CHAPTER XXI.
Thenight of the 23d passed by in quiet; and long before dawn on the 24th we stood as usual in our ranks, and under arms. So passed about half an hour, when orders were given to form into marching order, and to file towards the left, in the direction of the Adour. We were glad to be put in motion, and, after a journey of about a league, halted upon a sandy plain, at the distance of perhaps a couple of miles from the walls of Bayonne, and half that distance, or something less, from the outworks. Though thus placed within easy range of the enemy's advanced batteries, we were nevertheless well protected from their fire; for a little sand-hill stood in our immediate front, of height sufficient to shut out not only the soldiers, but the tops of the tents, from the gaze of the besieged.
Though we reached our ground at an early hour in the morning, a considerable space of time elapsed ere the baggage and provisions came up. The reader will therefore imagine that the setting forthof a substantial breakfast, which immediately ensued, proved a source of no trifling gratification to men who had fasted for upwards of forty hours, and whose appetite, though stifled by sleep, had revived of late in a very troublesome degree. It consisted, I well recollect, of slices of beef hastily and imperfectly broiled, with mouldy biscuit and indifferent tea; but the coarsest viands are sweet to the hungry, and we were in no humour that day to find fault with the quality of ours.
We were yet busy with our meal, and the baggage and tents, though removed from the backs of the animals, lay packed and ready for another move, when the intelligence, not at that moment unacceptable, reached us, that for the present we were to remain stationary, that our position in the line was taken up. Immediately the camp was marked out in due form; sundry ruinous dwellings in its vicinity were taken possession of, chiefly as stables for the horses; guns, fishing-rods, and greyhounds were desired to be put in serviceable order; and every disposition was made to secure comfort. The sole subject of complaint, indeed, was found to be in the unfavourable state of the weather, which had become since yesterday boisterous, with heavy showers of rain and hail. But this very circumstance, at which we were disposed to murmur, chanced to be, of all others, the most favourable to the operations of thearmy. By the help of these squalls, the boats andchasse-marées, which had hovered about the mouth of the Adour for several days, were enabled to pass the bar, and the groundwork of the floating bridge (if such an Iricism be admissible) was laid.
As the passage of the bar was an operation of considerable difficulty, and as I was fortunate enough to be an eyewitness of the daring intrepidity and nautical skill of those who effected it, I shall take the liberty of describing the occurrence more at length.
My friend and myself having seen a little to the comforts of our men, and added in an important degree to our own by a change of habiliments, walked forth with no other view than that of whiling away certain hours, which might have otherwise hung heavy on our hands. We took the direction of the river's mouth, because there a dark pine-wood promised to shelter us from the blast, and because we were anxious to see how far the engineers had proceeded in the construction of the bridge. At this time we were quite in the dark as to the sort of bridge which was about to be formed. We knew not so much as that it was to consist of sailing vessels at all, but concluded that pontoons would be anchored, as had been the case at the Bidassoa. Our astonishment may therefore be conceived when, on mounting an eminence, we beheld a squadron ofsome thirty craft bearing down, with all sail set, towards the bar, over which the waves were dashing in white foam, being driven inwards by a strong gale from the north-east. But we were not the only anxious spectators of this animating show. The bank of the river, and all the heights near, were crowded with general and staff officers, conspicuous among whom were Sir John Hope, and, if my memory fail me not, Lord Wellington himself. The groups were, one and all of them, speechless. The squadron and its manœuvres involving, as they did, the lives of the gallant men who executed them, seemed to engross the attention of the lookers-on, who all faced in the same direction, and stood silent and motionless as statues.
Down came the boats before the breeze with amazing velocity. The surf, however, ran so high, and there seemed to be so little water upon the sands, that I for one felt as if a weight had been removed from my heart, when I beheld them suddenly put up their helms and tack about again. The prospect from the sea must have been appalling; and even British sailors hesitated, for once in their lives, whether they could face the danger. But the hesitation was not of long continuance. A row-boat, Spanish built, but manned by Lieutenant Cheyne and five seamen from the Woodlark, threw herself with great judgment upon a wave. Theswell bore her clear across the shoal; and loud and reiterated were the shouts with which she was greeted as she rushed proudly through the deep water. The next which came was a prize—a large French fishing-lugger—manned by seamen from a transport, closely followed by a gunboat, under the command of Lieutenant Cheshire. They, too, were borne across; but the fourth was less fortunate. It was a schooner-rigged craft, full of people, and guided by Captain Elliot. I know not how it came about, whether a sudden change of wind occurred, or a rope unfortunately escaped from its fastening, but at the instant when the schooner took the foam, the mainsail of her hinder mast flapped round. In one second her broadside was to the surf, in another she was upset, and her gallant captain, with several of his crew, perished among the breakers. The rest were dashed by an eddy towards the bank and happily saved.
