Upon this, Mr. Jacob, who had recently returned from Spain, denied that France had any complete occupation of that country, either civil or military. In Catalonia, he said, it would be difficult to say, whether there were at that moment more Spanish towns besieged by the French, or towns occupied by French troops besieged by the Spaniards; and the communications were so completely cut off, that the French could not send a letter from Barcelona to Gerona, without an escort of at least 500 cavalry to protect it. Generally speaking, throughout the whole of Spain, those towns only were surrendered which were under the influence of the nobility and gentry of large estates; but the mass of the people were patriotic, and the villages were defended after the towns had been betrayed. And not only the villages, but the mountains, were still obstinately defended. He believed, that among the nobility and gentry, where there were two brothers, the man of great possessions was always for submitting to the enemy, while the other joined the patriotic standard. We had been accustomed to consider civil wars as the most horrible of all kinds of hostilities, but never was any civil war so horrible as that which was now raging in Spain. The massacre, the pillage, and the violence offered to women, were unparalleled. He had lately been witness to some of these atrocities. The town of Puerto Real had surrendered upon terms, and Victor, upon entering it, published a proclamation, promising the most perfect security to all the inhabitants. Nevertheless, he had hardly taken possession before he ordered the men, who were mostly artificers at the docks in Cadiz, to be imprisoned, and the females were marched down to St. Mary’s, to be violated by his army.