The famous 50th, fiercely advancing, checked the French rush at one
point; but Soult's men were full of the _elan_ of victory, and swept
past the British flanks. The 71st and 92nd were brought into the
fight, and the latter especially clung sternly to their position till
two men out of every three were shot down, the mound of dead and dying
forming a solid barrier between the wasted survivors of the regiment
and the shouting edge of the French advance. "The stern valour of the
92nd," says Napier, "principally composed of Irishmen, would have
graced Thermopylae." No one need question the fighting quality of the
Irish soldier, but, as a matter of fact, there were 825 Highlanders in
the regiment, and 61 Irishmen. The British, however, were steadily
pushed back, ammunition failed, and the soldiers were actually
defending the highest crag with stones, when Barnes, with a brigade of
the seventh division, coming breathlessly up the pass, plunged into the
fight, and checked the French. Soult had gained ten of the thirty
miles of road toward Pampeluna, but at an ominous cost, and, meanwhile,
the plan of his attack was developed, and Wellington was in swift
movement to bar his path.

Soult had now swung into the pass of Roncesvalles, and was on the point
of attacking Cole, who held the pass with a very inadequate force,
when, at that exact moment, Wellington, having despatched his aides in
various directions to bring up the troops, galloped alone along the
mountain flank to the British line. He was recognised; the nearest
troops raised a shout; it ran, gathering volume as it travelled down
all the slope, where the British stood waiting for the French attack.
That sudden shout, stern and exultant, reached the French lines, and
they halted. At the same moment, round the shoulder of the hill on the
opposite side of the pass, Soult appeared, and the two generals, near
enough to see each other's features, eagerly scrutinised one another.
"Yonder is a great commander," said Wellington, as if speaking to
himself, "but he is cautious, and will delay his attack to ascertain
the cause of these cheers. That will give time for the sixth division
to arrive, and I shall beat him." Wellington's forecast of Soult's
action was curiously accurate. He made no attack that day. The sixth
division came up, and Soult was beaten!

[Illustration: Combat of Roncesvalles, July 25, 1813. From Napier's
"Peninsular War."]

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