Page:Vol 4 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/572

556 to this officer's diary, consisted of a little over 1,000 men, including 150 dragoons and nineteen artillerymen, with four field-pieces. Candano was before Coscomatepec the 5th of September; his chief attack was, of course, on the west. After much fighting and loss of life on both sides, nothing had been gained by the assailants, when Águila arrived with a strong reënforcement, and continued the operations, though he well knew and reported to the viceroy that they were costing more than the place was worth strategically, and that the besieged could get away whenever they pleased. In fact, on the 4th of October Bravo, seeing the new commander's measures for an irresistible attack, and being himself but scantily supplied with provisions and ammunition, after burying his artillery, abandoned the place at 11 o'clock that night with his troops and the inhabitants, directing his course to San Pedro Ixhuatlan. Águila, who did not discover for some time the flight of his foe, entered Coscomatepec and burned it. It was said that his soldiers shot at the images of the virgin of Guadalupe, as the patroness of the revolutionists, and committed other irreligious acts. The royalists lost at this siege time, men, and credit, for the possession of a hill affording no real advantages. Bravo won much reputation for having thus diverted to that point the royalist forces of the south which Calleja had intended for the occupation of Tehuacan, thus disconcerting the viceroy's plans, and bringing on still more disastrous consequences, as will be seen. Águila went back with his troops to Orizaba, a party of insurgents having on the 5th of October attacked the detachment at Angostura, of which only a commissioned officer and a sergeant escaped. The victors