Head-Quarters at St. Jean de Luz – Description of the Town and Harbour – The Pays de Labourt, part of the Country of the ancient Cantabri – Some Account of the Cantabrians, or Basques, and of their Language – The Basques return to their Homes – Description of Fort Socoa and its Harbour.

As soon as the army had gone into cantonments, the Marquess of Wellington established his head-quarters at St. Jean de Luz. The first and second brigades of Guards were cantoned in that town and in the suburb of Ciboure. For the greater convenience and despatch, a printing-press was established in the large building on the island, which connects the two parts of the bridge across the Nivelle, from which printed orders were distributed to every part of the allied army.

The enemy having withdrawn the great body of his forces within an intrenched camp, in front of Bayonne, the Marquess adopted the precautionary measure of forming a line of out-posts, for the protection of the allied cantonments. The right and centre of the army guarded the left bank of the Nive, by occupying Cambo, Larressore, Ustaritz, and Arrauntz, turning to the left en potence in front of Arcangues, opposite a chateau of the Senator Garrat. The left wing held a line of out-posts in continuation to the sea-coast, between Bidart and Biarits, crossing the great Bayonne road at the house of Barouillet, the residence of the Mayor of Biarits. Two small lakes defended the front of this portion of the line; the Etang de Chuhigue, the front of the Plateau of Barouillet and the Etang de Rousta, the Plateau of Bassussary. The great Bayonne road leads across a valley between these lakes, and here was the most advanced line of sentinels guarding the left wing.

St. Jean de Luz, though built on a very flat piece of ground, nearly level with the surface of the Nivelle at high water, is so situated as to afford a very picturesque view. The Nivelle, dividing the town from Ciboure, enters a beautiful semicircular bay, which takes its name from St. Jean de Luz. This semicircle is terminated on the north-east by a rocky point of land, on which a battery was erected, named from an adjoining chapel, Fort Ste. Barbe. A short pier extends in a direction crossing the entrance to the bay from this point. The opposite side of the bay is terminated in the south-west by the harbour and Fort of Soma, where there is also a short pier extending in a direction which crosses the entrance to the bay, and corresponding with the pier of Ste. Barbe. The width of the bay, from Fort Ste. Barbe to Fort Socoa, is very nearly one English mile. These piers, however, extend but a short distance, and afford little or no security to vessels at anchor in the bay. They were originally intended to have been carried nearly across it, and to have had light-houses erected on their extreme points, between which a sufficiently wide entrance to the harbour would still have been left. This grand project, besides affording secure anchorage to vessels trading on this stormy coast, would have added to the security of St. Jean de Luz against the violent force the sea, which, in very heavy gales, threatens the total destruction of the town. Fear the better protection of the town, however, a strong wall has been built, skirting that side of it which adjoins the bay, and extends nearly its whole length. The top of this wall is wide enough to afford an excellent promenade for the inhabitants, and it slopes from thence into the sea, so as to break the force of the waves by its inclination. This barrier wall was in part broken down by a tremendous storm in the year 1777, which caused the destruction of many houses, and threatened the submersion of the whole town.

The esplanade, on the summit of this wall, was a favourite walk of the Marquess of Wellington, who might there be seen in a plain grey coat, devoid of all military parade and attendance, enjoying a momentary relaxation from the bustle and cares of the camp. On the retreat of the French army, the inhabitants of St. Jean de Luz had generally remained shut up in their houses, waiting in trembling anxiety for the moment when, as they had been told, or had persuaded themselves, they would be plundered of their property and maltreated in every possible way by the conquerors; but when they were informed that the most rigid orders were given for the protection of person and property, they gradually, but cautiously, began to shew themselves abroad. They soon, however, gained confidence, opened their shops, and followed their usual occupations. It was amusing to observe with what amazement they regarded the affability of manner, and the unassuming style of dress, of the British Commander-in-Chief; so different to what they had been accustomed in the French generals, strutting about in splendid uniforms, attended every where by the staff officers and their aides-de-camp.

