No sooner had Tortosa fallen, than Marshal Macdonald began to prepare at Lerida for laying siege to Tarragona. The arrival at Barcelona of a convoy of ammunition and grain from Toulon relieved him from all anxiety on that point, and left him at leisure to direct his whole attention to this great object, which in a military view would complete the conquest of Catalonia, ... any other Buonaparte was incapable of taking. Tortosa was to be the pivot of the intended operations against Tarragona first, and after its fall, which was not doubted, against Valencia; and to facilitate these operations, Col de Balaguer was put in a state of defence, and Fort Rapita which commanded the mouth of the Ebro. These measures had been taken when General Suchet received orders from Paris to undertake the siege, and was at the same time informed that Lower Catalonia was to be under his command. Early in the preceding year this general had ♦MARCH 19.♦ been told that he must raise in his government of Aragon means both for the pay and subsistence of his troops, France being no longer able to support such an expense; and that while he was to communicate as before with the _E’tat-major_ of the army ♦THE PYRENEAN PROVINCES ADMINISTERED IN BUONAPARTE’S NAME.♦ concerning military affairs, he was to receive instructions upon all matters relating to the administration, police, and finances of the country, from the Emperor alone. It was evident, therefore, that Buonaparte was as little disposed to keep faith with his brother, King Joseph, as he had been with his ally Charles IV., and Ferdinand his invited guest, but that it was his intention to extend the frontier of France from the Pyrenees to the Ebro; and in fact from that time all orders of the government in that part of the Peninsula were issued in his name. The faithful Spaniards cared not in which name it was administered, acknowledging neither, and detesting both: if they had any feeling upon the subject, it was a sense of satisfaction that their unworthy countrymen in the Intruder’s service should be deprived of the shallow pretext with which they sought to excuse their treason to their country. At first this change appeared to increase the difficulties of Suchet’s situation, who, while he looked only to a temporary occupation of the province, would without scruple have supplied himself by force, regardless in what condition he might leave it to those who should succeed him, or what sufferings he might bring upon the inhabitants. But regarding himself now as fixed in a permanent command, it behoved him to adopt measures which, ... if any thing could have that effect upon the Aragonese, might gradually reconcile them to subjection, by giving them the benefit of a military government, regularly as well as vigorously administered. ♦STATE OF ARAGON.♦