I could not help contrasting the healthy and spirited appearance of the French soldiers to that of the unfortunate English. But the privations the latter had endured, and still were suffering, through neglect, and the continued lash of those in command of them, actually had pinched out that noble spirit which I ever found the British soldier to possess. Indeed, I have wondered since that the slightest subordination was kept, under the system of cruelty pursued towards them. Any, or the least dereliction of duty, even the forgetting to touch the hat to a passing officer, was commonly followed by the _cats_; while the distant bearing of most of the commanding officers prevented the soldiers’ complaints being heard: the total disregard also of the latter to the billets and personal comforts of their men—and in many cases, tyrannical ejections from quarters, where they interfered in the least with those petty despots, had totally alienated the man from the officer. But with the “Foreign Legion,” composed, as it was, of men of all nations, everything went pleasantly, and officers and men were so alive to each other’s welfare, that it extended its secret services even to the unfortunate British Auxiliaries. Many and many were the instances in which the miserable Legionite, stretched in liquor on the street, has been dragged by them to concealment, to screen him from the lash of the Provost. In truth, this sympathy was found among the Spaniards, also, who constantly witnessing the cruelty, had become quite alive to the risk the delinquents daily incurred. A day or two following that on which Cordova withdrew from the positions about Arlaban, and from between the British and Foreign Legion, who were posted to the right and left of the Spaniards, an occurrence took place which will illustrate the sympathy that existed between the officers of the French Legion and their soldiers. It will be remembered, that in consequence of the above movement, many officers of the French resigned, and Cordova, for the first time, was stigmatised as a traitor. The two Legions withdrew from their advance posts, and a recrimination followed between the Foreign and Spanish Generals.