Page:Vol 5 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/781

Rh on the 10th, with 5,000 men and 22 pieces of artillery, in the direction of San Cosme, Popotla, and the hacienda of Morales. He placed a double battery on the heights of Tacubaya, to cut off the enemy's retreat by way of Toluca, and opened a brisk fire on the Molino de Valdés, which lasted till after dark. This mill and the archbishop's house were the most advanced as well as the strongest points of the liberals. At nightfall there was noticed a brisk musketry firing, answered from a position nearer Tacubaya, and even at 9 o'clock some discharges of artillery were heard. At 6 o'clock the next morning the heights of Mexico were crowded with spectators. No movement could then be seen in Marquez' camp; but at a few minutes before seven twelve of his pieces opened a tremendous fire on the archbishop's house and the aforementioned mill, and a column of infantry, under cover of it, approached the mill, being hotly received by volleys of musketry; but soon the constitutionalists abandoned the position, and the firing ceased there. A few moments later the battery on the height continued playing upon Tacubaya, though not very actively, a portion of the reactionary army advancing a considerable distance, and taking up a position in the vertex of an angle in the direction of the archbishop's house and the slope of the Chapultepec forest. The column placed a battery there, which kept up a heavy fire from halfpast seven till ten. Another fight occurred at the casa mata, where the liberals — infantry, cavalry, and artillery — were attacked by two battalions of infantry and some cavalry. At ten the general depôt of ammunition in the archbishop's palace exploded. Some grenades had also been hurled upon Chapultepec from Belen. Before 11 o'clock Marquez was in possession of all the points Degollado had held in Tacubaya. A portion of the latter's army retreated to Chapultepec, Another fight occurred at the