CHAPTER XLVI.

PROCEEDINGS IN FRANCE. THE DUC D’ANGOULEME GOES TO LORD WELLINGTON’S

ARMY. LERIDA, MEQUINENZA, AND MONZON RECOVERED BY STRATAGEM.

PASSAGE OF THE ADOUR. BATTLE OF ORTHES. THE ALLIES RECEIVED AT

BOURDEAUX. BATTLE OF TOULOUSE. SORTIE FROM BAYONNE. RESTORATION

OF FERDINAND. CONCLUSION.

♦1814.♦

Buonaparte had returned to France breathing vengeance. He sent before

him two-and-twenty standards taken in the course of his German

campaign; and he announced to his Council of State, in troubled and

passionate language, the extent of his danger, and his determination

of opposing and overcoming it by the most ♦BUONAPARTE’S SPEECH TO HIS

COUNCIL.♦ violent efforts. “Wellington,” said he, “is in the south, the

Russians threaten the northern frontier, Austria the south-eastern, ...

yet, shame to speak it, the nation has not risen in mass to repel them!

Every ally has abandoned me: the Bavarians have betrayed me!... Peace?

no peace, till Munich is in flames! I demand of you 300,000 men; I will

form a camp at Bourdeaux of 100,000, another at Lyons, a third at Metz:

with the remnant of my former levies, I shall have 1,000,000 of men in

arms. But it is men whom I demand, full-grown men; not these miserable

striplings who choke my hospitals with sick, and my highways with their

carcases.... Give up Holland? rather let it sink into the sea! Peace,

it seems, is talked of, when all around ought to re-echo with the cry

of war!”

♦NOVEMBER.

PROCEEDINGS OF THE FRENCH GOVERNMENT.♦

Accordingly the obsequious senate placed, in official form and phrase,

300,000 conscripts at the disposal of the minister of war: they were

to be taken from the men who had been liable to the conscription in

former years, as far back as 1806, with an exception however in favour

of those who should have been married prior to the publication of this

decree; half this number were immediately to take the field, the others

to be held in reserve, and brought forward in case the eastern frontier

should be invaded. Comte Dejean, who ♦COMTE DEJEAN.♦ addressed the

senate upon this measure, said that painful as it was thus to call upon

classes who had formerly been free from the conscription, circumstances

now required such a measure: by this means men would be ranged under

the French eagles, who united strength with courage, and could support

the fatigues of war; while the younger conscripts would have time in

garrisons and in armies of reserve to acquire vigour for seconding the

sentiments which inspired them. “The cry of alarm,” said Regnaud de S.

Jean d’Angely, ♦REGNAUD DE S. JEAN D’ANGELY.♦ “and of succour, sent

forth by our sons and brethren in arms, still gloriously combating upon

the banks of the Rhine, has resounded upon the Seine and the Rhone, the

Doubs and the Gironde, the Moselle and the Loire, the mountains of Jura

and of the Vosges, the Alps and the Pyrenees. All true Frenchmen are

already prepared to meet the wants of their country, ... to meet the

dangers and sacrifices which must prevent other dangers and sacrifices

far more frightful, both for their extent and for the humiliation which

must accompany them. If the coalesced armies could penetrate beyond the

Pyrenees, the Alps, or the Rhine, then the day of peace could not shine

upon France; there could be no peace till we should repulse the enemy,

and drive him far from our territory. Noble sons of our dear France!

generous defenders of our glorious country! you, who close the entrance

of France against the English, the Russians, and their allies, you

shall not be left without support in the holy and honourable struggle

to which you have devoted yourselves. A little while, and numerous

battalions of men, mighty in strength and in courage, will come to aid

you in again seizing upon victory, and in delivering the French soil.”

♦COMTE LACEPÈDE.♦

“Your Majesty,” said Comte Lacepède, “who knows better than any one

the wants and the sentiments of your subjects, know that we desire

peace. But all the nations of the continent are in greater need of it

than we are; and if, notwithstanding the wishes and interest of more

than 150 millions of souls, our enemies should think of presenting to

us a sort of capitulation, their expectations will be deceived; the

French people show by their devotement and their sacrifices that no

nation ever better understood their duties toward their country, their

honour, and their sovereign.” To this Buonaparte made answer, ... “It

is but a year since all Europe was with us; all Europe marches against

us now: this is because the opinion of the world is directed by France

or by England. We should have every thing to fear, were it not for the

energy and the power of the nation. Posterity will say that if great

and critical circumstances offered themselves, they were not superior

to France and to me.” His heart was hardened, or he might now have made

peace upon terms which would speedily have enabled him again to disturb

the world; but his spirit was unbroken; and his abilities were never at

any time so signally displayed, as in making head against the dangers

which were about to beset him on all sides. It was no longer possible

to keep the people in ignorance of the real state of things: the press,

which hitherto under his tyranny had been employed in deceiving them,

was made use of now to excite them, by declaring the whole truth as

respected the danger, but suppressing it upon all other points: the

allies were charged with breach of faith and inordinate ambition, they

were represented as all seeking their own aggrandizement; and the

Emperor Napoleon as struggling alone against them, for the honour and

the interests ♦BUONAPARTE’S SPEECH TO THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY.♦ of

France. He himself addressed the legislature to the same effect, ...

“Brilliant victories,” said he, “have illustrified the French arms in

this campaign; unexampled defections have rendered those victories

useless. Every thing has turned against us. France itself would be in

danger were it not for the energy and unanimity of the French. I have

never been seduced by prosperity; adversity will find me superior to

its attacks. Often have I given peace to nations when they had lost

all.... From part of my conquests I have erected thrones for kings

who have abandoned me. I had conceived and executed great designs for

the prosperity and happiness of the world. A monarch and a father,

I know what peace adds to the security of thrones and of families.

Negotiations have been set on foot. I hoped that the congress would by

this time have met; but delays, which are not attributable to France,

have deferred the moment which is called for by the wishes of the

world.” When Buonaparte said this, he had no hope of peace, no desire

for it, no intention of making any such concessions as would render it

possible.

♦BRITISH REGULATIONS FOR TRADING WITH THE CAPTURED FRENCH PORTS.♦

As yet none of the other allied armies had passed the frontier;

but Lord Wellington was established in France, where, taking into

consideration the necessity of fixing the bases upon which the trade

with the ports of French Navarre to the south of the Adour should be

regulated, he published a proclamation, declaring that those ports

were ♦DEC. 18.♦ open to all nations who were not at war with any of

the allied powers, and fixing a duty of five per ♦DEC. 31.♦ cent. _ad

valorem_ upon all articles, except grain and salt, and stores for the

use of the army. An order of council was also published in England,

permitting British ♦JAN. 14.♦ vessels to trade with these and such

other French ports as might be under the protection, or in the military

occupation of his Majesty’s arms. To this then were the decrees of

Berlin and Milan come at last! The tyrant who had endeavoured to shut

the ports of all Europe against British ships and British merchandise,

and at one time had well nigh accomplished his barbarous and

barbarizing purpose, saw England now regulating the commerce of his own

ports, and levying duties in France, ... not after his example, with

blind and merciless rapacity, but upon those principles of moderation

and equity, on which her power has been raised, and by which her

prosperity is supported. Three years had not elapsed since the official

journal of Buonaparte’s government had said, that instead of defending

Portugal and Cadiz, Great Britain’s efforts would soon be required for

the defence of Gibraltar; that Spain having been conquered foot by foot

was on the point of being entirely subjected; that Wellington’s mode

of defending Portugal had been by abandoning the fortresses and laying

waste the country, and God grant, said the Moniteur, that he may one

day defend England in the same manner! “Our continental system,” said

the official journalist, “is completed; it diminishes your receipts by

crippling your commerce, and increases your expenses by obliging you

to keep armies in Lisbon and Sicily. In the meantime the French army,

according to our fundamental law, lives on the country in which it is

making war, and only costs us the pay which it would do at home.”

“The credit which sustained the colossal power of Great Britain,”

said Buonaparte to his Legislative Body in the summer of 1811, “is no

more. Her allies are either lost or destroyed. She ruins all whom she

would subsidize; she exhausts her own people in useless efforts. But

the struggle against this modern Carthage will now be decided on the

plains of Spain; the peace of the continent will not be disturbed;

England herself shall feel the evils which during twenty years she has

inflicted on the continental nations. A clap of thunder shall put an

end to the affairs of the Peninsula, seal the fate of her armies, and

avenge Europe and Asia by terminating this second Punic ♦DECEMBER.♦

war.” With what feelings must Buonaparte now have reflected upon these

bootless boasts!

With as little satisfaction too could he reflect upon the result of

that fundamental principle of his military system, by which his armies

were made to live on the countries wherein they were making war. The

principle of the British commander was to demand nothing from the

inhabitants, and to seize nothing; not a single ration was required

from them; they were paid on the spot for every thing which they

brought, while Soult’s army drained the adjoining provinces by its

requisitions, and his soldiers were rendered at once formidable and

odious to their own countrymen by the insolent and lawless habits which

they had acquired in the Peninsula. The passage of the Nive had put the

allies in possession of a large tract of country singularly fertile;

they obtained great part of their forage from it; and the right wing by

its position on the left of the Adour, commanded the navigation of that

river, and often intercepted the enemy’s supplies. In that deep soil,

and in a season of continued rain, it was not possible for the army to

advance, an individual indeed could with difficulty make his way any

where but on the paved road; ... it was hardly thought bad walking if

the waters were not more than knee-deep. ♦INJURY DONE BY DESTROYING THE

WOODS IN THIS PART OF THE PYRENEES.♦ One of those unforeseen effects

which frequently arise when man interferes upon a large scale with the

works of nature, has rendered this country liable to inundations in

winter and spring, and to drought in summer. About the middle of the

seventeenth century a speculator[4] undertook to supply the French

government with ship timber from the Pyrenees; to effect this it was

necessary for him to increase the waters of the two rivers, or, as

they are there called, _Gaves_ of Pau and Oleron; and by turning into

them the course of numerous rivulets, he doubled the volume of the

latter stream, and increased the current of the Adour so much that a

50-gun ship could cross the bar of Bayonne with less difficulty than

before that time was experienced by a vessel with ten guns. He expended

300,000 crowns upon this scheme, succeeded in it, and ruined his

family. But permanent evil was occasioned to the country: for when the

mountains were clothed with woods, the snow which was collected there

melted gradually under their shade, and fed the streams during the

whole year; afterwards, when the snow was exposed to the sun and rain,

the streams poured down in torrents, rendering the rivers destructive

during the winter and spring, and scarcely supplying water enough in

summer for navigation.

