He asked if they would keep
on, or if they preferred to return. They all voted in favor of going
onward, and the knowledge of their decision inspired the weary troops with
new spirit.
Before the terrible passage was completed one hundred men had died of
cold, fifty of them being Englishmen. Not a horse was left, and it was
necessary to abandon the spare arms, and even some of those borne by the
soldiers. It was little more than the skeleton of an army that at length
reached the beautiful valley of Sagamoso, in the heart of the province of
Tunja, on the 6th of July, 1819. Resting at this point, Bolivar sent back
assistance to the stragglers who still lingered on the road, and
despatched parties to collect horses and communicate with the few
guerillas who roamed about that region.
Barreiro, the Spanish commander, held the Tunja province with two thousand
infantry and four hundred horse. There was also a reserve of one thousand
troops at Bogota, the capital, and detachments elsewhere, while there was
another royalist army at Quito. Bolivar trusted to surprise and to the
support of the people to overcome these odds, and he succeeded in the
first, for Barreiro was ignorant of his arrival, and supposed the passage
of the Cordillera impossible at that season of the year.
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