"No! no!" said Evaristo, still tightly holding his pony by the head. "Oh! my brother, even yet I can save you!" he cried, as he saw Marcelino's last desperate effort, then twitching the rein from Manuel's hand, he urged his pony back through the gateway, and was close to his brother when he fell, trampled to the earth under the feet of the furious soldiery. But Manuel on foot had kept pace with him, and now springing up behind him wrenched the reins from him, and holding him fast in his arms, turned the pony's head and galloped off, and neither spoke nor slacked his pace until he had reached the house of Don Gregorio Lopez, where he set the boy down, half dead with sorrow and excitement, and went back himself in search of his master, whom he had small hope of ever seeing again alive. The "Morenos de Ponce" were utterly routed and dispersed; Marcelino had sacrificed himself and his men, but he had saved the army of General Liniers from destruction. A deadly fire from the Corrales de la Miserere had checked the advance of the main body of the army, the charge of the British infantry had driven it back in hopeless confusion into the roads by which it had debouched upon the Plaza; had the flank movement of the two regiments under General Crauford been uninterrupted, the retreat of the greater part of the army would have been cut off. As it was, General Liniers lost eleven guns, and was driven from amongst the quintas into the open camp, far away to the left of the road by which he had advanced. Night closed in and prevented further pursuit by the victorious enemy. Almost broken-hearted by the misfortune which had befallen him, and desperate at the ruin of all his high hopes, the Reconquistador threw himself upon the ground and for hours spoke to no one. About 1000 men lay round him in every attitude of exhaustion and despair; of the rest of his army he knew nothing, it was dispersed in all directions. The army to which Buenos Aires had entrusted her honour and her defence had melted away at the first brush with the enemy. Buenos Aires had no longer an army and the enemy was at her gates. CHAPTER IX THE NIGHT OF SORROW All day the city had been in a state of nervous anxiety, all manner of conflicting rumours were current, every horseman who appeared in the streets was beset by a crowd of eager questioners, men ran to and fro and went from house to house, gleaning what intelligence they could. According to some General Liniers had marched from the Puente Galvès at dawn in search of the enemy, according to others he was yet encamped there and beset by the entire English army. As either hope or fear gained the ascendant, so each man spoke as his hopes or his fears prompted him.