Our horror at contemplating this event, though extreme, was necessarily brief, because our attention was immediately attracted to other vessels which, one after another, drew near. Of these, all except one, achasse-marée, succeeded in making good the passage. It shared the fate of the schooner: it was upset upon the curl of a wave, and went down with the whole crew. This last was even a more awful spectacle than the former. The little vessel, afterbeing tossed round, rocked for a moment, as it were, upon the surf, just long enough for us to see the despairing gestures of the sailors, and to hear their shriek of consternation; and then a huge wave striking her, she fell, not upon her broadside, but with bottom upwards. Not a man escaped of all who had conducted her, and several fine promising midshipmen were among them.
Five-and-twenty vessels having now entered the Adour, besides four or five gunboats destined to protect them, no time was lost in running the whole up to their proper stations, and in bringing them securely to anchor at equal distances from one another. They were then strongly bound together by cables, the ends of which were made fast to winches prepared for the purpose on each bank, and which, running both by the bows and sterns, kept the craft tolerably steady, notwithstanding the violence of the current. I need not add that no economy was exercised in the matter of anchors, of which two were dropped from each bow, and a like number from each stern.
The boats being thus rendered sufficiently secure, half-a-dozen strong ropes were extended along their centres, at equidistances of about two feet from one another. These were so disposed as not to bear any continuous weight upon the smaller vessels. They were steadied, indeed, as they passed over each, bybeing fastened to capstans, and so kept from swinging too widely; but it was upon four or five of the largest class only that they were made to lean, the intervals between being in reality so many hanging bridges. Across these ropes were laid down planks, made fast by ties only; and the whole was so nicely balanced that though the tread of a single passenger caused it to swing backwards and forwards, an entire army might pass with perfect safety. Such was the famous bridge of boats across the Adour, which connected the two banks of the river, where it measures eight hundred yards in width, and which, in itself, including groundwork on both sides, covered a space little short of nine hundred yards.
Ahead of the bridge, with their broadsides towards the town, were moored five gunboats, each armed with six long twenty-four pounders. These, in their turn, were in part defended by a slight boom; whilst a boom infinitely stronger, capable of repelling any substance which might be floated down by the tide, hung between them and the bridge. A boom somewhat similar, but more in the shape of a breakwater, was placed behind the bridge, to shelter it from any sudden swell of the sea, such as might be apprehended during spring-tides; and each boat being manned by a party of seamen well skilled in the management of such craft, the fabric was justly regarded as abundantly secure. To complete itsconstruction, however, gave employment to the artificers of the army during two whole days, though they contrived to render it passable for infantry in less than half that space of time.
Meanwhile, neither the right nor the centre of the Allied army was inactive. The operations of the 23d—of which I have already said as much, and perhaps more than one who professes not to speak from personal observation is entitled to say—having been concluded, Soult, alarmed at the determined advance of his enemies, and confounded by the celerity of their movements, retired, in the night of 24th, from Sauveterre across the Gave du Pau, and, destroying all the bridges in his flight, assembled the strength of his army, on the morning of the 25th, near the village of Orthes. Thither Lord Wellington immediately followed. Pushing forward a numerous body of Spaniards, so as to cut off all communication between the French Marshal and Bayonne, he manœuvred with the third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh British divisions during that and the succeeding days; and finally, on the 27th, fought the glorious battle of Orthes, of which, as I had no share in it, I shall attempt no description. The result of it, as everybody knows, was the hasty and disastrous retreat of Marshal Soult upon Toulouse, the capture of Bourdeaux, and the first public declaration which had yet been made, byany part of the French nation, of the renewal of their allegiance to the house of Bourbon.
Whilst these great events were in progress elsewhere, a corps, consisting of the first and fifth British divisions, of two or three brigades of Portuguese, and a crowd of Spaniards, proceeded, under the command of Sir John Hope, to invest the town and citadel of Bayonne. As the rest of my journal will consist entirely of such occurrences as befell during the progress of the siege, it may not be amiss if I endeavour to convey to the mind of my reader something like a correct idea of the important city against which our efforts were turned, and of the general face of the country immediately around it.
The city of Bayonne stands upon a sandy plain—the citadel upon a rock or hill which closely overhangs it. Between them runs the river Adour with a sluggish current, resembling, in the darkness of its water and the sliminess of its banks, the Thames near Gravesend or Blackwall, but considerably narrower and more shallow. Both town and fortress are regularly and strongly fortified; and on the present occasion a vast number of field-works, of open batteries, fleches, and redoubts, were added to the more permanent masonry which formed the ramparts. Nor was the erection of these the only method adopted by the enemy to give unusualstrength to this most important place. Various sluices were cut from the river, by means of which, especially in our immediate front, the whole face of the country could be inundated at pleasure to the extent of several miles; whilst ditches, deep and wide, were here and there dug, with the view of retarding the advance of troops, and keeping them exposed to a heavy fire from the walls, as often as the occurrence of each might cause a temporary check. The outer defences began in all directions, at the distance of a full mile from the glacis. The roads were everywhere broken up and covered with abattis and other encumbrances. Nothing, in short, was neglected which promised in any degree to contribute to the strength of a place which is justly regarded as the key of the southern frontier of France.
