THE PASS OF VILLA VELHA, on the Tagus.

Published June 15. 1809. by Richard Phillips. Bridge Street. Blackfriars. London.

tained a garrison of twelve hundred militia, under the command of a brigadier-general. This affront however was soon forgotten by the Spaniards. The capture of Villa Velha had increased the confidence of the detachment of Alvarez, who despising the enemy, abandoned themselves to a fallacious security. Hamilton perceived their negligence, passed a ford of the river by night with three hundred men, half of them English, surprised the camp of Alvarez, consisting of two thousand men, the flower of the Spanish army, spiked their cannon, and repassed the Tagus without loss, leaving behind him no common scene of disorder and confusion."

The scene of this enterprize I have sketched, and shall send it to you in my next letter. Mean time adieu.

REGIMENT.---PORTUGUESE

AT Villa Velha we were quartered on the acting Juez de Fora, a poor man, who complained how much he had been plundered by the French army. Near that town we crossed a small sandy plain, well covered with ever-green oak trees. On fording a rivulet which divides it, we found a poor devil, dripping wet, perched on an island of sand, in the midst of the stream. He was, he told us, a Gallician, the servant of an English officer. In attempting to cross the ford, the stream being much swollen with the rains, he had mistaken the shallow, and stepping into a large hole, had been swept down by the current. In struggling for his life the unfortunate man had dropt his knapsack, containing his little all. I rescued him from the awkward situation

in which he was, and passed on to the head of the valley.

Here the road led by a narrow steep defile to the top of the mountain. The wrecks of oxen-wains, broken wheels, and disabled carriages, marked the progress of our army. The whole of the road, indeed, to As Carnadas, is the very worst, perhaps, in Europe. The rock over which it lies, is a granitic schistus, with veins of quartz, the stratums of which are nearly perpendicular to the horizon, and the wheels of the carriages had cut it down, in most places, in ruts at least three or four feet deep. It is surprising how any animals could have dragged the carriages along.

We slept at As Carnadas, which is a wretched collection of most miserable hovels. placed on the summit of a bare rock. From thence to Castel Branco, a distance of three leagues, the road is nearly as bad as that from Villa Velha.

At Castel Branco we found the first battalion of the thirty-second regiment, who are ordered to remain here to bring forward the ammunition, which, as I mentioned you in my last, is lying on the mountains of the Serra de St. Miguel.

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We are billeted at the house of a very worthy man,

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Major in the Castel Branco regiment of cavalry, who treats us with the greatest hospitality. He has just shewn us some late Madrid newspapers, which speak in very flattering terms of the successes of their troops; but I cannot help remarking, that the news which they contain appear to be mutilated, and many circumstances glossed over.

The greatest part of the columns of the papers are occupied by minute details of donations for the use of the patriotic army, which are in themselves so insignificant, and even paltry, that they prove either that the people in Spain are already impoverished to an excessive degree, or that they possess little of that glow of public spirit and patriotism, for which we in England are inclined to give them so much credit. For example, what do you think of a Count giving one mule, a Countess a mare and two pack-saddles, a Marquis three bridles and a hunting-saddle, and other items equally humble, with the full titles and designations of the donors prefixed. Such, however, are the proofs of public spirit given at Madrid.

Our landlord seems a well-informed man, and talks with much feeling and judgment on the state of his own coun-` try. He reprobates, in strong terms, that misguided policy, according to which the Portuguese nobility have been prevented from entering into the army.