, discouraged by his loss, and reduced
already to little more than a third of their original numbers, threw
down their arms and asked for quarter. Their example was immediately
followed by those of the infantry who had escaped alive from the
murderous volleys of their opponents.

Of all those who took part in this bloody conflict, not one bore
himself more gallantly, or did more execution amongst the enemy, than
our old acquaintance, Sergeant Velasquez. When the charge had taken
place, and the desperate fight above described commenced, he backed
his horse off the narrow road upon which the combatants were cooped
up, into a sort of nook formed by a bank and some trees. In this
advantageous position, his rear and flanks protected, he kept off all
who attacked him, replying with laugh and jeer to the furious oaths
and imprecations of his baffled antagonists. His fierce and determined
aspect, and still more the long and powerful sweep of his broad sabre,
struck terror into his assailants, who found their best aimed blows
and most furious assaults repelled, and returned with fatal effect by
the practised arm of the dragoon. At the moment that Herrera was
wounded, and the fight brought to a close, the mass of combatants had
pressed further forward into the defile, and only three or four of the
rearmost of the Carlists occupied the portion of the pass between
Velasquez and the open country. Just then a shout in his rear, and a
bullet that pierced his shako, warned the sergeant that the infantry
were upon him; and at the same moment he saw his comrades desist from
their defence. Setting spurs to his charger, he made the animal bound
forward upon the road, clove the shoulder of the nearest lancer, rode
over another, and passing unhurt through the rain of bullets that
whistled around him, galloped out of the defile.

But, although unwounded, Velasquez was not unpursued. A dozen lancers
spurred their horses after him; and although more than half of these,
seeing that they had no chance of overtaking the well-mounted
fugitive, soon pulled up and retraced their steps, three or four still
persevered in the chase. Fortunate was it for the sergeant that the
good horse which he had lost at the venta near Tudela, had been
replaced by one of equal speed and mettle. With unabated swiftness he
scoured along the road through the whirlwind of dust raised by his
charger's feet, until the Carlists, seeing the distance between them
and the obj