In the afternoon, Morla and another officer came out to demand a suspension of arms, necessary, they said, to persuade the people to surrender. Being admitted to the emperor’s presence, he addressed Morla in terms of great severity; he reproached him for his scandalous conduct towards Dupont’s army. “Injustice and bad faith,” he exclaimed, “always recoil upon those who are guilty of either.” This saying was well applied to that Spaniard, and Napoleon himself confirmed its philosophic truth in after times. “The Spanish ulcer destroyed me,” was an expression of deep anguish which escaped from him in his own hour of misfortune. Morla returned to the town: his story was soon told: before six o’clock the next morning Madrid must surrender or perish. A division of opinion arose; the violent excitement of the populace was considerably abated, but the armed peasantry from the country, and the poorest inhabitants, still demanded to be led against the enemy. A constant fire was kept up from the houses in the neighbourhood of the Prado; the French general Maison was wounded, and general Bruyeres was killed; but the disposition to fight became each moment weaker, and Morla and Castelfranco prepared a capitulation. The captain-general Castellar refused to sign it, and as the town was only invested on one side, he effected his escape with the regular troops during the night, carrying with him sixteen guns. The people now sunk into a quiescent state, and at eight o’clock in the morning of the 4th, Madrid surrendered. That Morla was a traitor there is no doubt, and his personal cowardice was excessive; but Castelfranco appears to have been rather weak and ignorant than treacherous, and certainly the surrender of Madrid was no proof of his guilt; that event was inevitable. The boasting uproar of the multitude when they are permitted to domineer for a few days is not enthusiasm. The retreat of Castellar with the troops of the line during the progress of the negotiation was the wisest course to pursue, and proves that he acquiesced in the propriety of surrendering. That the people neither could nor would defend the city is quite evident, for it is incredible that Morla and Castelfranco should have been able to carry through a capitulation in so short a period, if the generals, the regular troops, the armed peasantry, and the inhabitants, had been all, or even a part of them, determined to resist.