Orders were given for the removal of the wounded to the Coa, where the army was to take up its winter quarters, and Zamorra and I had to part.

We parted with mutual expressions of good-will, and in the hope, destined never to be realized, that we might soon meet again.

I had seen Don Alberto for the last time.
A few weeks later I was sufficiently recovered from my hurts to use my bridle-arm, and before the opening of the next campaign I was fit for the field and eager for the fray.

It was the campaign of Vittoria, one of the most brilliant episodes in the military history of England.

Even now my heart beats faster and the blood tingles in my veins when I think of that time, so full of excitement, adventure, and glory--the forcing of the Pyrenees, the invasion of France, the battles of Bayonne, Orthes, and Toulouse, and the march to Paris.
But as I am not relating a history of the war, I shall mention only one incident in which I was concerned at this period--an incident that brought me in contact with a man who was destined to exercise a fateful influence on my career.
It occurred after the battle of Vittoria.