to determine whether they would surrender prisoners at war, and they were glad to secure their lives by submitting to that condition. About 1300 men were thus taken, and 114 Spaniards whom Soult had left there as prisoners were restored to liberty. Silveira then followed the steps of the enemy. Hearing that they had entered Braga, his intention was to cut off their garrison there, as he had done at Chaves; but while he was arranging measures for this, he learned the fate of Porto, and marched in consequence toward Villa Real. On the way he was informed that the enemy intended to enter Tras os Montes by way either of Canavezes or of a little town known by the awkward name of _Entre ambos os rios_, from its position near the point where the Tamega falls into the Douro. Immediately he occupied both places, repulsed the French in two attempts upon the former, and reaching Amarante himself just as a party of the enemy, having burnt the villages of Villa Meam, Manhufe, and Pildre, were advancing ♦DIARIO OFFICIAL. CORR. BRAZ. III. 113, 115.♦ to take possession of it, he made them retire to Penafiel, and entered that city the next day on their withdrawing from it. ♦PROCEEDINGS AT COIMBRA.♦ Silveira’s activity raised the hopes of the Portugueze: it was said in Porto that he would soon take his coffee in that city, and this was repeated to Soult, who desired Silveira might be assured that he would provide him with sugar for it. The jest is said to have kept up ♦OPERATIONS, &C. P. 199.♦ the spirits of those Portugueze who had consented to serve the French interest. But the cup which they had prepared for themselves was one which, drug it as they might, nothing could sweeten. Every sacrifice and every success on the part of their countrymen, every act of heroism and virtue, every manifestation of the old national spirit, was a reproach to them; and tidings which would have elated and rejoiced their hearts if they had not fallen from their duty, brought to them feelings only of fear, and shame, and self-condemnation. The Portugueze were so persuaded of their own strength, and the experience even of the preceding year had so little abated that persuasion, that they had considered it impossible for the French to enter Porto, or had expected at least that the city would have made a long and glorious resistance. And yet the tidings of its capture, with all the shameful and all the dreadful circumstances that attended it, occasioned no consternation. That miserable event was known at Coimbra on the following day; it was known also that no means had been taken for removing the boats and destroying the bridge; that the part which had been broken by the crowd of fugitives had speedily been repaired by the enemy, and that their advanced parties had proceeded as far as Grijo. It was considered certain that they would lose no time in occupying so important a city as Coimbra and the intermediate country, one of the finest and most fertile parts of the kingdom.