On arriving at St. Jean de Luz, a startling rumour awaited us. The steel-built Carlist privateer had been captured at the mouth of the Adour; she had been taken a prize to San Sebastian; Stuart and Travers were in close custody; and there were alarmists who whispered that they would be tried by drum-head as pirates, and hung up in chains in the cause of humanity. It was well for me I did not accept the invitation to that water-party. I ran over to Bayonne to ascertain what particulars I could, saw the Carlist Junta, the British and Spanish Vice-Consuls, and from their combined and conflicting narratives was able to sift some grains of the authentic. But the sudden first report was undeniable. The weasel had been caught asleep.
The San Margarita was a serious loss to the cause. She had cost £3,500. She was very fast, being capable of a speed of between ten and eleven knots an hour, and should be equal to fourteen knots if her lifting screw had another blade. A three-bladed screw had been provided, and was to have been fitted to her stern on her return from the ill-fated expedition which put an end to her roving career. It was true that the descendant of kings was under bolts and bars. The French journals described him as a "Monsieur Stuart, a Scotch colonel, entrusted by the English Catholics with collections for the Carlist cause." They had never heard of his royal lineage, of his connection with the Austrian cavalry, or of his exploits by the side of the unhappy Maximilian in Mexico. He assumed the responsibility of ownership of the vessel. The hue-and-cry description of him was "a man of forty to forty-five years of age, over middle height, figure spare, features thin, and resolute in expression."
The burly bronzed Corkonian was also in durance, and with the pair of officers were a picked crew of thirteen Englishmen, including engineers, steward, stokers, and able-bodied seamen, and one Spanish cabin-boy. A Basque pilot, an old smuggler, familiar with every nook and crevice of the Bay of Biscay, had escaped.
If reports were credible, the San Margarita had already landed two millions of cartridges, and an immense quantity of arms. Much vexation was caused to the officers of the Spanish navy in those quarters by the stories of the daring feats she had achieved, absolutely discharging a cargo once on the very wharf of Lequeieto, as if she were a peaceful merchantman, and on another occasion sending off rifles and ammunition by small boats in the dead of night, a man-of-war lying sleepily oblivious of what was going on just outside her. It was felt that her continued impunity was a reproach, and three small vessels of the Spanish navy were commissioned to cruise between Bilbao and Bayonne on the look-out for her. This little squadron of vigilance consisted of El Aspirante and El Capricho, gun-boats, and the Buenaventura, a three-gun steam-brig. On Tuesday, August 12th, the Buenaventura, flying a George's Jack at her peak, was off Fontarabia for a portion of the day, close in shore. At nightfall she disappeared—it is now supposed into the sheltered and almost invisible inlet of Los Pasages, between Fontarabia and San Sebastian. Before daybreak on Wednesday, the Carlists under Dorregaray swarmed down from the hills covering Cape Higuer. The San Margarita came in sight, and began landing arms in the same spot where the undisturbed landing of the 28th July had been effected. Not more than three hundred stand had been put on shore, and about one hundred thousand cartridges in boxes, labelled in English "metallic rolled cartridges, centre-primed," when she had to get away, as the daylight began to play the informer. She dropped down towards Bayonne, and appears to have reached a point some four miles from the French shore (the exact distance is a moot question), where she laid to and allowed her furnaces to cool The men were "dead tired out" after their night's work, and the captain considered that he was within the protection of French waters. But there is a very ancient proverb about a pitcher and a veil, and the period of its realization had been reached at last Whilst the San Margarita was effecting the landing, a coastguard's boat had slipped from under the heights of Fontarabia, and given notice of what was going on to the Buenaventura in Los Pasages, and the brig steamed out, still with the British colours at her peak Whilst the Carlist privateer was motionless in fancied security—there was some want of prudence or vigilance there, surely—the gun-brig crept down and overhauled her before alarm could be given, and the rakish schooner-yacht, the skimmer of the seas, had the humiliation of falling a prey to a wretched slow boat that she could laugh at with steam up in the open sea. The arrest was made in the usual manner, and the captors behaved with the customary naval courtesy. They were over-joyed at their good fortune, and gave their prisoners to eat and to drink—champagne to the officers and chacoli to the men. They towed their prize into the bay of St. Sebastian, and there was triumph. The yellow and scarlet flag of Spain was over the wee San Margarita as she entered, and Colonel Stuart and Captain Travers and their companions must have felt sore, for all the good cheer and generous wine. Still there was quite a courtly scene on board—hand-shakings and reciprocal compliments—as they were marched off to the dungeon of the Castillo de la Mota on a hill in the city, where they were incarcerated. There they did not fall on such pleasant lines as afloat. The Republicans lost no time in unloading the vessel. They took off her, with a hurry that betrayed apprehension, 1,545 carbines and six Berdan breech-loaders, with a number of armourer's tools. It was remarked that the rifles supplied to the regular troops from Madrid were sighted to eight hundred metres, but that the range of those seized from the Carlists did not exceed five hundred.
