Verdier, elated by the capture of Monjouic, boasted, in his despatches, of the difficulties that he had overcome, and they were unquestionably great, for the rocky nature of the soil had obliged him to raise his trenches instead of sinking them, and his approaches had been chiefly carried on by the flying sap. But he likewise expressed his scorn of the garrison, held their future resistance cheap, and asserted that fifteen days would suffice to take the town; in which he was justified neither by past nor succeeding facts; for the Spaniards indignant at his undeserved contempt, redoubled their exertions and falsified all his predictions; and while these events were passing close to Gerona, Claros and Rovira, at the head of two thousand five hundred Miguelettes, attacked Bascara a post between Figuera and Gerona at the moment when a convoy, escorted by a battalion had arrived there from Belgarde. The commandant of Figueras indeed, uniting some “_gens d’armes_” and convalescents to a detachment of his garrison, succoured the post on the 6th; but, meanwhile, the escort of the convoy had fallen back on France and spread such terror, that Augereau applied to St. Cyr for three thousand men to protect the frontier. That general refused this ill-timed demand, and, in his Memoirs, takes occasion to censure the system of moveable columns, as more likely to create than to suppress insurrections, as being harassing to the troops, weakening to the main force, and yet ineffectual, seeing that the peasantry must always be more moveable than the columns, and better informed of their marches and strength. There is great force in these observations, and if an army is in such bad moral discipline that the officers commanding the columns cannot be trusted, it is unanswerable. It must also be conceded that this system, at all times requiring a nice judgement, great talents, and excellent arrangement, was totally inapplicable to the situation and composition of the seventh corps. Yet, with good officers and well combined plans, it is difficult to conceive any more simple or efficient mode of protecting the flanks and rear of an invading army, than that of moveable columns supported by small fortified posts; and it is sufficient that Napoleon was the creator of this system, to make a military man doubtful of the soundness of St. Cyr’s objections. The emperor’s views, opinions, and actions, will in defiance of all attempts to lessen them, go down, with a wonderful authority to posterity.