Franceschi and Mermet found considerable difficulty in ascending the rugged sides of the Monte Vallonga, but having, at last, attained the crest, the whole of their enemies fled. The two generals then crossed the valley to gain the road of Guimaraens, and cut off that line of retreat, but fell in with the three thousand Portuguese posted above Falperra. These men, seeing the cavalry approach, drew up with their backs to some high rocks, and opened a fire of artillery. But Franceschi, placing his horsemen on either flank, and a brigade of infantry against the front, as at Verim, made all charge together, and strewed the ground with the dead. Nevertheless, the Portuguese fought valiantly at this point, and Franceschi acknowledged it. [Sidenote: Sir J. Cradock’s papers, MSS.] The vanquished lost all their artillery and above four thousand men, of which four hundred only were made prisoners. Some of the fugitives crossing the Cavado river, made for the Ponte de Lima, others retired to Oporto, but the greatest number took the road of Guimaraens, during the fight at Falperra. Eben appears, by his own official report, to have been at Braga when the action commenced, and to have fled among the first; for he makes no mention of the fight at Falperra, nor of the skirmish at Ponte Porto, and his narrative bears every mark of inaccuracy. When the French outposts were established in front of Braga, general Lorge crossed the Cavado and entered Bacellos; and the corregidor received him well, for which he was a few days after put to death by the Portuguese general, Bonteilho, who commanded between the Lima and the Minho. Braga itself had been at first abandoned by the inhabitants, but they were induced to return the next day; and some provisions and a large store of powder being found in the magazines, the latter was immediately made up into cartridges, for the use of the troops. The gun-carriages and ammunition-waggons were again repaired, and an hospital was established for eight hundred sick and wounded: from whence it may be judged that the loss sustained in action, since the 15th, was not less than six hundred men. The French general, having thus broken through the second Portuguese line of defence, was in a situation either to march directly against Oporto, or to recover his communication with the depôt at Tuy. He knew, through the medium of his spies and by intercepted letters, that general La Martiniere, although besieged, was in no distress; that he made successful sorties; and that his artillery commanded that in the fortress of Valença. On the other hand, information was received that sixty thousand troops of the line, militia, and _ordenanza_, were assembled at the entrenched camp covering Oporto, and the scouts reported that the Portuguese were also in force at Guimaraens, and had cut the bridges along the whole course of the Ave.