Browne’s composite battalion had started from a position close under the edge of the pine wood; it had first to cross a broad but shallow ravine, and then to climb the gentle slope of the Cerro, where it became fully visible to the enemy, though there was a little cover here and there upon the hillside, in the form of scattered bushes and slight dips in the ground. The French allowed the line to advance a little way up the ascent, and then opened upon it both with a field battery placed close to the chapel on the summit, and with the musketry fire of the three battalions which formed their right wing. Blakeney, our ever-useful authority for this side of the battle, says that the first salvo of the French knocked over more than 200 officers and men out of 536 forming the line. Browne ordered the men to close to the centre, and endeavoured to continue his climb; this was done with much difficulty, but, before the advance could be resumed, more than fifty men more were killed or wounded. All the exertions of the colonel could not form a third line--fourteen officers out of twenty-one were down, and more than half the rank and file. The remainder now scattered; the men did not retreat, but threw themselves down, and commenced independent firing from behind bushes, hillocks, and any other cover they could find. The French made no attempt to fall upon them by descending the hill, as would have seemed natural. The reason was that by the time that the flank battalion had been disposed of, the main body of Dilkes’s brigade had come out of the wood, and was visible forming up at the foot of the hill to deliver the real assault.