On the 28th a breach had been made between two bastions capable of only two, or, at the most, three men abreast. That afternoon there was a strong cannonade: it ceased, and a dispatch came off from Contreras to the squadron, saying that the British guns had silenced the enemy’s batteries, that very little harm had been done to the place, and that the breach was nothing; yet he said, knowing the city was not tenable, he had determined upon leaving it with the garrison next day. While the British officer was reading this dispatch, the enemy were seen from the ships storming the breach, and in half an hour the place was carried. The Spaniards, disheartened by all the previous events of the siege, ... betrayed by some, and by others deceived and disappointed, ... abandoned themselves now: they were seized with a sudden panic; ... and there is nothing to alleviate, nothing to mingle with and modify the horror wherewith the ensuing tragedy will be regarded as long as the history of these times shall be held in remembrance. The scene was shameful as well as shocking. Instead of maintaining the breach, as the people of Gerona had done when suffering under disease and famine; instead of attempting to cut their way through the enemy, which at one time had less wisely and less generously been intended, the soldiers fled. Without the satisfaction of selling their lives dearly, or the sense of duty to console them in death, they suffered themselves to be butchered without resistance. Some of the officers tried every means to rally their men, but such efforts were in vain; that moral discipline had been neglected by which Zaragoza and Gerona have rendered themselves for ever worthy of admiration. The governor of the place, Gonzalez, with a handful of brave men, defended himself till the last, and fell. Contreras was wounded, and taken prisoner. The last effort was made before the cathedral, whither a multitude of Spaniards had betaken themselves; some in the vain hope that the sanctity of the place might protect them, some that they might die before their altars, and some to avail themselves of the vantage ground afforded by the ascent, which is by a flight of threescore steps. The conquerors made their way up under a destructive fire; and their fury, according to Suchet, knew no bounds, till upon entering the cathedral they beheld nine hundred wounded lying on the ♦MÉMOIRES, 2. 105.♦ pavement. Their bayonets, he says, respected them; and he commends what he calls this trait of humanity. Little was shown elsewhere; but the carnage was chiefly among the inhabitants. Many thousands who had got over the ramparts or through the embrasures, or through the gate of St. Antonio, fled along the beach. The French field artillery and the batteries opened a fire upon this mixed and flying multitude on one part; and on another the cavalry charged among them, sabring the women and children, and trampling them down. ♦MASSACRE AT TARRAGONA.♦