e the passage of the Tagus, and to cover the capital. About four
o'clock on the morning of the 23d of October, we received orders to be
on our alarm-posts at six, and, as soon as we had formed, we were
marched to the city of Alcala.

October 27th.--We were all this day marching to Arganda, and all night
marching back again. If any one thing is more particularly damned than
another it is a march of this kind.

October 30th--An order arrived, from Lord Wellington, for our corps of
the army to fall back upon Salamanca; we, therefore, returned to
Madrid, and, after halting outside the gates until we were joined by
Skerret's division, from Cadiz, we bade a last sorrowful adieu to our
friends in the city, and commenced our retreat.

October 31st.--Halted for the night in the park of the Escurial. It is
amusing, on a division's first taking up its ground, to see the
numbers of hares that are, every instant, starting up among the men,
and the scrambling and shouting of the soldiers for the prize. This
day, when the usual shout was given, every man ran, with his cap in
his hand, to endeavour to capture poor _puss_, as he imagined, but
which turned out to be two wild boars, who contrived to make room for
themselves so long as there was nothing but men's caps to contend
with; but they very soon had as many bayonets as bristles in their
backs. We re-crossed the Guadarama mountains next morning.

November 2d.--Halted, this night, in front of a small town, the name
of which I do not recollect. It was beginning to get dark by the time
I had posted our guards and piquets, when I rode into it, to endeavour
to find my messmates, who, I knew, had got a dinner waiting for me
somewhere.

I entered a large square, or market-place, and found it crowded with
soldiers of all nations, most of them three-parts drunk, and in the
midst of whom a mad bull was performing the most extraordinary feats,
quite unnoticed, excepting by those who had the misfortune to attract
his attention. The first intimation that I had of him was his charging
past me, and making a thrust at our quarter-master, carrying off a
portion of his regimental trousers. He next got a fair toss at a
Portuguese soldier, and sent him spinning three or four turns up in
the air. I was highly amused in observing the fellow's astonishment
when he alighted, to see that he had not the remotest idea to what
accident he was indebted for such an evolution, although he seemed
fully prepa