A stranger who, on the morning referred to, should, for the first time, have walked through the ranks of the Carlist army, would have found much that was curious and interesting to note. The whole disposable military force of what the Christinos called the Faction, was there assembled, and a motley crew it appeared. Had stout hearts and strong arms been as rare in their ranks as uniformity of garb and equipment, the struggle would hardly have been prolonged for four years after the date we write of. But it would be difficult to find in any part of Europe, perhaps of the world, men of more hardy frame, and better calculated to make good soldiers, than those composing many of the Carlist battalions. Amongst them the Navarrese and Guipuzcoans were pre-eminent; sinewy, broad-chested, narrow-flanked fellows, of prodigious activity and capacity for enduring fatigue. The Guipuzcoans especially, in their short grey frocks and red trousers, their necks bare, the shirt-collar turned back over their shoulders, with their bronzed faces and wiry mustaches, leathern belts, containing cartridges, buckled tightly round their waists, and long bright-barrelled muskets in their hands, were the very _beau-ideal_ of grenadiers. Beside these, the Biscayans and some of the Castilians, undersized and unsoldierly-looking, showed to much disadvantage. Other battalions were composed in great part of Christino prisoners, who, having had the choice given them between death and service under Don Carlos, had chosen the latter, but who now seemed to have little stomach for a fight against their former friends. The whole of the Carlist cavalry, even then not very numerous, was also there. The grim-visaged priest Merino, ever the stanchest partisan of absolutism, bestrode his famous black horse, and headed a body of lancers as fierce and wild-looking as himself; Pascual Real, the dashing major of Ferdinand's guard, who in former days, when he took his afternoon ride in the Madrid prado, drew all eyes upon him by the elegance of his horsemanship, marshalled the Alavese hussars; and, in a third place, some squadrons of Navarrese, who had left the fat pastures of the valley of Echauri to be present at the expected fight, were ranged under the orders of the young and gallant Manolin.