"Too late," said he; "tell General Miller I have ordered the cavalry to retire on me.--Caza," to one of his officers, "lend--" "Lieutenant Crawford, sir." "Lend Lieutenant Crawford your horse; his is done up.--Now ride as fast as you can, and give General Miller my message." I saluted, sprang into the saddle, dashed past the Peruvian infantry, down the hill, and into the defile. Here I found the main body of our cavalry retiring in accordance with Bolivar's command, and heard that Miller, with a squadron of Peruvians, was still following the Royalists. It was quite dark now, and the route was covered with hillocks; but I rode on swiftly, trusting to luck, and at length came up with the general, who had halted in his pursuit. On receiving Bolivar's message he immediately gave orders to retire, and about seven o'clock we reached our camping-ground. Fortunately we managed to collect a little fuel, for the night was so intensely cold that few of the seriously wounded, though receiving every possible attention, survived its rigours. Even lying close to the fire and enveloped in our ponchos we shivered. A surgeon had sewn up the cut in Alzura's face, and we gave him the most sheltered place, and the one nearest the fire. There was not much sleep for any of us that night; we were far too excited, and spent most of the time fighting the battle over again. To my delight, every one talked of Santiago and his magnificent bravery. "Didn't we take him prisoner once, down south?" asked Plaza. "His face seemed familiar to me." "Yes," said I: "his name is Santiago Mariano, and at that time he was a major." "Faith," observed Alzura, looking up, "as far as fighting goes, he ought to be a commander-in-chief! A wounded Colombian told me the fellow sprang on them like a lion falling on a herd of deer. A lucky thing for us that the Marianos are in a minority among the Royalists." "Canterac nearly did the trick though," growled the major. "I thought he would drop on us in that defile. I tell you what it is: Bolivar can thank our colonel that he has any cavalry left." "Bravo, major! I heard this evening that we saved the army." "So we did," chuckled Plaza; "and we can say it without a word of boasting. I don't care about praising my own men." But the rest was drowned in good-humoured laughter, as every one knew that the finest troop in South America--and the world, too, for that matter--was Plaza's. However, it appeared that we really had done a smart thing: for the next morning Bolivar held a grand parade, and in presence of the whole army ordered that henceforth the regiment of which we formed part should be known as the "Hussars of Junin;" and General Miller publicly said that we deserved the honour.