This succeeded. "We lose honor,"
exclaimed Centeno's soldiers; who, with a bastard sort of
chivalry, belonging to undisciplined troops, felt it a disgrace
to await an assault. In vain their officers called out to them
to remain at their post. Their commander was absent, and they
were urged on by the cries of a frantic friar, named Domingo
Ruiz, who, believing the Philistines were delivered into their
hands, called out, - "Now is the time! Onward, onward, fall on
the enemy!" *32 There needed nothing further and the men rushed
forward in tumultuous haste, the pikemen carrying their levelled
weapons so heedlessly as to interfere with one another, and in
some instances to wound their comrades. The musketeers, at the
same time, kept up a disorderly fire as they advanced, which,
from their rapid motion and the distance, did no execution.
[Footnote 32: "A las manos, a las manos; a ellos, a ellos."
Fernandez, Hist. del Peru, Parte 1, lib. 2, cap. 79.]
Carbajal was well pleased to see his enemies thus wasting their
ammunition. Though he allowed a few muskets to be discharged, in
order to stimulate his opponents the more, he commanded the great
body of his infantry to reserve their fire till every shot could
take effect. As he knew the tendency of marksmen to shoot above
the mark, he directed his men to aim at the girdle, or even a
little below it; adding, that a shot that fell short might still
do damage, while one that passed a hair's breadth above the head
was wasted.
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