The houses of St. Jean de Luz consist for the most part of long low buildings, whose gable ends, with large projecting roofs, front the principal street, called La Grande Rue. Wooden balconies are carried across the fronts of most of the buildings, which render the ground floors very dark and gloomy, and fit only for lumber rooms. The Grande Rue extends from the entrance of the town on the Bayonne side as far as the Hotel de Ville, which fronts the market-place opposite to the quay. In ,this part of the town there are some large houses, built partly in the French and partly in the Spanish style. In the annexed view of the quay may be remarked a large building, having arcades in front of the middle stories; it was occupied by the heads of the Commissariat department. The house beyond was inhabited by the Adjutant-General Sir Edward Pakenham, whose memory will long be revered by the-army, and by his countrymen. In the back ground, part of Ciboure is seen fronting the little harbour.

The trade and commercial activity of St. Jean de Luz have long fallen to decay. The inhabitants of the surrounding country (the Pays de Labourt) were, in former times, famous for their daring enterprises in long sea voyages; and it is well known that they were among the earliest to venture upon the hazardous employment of the northern whale fishery. The preference which they still give to commercial, rather than agricultural, pursuits, is visible in the small portion of the population scattered over the interior of the country; a very considerable part of its surface, capable of cultivation, still remaining in a state of nature. The treaty of 1763 between France and England, by which the former lost a great part of her Transatlantic possessions, gave a death-blow to the naval prosperity of St. Jean de Luz, which is now rarely frequented by vessels of larger tonnage than the coasting chasse-marées of the adjoining provinces. There is still, however, a chantier de construction on the island between the bridges, where sloops and small brigantines are occasionally built.

In describing the Bidassoa, an allusion was made to the celebrated treaty of the Pyrenees, negotiated in the Isle of Pheasants. The conferences were conducted by Cardinal Mazarine on the part of France, and Don Luis Mendez de Haro on that of Spain, from the 13th of August to the 7th of November, 1659, when Maria Teresa, daughter of Philip IV., was contracted to Louis XIV. The marriage was solemnized in the Hôtel de Ville of St. Jean de Luz, on the 9th of June, 1660. In  the annexed view, which is taken from the island in the Nivelle, may be seen the Hôtel de Ville, just beyond the bridge; it is distinguished by its turretted angles and arcaded windows.

The town, or suburb, of Ciboure is not much inferior in size to St. Jean de Luz; it consists, however, of only two principal streets; the one in the direction towards the Spanish frontier; the other, which is very narrow, extending along the left bank of the Nivelle, where it enters the Bay of St. Jean de Luz, by a narrow channel, confined between stone piers.

From the 18th of November to the 9th of December, no general movement of the army took place. Partial rencounters, however, occurred occasionally. A reconnoissance was made by the French of the positions occupied by the left wing on the 18th of November; General Wilson’s Portuguese brigade held the enemy in check, and during the skirmish that general was wounded. On the 19th of November, the enemy made an unsuccessful attempt to drive in the advance of the allied centre, which, on the former day, crossed the bridge of Urdains in front of Bassussarry, and guarded the road which, leading from Bayonne, branches off at that point towards Ste. Pé and Ustaritz. On the 23d of November, the advance of the light division imprudently pushed forwards to the intrenched camp before Bayonne, and was driven back to its proper line, with the loss of about ninety men and officers, in killed, wounded, and prisoners. The right wing of the army had remained stationary since its passage of the Nivelle; the only encounter on that part of the line was at Cambo on the Nive, where the enemy occupied a tête de pont, but, having been attacked on the 16th of November, withdrew behind that river, and destroyed the bridge.

