When the guerrillas of Asturias, the Biscayan provinces, Soria, or Rioja, were closely pressed by the enemy, they usually sought refuge in Navarre, or the higher parts of Aragon: here they had their chief strength. The French, indeed, complained, in their intercepted dispatches, that these bands gave the law in Navarre, levied contributions there, and even collected the duties at the frontier custom-houses. For this ♦XAVIER MINA.♦ superiority they were beholden to Xavier Mina. His career was short, but remarkable not less for the signal successes which he obtained, than for his hair-breadth escapes. On one occasion he and his little party were driven to seek refuge on a rock near Estella, where they defended the only accessible side till night-fall, and escaped during the darkness by letting themselves down the precipice by a rope. In the course of five months after his first appearance in the field, his celebrity was such that he might have raised an army from among the youth of Navarre and Upper Aragon, if there had been means to arm, and officers to discipline them: owing to the want of these, and chiefly of officers, he never had more than 1,200 under his command; greater numbers would have embarrassed him, these he was capable of directing: voluntary rations were provided for them by the villages, and for ammunition and money he looked to the enemy, calling the wood of Tafalla his powder-magazine and his mint. As a farther resource, he levied the duties of which the French complained, and he collected the rents belonging to the convents and churches, as having in this extremity reverted to the nation; and from these funds he was enabled to pay liberally and regularly for intelligence. The wisdom of his measures, not less than the chivalrous spirit of enterprise which he displayed, made him so formidable to the enemy, that his capture was considered by them as more important than a victory, when accident threw ♦XAVIER MINA MADE PRISONER.♦ him into their hands. Chance had delayed the advance of a convoy for which he was waiting: he was informed of the delay, but proposed to wait still; and went himself on horseback with only one companion, by moonlight, to reconnoitre the ground. The enemy, who would have thought no precautions necessary against a Spanish army at that time, stood in such fear of Mina, that they had formed a double line of outposts, and sent out patroles; by some of whom he and his comrade were surprised, dismounted, and taken. It is remarkable that he was not put to death as soon as identified, for he had been proscribed as a leader of banditti, and his capture as such was exultingly announced; but some person of more generosity than those who thus reviled him must have interfered; and where so little that has the character of honour or humanity can be recorded, it must be regretted that we know not to whom this redeeming act should be ascribed.