Page:Harris Dickson--The unpopular history of the United States.djvu/136

The Unpopular History of the United States Providence condones the blunders of these United States, and this wagon oversight switched round to our advantage. It enabled General Taylor to form the volunteers who were left behind into an army of the second line, to drill and prepare them for future campaigns. Those whom he carried with him, he put through a course of six hours' drilling per day. Never was the value of disciplined men more triumphantly demonstrated; 4,759 men, of whom but 517 were regulars, at the battle of Buena Vista, defeated the entire Mexican army of 18,133 men, with 20 pieces of artillery. General Taylor, in his official report, comments upon the "high state of discipline and instruction of several of the volunteer regiments." [118]