Macdonald was at this time meditating an attempt upon Montserrat, the possession of which place would be of great advantage in the operations against Tarragona. But the Catalans were not idle. Looking to something of more permanent importance than could be achieved in desultory warfare, Rovira, who from the commencement of the struggle had so distinguished himself as to be honoured with the particular invectives of the French, had long projected schemes for recovering from the enemy some of the fortresses whereof they had possessed themselves, and these schemes he proposed to the successive generals in the principality, all of whom, till Campoverde took the command, regarded them as impracticable. Rovira, however, was not deterred by ridicule from prosecuting plans which appeared to him well founded; and Campoverde at length listened ♦SCHEME FOR THE RECOVERY OF BARCELONA FRUSTRATED.♦ to his representations. He had established a communication in Barcelona, which, like other attempts of the like nature, was discovered; and five persons, two of whom were women, were condemned to death for it, but only one, Miguel Alzina by name, fell into the enemy’s hand, and he was executed upon the glacis of Monjuic. The sentence charged him with having conspired to betray that fortress and the place of Barcelona to the Spaniards: this he had done, and in suffering for it, felt that he was dying a martyr to his country’s cause: but he was charged also with having intended to poison the garrison; and that any such purpose should have been sanctioned by the commander-in-chief, under whose sanction the scheme was formed, or that it should have been communicated to him, or even formed at all, is not to be believed. Of the persons who were acquitted of any share in the conspiracy, two were nevertheless ordered to be sent into France, and there detained till the general pacification of Catalonia; and one, who was niece of Alzina, to be confined in a nunnery, under the special observation of the vicar-general and of the prioress, who were to be responsible for her.
Rovira had concerted a plan also for surprising Figueras: it was conceived in the spirit of more adventurous ages, and therefore, some of those persons who felt no such spirit in themselves called it, in mockery, the Rovirada; to better minds, however, it appeared so feasible for men like those who had undertaken it, that Martinez, the commandant of the division of Ampurdan, was instructed by Campoverde to join him in the attempt.