While the allies waited in their cantonments till the season should

allow them to recommence their operations, telegraphic signal stations,

to guard against surprise, were formed on the churches of Guethary,

Arcangues, and Vieux Monguerre, and these communicated with one upon

a high sand-hill, on the north side of St. Jean de Luz, near the

entrance from the Bayonne road: so that notice of any hostile movement

might almost instantaneously be communicated to the head-quarters.

Works were thrown up in front of the left, as the most assailable

part of the line, at Bidaut, at Arcangues, and almost on every knoll.

On such occasions it was that unavoidable injury was done to the

inhabitants. If a chateau unfortunately stood where it was deemed

expedient to fortify it, every part was pulled down that did not serve

for the purposes of defence; and all the noble trees around it were

felled, while the owner looked on, a sad and helpless spectator of the

ruin. These were cases of individual hardship; nothing could be more

honourable to the British character than the extreme care which was

taken to prevent all avoidable injury, and this was acknowledged by

the people with equal surprise and thankfulness. No army ever behaved

better even in its own country than the British army at this time in

France, and this was owing to Lord Wellington’s regulations. There

was another part of the British general’s conduct which attracted the

notice and commanded the respect of the French people; he regularly

attended divine service, with all his staff, not in the church, but

on the sandy beach, the brigade of guards forming a square there. The

service of Christmas-day[5] was performed there, on a bright frosty

day, not a breath of wind stirring, and no extraneous sound but that of

a high surf breaking at least half a mile from the shore, and flashing

in the sunshine.

♦MOVEMENTS IN THE MONTH OF JANUARY.

1814.♦

Towards the end of December the floods carried away the bridges

which had been thrown over the Nive, but they were soon replaced. A

detachment was sent towards Hasparren to clear the country in the

rear of the right wing of the enemy’s cavalry under Paris; and on new

year’s day a small island in the Adour, near Monguerre, was taken from

the French without opposition. At this time Clausel was assembling a

considerable force on the Gave de Oleron; on the third he drove in

the cavalry piquets between the Joyeuse and the Bidouze, and attacked

the posts of Major-General Buchan’s Portugueze brigade on the former

river, near La Bastide, and those of the third division in Bouloc. The

enemy turned the right of the Portugueze brigade on the heights of

La Costa, and established two divisions there and on La Bastide, on

the Joyeuse, with the remainder of their force on the Bidouze and the

Gave. The centre and right of the allies were immediately concentrated

and prepared to move; Lord Wellington reconnoitred the enemy the next

day, and would have attacked them on the ensuing, if the weather and

the swelling of the rivulets had not occasioned a day’s delay. But on

the 6th the attack was made by the 3rd and 4th divisions, supported

by Buchan’s Portugueze brigade of General Le Cor’s division, and the

cavalry under Major-General Fane; the enemy were dislodged without

loss on our side, and the troops resumed their former positions. Mina

was at this time with three battalions at Bidarray and St. Etienne

de Baygorey, observing the movements of the enemy from St. Jean de

Pied-de-Port. The people of the vale of Baygorey had distinguished

themselves in the war of 1793 by their brave opposition to the Spanish

troops; that spirit had been transmitted to the present generation,

and it was called into action by their countryman Harispe, one of the

most active of the French generals. They were the only peasantry who

manifested any disposition to act against the allies; by their aid,

with that of Paris’s division, and such troops as could be spared from

the garrison of St. Jean, Harispe ♦JAN. 12.♦ moved against Mina, and

compelled him to retire into the valley of Aldudes.

♦FALSE REPORTS CIRCULATED BY THE FRENCH GOVERNMENT.♦

These were the only military movements on this side during the month

of January; and the state of affairs here was disguised as much as

possible from the French people; Buonaparte persisting to the last in

that system of falsehood by which he had so long flattered and deluded

them. It could not, indeed, be concealed that Lord Wellington’s army

was wintering in France, though by what train of events it should

have arrived there the French were left to guess. But it was affirmed

that he had been defeated in the actions before Bayonne with the loss

of 15,000 men; that he now thought of nothing more than intrenching

himself within his own lines; that Clausel had assumed an attitude

which alarmed him; ... that his situation was becoming more and more

critical; ... that the misunderstanding between the Spanish and English

troops increased every day; ... that the British commander began to

fear lest the part of the French army which remained in the camp at

Bayonne might cut off his retreat; in fine, that the allies were filled

with consternation, and that while they were suffering from want of

provisions, their convoys were wrecked upon the coast of the Landes

department, and supplied the French with beef and clothing, and with

packages of pressed hay, which were sent to Bayonne, and there served

out to Marshal Soult’s cavalry.

♦THE DUC D’ANGOULÊME GOES TO LORD WELLINGTONS ARMY.♦

But while the Moniteur, in its official articles, dwelt thus upon

a chance shipwreck, and attempted, in its usual strain, to deceive

the French people, that part of the nation who remembered what had

been the state of France before its baneful revolution regarded the

progress of the British arms with secret satisfaction, because it

offered a hope of the restoration of the Bourbons, and of that peace

and security which could be obtained by no other means. The Bourbons

themselves thought it was now time for them to take advantage of the

course of events, and remind France that by putting an end to their

unmerited exile she might put an end to her own multiplied calamities.

The Duc d’Angoulême, therefore, with the Duc de Guiche, Comte Etienne

de Damas, and Comte d’Escars, sailed from England for Passages, and

proceeded to St. Jean de Luz. But as the allied powers, whether wisely

or not, had as yet held out no encouragement to the hopes of this royal

family, Lord Wellington could receive him with no public honours.

Many of the inhabitants, however, hastened to pay their court to him;

and the mayor of this little town, expressing to him a hope that the

calamities which France had so long endured would soon be terminated

by peace, observed, that peace could no otherwise be guaranteed than

by the word of their legitimate sovereign; and requested his Royal

Highness to convey to the king an assurance of cordial allegiance

from the municipality and people of that place. Deputations were also

sent to him from the neighbouring communes; and, before his arrival,

a circumstance had occurred which more unequivocally manifested the

disposition of the people. There was an emigrant officer in the British

army whose family estates were in the neighbourhood of Pau; a native

of that part of the country came to St. Jean de Luz charged by the

tenants of those estates to tell him how much they wished to live again

under their own old laws and customs, and how happy they should be

once more to pay their rents to their old master. The Duc, under the

name of the Comte de Pradelles, lived with the utmost privacy, as the

circumstances required; but he addressed a proclamation to the French

army, and agents were not wanting to circulate it. He called upon them

to rally round the _fleurs-de-lys_, which he was come, he said, to

display once more in his dear country; and he guaranteed, in the name

of the king, his uncle, their rank and pay to those who should join

him, and rewards proportionate to their services. “Soldiers,” he said,

“it is the descendant of Henri IV.; ... it is the husband of a princess

whose misfortunes are unequalled, but whose only wishes are for the

prosperity of France; ... it is a prince who, forgetting, in imitation

of your king, all his own sufferings, and mindful only of yours, throws

himself now with confidence into your arms!”

♦ROCHEJAQUELEIN COMES TO THE BRITISH CAMP.♦

A movement such as this address was intended to excite had already

begun, but it was among men who had been trained in better principles

than the soldiers of the revolution. An agent of Louis XVIII. had

arrived at Bourdeaux, and had found in that city the Marquis de la

Rochejaquelein, whom it was part of his commission to see, and say

to him that the king depended upon him for La Vendée. Rochejaquelein

is one of the redeeming names that appear in the black and bloody

history of the French revolution. The present Marquis had succeeded

to the title, the principles, and the virtues of his brother, who, in

the first Vendean war, had addressed his soldiers in these memorable

words: “_Si j’avance, suivez-moi; si je recule, tuez-moi; si je meurs,

vengez-moi_[6]!” “If I advance, follow me; if I falter, kill me; if I

fall, avenge me!” He now went through Anjou and Touraine, and awakened

that spirit which the National Convention had not been able, even by

its most atrocious barbarities, to suppress. A scheme was formed for

delivering Ferdinand from Valençay; but the person who was to have

headed the enterprise died at the time when it should have taken

place; and, indeed, no advantage could have been derived from it then,

if it had succeeded. Rochejaquelein’s designs were suspected, and M.

Lynch, the mayor of Bourdeaux, who was then at Paris, warned him, by

an express that orders were given for arresting him, and bringing him

dead or alive before Savary, Buonaparte’s worthy minister of police.

He escaped to Bourdeaux, and while remaining there in concealment,

heard that the Duc d’Angoulême was with the English army. Upon this he

determined immediately to repair to him, and receive his orders; but

before he set out upon this most hazardous adventure he requested an

interview with M. Lynch, who was just then returned from the capital.

That magistrate, who was always a loyalist at heart, foresaw the

speedy overthrow of Buonaparte, and had already given his word to the

Polignacs (then in confinement), that if Bourdeaux declared for the

king, he would be the first to mount the white cockade; this promise

he now renewed to Rochejaquelein, and charged him to assure the Duc

of his devoted services, and that he would deliver to him the keys of

the town. After many difficulties and dangers, the Marquis succeeded

in getting on board a ship bound, with a license, to S. Sebastian’s;

and, escaping from a storm by which several vessels were wrecked on the

coast, he landed at Passages, and hastened to St. Jean de Luz.

