The guard, under the command of the officer, immediately repaired to the place for the purpose of executing their orders, and demanded admission in the most ferocious manner; but not waiting for reply, the men began to batter the door with their muskets, and apply their shoulders to the panels. The door was too strong for them: they grew still more outrageous, and the officer still more abusive to those within: again they demanded admittance, but this was peremptorily refused by Captain Gore. With the old English maxim in his mind, “_my house is my castle_,” no doubt he believed that he was acting in a justifiable manner; and perhaps he was right in the line of conduct he pursued, because there was a British commandant in the town—and a British officer situated as he was, in the theatre of war, would act with perfect correctness in questioning any authority but that of his own nation:—however, nobody ever suspected the modern Spaniards of good military discipline, or prudence in their actions. As allies, and under a Commander-in-Chief who always listened to the complaints of the Spaniards against his officers or men, the British, in the case of Captain Gore, were treated in a most unwarrantable manner. The insolent and imprudent officer of the guard was now determined to do all the injury he could, and hearing the voice of Captain Gore inside the door, drew up his men in front of, and close to it; then motioning his orders, which were but too well understood, the whole of the guard fired; the door was not thick enough to resist the bullets, and the unfortunate young man within, fell lifeless in an instant. Would that he had fallen a few weeks before in that battle which defended the rights of Spain, and not thus by the murderous hands of those he defended in that action! He was _not_ a seducer: _this_ his _mistress_ declared over his dead body; and he did not mean to abandon her, as the melancholy catastrophe but too clearly proved. The young lady was borne almost heart-broken away, and placed within the cheerless walls of a convent many leagues from the scene that was the source of all her love and of all her sorrows. FOOTNOTES: