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thirds were Spanish, posted on the heights on his way sent orders to the sixth and of Altobiscar, 5,000 feet above the level of seventh divisions to form on the left of the sea, who undauntedly maintained their Picton and Cole's divisions, who were in position till Cole moved up to their support position in front of Pamplona. The light with Ross's brigade of the fourth division. division was directed to guard the commuThe allies resolutely held their ground till nication between Graham and the main their right was turned by the retreat of the body of the army; and Hill was directed to Spaniards, when Cole deemed it prudent to station himself in the passes between Alwithdraw in the night to the general ren- inandoz and Lanz, in front of Lizasso, for dezvous of the troops in that quarter, in the the purpose of preventing the enemy gaining valley of Zubiri. possession of the road between Pamplona and St. Sebastian.

Wellington first reached Hill's quarters at Bastan; thence starting at racing speed for Sorauren, he joined the Picton post on the 27th, as the troops were taking up their ground. A Portuguese battalion (Campbell's Portuguese brigade had just joined) first recognising him, raised a cry of joy, and the shrill clamour caught up by the next regiments, swelled as it ran along the

which the British soldier is wont to give on the eve of battle, and which no enemy ever heard unmoved. The only hostile movement that day was a sharp skirmishing fire of musketry along the front of the line.

While the pass of Roncesvalles, on the allied right, was forced, a sanguinary conflict was raging at that of Maya. Soon after Soult's attack had commenced, d'Erlon advanced against the British centre at the Maya pass. The French general had so skilfully marked his approach, that his troops were nearly at the summit of the defile before they were perceived. The pickets and light companies made a desperate defence, till the regiments were suc-line into that stern and appalling shout cessively brought up. The contest was long and severe, and the slaughter terrible, the ascent being literally blocked up with piles of the slain. But all was in vain. Sullenly, and foot by foot, the allies gave way to the last ridge of the pass, and were about to abandon the crest of the heights, when Barnes came up with a brigade of the seventh division, and by a brilliant charge drove the enemy back to the first ridge. But though that part of the heights regained by Barnes was the key of the position, and would have enabled the allies to recover it, Hill, learning that the pass of Roncesvalles had been abandoned, withdrew in the night to the heights of Irurita, in rear of Elizondo.

On the following day, Cole continued his retrograde movement down the valley of Roncesvalles, and early in the afternoon was joined by Picton, who brought up the third division, and assumed the command. Soult-whose march had been delayed by a thick fog-coming up, Picton retired to some strong ground in front of Zubiri, and offered battle, which the French marshal declining, the retreat was continued, on the 27th, to a position on the heights of Sorauren, in front of the villages of Huarte and Villaba, thus covering the blockade of Pamplona.

When Wellington, who was with the left of the army, superintending the operations before St. Sebastian, heard of these disasters, giving orders to Graham to convert the siege of that fortress into a blockade, he hurried off to the scene of action, and

On the morning of the 28th, the French army was formed on a mountain ridge fronting the allied position. Before any hostile movement had taken place, the sixth division under Pack came up, and was formed across the valley in front of the fourth division. This disposition had scarcely been completed, when Soult pushed forward a large force from the village of Sorauren, with the intention of penetrating the valley and turning the left of the allied position, when his troops found themselves in a circle of fire. In front they were met by the sixth division; on their left and rear they were assailed by the fourth division and Campbell's Portuguese; while the detached brigade of the sixth division, suddenly crowning the heights, opened a destructive fire on their right and rear. To extricate them, a division of their comrades assailed the heights on which the left of the fourth division was posted, and coming in contact with the seventh Portuguese caçadores, drove them from their station; but the caçadores, being supported by Ross's brigade, rallied, and drove the enemy with great loss down the heights.

The French now made a powerful attempt to gain possession of the hill above the village of Zubaldica, defended by the 40th and the two Spanish regiments of

Pravia and El Principe. One of the Span- Sorauren, Hill's corps, not exceeding 10,000 ish regiments giving way, they succeeded men, was attacked by d'Erlon, who had in gaining the summit of the height; 20,000 troops under his command, on the but the 40th, with a charge of bayonets, heights in rear of Lizasso. The English quickly drove them back. A general attack general being outflanked by the superior was then made on the whole of the front numbers of the enemy, withdrew to a strong of the heights occupied by the fourth divi- and rugged ridge about a mile in his rear, sion, and a contest of the most desperate where he resolutely maintained his ground. character ensued. Four times the assault Soult's situation had now become most was renewed and repelled. "The vehement hazardous. The allies were hurrying up shout and shock of British soldiers always from all sides to encompass him, and only prevailed; and, at last, with their ranks one line of retreat was open-that by the thinned, tired limbs, and hearts hopeless pass of Dona Maria. He and his army from repeated failures, the assailants were were now nearly surrounded, and must so abashed, that three British companies have surrendered, had not the appearance sufficed to bear down a whole brigade." of three marauding soldiers of the British In Wellington's phrase, it was "fair bludgeon-work." The French advanced with cries of "Vive l'Empereur !" to penetrate the position with the bayonet. The fourth division sternly waited their approach, receiving their fire till the enemy was only a few paces distant, when, pouring in a volley, and charging at the same instant, they drove them down the heights in the greatest confusion and with prodigious loss. In every part of the line the battle was in favour of the allies, except where a Portuguese regiment was stationed, which being overpowered, the enemy established themselves on its station; but they were quickly compelled to withdraw from the 'vantage ground they had gained by the advance of Ross's brigade. During the 29th of July, both armies remained in position without firing a shot.

army apprised him of his danger. Hurrying rapidly to the defiles of Yanzi and Echellar, leading to the Lower Bidassoa, he passed just at the moment that the light division and Longa's Spaniards were coming up to close them.

