"Come, my old friend, I will endeavour to make your peace; and Alice, I believe, will not be very inexorable. I am billeted on the house of the Escrivan, or town-clerk of this place, Villa Mayor, and there we shall have writing materials in abundance. Let us set about our correspondence, and have our letters ready for Lisbon, to be despatched by the first orderly dragoon who rides to the rear."
CHAPTER II.
THE BALL.—THE BELL-FIGHT.—AN ADVENTURE.
"For she laid adown
——the hood and veil,
And frontlet of the cloister pale,
And Benedictine gown."
Marmion.
With every demonstration of joy Sir Rowland's division of the army were received by the good people of Aranjuez,[*] a very interesting town, which stands near the Tagus and Garama, about twenty-seven miles from Madrid, and twenty-one from Toledo. Aranjuez is surrounded by an amphitheatre of hills and green forests, and contains the celebrated summer residence of the kings of Spain; around which spread the royal gardens, justly considered the most beautiful and elegant in Europe. The town contains a Prado, or public promenade, four miles in length, which crosses the Tagus twice, by gaily-painted wooden bridges, before it loses itself among the orchards and fragrant orange thickets.
[*] Pronounced by the Spaniards Arunwhais.
The streets of the town are perfectly regular, even monotonously so, but richly ornamented on the outside with projecting cornices, pilasters, and balconies. There is a quietness, and an air of dignity and "calm repose," about Aranjuez, which is not often met with in Spain, but which marks it as being strictly the residence of people of rank and fortune. The town contains three churches, and an area for bull-fights. The Highlanders halted in the large square, which is paved with marble, and contains the splendid brass statue of Charles the Fifth. The Emperor is represented armed cap-a-pie, trampling down heresy in the form of four arch-heretics. The statue and pedestal were decorated with flowers—indeed all the streets were strewed with them—in honour of the occasion.
Wellington, who by this time had been created a Marquess, lay before Burgos, besieging the castle, and the surrender of its garrison was looked for daily.
As the second division expected to remain some weeks at Aranjuez, they were billeted as usual on the inhabitants; and the long arrears of pay having been received, they were enabled to make themselves tolerably comfortable. The officers of the Highlanders having so much loose cash on their hands, determined to get rid of it as soon as possible, by giving a splendid ball to the ladies of Aranjuez and the officers of the division.
A committee was appointed to arrange matters, despatch the invitations, and get the palace, which had been procured for the purpose, duly fitted up and decorated. In this princely and spacious building the Supreme Junta of the Spanish government were installed, and held their first meeting in 1808. Joseph Buonaparte occupied it previously to his retreat to Valencia, and a great quantity of his household stuffs, crystal, &c. were found in it, very opportunely, and seized by the committee to equip the supper tables. From Madrid some thousand variegated lamps were procured to illuminate the gardens and avenues leading to the palace, and nearly twelve hundred oil paintings, many of them by the best ancient and modern masters, were collected from different parts of the building, and hung up in the suites of apartments appropriated to the festivities. The troops entered on the 1st of October,—the ball was to be on the night of the twentieth, and of course all the unmarried ladies of Aranjuez were in a flutter,—nay, in fact, in a state of extreme excitement about the affair. The ball, the ball to be given by the Scottish officers, was the only subject discussed at the soirées, tertulias, and parties at the houses of the citizens: at the Prado, and in the cafés and tabernas in the town. The committee, which consisted of Captain Seaton, Macdonald, and Ronald Stuart, usually met every evening in the palace, to send off the invitations and discuss some of King Joseph's wine.