At four o’clock, the bridge being repaired, the advanced guards of the French commenced crossing; but as the column of march was long, and the road narrow and rugged, the troops filed over slowly; and beyond the Ponte Nova there was a second obstacle still more formidable. For the pass in which the troops were moving being cut in the side of a mountain, open on the left for several miles, at last came upon a torrent called the Misarella, which, breaking down a deep ravine, or rather gulph, was only to be crossed by a bridge, constructed with a single lofty arch, called the _Saltador_, or leaper; and so narrow that only three persons could pass abreast. Fortunately for the French, the _Saltador_ was not cut, but entrenched and defended by a few hundred Portuguese peasants, who occupied the rocks on the farther side; and here the good soldier Dulong again saved the army: for, when a first and second attempt had been repulsed with loss, he carried the entrenchments by a third effort; but, at the same instant, fell deeply wounded himself. The head of the column now poured over, and it was full time, for the English guns were thundering in the rear, and the Ponte Nova was choked with dead. Sir Arthur Wellesley, quitting Braga on the morning of the 16th, had come, about four o’clock, upon Soult’s rear-guard, which remained at Salamonde to cover the passage of the army over the bridges. The right was strongly protected by a ravine, the left occupied a steep hill; and a stout battle might have been made, but men thus circumstanced, and momentarily expecting an order to retreat, will seldom stand firmly; and, on this occasion, when some light troops turned the left, and general Sherbrooke, with the guards, mounting the steep hill, attacked the front, the French made but one discharge, and fled in confusion to the Ponte Nova. As this bridge was not on the direct line of retreat, they were for some time unperceived, and gaining ground of their pursuers, formed a rear-guard; but, after a time, being discovered, some guns were brought to bear on them; and then man and horse, crushed together, went over into the gulph; and the bridge, and the rocks, and the defile beyond were strewed with mangled bodies. This was the last calamity inflicted by the sword upon the French army in this retreat; a retreat attended by many horrid as well as glorious events; for the peasants in their fury, with an atrocious cruelty, tortured and mutilated every sick man and straggler that fell into their power; and on the other hand, the soldiers, who held together in their turn, shot the peasants; while the track of the columns might be discovered from afar by the smoke of the burning houses.