The occupation of these positions gave the Allies possession of a great portion of the Pays de Labourt, which forms a part of that country, which was known to the Romans under the name of Cantabria; and whose inhabitants, taking refuge in the fastnesses of the Pyrenean mountains, for a long series of years maintained their independence against the attacks of the Roman legions. Various authors have described the countries inhabited by the ancient Cantabrians, but their accounts of this peculiar race of people, and the extent of their territory, are often at variance; some excluding whole provinces, whilst others give them an extension of limits beyond what appears, by all the records that remain, to have belonged to them. They seem anciently to have occupied the whole tract of country now comprised in the Provinces of Biscay, Alava, and Guipuzcoa; besides a great part of the kingdom of Navarre; the Pays de Labourt and the Bearnois, forming a considerable portion of Aquitania.* As a part of the inhabitants of Aquitania †, they were found to be among the most formidable opponents whom the Roman generals had to encounter, but they were totally defeated by P. Crassus ‡; and, afterwards, when Cæsar visited Aquitania §, he received hostages for their submission. Under Augustus, the Cantabrians made a fresh effort to shake off the Roman yoke. For a long time they held out against the Imperial arms, till Agrippa was sent with a powerful army to subjugate the country. At length, they were so hemmed in by the Romans, that, for want of provisions, they were compelled to try the fate of a general action: their defeat, of course, was the consequence; great numbers perished by the sword, and those who fled to the mountains fell victims to hunger. It is worthy of remark that, in this contest, the army of Agrippa was supplied with provisions by a fleet from Britain.

     * Concerning the Aquitanians in Gaul, it is certain that they were of Iberian or Cantabrian blood. – Adelung’s Mithridates, vol. ii. p. 10.
     † J. Cæsar., de Bello Gallico, lib. i. – Aquitania à Garumna flumine ad Pyræneos montes et eam partem Oceani quæ ad Hispaniam pertinet, spectat inter occasum solis et Septentriones.
     ‡ J. Cæsar., de Bello Gallico, lib. iii.
     § Id., lib. viii.

As the history of the Cantabri is so little known, it may, perhaps, not be thought irrelevant to insert a short extract from the account of the Cantabrian War, as related by Mariana, the Spanish historian. After describing the flourishing state of Spain in the early part of the age of Augustus, he says:

“In the height of this prosperity, when Spain flourished with riches and plenty, there broke out a new war, which proved more fierce and bloody than was imagined. This war was begun by the Cantabri, a fierce people, till then not entirely subdued by the Romans, as being the stubbornest nation of Spain, and protected by the harshness of the country they inhabited. Ptolemy says, the Cantabri bordered on the east upon the Antigones, on the west upon the Lungones, on the south they were bounded by the river Ebro, and on the north by the Cantabrian Sea, or Bay of Biscay. Their principal towns were Julioborga and Vellica. Others, and with reason, extend the bounds of Cantabria as far as the Pyrenean Mountains. At this time the Cantabri were a rude and fierce people, and had no use of gold or silver. The women, as well as the men, were of large stature; on their heads they wore a dress like a turban, and not unlike to what the women of Biscay now use. The women tilled the land, and when they were delivered of their children, the men themselves lay in, and they tended them, as is now used in certain parts of Brazil. In their dances they made a noise with their fingers and castanets. The men brought the portion when they married. They had always poison prepared to kill themselves rather than suffer any violence. In order to commence the war, they stirred up the people of Asturias and Gallicia to take up arms, and that done, made incursions into the neighbouring country that was subject to the Romans. This did not only strike a terror into the natives, but perplexed the Emperor Augustus, fearing it might be the beginning of a more dangerous war than others expected. Augustus being come into Spain, forces resorted to him from all parts, so that he gathered a formidable army. They marched towards Biscay, and encamped near Segisama, supposed to be that now called Brisama, in Guipuscoa, betwixt Aspeitia and Tolosa. Then being divided into three parts, they soon subdued all the neighbouring country. The Cantabri, not trusting to their own strength, to avoid coming to a battle, withdrew with their goods and families unto the mountains, which prolonged the war, and made it be feared it would last long. Augustus, what with vexation, and what with the unwholesomeness of the air, fell sick, and was carried away to Tarragona. Caius Antistius, and Publius Firmius, were left to prosecute the war in Gallicia. Publius Carisius in Asturias. M. Agrippa was left with the supreme command. He was then the Emperor’s favourite, and afterwards married his daughter Julia. Agrippa gathered a fleet from Britain, to furnish him with provisions, and at the same time to straiten the Cantabri by sea. Hunger pressing the Cantabri, they resolved to try the fortune of a battle, but being a rude people under no command, and without sense of honour, they were easily put to rout. Upon the coast of the ocean near to Segisama, rises the mountain Hirmius, by the Latins called Vinius, of difficult ascent, where many of them that fled saved themselves. The Romans, to avoid encountering with the strength of the place, and with men that were desperate, drew a trench quite round, and fortified it. So those miserable people were reduced to such extremity, they being obstinate not to surrender, and the Romans not to quit them, that the greatest part perished. A town near Brisama, then called Aracil, now Arraxil, after a long siege, was taken and destroyed by the Romans, Meanwhile while Antistius and Firmius were not idle in Gallicia, but drew a trench about the mountain Midulia, fifteen leagues in compass, where a great number of those people were retired, and after suffering the utmost extremities, (like the Cantabri,) part of them slew themselves with their swords, and others drank the poisonous juice of a tree that grows there. In Asturias, the war was carried on with the like success; for those people, thinking to surprise Carisius, who had divided his army into three parts, their design being discovered by the Tregenci, their confederates, were themselves oppressed by Carisius, who came upon them when they least expected it. Such as escaped fled to the city of Lancia, now Oviedo, where they fortified themselves, and held out a long siege, but were at last forced to surrender, and submit to the conqueror. Augustus, the war being ended, returned into Cantabria, where he pardoned the multitude; but, lest the roughness of the mountains might again encourage them to rebel, he caused them to come down and live in the plain country; and also to give a certain number of hostages. Many of the most obstinate were sold as slaves *.”

