This display of national character and of Romish superstition had taken place in the first fervour of their feelings after a signal deliverance. The spirit of the Geronans did not fail when danger was again at hand; and the governor, seeing and relying upon this disposition of the people, thought it advisable, before the time of trial approached, to restrain by fear the few treacherous subjects who might be waiting, when opportunity offered, to declare themselves; ♦APRIL 1.♦ he published an edict, therefore, forbidding all persons from speaking of capitulation on pain of immediate death, without exception of class, rank, or condition. Both by the garrison and the people it was received with acclamations. The military Junta of the city proposed that the streets should be unpaved as a precaution against bombardment; this was opposed by the board of police, upon the ground that it would be prejudicial to health; the question, therefore, was referred to the medical board, who found it convenient to avoid a physical discussion, and compromised the matter by deciding that the paving should be taken up in the squares and streets through which the troops must necessarily pass. ♦ST. CYR WOULD HAVE REDUCED THE CITY BY BLOCKADE.♦ General Reille, who was to have commanded the besieging army, was at this time superseded by General Verdier. This army consisted of 18,000 men; to make up that number Marshal St. Cyr was compelled to weaken the corps of observation under his own command, which was thus reduced to about 12,000; but from such armies as the Catalans could bring into the field, and such counsels as directed them, he well knew how little there was to apprehend. ♦ST. CYR, 164.♦ In this confidence St. Cyr would have preferred blockading the city to besieging it, and would have waited till it should be reduced by famine, whereby all the loss which the besiegers sustained might have been spared. But he was neither consulted nor listened to, holding the command at this time only till Marshal Augereau ♦1809. MAY.♦ should arrive. On the 6th of May the besiegers first appeared on the heights of Casa Roca and Costarroja on the other side the Ter, and began to form their lines without opposition. A battery of eleven mortars was planted upon Casa Roca, from whence it commanded the city; works were erected against Monjuic also; the garrison being far too weak to impede these operations, and no efforts being made for impeding them from without. When the lines were completed, and every thing ready to commence the bombardment, they sent a flag of truce requiring Alvarez to spare himself and the city the evils which must inevitably attend resistance. D. Mariano admitted the officer to his presence, and bade him tell his general, that in future the trouble of sending flags of truce might be spared, for he would hold no other communication with him than at the mouth of the cannon. The French commander found means of conveying