I went over to San Sebastian by tug from Socoa on the 16th of August, and sent up my card to M. de Brunet, the British Vice-Consul. He said he had called on the prisoners, and that the sailors murmured at their treatment. If I went to the citadel, after three—as it was Saturday afternoon, and visiting hours commenced then—I could see them without difficulty. I did clamber up the hill, and found this was not the case. On owning that I had no pass from the military governor, I was denied admittance. Happening to meet the commandant, I represented what I wanted, and he very civilly granted me leave to visit the prisoners "para un momento." As the gates were thrown open Stuart advanced and met me, grasping my hand cordially, and slipping a letter up the sleeve of my coat. He had caught sight of me labouring up the hill, and had immediately hastened to scribble a few lines which he trusted to my sympathy with misfortune to smuggle to their destination for him. He was not mistaken, and in so doing I had no qualm of conscience. I accompanied him to his cell, and he told me the story of the capture of the San Margarita. It was substantially as I have related; they thought they were in a mare clausum, at all events they had drifted out of it on the tide of fate; but there was a nice question of international law. The ruse of hoisting the British flag was legitimate if the Buenaventura substituted her own flag before proceeding to board them. The San Margarita had the flags of more than one nation in her lockers; but the gun-brig had no power to act the policeman in neutral waters. There was the point. Travers was in a separate lodging; they had been accommodated at first in the one cell, but they could not agree—ashore as afloat the old feud existed. However, both assented to a truce in order to have a talk with me. They were cheerful, had cigars ad libitum (at their own expense, of course), and were permitted to get their rations from the Hôtel de Londres in the city. The cells they occupied were bare, white-washed, low-ceiled rooms, some eight paces by six. They were not so clean or well-ventilated as Newgate cells, and the beds were spread on the floor. The captives had access to newspapers and writing materials, and it is but the due of the officers in charge to testify that they were extremely affable and disposed to make their prisoners as comfortable as possible. Still, in the close, stifling weather, to be locked up within the narrow circuit of a dungeon was limbo. The pair wore their own clothes, Travers still retaining a navy-jacket with brass buttons engraved with the initials of some yacht club, and did not complain of having been subjected to indignities. While I was with them the shadow of a face darkened the window; it was a Carlist prisoner who had hoisted himself up on the shoulders of a comrade from a yard below; he had a letter in his mouth. I took it, and slipped him a bundle of cigars for distribution among his fellow cage-birds. From this it may be deduced that the gaol regulations were not very stringent. The Carlists were treated as forfeit of war, not felons, and had no honest chance of illuminating their brows with the martyr halo of Baron von Trenck or Silvio Pellico.
San Sebastian is the most modern town in the Peninsula, having been re-built in 1816, three years after its destruction by the incensed allied troops. It is a great summer resort of wealthy Spanish idlers—a sort of Madrid-super-Mare. The attractions of the capital are to be had there, with the supplementary advantages of pure air, mountain scenery, and luxurious sea-bathing on a level sandy beach. There is a public casino, and a score of clandestine hells where a fortune can be lost in a night at monté—in short, every infernal facility for Satanic gambling. Cigarettes are cheap, and so are knives. There is an Alameda, where the band plays, and a passable imitation, of the Puerta del Sol, less the fountain, in the broad arcaded Plaza de la Constitution. There is a small theatre, a spacious bull-ring, and several commodious churches, where Pepita can talk the language of fans to her heart's content. Every attraction of Madrid which could reasonably be expected is to be had, I repeat, and hidalgos and sloe-eyed senoras speckle the promenades in the gloaming, and impart a mingled aroma of garlic and gentility, pomade and pretentiousness, to the chief town of Guipúzcoa. San Sebastian would be for Madrileños what Paris is for Bostonians, if a few of the attractions of the "only court," which could not reasonably be expected, were not lacking—say an occasional walk round of the Intransigentes, to show their political muscles; a grandiloquent, frothy word-tempest in the Congress, and the Sunday cock-fight. I am speaking, be it understood, of San Sebastian in ordinary summers. A short twelvemonth before my visit, a pair of pouting English lips told me it was "awfully jolly."
