The owner of my house is a well-bred woman, who lives in a great house opposite. She lives in one corner of it, whilst General Wimpfen and his staff, and Colonel M——, his wife, and three children, occupy all the best part. She has, she told me, thirteen houses round here, five are burnt, and two coming down, and yet she seems resigned and satisfied that we have really behaved very well; that it is the fate of war, and owing to the ill fortune of having property in a frontier country near armies, and is quite inevitable. She only exclaims, “Oh la pauvre France!” This is a novel language to the French of late.
4th, Friday.—Still rain, rain, rain, all night. All yesterday, all the night before, and still continuing. Oh! that we had your frost instead; all things would have been very different.
The great man just arrived, and now here, turns out to be the Duke d’Angoulême, and Count Damas is come out with him, but till the plot thickens the Duke is incog.
Our pontoons from the Bidassoa are now passing over the St. Jean de Luz bridge. This looks like something, and we have to-day at last a dry day, or at least a half day, for I must not be too sure yet. The wind is getting round to the north a little, or north-east, and if that remains it will do, especially as it is full moon; though I have not much more faith in the moon, in respect of weather than Lord Wellington has, who says it is nonsense. In addition to all your news, we have French news of a battle at St. Dizier, near Chalons, and that the Allies have been beaten. It is to be feared that it is not all to go so smoothly as hitherto, unless a rising takes place.
All odd strangers who come to head-quarters here have been long called tigers. Of course we now have “The Royal Tiger.” This is a head-quarters’ joke for you. We have had for some time here a Madame de ——, the wife of the Commandant of ——, come to make arrangements beforehand, and here she certainly has been making many little arrangements not much to the advantage of her husband, and not quite consistent with conjugal fidelity. When the Commandant arrived yesterday at last, she immediately began to blame him for his unnecessary delay, and insinuated that another lady was the cause. This is very hard upon a poor old man, but I suppose the lady thought it right to take the initiative.
The publication of the Leipsig letters, which George mentions, of Murray’s, will be very curious, but I think it is not right to let these be published. Similar letters were taken in Spain more than once, and police reports. The old letters which were too late (those I mean from you) were from the Secretary of State’s office, not from the Judge-Advocate’s office. They were probably mislaid at the former.
Sunday, Post-day.—A bright sun and a smiling sky, with a smooth bay covered with ships, quite a Vernet. I have just returned from the church service on the beach, in a square of about two thousand five hundred guards, and all the staff here present. As I returned I picked up your letter of the 26th, and papers at the post-office. I have just got some business come in, for desertion has commenced again now that we are quiet and idle. A corporal and twelve men all went off together a few nights since, all foreigners, and I believe French. Our people at home are very careless in selecting soldiers to enlist into our corps from the prisons. What can be better for a Frenchman in a prison-ship than to receive 4l., new clothes, arms, &c., and then to be sent into his own country, and put in a situation to join his comrades, with only the difficulty of watching a good occasion. In yesterday’s return, however, nine men have deserted, mostly English. Your English news is all good as far as it goes, and if this weather will but hold a little, you will hear of more glory and more broken heads here. In addition to the pontoons which have passed up, scaling-ladders have gone through here. If we could but cross the mouth of the Adour below Bayonne, and get at the citadel at once by scaling and storm, there would be something like a blow, and the town would be at our mercy immediately.
We have some gentlemen here, but very few, who begin to find the work too warm for them. I have been saved two cases of this sort, very awkward ones, by resignations, and have been consulted on two others by General Cole, very suspicious ones, but not so clear as the other two who are let off thus, to save the reputation of the regiments. An officer should think a little before he engages in service, such as we have had here the last few years.
More business, so I must put an end to this quickly. I have not seen the Royal Tiger, but am to dine at head-quarters to-day, and hope he may be there. The French ladies are staunch Bonapartists. They say we shall have another Quiberon business, and that the Allies are coming into France the same old road as twenty years since, and will return by it.
I have been so pressed to change my old mare, which was in high condition, that, to oblige Major D—— of the Guards, I have done so, and taken “Mother Goose” (a pet name of General Hulse’s formerly) in exchange, and fifteen guineas to boot. Mother Goose is a very good mare, but never would stand fire. She is not so large or showy as my old lady, but I like her much. She was valued at eighty-five guineas, and has always sold for that. I put mine at a hundred guineas. I gave more—four hundred dollars; as dollars cannot be had under 7s., and the exchange is still higher on the muleteer Treasury bills. These, however, I should not think it right to deal in.