Thus suddenly was this powerful fortress reduced, by a proceeding, politic indeed, but scarcely to be admitted within the pale of civilized warfare. For, though a town, taken by assault, be considered the lawful prey of a licentious soldiery, this remnant of barbarism, disgracing the military profession, does not warrant the driving of unarmed helpless people, into a situation, where they must perish from the fire of the enemy, unless a governor fail in his duty. Suchet justifies it, on the ground, that he thus spared a great effusion of blood which must necessarily have attended a protracted siege, and the fact is true. But this is to spare soldiers’ blood at the expense of women’s and children’s, and, had Garcia Conde’s nature been stern, he, too, might have pleaded expediency, and the victory would have fallen to him who could longest have sustained the sight of mangled infants and despairing mothers. CHAP. IV. When Lerida fell, Conde was accused of treachery, but there seems no foundation for the charge; the cause stated by Suchet is sufficient for the effect; yet the defence was very unskilful. The walls, on the side of the attack, could not be expected, and scarcely did, offer an impediment to the French general; hence the citadel should have been the better prepared, and, as the besiegers’ force, the corps of observation being deducted, did not exceed the garrison in number, it might have baffled Suchet’s utmost efforts. Engineers require that the relative strength of besiegers and besieged, should not be less than four to one; yet here the French invested a force equal to themselves, and in a short time reduced a great fortress in the midst of succouring armies, for Lerida had communications, 1º. With the armed population of the high valleys; 2º. With O’Donnel’s corps of fourteen thousand; 3º. With Cervera, where Campo Verde was posted with four thousand men; 4º. With Tortoza, where the marquis of Lazan, now released from his imprisonment, commanded from five to six thousand; 5º. With Valencia, in which province there was a disposable army of fifteen thousand regular and more than thirty thousand irregular soldiers.