made for it, gained it, and found himself in a wider
street. And there the enchantment fell on him.

For the street was empty, utterly empty, yet brilliantly illuminated.
Not a soul could he see: yet in house after house as he passed lights
shone from every window, in the lower floors behind blinds or curtains
which hid the inmates. It was as if Badajos had arrayed itself for
a fete; and still, as he staggered forward a low buzz, a whisper of
voices surrounded him, and now and again at the sound of his footstep
on the cobbles a lattice would open gently and be as gently re-shut.
Hundreds of eyes were peering at him, the one British soldier in a
bewitched city; hundreds of unseen eyes, stealthy, expectant. And
always ahead of him, faint and distant, sounded the bugles and the
yells around the Trinidad and the breaches.

He stood alone in the great square. While he paused at the corner, his
eyes following the rows of mysterious lights from house to house, from
storey to storey, the regular tramp of feet fell on his ears and a
company of Foot marched down into the moonlight patch facing him and
grounded arms with a clatter. They were men of his own regiment, and
they formed up in the moonlight like a company of ghosts. One or
two shots were fired at them, low down, from the sills of a line
of doorways to his right; but no citizen showed himself and no one
appeared to be hit. And ever from the direction of the Trinidad came
the low roar of combat and the high notes of the bugles.

He was creeping along the side of the square towards an outlet at its
north-east corner, when the company got into motion again and came
towards him. Then he turned up a narrow lane to the left and fled. He
was sobbing no longer; the passion had died out of him, and he knew
himself to be mad. In the darkness the silent streets began to fill;
random shots whistled at every street corner; but he blundered on,
taking no account of them. Once he ran against a body of Picton's
men--half a score of the 74th Regiment let loose at length from the
captured Castle, and burning for loot. One man thrust the muzzle of
his musket against his breast before he was recognized. Then two or
three shook hands with him.

He was back in the square again and fighting--Heaven knew why--with an
officer of the Brunswickers over a birdcage. Whence the birdcage came
he had no clear idea, but there was a canary-bird inside, and he
wanted it. A random shot smashed his lef