The British lay in camp, and on the following morning advanced, and met with the enemy at Ponto Ferrado. We crossed the river up to about our middles. The enemy occupied the hill in front of us. We had about 23,000 men. It being a windy day, the colours were extended to their full size. They brought the guns to bear upon us, and our brigade of 2,000 charged to take possession of the guns. It was supposed that we lost about 1,700 men of the brigade in a very few minutes. The General was very much blamed, from what we could understand, for bringing these men into action before the others had arrived. Shortly after, the right wing of the army came over the bridge, some little way down the river, and, coming round on the back of the enemy, took possession of the artillery, spiked their guns, dismounted them from their carriages, and the whole of our army took the hill to scour the troops off. A few out-skirmishers, under the command of an officer, were beating back skirmishers. Ours were about thirty in number; fifteen out of the thirty were French volunteers. We kept the enemy moving pretty smartly, especially the skirmishers. After going for nearly half a mile, there was, rather at an incline and some little distance from the hill, a big gully in front of us. I looked over into the gully and saw a troop of cavalry belonging to the enemy; they were dismounted, holding their bridle-reins in their hands, waiting for orders to mount. I remarked to Mr. Burton, the officer, “Dangerous route to go any further, sir.” “How so, corporal?” he asked. I replied, “There is a troop of cavalry down there, right before us.” He said he could not discover them; we spoke in a very low voice, in order that the enemy’s cavalry should not hear us. “You come and look over my shoulder,” I said. When he did so, he discovered them, and gave orders to retire to where we had taken the brigade.