Part 11

As the sun sets we get into the park of Zagala, thinly covered with large cork trees and under-spread with smooth pasture. Here, having the best animal, I, given up to my own thoughts, insensibly ran ahead of my servant and guide, but the road turning suddenly to the right and descending to the bed of the river, reminded me of the imprudence of parting with my servants and baggage, who might take another road. I therefore pulled up in the midst of the stream, and casting my eyes upward and around, beheld one of the most beautiful nights that ever etherealised the human mind. The woods were not breathed on, all was still; the half moon rode high in heaven, frequently passed over by the light blushing clouds with which the sky was chequered. The solemnity of the scene was such as is not to be described.

I had talked some time ago with a sceptic, and been bothered with his subtilties; how did they now all fly before the sublime soarings of my spirit at this moment! Does this airy transport tend to nothing, and must this mind with such an ardent curiosity to explore the heavens, and such a celestial gratitude for the refinement it feels in itself, perish with the body? Could I have made the sceptic take my feelings as the best argument I could offer, he had been soon converted.

A sceptic should by analogy be of a sordid mind, but this man was intelligent.

Having passed the river, we soon began to ascend through a thick wood to the castle of Zagala, crowning the very summit of a rock-gnarled mount.

When we were half up the hill my donkey started at the appearance of an animal half as big again as itself, which advanced with a majestic, deliberate step, and on going close up to it I found it was a beautiful red stag that very politely came and kissed my hand--beautiful, elegant creature.

On arriving at the gate of the old mouldering castle we thundered for entrance, but for some time all was still. At length we thought we heard the steps of some one dimly sounding through the echoes of the castle, and ere long a hoarse voice demanded, “Who’s there?” “An English officer with his servant and guide.” “What do you want?” “Shelter for the night.” The steps were then heard to retire, and all was still. Soon after, they were again heard approaching, and the voice again asked, “How many are you?” “Three.” At last the grating gate was slowly opened, and we beheld a snug village within, and at the end of the street a fine-looking hall door with lamps, etc.

They took us to this house, and going upstairs the steward of the estate of Zagala, belonging to the Marquis of Portachio, received me with great cordiality and politeness. I was comforted to find a most capital house with curtains, etc., the picture of cleanliness and convenience, but how much more delighted when his most beautiful wife entered the room, with long black mantilla, brilliant rolling eyes, Roman nose, sweet mouth, jet black hair in short graceful curls upon her neck, tall, polite, retired, conversable. Could not take my eyes off her during supper, and feared the administrator would cut my throat. There was an old priest who disputed with me concerning Popery. Adventures romantic at first they told, as they had just killed a large wolf, whose skin was brought in to show us. They then took me into a nice little ante-room with a clean-looking bed, where I slept delightfully.

Surely no man can live more happily than my host. This is his castle. He is alike fearless of the wolves or thieves, for his peasants form an ample garrison and he has plenty of arms. He lives in modest luxury, a beautiful wife and fine children, what would he more? The man himself was a fine black animated Spaniard.

_October 27._--Rise, and when dawn began, the view of the mountains was grand, the rocky peaks tossing their wild forms above the foggy clouds.

Start for Villa del Rey and soon arrive, as the beast provided for me was a good little animal. Go on to Campo Mayor and arrive at Elvas at four o’clock.

Find the General, and soon discover that I have left Squire’s map at Villa del Rey. Borrow twenty dollars from Colonel Ross to enable me to purchase the little horse that brought me from Villa del Rey, and pay forty-three dollars for the same.

Army entering Spain ordered to wear red cockades.

_October 28._--Bernardo starts at seven o’clock for Villa del Rey to retrieve Squire’s map.

Write my report upon the Aliseda road, which I take to the General when he has dined. Confess my sins to Squire, who laughs and receives the mortifying news with good-natured philosophy.

_October 29._--Breakfast with the General, who starts with his suite for Badajoz at seven. I arrive at Estremoz at eleven and General Paget in the afternoon. I begin to fret about Bernardo.

