Marshal Moncey, on whom the odious service of besieging Zaragoza had been imposed, fixed his head-quarters at Alagon, while he waited for reinforcements, and preparations were making to commence it. At the end of November he reconnoitred the Torrero, a point which it was ♦1808. DECEMBER.♦ necessary to occupy before he could begin the siege; some warm skirmishes ensued, which tended to encourage the Spaniards, because the enemy, when they had well examined the ground, returned to Alagon. The importance of the Torrero seems not to have been duly appreciated by the Zaragozans; they contented themselves with throwing up some slight works there, faced with unburnt bricks. Moncey had with him 17,000 men, and was joined by Mortier with 14,000 in the middle of December. Meantime a battering train of sixty pieces was brought from Pamplona; projectiles also were supplied from the same arsenal; the country was compelled to furnish means of transport as far as Tudela, and there they were embarked upon the canal. ♦THE FRENCH APPEAR BEFORE THE CITY.♦ All being ready, they appeared before Zaragoza on the 20th. Gazan’s division crossing the Ebro at Tauste marched to Zuera and Villa Nueva; Suchet’s took a position upon the right bank of the river, within a league of the city; and Moncey, following the right bank of the canal, placed one of his divisions on the left of the ♦ROGNIAT, 3.♦ Guerva, opposite the great sluice, the two others on the right. ♦THEY TAKE THE TORRERO.♦ Buonaparte had declared that bombs and mines should bring Zaragoza to reason; and in the spirit of that declaration had prepared the fullest means for overpowering moral resistance by military force. Skilled as he was in the art of war, he did not, like a Mahommedan conqueror, reckon upon numbers for success: to have employed a larger army (even if the Austrian war had not occurred) would have been wasting men here who might be more serviceably employed in other quarters; there was the difficulty of feeding them, and no danger could be apprehended from any efforts which might be made to raise the siege; but the number of engineers was unusually large, and the means of destruction were in proportion. General Lacoste commanded this department; he was perfect master of his profession, and having served with Buonaparte in Egypt, had acquired at the siege of Cairo some knowledge of the kind of difficulties with which he had now to contend. During the night the enemy erected a battery which commanded the Torrero, and was opened upon it at daybreak: a false attack was made upon that post in front, where the canal covered it; meantime another brigade, which under cover of the olive-yard of St. Joseph had got possession of an aqueduct the preceding evening, passed the canal under that aqueduct, and moved rapidly up the left bank with the intention of interposing between the city and the point of attack. The Spaniards were thrown into confusion