The Maid Of Saragossa in Spain hardly a town of importance and antiquity - and most of the cities of Spain are ancient - but has its story of a miraculous deliverer who appeared in the hour of need, when the Moor thundered at the gates, and the chivalry of Spain leaned exhausted on their arms. Few of these legends will bear the sceptical investigation of modernity, but one can at any rate.

The story of the Maid of Saragossa is well known and well authenticated. Besides, she lived in times no further distant than Napoleonic days. Yet it is difficult to learn anything of her childhood and family, save that she was of humble parentage, and dwelt in the dilapidated, war-battered town of Saragossa. In short, she lived the ordinary life of the poor Spanish girl, until came the news that the French, who were the masters of Spain, had despatched General Lefebvre to take possession of Saragossa, where the Bourbon flag had been unfurled.

An Unequal Contest

The garrison of regular troops was known to be small. The city could only boast of ten old cannon, and its walls seemed a useless defence. But, none the less, the inhabitants, under the heroic leadership of Jose Palafox, the Spanish commandant, offered a resistance which has become famous in the annals of war. None was too old and none too young to bear a hand in the defence of the city. Women of all classes formed themselves into properly constituted companies of between two and three hundred, and fought shoulder to shoulder with their menfolk.

Unable to carry the town by assault, or to reduce it by starvation, the French succeeded in finding a way into the town. They bribed the keeper of a large powder magazine. The traitor blew up the magazine, and simultaneously the French attack was pressed hard on all sides. A terrific cannonade burst forth upon the town. The gallant defenders were confused and bewildered. Dazed by the act of treachery which laid their city open to the enemy, they ran panic-stricken through the streets.

The French launched their men up to the walls, and began to pour into the city. Its doom seemed certain. Suddenly, frorn the church of Nostra Dona del Pilar, where in times of war and sickness the city always sought succour and consolation, the figure of a maiden appeared. She was clad in white, and on her breast there gleamed a cross of gold. Her eyes shining with the lire of inspiration, she passed through the panic-stricken people to the walls, where the shroud of defeat already encompassed the defenders. Snatching the lighted match from the hands of an artilleryman who was sinking back into the arms of death, she herself fired the gun. Then, with the accents of exaltation, she cried aloud : " Death or victory ! "

The gathering clouds of despair and defeat dispersed before her shout of defiance. The victory was snatched as though by miracle from the hands of the French, who decided that they must reduce the town by famine and bombardment.

The heroic maid risked her life daily in succouring the wounded, and also kept to her new-found vocation of artillery woman. The condition of the town became pitiable. The defenders were unable any longer to keep out the French, who became possessed of half the city. General Lefebvre sent to Palafox a demand for surrender. The Spanish leader received the request in the open street.

' What answer shall I send ? " he asked of the Maid, who was standing near him.

" War to the knife ! " she cried. And the enfeebled Saragossans took up the cry of defiance.

It was the signal for a butchery which lasted eleven days and eleven nights. Each street became a battlefield, each house a citadel. Blood-lust seized upon all, and old and young, men, women, and children and babies, were slaughtered ruthlessly. The whole city was a shambles. When, on August 15, General Lefebvre was forced to retire, he boasted that he left behind him, instead of a city, a mass of debris.

A Modest Heroine

The Maid was asked to choose the reward for her heroic labours. All she asked was permission to wear the uniform of an engineer and the arms of Saragossa. Throughout the siege and the carnage in the streets, she escaped injury of any sort. Twice she saved her city at the critical moment ; but her heroic spirit sustained her in long, arduous labours, and did not only show itself in inspired flashes.

A few months later, Saragossa was again besieged, but this time the French knew what to expect, and four marshals - MM. Lannes, Mortier, Moncey, and Junot - conducted operations. After sixty-two days of desperate resistance, during which the defence was weakened by famine and plague, the city capitulated. In this second siege the Maid continued to serve the gun she first fired. " My gun," she called it. It is related that when her husband, whom she had married in the brief interval between the sieges, and who was, as one might expect, a gunner, was wounded, she remained with him and worked his gun.

Of the 130,000 souls in Saragossa, only 58,000 remained after the second siege. The Maid herself passed through both sieges unscathed, but was captured by the French, and abandoned by them and left to die of a contagious fever. She recovered, and escaped, and lived to die a natural death at the age of sixty-seven.