The
negotiations were prolonged until evening, but the bishop declined all
Soult's overtures, and the fire from the intrenchments continued. In the
course of the evening Merle's division, in order to divert attention from
the points Soult had fixed upon for the attack, moved towards the
Portuguese left, when a tremendous fire of artillery and musketry opened
upon it. The division made its way forward, and occupied some hollow
ground which shielded it from fire, within a very short distance of the
intrenchments. Feeling that the crisis was at hand, Terence had everything
prepared. The boatmen were told that they might be required that night,
and that they were to have the boat in readiness to start at any moment.
Herrara had warned his friends, and went to their house with six of his
men, as soon as it became dusk, to escort them over. Terence with his two
troopers, clad in the dresses of two of the tallest of the men and wrapped
in cloaks, with their broad hats pressed low down upon their foreheads,
went down to the end of the bridge as soon as it became quite dark. The
river was three hundred yards broad, but the sound of the confusion and
alarm that prevailed in the city could be plainly heard, although the
evening had set in rough and tempestuous. The shouts of the excited mob
mingled with the clanging of the church bells.
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