Towards evening a French company with signal audacity seized a village half musket-shot from the light division, and refused to retire; whereupon Craufurd, turning twelve guns on the houses, overwhelmed them with bullets; but after paying the French captain this distinguished honour, recovering his temper, he sent a company of the 43rd down, which cleared the village in a few minutes. Meanwhile an affecting incident, contrasting strongly with the savage character of the preceding events, added to the interest of the day. A poor orphan Portuguese girl, seventeen years of age and very handsome, was seen coming down the mountain, driving an ass loaded with all her property through the midst of the French army. She had abandoned her dwelling in obedience to the proclamation, and now passed over the field of battle with a childish simplicity, totally unconscious of her perilous situation, and scarcely understanding which were the hostile and which the friendly troops, for no man on either side was so brutal as to molest her. This battle was fought unnecessarily by Massena, and by Wellington reluctantly, being forced thereto from the misconduct of the Portuguese government. It was however entirely to the disadvantage of the French, who had a general and eight hundred men killed, two generals wounded, and one, Simon, made prisoner. Their whole loss may be estimated at four thousand five hundred men, while that of the allies did not exceed thirteen hundred. Massena now judged Busaco impregnable, and as it could not be turned by the Mondego, because the allies might pass that river on a shorter line, it was proposed in council to return to Spain; but at that moment a peasant told him of a road leading over the Caramula and he resolved to turn the allies’ left. To mask this movement the skirmishing was renewed on the 28th so warmly that a general battle was expected; yet an ostentatious display of men, the disappearance of baggage, and the casting up of earth indicated some other design. In the evening, the French infantry were sensibly diminished, the cavalry was descried winding over the distant mountains towards the allies’ left, and the project was then apparent. Wellington arrived from the right, and observed the distant columns for some time with great earnestness; he seemed uneasy, his countenance bore a fierce and angry expression, and suddenly mounting his horse he rode off without speaking--one hour later and the army was in movement to abandon Busaco, for Massena had threaded the defiles of the Caramula and was marching upon Coimbra.