yell of "_Viva la Reyna!_" he in
another minute stood safe and sheltered within the exterior
fortifications of Bilboa.

Three weeks had elapsed since the death of Zumalacarregui, and that
important event, which the partisans of the Spanish pretender had, as
long as possible, kept secret from their opponents, was now universally
known. Already did the operations of the Carlists begin to show symptoms
of the great loss they had sustained in the person of a man who, during
his brief but brilliant command, had nailed victory to his standard.
Even during his last illness, he kept up, from his couch of suffering, a
constant correspondence with General Eraso, his second in command, and
in some degree directed his proceedings; but when he died, the system of
warfare he had uniformly, and with such happy results, followed up, was
exchanged by those who came after him, for another and a less judicious
one. This, added to the immense moral weight of his loss, which filled
the Christinos with the most buoyant anticipations, whilst it was a
grievous discouragement to the Carlists, caused the tide of fortune to
turn against the latter. Dejected and disheartened, they were beaten
from before Bilboa, the town which, but for Zumalacarregui's
over-strained deference to the wishes of Don Carlos, they would never
have attacked. On the other hand, the Christinos were sanguine of
victory, and of a speedy termination to the war. The baton of command,
after passing through the hands of Rodil, Sarsfield, Mina, and other
veterans whose experience had struggled in vain against the skill and
prestige of the Carlist chief, had just been bestowed by the Queen's
government on a young general in whose zeal and abilities great reliance
was placed. On various occasions, since the death of Ferdinand, had this
officer, at the head of his brigade or division, given proof not only of
that intrepidity which, although the soldier's first virtue, should be
the general's least merit, but, as was generally believed, of military
talents of a high order.

Luis Fernandez de Cordova, the son of a poor but noble family of one of
the southern provinces of Spain, was educated at a military school,
whence he passed with an officer's commission into a regiment of the
royal guard. Endowed with considerable natural ability and tact, he
managed to win the favour of Ferdinand VII., and by that weak and fickle
monarch was speedily raised to the rank of colonel. His then bia