♦LORD WELLINGTON REFUSES TO SEND AN EXPEDITION TO THE COAST OF POITOU.♦

When the Duc heard his report of the state of feeling in La Vendée, of

the general opinion which prevailed in France, and of the disposition

which there was to receive him in Bourdeaux, he declared that nothing

should now make him forsake that country in which he had found subjects

who were still so faithful. Without delay, accompanied by the Duc de

Guiche, Rochejaquelein proceeded to Lord Wellington, who was then at

Garitz; he assured him that Bourdeaux would declare for the Bourbons

as soon as a British force should approach it; and, as the means of

effecting a powerful diversion in aid of that loyal city, he proposed

that the British General should send one or two vessels and a few

hundred men to land him by night upon the coast of Poitou, escort

him some two leagues into the interior, and then leave him there:

while they re-embarked and drew the attention of the troops, he would

pursue his way alone, and raise once more that loyal race who had

exerted themselves so dutifully, and suffered so severely, in the

most frantic and ferocious times of the revolution. Lord Wellington

listened with great interest to these representations; but he doubted

whether the feelings of the people towards the royal family were what

Rochejaquelein believed them to be; and he did not think himself

authorized to detach even a small force upon an expedition such as

♦MÉMOIRES DE LA MARQUISE DE LA ROCHEJAQUELEIN, PP. 513–28.♦ was

proposed, when he had no instructions from his own government, and

moreover when he was on the eve of great operations, ... for he was now

preparing to pass the Adour.

♦SUCHET FAILS IN AN ATTEMPT TO SURPRISE A BRITISH CORPS.

DECEMBER.♦

On the side of Catalonia, meantime, all went on favourably for the

allies; for if they were too weak to obtain any advantages for

themselves, the enemy was weakened to a greater degree, in consequence

of the progress of the war in other quarters. Marshal Suchet made one

vigorous attempt in the beginning of December to surprise the corps

at Villafranca, where the British head-quarters were established. He

made a forced night march in this hope with about 15,000 men; but

timely information had been obtained. Sarsfield’s division, which was

stationed there, retired across the country to the left; the British

cavalry and artillery fell back about eight miles along the main road

to Arbos, where there was a strong position, and whither General

Mackenzie moved his division to their support; and Suchet, having

failed in his intention, retired from Villafranca on the afternoon

of the same day, and returned to the Llobregat as rapidly as he had

advanced. The wants of the Spanish army had now become so pressing

that it was necessary to send Sarsfield’s cavalry to the rear, where

it might be possible for them to subsist, his infantry being sometimes

upon the shortest allowance, and without any sure prospect of even

that insufficient dole for more than two or three days. His troops

must from sheer destitution have quitted the field had it not been for

the merchants of Villa-nueva, who, at his earnest persuasion, but on

their own credit, and at their own risk, supplied them with provisions

from the imports which arrived at that port. Not a murmur meantime

was heard from the men; nor did they evince the slightest feeling

of discontent or jealousy when they saw the Anglo-Sicilian troops,

forming part of the same army, duly supplied, while they themselves

were hungered. Only if the greater strength of the British soldiers

appeared, when they were engaged together in the public works, a

Spaniard would sometimes quietly say, “Give us your rations, and you

shall see us work as well as you do.”

After the Nassau battalions had passed over to Lord Wellington’s camp,

immediate advice had been dispatched to Sir William Clinton; and the

information was with due secrecy communicated to the officer who

commanded the Nassau troops in Catalonia; but this person preferring

what he considered his military obligations to his national duty,

delivered the papers into General Habert’s hands, who had succeeded

Maurice ♦THE GERMAN TROOPS IN BARCELONA DISARMED.♦ Mathieu in the

command at Barcelona. The French would, perhaps, have been better

pleased if he had followed the example of his better-minded countrymen;

for that German feeling which the officer had renounced existed among

the men, and it was deemed necessary to disarm them all, 2400 in

number, thus weakening the army of Catalonia, and bringing upon it

this additional inconvenience, that the men of whose services it was

deprived were to be supported as prisoners, and guarded also. This

officer was mortally wounded a few weeks afterwards in a sally from

Barcelona.

♦TROOPS WITHDRAWN FROM SUCHET’S ARMY.♦

Suchet’s force was still farther weakened by the withdrawal of 2000

of his Italian troops; he then proposed to the French government,

as a measure of expediency, that they should dismantle the city of

Barcelona, and content themselves with occupying the citadel and

Fort Monjuic, whereby 5000 of the garrison would be disposable for

service; but his advice was rejected, the possession of Barcelona

being deemed necessary for the support of the army in Catalonia. About

the same time two strong battalions of Spaniards were detached from

the Anglo-Sicilian army, at the pressing request of General Roche,

to assist him in blockading Murviedro. Tarragona had now been so far

repaired as to be in a defensible state; but such was the exhausted

condition of the province that no stores of any kind could be obtained

from it for the Spanish authorities. ♦FAILURE OF AN ATTEMPT AGAINST THE

ENEMY AT MOLINS DEL REY. JANUARY.♦ While both armies were withheld

from undertaking any important operation by the diminution of strength

on both sides, and by the increasing difficulties of obtaining supplies

on the part of the Anglo-Sicilians, a plan was concerted between

Sir William Clinton and Manso for attacking the enemy’s cantonments

at Molins del Rey and the adjoining villages on the Llobregat: Sir

William was to move with 8000 men upon the Barcelona road and attack

them in front, while Manso should post himself upon the strong ground

in the rear of Molins del Rey, close to the only road by which they

could retire. Copons had assented to this project, and agreed to

lend Manso and his brigade for this service, both the men and their

commander being worthy of all confidence. ♦JAN. 17.♦ The enterprise

failed, because Copons, without making any communication to the English

General, instead of sending Manso, chose to go himself with a larger

force, set off two hours later than the time which had been agreed

upon, and finally appeared on the right flank of the enemy instead

of in the rear; meantime the force from Villafranca having arrived

at the hour appointed, the French, who, if there had been the same

punctuality on the other side, must have been taken by surprise, were

able to effect their retreat over the Llobregat by the stone bridge

near Molins, which was well fortified. Upon the first alarm Suchet

dispatched troops to support General Pannetier, who was in command

there, and manœuvred in the hope of decoying the allies to a dangerous

advance: but Sir William was too wary to incur any unwise risk, when

the object of his movement had been disappointed. Had Manso been left

to execute what had been concerted with him, Pannetier’s division must

in all likelihood have been captured.

♦FARTHER DRAFTS FROM SUCHET’S ARMY.♦

A few days afterwards Marshal Suchet received positive orders from

Paris to dispatch for Lyons with the least possible delay two-thirds

of his cavalry, from 8000 to 10,000 foot, and fourscore field-pieces.

He renewed his representations concerning Barcelona, saying, he should

delay till the latest minute his departure from the vicinity of that

city, in the hope of farther instructions; and he advised that, as

the mission of the Duque de S. Carlos had produced no good effect,

Ferdinand should be sent to Barcelona, with an understanding that

France put him in possession of the fortified places, in reliance

upon his honour for sending the garrison home. Meantime he appointed

Habert to the command of Lower Catalonia, the division of the Lower

Ebro being under General Robert, who commanded in Tortosa; that General

was assured that he should soon be delivered, either by succour or by

the conclusion of peace; but at the worst, he was instructed, when

his provisions should fail, which would be before the end of April,

to make for Lerida, collect his troops there, and by a rapid march

through the mountains proceed to Benasque, and so into France. No

farther ♦HE RETIRES TO GERONA.♦ advices having reached him by the first

of February, Marshal Suchet moved with the remains of his army to the

neighbourhood of Gerona; and when, in the course of another fortnight,

instructions came to act as he had advised with regard to Barcelona,

it was too late, the allies having immediately upon his removal

blockaded that city.

♦ONE OF HIS AIDES-DE-CAMP OPENS A CORRESPONDENCE WITH EROLES.♦

A greater mortification awaited him. Eroles, in the month of November,

when confined by a dangerous illness at Manresa, received information

from one in whom he had reason to place entire confidence, that a

Spanish officer, by name D. Juan de Halen, who was then one of Suchet’s

aides-de-camp, was desirous of being restored to the service of his

country, under his protection. Eroles replied that this was not to be

hoped for, unless the officer could make some signal reparation for

the injury which he had done to the Spanish name; but that in waiting

till this could be effected, he might give proof of his sincerity and

earnest of his intentions by communicating such useful information as

his situation about Suchet’s person enabled him to obtain. Van Halen

replied as if he felt himself wounded by being expected to act the part

of a spy: there was not much difficulty in overcoming this objection;

and he found means of transmitting intelligence from time to time,

and, among other papers, a copy of Suchet’s cipher. The more important

communications were not intrusted to writing, but made orally, through

the person by whom this correspondence was opened.

♦VAN HALEN.♦

Juan Van Halen, as may be inferred from his name, was a Spaniard of

Flemish or Brabantine descent. He was a native of the Isle of Leon,

and born in 1789. After some years of active service in the navy, he

was employed in the engineers; and as an officer in that corps bore

a part at Madrid in the tragedy of the 2nd of May. Escaping from the

capital, he joined Blake’s army after the battle of Rio-seco, and was

sent by him to Ferrol; when that place was surrendered, he took the

oath of fidelity to the Intruder, and afterwards held a commission in

his body guards. He had the good fortune subsequently to be employed

in other parts of Europe, and was at Paris when Buonaparte’s reverses

in Germany rendered it no longer doubtful that the part in which

he had engaged must finally be the unsuccessful one. A friend and

countryman, who had come to the same unpleasant conviction, advised

him to forsake the sinking cause; but Van Halen, in his own words,

“could not think of prostrating himself at the feet of the throne and

of his country, unless he could bear with him the testimony of some

such service as might make him worthy of being received in the arms of

Spanish generosity and gratitude, not in those of indulgence, or of

♦RESTAURACION DE LAS PLAZAS, &C. P. 12.♦ strict justice.” So getting

leave from the then expelled Intruder to solicit employment in Spain,

he obtained from the Duc de Feltre an appointment upon Suchet’s staff,

and provided himself with credentials to Eroles, and also with a letter

of recommendation to Sir Rowland Hill.

