We were yet a half musket-shot from the hill which the cavalry were desired to occupy when we observed a superior force of French dragoons advancing from the lines towards the same point. The push now was for the high ground. We foot-soldiers could not of course keep pace with our mounted comrades, but we followed them at the double, and arrived at the base just as they had crowned the height. They were hardly there, however, when a discordant shout, or rather yell, told us that the French were ascending by the opposite side. Our dragoons, I observed, instantly formed line; they discharged their pistols, and made a show of charging: but whether it was that the enemy's numbers overawed them, or that their horses took fright at the report, I cannot tell, but before the caps of their opponents were visible to our eyes their order was lost, and themselves in full retreat. Down they came, both parties at full speed; and now it was our turn to act. I had already placed my men behind a turf fence, with strict orders not to fire till I should command them. It was in vain that I stood upon the top of the wall and shouted and waved to the fugitives to take a direction to the right or left. They rode directly towards the ditch, as if their object had been to trample us under foot; and, what was still more alarming, the enemy were close behind them. In self-defence, I was therefore obliged to give the preconcerted signal. My people fired. One of our own, and three of the French dragoons dropped. The latter, apparently astonished at the unlooked-for discharge, pulled up. "Now, now," cried we, "charge, charge, and redeem your honour!" The dragoons did so; and we, rising at the same instant with loud shouts, the enemy were completely routed. Two of their troopers were taken; and of all who escaped, hardly one escaped without a wound.
After this trifling skirmish, the French no longer disputed with us the possession of the hill. Leaving the cavalry, therefore, to maintain it, I fell back with my men to the picket-house; and, about an hour after my return, was by no means displeased to find another party arrive to relieve us. Having given to the officer in charge as much information as I myself possessed, I called in my sentries and marched to the rear.
CHAPTER XIX.
From the 26th of January up to the 20th of the following month nothing occurred, either to myself individually or to the portion of the army of which I was a member, particularly deserving of notice. During that interval, indeed, a fresh supply of wearing apparel, of flannels, stockings, and shoes, reached me, being a present from kind friends at home; and seldom has any gift proved more acceptable, or arrived more opportunely: but the reader is not, I daresay, over-anxious to know whether the articles in question were too large or too small, or whether they fitted to a hair's-breadth. Neither would it greatly amuse him were I to detail at length how ships freighted with corn reached Secoa; how fatigue parties were ordered out to unload them; and how the loads, being justly divided, were issued as forage for the horses, which stood much in need of it. It may, however, be worth while to state that, previous to the arrival of these corn-ships, even the cavalry and artillery were under the necessity of feeding their horses chiefly upon chopped furze; and hence that disease had begun to make rapid progress among them, many dying almost every day; and all, even the most healthy, falling fast out of condition. But for this providential supply of wholesome oats and barley, I question whether we should have been able to take the field, at least effectively, till later in the season.
On the 16th of February 1814, the Allied troops may be said to have fairly broken up from their winter quarters. The corps to which I belonged continued, indeed, under cover till the morning of the 21st; but we were already in a great measure at our posts, seeing that our cantonments lay immediately in rear of the pickets. Such divisions as had been quartered in and about St Jean de Luz began to move to the front on the 16th; and pitching their tents on the crest of the position, they waited quietly till their leader should see fit to command a farther advance. On these occasions, no part of the spectacle is more imposing than the march of the artillery. Of this species of force, six pieces form a battery, then called a brigade: each gun is dragged by four or six horses; by four, if the brigade be intended to act with infantry—by six, if it belong to what is called the horse-artillery. In the former case, eight gunners march on foot beside each field-piece, two riding à la postilion; in the latter, the gunners are all mounted and accoutred like yeomanry cavalry. Then the tumbrils and ammunition-waggons, with their train of horses and attendants, follow in rear of the guns; and the whole procession covers, perhaps, as much ground as is covered by two moderately strong battalions in marching order.
