The third expedition, with which Great Britain was preparing to avenge the two defeats she had suffered in Buenos Aires, never reached the shores of La Plata. Troops mustered at Cork, but ere they embarked their destination was changed. In Portugal, under the command of Sir Arthur Wellesley, they won the two victories of Roliça and Vimeira, the first in that long list of victories which is called by English historians the Peninsular War. CHAPTER I AT THE QUINTA DE DON ALFONSA It was near the end of August. In a small, barely-furnished room at the quinta where General Whitelock had held his council of war on the afternoon of the 4th July, Marcelino Ponce de Leon lay on a low bedstead reading a newspaper entitled "La Estrella del Sur." It was about the size of a fly-sheet of the present day, very badly printed on very bad paper, and it bore the date "Monte Video, April, 1807." The Comandante de los Morenos de Ponce looked very pale; his left arm was bandaged, and lay in a sling formed by a silk handkerchief, which passed round his neck and hung down in front of him. He was propped up with pillows, and held the paper in his right hand; even turning it and holding it in a position to read was a labour to him. There came a footstep in the patio outside, a hand was laid upon the latch of the door, Marcelino hurriedly rolled up the paper and pushed it under the pillow behind him. The door was softly opened, and Don Carlos Evaña walked in. "It is you, Carlos," said Marcelino; "I thought it was my host, for he has not been to see me to-day. Come and sit down and talk." "With pleasure, I have come to spend the morning with you. Don Alfonso has gone into the city to meet his daughter, who has been living for the last four years with Don Fausto Velasquez and his family at their estancia." "His daughter! I did not know he had one." "Nor I either till yesterday. It seems that while he was in prison Don Fausto Velasquez took pity on his daughter, and she has lived more with his family than with her father ever since." "But how goes my father?" "Yesterday he was hobbling about with a crutch--the wound was nothing more than a simple fracture. He says the only thing he has to grumble about is your being here, and he is very anxious for you to grow strong enough to be moved." "There again, and none of them will come to see me while I am here, not even my mother!" "Poor Doña Constancia! I can tell you it has cost her many tears, but Don Roderigo's orders are positive. Luckily I followed General Whitelock here, or I don't think they would ever have heard of you till you got well enough to seek them yourself." "And the English officer who brought me here, have you never been able to find out who he was?" "I have not the slightest clue to him, except that he was an officer of Crauford's brigade." "Well, one is forced at times to accept benefits for which one cannot even give thanks; but God knows who he is, and will reward him."