Don Carlos d’España, with a small Spanish force, being after a time placed under sir Robert’s command, the latter detached two battalions to occupy the pass of Baños, and Lapisse was thus deprived of any direct communication with Victor. In this situation the French general remained without making any vigorous effort either to clear his front or to get intelligence of the duke of Dalmatia’s march upon Oporto until the beginning of April, when he advanced towards Bejar, but, finding the passes occupied, turned suddenly to his right, dissipated Wilson’s posts on the Ecla, and forced the legion, then commanded by colonel Grant, to take refuge under the guns of Ciudad Rodrigo. He summoned that town to surrender on the 6th, and, after a slight skirmish close to the walls, took a position between the Agueda and Ledesma. This event was followed by a general insurrection from Ciudad Rodrigo to Alcantara and from Tamames to Bejar. For Lapisse, who had been again ordered by the king to fulfil the emperor’s instructions, and advance to Abrantes, instead of obeying, suddenly quitted his positions on the Agueda, and, without regarding his connexion with the second corps, abandoned Leon, and made a rapid march, through the pass of Perales, upon Alcantara, followed closely by sir Robert Wilson, don Carlos d’España, the two battalions from Bejar, and a multitude of peasants, both Portuguese and Spanish. At Alcantara, a corps of Spanish insurgents endeavoured to defend the passage of the river, but the French broke through the entrenchments on the bridge, and, with a full encounter carried the town, and pillaged it, after which they abandoned the place, and joined the first corps, at Merida, on the 19th of April. This false movement greatly injured the French cause. From that moment the conquering impulse given by Napoleon was at an end, and his armies, ceasing to act on the offensive, became stationary or retrograded, and the British, Spanish, and Portuguese once more assumed the lead. The duke of Dalmatia, abandoned to his own resources, and in total ignorance of the situation of the corps by which his movements should have been supported, was forced to remain in Oporto; and at the moment, when the French combinations were thus paralyzed, the arrival of English reinforcements at Lisbon and the advance of sir John Cradock towards Leiria gave a sudden and violent impetus both to the Spaniards and Portuguese along the Beira frontier. Thus the insurrection, no longer kept down by the presence of an intermediate French corps, connecting Victor’s and Soult’s forces, was established in full activity from Alcantara, on the Tagus, to Amarante, on the Tamega.