That general, who had heard of the battle of Salamanca, the evacuation of Madrid and the approach of Joseph, and now saw a fresh army springing up in his front, hastened to concentrate his disposable force in the positions of San Felippe de Xativa and Moxente which he entrenched, as well as the road to Almanza with a view to secure his junction with the king. At the same time he established a new bridge and bridge-head at Alberique in addition to that at Alcira on the Xucar; and having called up Paris from Teruel and Maupoint from Cuenca resolved to abide a battle, which the slowness and vacillation of his adversaries gave him full time to prepare for. [Sidenote: August.] Maitland arrived the 7th, and though his force was not all landed before the 11th, the French were still scattered on various points, and a vigorous commander would have found the means to drive them over the Xucar, and perhaps from Valencia itself. However the British general had scarcely set his foot on shore when the usual Spanish vexations overwhelmed him. Three principal roads led towards the enemy; one on the left, passed through Yecla and Fuente La Higuera, and by it the remnant of O’Donel’s army was coming up from Murcia; another passed through Elda, Sax, Villena, and Fuente de la Higuera, and the third through Xixona, Alcoy, and Albayda. Now O’Donel, whose existence as a general was redeemed by the appearance of Maitland, instantly demanded from the latter a pledge, that he would draw nothing either by purchase or requisition, save wine and straw, from any of these lines, nor from the country between them. The English general assented and instantly sunk under the difficulties thus created. For his intention was to have attacked Harispe at Alcoy and Ibi on the 13th or 14th, but he was only able to get one march from Alicant as late as the 16th, he could not attack before the 18th, and it was on that day, that Suchet concentrated his army at Xativa. The delay had been a necessary consequence of the agreement with O’Donel. Maitland was without any habitude of command, his commissariat was utterly inefficient, and his field-artillery had been so shamefully ill-prepared in Sicily that it was nearly useless. He had hired mules at a great expense for the transport of his guns, and of provisions, from Alicant, but the owners of the mules soon declared they could not fulfil their contract unless they were fed by the British, and this O’Donel’s restrictions as to the roads prevented. Many of the muleteers also, after receiving their money, deserted with both mules and provisions; and on the first day’s march a convoy, with six days’ supply, was attacked by an armed banditti called a guerilla, and the convoy was plundered or dispersed and lost.