At the date with which I am concerned, it was anything but "awfully jolly." The fifteen thousand rich visitors who were wont to flock into the city during the season had gone elsewhere to recruit their health on the sands and lose their money at the gaming-tables. They had been frightened to the coasts of France by the apparition of Carlism, and San Sebastian was plaintive. Her streets and her coffers were empty. The campamento of bathing-huts was ranged as usual on the velvet rim of the ear-like bay, but no bathers were there. There were more domestics than guests in the hotels; and at the table d'hôte three sat down in a saloon designed for a hundred to breakfast in; and we had no butter. The peasants in the country round were afraid to bring in the produce of their dairies and barn-yards. The bull-ring was to let; conscientious barbers shaved each other or dressed the hair on the wax busts in their windows, in order to keep alive the traditions of their craft; the fiddlers in the concert-room of the casino scraped lamentations to imaginary listeners. A Sahara of dust had settled on the curtain of the theatre, and fleet-footed spiders made forages athwart it from one cobwebby stronghold to another. The once festive resort had lost its spirits completely, and all on account of this civil war. It was summer, but the city was in a state of hibernation. No business was done in the shops, the cafés were empty, most of the resident population who could afford it had emigrated, and the public squares were as vacant as if there were a perpetual siesta. There was no sign of animation, as we understand it in England. There were but three vessels in the west bay—the Buenaventura, a merchant steamer, and the San Margarita, pinioned at last, her yellow funnel cold. Sojourn in the place was insupportable. I knew not how to kill the tedious hours. I climbed again to the Castle of the Mota, inspected some English tombs on the slope of the acclivity, and noticed that if the citadel is still a position of strength, nature deserves much of the credit. The defences recently thrown up had been devised and executed carefully, and if the defenders were only true to themselves, the Carlists, with no better artillery than they possessed, might as well think of taking the moon as of entering San Sebastian. They would have a formidable fire from well-planted cannon to face; stockades, and strong earthworks, and more than one blockhouse cunningly pierced with loopholes, to carry. Even if San Sebastian was entered, the configuration of the streets was such as to give every aid to disciplined men as opposed to mere guerrilleros. The city is built in blocks, on the American system; the wide thoroughfares cross each other at right-angles, and all of them could be swept as with a besom by a few guns en barbette behind a breastwork at either end. In this sort of work, accuracy of aim is not called for, as in that warfare up in the mountains. If it were, not much reliance could be placed on the Republican artillery. General Hidalgo had well-nigh nullified that arm of the service. A Carlist leader, in whose information and whose word confidence could be reposed, assured me that not a single Carlist had yet been killed or wounded by the Republican gunners. The estimated lists of the enemy's casualties given by both parties during the struggle, I may remark en passant, were grossly exaggerated. The butcher's bill was very small in proportion to the expenditure of gunpowder. Returning to the question of the defence of San Sebastian—even on the supposition that the main works and town were to fall into the hands of the Carlists, the citadel still remained, where a determined leader could hold out till relief came, as long as his provisions lasted. This lofty citadel is almost impregnable. It was hither the French retired in 1813, and it took General Graham all that he knew to dislodge them. If I were asked what were the prospects of the Carlists getting into the place, I should say there was but one—by crossing over a golden bridge. But that implied the possession of money, and money was precisely what the Carlists declared they needed most.
There was always the remote hazard of a Carlist rising in San Sebastian, for there were in the city the children of settlers from the rural districts who bit their thumbs at the sight of the muzzled San Margarita, and prayed that Charles VII. might have "his ain again." But they were in the minority. The Miqueletes, a soldierly body of men in scarlet Basque scones very like to the Carlist head-gear, and a blue capote with cape attached, garrisoned the citadel. They were brave and loyal to the Republic, and the object of deep grudge to the Chicos, for they were Basques of the towns. Many of these provincial militiamen had come in from the small pueblos in the neighbourhood, where they ran the risk of being eaten up by "the bhoys;" and this was the only accession to the population which redeemed the dismal, tradeless port from the appearance of having been stricken by plague and abandoned, and lent it at intervals an artificial bustle.
I sickened of San Sebastian, with its angular propriety; its high, haughty houses, holding up their heads in architectural primness; its wide geometrical streets, where there is no shade in the sun, no shelter in the wind. I began to hate it for its rectilinearity, and dub it a priggish, stuck-up, arrogant upstart among cities. What business had it to be so straight and clean and airy? Fain would I shake the dust off my feet in testimony against it; but here was the trouble. How to get away—that was a knotty problem. The railway had been torn up for months, and the armour-vested locomotives were rusting on the sidings at Hendaye. The dirty hot little tug, the Alcorta, that plies between the quay and Socoa, had left; and I grieved not, for the thought of a passage by her was nausea. Three more torturing hours never dragged their slow length along for me than those I spent on board her coming over. Try and call up to yourself three hours in a low-class cook-shop, coated an inch thick with filth, and fitted over the boiler of a penny steamer dancing a marine break-down on the Thames, opposite the outlet of the main-drainage pipes. That, intensified by strange oaths and slop-basins, was the passage by the Alcorta. But dreary, lonely San Sebastian was not to be endured. Those poor fellows above, accustomed to the wild freshness and freedom of the sea, how they must mourn and repine! By some means or other I must get back to the world that is not petrified. No diligences dare to affront the dangers of the short journey to the Irun railway-station, since three were stopped some days before, the traces cut, the horses stolen, the windows shattered, the woodwork burned, and the charred wreck left on the roadside, a terror to those who neglect to obey the commands of the Royalist leaders.
"Royalist prigants, serr!" shouted a corpulent German doctor, connected with mines in the neighbourhood, who retained fierce recollections of having been robbed of a "boney, capitalest of boneys for crossing a mountain."