warmed round their camp, shot down the sentries, and attacked
with such boldness that the marshal was obliged to keep a large number
of his men constantly under arms.

At last, worn out by fatigue and fighting, the weary army emerged from
the hills into the wide valleys, where their cavalry were able to act,
and the ground no longer offered favorable positions of defense to
the peasantry. Seeing the uselessness of further attacks, the Count of
Cifuentes drew off his peasants; and Tesse marched on to Barcelona and
effected a junction with the troops from Roussillon under the Duke de
Noailles, who had come down by the way of Gerona. The town was at once
invested on the land side; while the Count of Toulouse, with thirty
French ships, blockaded it from the sea.

CHAPTER XIII: THE FRENCH CONVOY

A report having arrived at the camp of the Count of Cifuentes that the
peasants around Saragossa had risen in insurrection, Jack thought that
he should be doing more good by discovering the truth of the rumor, and
by keeping the earl informed of the state of things in the enemy's rear,
than by remaining with the count. He hesitated whether he should take
his two orderlies with him, but as they were well mounted he decided
that they should accompany him, as they would add to his authority, and
would, in case of need, enable him the better to assume the position of
an officer riding in advance of a considerable force.

After a hearty adieu from the Count of Cifuentes, he started soon after
daybreak. After riding for some hours, just as he reached the top of a
rise, up which he had walked his horse, one of the orderlies, who were
riding a few paces behind him, rode up.

"I think, Captain Stilwell," he said, "I hear the sound of firing. Brown
thinks he hears it too."

Jack reined in his horse.

"I hear nothing," he said, after a pause of a minute.

"I don't hear it now, sir," the man said. "I think it came down on a
puff of wind.. If you wait a minute or two I think you will hear it."

Jack waited another two minutes, and then was about to resume his
journey, when suddenly a faint sound came upon the wind.

"You are right, Thompson," he exclaimed, "that's firing, sure enough. It
must be a convoy attacked by peasants."

He touched his horse with the spur and galloped forward. Two miles
further on, crossing the brow, they saw, half a mile ahead of them in
the dip of the valley, a number of wagons huddled together. On eit