_October 30._--Sunday. Breakfast at the General’s. No Bernardo. Write the General a copy of last report, and after dinner, to my great satisfaction, Bernardo is announced, for the fellow has become extremely useful to me, and I depend on his fidelity. On journeys, also, as I ride before and he behind, he entertains me exceedingly with the drollery of his anecdotes and remarks, which are extremely acute. He has withal a very good judgment, is unobtrusive, and can bear a rub. Thus, though I allow him to talk and laugh, he is not sulky when told to hold his tongue. Then his cookery and providonata is so good and his honesty undoubted, he is a perfect interpreter, and up to their manners. I was glad of his return.

_October 31._--To march to-morrow to Arronches; only hear of it when I go to dinner. Get a pair of velvet overalls.

_November 1._--On arriving at Arronches, seven leagues from Estremoz, find Major Gilmore, who gives me soup. Sleep in the justice house. Little Kickery[20] comes on well. Buy a blanket, of, I think, a rogue.

_November 2._--Start for Albuquerque and overtake the 95th Regiment, having first passed the Spanish boundary and taken out the Portuguese cockade. On arriving at Albuquerque we find the deaf Corregidor disputing with the General’s staff in a great rage; they receive me with smiles, to the astonishment of the others, and insist on my being quartered there. At least fifty officers come in about quarters. They make no hand of the deaf Corregidor, but I explain the matter to the lady, and she soon arranges it, for she is, in fact, a very good Corregidor. Find the 20th Regiment here, and Colonel Ross quartered at the house of my friend the Governor.

_November 3._--Colonel Ross comes to induce the old Corregidor to swear in the paymaster. The wife achieves it, otherwise the old man would have first inspected the regimental accounts!!

_N.B._--The man who ran off with his mules before has never returned. I am badly off here now, for the great room that I had before is occupied, and I am in the family.

_November 4._--Start in the morning with the 20th Regiment for Aliseda. Ready at three. No mule. Colonel Ross starts. The Corregidor in a fury. I start at four, leave the column in the dark, and take a doubtful road. Hear a dog bark, and ferret out a peasant, who rights us; but soon after we were again _presque au désespoir_, when a dear dog not far off began to bark. We made for the noise, holloaing, and at length a peasant rights us. It now begins to rain like the devil. Lose my way again in a great wood, but retrieve it, and arrive at Aliseda, wet and tired, at eleven o’clock. Regiment arrives at two, after a wet, painful march.

_November 5._--Fine fair day, and after breakfast we leave for Brozas.

_November 6._--Start again at daylight in excessive rain, and arrive at Alcantara at nine, perfectly wet. Quartered on my old friend the Alcalde (Mayor), who receives me with the greatest _bon cœur_. The General is quartered at the Benedictine convent, the richest order in Spain, and the Prior, who is chaplain to Charles IV., undertook to prepare dinner for the General, his baggage not having arrived. So one was rather disposed to expect something sumptuous, and at half-past four go up to the convent to dinner; dismayed to see a little tabletto with one glass and a pint of wine. For dinner there was a soup made of bread, water, beans, and salt in a flat plate, and a light leg and shoulder of goat--execrable; silver plates, and a few grapes after dinner.

Coming home we hear the Fandango playing and singing. Go to the door, which is immediately shut. Complain to the Alcalde. “Do you wish to see it?” said he quickly. “Yes.” “Vamos.” And away we went, and were now highly received among the dancing peasants. I think it exceedingly pretty, the girls seem so glorified, dizened out in all their finest costume, and preserving such a gravity of modest dignity, that awes the boors into distance and respect. They, on the contrary, with their hats on, and in all their working dirt, dance with the fair, but never touch them, both snapping their fingers all the time, and raising their heads alternately with a graceful motion. When it was over we retired to the Alcalde’s house, and entered into conversation, in the midst of which he was called out to quell a disturbance in the street. I asked what it was. “Nothing,” they said; but from the looks of the women, who wished to detain me in the house, I suspected some English were concerned, so I went out, and Bernardo followed me, and, directed by the noise to a neighbouring house, we found two English officers--Tilford and Falls--in a small room, bayed by about fifty Spaniards with swords and fixed bayonets. I was going to inquire very quietly what was the matter, and prevent mischief as skilfully as I could, when that fool Bernardo, like a horse taking fright on the brink of a precipice, darted on one of the peasants, dragging him away, and calling him all the devils in hell, and cuffing him with all his might.