♦HE DESERTS FROM THE FRENCH ARMY.♦

After carrying on a correspondence with Eroles for about two months,

and arranging with him a plan for attacking some of the places which

the French held on the left of the Llobregat, it was agreed that he

should come over to the Spaniards and put the design in execution; and

hoping both to render service to the cause in which he now embarked,

and to conceal the fact of his own desertion, leaving Barcelona in the

night, he led away with him from the ♦JAN. 17.♦ neighbourhood of that

city two squadrons of cuirassiers, to whom he produced a forged order

of the Marshal’s that they should follow him on a secret expedition.

His intention was that Eroles should intercept them, and make them and

himself prisoners: but the messenger, whom he had dispatched two days

before to apprise the Baron of his movements, fell in with a party of

hussars belonging to the Anglo-Sicilian army, who were scouring the

road to Moncada, and was detained by them; and when Van Halen came to

the place appointed, and found that the scheme had failed, nothing

remained for him but to provide for his own safety by escaping as soon

as he could. Thus his desertion became notorious, and all the plans

which had been formed upon the supposition of keeping it secret were

frustrated.

♦HIS SCHEME FOR RECOVERING CERTAIN PLACES.♦

But Van Halen’s disposition was turned to perilous intrigues and

enterprises: he now conceived a design of recovering some strong

places by stratagem; and Eroles remembering the _Rovirada_ by which

Figueras had been surprised, and being himself of an adventurous

spirit, entered readily into his views, and went with him to General

Copons, whose head-quarters were then at Vich. Copons was not without

difficulty induced to give his consent, and they then proceeded to

Xerta, where Don Josef Sans, who commanded the force before Tortosa,

had his head-quarters. This place was so strictly blockaded that it

was certain no tidings of Van Halen’s desertion could have reached it;

and to induce a belief in other quarters that he had left Catalonia,

bills upon Madrid and other places at a distance had been taken up

for him. He had possessed himself not only of Suchet’s cipher, but of

the handwritings which it was necessary to counterfeit; and letters

were now written as from the Marshal, informing General Robert the

commander that the exigencies of the Emperor’s affairs compelled

him to withdraw all his garrisons from that side of the Llobregat;

that Colonel D’Eschalard of his staff was gone to Tarrasa, there to

conclude the treaty for evacuating them; and that he must be prepared

to depart with his equipage and field-artillery as soon as orders to

that effect should reach him. It was added, that the Emperor had been

pleased to honour him with the grand-cross of the Imperial Order of the

Reunion, and upon this the Marshal offered him his congratulations.

An unlucky peasant was found, who undertook, in the character of a

spy of Suchet’s, to carry this forged dispatch into the town. So few

communications, without a strong escort, escaped the vigilance of the

Catalans, that whenever a single messenger was sent, the letter ...

written in the smallest compass and in the fewest words ... used to

be inclosed in lead, and swallowed by the bearer. Van Halen was well

acquainted with all the details of such transactions. If the enemy sent

a spy out from one of their fortresses, they usually made a sally,

and thus brought him out unobserved, and set him on his way; but the

messenger who was to make his way in, approached in the darkness, and

made a certain signal with a flint and steel. The peasant, though

carefully instructed upon this as upon all other points, forgot this

important part of his instructions, and in consequence was wounded

by the sentinel: the first part of his errand, however, was not the

less performed; the dispatch was delivered to General Robert, and no

suspicion being entertained of the stratagem, the man was sent to the

hospital, and there carefully attended. But the answer which he should

have delivered into the hands of his employers was sent by another

person, and consequently not received by those who were expecting it.

♦THE DECEIT TRIED AT TORTOSA.♦

Having learnt what had befallen their messenger, Eroles and Van Halen

proceeded with their device. A Spanish officer was sent with a letter

from Sans, saying he had just received a copy of a treaty signed at

Tarrasa by the Spanish and French commanders-in-chief in Catalonia,

agreeing upon an armistice of fifteen days for the evacuation of the

places named in the treaty, Tortosa being one; he inclosed a letter

with D’Eschalard’s signature, which it was pretended had accompanied

it, and in which it was stated that the chef d’escadron, Van Halen,

one of the Marshal’s aides-de-camp, would speedily arrive with full

instructions. The garrison were on the point of making a sally

when the officer arrived: the news of the armistice spread; a free

communication in consequence took place with the advanced posts of the

Spaniards, and on the next morning General Robert sent out Colonel

Plique to make arrangements for evacuating the place; at the same

time he liberated some soldiers who had lately been surprised and

made prisoners. The Colonel accordingly came at the hour appointed;

Van Halen presented himself in his aide-de-camp’s uniform, and the

Spanish Captain Daura, as having accompanied him from the Llobregat,

delivered a letter from Copons. Plique desired to be left alone with

Van Halen, whose instructions he was authorized to receive, in case the

Spanish commander should not permit him to enter the town. He inquired

of him concerning the state of affairs which had reduced the Emperor

to sacrifice these places, and Van Halen briefly related the series

of reverses which rendered it necessary to withdraw from Spain 30,000

men, leaving only garrisons in Barcelona, Gerona, and Figueras. The

Marshal, he said, was before Barcelona, waiting impatiently ♦FEBRUARY.♦

for their arrival, that he might begin his march: his desire was that

no man should be left in the hospitals if he could safely be removed;

that General Robert should bring away all the artillery he could, and

include the public money with his own to avoid all difficulty upon that

score: for himself, he added, he must proceed with the same orders to

Murviedro and Peñiscola. Plique inquired if the English assented to

the armistice, and was assured that they did. He then asked if the

only favour which the Emperor had bestowed upon their garrison was that

of granting the grand-cross to General Robert, the Marshal, he said,

when he withdrew from Valencia, having promised to recommend several

officers for promotion. Van Halen told him he had understood that two

Generals of Brigade were made, M. Plique himself he believed being

one, and M. Jorry, then at Murviedro, the other. The Colonel appears

to have been completely deceived; but he was instructed to invite

Brigadier Sans to a repast before the town should be evacuated, and to

request that he would send officers of artillery to take possession of

the magazines, and that he would allow the aide-de-camp to return with

him into the town, and take up his quarters there. This, Sans said, he

was positively enjoined not to permit; all he could allow was that M.

Van Halen, accompanied by a Spanish officer, should present himself at

the Puente de Jesus, and confer there with General Robert. When they

reached the bridge, Robert did not come out, but he sent the chief of

his staff, with several officers, and one company, and they renewed the

request that Van Halen might enter; this of course was refused, and in

case an attempt had been made to seize him, Eroles with a body of horse

was near at hand. A letter was sent in, inclosing a copy of the forged

treaty, and the parties then separated. Van Halen suspected that the

deceit had been discovered; still, however, he carried it on, and wrote

to Robert, saying, ♦IT FAILS THERE.♦ that as the officers had urged

him to do, he should have evaded the presence of the Spanish Colonel,

had he not been strictly ordered by Marshal Suchet to do nothing which

could tend to interrupt the good understanding during the armistice;

and being now obliged to communicate without delay his orders in

Murviedro and Peñiscola, he was deprived of the honour of seeing him.

General Robert answered this by a letter to Sans, regretting that he

had not accepted his invitation. Van Halen’s letter, he said, gave

him no satisfactory notion either of his proceedings or those of his

government; and unless he conferred with Van Halen in the fortress, he

should not observe the armistice, but renew hostilities that afternoon,

and continue them till this aide-de-camp, whom he must see, returned

from Murviedro.

♦ATTEMPT AT LERIDA.♦

It was known afterwards that a spy during the preceding night had

entered the town, and his letters made General Robert immediately

suspect the stratagem: disappointed of getting Van Halen into his

hands, and of taking the Spanish officers in a counter-snare, he took

the only vengeance in his power, by putting to death the wounded

peasant who had brought the first forged letter. Eroles, meantime, not

discouraged by this failure, lost no time in trying the same artifice

elsewhere. Mequinenza had hitherto only been observed by part of one

regiment; and the garrison, though reduced in number, made incursions

for many leagues round, by which means they had laid in stores of

provision for eighteen months, and kept the surrounding country in

continual alarm. Eroles, on his way from Xerta towards Lerida, sent his

adjutant, Don Antonio Mazeda, with Don José Antonio Cid, a member of

the provincial deputation of Catalonia, to raise the Somatenes, and by

this means cut off all communication with the place; and he dispatched

before them a peasant with such another letter as that which at first

had imposed upon General Robert. He halted that night a day’s journey

from Lerida, having in his company Don Juan Antonio Daura, who forged

the signatures, Van Halen, and Lieutenant Don Eduardo Bart, who spoke

French so perfectly, that he was able to personate a French officer.

Here they parted company, the two latter making for Torres del Segre,

a place on the river of that name, six leagues from Mequinenza, and

three from Lerida; there they remained in secret, coming out only at

night to confer with Eroles, learn from him the state of affairs, and

copy such papers as were required, none of which were forwarded till

they had been examined by each of the party most carefully. The Baron

himself proceeded to the blockading force before Lerida, and appearing

there as Commandant-General of the blockade of that place, Monzon and

Mequinenza, he reviewed the troops, inspected their posts, and made

♦FEB. 9.♦ dispositions for straitening the blockade; meanwhile the

forged orders were sent in by a trusty agent to the governor, General

Lamarque. Hither the spy from Mequinenza returned, bringing with him

the reply of Baron Bourgeois, the governor, to Marshal Suchet, in which

he acknowledged the receipt of his orders, said that he was preparing

to obey, inclosed the returns of his force, the state of the military

chest and the magazines, and thanked the Emperor for the grand-cross

with which he had been pleased to honour him; the same messenger

brought also a letter from Mazeda, saying that he had strictly

blockaded the place. The reply from the governor of Lerida was in like

manner brought him, and he thus obtained the exact returns which he

wished, and understood also that both commandants were ready to fall

into the snare.

