From one of the windows of the tower, Montgomery, during the religious wars of the sixteenth century, forced priests and friars to leap into the river.

first in an orderly fashion, but in the greatest confusion when their retreat was threatened. In his despatch Wellington wrote:

‘We continued the pursuit till it was dusk.... I cannot estimate the extent of the enemy’s loss; we have taken six pieces of cannon and a great many prisoners. The numbers I cannot at present report; the whole country is covered by their dead. The army was in the utmost confusion when I last saw it passing the heights near Sault de Navailles, and many soldiers had thrown away their arms; the desertion has since been immense.’

The scene of this débâcle is passed through on the way to Pau, but there is nothing at all to suggest the horrors of such a bloody retreat. There is an almost English feeling in the aspect of the country, the villages being tidy; and the large houses, standing in pleasant, well-kept, park-like surroundings, give a feeling of repose to the scenery. To the right, beyond the river, the landscape becomes hilly and dark with woods, and ends with a piled-up horizon of blue-white peaks touched here and there with a pale gleam where the sunlight falls on the snow.

It is interesting to watch the change from tiled roofs to slate, and the high-pitched roofs with hipped ends and splayed eaves, entirely taking the places of the low roofs near Bayonne. Here and there walls built of round stones laid herring-bone-wise recall the cottages and barns of parts of the Sussex coast. The road keeps by the Gave, and goes very straight over the flat alluvial land of the valley until the beautifully situated town of Pau is reached.

SECTION XIII
PAU TO ST. GAUDENS, 61½ MILES
(99 KILOMETRES)

DISTANCES ALONG THE ROUTE

Kil.Miles.
Pau to Tarbes3823½
[Pau to Lourdes via St. Pé-de-Bigorre3924¼]
[Lourdes to Tarbes1911¾]
Tarbes to Tournay1811¼
Tournay to Lannemezan1710½
Lannemezan to Montrejeau1610
Montrejeau to St. Gaudens106¼

NOTES FOR DRIVERS