* Stephen’s Translation, chap. vii. lib. 3.

No sooner had Augustus returned to Rome, than the Cantabri again took up arms, and Agrippa, who had gone into Gaul, returned, and attacked them. The Cantabri were at first successful, but the Romans ultimately prevailed. It appears an incontrovertible fact, that though the Cantabrians do not now answer exactly to the description given of them by the Romans, yet they have retained their original language through all the different changes of government, to which their country has been subjected. Although in crossing the Pyrenean frontier we make a sudden transition from the character and language of Spain to that of France, yet, in the country here described, the great majority of the inhabitants still speak the ancient Cantabrian language, differing indeed in dialects in each of the provinces where it is spoken, but in all retaining the character of the original, known under the name of the Vaskian, Baskian, or, as it is called, the Basque or Bazque language. A number of words and phrases, it is true, have crept into their language during the occupation of Cantabria by foreign nations, and hence it has been inferred by some that the Cantabri were originally of the same stock with such foreigners; the fact, however, seems otherwise; and later inquiries have determined the point, that the language now spoken has, in reality, no connexion with the Bas Breton, Welsh, Erse, or other Celtic dialects.

Bouterwek, in the Introduction to his History of Spanish Literature, makes mention of the Cantabrian, Baskian, or Biscayan language, and says, that it was spoken by the greatest part of the inhabitants of Navarre, though the nobles spoke the Catalonian of Arragon, resembling the Provençal, but that the Cantabrian has no resemblance to the three great idioms spoken in the early part of the thirteenth century by the inhabitants of the three great kingdoms of the Peninsula.

Many of the old commentators and historians have fallen into the error of confounding the Vaskian or Baskian with the Vasconian, spoken by the inhabitants to the southward of the Garonne; the latter is, however, a Latinized dialect, the Patois of Gascony, and has every appearance of being a remnant of the old Provençal. In the works of Jornandes (de Rebus Geticis), he adds some account of the Cantabrian or Basque language. “Est autem Cantabrica lingua, quæ hodie Viscayna sive Vasconia vocatur (Vizcayam enim olim Vasconiam dictam fuisse autumno) nunc vero vulgo Basque sive Bazcuence appellatur. Cujus usus hodie est non in Vizcaya tantum, verumetiam in finitimis ei et circumjacentibus provinciis, Alaba, Guipuzcoa, Navarrae etiam regno, et Bearnensi ditione.”

A treatise on the Vasconian was written by Oihenartus, entitled Notitia utriusque Vasconiæ tum Ibericæ tum Aquitanicæ, &c., and published in Paris in 1638. In his eleventh chapter, he treats – De Lingua Vasconum, &c., and he quotes Augustine, to prove the custom of the Romans introducing the Latin tongue in the countries they subjected *.

