for those; nor any provisions laid in for any thing like a siege. On the other hand, the enemy without were upwards of seven thousand, with a body of four thousand more, not fifteen leagues off, on their march to join them. Add to this, the Mareschal de Thesse was no farther off than Madrid, a very few days march from Valencia ; a short way indeed for the Earl, (who, as was said before, was wholly unprovided for a siege, which was reported to be the sole end of the Mareschal's moving that way.) But the Earl's never-failing genius resolved again to attempt that by art, which the strength of his forces utterly disallowed him. And in the first place, his intelligence telling him that sixteen twenty-four pounders, with stores and ammunition answerable for a siege, were shipped off for the enemy's service at Alicant, the Earl forthwith lays a design, and with his usual success intercepts them all, supplying that way his own necessities at the expence of the enemy.

The four thousand men ready to reinforce the troops nearer Valencia, were the next point to be undertaken; but hic labor, hoc opus; since the greater body under the Conde de las Torres, (who, with Mahoni, was now reinstated in his post,) lay between the Earl and those troops intended to be dispersed. And what enhanced the difficulty, the river Xucar must be passed in almost the face of the enemy. Great disadvantages as these were, they did not discourage the Earl. He detached by night four hundred horse and eight hundred foot, who marched with such hasty silence, that they surprised that great body, routed them, and brought into Valencia, six hundred prisoners very safely, notwithstanding they were obliged, under the same night- thousand. covert, to pass very near a body of three thousand of the enemy's horse. Such a prodigious victory would hardly have gained credit in that city, if the prisoners brought in had not been living witnesses of the action, as well as the triumph. The Conde

A small

party of the Earl's routs a body of four

de las Torres, upon these two military rebuffs, drew off to a more convenient distance, and left the Earl a little more at ease in his new quarters.

Here the Earl of Peterborow made his residence for some time. He was extremely well beloved; his affable behaviour exacted as much from all; and he preserved such a good correspondence with the priests and the ladies, that he never failed of the most early and best intelligence; a thing by no means to be slighted in the common course of life; but much more commendable and necessary in a General, with so small an army, at open war, and in the heart of his enemy's country.

The Earl, by this means, some small time after, receiving early intelligence that King Philip was actually on his march to Barcelona, with an army of upwards of twenty-five thousand men, under the command of a Mareschal of France, began his march towards Catalonia, with all the troops that he could gather together, lea

ving in Valencia a small body of foot, such as in that exigence could best be spared. The whole body thus collected made very little more than two thousand foot and six hundred horse; yet resolutely with these he sets out for Barcelona: In the neighbourhood of which, as soon as he arrived, he took care to post himself and his diminutive army in the mountains which environ that city; where he not only secured them against the enemy, but found himself in a capacity of putting himself under perpetual alarms. Nor was the Mareschal, with his great army, capable of returning the Earl's compliment of disturbance; since he himself, every six or eight hours, put his troops into such a varying situation, that always when most arduously sought, he was farthest off from being found. In this manner the General bitterly harassed the troops of the enemy; and by these means struck a perpetual terror into the besiegers. Nor did he only this way annoy the enemy; the precautions he had used, and the

Monjouick taken by the Mareschal of France.

measures he had taken in other places, with a view to prevent their return to Madrid, though the invidious endeavoured to bury them in oblivion, having equally contributed to the driving of the Mareschal of France, and his catholic king, out of the Spanish dominions.

But to go on with the siege: the breaches in the walls of that city, during its siege by the Earl, had been put into tolerable repair; but those of Monjouick, on the contrary, had been as much neglected. However, the garrison made shift to hold out a battery of twenty-three days, with no less than fifty pieces of cannon; when, after a loss of the enemy of upwards of three thousand men, (a moiety of the army employed against it when the Earl took it,) they were forced to surrender at discretion. And this cannot but merit our observation, that

a place which the English general took in little more than an hour, and with very inconsiderable loss, afforded the Mareschal