I remained an hour behind the division, to refresh my horses--they having been nearly knocked up; and it was at this place I perceived the first effects of fatigue in some of the soldiers. The army had, for the preceding march, pressed onwards more rapidly than before, and the weather had become very hot; several men, therefore, lagged behind, and I met eight or ten of them sitting by the side of the river--some only severely blistered on the feet from walking, but others extremely ill. There was no depôt nearer than Valladolid--about ninety miles distant; for the army’s advance was so rapid and so unexpected, that no time could be allowed for considerations of this kind; and the soldiers, if left behind, would have fared but miserably indeed--particularly those who were ill there. I, without hesitation, laid an embargo upon a sort of cart, which was drawn by two horses, and which happened, fortunately, to be near; in this vehicle I directed the men to place themselves and their kits, which they had unbuckled from their backs, and dispatched them to continue their march. I also desired the men not to permit the carter to return until they overtook their division. “All is fair in war,” says the unamiable adage: it was a hard case for the Castilian carter, but for the poor disabled soldiers it would have been a still harder; and I thought I could not do better, under the circumstances, than to oblige the peasant, who seemed well-fed and hearty, to do “the state some service,” whether he was so disposed or not. Our march was now ten times more a march of pleasure than it had been before we crossed the Ebro, although it did not long hold that character: there was soon something for the army to do besides to admire the scenery, sing songs, and smoke cigars. Each day’s march was concluded about twelve or one o’clock, and the men encamped or bivouacked usually on some open glade, near or in a small wood; or perhaps in a valley by a river: here they unbent from the toils of the morning, and escaped the meridian heat of the sun, within their tents, or beneath the thick foliage with which nature so profusely stocked the country. A considerable distance right and left of the road, where the army encamped each day, was changed from the silence in which it had so long dwelt, to the hum and bustle of a populated city. The first thing done, on arriving at the ground for encampment, was to cook:--rations were served out; wood, water, and fire, made ready: and while the meat was boiling--or _broiling_, more frequently, upon a wooden spit--the men would sit together in groups on the grass, and chat. After dinner, they employed themselves for a short time in washing both themselves and their linen in the neighbouring streams--cleaning their arms, clothes, &c., and then a pipe and a cup of grog prepared the way for a sweet and sound sleep on the turf.