Note 419 — Chapter XLIV

"Augustina Zaragoza, a handsome woman of the lower class, about twenty-two years of age, arrived at one of the batteries with refreshments at the time when not a man who defended it was left alive, so tremendous was the fire which the French kept up against it. For a moment the citizens hesitated to re-man the guns. Augustina sprung forward over the dead and dying, snatched a match from the hand of a dead artilleryman, and fired off a six-and-twenty pounder; then jumping upon the gun, made a solemn vow never to quit it alive during the siege."—Southey, vol. ii., p. 14.—Lord Byron states, that when he was at Seville, in 1809, the Maid of Zaragoza was seen walking daily on the Prado, decorated with medals, and orders, by command of the Junta. She has further had the honour of being painted by Wilkie.