* Inde est quod vernaculæ lingua Gallorum juxta ac Hispaniorum prorsus introduxerint, Romanensi in earum locum substituta, si Britannos Armoricos et Vascones excipias, qui suas constanter ad hoc usque tempora retinuerunt, Vasconiam Magnus Scaliger, Cantabrismum vocat in tractatu de Europæodrum linguis, et diatriba de hodiernis Francorum linguis, numeratque inter Matrices linguas Europæorum, addito etiam elogio in hæc verba. “Cantabrismus incipit à suburbicariis Baionæ Lapurdensium et itinere sex aut septem dierum in intima montana Hispaniæ extenditur, Galli eos qui ea lingua utuntur vocant, Bascos vel Basculos Hispani regionem, in qua illa dialectus locum habet, generali nomine Bascuença vocant, nihil barbari, aut stridoris aut anhelitus, lenissima est et suavissima atque sine dubio vetustissima, et ante tempura Romanorum in illis finibus non erat.” Ea nunc cis Pyrenæum utuntur maxima pars Navarræ, universa Ipuscua, Alava, atque Biscaya: trans Pyrenæum vero tres illæ ditiones quæ Vascitaniæ seu Vascorum regionis nomine designantur scilicet Lapurdum, inferior Navarra et Sola.

The tract of country where the Basque language is spoken, is pretty accurately defined; and if due allowance be made for the rate of travelling in those days, the account of Scaliger will mark very nearly the extent of country occupied at the present day by the descendants of the ancient Cantabrians.

In the ingenious work of Adelung, (Mithridates, oilier allgemeine Sprachenkunde, published at Berlin in 1809,) there are many interesting particulars collected respecting the ancient territory, language, and manners of the Cantabrians or Basques; and, in the supplement to his work, more details are given by Wilhelm von Humboldt, who has added to his treatise a selection of words, arranged in alphabetical order, from the Basque Vocabulary.

After describing the ancient inhabitants of the tract of country between the Pyrenees and the Rhone, Adelung remarks, “Yet all these people are vanished, and their language by degrees lost. Only there still exists a real Cantabrian remnant on both sides of the Pyrenees, in the present Spain and France, from the sea on the north as far as Pamplona; in the present Biscay, which Pliny knew under the name of Vascones. This people owe the preservation of their language and independence particularly to their residence in the mountains, where they were neither disturbed by the Romans nor Arabians. The Romans treated them as friends and allies, and as they did not place any colony amongst them, their language remained quite pure. The Arabians also let them alone, but not so the Visi-Goths, who established and supported many small states amongst them; and it may be owing to this circumstance that there are so many German words existing in their language. Hence the Basques believe that they have preserved the old Cantabrian Noblesse genuine and pure, and the lowest labourer holds himself, in point of nobility, upon a level with the wealthiest of the upper classes. The Spaniards call these people Bascongados, and the language Bascongada and Bascuence, the last from ence and ante, kind and manner, and vasco. By the French, the inhabitants are called Basques and Biscaines. They extend these names out farther, even to the Gascons, who have nothing in common with them, but quite the contrary, and are hated by them most vehemently. A Basque can bear any other affront offered him, but that of being called a Gascon; this he will either revenge himself, or carry his anger to the grave. They call themselves Escualdunac, and their language Escuara. Their language still exists on both sides of the Northern Pyrenees, partly in Spain, partly in France; in Spain, in the province of Biscay, and in the country of Guipuscoa and Alava, and in the kingdom of Upper Navarre; in France, in Lower Navarre, in the country of Labourt and Soule, which together are called Basque. It is only in the country, amongst the lowest classes, that it is spoken. Amongst the higher classes, and in towns, it is never made use of, but either French or Spanish is spoken*.”

* Vol ii. P. 11.

In the matter added by Humboldt, he says – There are only three (principal dialects), and all good Basque grammars only enumerate so many; viz., 1st. The Labourtanian, in Biscay and Navarre; 2nd. The Guipuscoan, in Guipuscoa and Alava; and 3rd. The Vizcayan, in Vizcaya. The appellations of Autrigonian and Vardulian are no longer in use, and are most likely taken out of Oienhart’s †.

