The green slope of a hill, at the base of a southern spur of the Pyrenees, presented, upon a spring night of the year 1837, a scene of unusual life. The long grass, rarely pressed save by some errant mountain-goat, or truant donkey from the plain, was now laid and trodden beneath the feet and hoofs of a host of men and horses; the young trees, neglected by the woodcutter in favour of maturer timber, resounded beneath the blows of the foraging-hatchet. Up the centre of the hill, an avenue, bare of wood, but not less grass-grown than the other portions of the slope, communicated with the steep and rocky path that zigzagged up the face of the superior mountain. On either side of this road--if such the track might be called, that was only marked by absence of trees--several squadrons of cavalry, hussars, lancers, and light dragoons, had established their bivouac. There had been hard fighting over that ground for the greater part of the afternoon; but with this the horsemen had little to do. On the other hand, the fragments of smoked paper strewing the grass showed that musketeers had been busy, and many cartridges expended, amongst those very trees, where the enemy had made a vigorous stand before he was driven up and finally over the mountain by the Queen's troops. A little higher, where less cover was to be had, dead bodies lay thick; and there had been a very fair sprinkling of the same, in great part despoiled of clothes by the retiring Carlists, upon the luxuriant pasture the Christino cavalry now occupied. From the immediate vicinity of the bivouac, however, these offensive objects had, for the most part, been dragged away. The infantry were further in advance up the mountain, and on the right and left. The enemy having vacated the plain on the approach of a superior force, the cavalry had scarcely got a charge, but had had, upon the other hand, a large amount of trotting to and fro, of scrambling through rugged lanes, and toiling over heavy fields. They had also had a pretty view of the fighting, in which they were prevented taking a share, but which their brass bands frequently encouraged by martial and patriotic melodies; and they had received more than one thorough drenching from the heavy showers that poured down at brief intervals from sunrise till evening. The sun had set, however, in a clear blue sky; the stars shone brightly out; the air was fresh rather than cold; and, but for the extreme wetness of the grass, the night was by no means unfavourable for a bivouac. This inconvenience the men obviated, in some measure, by cutting away the long rank herbage with their sabres, in circles round the fires, made with some difficulty out of the green moist branches of oak and apple-trees; and which, for a while, gave out more smoke than flame, more stench than warmth.