This immediately, as I foresaw, raised the fury of this disorderly patrole to ungovernable bounds. They heeded neither corporal nor Alcalde. They entirely threw off all authority, and seemed prepared, with drawn daggers and swords and fixed bayonets, to take the most plenary revenge. I seized Bernardo, stamped and bawled to him to be quiet, but still the fool with his damned tongue and violent gestures inflamed them so much, that, losing all distinction, having seized him, they hemmed us in, and drove us backward into the room.

Seeing Bernardo pinioned, with a parcel of swords clashing about and twenty bayonets ready, I expected fully every instant to see him fall with fifty stabs, and pushed forward to the Spaniards, saying, “Prighonera, prighonera,” meaning that they should take him prisoner and not kill him. And perhaps this hint saved him, for they repeated, “Yes, yes, prisoners; all of you prisoners.” Just then Bernardo broke loose, and rushed to us within the room.

Immediately, with loud shouts and execrations, the mob from behind, pushing the mob in front, came tumultuously and blackly towards us, their bayonets thrusting open the door.

I entreated Falls and Tilford to be perfectly quiet and to use no gestures nor loud words, and told Bernardo, with an angry frown, he would be answerable for our lives. He seemed to have found his senses, and to see the madness of his conduct. I then went quietly up to the first rank (we were unarmed) and asked, “What do you want? To murder your friends? Are we not your friends? What do you want?”

Immediately reason seemed to strike one of them, and he pulled off his hat and said, “Yes, sir, we are friends, and we only want you to stay here until the Governor settles the dispute.”

This was breath and blue sky, and I employed the interval in conciliating them as much as possible, and, going close among them, told them we were friends come to help them, that we had the same cause, etc., and how silly it was to make ill blood owing to some foolish mistake.

Still the storm clamoured from without, and through the windows I perceived the street full of furious faces and glistening arms.

At length, however, the calm which I had obtained near me gradually pervaded the others, and we entered into quiet conversation. Still, however, they were bitter against Bernardo, and Tilford wished for the Grenadiers of the 20th, if he could get them.

In the beginning of the fray our excellent little Alcalde (Mayor) had been very active and bold, and pushed the fellows out of the room with many a crack; but when Bernardo put them in such a fury, he was fairly jostled to the outside, and could not get to us again until the calm reached him from within.

He then settled the matter by taking Tilford, against whom the offence was, into his own house. Bernardo made very handsome apologies, which were accepted with good heart, and I went home very thankful that the thing had ended as it did, and gave Mr. Bernardo very cogent hints respecting the gallant fire he had so perniciously displayed.

The cause of the foolish affair was the spite of the beastly master of the house because Tilford had come to join Falls in his billet, and he had lyingly persuaded the patrole that he had insulted his wife.

_November 7._--I find that last night when Bernardo had followed me the dangerous fellow had concealed the Alcalde’s long toledo under his cloak, and made a thrust at one man, but the sword luckily only passed through his coat.

The General after breakfast complains to the assembled authorities of the town that the men are not received with sufficient friendship, and that it may have a bad effect on the minds of the soldiers. The 20th Regiment marches to Zarza, and Colonel Beckwith with the 95th marches in.

