Before six o’clock in the morning of the 7th of April, all organisation amongst the assaulting columns had ceased, and a scene of plunder and cruelty, that it would be difficult to find a parallel for, took its place. The army, so fine and effective on the preceding day, was now transformed into a vast band of brigands, and the rich and beautiful city of Badajoz presented the turbulent aspect that must result from the concourse of numerous and warlike multitudes nearly strangers to each other, or known only by the name of the nation to which they belonged. The horde of vagabonds—Spaniards as well as Portuguese, women as well as men—that now eagerly sought for admission to plunder, nearly augmented the number of brigands to what the assailing army had reckoned the night before; and it may be fairly said that twenty thousand people—armed with full powers to act as they thought fit, and all, or almost all, armed with weapons which could be turned, at the pleasure or caprice of the bearer, for the purpose of enforcing any wish he sought to gratify—were let loose upon the ill-fated inhabitants of this devoted city. These people were under no restraint, had no person to control them, and in a short time got into such an awful state of intoxication that they lost all control over their own actions. In the first burst, all the wine and spirit stores were forced open and ransacked from top to bottom; and it required but a short time for the men to get into that fearful state that was alike dangerous to all—officers or soldiers, or the inhabitants of the city. Casks of the choicest wines and brandy were dragged into the streets, and when the men had drunk as much as they fancied, the heads of the vessels were stove in, or the casks otherwise so broken that the liquor ran about in streams. In the town were a number of animals that belonged to the garrison, several hundred sheep, numerous oxen, as likewise many horses; these were amongst the first taken possession of; and the wealthy occupier of many a house was glad to be allowed the employment of conducting them to our camp, as, by doing so, he got away from a place where his life was not worth a minute’s purchase. But terrible as was this scene, it was not possible to avoid occasionally laughing, for the _conducteur_ was generally not only obliged to drive a herd of cattle, but also to carry the bales of plunder taken by his employers—perhaps from his own house—and the stately gravity with which the Spaniard went through his work, dressed in short breeches, frilled shirt, and a hat and plumes that might vie with our eighth Henry, followed, as he was, by our ragamuffin soldiers with fixed bayonets, presented a scene that would puzzle even Mr. Cruikshank himself to justly delineate. The plunder so captured was deposited in our camp, and placed under a guard chiefly composed of the soldiers' wives.