and in a sort of sacred battalion, composed of
officers, young Pepe, who had just completed his sixteenth year, was
appointed serjeant-major. In this capacity he first saw fire, in a
skirmish with a band of armed peasants. But the enemy gained ground, the
limits of the Republic grew each day narrower, until at last they were
restricted to the capital and its immediate environs. Cardinal Ruffo's
army, now amounting to forty thousand men, backed by detachments of
foreign troops, and by regiments landed from Sicily, had improved in
discipline and organisation, and, flushed with their successes, ventured
to attack Naples. They encountered an obstinate resistance. General
Schipani, an officer of distinguished bravery but little skill,
commanded the body of troops of which Pepe's battalion formed a part,
and occupied the most advanced of the Republican positions, between
Torre dell' Annunziata and Castella-mare. The Cardinal's troops cut him
off from Naples, and whilst gallantly endeavouring to force a passage
through them and assist the city, his little band, fifteen hundred in
number, was assailed by a body of Russians, and by a thousand Calabrians
under the command of Pano di Grano, a returned galley slave, and Ruffo's
favourite officer. In a narrow road a desperate contest ensued, and
terminated in the defeat of the Republicans. Pepe received a bayonet
thrust and a sabre cut, and although he escaped at the time, was soon
afterwards captured with some of his comrades, by a party of peasants
armed with scythes. This was the commencement of the young soldier's
misfortunes. Suffering from hunger, thirst, and wounds, he was
imprisoned in a damp and unwholesome warehouse, and subjected to the
brutality of his peasant guards, who called in their women to gaze at
the ill-fated patriots, as if they had been strange and savage animals
caught in a snare, and to be viewed as objects of mingled curiosity and
loathing. On the following day, when a detachment of the Cardinal's
troops came to take charge of the prisoners and escort them to the
capital, they were so exhausted with fatigue, loss of blood, and want of
food, that before they could move, it was necessary to supply them with
bread and water. This meagre refreshment taken, they were stripped to
their shirts, manacled in couples, and marched off to Naples. Although
informed of it by their captors, many of them had refused to credit the
downfal of the city. "This illusion was soon