Page:The History of San Martin (1893).djvu/482

452 hussars, had drawn his men into an angle of the marsh, and, letting the rout pass by, charged the pursuers in the rear. The fugitives were rallied by Miller, who led them again to the charge, and drove the Royalists from the field. In forty-five minutes the whole affair was over, and not a shot was fired. The Royalists lost 250 killed by lance and sabre; the Patriots lost 150 between killed and wounded, and rescued Necochea. The fugitives took shelter under the fire of their infantry, which at once retreated.

Such was the celebrated action of Junin, which broke the prestige of the Royalist army, and prepared the way for the final triumph. Bolívar, who had seen the rout of the first squadrons, thought he had lost his cavalry, and returned to the infantry, who were a league behind. He only learned the defeat of the enemy from a pencil note sent him by Miller after sundown. The hussars who did such good service were afterwards styled the Hussars of Junin, in reward for their gallant behaviour. Canterac, who was greatly disheartened by this disaster, which was chiefly the result of his own precipitate conduct in charging without a reserve over ground of which he knew nothing, evacuated the valley of Jauja, and retreated so rapidly that in two days he was more than a hundred miles from the scene of the action, and his infantry was quite worn out; but he did not stop until he had crossed the Apurimac, more than five hundred miles from Junin, and lost between 2,000 and 3,000 men by desertion on the way. La Serna sent him a reinforcement of 1,500 men, and recalled Valdes to Cuzco. Canterac had fled from his own shadow, for he was not pursued.

Bolívar rested for three days on the field of battle, took ten days to occupy the valley of Jauja, and remained nearly a month at Huamanga. In September he crossed the river Pampas, an affluent of the Apurimac, and threatened Cuzco from the sources of that river, his right flank being covered by a spur from the Cordillera, but did not consider himself strong enough to attempt anything more