plundering, but our men shot
every one who attempted to go near them, until towards evening, when a
French officer approached, waving a white handkerchief and pointing to
some of his men who were following him with shovels. Seeing that his
intention was to bury them, we instantly ceased firing, nor did we
renew it again that night.

The forty-third, from their post at the church, kept up an incessant
shower of musketry the whole of the day, at what was conceived, at the
time, to be a very long range; but from the quantity of balls which
were afterwards found sticking in every tree, where the enemy stood,
it was evident that their birth must have been rather uncomfortable.

One of our officers, in the course of the day, had been passing
through a deep road-way, between two banks, with hedge-rows, when, to
his astonishment, a dragoon and his horse tumbled heels over head into
the road, as if they had been fired out of a cloud. Neither of them
were the least hurt; but it must have been no joke that tempted him to
take such a flight.

Soult expected, by bringing his whole force to bear on our centre and
left wing, that he would have succeeded in forcing it, or, at all
events, of obliging Lord Wellington to withdraw Sir Rowland Hill from
beyond the Nive; but he effected neither, and darkness left the two
armies on the ground which they had fought on.

General Alten and Sir James Kempt took up their quarters with us in
the chateau: our sentries and those of the enemy stood within
pistol-shot of each other in the ravine below.

Young Arcangues, I presume, must have been rather disappointed at the
result of the day; for, even giving him credit for every kindly
feeling towards us, his wishes must still have been in favour of his
countrymen; but when he found that his chateau was to be a bone of
contention, it then became his interest that we should keep possession
of it; and he held out every inducement for us to do so; which, by the
by, was quite unnecessary, seeing that our own comfort so much
depended on it. However, though his supplies of claret had failed some
days before, he now discovered some fresh cases in the cellar, which
he immediately placed at our disposal; and, that our dire resolve to
defend the fortress should not be melted by weak woman's wailings, he
fixed an arm-chair on a mule, mounted his grandmother on it, and sent
her off to the rear, while the balls were whizzing about the
neighbourhood in a manner