_Second Combat of Vera._—Soon after seven o’clock a few cannon-shot from some mountain-guns, of which each side had a battery, were followed by the Spanish musquetry on the right, and the next moment the “_Boars back_” was simultaneously assailed at both ends. The riflemen on the Vera side ascended to a small pine-wood two-thirds of the way up and there rested, but soon resuming their movement with a scornful gallantry they swept the French off the top, disdaining to use their rifles beyond a few shots down the reverse side, to show that they were masters of the ridge. This was the signal for the general attack. The seventeenth Portuguese followed the victorious sharp-shooters, the forty-third, preceded by their own skirmishers and by the remainder of the riflemen of the right wing, plunged into the rugged pass, Longa’s troops entered the gloomy wood of the ravine on the left, and beyond them Colborne’s brigade moving by narrow paths and throwing out skirmishers assailed the Bayonette, the fifty-second took the middle tongue, the Caçadores and riflemen the two outermost and all bore with a concentric movement against the star redoubt on the platform above. Longa’s second brigade should have flanked the left of this attack with a wide skirting movement, but neither he nor his starved soldiers knew much of such warfare, and therefore quietly followed the riflemen in reserve. Soon the open slopes of the mountains were covered with men and with fire, a heavy confused sound of mingled shouts and musquetry filled the deep hollows between, and the white smoke came curling up above the dark forest trees which covered their gloomy recesses. The French compared with their assailants seemed few and scattered on the mountain side, and Kempt’s brigade soon forced its way without a check through all the retrenchments on the main pass, his skirmishers spreading wider and breaking into small detachments of support as the depth of the ravine lessened and the slopes melted into the higher ridges. When about half-way up an open platform gave a clear view over the Bayonette slopes, and all eyes were turned that way. Longa’s right brigade, fighting in the gulf between, seemed labouring and overmatched, but beyond, on the broad open space in front of the star fort, the Caçadores and riflemen of Colborne’s brigade, were seen coming out, in small bodies, from a forest which covered the three tongues of land up to the edge of the platform. Their fire was sharp, their pace rapid, and in a few moments they closed upon the redoubt in a mass as if resolved to storm it. The fifty-second were not then in sight, and the French thinking from the dark clothing that all were Portuguese rushed in close order out of the entrenchment; they were numerous and very sudden; the rifle as a weapon is overmatched by the musket and bayonet, and this rough charge sent the scattered assailants back over the rocky edge of the descent. With shrill