♦AND AT MEQUINENZA, WHERE IT SUCCEEDS.♦

He then set out for Mequinenza, with 300 foot and 40 horse, including

a company of Mina’s division, which he met upon the way, and ordered

to follow him. Van Halen was instructed to join him by a different

road, which he did, in sight of the fortress, Eroles having first sent

in dispatches, signed in D’Eschalard’s name, and sealed with the seal

of the staff, informing the governor of the pretended armistice, and

stating that the two aides-de-camp, Van Halen and Captain Castres,

would go round to the fortresses with the necessary orders; he

accompanied this with a letter in his own name, announced the arrival

of an officer from Marshal Suchet, and requested to be informed what

number of officers the French Commandant would bring out to confer

with this officer in his presence, that he might present himself

with an equal number; coming himself, if the Commandant came, or

deputing one of his chief officers, if General Bourgeois should think

proper to act by delegate: in either case, his troops should be drawn

out at an equal distance with those of the French from any central

point which the Commander might please to name. Time and place were

accordingly appointed, and Van Halen in his French uniform, and Bart

as his orderly, went to the conference without an escort, and with an

effrontery which prevented all suspicion. Van Halen presented a letter

as from Suchet, in which the Marshal was made to say how painfully

he felt the circumstances which compelled him to give orders for

evacuating places wherein, at the cost of so many sacrifices, they had

planted their victorious banners. But unexampled defections had forced

the Emperor to this measure; and his object now was, to preserve these

brave garrisons, and place them once more in the first rank of his

bayonets. His aide-de-camp was charged with verbal communications. Van

Halen acted his part perfectly; and having arranged everything for the

march of the troops, who were to evacuate the place on the following

noon, Eroles hastened with his subtle agent to Lerida, there to repeat

the stratagem.

♦SUCCESS AT LERIDA;♦

The news that Mequinenza was recovered had already spread; but none of

the circumstances were known, and the better to deceive the French, it

was now necessary to deceive the Spaniards also. Eroles, therefore,

issued an order of the day, stating that Mequinenza was that day to be

evacuated, and that Lerida and Monzon were to be given up by the same

treaty; and commanding the Spaniards not to molest the French during

the twelve days’ truce, but to treat them with that generosity which

characterized the Spanish nation. He had approached the blockading

force amid the rejoicings of the people, who gathered round him on his

way. General Lamarque’s suspicions were completely disarmed; and when

he requested that Van Halen might be allowed to enter the place and

confer with him, because his own orders did not permit him to go beyond

a certain distance from it, Van Halen, relying upon his courage and

his strength of countenance, ventured in. The governor met him on the

bridge, and they retired into an adjoining house, where, after some

searching questions, he produced a dispatch received, as he said, by

an emissary who had recently arrived, in which the Marshal approved

of some proposals for the further security of the place, and held

out a hope of succouring him in the course of a few weeks. Van Halen

answered by a reference to the date of his own letter, and the recent

events which had produced an alteration in the Marshal’s views. The

conversation turned upon the Spanish Generals, and the circumstances

of the blockade; and Van Halen took occasion to represent that Eroles

seemed hurt by the General’s declining to communicate with him in

person, when he, in proposing such a meeting, had gone beyond the line

of his instructions from General Copons. The French General, upon this,

not to be outdone in ♦FEB. 14.♦ courtesy, sent to offer a meeting; and

went accordingly beyond his own advanced posts with his treacherous

companion. At this interview everything was arranged, and three o’clock

on the following afternoon was fixed upon as the hour for evacuating

the city. Van Halen was invited to return with the General, and be his

guest that night; but he pleaded the necessity of hastening to Monzon

as his excuse, and thither he departed with a Spanish escort.

♦AND AT MONZON.♦

Monzon had been besieged by part of Mina’s troops since the end of

September, to the great distress of the inhabitants, who were under

the guns of the fortress. The besiegers attempted to mine the rock on

which it was placed. There was but one man belonging to the engineers

in the place, and he was a simple miner; but, being a man of great

ability, the commandant and the garrison confided in him; and the

♦SUCHET, 2. N. PP. 371, 372.♦ works which were executed under his

direction were so skilfully devised, that they baffled all the attempts

of the assailants, and they had in consequence converted the siege

into a blockade. Here Van Halen had two difficulties to overcome with

the Commandant: a report had reached him that there was a Spaniard at

this time with Eroles who had served as aide-de-camp to Suchet; and,

the place being held under the orders of the governor of Lerida, he

could not surrender it, without sending to receive his instructions.

The suspicion which the report ought to have excited seems to have been

removed by the confidence with which Van Halen presented himself. And

the second objection was easily disposed of: the false aide-de-camp,

though he might reasonably judge that the real purport was to discover

whether or not there was any fraud in the business, knew that Lerida

had by this time been delivered up; he prevailed upon the blockading

force, therefore, to let an officer pass with this commission, and

required the Commandant to hold himself in readiness for marching

as soon as he should return. The officer accordingly arrived before

Lerida on the night after its surrender. Eroles affected anger when he

heard his errand, and declared that, if there were any further delay,

the treaty as it respected Monzon should be annulled, and he would

march against it and reduce it to ashes. The officer, finding him in

possession of Lerida, was confounded, made what excuse he could for

his superiors, and faithfully promised that Monzon should be given up

immediately on his arrival there; and this was done.

♦THE THREE GARRISONS MADE PRISONERS.♦

Monzon was at this time stored for seven months, Mequinenza for

eighteen, and Lerida for two years. By the recovery of these places,

40,000 inhabitants were saved from the miseries of a siege, and

6000 Spanish troops were rendered disposable for other service. The

navigation of the Ebro, the Cinca, and the Segre was restored, and the

most fertile part of Catalonia delivered, Aragon secured, and a direct

communication opened with Lord Wellington’s army. The next business

was to secure the garrisons who had been thus deceived, amounting

to more than 2300 men. As soon as Eroles had taken measures for

preserving order in Lerida, which, under such circumstances, required

extraordinary care, he set out with two battalions of infantry and 200

horse in the rear of the French, Colonel Don Josef Carlos having gone

before them with an equal force. The intention was to intercept them in

the defiles of Igualada; but they made a forced march, and frustrated

this part of the plan. Upon this, lest they should succeed in effecting

a junction with the troops in Barcelona, part of the blockading army

was sent for; and when they arrived at Martorell, they found themselves

surrounded there. General Lamarque was then informed that he had been

deceived by a stratagem of war; and that nothing remained for him but

to lay down his arms, give up the public treasure, and to submit to

fortune. Eroles expressed his personal esteem for the General, and

his sorrow that the misadventure should have fallen upon him; he

promised that the officers should be sent to Tarragona, and receive

every attention which could alleviate their imprisonment; and he

observed, that the General himself could not but in his heart approve

a stratagem by which so much bloodshed and misery was prevented, as

must have attended the reduction of these places, whether by siege or

by blockade. Lamarque upon this asked if Van Halen was a Spaniard; and

Bourgeois remarked upon the answer, that in truth he had rendered a

great service to his country. The former said he had been dreaming for

the last five days, and hardly knew if he were yet awake.[7]

Chagrined as Marshal Suchet was by the success of what, though he might

justly deem it treachery in the agent, he could not but consider to be

an allowable stratagem on the part of an injured, enterprising, and

ever active enemy, ... it was even more mortifying for him immediately

afterwards to make overtures, by order of ♦SUCHET DISMANTLES GERONA AND

OTHER PLACES. SUCHET, 2, 374.♦ the minister at war, to General Copons

for evacuating all the places which he yet retained, Figueras only

excepted; and to find the allies so confident of speedily obtaining

them unconditionally that his proposals were disregarded, in retiring

from the vicinity of Barcelona he had destroyed his works at the

bridge of Molins del Rey, and in the pass of Moncada, and at Mongat;

he now found it necessary to demolish the fortified posts at Besalu,

Olot, Bascara, Palamos, and other smaller places; and even to dismantle

Gerona, evacuate it, and retire with the remains of his army to the

neighbourhood of Figueras. Jaca, too, about the same time was compelled

to surrender to a part of Mina’s army.

♦STATE OF LORD WELLINGTON’S ARMY.♦

On the Biscayan coast Santona was the only place which still remained

in the enemy’s power; the garrison were blockaded; but they contrived

to get supplies by sea, sometimes by successful runners from the

opposite side of the bight, sometimes by capturing traders that

approached too near, for they had one or two armed vessels in the

port; but more by means of smugglers, who ran in for the sake of a

good market, and in the spirit of their illicit occupation cared not

with whom they dealt. The British depôts had been removed from Bilbao

and S. Sebastian’s; and, notwithstanding the stormy season, the army

was always abundantly supplied, except with fodder; when this failed,

bruized furze was used: the horses ate it with avidity, and kept in

excellent condition. The men, during this inaction, suffered more; some

of the corps were very sickly; and one regiment, which lost many men by

a fever, was sent into the rear, both for change of air, and that it

might be removed from intercourse with the rest of the army. The rain

sometimes rendered it difficult to communicate with the more distant

corps: a Portugueze brigade belonging to Sir Rowland was once four

days without bread or meat, a rivulet, small at other times, being so

swoln as to become impassable. But in general, money was the scarcest

article: dollars, which were exchanged at so low a rate after the

spoils at Vittoria, sold now for eight shillings each.

