Hence when, in November, General Decaen arrived to take over Macdonald’s task, he found before him a task not without serious difficulties, though the actual force of Spaniards in the field was far less than it had been before the disasters at Tarragona and Figueras. Lacy had a very small field army--he had reorganized 8,000 men by October, and all through his command the total did not grow very much greater. When he handed over his office to Copons fifteen months after, there were no more than 14,000 men under arms, including cadres and recruits. On the other hand he had a central position, a free range east and west, now that the line of French posts across Catalonia had been broken, and several points of more or less safe access to the sea. Munitions and stores, and occasionally very small reinforcements from the Balearic Isles, were still brought over by the British squadron which ranged along the coast. Some of the officers, especially the much tried and never-despairing Eroles, and the indefatigable Manso, were thoroughly to be relied upon, and commanded great local popularity. This Lacy himself did not possess--he was obeyed because of his stern resolve, but much disliked for his autocratic and dictatorial ways, which kept him in constant friction with the Junta that sat at Berga. Moreover he was a stranger, while the Catalans disliked all leaders who were not of their own blood: and he was strongly convinced that the brunt of the fighting must be borne by the regular troops, while the popular voice was all in favour of the _somatenes_ and guerrilleros, and against the enforcement of conscription. Much was to be said on either side: the warfare of the irregulars was very harassing to the French, and had led to many petty successes, and one great one--the capture of Figueras. On the other hand these levies were irresponsible and untrustworthy when any definite operation was in hand: they might, or they might not, turn up in force when they were required: the frank disregard of their chiefs for punctuality or obedience drove to wild rage any officer who had served in the old army. With regular troops it was possible to calculate that a force would be where it was wanted to be at a given time, and would at least attempt to carry out its orders: with the _somatenes_ it was always possible, nay probable, that some petty quarrel of rival chiefs, or some rival attraction of an unforeseen sort, would lead to non-appearance. To this there was the easy reply that ever since Blake first tried to make the Catalans work ‘_militarmente_ and not _paisanmente_’ the regular army for some two years had never gained a single battle, nor relieved a single fortress[84]. The best plan would probably have been to attempt to combine the two systems: it was absolutely necessary to have a nucleus of regular troops, but unwise to act like Blake and Lacy, who tried to break up and discourage the _somatenes_, in order that they might