Mina’s first care was to place the rescued prisoners in safety, and this could only be done by getting them into Valencia. For this purpose he sent to Duran and the Empecinado to co-operate with him, and pass along the bank of the Ebro in order to protect their passage; but Duran was too far distant, and the Empecinado was at this time closely pressed by the enemy; he had therefore nothing to rely on but himself. Accordingly he made preparations for throwing a bridge over the river, and named the place where it was to be done; the materials were sent towards this place, and he moved in the same direction: then in the middle of the night turning aside marched to a part of the river twelve miles distant, tried the depth by forcing his own horse into the water, and making each of his cavalry take up a man behind him, in this manner landed the whole in safety, while the enemy were waiting to attack him when he should be employed in making his bridge. ♦JUNE 6.♦ Next his band was heard of at Irun, when D. Josè Gorriz, who, according to the Maccabean system, had succeeded his kinsman in the command of the third battalion, forming a junction with the fourth under Ulzurrun, marched against that place, defeated the garrisons of Oyarzun and Beriatu, got possession of the stores of the Intrusive government at Irun, and burnt the bridge which the French had constructed over the Bidasoa, which there separates France from Spain; after which they returned with their booty, though all the force of the adjoining posts was collected to oppose them. Greater and more persevering efforts were now made to destroy him. Caffarelli arrived to take the command in Biscay, and his first object was to signalize himself by the destruction of an enemy, for whose blood Buonaparte thirsted as he had thirsted for that of Schill and of Hofer. Mina was in the village of Mendigorria with three of his battalions and his cavalry, when Caffarelli with one division came against him by Puente la Reyna, another by the Valle de Echaurri; Reille advanced with a third by Carrascal, and a fourth moved from Logroño upon Estella. The whole force in ♦JUNE 14.♦ motion against him amounted to 8000 foot and 2000 horse. Mina put himself in ambush near Carrascal, meaning to attack Reille; he engaged him, and forced him to retire upon Tafalla: but when the Guerrilla chief had advanced in pursuit as far as the village of Barasoain, he discovered that Caffarelli, marching back from Puente, had contrived to cut off the battalion which he himself commanded, and place it between two fires. Reille and Caffarelli then, whose joint force amounted to 700 horse and 4000 foot, attacked him with as great advantage of ground as of numbers, and Mina for the moment expected to see six of the seven companies of his battalion cut off. Their desperate courage brought them off with the loss of twenty-three killed and eighty taken; a heavy loss, but far less than there had been cause to dread, ...