All this passed in much less time than I take to tell it. After Manuela Sancho, first one, then another, then many hurried, then all, urged on by the leaders whose sabre-cuts had prodded us to the point of duty. This portentous transformation came about by the impulse of every man's heart obeying sentiments which all feel without any one's knowing whence the mysterious force emanates. I do not know why we were cowards, nor why we were brave a few moments later. What I do know is that, moved by an extraordinary power, immense and superhuman, we hurled ourselves into the breach behind the heroic woman, at the point where the French were attempting the assault with ladders. Without in the least knowing how to explain it, we felt our strength increased a hundred-fold, and crushed them back, hurling into the ditch those men of cotton who a little while ago had seemed to us men of steel. With shots and sabre-cuts, with shells, with shovels full of earth, by blows, and bayonet-thrusts, we fought. Many of our number died to defend others with their dead bodies. We defended the breach, indeed, and the French were obliged to retire, leaving many dead and wounded at the bottom of the wall. The cannons again began firing, and the unconquerable redoubt did not fall on the eleventh into the hands of the French. When the tempest of fire was calmed, we did not know ourselves. We were transfigured, and something new and unknown palpitated in the depths of our souls, giving us an unheard-of fierceness. The following day Palafox said, with much eloquence: "Nor balls, nor bombs, nor shells shall make our faces change color, nor can all France accomplish that!" CHAPTER XI The fortress of San José had surrendered, or rather the French had entered it when their artillery had reduced it to powder, and all of its defenders had fallen, one by one, to lie among its fragments. The Imperial soldiers, on entering, found heaps of bodies and stones matted together with blood. They could not establish themselves there because they were flanked by the batteries of Los Martires and the Botanical Garden, so they continued operations by mining, in order to possess themselves of those two points. The fortifications which we held were so nearly destroyed that a general agreement was urgent, and the terrible orders, calling upon all the inhabitants of Saragossa to work in renewing them. The proclamation said that every citizen should carry a gun in one hand and spade in the other.