a 'blow-out' that his stomach, undermined by prison diet, gave way under the sudden change, and Prince Pignatelli died just as he was restored to freedom and happiness. He left an income of more than 900,000 francs to a collateral relation who had hardly a farthing.

When a place capitulates it is usual for the officers to retain their swords. This practice was followed at Saragossa, except in the case of the governor, Palafox, touching whom the marshal had received special instructions from the Emperor, on the following grounds:—

Count Palafox, a devoted friend of Ferdinand, had followed him to Bayonne. Thrown into consternation by the abdication of that prince and his father, the Spanish grandees summoned by Napoleon to a national assembly, finding themselves in France and in Napoleon's power, for the most part recognised Joseph as their king. Palafox, it appears, under the same pressure, did the same; but hardly had he returned to Spain when he promptly protested against the moral violence which, he asserted, had been used towards him, and hastened to put himself at the head of the insurgents at Saragossa. The Emperor regarded this conduct as perfidious, and ordered that, when the town was taken, Count Palafox should be treated, not as a prisoner of war, but as a state prisoner, and accordingly disarmed and sent to prison at Vincennes. Marshal Lannes, therefore, found himself under the necessity of sending an officer to arrest the governor and demand his sword. He entrusted the duty to d'Albuquerque, who found it all the more painful that he was not only a Spaniard, but a relation and old friend of Palafox's. I have never been able to divine the marshal's motive in selecting him for such a duty. D'Albuquerque, however, had to obey, and entered Saragossa more dead than alive. He presented himself to Palafox, who handed him his sword, saying, with a noble pride: 'If your ancestors, the famous d'Albuquerques, could return to life, there is not one of them who would not sooner be in the place of the prisoner who is surrendering this sword, covered with honour, than in that of the renegade who is receiving it on behalf of the enemies of his country. 'Poor d'Albuquerque, terrified and almost fainting, had to lean against a piece of furniture to avoid falling. The scene was related to us by Captain Pasqual, who, having been ordered to take charge of Palafox after his arrest, was present at the interview. Count Palafox remained in France till 1814.

How strange are human affairs! Palafox having been proclaimed governor of Saragossa when the insurrection broke out, has received both from fame and history the credit of the heroic defence. He really contributed little to it, for he fell ill early in the siege, and handed over the command to General Saint-Marc, a Belgian in the Spanish service, and it was he who sustained all our attacks with such remarkable courage and ability. But as he was a foreigner, Spanish pride assigned all the glory of the defence to Palafox, whose name will go down to posterity, while that of the brave and ardent General Saint-Marc is mentioned in no history, and remains forgotten. 2

The garrison, 40,000 in number, were forwarded to France as prisoners of war, but two-thirds of them escaped and recommenced the slaughter of Frenchmen as members of guerrilla bands. They had carried away the germs or typhus, and died later. The ruined streets of the city were a perfect charnel-house, and the contagion spread to the French troops who formed the new garrison.