♦OPERATIONS ARE RENEWED.♦

The disposition of the French towards the Bourbons could at this time

be so little doubted, that though the allies did not yet openly support

their claims, dies were made to cut out fleurs-de-lys for scarfs, to be

worn on the arms of those who might be willing to declare in favour of

the old loyal cause. During the weeks of inactivity which the season

occasioned, preparations were made for crossing the Adour, investing

Bayonne, and carrying the war into the heart of France. The snow on the

lower range of the Pyrenees had visibly lessened on the 6th, and in

the course of a week had wholly disappeared. On the 14th of February,

Sir Rowland put the right of the army in motion, drove in the enemy’s

piquets on the Joyeuse river, attacked Harispe’s position at Hellete,

and compelled him to retire with loss towards St. Martin. That General

then took up a strong position in front of Garris, on the heights of Le

Montagne, where he was joined by troops from the enemy’s centre, and

by Paris with his division, who, having commenced their march toward

the interior of France, had been recalled because of the danger in this

quarter. On the same day the detachment of Mina’s troops in the valley

of Bastan advanced upon Baygorrey and Bidarrey, and blockaded St. Jean

de Pied-de-Port, Sir Rowland having cut off the direct communication

of the enemy with that fort. On the ♦FEB. 15.♦ morrow, Morillo, after

driving in their advanced posts, was ordered to move toward St. Palais,

by a ridge parallel to that on which they had taken their position,

that he might turn their left, and cut off their retreat upon that

road by the bridge of St. Palais, while the second division under Sir

William Stewart should attack in front. The day was far gone before

the attack could be commenced, and the action lasted till after night

had closed: the position, though remarkably strong, was carried

without much loss on the first effort; many gallant attempts were

made to recover it, and as gallantly resisted; the struggle was more

obstinate in the darkness than it had been while daylight lasted, and

the French being encountered in all their charges with the wonted

resolution of British troops, more men were bayoneted than usual in

proportion to the numbers engaged. The enemy at length gave up the

contest, and retired with considerable loss, leaving ten officers and

about 200 men prisoners; but they reached St. Palais before Morillo

could arrive, and crossed the Bidouze during the night, and destroyed

the bridges. The right of the centre made a corresponding movement

with the right wing on these two days, and the allied posts were this

evening on the Bidouze. The bridges were repaired; Sir Rowland crossed

the next day, and on the following drove the enemy across the Gave de

Mouleon. They attempted to destroy the bridge at Arriverete, as if it

were their intention to dispute the passage, but time was not allowed

them to complete its destruction; and a ford having been discovered

above the bridge, the 92nd, commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Cameron,

crossed there, covered by the fire of Captain Beane’s troop of horse

artillery, which was advantageously placed; this regiment made a

gallant attack upon two battalions of French infantry in the village of

Arriverete, and drove them out with much loss. The enemy retired in the

night across the Gave d’Oleron. Sir Rowland’s posts were established

on that Gave the next day; and the French took up a position in the

neighbourhood of Sauveterre, where they were reinforced. The position

was very strong, and covered in front by a broad and rapid river; but

it seemed now as if no position, however advantageous, could give the

French confidence; they had been driven during the last four days from

a country of peculiar difficulty, where frequent rivers afforded them

great opportunities for defending it; and when Marshal Soult understood

with how little success it had been defended, he directed his whole

attention to that side, destroyed all the bridges over the Adour, which

were not protected ♦FEB. 22.♦ by Bayonne, left that place to its own

resources, and, concentrating his forces behind the Gave de Pau, fixed

his head-quarters at Orthes.

♦PREPARATIONS FOR CROSSING THE ADOUR.♦

During these operations the left wing of the army continued to observe

Bayonne, with the 4th division, also, which occupied the heights of

Monguerre, communicating with the left on the Nive, and resting its

right on the Adour, and thus preventing the enemy from drawing any

supplies for the fortress from that side of the river. Preparations had

been made for passing that river, and for throwing a bridge over it,

both below Bayonne, ... enterprises so difficult, that though Soult had

witnessed the passage of the Douro, he seems not to have apprehended

that they would be attempted. His attention had now been withdrawn

from that side by Sir Rowland’s movements; the 4th division moved to

the right to support that larger part of the allied army which was now

assembled on the Gave d’Oleron; the 5th replaced it in the position

of Monguerre, and was itself replaced by Lord Aylmer’s brigade of the

first, and the Portugueze under Colonel Campbell: thus making room for

Freyre’s Spanish division, which had been cantoned within their own

frontier, and now, to the dismay of the inhabitants, re-entered France.

The people lamented the departure of the English, and dreaded the

arrival of the Spaniards; and knowing their vindictive spirit, and the

long provocation which it had received, they expressed their earnest

hopes that some English authorities might be left for their protection.

♦THE ADOUR.♦

Adour is like Gave, a name common to many rivers in the Pyrenees, both

simply meaning water in some of those primeval languages, the remains

of which are still widely preserved in the appellations of rivers and

mountains. The greater and noted streams, into which the others are

received, has its sources in the county of Bigorre, under the Pics

du Midi and d’Espade, two of the highest mountains in the chain; it

passes by Campan, Bagnères, Montgaillard, and Tarbes, and begins to be

navigable near Grenade, a small town in the little county of Marsan;

having been joined by the Douze on its right below Tartas, it inclines

to the southwest from its junction, passes Acqs, and then holds an

almost southerly course to meet the Gave de Pau, which brings with its

own waters those of the Gave d’Oleron, into which the Gave de Mauleon

has been received. The Adour is then joined by the Bidouze, and lastly

by the Nive. Formerly it made a turn to the northward, after that

junction, at Boucaut, below Bayonne, and held for about six leagues

a slow and winding way, parallel with the coast, before it entered

the sea at Cape Breton, its direct course having apparently been

obstructed by an accumulation of sand. But towards the latter part of

the sixteenth century, Louis de Foix, whose water-works at Toledo were

then among the wonders of machinery, and who built the lighthouse at

the mouth of the Garonne, (the Smeaton and the Telford of his age,)

opened the present channel, ... an arduous undertaking, in which he

was more than once foiled. His intent was, by erecting a dam across

the river at its curvature, to force it into a straighter line, and

make it clear a way for itself through the sands: the river again and

again swept away his embankments, but he, with a just confidence in

his own theory, persevered in the attempt; at length, on the day of St.

Simeon and St. Jude, in the year 1579, such torrents poured down from

the ♦PIERRE DE MARCA. HISTOIRE DE BEARN, P. 28.♦ Pyrenees, that Bayonne

was in danger of being destroyed by an inundation; the Adour took then,

with its increased weight of water, a straight course, and the engineer

was rewarded for all his anxieties by beholding the complete triumph of

his art. The Bayonnese, however, ascribed the whole ♦THUANUS, L. 80. T.

3. P. 619.♦ merit, not to him, but to the two joint Saints of the day,

and appointed a commemorative thanksgiving to be celebrated annually

from that time forth upon their festival. An excellent port would now

have been formed in the Adour, if the constant tendency of the sea to

throw up a bar at its entrance could have been overcome. With this view

the French government constructed massive stone embankments on both

sides, from Boucaut to the sea; it was hoped that by thus confining

the stream, its current, which at ebb tide runs about seven miles an

hour, would with its own force and weight of water keep always a clear

channel; but the effect was only to remove the bar somewhat farther,

without lessening the difficulty or the danger of the entrance. These

were so great, that the enemy at this time relied on them. They had the

Sappho corvette anchored so as to flank an inundation which protected

the right of their intrenched camp; they had many armed boats on the

Adour, above the town, to protect the convoys of provision which came

down the river, and sometimes succeeded in getting in; the mountain

guns of the allies, which were the only ones that could be removed,

now and then exchanged shots with these: below Bayonne they had some

gun-boats in the bend of the river, by the village of Boucaut,

stationed there, as it seemed, to strengthen their intrenched camp by

a flanking fire; but the only precaution that the enemy had taken to

impede the passage, was that of removing the signal-staff on the left

bank, which marked the line for vessels to steer by, in making for the

mouth of the river.

♦PASSAGE OF THE ADOUR.♦

A number of Spanish _chasse-marées_ had been collected at Socoa for

forming a bridge; materials also were ready for a boom to protect it.

The naval part of the operation was under Admiral Penrose’s direction,

and the 21st was the day appointed for the attempt; but the weather

proved unfavourable, and it was not possible for the vessels and

their convoy to get out of Socoa. Sir John Hope, however, would not

delay his movement, and resolved to attempt the passage without naval

co-operation; the troops, it was thought, might be towed over upon

rafts formed of pontoons, and carrying about 100 men each. On the

evening of the 22nd, the troops were ordered to be in readiness for

marching at midnight; they had with them a brigade of 18-pounders, and

a rocket detachment which had arrived at Passages a few days after

the passage of the Nive. There was a prejudice in the army against

this weapon, which had hitherto not been used in the field; the

opinion seems to have been, that if it had been an efficient means of

destruction, it would sooner have been borrowed from the East Indian

nations. Lord Wellington, however, was willing that they should be

tried; and some experiments which were made at Fontarabia gave reason

for supposing that they might be found useful on the Adour. The

direction of this new arm was assigned to Sir Augustus Fraser, but the

trial was to be made under all the disadvantages of inexperience; for

the corps was composed of men hastily brought together, and entirely

ignorant of the arm they were to use; and the rockets themselves were

equipped in five different ways, and consequently liable to as many

failures. Altogether the enterprise was one of no ordinary hazard;

the entrance of the river was frequently impracticable, and always

perilous; its width where it was to be bridged was 270 yards, and the

tide and the ripple were there so formidable as to preclude the use of

anything smaller than decked vessels of twenty or thirty tons burthen;

the navigation from Socoa was uncertain; and there were the corvette

and the flotilla of gun-boats to assist a garrison which consisted

of more than 10,000 men. Yet even those who fully understood the

difficulties of the operation had nevertheless full confidence that it

would succeed.

Soon after midnight the troops were in motion; when within a short

distance of Anglet, they turned by a crossroad toward the coast,

marching in strict silence along the skirts of the enemy’s outposts.

It was a dark night, the road narrow, deep in mud, and with ditches

on either side; one of the 18-pounders was drawn too near the edge

in the darkness, the side of the road gave way under its weight,

and it sunk into the ditch, dragging the near horses after it. This

delayed the march for some time, till, by the greatest exertions, the

gun was drawn up out of the deep mud; but no ill consequence arose

from this mischance; the enemy were not on the alert, and the troops

arrived before daylight on the sand-hills which border the coast from

the vicinity of Biaritz to the mouth of the Adour: the tract between

these hills and the intrenched camp is almost wholly covered by the

pine-wood called the Bois de Bayonne. At daybreak, two light battalions

of the German legion patroled through the wood, and dislodged the

enemy’s piquets, which retired from thence, and from the village of

Anglet, into the intrenched camp. The first brigade of guards, under

Colonel Maitland, debouched from the wood near the place where the

signal-staff, known by the name of the _Balise Orientale_, had stood,

which was on a high sand-hill nearly opposite Boucaut. The ground here

could not be reconnoitred till the enemy’s piquets were driven in; and

this of course was avoided till the last moment, that no alarm might

be given. It had been supposed that the guns might be brought within

700 or 800 yards of the Sappho, and that they might sink her, lest she

should be employed against the bridge; but, when they had been brought

with great labour through the deep sandy ground, it was necessary to

place them where they were sheltered from the guns of the intrenched

camp, and this was in a situation 1500 yards from the corvette. There

they were placed in battery, and the brigade was posted behind some

sand-hills, close to the marsh which protected the front of the camp.

