When the mob saw the Empecinado fall, they threw themselves upon him with as much ferocity as they had previously shown cowardice, and beat and ill-treated him in every possible manner.  Not satisfied with that, they bound him hand and foot, and pushed him through a cellar window, throwing after him stones, and every thing they could find lying about the street.  At last, wearied by their own brutality, they left him for dead, and he remained in that state till nightfall, when the corregidor and the ayuntamiento proceeded to inspect his body, in order to certify his death, and have him buried.  When he was brought out of the cellar, however, they perceived he still breathed, and sent for a surgeon, and also for a priest to administer the last sacraments.  They then carried him upon a ladder to the posito, or public granary, a strong building, where they considered he would be in safety, and put him to bed, bathed in blood and covered with wounds and bruises.

The corregidor, fearing that the news of the riot, and of the death of the Empecinado, would reach Penafiel, and that the escort which had been left there, and the many partizans that Diez had in that town, would come over to Castrillo to avenge his death, persuaded one of the cures or parish priests of the latter place, to go over to Penafiel in all haste, and, counterfeiting great alarm, to spread the report that the French had entered Castrillo, seized the Empecinado, and carried him off to Aranda.  This was accordingly done; and the Empecinado’s escort being made aware of the vicinity of the French and the risk they ran, immediately mounted their horses and marched to join Mariano Fuentes, accompanied by upwards of fifty young men, all partizans of the Empecinado, and eager to revenge him.  This matter being arranged, the corregidor had the jewels that were buried in the cellar of Manuel Diez dug up, and having taken possession of them, and installed Madame Barbot with all due attention in one of the principal houses of the town, he forwarded a report to General Cuesta of all that had occurred.  The general immediately sent an escort to conduct the lady and the treasure to Ciudad Rodrigo, and ordered that as soon as the Empecinado was in a state to be moved, he should also be sent under a strong guard to that city.

Meanwhile, the Empecinado’s vigorous constitution triumphed over the injuries he had received, and he was getting so rapidly better, that for his safer custody the corregidor thought it necessary to have him heavily ironed.  Deeming it impossible he should escape, and there being no troops in the village, no sentry was placed over him, so that at night his friends were able to hold discourse with him through the grating of one of the windows of the posito.  In this manner he contrived to send a message to his brother Manuel, who, having also got into trouble on account of Madame Barbot’s detention, had been compelled to take refuge in the mountains of