get the
horse--a sound hardy animal that would not call for elaborate grooming,
or refuse a feed of barley. Horse-flesh was at a premium, but he thought
I might be able to have what I wanted at Bayonne, on payment of an
extravagant price. A requisition for forage and corn could be had
through the Junta; and I should have no trouble in getting an orderly on
applying with my credentials to the chief of staff of any of the Carlist
columns to which I might attach myself. We had a long conversation, and
Thieblin frankly informed me that in his opinion the Carlists had not
the ghost of a chance outside their own territory. There they were cocks
of the walk. What the end might be he could not pretend to vaticinate,
but "El Pretendiente" would never reign in Madrid. The conflict might
last for months--might last for years; but the Carlists owed the
vitality they had as much to the divisions and inefficiency of their
adversaries as to their own strength. There would be no important
engagements--to dignify them by the epithet--until the organization of
the insurrectionary forces was regularized, and they had a stronger
artillery and an adequate cavalry. M. Thieblin did not stray far from
the bull's-eye in his prophecy.

I went to bed in the mood of Crookback on Bosworth Field, and felt that
my dream-talk would shape itself into the cry, "A horse! a horse!"

Until that coveted steed had been lassoed, stolen, or bought, I must
only endeavour to justify my existence--that is to say, render value for
the money expended on me by picking up "copy" anywhere and everywhere.

I was advised to go to Bilbao by sea, but the advice came too late. The
last steamer from Bayonne had ventured there four-and-twenty hours
before I sought my passage, and even on that last steamer the few
voyagers were unable to insure their lives with the Accidental Company,
although they consented to promise that they would descend into the hold
the instant they heard a shot. It was almost as full of jeopardy to
travel to Bilbao by sea as to sail down the Mississippi with a racing
captain and a lading of rye-whisky on board. One Monsieur Gueno, master
of the barque _Numa_, of Vannes, made moan that he was seriously knocked
about while he lay in the Nervion, off the Luchana bridge, during a
skirmish between the Carlists and the troops. They both fought
vigorously, but they gave him most of the blows. One of his crew, in a
punt behind, was killed, and twenty-five