In the course of the eight days' operations which the battles of the Pyrenees had occupied, the loss of the allies in killed, wounded, and missing, was 7,096; that of the enemy, according to their own admission, 15,000; but considering their propensity to cloak their misfortunes, it no doubt much exceeded that number. The prisoners alone amounted to 7,000.

On the 2nd of August, the French, at all points, evacuated the Spanish territory, and both armies resumed nearly the positions which they held prior to Soult's irruption. To provide against future attacks, Wellington ordered the passes of the Lower Pyrenees to be strengthened by the construction of redoubts and intrenchments.

bastian was resumed. The heavy guns which, at its suspension, had been shipped at Passages, were on August 6th relanded, and the whole placed in battery. On the 27th the batteries opened fire; and by sunset of the 30th, the old breach was reopened, and a new one effected about a stone's-throw from the former. The storming was ordered for the 30th, at noon-day, the time of low-water.

Hopeless of penetrating the allied line and thus relieving Pamplona, Soult now manœuvred on his right, with the view of falling on Hill and turning the left of the The battering train and matériel having allies, and thus raise the siege of St. Se-arrived from England, the siege of St. Sebastian. But Wellington perceiving his danger, resolved on an immediate attack. While the enemy's central position at Sorauren, opposite to the heights which had been the theatre of the bloody conflict on the 28th, was attacked by Wellington, Picton was ordered, with his division, to move by the valley of Zubiri, and turn the enemy's left, while Dalhousie, with the seventh division, should possess himself of the ridge in front of his position, and thus turn Soult's right. These manoeuvres were completely successful. Sorauren was carried by storm, and the enemy pursued up the valley of Lanz, as far as Olague.

While Wellington a second time was gathering laurels in the neighbourhood of

The column of attack was composed of Robinson's brigade of the fifth division, the stormers consisting of 750 men of the 52nd regiment, the brigade of guards, the German legion, and the fourth division, which had been expressly deputed by Wellington for the purpose; but General Leith, not willing to

ing a siege, capitulated on the 9th of September, when the garrison, amounting to 1,200 effective men, and upwards of 500 sick and wounded, surrendered prisoners of war. The loss of the allies, in killed and wounded, from the commencement of the blockade, had been 2,500 men.

endure the slight shown to his division, put | hour in the evening, that the gallant band Robinson's men in front. The assaulting retired into the castle, which, after sustaincolumn had no sooner reached the middle of the Urumea, than they were assailed by so dreadful a tempest of grape, musketry, canister, shells, and grenades, that the bed of the stream was nearly choked up with the bodies of the killed and wounded. Undaunted, however, they reached the foot of the breach, and clambering up the face of The capture of St. Sebastian was followed the ruins, they gained its summit; but be- by scenes of atrocity and outrage fearful to yond it they could not pass-the retrench-record. The inhabitants were treated with ments were insurmountable; and an im- the greatest barbarity by the drunken and movable barrier of steel was presented by infuriated soldiery, and the profligate campthe garrison. Recede, however, the brave followers. assailants would not, but remained in close and desperate strife with their opponents. The slaughter was tremendous. The attack on the lesser breach by the Portuguese under Major Snodgrass, had been equally unsuccessful. After two hours' mortal strife, the summits of both breaches had been swept clear by the fire of the garrison; not a living man was to be seen on either. Failure now seemed inevitable; but as a last resource, at the suggestion of Colonel Dickson, who commanded the artillery, the fire of fifty heavy guns was directed against the high curtain which impeded the entrance of the assailants, the balls and shells passing over the stormers within a couple of feet. In a few minutes the obstruction was shattered to atoms, and the ramparts strewed with the mangled limbs of the defenders. At the same moment, a mine, charged with barrels of gunpowder and other combustibles (placed behind the summit of the breach, and intended for the destruction of the assailants), being fired by a shell from the British mortars, exploded, and blew into the air 300 grenadiers who stood over it. Before the suffocating smoke had cleared off, the stormers sprang over the ruined parapet, and, with an appalling shout, made themselves masters of the rampart. The besieged rallied, and a fierce encounter ensued; but the increasing numbers and vehemence of the assailants prevailed. Right and left the works were cleared, and the besiegers poured impetuously down into the town. There the furious strife, which had raged during three hours at the walls, was renewed; the besieged fighting with desperate courage, from house to house and street to street; and it was not till a late

On the day on which St. Sebastian was reduced, the battle of San Marcial was fought on the heights from which the battle takes its name, between the Spanish army, under Freyre, covering that fortress, and the French army, under Marshal Soult. The object of Soult was the relief of St. Sebas-i tian. The Spanish army consisted of 1,800 men, supported on the left by the British first division and Lord Aylmer's brigade of the fourth division; and on the right by the light division, Inglis's brigade, and the Portuguese brigade of the fourth division. At daybreak of the morning of the 31st of August, two divisions of the enemy crossed the fords in front of the Spanish position, and resolutely ascended the heights, but were met with great firmness by the Spaniards. While the enemy was ascending the face of the heights, Wellington appeared in front of the line. The Spanish troops expressed their joy and confidence by loud and repeated acclamations, and charging the enemy with the bayonet, dashed down the hill so vehemently, that, panic-struck, the French plunged headlong into the river. There the pontoon bridge, which at the same moment gave way under the extraordinary pressure of the fugitives, occasioned a terrible loss of life.

During this attempt to force the high or direct road to St. Sebastian, Clausel's columns, which had, at Vera, endeavoured to force the road leading through Oyarzun to the left, were resisted by the brigades of Barnes and Inglis, and driven across the Bidassoa with great slaughter.

The loss of the enemy, in these engagements, was 3,600 in killed, wounded, and prisoners; while that of the allies was 2,500.