For the counter-revolution at Palermo had only lasted for four days! Finding Lord William Bentinck firm, and prepared to use force, King Ferdinand withdrew his proclamation, and resigned the administration into the hands of his eldest son, the Prince Royal. The Queen, whose strong will had set the whole affair on foot, promised to return to her native Austria, and actually sailed for the Levant, to the intense satisfaction of every one save the knot of intriguers in her Court. The scare was soon over--its only result was the abandonment of the raid on Valencia. Murray had now received orders from Wellington to await the arrival of a detailed scheme for the way in which his army was to be employed. Pending the receipt of these[410] directions he lapsed into absolute torpidity--the only record of his doings in the last days of March and early April being that he set the troops concentrated at Castalla to entrenching the hillsides around that formidable position--a clear sign that he had no further intention of taking the offensive on his own account. Suchet had been much puzzled by the advance of his enemy to Alcoy and Albeyda, followed by subsequent inactivity for a whole month. When he found that even the movement of Elio’s troops to Yecla did not foreshadow a general assault upon his lines, he concluded that there must be some unexplained reason for the quiescence of the Allies, and that the opportunity was a good one for a bold blow, while they remained inexplicably waiting in a disjointed and unconcentrated line opposite his positions. The obvious and easy thing would have been to fall upon Whittingham at Alcoy, but probably for that very reason the Marshal tried another scheme. He secretly passed all his available troops to Fuente la Higuera, on his extreme right flank, leaving only a trifling screen in front of Murray’s army, and on April 10th marched in two columns against the allied left. One consisting of six battalions of Harispe’s division and two cavalry regiments aimed at the isolated Murcian division at Yecla, the other and larger column four battalions of Habert’s division, and seven of Musnier’s (under Robert during the absence of its proper chief), with his cuirassier regiment, marched by Caudete on Villena, to cut in between the Spaniards and Murray, and intercept any aid which the latter might send from Castalla towards the Spaniards.