Page:The History of San Martin (1893).djvu/368

338 1,000 men which had been sent against him, near Calabozo, on the 20th September. The cavalry passed over to him, the infantry he routed. He murdered all his prisoners, and then took and sacked the small town of Cura.

Now there appeared upon the scene another singular character, of the iron temperament of Boves, with all his ferocity and courage, who raised a barrier to his impetuous onslaught. Nothing was known of him except that he was a Spaniard who had come to America very young, and had married an American wife. When Bolívar opened his campaign of emancipation, this man had headed the rising at Mérida; then, leaving wife and children, he raised a battalion and devoted himself body and soul to the cause of independence. Throughout the campaign he distinguished himself by his indomitable valour and by his cruelty to prisoners, to whom he gave no quarter. The cause of his hatred to his fellow countrymen is unknown. He was accustomed to say:—

"When the Spaniards are all killed then I will cut my own throat, so that there shall not be one left."

The name of this man was Vicente Campo Elias. At Las Trincheras he was raised to the rank of lieutenant-colonel for conspicuous bravery. This was the man to send against Boves.

He marched from Valencia with 1,000 infantry and 1,500 cavalry. Boves with 2,500 horse, and Morales with 500 infantry, waited for him at a place called Mosquitero, at the entrance to the plains. On the 14th October the armies met. Boves charged the left wing of the Patriots with his usual impetuosity, and carried all before him, but Campo Elias, caring nothing for this, rushed upon the main body of the Royalists, and routed them completely in fifteen minutes. Morales escaped badly wounded, but nearly the whole of his infantry were butchered, and the Llanero horse were cut to pieces. Boves and Morales fled with twenty men beyond the Apure, and the state of the plains rendered pursuit impossible.