The people in this part of the country are as bad, if not worse than in Portugal. There is nothing but filth and laziness. They are not good-looking either. They live in dirty mud houses, and fleas are so abundant that I cannot sleep from their annoyance. I suppose we shall cross near Puente Arences, or Rampalaise, to-morrow, or next day at the latest. The French have left about ninety sick or wounded at Burgos, and the bedding of the hospitals, about eight hundred beds. No cannon, &c. We are already short of forage or corn for the horses; bread scarce, as well as spirits, and the country we enter produces little or nothing.
CHAPTER VIII.
March continued—Quintana—Anecdote of Wellington—Morillas—Vittoria—The Battle—Its Results—Plunder—Kindness to the Enemy—Madame de Gazan—The Hospital—Sufferings of the Wounded—Estimated Loss.
Head-quarters, Berberena,
June 18, 1813.
My dear M——,
My last left me at Massa, on the other side of the Douro, in a miserable quarter. On the following morning (the 15th) we marched for Quintana, on the same side. For about four leagues we proceeded through a rough hilly country, barren, but at times picturesque. We passed troops all the way, and at last came to a tremendous long hill which led us down to Quintana, near the banks of the Ebro. Troops were descending the hill, infantry, cavalry, and artillery, from eight or nine o’clock until past four; and at last the baggage, which was kept waiting on the banks around the road-side, moved on; the scene was very striking. The artillery was much shaken; some guns were lowered by hand, with the wheels locked, without horses, and all very gently; four wheels gave way, and the 18-pounders had to go round by St. Martine.
The valley in which Quintana and six or seven other small villages were placed, and through which the Ebro passed, was very rich and beautiful, surrounded with rocky heights and covered with corn, beans, fruit, vines, trees, &c., and the villages externally very picturesque. Internally, however, they were most wretched, and my quarter was misery itself. The people had not seen the French in the valley for two years, until about ten days before we were there, when they had been through to collect contributions, and to seize part of a magazine formed there by Longa. The head-quarters’ house was, however, good, and near it was a large but unfinished and unoccupied college, for young persons of both sexes, founded about twenty years ago by the owner of the head-quarters’ house, by the desire of his deceased wife, for the education of children of the valley. The great man of the valley, however, was the owner of the Adjutant-general’s quarter, and only a Procureur there—a poor abode. I think he was called the Marquis de Villa Alta. There was a small castle, and the whole scenery, particularly along the banks of the river, was very delightful. I longed for a tent, for I could not live in my house in the daytime from the smoke, and could not sleep in the night from the fleas. The light division and the fourth were encamped in the meadows across the river, and added, by their fires and tents, much to the interest of the scene; the cavalry and artillery passed through the valley. The river runs in this part about as wide as the Severn above Shrewsbury—less than the Thames at Maidenhead.
The next day (the 16th) we crossed the river, and proceeded with the troops between the lofty rocky banks of the river, above the valley, on a road cut close to the water, and winding alongside the river for about a league and more, most beautifully! in some respects like the Wye, the cliffs almost like Cheddar, and wooded to the water’s edge. The constant line of cavalry and infantry, whenever the eye caught the winding road, was very picturesque. In two places were the remains of walls across the road made by Longa or the French—I do not know which.
The road afterwards turned from the river, and through a fine country brought us to Medina de Pomar, leaving Villa Cayo on our left. Medina de Pomar, our next head-quarters, was a straggling dirty town, and the accommodation very moderate indeed. I got a tolerable clean room for myself at the apothecary’s, but my stable was down a cellar with dark stairs, and I could scarcely get my animals in or out. The alcalde was not civil, nor did the people appear glad to see us. The town was very full, for the Spanish Generals Mendizabel and Longa (the ci-devant Guerilla chief) were quartered there on our arrival, and did not seem disposed to move for us.
I saw Longa in the street; rather a stout man, well dressed in a sort of hussar uniform, and looking civilized enough. I was in hopes of meeting him at Lord Wellington’s, where I dined that day, but he did not stay. The party of cavalry attending him were all uniformly dressed, and seemed to me to be more regular than most of the Spanish regulars. They wore scarlet jackets, and appeared not unlike some of our volunteer yeomanry cavalry, but they had quite an air of consequence which was amazing. Longa has left thirty of them and two officers at head-quarters, as part of the corps of guides, to assist in keeping up the communications of the army, in which way I have no doubt they will be very useful.