Great was the disorder on the hill. The shrinking Spaniards were in one part blindly firing, though the British troops were before them, and in another part, flying before the lancers, would have broken through the 29th, then advancing to the succour of Colborne; but, terribly resolute, that regiment smote friends and foes without distinction in their onward progress: meanwhile Beresford urging the main body of the Spaniards to advance in his heat seized an ensign by the breast and bore him and his colours by main force to the front, yet the troops did not follow, and the coward ran back when released from the marshal’s iron grasp. In this crisis, the weather, which had ruined Colborne’s brigade, saved the day, for Soult could not see the whole field of battle and kept his troops halted in masses when the decisive blow might have been struck. His cavalry indeed, began to hem in that of the allies, yet the fire of the horse-artillery enabled Lumley, covered by the bed of the Aroya and supported by the fourth division, to check them; Colborne still kept the height with the 31st Regiment, and the British artillery, under Julius Hartman, was coming fast into action; William Stewart, also, having escaped the lancers, was again mounting the hill with Houghton’s brigade, which he brought on with the same vehemence but in a juster order of battle. The day now cleared and a dreadful fire poured into the thickest of the French columns taught Soult the fight was yet to be won. Houghton’s regiments reached the height under a heavy cannonade, and the 29th, after breaking through the fugitive Spaniards, was charged in flank by the French lancers, but two companies, wheeling to the right, foiled this attack; and then the third brigade of Stewart’s division came up on the left, and the Spaniards under Zayas and Ballesteros moved forward. Hartman’s artillery had made the enemy’s infantry recoil, yet, soon recovering, they renewed the battle with greater violence than before, and the cannon on both sides discharged showers of grape at half-range, while the play of musketry was incessant and often within pistol-shot; but the crowded columns of the French embarrassed their battle, and the British line would not yield them an inch of ground or a moment of time to open their ranks. Their fighting was however fierce and dangerous. Stewart was twice wounded, Colonel Duckworth was slain, and the gallant Houghton, having received many wounds without shrinking, fell and died in the act of cheering on his men.