whom were five officers. "He has brightened up a deal the last four days,
and his wound looks distinctly more healthy. I have a strong hope that all
those splinters have worked out now, and your being here has given him a
fillip, so that he is altogether better and more cheerful. I hope by the
spring he will be able to rejoin us. I can tell you I am mighty glad to be
off again myself. It has been pretty hard work here, for I have had, for
the last fortnight, a hundred and twenty men on my hands. At first there
were three of us here, but two went off with the last batch of
convalescents, and I have been alone since. Luckily Major Peters has been
well enough to look after things in general, and help the commissariat
man; still, with forty bad cases, I have not had much time on my hands. Of
course I knew him and all the other officers, but they all belonged to
other regiments, and it was not like being among the Mayos. And when do
you think we will be starting again?"

"I have no idea. I have heard that Moore is doing everything he can to
hurry on things, but that he is awfully hampered for want of money. It is
scandalous. Here are our agents supplied with immense sums for the use of
these blackguard Spaniards, yet they keep their own army without funds."

"If the general has no funds, Terence, he had better be stopping where he
is. There is no getting anything in Portugal without paying ten times the
proper price for it, and from what I hear of the Spaniards they will
charge twenty times, put the money in their pockets, and then not even
give you what you paid for. As to their being any good to us as allies, it
is not to be hoped for; they will take our arms and our money, expect us
to feed their troops, and will then run away at the sight of a French
soldier; you will see if they don't."

"I hear that the Junta of Corunna says that all the north will rise as