My dear M——.
The very small number of sights which this town affords being exhausted, and Lord Wellington being still absent, we are in truth more dull than we should be in a country town in England. The only interesting subject of conversation now is, who goes to America, and who does not? Some of the regiments move to-day towards Bordeaux from hence for the purpose of embarking upon this new expedition, which I should think would all end in a mere demonstration. Lord Wellington is expected here to-morrow, and we shall then know what is to happen; and head-quarters will, I conclude, move immediately.
I have heard nothing since my last, and seen but one thing worth mentioning, and that is, Mr. Macarthy’s library, which the old father and grandfather have been sixty years collecting, and which is now to be sold on the father’s death for the benefit of the widow and nine children. This is the library for which the Duke of Devonshire offered 25,000l. sterling as it stands; but the bargain was never closed, as he wished the whole to be embarked at the risk of the owner, and they wanted to have the money for it as it stands here, to be moved by the purchaser. The owner now talks of sending it to Paris, and having a public sale there by auction, thinking that emperors and kings will then bid against the Duke of Devonshire, Earl Spencer, and others of our book-loving nobles.
It contains a considerable number of fine copies of “Principes editiones,” filling one side of a large room all upon vellum. There is also Cardinal Ximenes’ polyglot edition of the Bible; his own copy—the only one on vellum; and a number of valuable books and some fine MSS. Amongst the rest is the first printed edition of the Psalms in 1457, of which we are told the only other perfect copy is in our king’s (George the Third’s) library; that Lord Spencer had only an imperfect copy, and that twelve thousand francs had been already offered for this one volume! So the world goes! This sum would furnish a handsome set of all the best French authors, and amusement for life; but many, you find, prefer a single black-letter volume, which one must go to school again to learn to read, and which, indeed, looks like a child’s great black-letter spelling book, or the books among the giant friends of Gulliver. A single page as a specimen would be as good to me as the whole, and thus five hundred curiosos would be gratified for a few guineas a-head; or a lottery would be still better—fifty pages for the highest prize, and a few lines for every one; no blanks! There would be another advantage in this, that it would be employment for some worthy collector for half his life to reassemble all the parts and put the book together again.
The Marquess of Buckingham has been here, and is now going to Tarbes and Barege, and then returns to see our great man. We hear the latter was at the review at Paris in his blue coat and round hat. This is quite like him, and upon a good principle; the marshals, the public functionaries, the kings and the emperors, would have outdone anything he could have put on except this.
I am sorry not to have returned from Revel through Castelnaudary. Some of the officers did so, and by that means fell in with a division of the French army. The French officers were very civil, but told the same story—“If the Emperor had not deserted us, we never would have deserted him; and the men are of the same opinion; but as it was, there was nothing else to be done.” Colonels B—— and C—— went over to the second review at Montauban, where the Duke d’Angoulême reviewed Count Reille’s corps—two divisions. If I had known this had been permitted, I should have been very curious to be of the party. The men, it is said, were well equipped and in high order. The officers in general looked very shabby and unlike gentlemen.
Suchet was smiling and in high good humour, and very fine as he was here. Soult was only to be distinguished by a most enormous hat, and by a surly look, which is described as unpleasantly penetrating, and more bespeaking talent than amiability. He took little notice of the English officers, but the aides-de-camp and staff officers, both belonging to Soult and to the other Generals, did so when they learnt who they were, and appeared very earnest in their attentions and civilities. They went there in a carriage, but were splendidly mounted immediately; Colonel —— on Count Erlar’s led and caparisoned charger.
Thursday, 12th.—Lord Wellington not having yet returned, and of course nothing positive being known as to our destination, we have only those passing reports which the military men call “shaves.”
General Hope is, I fear, likely to suffer long from his wounds. He has astonished the Generals at Bayonne by making three of them presents each of an English horse out of his stud. It is an odd circumstance, but I believe true, that the sort of notice we had of an intended sortie by the enemy at Bayonne, which was given by a deserter just before it took place, only did us mischief. The out-picquets were doubled, and as no picquets could stand the rush of four or five thousand men, we only lost so many more prisoners by this. The men were alarmed with the expectation of such an attack. The only fault spoken of in this business was the abandonment of the church of St. Etienne, which might and ought to have been maintained. The fifth division were but just on duty there, and scarcely knew their posts. General Hay met the men running back from it, and was stopping and leading them on again, telling them he would show them how to defend the church, when he was killed. Some of the muskets of our men were found there, broken by the French, and thrown away unfired. An English officer, with about twenty men, maintained himself in a house near the church the whole time, though it was much less defensible than the church.
Our position there, close under the works, it is said, was liable to such a sortie every night, and some well-informed persons wonder it did not take place sooner. General Hope’s eager courage led him into a situation where, I am told, no one could under ordinary circumstances remain the shortest time without almost a certainty of destruction. Even as it was, it is said that a party of Guards ought to have carried him off, as at first only four Frenchmen were near him when his horse fell, and the Guards then were close by. The French had made the outworks of the citadel very strong; they must have been stormed first, which would have cost us about twelve or fifteen thousand men. It would then have taken sixteen days to establish batteries on the crest of the glacis, the only possible way of breaching the citadel. The garrison, who are now excessively bold, and who have demanded rations for nineteen thousand two hundred men, say they should have even then stood a storming twice—in the citadel, and again in the town at last.