† Notitia Utriusque, Vasconice, &c., p. 72.
The following is a specimen of the Lord’s Prayer in the Basque language in the dialect of the Pays de Labourt :--

         Our father heaven in thou art, hallowed be  thy  name.
         Gure aita   ceruë-tan aicena, sanctifica-bedi hire Icena.

         Come  be   thy  kingdom, done be   thy       will,
         Ethor-bedi hire rehumà, Eguin-bedi hire vorondatea,

         Heaven (in) the same as earth (in) also.
           Ceru,an   beçala        lurre,an-ere.

           Us      daily    bread, give this day,
         Gure egun,eco oguia, iguc   egun.

         And    pardon us      our  trespasses, as
          Eta  quitta-ietzague    gure çorrac,  nola

           We    our  trespasses     pardon them;
         Gucre gure çorduney quittazen-baitrauegu;

         And  not evil   to enter suffer temptation,
         Eta ez-gaitzala   sar-eraci      tentationetan;

           But     deliver-us       evil  from.
         Baina delivea-gaitzac gaich totic.
 

The Basques have of late years maintained their ancient character as good soldiers, particularly for the service of light infantry. Horace makes frequent mention of them, and always as warlike, fierce, and unconquerable*. They pride themselves much on their skill as marksmen. The character given of them by the biographer of the Duke D’Espernon, who has been before quoted, is by no means flattering. In describing the invasion of the Spaniards in 1636, he says:–

“The Spanish council having determined to invade the kingdom in several places at once, principally hasted to enter into Guienne; to come to which province, they were to pass through the country of Labourt, (which is that of Biscaye) and by the way highly threatened the city of Bayonne. They knew very well the Duke of Espernon had no forces to send into that country; neither had he had them, durst he indeed have done it, without the consent of the inhabitants; lest, being a choleric, and impatient people, as they naturally are, any thing he should do of that kind, out of care to preserve them, should put them upon desperate resolutions, and make them wilfully lose themselves. They had, before they came, so despised the enemies’ forces, that they would not endure any one should think of contributing to their preservation; a security that did not a little afflict the Duke, who had been of old acquainted with the humour of this people, and knew them to be as timorous and dejected, when any danger was near at hand, as they were stout and haughty when it was remote, and out of the prospect of their fear.”

* Quid bellicosus Cantaber, &c. – CARM. lib. ii. O. 11.
   Servit Hispanæ vetus hastis oræ
   Cantaber, Sera domitus catenâ. – CARM. lib. iii. O. 8.
   Cantabrum indoctum juga ferre nostra. – CARM. lib. ii. O. 6.
   Te Cantaber non antè domabilis.-CARM. lib. iv. O. 14.
Besides frequently noticing them in his Epistles.
 

Entering among such a people, it was impossible not to feel an interest, as well as a desire to ascertain, how far their modern character had undergone a change, from their intervention between the two civilized nations of France and Spain. Unfortunately, the state of warfare prevented our seeing the inhabitants divested of the restraint imposed by so unsettled a condition; but still we saw enough to prove their dissimilitude both from the French and Spaniards. Although there is a manifest shade of Spanish character intermixed in those of the south side of the Pyrenees, and of French in those on the north, it is seen rather in particular localities, and along the great line of communication between the two countries, than generally spread throughout the Basque provinces. Adelung is quite mistaken in his assertion, that the Escuara, or Bascuence, is only spoken in the country among the lower classes. It is in reality the vernacular tongue of all classes; and, at St. Jean de Luz, was invariably spoken by the citizens among themselves; but, when they have occasion to address a stranger, or happen to be in mixed company of French or Spaniards, they speak French or Spanish, with which languages most of the townsmen are acquainted. During recent wars, the French government has always adopted the policy of appointing Basque generals to command the troops of that country, as they are with difficulty led by other commanders; and it is with great reluctance that they ever serve beyond the limits of their own territory.

