The Junta could at this time have had no reasonable hope of preventing the French from entering Andalusia. They could have no reliance upon the remains of Areizaga’s army, for the most mournful circumstances attending such battles as that of Ocaña is, that the worst men escape, and that the best and steadiest are those who fall. Parque’s force was not so completely broken up; it had lost more in reputation than in actual strength, but its strength was comparatively small, and it was at a distance. What reliance they had was upon Alburquerque’s corps, which consisted of only 12,000 men; ... his head-quarters were at Don Benito, having 2000 men at Truxillo, and some advanced parties upon the Tagus. But their immediate danger was not from the side of Extremadura, and what was such a corps against the armies which the French would now bring into the field! Fallacious statements were circulated to make the Andalusians rely upon the strength of the passes, and the measures which had been taken for defending them. It was affirmed that Areizaga had been joined by considerable reinforcements, and abundantly supplied with means of every kind; that his army had been re-organized; that that general, who had gained the confidence of the nation, would soon be at the head of its four divisions; and that the works in the passes were such, that all the force which Napoleon might send against them would be unable to effect their way. ♦SCHEMES OF COUNT TILLY.♦ Such statements, which could only deceive the people into a false security, may very possibly have been designed for that effect by some of those agents of the government, who were now looking to obtain favour with the Intruder, The members of the Junta themselves stand clearly acquitted of any such intention. One of them, and only one, had at this time his own projects in view, and they were not so much those of a traitor, as of a desperate adventurer, in the delirium of revolutionary ambition. This was the Conde de Tilly, a man equally destitute of principle and of character, and who, as sometimes happens in the crooked paths of political expediency, had been promoted from the provincial to the Central Junta, because such promotion was the readiest means of removing him from a situation which he disgraced! This man, being destitute of any private worth and of all national feeling, could have no hope for his country; and finding no farther hope there for himself, he had turned his thoughts toward the colonies. His plan was to get four or five thousand troops at his disposal, and when the crisis which he foresaw should arrive, seize what money there might be in the treasury, hasten to Cadiz, take possession of the ships there, sail for Mexico, and there establish himself at the head of an independent government. The difficulties which he might find from the British squadron at his outset, or the Mexicans on his arrival, were overlooked in this frantic scheme. A few days before the battle of