Don Carlos d’España meantime made a demonstration on the heights above

Anglet, to prevent the enemy from detaching any troops.

As soon as the French saw the brigade debouching from the pine-wood

they commenced a cannonade against it from their gun-boats. This had

been foreseen; the rocket-corps had, therefore, been divided into

three parties, one of which went, with the first division, towards

the mouth of the Adour, and the other two accompanied the 18-pounders

to be employed against the flotilla. There were twelve boats to

assist the Sappho; but when a few rockets had been discharged, the

terrified sailors took to their oars, and made all speed up the river;

the effect, indeed, of these weapons was most terrific; they dashed

through the water like fiery serpents, and pierced ♦BATTY’S CAMPAIGN,

P. 119.♦ the sides of the boat, burning apparently even under water

with undiminished force. The guns meantime opened upon the corvette,

and fired about 400 rounds at her, some toward the conclusion with hot

shot. This failed to set her on fire; and when the three-coloured flag

was shot from the flag-staff, the enemy presently nailed it to the

mast-head; but after some hours the French retired from the contest,

under the protection of the citadel, their captain having been killed,

and 34, out of a crew of 40 men, killed or wounded, ... sacrificed, as

it should seem, in a display of courage which could be of no avail.

The action had served as a spectacle for the inhabitants of Bayonne,

who came out from the promenade which skirts the river, to witness,

and apparently to enjoy it, ... the day being remarkably fine, and

the action itself, with all its circumstances, as described by an

eye-witness, more resembling some festival display than the dreadful

reality of war; the spectators, too, thought themselves at safe

distance, till one poor fellow came rashly within range of the guns,

and had his head carried off by a shot which passed completely through

the corvette.

That vessel had not been destroyed, but the attack on it, and the other

demonstrations in front of the intrenched camp, had the desired effect

of occupying the enemy’s whole attention; a bend which the Adour makes

on the seaward side of the town, and the pine-wood, which extended

almost close to its banks, prevented them from seeing the movements of

the allies on that side, and they kept little watch there, because they

apprehended no danger. But meantime the whole of the first division,

except the brigade of guards which accompanied the artillery that

attacked the Sappho, had marched to attempt a passage near the mouth

of the river. With this force there were eighteen pontoons and six

small boats, forty rocketeers, and an officer with a few artillerymen,

destined to spike the guns of a battery on the enemy’s side of the

water. The intention was, to construct six rafts, each upon three

pontoons, by which, in two passages, 1200 men might be passed across

before the day should dawn; 1200 more being ready to follow, while

these held their ground, supported by twelve field-pieces from the

left bank. But, owing to the difficulty of getting the pontoons on,

it was found that only three of them could be brought to the water’s

edge before daylight; and therefore it was deemed advisable by the

officers in command to withdraw the troops behind some sand-hills,

where they were quite concealed, and collect the pontoons. Some of

the officers, meantime, before day broke, examined the shore, to see

where would be the most favourable points for putting the rafts into

the water; the sentry on the opposite bank challenged them, but no

answer was returned, and no alarm taken. Sir John Hope came to the

spot at daylight, but afterwards sent orders to attempt the passage,

at all hazards, when the tide would permit. A little before noon the

river became passable, the tide, still running out, being nearly slack.

At this time the fleet from Socoa was in sight, but at considerable

distance, and with an unfavourable though not a strong wind, rather

losing than gaining ground. The river at the point where the passage

was to be attempted appeared to be about 200 yards wide at low water.

The British made no show of men, and could only see a small piquet of

the enemy’s on the other side; this piquet appeared at a loss what to

do, and as soon as the first boats were carried to the water’s edge

on men’s shoulders, they fairly ran off, without discharging a single

shot, the piece of their advanced sentry having missed fire. The six

boats were soon on the water, each carrying only six soldiers; and the

tide coming in soon increased the labour of the passage. A rope was

passed from one side to the other, and three rafts were put together

with all speed, each carrying from 50 to 60 men; but, after two or

three passages had been effected, the tide came in with such force

that it was found impracticable to get the raft either backward or

forward from the middle of the current, where it remained tide-bound,

the united strength of all who were on board not being sufficient to

haul with any effect upon the hawser. About five o’clock they ceased

working, the few seamen whom they had, and who were all Portugueze,

being exhausted with fatigue. By that time 500 of the guards had been

ferried across, the rocketeers having been the last, with Captain Lane

of the artillery, who came out with them from England. All was at this

time quiet, and apparently the day’s work was done. But a little before

dusk the enemy pushed down two regiments from the citadel; they came

on with apparent spirit, beating the charge. Colonel Stopford posted

the guards behind some low sand-hills, with their right on the river,

and their left on a morass, the ground in their front being flanked

by the artillery on the opposite bank; but a well-directed discharge

of rockets made the French hastily retreat: the effect of this weapon

was more terrible because they had never before witnessed it, and they

retired with all speed into the citadel.

♦ENTRANCE OF THE FLOTILLA.♦

The troops bivouacked that night on the ground which they occupied;

those who were in the wood felled trees and kindled fires. As soon

as the tide served more men were passed across, the pontoons being

used as row-boats, carrying fifteen men at each turn: it was bright

moonlight, the weather perfectly still, and there was no enemy to offer

any opposition. ♦FEB. 24.♦ The wind sprung up for the flotilla during

the night, and at morning it was seen, ... about threescore vessels,

including boats of all kinds, some of them near the mouth of the

river, standing off and on. The Admiral was in the Porcupine frigate:

he had been apprized, through the naval agent at Socoa, how anxiously

the entrance of the vessels for the bridge was desired. The surf had

increased in proportion as the wind became favourable; and the bar,

which extends from the right bank, nearly across the river, shifting

with the change of wind and tide, and at all times dangerous, was at

this time more than usually formidable. The agent, who set off in his

boat from Socoa as soon as he received the last night’s advices, had no

pilot on board, and mistaking the channel where he should have entered

the river, beached himself on a spit of sand; fortunate, however,

in his mishap, for the boat cleared the sand by great exertion, and

having been pulled, sails standing, over the spit, got into deep water.

One boat, which had the principal pilot on board, and therefore was

selected as the safest, led the way, and was overset, several of the

crew perished, and most of those who saved themselves were dreadfully

bruised. Captain O’Reilly, who had command of the flotilla, was on

board, and Captain Faddy (who had charge of 50 artillerymen sent in

five gun-boats), both with great difficulty escaped: a second succeeded

in reaching the beach; the larger vessels then put off, to wait the

chance of the next tide, it being, as the Admiral declared, scarcely

possible that one in fifty could then have effected the passage. Some

small boats, however, attempted it, and were swamped; what boats were

on the river were sent to pick up those who were struggling for life,

but without success; some who regained their own boats, and clung to

them, were swept off into the sea, and only one man was saved.

Had the bar been smoother, the tide was now too low for vessels to

attempt the entrance; but a pilot was landed to the south-west of it,

that he might walk to the Adour, and make signals from within the

bar, to guide the vessels into the safer parts, supplying thus the

signal-staff which on that side had been removed, for from the sea

there appeared only one long and heavy line of surf. Meantime the

troops continued to cross as they could, about 100 yards above the

mouth of the river, some on rafts, some in a pontoon-boat which carried

only twelve at a time; and when the tide presented least difficulty,

a few cavalry by swimming. When the tide had risen sufficiently, the

vessels boldly stood in, the pilot who had been landed having set up

a halberd, with a handkerchief fixed to it, as a signal for directing

them. The master’s mate of the Lyra led the way; his boat was lost,

and himself and the whole of the crew. Several vessels shared the

same fate. One who was on the shore, close at hand, and who had been

accustomed to fields of battle, declared that he had never beheld

a scene so awful. The boats were so agitated as they attempted the

passage, sails flapping, oars apparently useless, and all steerage

lost, that it seemed as if each must inevitably be wrecked. Two vessels

were stranded, but almost all their crews were by great exertion saved.

A gun-brig also was driven ashore; Captain Elliot, of the Martial

gun-brig, was swamped in his boat; his surgeon was picked up by this

gun-boat, but upon her striking the ground the shock threw down a

24-pounder, which fell upon him and killed him. Three transport boats

with their crews were lost; every exertion was made to save those who

were struggling for life in the surf, literally within ten yards of

their countrymen on shore; but though there were men with ropes tied to

them on the beach, who spared no endeavour for assisting them, and who

when the waves retired appeared as if they were close to them, not a

soul could be saved: some who actually obtained footing on the ground

were carried back by the receding surf, and swept away for ever. But

the zeal and intrepidity of British seamen will overcome all obstacles

that are not absolutely insuperable: officers and men on this occasion

displayed gallantry which could not be surpassed, and skill which has

seldom been equalled; vying with each other they essayed the passage;

and happily the wind towards evening gradually died away, and about

thirty vessels got in.

♦A BRIDGE CARRIED OVER THE ARDOUR.♦

The passage of the troops, meantime, had been continued; it was quite

dark before the last party were ferried over, and the tide was then

running out so rapidly, that the most strenuous rowing hardly prevented

the boat from being drifted out to sea. The whole of General Howard’s

division, about 6000 in number, were then on the right bank. They

bivouacked on the sand-hills where the enemy on the yester-evening

♦FEB. 25.♦ had been discomfited by the rockets. On the morrow they

advanced towards the citadel, their right flank resting on the Adour,

the left extending to the great road leading from Bayonne to Bourdeaux.

