Miller was again wounded in an unsuccessful attempt, under Lord Cochrane, to capture the Island of Chiloe.  In June, 1820, he was made lieutenant-colonel of the eighth battalion of Buenos Ayres, and in the August following, he embarked for Valparaiso, with his battalion, forming a part of the liberating army of Peru.  They made the passage to Pisco, a distance of 1,500 miles, in fifteen days; and from this point commenced that series of sanguinary conflicts which terminated, in five years, in the complete liberation of the country of the Incas.  During the land operations was Lord Cochrane’s triumphant capture of the Spanish frigate, the Esmeralda, in the fort of Callao, which is briefly but vividly told.

Early in 1821, lieutenant-colonel Miller abandoned Pasco, and re-embarked for the fort of Arica; and after a hair-breadth escape, landed ten leagues north of that point.  The colonel now advanced with his little army of 400 men into the country, where he routed the royalist troops, and in a fortnight killed or captured more than 600 Spaniards.  In 1822, he was promoted to the rank of colonel, and the civil and military government of an extensive district in Peru; in which year also he was engaged in several important battles.  In the beginning of 1823, with only a company of cacadores, he harassed the royalists for several months; and so alarmed the enemy by the rapidity of his movements, that he often passed the hostile division, of a thousand men, without their daring to attack him.  Of the country in which these operations were carried on, the general gives a frightful picture.

In 1823, colonel Miller, was promoted to the rank of general of brigade, and in the same year he became chief of the staff of the Peruvian army.  In 1824, he was introduced to Bolivar.  On the 13th of June he crossed the Andes to take the command of 1,500 montoneros (a body of men very similar to the Guerillas of Spain,) who occupied the country round Pasco.  The difficulties of this service, and the perils of a campaign in the Andes, may be well inferred from the following passages:—­

It often occurred during the campaign of 1824, that the cavalry being in the rear, were, by a succession of various obstructions, prevented from accomplishing the day’s march before nightfall.  It then became necessary for every man to dismount, and to lead the two animals in his charge, to avoid going astray, or tumbling headlong down the most frightful precipices.  But the utmost precaution did not always prevent the corps from losing their way.  Sometimes men, at the head of a battalion, would continue to follow the windings of a deafening torrent, instead of turning abruptly to the right or left, up some rocky acclivity, over which lay their proper course; whilst others who chanced to be right, would pursue the proper track.  The line was so drawn out, that there were unavoidably many intervals, and it was easy for such mistakes to occur, although trumpeters