The Benedictine church is extremely fine inside; the bare stone in Gothic arches extremely grand. We view the bridge. Nothing can exceed it. Its venerable air, as well as the inscription over the triumphal arch, declare its structure of antiquity. It was built by the Emperor Trajan, and is about 150 feet high, stretching from mountain to mountain. The stones are immense, and of nearly equal size, with all the roundness of time’s rubbing. Standing on the bed of the river and catching the wild mountains through the enormous arches, it appears like the Bridge of Sin and Death striding over chaos. The piers seem to have been exceedingly well clamped, and there is a triumphal arch in the centre of the bridge. I should think it as fine and perfect a Roman relique as any that exists, and being in this country it involves a number of inferences very interesting to the antiquary and historian. I wish some of them could see it. There is a striking grandeur of rude yet elegant simplicity in this structure which must always have rendered it most imposing; but that very venerable air that the whole has acquired, from each great stone being mouldered by time, until there are wide joints between them, and the whole inexpressible shade cast over it by a thousand years, give it an impression on the mind (while the light clouds dance over the top of the arch) that is not to be described.

ALCANTARA, _November 5, 1808_.

MY EVER DEAREST DAD--The advanced division of the Army under General Paget is now moving onwards by the shortest route towards Burgos from the Alemtejo. The roads along the frontier into the north of Spain by Alcantara, Ciudad Rodrigo, etc., are so bad that all the artillery on the south side or left bank of the Tagus is moving on by the high road to Madrid. The rest will go from Lisbon to Almeida, and so on.

There has been a very irksome interval between the knowledge of our destined entry into Spain and the commencement of the march.

The rainy season appears to have commenced, but I devoutly hope that its effects will not be great before the arrival of this division at Ciudad Rodrigo, from which place I believe the roads are not liable to be broken up by bad weather.

If we get in time upon the theatre of war, the British Army has every reason to be sanguine. I believe there is no man in the Army who is not confident in Sir John Moore. He has under him as generals as fine ardent fellows as ever breathed, and I believe his particular attached friends. Then the troops are the best quality of British troops, which is as much praise as can be given. So if Buonaparte himself with 50,000 Frenchmen of his best bands will please to oppose himself to the British corps of the Allied Army, we can wish no more. I shall take care that you get a line from me as often as is possible.

I rambled a good deal about this part of the country before the division moved, and had some curious adventures. I have been fortunate enough to get an invaluable servant, who is an excellent cook, interpreter, and travelling companion, of tried fidelity and diligence, and more entertaining and conversable on the road than Sancho was with Don Quixote in the same relations and in the same country. I have completed my stud for forty guineas. Two chargers and a baggage pony make my establishment, and in these I have been so fortunate that I would spurn sixty guineas for them, and was offered twenty-five for one that cost me fifteen the other day. However, by the end of the campaign I expect I shall have taken out of them a little of their worth.

It is the greatest comfort to me to be with such a man as General Paget. I consider myself as a part of his suite, and shall be very proud if I gain the esteem of such a noble man.

This morning before we set off from Brozas it was not light, and a man was smoking a little paper cigar in the hall. The General said he should like one of all things, so I asked the man if he had one, and one ready made was produced. There was some embarrassment about which end was to be lighted, and which to be taken into the mouth, so the man seized it very readily to show him the way. I endeavoured to redeem it before it was, as I should have thought, rendered unfit for service by being in the man’s mouth, saying with impatience, “He’s going to put it in his mouth.” “No, now let him alone; never mind,” said the General. “He knows nothing about that sort of thing, you know, and I’d rather do that than offend a fellow.”

It was said in such a natural, quiet, unaffected way as to be quite delightful.

Do let me hear often. I received a letter from dearest Mamsey, which gave me great delight. That Mr. Leckie is a very clever, but rather wild gentleman, who treated me very hospitably at Syracuse. I liked him very much. My friend Lefebure, to my great delight, is in Spain, most creditably employed as a missionary on affairs of very particular importance. The higher his employment is, the more I am sure his energetic mind will do him credit. I have had a very long communicative letter from him. I find he has applied to Lord Chatham for me, among a few others, to assist him in his occupation. I shall send this to headquarters by one of General Paget’s staff, who happens to be going, and hope that it will tell you very soon that I am well and happy.--With greatest love, ever, dearest Dad,

CHARLES.

_November 8._--Start at nine o’clock for Zarza, and arrive about two.

My host is a Spanish gentleman, very civil, and the lady apologises for giving me a tin wash-hand basin, as all the silver ones are buried in the woods on account of the French.