Such was the condition of the works about Bayonne. With respect to the country commanded by them, it varied considerably, both in its nature and general appearance, the soil being in some directions tolerably fruitful, in others little better than sand. It was, however, universally flat, and very slightly wooded or broken to the distance of three or four miles in every direction from the ditch. A few hamlets were, indeed, scattered here and there (and wherever there is a French hamlet a certain quantity of foliage will be found), thelargest of which was Anglete, where we had spent the night of the 23d, and through which runs the great road to Bourdeaux and Paris; but in general the desolate aspect of things seemed to indicate that the labours of the builder and planter were prohibited, lest a village or a grove might shelter an enemy, or furnish a point for the establishment of a hostile post within cannon-shot of the walls. In the direction of the sea, and parallel with the left bank of the river, deep sands prevailed. These were, for large patches, totally bare of verdure; but thick woods of dark short pine more frequently overspread them, which, rising and falling, as the sands had broken up into little eminences and valleys, gave a very striking and romantic appearance to that side of the panorama. As I afterwards learned, the Landes—those vast forests which stretch all the way to Bourdeaux, and which, according to the tradition of the natives, were originally planted to render firm what had previously been a huge moving quicksand—begin here.
My description of Bayonne, and the scenery near it, applies thus far only to the city, and to the tract of country situated on the southern or Spanish side of the Adour. The citadel, being built upon a hill, or rather upon the crest of a range of heights which rise gradually from the sea, and extend upwards in a sort of inclined plane for about eight miles, differsentirely from the preceding sketch, both in its style of fortification and in the nature of the view which it presents to the gaze of a traveller. Like all hill-forts, its works are constructed rather as the natural inequalities of the ground permit than after any scientific plan or model. One of its fronts—that which faces the village of St Esprit and the mouth of the river—presents, indeed, the regular octangular appearance; but in other directions the abrupt and uneven course of the rock has compelled the engineer to draw his wall around without any respect to form or figure. Yet it is a place of prodigious strength—the more assailable of its faces being that on which the shape of the ground has permitted the engineer to bestow the largest share of his attention.
The view from the ramparts of the citadel is extremely pleasing. Vast woods of pine are seen in the distance; whilst nearer, the face of the country is beautifully diversified by the intermingling of corn-fields, meadows, groves of magnificent cork-trees, vineyards, cottages, and several chateaux. Close beneath the walls, moreover, lies the romantic village of St Esprit, with its neat church and churchyard, sloping along the side of a ravine, and having all its cottages surrounded by pretty gardens, well stocked with fruit-trees and shrubs. This village was commanded, not only by the guns from the citadel, but by a redoubt which General Thouvenot, theFrench governor, had caused to be erected on a sort of table-land near it, and which, though no addition to the beauty of the landscape, added greatly to the general strength of the castle by occupying the only level spot across which the besiegers might hope to push a sap with any success or facility.
Though Bayonne was already, to all intents and purposes, invested—that is to say, though the garrison and inhabitants were fairly cut off from holding open intercourse with other parts of the country—nothing of the restraint of a siege, in the proper acceptation of the term, had as yet been imposed on either class. The besiegers had, indeed, drawn an extended line around the works; but the French pickets were still posted at the distance of three, four, and some of them five miles from the glacis; whilst their patrols continually broke the chain of connection, and made excursions as far as the camp of Marshal Soult at Orthes. This was the case at least up to the evening of the 24th. There being no direct or safe communication between the two banks of the Adour below the town, Sir John Hope could not venture to tighten the cord, or to convert the investment into a strict blockade. For as yet all reinforcements to the little corps which, under the command of General Stopford, had passed on the 23d, were floated across by means of rafts—the men sitting with their guns upon the beams of wood,and leading the horses, which swam after them. Yet, even in this rude way, so large a force contrived to establish itself among the sand-hills by the evening of the 24th, that all apprehension of a renewed attack from the enemy was laid aside. Nevertheless the artificers were anxiously pressed to render the bridge trustworthy with as little delay as possible; and they strenuously exerted themselves to meet the wishes of the general.
Meanwhile, about fourteen or twenty thousand men of the Spanish army took post along those faces of the town and citadel which looked towards Helletre and the Joyeuse. The left of this semicircular line, resting upon the heights where, during the late affair, I stood in safety to watch the progress of the skirmishers on both sides of me, swept round, through the abandoned intrenchments, to the brink of the river. Here, the stream being narrow, a pontoon-bridge was formed, and the line recommencing on the opposite bank, wound on till it touched a corps of Portuguese at the back of the citadel. But as yet the chain was continued from that point only by occasional patrolling parties; and through this opening the enemy daily sent out his foragers and brought in supplies. Such a state of things could not be permitted long to last. It was essential to the prosecution of Lord Wellington's future operations that the gap should be filled up previous to therenewal of hostilities between his army and that of Soult; nor was much time wasted in making preparations for driving the garrison within the walls. Working parties laboured hard, not only during the day, but during the whole night of the 24th; and at dawn on the 25th it was reported that infantry might cross the floating bridge with safety. This was the signal for action; and hence the 25th proved to be, at least to part of the army, a day of hostile employment.