spy of Suchet’s, to carry this forged dispatch into the town. So few communications, without a strong escort, escaped the vigilance of the Catalans, that whenever a single messenger was sent, the letter ... written in the smallest compass and in the fewest words ... used to be inclosed in lead, and swallowed by the bearer. Van Halen was well acquainted with all the details of such transactions. If the enemy sent a spy out from one of their fortresses, they usually made a sally, and thus brought him out unobserved, and set him on his way; but the messenger who was to make his way in, approached in the darkness, and made a certain signal with a flint and steel. The peasant, though carefully instructed upon this as upon all other points, forgot this important part of his instructions, and in consequence was wounded by the sentinel: the first part of his errand, however, was not the less performed; the dispatch was delivered to General Robert, and no suspicion being entertained of the stratagem, the man was sent to the hospital, and there carefully attended. But the answer which he should have delivered into the hands of his employers was sent by another person, and consequently not received by those who were expecting it. ♦THE DECEIT TRIED AT TORTOSA.♦ Having learnt what had befallen their messenger, Eroles and Van Halen proceeded with their device. A Spanish officer was sent with a letter from Sans, saying he had just received a copy of a treaty signed at Tarrasa by the Spanish and French commanders-in-chief in Catalonia, agreeing upon an armistice of fifteen days for the evacuation of the places named in the treaty, Tortosa being one; he inclosed a letter with D’Eschalard’s signature, which it was pretended had accompanied it, and in which it was stated that the chef d’escadron, Van Halen, one of the Marshal’s aides-de-camp, would speedily arrive with full instructions. The garrison were on the point of making a sally when the officer arrived: the news of the armistice spread; a free communication in consequence took place with the advanced posts of the Spaniards, and on the next morning General Robert sent out Colonel Plique to make arrangements for evacuating the place; at the same time he liberated some soldiers who had lately been surprised and made prisoners. The Colonel accordingly came at the hour appointed; Van Halen presented himself in his aide-de-camp’s uniform, and the Spanish Captain Daura, as having accompanied him from the Llobregat, delivered a letter from Copons. Plique desired to be left alone with Van Halen, whose instructions he was authorized to receive, in case the Spanish commander should not permit him to enter the town. He inquired of him concerning the state of affairs which had reduced the Emperor to sacrifice these places, and Van Halen briefly related the series of reverses which rendered it necessary to withdraw from Spain 30,000 men, leaving only garrisons in Barcelona, Gerona, and Figueras. The