evies were drilling, the townspeople--including old men,
women, and children--were employed, under the few officers who had any
knowledge of engineering, in throwing up batteries and forming
entrenchments round the town. In some cases the walls were strengthened
by the aid of a machine, consisting of a large square bottomless box,
into which the mud was thrown, and then beaten down hard. A number of
these boxes were used at a time, and it was extraordinary with what
rapidity a strong wall could thus be erected. The mud was brought in
carts, in baskets, and in various other ways, and thrown into the box.
Additional strength was gained by forming a slope on the outer side. A
number of guns buried on a former occasion by the Patriots, to conceal
them from the Spaniards, were also dug up, and mounted. Night and day
the people worked, for every hour gained added to the strength of the
place, and increased the prospect of successfully resisting the enemy.

There were several known Royalists in Popayan, who had hitherto remained
quiet; and many of them, on seeing the preparations made for the
defence, hurriedly left the town. Many Liberals also sent off their
families, to avoid the risk to which they would be exposed. Among the
Royalists I met the Bishop of Popayan, Don Salvador Ximenes, mounted on
a splendid horse, and attended by his secretary and several
ecclesiastics--who, but for their hats, I should have taken for military
officers, for they were all armed to the teeth, and had a decidedly
martial aspect. My father knew the bishop well, while I had often seen
him. Though a somewhat small man, he was remarkably well-made, and had
a good-natured, open countenance, with sparkling grey eyes. His
secretary was a tall, good-looking fellow, with a broad pair of
shoulders, but bearded like a pard, and looking little like a priest;
indeed, he had formerly been a captain of dragoons in Spain, until he
followed the bishop out to South America. Don Salvador had been canon
of the cathedral at Malaga when Buonaparte invaded Spain. On that
occasion, throwing off his ecclesiastical garb, he had assumed the rank
of a colonel, and by his preachings and exhortations he had aroused the
Spanish peasantry to resist the French. On the restoration of Ferdinand
the Seventh to the crown of Spain, the _ci-devant_ colonel was created
Bishop of Popayan, then in possession of the Spaniards, where he had
made himself very popular among all