We must go back to Charles Napier, fighting fiercely in the enclosures between Elvina and the great battery, and raging because the supports which might have turned his withered effort into success were denied him. We have seen the reason of this denial. The fall of Moore paralysed the thinking power of those who succeeded to the command. Instead of supporting the attack of the Fiftieth, orders were sent to recall that regiment, and Napier and the few men who were still with him were left alone in the extreme front. This withdrawal from Elvina allowed the French light troops to surround Napier's party. Finding himself thus enclosed in a net, he gathered the few survivors around him and made a dash to cut his way through to the English line, but it was too late. He was surrounded and made prisoner. Both sides would appear to have exhausted their ammunition at this point, and the fight was now entirely of cold steel. It is so full of graphic detail, and gives so many glimpses of national characteristics under stress of battle, that it had best be told in Napier's own words. I said to the four soldiers [Irish privates of the Fiftieth and Forty-Second] "Follow me and we will cut through them." Then with a shout I rushed forward. The Frenchmen had halted, but now ran on to us, and just as my spring was made the wounded leg failed, and I felt a stab in the back; it gave me no pain, but felt cold, and threw me on my face. Turning to rise, I saw the man who had stabbed me making a second thrust. Whereupon, letting go my sabre, I caught his bayonet by the socket, turned the thrust, and raising myself by the exertion, grasped his firelock with both hands, thus in mortal struggle regaining my feet. His companions had now come up, and I heard the dying cries of the four men with me, who were all instantly bayoneted. We had been attacked from behind by men not before seen, as we stood with our backs to a doorway, out of which must have rushed several men, for we were all stabbed in an instant, before the two parties coming up the road reached us. They did so, however, just as my struggle with the man who had wounded me was begun. That was a contest for life, and being the strongest I forced him between myself and his comrades, who appeared to be the men whose lives I had saved when they pretended to be dead on our advance through the village. They struck me with their muskets, clubbed and bruised me much, whereupon, seeing no help near, and being overpowered by numbers and in great pain from my wounded leg, I called out _Je me rend_, remembering the expression correctly from an old story of a fat officer whose name being James called out _Jemmy round_. Finding they had no disposition to spare me, I kept hold of the musket, vigorously defending myself with the body