now the Highlanders could see, and took part in, the interesting operations of 26,000 men, under Generals Stewart, Clinton, and Hamilton, pending the assault of the heights.

The country was difficult, and it was eleven o'clock before they got within cannon shot of the redoubts; but Clinton and Hamilton having turned the right of the enemy's position at Ainhoa, the French immediately opposed to the 92nd made little resistance, running out of the redoubts in confusion; many prisoners were taken, and their own guns were turned to give them a parting salute. The Highlanders took possession of the Frenchmen's huts, where they passed the night very comfortably, being employed during the afternoon in collecting and attending to the enemy's wounded.

When, in after years, the regiments engaged were given authority to bear Nivelle on their colours and appointments, the 92nd and other regiments of the First Brigade were not included in the grant. It is true that the principal action was fought, and the great loss sustained, in the centre and on a space of about seven miles; but the action of Hill's Corps and the Second Division, in which was the 92nd, had an important effect on the success of the combinations, which failed in no point,* and the fact that the battalion captured the redoubt with the loss of only one man wounded, in no way detracts from the credit of their bold attack.

The Allies had about 90,000 men; the French 79,000, of whom, however, Foy's Division acted separately. The former had 2690 officers and men killed and wounded, and Generals Knight and Byng were wounded. The loss of the latter was 4265 officers and men, of whom about 1400 were prisoners, and one general was killed; the field magazines and fifty-one pieces of artillery were taken.

On the day following the battle of the Nivelle, the army advanced in order of battle. Sir John Hope, on the left, marched by St Jean de Luz on Bidart; Marshal Beresford, in the centre, moved upon Arbonne, and General Hill, communicating by his right with Morillo, who was on the rocks of Mondarain, brought his left forward into communication with Beresford, and with his centre took possession of Suraide and Napier, Vol. VI., page 343-344.

*

Espelette, facing towards Cambo. The time taken by these movements enabled Soult to rally his army upon a line of fortified camps, his right resting on the coast at Bidart, and the left at Ustaritz on the Nive. Foy had driven back Mina's Spaniards on the right of Hill's troops on the 10th, and taken a quantity of baggage, but finding that d'Erlon was giving way before Hill, he retreated during the night, and on the 11th reached Cambo and Ustaritz, ready to defend them against Hill.

About 10 a.m. on the 11th, the 92nd, with the Second Division, quitted the heights from which they had driven the enemy the preceding day, but after advancing three or four miles they halted. The rain, which fell in torrents, rendered the country roads impassable for artillery, and no attempt was made to drive the enemy further back. They, however, retired at sunset. The 92nd encamped on a heathery hill near Espalette, where they spent a most uncomfortable night, for even cooking was difficult, as the wood was too wet to burn. On the 12th, Hill tried to pass the fords of the Nive, and also made a demonstration against Cambo, but the floods rendered the fords impassable, and both places were successfully defended by Foy. In these operations the 92nd, with the First Brigade, moved by Espelette along the road to Cambo, drove back the enemy's pickets to within a short distance of his works, and then ascended a height which overlooked the town and its defences from the right. Sir Rowland reconnoitred, and finding the enemy better prepared than he expected, contented himself with driving in their light troops and cannonading the garrison. The 92nd passed the night in the neighbourhood. Their baggage had not yet arrived, and the fires they made roasted one side of a man's body while the other was iced by the winter wind. The battalion had one man wounded this day at Espelette.

The baggage arrived on the 13th, but the rain ceased not from the evening of the 12th to the 16th, when the enemy retired over the Nive, destroyed two arches of the bridge to prevent his being followed, and the battalion marched into Cambo, after a skirmish with the enemy's rear-guard.*

It

Sergeant Robertson says two of the Light Company were killed on this occasion, but I do not find them in the existing returns.

appeared that the French had told their countrymen that the British would murder them, and they found no one in Cambo but one dragoon, who had been left behind, a bedridden old man and his wife, and a pig-for the head of the latter a Highland officer paid four dollars. The soldiers did not regret the absence of the inhabitants, as they had left their beds, which were a treat to men, many of whom had only been under the roof of a house thirteen nights out of the last one hundred and eighty-one days.*

The order books and morning states of this period are lost, but it appears from monthly returns that a private was discharged, November 25th, by authority of the Prince Regent, on account of being promoted to ensign in the York Light Infantry Volunteers, name not given. A draft of 100 rank and file, from the 2nd Battalion in Scotland, joined at Cambo on November 27th, "the greater portion of them fine-looking stout young fellows, and proved a great acquisition." At the same time four officers, who were doing duty with the First Battalion, but who belonged to the Second, were ordered, much to their regret, to join it in Glasgow.

Notwithstanding the hardships, the British army was at this time exceptionally healthy, there being hardly any sick except the wounded, and of these numbers were rejoining the battalion; one private joined at Cambo" from reported dead." The troops felt a just pride in contrasting their present position, quartered as victors in a French town, with their situation at the same date in the previous year, when retreating before the French into Portugal.

As soon as his army entered France, Wellington's first care was to establish the system of regular payment for supplies, which had so greatly contributed to his previous success. He issued a proclamation to the allied troops, in which, after recounting the miseries which the exactions of the French troops had brought upon Spain and upon themselves, he added that it would be unworthy to retaliate on the innocent inhabitants of France. "The officers and soldiers of the army must recollect that their nations are at war with France, solely because the ruler of the French nation will not allow them to be at Military Memoirs," the author being one of them.

*

66