The Earl, by this Means, some small time after, receiving early Intelligence that King Philip was actually on his March to Barcelona, with an Army of upwards of twenty five thousand Men, under the Command of a Mareschal of France, began his March towards Catalonia, with all the Troops that he could gather together, leaving in Valencia a small Body of Foot, such as in that Exigence could best be spar’d.  The whole Body thus collected made very little more than two thousand Foot and six hundred Horse; yet resolutely with these he sets out for Barcelona:  In the Neighbourhood of which, as soon as he arriv’d, he took care to post himself and his diminutive Army in the Mountains which inviron that City; where he not only secur’d ’em against the Enemy; but found himself in a Capacity of putting him under perpetual Alarms.  Nor was the Mareschal, with his great Army, capable of returning the Earl’s Compliment of Disturbance; since he himself, every six or eight Hours, put his Troops into such a varying Situation, that always when most arduously fought, he was farthest off from being found.  In this Manner the General bitterly harrass’d the Troops of the Enemy; and by these Means struck a perpetual Terror into the Besiegers.  Nor did he only this way annoy the Enemy; the Precautions he had us’d, and the Measures he had taken in other Places, with a View to prevent their Return to Madrid, though the Invidious endeavour’d to bury them in Oblivion, having equally contributed to the driving of the Mareschal of France, and his Catholick King, out of the Spanish Dominions.

But to go on with the Siege:  The Breaches in the Walls of that City, during its Siege by the Earl, had been put into tolerable Repair; but those of Monjouick, on the contrary, had been as much neglected.  However, the Garrison made shift to hold out a Battery of twenty-three Days, with no less than fifty Pieces of Cannon; when, after a Loss of the Enemy of upwards of three thousand Men (a Moiety of the Army employ’d against it when the Earl took it) they were forc’d to surrender at Discretion.  And this cannot but merit our Observation, that a Place, which the English General took in little more than an Hour, and with inconsiderable Loss, afforded the Mareschal of France a Resistance of twenty-three Days.

Upon the taking of Fort Monjouick, the Mareschal de Thess gave immediate Orders for Batteries to be rais’d against the Town.  Those Orders were put in Execution with all Expedition; and at the same time his Army fortify’d themselves with such Entrenchments, as would have ruin’d the Earl’s former little Army to have rais’d, or his present much lesser Army to have attempted the forcing them.  However, they sufficiently demonstrated their Apprehensions of that watchful General, who lay hovering over their Heads upon the Mountains.  Their main Effort was to make a Breach between Port