296 HIS EFFORTS LOS REMEDIOS GUERILLAS. 



hands of Spanish levies, two thousand of whom surrounded the 

 slender band. Notwithstanding the inequality of forces between 

 the assailants and the besieged, the royalists were unable to take 

 the place by storm ; but, after repeated repulses, General Arre- 

 dondo proposed terms which were accepted by Major Sarda, the 

 independent commander. It is scarcely necessary to say that this 

 condition was not fulfilled by the Spaniards, who sent the capitu- 

 lated garrison in irons, by a circuitous journey, to the sickly Castle 

 of San Juan de Ulua at Vera Cruz, whence some of the unfortunate 

 wretches were marched into the interior whilst others were de- 

 spatched across the sea to the dungeons of Cadiz, Melilla and 

 Ceuta. This was a severe blow to Mina, who nevertheless was 

 unparalized by it but continued active in the vicinity of Sombrero 

 to which he retreated after an illjudged attempt upon the town of 

 Leon, where the number of his troops was considerably diminished. 

 Sombrero was invested, soon after, by a force of three thous-and 

 five hundred and forty soldiers, under Don Pascual Linan, who 

 had been appointed Field Marshal, by Apodaca, and despatched to 

 the Bajio. This siege was ultimately successful on the part of the 

 royalists. The fresh supplies promised to Mina did not arrive. 

 Colonel Young, his second in command, died in repulsing an as- 

 sault; and, upon the garrison's attempting to evacuate the tow T n, 

 under Colonel Bradburn, on the night of the 19th of August, the 

 enemy fell upon the independents with such vigor that but fifty of 

 Mina's whole corps escaped. " No quarter," says Ward, "was 

 given in the field, and the unfortunate wretches who had been 

 left in the hospital wounded, were by Linan's orders, carried or 

 dragged along the ground from their beds to the square where they 

 were stripped and shot ! " 



Mina, as a last resort, threw himself into the fort of Los Reme- 

 dios, a natural fortification on the lofty mountain chain rising out 

 of the plains of the Bajio between Silao and Penjamo, separated 

 from the rest by precipices, and deep ravines. 



Linan's army sat down before Remedios on the 27th of August. 

 Mina left the town so as to assail the army from without by his 

 guerillas, wmilst the garrison kept the main body engaged with the 

 fort. During this *period he formed the project of attacking the 

 town of Guanajuato, which, in fact, he accomplished; yet, after his 

 troops had penetrated the heart of the city, their courage failed and 

 they retreated before the loyalists who rallied after the panic created 

 by the unexpected assault at nightfall. On retreating from Guana- 

 juato, our partizan warrior took the road to the Rancho del Vena- 



