Wellington had retired; or that
Massena, seeing his inability to drive the British from their
position, intended himself to fall back upon Ciudad.

The convoy marched twenty miles, and then halted for the night. Two
hours after they did so a great train of waggons containing wounded
came up, and halted at the same place. The wounded were lifted out
and laid on the ground, where the surgeons attended to the more
serious cases.

"Pardon, monsieur," Terence said in French, to one of the doctors
who was near him, "are there any of our countrymen among the
wounded?"

"No, sir, they are all French," the doctor replied.

"That is a good sign," Terence said, to an English officer who was
standing by him when he asked the question.

"Why so, Colonel?"

"Because, if Massena intended to attack again tomorrow, he would
have sent the British wounded back, as well as his own men. The
French, like ourselves, make no distinction between friends and
foes; and that he has not sent them seems, to me, to show that he
intends himself to fall back, and to leave the British wounded to
the care of their own surgeons, rather than embarrass himself with
them."

"Yes, I have no doubt that is the case," the officer said. "It
seems, then, that we must have won the day, after all. That is some
comfort, anyhow, and I shall sleep more soundly than I expected. If
we had been beaten, there would have been nothing for it but for
the army to fall back again to the lines of Torres Vedras; and
Wellington would have had to fight very hard to regain them. If
Massena does fall back, Almeida will have to surrender."

"I was inside last time it surrendered," Terence said, "but I
managed to make my way out with my regiment, after the explosion."

"I wonder whether Massena means to leave us at Ciudad, or to send
us on to Salamanca?"

"I should think that he would send us on," Terence replied; "he
will not want to have 300 men eating up the stores at Ciudad,
besides requiring a certain portion of the garrison to look after
them."

Terence's ideas proved correct and, without stopping at Ciudad, the
convoy of prisoners and wounded continued their march until they
arrived at Salamanca. Terence could not help smiling, as he was
marched through the street, and thought of the wild panic that he
and Dicky Ryan had caused, when he was last in that town. The
convent which the Mayo Fusiliers had occupied was now turned into a
prison, and here the prisoners