In the present contest, when the allied troops first entered their territory, the great mass of the inhabitants, particularly those of the villages, were found to have retreated with the French army into the interior; but as soon as they began to discover that they had formed false notions of the English army, which, instead of maintaining itself at the expense of the conquered country, scrupulously paid for every article of provision; when they were told that private property was respected, they now sought every favourable opportunity of returning to their homes. It was said, and there is little doubt of the fact, that the French authorities strenuously endeavoured to dissuade the Basques from their intention of returning to their houses, but that their clamours at length prevailed, and they obtained permission to that effect; in, consequence of which, about three thousand of them returned to St. Jean de Luz, Urogne, and the surrounding country, before the end of November.

St. Jean de Luz had rather a gloomy appearance when the troops first went into cantonments; but now the shops were opened, and the town became a bustling scene of traffic for every article of supply required by the army. Provisions were, however, always dear, as the influx of so many strangers soon made away with the ordinary supply of the place, and the surplus was of course obliged to be obtained from great distances. Many Spaniards had set up shops in the town, and they were of great use in supplying provisions, and even luxuries, which their facilities of transport enabled them to bring from the adjoining provinces of Spain. Even the women, from the mountainous country around St. Andero, brought, in truck-baskets slung over their shoulders, butter, chocolate, honey, &c. The costume of these active pedestrians was very singular and gaudy. Notwithstanding the motley race who now were collected in this little town, perfect order was preserved. The Allies felt the beneficial effects of the Marquess of Wellington’s having rigidly enforced the protection of private property; for, instead of meeting with a race of hostile inhabitants, on whom the French government relied for commencing a harassing partisan warfare, nothing could exceed the harmony which prevailed between the Basques and the troops who were now spread over their country. Their confidence daily increasing, about three thousand more of the natives passed the line of allied outposts, on the 3d of December, and came back to their different villages. Many young men were amongst these, disguised as women, to avoid being detained by the French authorities for the new conscription. Their fears were ludicrous when detected in this disguise, apprehending that they would be sent back to Bayonne, or be treated as spies. Yet it was repeatedly announced in the Moniteur, that the Basques had risen en masse; and that the whole population, from eighteen to forty-five years of age, had taken up arms, leaving none in the mountains but old men, women, and children; and that they were perpetually harassing the English at every point, not allowing them a moment of repose; which is just about as true as, another article in the same paper, which asserts, that in the combats which had taken place between the 9th and the 13th of December, the allied army had lost fifteen thousand men, whilst the losses of the French did not amount to one-fourth part: that the uttermost consternation prevailed in the army of Lord Wellington; and that, with the dissensions among the Allies, the desertions that took place, the disease and privations which the army was suffering, and the numerous shipwrecks on the coast, which served to feed the French army, the position of the English became, from day to day, more critical. These and similar falsehoods were repeated, from time to time, in the official gazette; but not a word of the capture of St. Sebastian by storm, of the surrender of Pamplona, of the crossing of the Bidassoa, and the establishment of the allied army on the French territory. Of these circumstances it was attempted, by the usual system of falsehood and delusion, to keep the people of France in profound ignorance; but the friends of the Bourbons were in the secret, and quietly taking their measures to avail themselves of the catastrophe, which it was now evident was about to close the career of Napoleon.

In the-mean time, the best spirit and the most cordial unanimity prevailed among the officers and troops of the allied army. The state of the weather allowed them a little breathing time in their cantonments; and the officers were not idle in examining the neighbouring country.

The little port of Socoa, at the mouth of the bay of St. Jean de Luz, became an entrepôt for supplies of corn and biscuit, which was conveyed from thence to the different divisions of the army by large convoys of Spanish muleteers. The name of Socoa is from the Basque, Zocoa, which signifies an angular point or corner, the sitation of Socoa being at the angular point of rock which terminates the Bay of St. Jean de Luz on its south-west side. Its little harbour is strongly fortified, and its batteries serve at the same time to guard the entrance to the bay. A beautiful martello-tower crowns the defences, and commands the approaches to it for a considerable extent. Fort Socoa, with its martello-tower, forms a very pleasing object in the view from St. Jean de Luz ; but the most striking view of it is from the heights terminating the point of land with which the fort is connected; from thence we have complete command of the harbour and the handsome stone piers which enclose it. In this view, the little fort and pier of Ste. Barbe are seen on the opposite side of the bay, and the distance terminates in the low range of hilly ground towards Bidart and Bayonne.