Closing in to the verge of a deep and marshy ravine, which separates

the high ground about the citadel from the surrounding country, they

cut off the enemy’s communication with the open tract to the north

of the river, and completed the investment of the fortress and its

camp; a feint attack being kept up the while on the opposite side by

Lord Aylmer’s brigade, the 5th division, and the Spaniards. By great

exertions the bridge was finished on the following day. The point fixed

upon for it was near the village of Boucaut, where the river is 270

yards wide. It consisted of six-and-twenty _chasse-marées_, anchored

each at the bow and stern so as to resist both the ebbing and the

flowing tide; to many of these, as a substitute for anchors, the heavy

iron guns were used which had been taken in the redoubts on the Nive.

The vessels were lashed together both at bow and stern. Five cables

were stretched by capstans across these vessels from shore to shore,

and oaken planks were laid athwart upon these, and secured to the

two outer cables, so as to form a platform strong enough to bear the

passage of artillery, yet pliant enough to adapt itself to the motion

of the vessels with the tide. On the right bank the cable ends were

fastened to some of the heaviest iron guns which had been taken in

the camp of the Nivelle; on the left they were wound round capstans,

which were firmly fixed by large stakes driven into the ground; and by

these the tension of the platform could be increased or lessened as

the rise or fall of the river might require. A little way above the

bridge a boom-chain was laid down for its protection; and above this

the gun-boats were anchored, in readiness to engage those of the enemy,

should any attempt be made upon the bridge by sending them down the

river. The piers on both sides were wide enough for carriages of all

descriptions; and that on the right bank was used for the artillery,

in a part where the ♦BATTY’S CAMPAIGN, 126, 127.♦ water is admitted at

flood through apertures, and where a road could not have been formed

without great expense of labour and of time.

This bridge was of the greatest importance, not only as affording a

communication between the troops upon both banks during the blockade

and intended siege of Bayonne, but also because it opened a way to the

_chaussées_ on the right of the river, whereby the army in its advance

towards the interior could be much more easily supplied than by the

bad roads in the exhausted country along the skirts of the Pyrenees,

and where the Gaves and other tributary streams of the Adour were to

be crossed. The inhabitants of Boucaut and of the adjacent villages

had been ordered to take up arms against the allies; they had refused;

and in consequence, the French troops upon leaving them committed some

excesses. The contrast indeed was so great between the treatment which

they experienced from their own soldiers and from the allies, that the

peasantry volunteered to repair the roads for their uninvited, but now

not unwelcome visitors.

♦PASSAGE OF THE GAVES.♦

While Bayonne was thus being invested by the left wing of the army,

the two divisions which had hitherto observed that place between the

Adour and the Nive joined the main body; and Lord Wellington, as soon

as the troops were closed up, continuing his operations to the right,

made a general advance. Marshal Beresford, who had remained since Sir

Rowland’s movement with the 4th and 7th divisions and with Colonel

Vivian’s brigade on the lower Bidouze, attacked the enemy on the 23rd

in their fortified posts at Hastingues and Oyergave, on the left of

the Gave de Pau, and made them retire within their _tête-de-pont_ at

Peyrehorade. On the 24th, Sir Rowland, with the light, the 2nd, and

the Portugueze divisions, under Baron Alten, Sir William Stewart,

and Camp-Marshal Lecor, passed the Gave d’Oleron, by a ford near

Ville-nave, without opposition. Sir Henry Clinton passed in like manner

with the 6th, between Monfort and Laas; and Sir Thomas Picton with

the 3rd made demonstrations as if he would have attacked the enemy’s

position at the bridge of Sauveterre, upon which they blew up the

bridge. Morillo at the same time drove in their posts near Navarreins,

and blockaded that place, which was fortified strongly enough to

require battering-artillery for its reduction. Immediately after the

passage of the Oleron Gave, Sir Rowland and Sir Henry Clinton moved

towards Orthes, and the great road leading from Sauveterre to that

town; and the enemy retiring from Sauveterre across the Gave de Pau in

the night, destroyed the bridges upon that river, and assembled their

army near Orthes on the 25th. The allies continued to advance that

day, and on the following Beresford crossed the Gave de Pau below its

junction with that of Oleron, at some fords about four miles above

Peyrehorade; these were not discovered till after some unsuccessful

attempts, and the current there was so rapid, that the infantry of

General Walker’s division could hardly support each other against it,

and for some minutes there was reason to fear that the column would

be carried down the stream. The Marshal then moved along the high

road from Peyrehorade toward Orthes, on the enemy’s right. Sir Thomas

Picton had found a ford below the bridge of Berenx, where he crossed

with the 3rd division, and Sir Stapleton with the cavalry as Beresford

approached; the 6th and light divisions made a flank movement to

support them, and Sir Rowland occupied the heights opposite Orthes,

and the high road leading to Sauveterre, on the left bank of the Gave.

His corps advanced directly upon the bridge of Orthes, with the hope

of forcing it; but, being without artillery, and finding the approach

defended by loop-holed houses, and by a tower strongly manned against

them, they desisted from their intent.

♦ORTHES.♦

Orthes, which before the territorial arrangement of France was

revolutionized, was the capital of the Senechalry of the same name,

is supposed by Scaliger to have been the ancient city of Bearum, the

Beneharnus of Antoninus, and the Benarnus of writers in a later age;

but this opinion seems to have been satisfactorily ♦RAMOND’S TR. IN

THE PYRENEES, P. 92.♦ disproved. It stands upon the Gave de Pau, there

a considerable river, and remarkable, because its accessible source

is a waterfall, higher, except one in America, than any that has ever

yet been measured; it springs from a height of 1266 feet, and being

twice broken on the way by projections of the precipice, falls upon a

bed of perpetual snow, under ♦P. DE MARCA. HIST. DE BEARN, L. 1. C.

6. § 4. 14.♦ which it works its passage. Orthes was the residence of

the Princes of Bearn during some 200 years from the middle of the 13th

century, when Gaston de Moncada built the _Chasteau Noble_ there, upon

the plan of his hereditary castle in Aragon, and in a like situation,

on an eminence commanding the town, and overlooking a wide circuit of

country. In that castle Froissart was entertained by Gaston Phebus, the

twelfth Count of Foix, and Lord of Bearn, and there he was informed

concerning the affairs of Castille, Portugal, Navarre, Aragon, Gascony,

and England, Gaston himself communicating to him what he knew, and

telling him that the history which he had undertaken to write would

be esteemed above all others, because more marvellous deeds of arms

had been done in the world within the last fifty years than in three

centuries preceding. There the good old chronicler was as happy as

splendid hospitality, and the diligent use of favourable opportunities,

could make him; the thing which he most desired being to collect

information for his great work, and having at his wish there, lords,

knights, and squires, ready and willing to inform him. In this castle

Gaston Phebus kept his treasure, and it is said to have amounted at one

time to no less a sum than three million florins, raised by taxation,

which was borne cheerfully, because he maintained order in his

dominions; neither English nor French, nor robber nor rover, harassed

his people; and he had the reputation of being as liberal as he was

just, not heralds and minstrels only, but strangers who came there

having cause to praise him for his bounty. Froissart had been in many

courts of kings, dukes, princes, earls, and great ladies, but never in

any, he says, that so well liked him as the Castle Noble of Orthes;

and he had seen many knights, kings, and princes, but none like this

Count of Foix for personage, nor of so fair form, nor so well made;

for in every thing he was so perfect, that he could not be praised too

much, loving what ought to be beloved, and hating that which ought to

be hated. Yet so accustomed were men to the most atrocious actions,

in that which was the brightest age of chivalry, that this very Gaston

committed a murder in this castle as much in violation of honour and

of hospitality, as of laws both human and divine; tortured innocent

persons to death upon mere suspicion, and with his own hands killed his

own son at the close of a frightful tragedy, of which this castle was

the scene; and the faithful historian who thus extols him has related

all these things! The ruins of the _Chasteau Noble_ are yet to be

seen, and the tower in which Gaston kept his treasure was standing in

the last century. Orthes ceased to be the residence of the Counts in

1460, when they removed their court to Pau; and their removal was not

compensated by the short-lived university which about a century after

Queen Jeanne of Navarre founded there for the Huguenots, and endowed

from the church property in her dominions.

♦BATTLE OF ORTHES.♦

Here Marshal Soult had taken a strong position, extending about a mile

in length along a range of tabular heights; his right, under Reillé,

resting on them upon the high road to Dax, and occupying the village

of St. Boes; the centre, under Drouet, taking the bend of a sickle, as

the hill formed a cove, and being thus protected by the flanks; the

left, under Clausel, resting upon the town and the heights above it,

and defending the passage of the river from Sir Rowland. Villatte’s and

Harispe’s divisions, and Paris’s brigade, were formed in reserve on

high ground upon the road ♦FEB. 27.♦ to Sault de Navailles. “Thus,” in

the words of a French historian, “from 35,000 to 40,000 French troops

were collected at a point as favourable as the most skilful commander

could have chosen for ♦BEAUCHAMP’S NARRATIVE OF THE INVASION, 2. P.

52.♦ resisting the advance of an invading army.” Lord Wellington’s

arrangements were, that Beresford, with the 4th and 7th divisions,

and Colonel Vivian’s brigade of cavalry, should turn and attack the

enemy’s right; while Picton, with the 3rd and 6th, supported by Sir

Stapleton with Lord Edward Somerset’s brigade of horse, should move

along the Peyrehorade road, and attack their centre and left. Baron

Alten, with the light division, kept up the communication, and was in

reserve between these; and Sir Rowland was to force the passage of the

Gave, and turn and attack their left.

The action commenced about nine in the morning. The 4th division, under

Sir Lowry Cole, carried the village of St. Boes, after an obstinate

resistance. Beresford then directed his efforts against two lines

of the enemy formed on the heights above it; but the troops had not

room here to deploy for the attack, the only approach being along a

narrow tongue of land, which had on either side a deep ravine, and was

completely commanded by the enemy’s guns. Sir Lowry’s division led the

way; 15 pieces of artillery played on them diagonally with full effect;

in front they were opposed by the main line of the French infantry,

and strong bodies were formed in the ravines on their flanks. Repeated

attempts were made by Major-General Ross, and by Vasconcellos’s

Portugueze brigade, till at length that brigade was completely broken,

and the remainder of the division, with a brigade of Baron Alten’s that

hastened to their assistance, with difficulty covered their retreat:

thus, on this point, the attack totally failed.