ure. He therefore insisted upon his
remaining incognito and as a non-combatant at St. Jean de Luz. Soult
was in great straits, not only because he was compelled to "make war
support war" by exorbitant requisitions upon the French peasantry, but
also because the exigencies of Napoleon were such that large drafts of
the best troops were drawn from the army of the south. When hostilities
were resumed in the middle of February, 1814, the Anglo-Portuguese and
Spanish force combined outnumbered the French by nearly five to three,
but Soult retained the decisive advantage of having a strong _point
d'appui_ in Bayonne at the confluence of the Nive and Adour. Careful
preparations were made by Wellington for throwing a large force across
the Lower Adour below Bayonne, in concert with a British fleet. Contrary
winds and a violent surf delayed the arrival of the British gunboats,
but on February 23 Hope sent over a body of his men on a raft of
pontoons in the face of the enemy's flotilla, with the aid of a brigade
armed with Congreve rockets, which had been first used at Leipzig, and
produced the utmost consternation in the French ranks. The gunboats soon
followed, but with the loss of one wrecked and others stranded in
crossing the bar. By the joint exertions of soldiers and sailors a
bridge was then constructed, by which Hope's entire army with artillery
passed over the river, and, two days afterwards, began the investment of
Bayonne.

Meanwhile, the centre and right wing, under the command of Wellington,
had forced a passage across the Upper Adour and threatened Bayonne on
the other side. Leaving a garrison of 6,000 men in Bayonne, Soult took
his stand at Orthez, with an army of about 40,000 men, on the summit of
a formidable ridge. Wellington attacked this ridge on the 27th, with a
force of nearly equal strength in three columns so disposed as to
converge from points several miles distant from each other. The veterans
of the French army, admirably handled, fought with tenacity, and all but
succeeded in foiling the attack before Wellington could bring up his
reserves. The conscripts, however, were not equally steady, and when
Hill, advancing from the extreme right, pressed upon the French left,
Soult's orderly retreat became a precipitate flight. The French loss
greatly exceeded the British, and was soon afterwards swelled by
wholesale desertions; the road to Bordeaux was thrown open, and the
royalist reaction against Napoleon,