s heroic.

On the ninth of March, 1847, the General, then nearly sixty-one years
of age, arrived at Vera Cruz, with an army of 12,000 men. That city
was taken in about a week, and the way was opened from the coast to
the capital. The advance began on the eighth of April, and ten days
afterward the rocky pass of Cerro Gordo was carried by assault. Santa
Anna barely escaped with his life, leaving behind 3000 prisoners, his
chest of private papers, and his _wooden leg!_

On the twenty-second of the same month, the strong castle of Perote,
crowning a peak of the Cordilleras, was taken without resistance. Then
the sacred city of Puebla was captured. On the seventh of August,
Scott, with his reduced forces, began his march over the crest of the
mountains against the city of Mexico. The American army, sweeping over
the heights, looked down on the valley. Never before had a soldiery in
a foreign land beheld a grander scene Clear to the horizon stretched
a living landscape of green fields, villages, and lakes--a picture too
beautiful to be marred with the dreadful enginery of war.

The American army advanced by the way of Ayotla. The route was the
great national road from Vera Cruz to Mexico. The last fifteen miles
of the way was occupied with fortifications, both natural and
artificial, and it seemed impossible to advance directly to the gates
of the city. The army was accordingly brought around Lake Chalco, and
thence westward to San Augustine. This place is ten miles from the
capital. The approach now lay along causeways, across marshes and the
beds of bygone lakes. At the further end of each causeway, the
Mexicans had built massive gates. There were almost inaccessible
positions at Contreras, San Antonio and Molino del Rey. Further on
toward the city lay the powerful bulwarks of Churubusco and
Chapultepec. The latter was of great strength, and seemed impregnable.
These various outposts were held by Santa Anna with a force of fully
thirty thousand Mexicans.

The first assaults of the Americans were made on the nineteenth of
August, by Generals Pillow and Twiggs. The line of communications
between Contreras and Santa Anna's army was cut, and in the darkness
of the following night an assault was made by General Persifer F.
Smith, who about sunrise carried the place and drove the garrison
pell-mell. This was the _first_ victory of the memorable twentieth of
August.

A few hours later, General Worth compelled the evacuation