This was the last of the battle. Davis and Bragg followed the enemy a short distance; but the San Patricio battery still commanded the southern edge of the plateau, and the troops were so fagged that they could hardly walk. Night was coming on, and the firing ceased. The men lay down where they stood; and a few, overcome by fatigue, slept side by side with the dead and the wounded. It was a dark, gloomy night, and a bitter wind swept from the mountain. Not far in the distance the wolf’s howl broke dismally on the ear, and the vultures flapped their wings overhead. Nothing was known of the Mexican army; no one could say what the morrow might bring forth. With anxious eye the officers looked for the dawn. It came at last; and to their inexpressible delight the first streaks of light in the eastern sky revealed a deserted camp. The Mexicans had fled. An army of over twenty thousand men, comprising the flower of the Mexican troops, had been beaten by forty-six hundred Americans, over four thousand of whom were raw volunteers. Such a cheer as rose from the pass of Angostura on that February morning never before or since re-echoed through the dark gorges of the Sierra Madre. XIV SCOTT’S CONQUEST OF MEXICO, 1847 Northern Mexico lay helpless at Taylor’s feet. The stars and stripes floated over the citadel of Monterey, and the flower of the Mexican army, commanded by their greatest general, had been repulsed at Buena Vista. Nothing now remained but to strike a blow at the vitals of the southern republic. That task had been imposed on General Scott, whose skill and experience designated him as the proper man to conduct a campaign in which the fate of the war was to be decided. On March 6, 1847, the fleet of transports and men-of-war was concentrated near Vera Cruz. It bore a small but well-disciplined force of some twelve thousand men, comprising the whole standing army of the United States--four regiments of artillery, eight of infantry, one of mounted riflemen, and detachments of dragoons--besides eight volunteer regiments of foot and one of horse. Major-General Scott commanded the whole, with Worth, fresh from the brilliant capture of Monterey, Twiggs, and the volunteer Patterson as his brigadiers. Under the latter served Generals Quitman, Pillow, and Shields.