the
utmost of his power the present position of the count, he recommended
him to the care of the officer placed on guard over him, who promised
to allow his prisoner every indulgence consistent with his safe
keeping. And although the escort duty assigned to him was in some
respects so unpleasant to fulfil, Herrera became almost reconciled to
it by the reflection, that he might be able to spare Villabuena much
of the hardship and rough treatment to which his captivity exposed
him.

The first grey light of morning had scarcely appeared in the Lower
Amezcoa, stealing over the mountain-tops, and indistinctly shadowing
forth the objects in the plain, when the stillness that had reigned in
the valley since the conclusion of the preceding day's skirmish, was
broken by the loud and joyous clang of the reveille. At various points
of the Christino cantonments, the brazen instruments of the cavalry,
and the more numerous, but perhaps less martially sounding, bands of
the infantry regiments, were rousing the drowsy soldiers from their
slumbers, and awakening the surrounding echoes by the wild melody of
Riego's hymn. Gradually the sky grew brighter, the last lingering
stars disappeared, the summits of the western mountains were
illuminated with a golden flush, and the banks and billows of white
mist that rested on the meadows, and hung upon the hillsides, began to
melt away and disappear at the approach of the sun's rays. In the
fields and on the roads near the different villages, the troops were
seen assembling, the men silent and heavy-eyed, but refreshed and
invigorated by the night's repose, the horses champing their bits, and
neighing with impatience. Trains of mules, laden with sacks of corn
and rations, that from their weight might be deemed sufficient load
for as many dromedaries, issued from barn and stable, expending their
superfluous strength and spirit by kicking and biting viciously at
each other, and were ranged in rear of the troops, where also carts
and litters, containing wounded men, awaited the order for departure.
The sergeant-majors called the roll of their troops and companies;
whilst the men, leaning upon their muskets, or sitting at ease in
their saddles, munched fragments of the brown ration bread, smoked the
cigarette, or received from the hands of the tawny-visaged sutlers and
_cantinieras_, who walked up and down the ranks, an antidote to the
effects of the cool morning air, in the shape of a glass of