That night the English general slept amongst the troops, and the first streak of light saw both sides under arms. Some signals were interchanged between Marmont and the forts, yet all remained quiet until evening, when Wellington detached the 68th Regiment to drive the French from Moresco. This attack, made with vigour, succeeded, but the troops being recalled just as daylight failed, a body of French, passing unperceived through standing corn, broke into the village unexpectedly and did considerable execution. In the skirmish an officer, named Mackay, being surrounded, refused to surrender, and, fighting against a multitude, received more wounds than the human frame was thought capable of sustaining; yet he lived to show his honourable scars. Next day three divisions and a brigade of cavalry joined Marmont, who, having now forty thousand men, extended his left and seized a part of the height in advance of the allies’ right wing. From thence he could discern the whole of their order of battle, and attack their right on even terms; but Graham, using the seventh division, dislodged his detachment with a sharp skirmish before it could be formidably reinforced, and in the night the French withdrew to some heights six miles in rear. It was thought Marmont’s tempestuous advance to Moresco on the evening of the 20th should have been his ruin; but Wellington argued, that if he came to fight it was better to defend a strong position than descend to combat in the plain; for the French inferiority was not such as to insure a result decisive of the campaign, and in case of failure, a retreat across the Tormes would have been very difficult. To this may be added, that during the first evening there was some confusion amongst the allies; the troops, of different nations, had formed their order of battle slowly; the descent of the mountain towards the enemy was by no means easy; walls, hollow ways and villages, covered the French front, and Marmont, having plenty of guns and troops ready of movement, could have evaded the action until night. This reasoning however failed on the 21st. The allies, whose infantry was a third more, their cavalry three times as numerous and much better mounted, might have poured down by all the roads at daybreak, and then Marmont, turned on both flanks and followed vehemently, could never have made his retreat to the Duero through the open country: on the 22nd, when his other troops came up, the chances were no longer the same.