The troops in Tarragona were not in a condition to harass the French on their retreat; but the retreat was most important to them. They obtained room to distribute their sick, and the progress of the contagion was stopped as soon as its main cause was thus removed. Some affairs took place beyond the Llobregat with Wimpffen’s division, which dispersed, as it became irregular troops to do, when they were not acting at advantage. When the enemy reached Vicq, they found that that city had not been infected by the ill example of Reus; the Bishop, five or six old men, and the sick who were unable to remove, were the only inhabitants of that populous city who remained. The others, with a spirit worthy of their country and their cause, upon the unexpected approach of the invaders abandoned all that they could not carry with them in their instant removal, and went to seek shelter where they could; many of them actually lived among the mountains during the whole three months that the French continued there, though at the time of their flight the weather was severe, and the snow daily falling. ♦ST. CYR, 156.♦ There had been no time to destroy the provisions, much less to remove them; if St. Cyr had not succeeded in effectually concealing his intention of quartering the troops there, this would have been done, and his army could then have derived no advantage from their change of position. As it was, they found corn enough to last till the harvest, lard for a month, and wine for a fortnight: but the change of diet, air, and climate (for they had moved into a higher region), and the want of wine as soon as the stock was exhausted, produced disease among the soldiers; and it was well for them that neither Reding nor his army was in a state to resume offensive operations; so that they were enabled to rest. ♦ARREST OF THE PERSONS IN OFFICE AT BARCELONA FOR REFUSING THE OATH.♦