The greater part of the infantry attached to the left column had passed when brigade after brigade of guns wound through our village. These, halting just after they had cleared the street, diverged into some open fields on the right and left of the road, where the whole park, amounting to perhaps thirty pieces, was established. In another green field at the opposite side of Bidart four heavy eighteen-pounders took their station, to be in readiness, in case of need, to be transported to Fort Charlotte. Last of all came the cavalry, consisting of the 12th and 16th Light Dragoons, and of two regiments of heavy Germans; nor could we avoid remarking that, though the 12th and 16th Dragoons are both of them distinguished corps, the horses of the foreigners were, nevertheless, in far better order than those of our countrymen. The fact I believe to be, that an Englishman, greatly as he piques himself on his skill as a groom, never acquires that attachment to his horse which a German trooper experiences. The latter dreams not under any circumstances of attending to his own comfort till after he has provided for the comfort of his steed. He will frequently sleep beside it, through choice; and the noble animal seldom fails to return the affection of his master, whose voice he knows, and whom he will generally follow like a dog.
There was another striking difference in the two brigades of cavalry which I remarked. The English rode on, many of them silent, some chatting of a thousand things, others humming or whistling those tuneless airs in which the lower orders of our countrymen delight. The Germans, on the contrary, sang, and sang beautifully, a wild chorus—a hymn, as I afterwards learned—different persons taking different parts, and producing altogether the most exquisite harmony. So great an impression did this music make upon me that I caught the air, and would write it down for the benefit of my reader were I sufficiently master of the art of notation; but as this happens not to be the case, he must wait till we become personally acquainted, when I promise to play it for him in my very best style upon the flute.
Nor was it only on the left that warlike movements occurred. The whole army took the field; and that a serious campaign was already commenced the sound of firing at the extreme right of the line gave notice. I had wandered abroad with my gun on the morning of the 18th—not, indeed, venturing to proceed far from home, but trying the neighbouring copses for a hare or a woodcock—when my farther progress was arrested by the report of several cannon in the direction of Lord Hill's division. These were succeeded by a short, sharp discharge of musketry; and my sport was immediately abandoned: but I found on my return that no alarm was excited, and that every description of force which I had left in a state of inaction continued still inactive.
The same degree of suspense prevailed amongst us during the 19th and 20th. On the latter of these days my mind at least was kept busy by a journey to the harbour, for the purpose of bringing up a fresh supply of corn for the horses; though it was a species of employment with which I would have readily dispensed, inasmuch as the day chanced to be particularly cold, with snow. But our anxiety was destined not to be of long continuance, an order reaching us that night at a late hour to be accoutred and in line of march by three o'clock on the following morning. Now then at length we applied ourselves to the task of packing the baggage. The tents were once more summoned into use; their condition closely examined; such rents as appeared in the canvas were hastily repaired, and every deficiency in pegs and strings made good. Then the ordinary supply of provend, as Major Dalgetty would call it, being put up, we threw ourselves down in our clothes, and fell asleep.
It was still dark as pitch when the well-known sound of troops hurrying to their stations roused me from my slumber. As I had little to do in the way of accoutring, except to buckle on my sabre and to stick my pistols in a black leathern haversack, which on such occasions usually hung at my back, abundance of time was given for the consumption of as much breakfast as at that early hour I felt disposed to eat; after which I took post beside my men. The reader will have doubtless noted that, like the good soldier already named, I never set out upon any military expedition without having in the first place laid in a foundation of stamina to work upon. And here I would recommend to all young warriors, who may be gathering laurels when nothing of me shall remain except these Memoirs, invariably to follow my example. They may depend upon it that an empty stomach, so far from being a provocative, is a serious antidote to valour; and that a man who has eaten nothing previous to either an advance or a retreat runs no little risk of finding his strength fail at the very moment when its continuance is of vital importance to him. No, no; your hot-brained youth, who is too impatient to eat, is like your over-anxious hunter, which refuses its corn because the hounds pass the stable. Neither the one nor the other will go through a hard day's work.