Wait three hours for dinner, and at eight o’clock in comes cold meat.

_November 9._--Get up at half-past four to start for Perales.

Shall be glad when we get to Ciudad Rodrigo and emerge from this miserable part of Spain.

We pass remarkable ridges of mountains and Moorish castles, also through great woods and watery tracts, but no towns, houses, or human beings. Perales six leagues from Zarza.

_November 10._--Rise at four; very dark. Straw makes a good torch. The guide of the 20th Regiment takes them the wrong road. Error soon discovered. Violent rain.

General starts without a guide. I return for one, and by threats get an old postillion. The road by the Puerte desalto de Perales goes marvellously over the very summit of an exceeding high mountain, excessively steep, and much injured by great rain. Looking back, while climbing, I find the view most extensive and well wooded, half obscured by a heavy cloud, whose watery skirts, as they lift, reveal more and more of the landscape; then looking forward, I see a convent resting in a bunch of rare trees on the bosom of the mountain.

Here was formed a vast abrupt vale, in which better than ever before I could observe the system of waters as they sever the mountains. Many little runs joining, form a larger one, many of these again join, and amass a larger course, which forms a ravine; these ravines, falling into the same bottom, wear a torrent, these torrents brooks, and brooks rivers, and rivers a great river. All this lay with the most interesting development before the eye; but soon, ascending higher, I reached the clouds, and could see nothing but a circle of two yards round me, the bleak, rocky, wretched road, with a black hill on one side, and a precipice on the other, both lost in the impenetrable clouds, and what one could see of them covered with the stumps of heath, which, having been burnt, were quite black, and this, added to the excessive cold, made me feel as if I were travelling on the bare outside of the world, bordered by the chaotic beginning of things.

Soon after, without descending much, one enters a vast oak wood, which continues even to Penaparda, a miserable village. Wait with the postillion at the Alcalde’s house. The General arrives an hour afterwards. Proceed to Gainaldo, a noble city compared to Penaparda. Get good billets, and a happy family by a kitchen fire make me a welcome guest. Go to bed betimes.

_November 11._--Gainaldo; halt to-day. This place is two leagues from Penaparda, six from Perales. The happy family now sitting at dinner before me by a good fire. Three fine brats have a little table and a little pot of porridge apiece. There is besides a beautiful omelet. The man and his wife and mother at another table.

The right wing of the 20th Regiment marches into the town. Ride my pony, _restivissimo_! Sentence him to an immediate hard gallop, and further to carry his master to Ciudad Rodrigo to-morrow.

_November 12._--Breakfast at five; start at seven, I on my pony, which starts very docilely to-day. The ground about this place is open and cultivated. Slight hills and enclosures. Part of the ride put me in mind of that part of the walk to Ollerton where there is a sandy hollow and a steep bit of the road. Fine morning, but the huge mountains threaten rain, which attacks us a short league from Ciudad Rodrigo, with sufficient spirit to wet us through completely. On our arrival we meet some officers of the 50th and 28th, and Colonel Ronch conducts the General to his quarters.

I get to a priest’s house, who makes a good palaver; but on seeing my little dungeon-room I sink under the weight of my afflictions. So after taking a glass of Malaga I sally forth, and get an excellent billet with a watchmaker. I intend to tell the priest that I am very fond of him, but detest his apartments.

Sir John Moore left this morning, without baggage, for Salamanca.

_November 13._--Read papers, and see a great many old acquaintances, and on returning to the house find Engineers’ horses at my door--Fletcher, Burgoyne, and Mulcaster. We call on General Paget, who asks us all to dinner.

Ciudad Rodrigo, a walled handsome town, standing on the river Agueda, which runs beneath.

_November 15._--Go on miserable beasts, with Stewart, to Almeida, within six leagues of this place, and arrive at dark, getting horrid dirty billets.

_November 16._--In the morning I go with Wilmot round the hexagonal works of Almeida, and also to Fort Conception. The angles of the flank and the ravelin of one front blown up by the French.