was entirely composed of infantry and, as Terence
could not therefore take his horse with him, he joined the other
officers on foot.

To his great surprise and joy he found that one of these was his
chum, Dick Ryan.

"This is an unexpected pleasure, Dicky!" he exclaimed.

"Well, yes, I am as pleased as you are at our meeting, Terence; but
I must own that the conditions might have been more pleasant."

"Oh, never mind the conditions!" Terence said. "It is quite enough,
for the present, that we both are here; and that we have got before
us a journey that is likely to be a jolly one. I suppose that you
have given your parole, as I have; but when we are once in prison
there will be an end of that, and it is hard if, when we put our
heads together, we don't hit on some plan of escape.

"Do you know the other officers? If so, please introduce me to
them."

As soon as the introductions were completed, Terence asked Ryan
where he had been wounded.

"I was hit by a piece of a French shell," the latter replied.
"Fortunately it did not come straight at me, but scraped along my
ribs, laying them pretty well bare. As it was a month ago, it is
quite healed up; but I am very stiff still, and am obliged to be
very careful in my movements. If I forget all about it, and give a
turn suddenly, I regularly yell; for it feels as if a red-hot iron
had been stuck against me. However, I have learned to be careful
and, as long as I simply walk straight on, I am pretty well all
right.

"It was a near case, at first; and I believe I should have died of
starvation if the French had not come in. Those brutes of Spaniards
would do nothing whatever for me, and I give you my word of honour
that nothing passed my lips, but water, for three days."

"Perhaps it was a good thing for you, Dicky, and kept down fever."

"I would have run the chance of a dozen fevers, to have got a good
meal," Ryan said indignantly. "I don't know but that I would have
chanced it, even for a crust of bread. I tell you, if the French
had not come in when they did, there would not have been a man
alive in hospital at the end of another forty-eight hours. The men
were so furious that, if they could have got at arms, I believe
everyone who could have managed to crawl out would have joined in a
sally, and have shot down every Spaniard they met in the streets,
till they were overpowered and killed.

"Now, let us hear your adventures. Of course, I saw in orders what
go