Here he was joined by a regiment of the guards, and by detachments coming from Coruña, and his position extending from Villa Muriel to Dueñas below the meeting of the waters, was strong. The troops occupied a range of hills, lofty, yet descending with an easy sweep to the Carion; that river covered the front, and the Pisuerga did the same by the right wing. A detachment had been left to destroy the bridge of Baños on the Pisuerga; colonel Campbell with a battalion of the royals was sent to aid the Spaniards in destroying the bridges at Palencia; and in Wellington’s immediate front some houses and convents beyond the rivers, furnished good posts to cover the destruction of the bridges of Muriel and San Isidro on the Carion, and that of Dueñas on the Pisuerga. Souham excited by his success on the 23d followed from Villadrigo early on the 24th, and having cannonaded the rear-guard at Torquemada passed the Pisuerga. He immediately directed Foy’s division upon Palencia, and ordered Maucune with the advanced guard to pursue the allies to the bridges of Baños, Isidro, and Muriel; but he halted himself at Magoz, and, if fame does not lie, because the number of French drunkards at Torquemada were even more numerous than those of the British army. COMBAT ON THE CARION. Before the enemy appeared, the summits of the hills were crowned by the allies, all the bridges were mined and that of San Isidro was strongly protected by a convent which was filled with troops. The left of the position was equally strong, yet general Oswald, who had just arrived from England and taken the command of the fifth division on the instant, overlooked the advantages to be derived from the dry bed of a canal with high banks, which, on his side, run parallel with the Carion, and he had not occupied the village of Muriel in sufficient strength. In this state of affairs Foy reached Palencia, where, according to some French writers, a treacherous attempt was made under cover of a parley, to kill him; he however drove the allies with some loss from the town and in such haste that all the bridges were abandoned in a perfect condition, and the French cavalry crossing the river and spreading abroad gathered up both baggage and prisoners.