CHAPTER II Headquarters of the 88th Regiment—Its losses from sickness—Unhealthy state of the country—The British army leaves the Alemtejo—General Picton takes the command of the 3rd Division—Remarks on the general’s conduct—His apology to Colonel Wallace—The Connaught Boy and the goat. The 88th at this period, although one of the strongest and most effective regiments in the army, did not count more than five hundred bayonets. The fatigues of the late campaign, and the unhealthiness and debility of many of the soldiers in consequence, caused a material diminution in our ranks; added to this, the country in the neighbourhood of the Guadiana was swampy and damp, and what between ague, dysentery, and fever, the hospitals were in a few weeks overstocked. Not less than ten thousand were on the sick list, or about one-third of the entire force, as borne on the muster-rolls; and there was a great paucity of medical officers; many of those had been left at Talavera with the wounded, that were of necessity obliged to be abandoned, and others, either catching the contagion that raged throughout the country, or infected by their close attendance in the hospitals, were lost to us. The consequence was that the men and officers died daily by tens and fifteens, and this mortality was not confined to the old soldiers alone, for the young militia men, who now joined the army from England, suffered equally with those who were half starved on the retreat from Talavera, and during the occupation of the bridge of Arzobispo. For several days the rations of those soldiers consisted of half a pound of wheat, _in the grain_, a few ounces of flour twice in the week, and a quarter of a pound of goat’s flesh; and regiments which a few weeks before were capable of exertions that were never equalled during the remainder of the Peninsular contest, were now unable to go through an ordinary march. It was not to be wondered at that men who had so suffered should be now attacked with disease when all excitement was over, and a reaction of the system was the natural consequence; but the young men who joined from England at this period could not be so classed, and as it was manifest that the air of the country was unwholesome, Lord Wellington decided upon marching his army to the north-eastern frontier; yet before quitting the Alemtejo it was necessary that the safety of Seville should be guaranteed by a sufficient Spanish force. Early in December the army left the Alemtejo, and by the first week in January the 3rd Division was distributed in the different villages in the neighbourhood of Trancoso. The villages of Alverca and Frayadas, distant about two miles from each other, were allotted for the 88th Regiment. Midway between the two was a plain of considerable extent, and upon this plain the regiment exercised every day for several hours.