"No, no," said I; "you go with us."
By this time he was decidedly in a fidget, and began to hang behind. Just then we came suddenly to a lane, branching off to the right. This was probably the very direction he had wished me to take; though whether it really led to a ford over the Adour, or to what it led, was a different question. Before I was aware of his design, he turned sharp in that direction; and, when I looked after him, he was already some distance down the lane, digging his heels into the old poster's sides. This operation had put the gay old stager into something as much like a gallop as you can hope to get out of a French post-horse. He was off! Ah! our cavalry had left us too soon. I looked round, and shouted "Fraser!"
Fraser, prepared for my order, and anxious to have all ready for executing it, had three men marching at hand, with loaded firelocks. Three balls whistled down the lane. But it was a waste of his Majesty's powder and shot; the fugitive escaped unhurt. Not so, though, the lively old post-horse. His screwed tail, his stradding hind-legs, and his action – for a moment prancing, not progressive – gave evident indications that the luckless beast had not got off so easily as his rider. Then, in an agony of apprehension lest his scutcheon should receive a second totem, he plunged forward again at his previous rate, and soon disappeared down the lane. Pursuit was out of the question, for Sancho's best pace was an up-and-down; even a French horse was too fast for a French pony: so both horse and horseman got off.
My first care, on reaching headquarters, was to make inquiry respecting this new member of our department. You will hardly need to be informed, that there was no such person belonging to us. The only question was, how did he get the uniform coat? It certainly was not that of the corresponding department of the French service, which not only rejoiced in the appropriate embellishment of a key embroidered on the collar, but differed in other respects from ours. Some said he must have procured the coat at Lisbon. Some said he had got it made for the occasion. A gentleman of the Commissariat suggested that he had picked up a coat at headquarters, cast off when some of us had been promoted. But the worst of it was, our department couldn't recollect when any such cheering event had taken place.
As both Hookey, and this more recent adviser, strenuously insisted on our proceeding to headquarters by the country to the south-east of the Adour, and as Hookey particularly inculcated the duty and necessity of our passing through Hagetmau, which lies a few miles to the south of St Sever, it is curious to discover, at this interval of time, that the very neighbourhood indicated by these two talented individuals as offering us the best route, was precisely the most unsafe. I reached headquarters on the 17th of March. The next day the Commander-in-Chief (vide Gurwood) writes to Sir J. Hope, – "I use the cipher, because I understand the enemy were at Hagetmau yesterday." That's just where we should have been on the same day, had I followed Hookey's advice; so that we should have walked right into them; and that, no doubt, was what Hookey intended. But further, by a letter from the Commander-in-Chief to the Mayor of Hagetmau, dated 21st March, we learn that, on the 18th, there was in that place an affair of partisans. It was, therefore, a very eligible neighbourhood to which our two friends wished to introduce us.
When I reached headquarters at Aire with the convoy and escort, a forward movement of the troops appeared to have already commenced. Firing was heard at hand; and the operation was attended with rather more noise than those in which we were engaged the day before. A great army advancing upon the enemy, like the chariot of Jove, cannot move without thunder. I know not how far the arrival of the treasure which we brought up contributed to this movement. Suffice it to say, I find our Commander-in-Chief writing to Sir J. Hope, March 18 – "I waited quietly till all my means coming up were arrived, and I am now moving upon them in earnest." Ah, Hookey! you played great stakes, and a deep game, too. But it wouldn't do.
The hour of my arrival, though, was signalised by that event, of all others, which men chronicle as the most important of their lives – an interview with a great man. In my case, it was a very great man. To be sure, he didn't speak to me. But what does that signify? I spoke to him. On arriving with the treasure at the office of our own department, I was directed to go forthwith and report myself at the office of the Quartermaster-General. I went, and found it in a very humble mansion. On entering the passage, found a door to the right, where I was desired to go in. Saw a long table by the window, with two or three officers writing. Before the fire stood ANOTHER. He was drenched with rain; all in a steam, like a hot potato; lost in thought; looked awful; a middle-aged and remarkably well-built man, with a striking – nay, more than striking – with a particular expression of countenance; such a face as I had never seen before; a very keen eye – the eagle's, that can look at the sun, would have quailed before his; and oh, what a beak! I felt rather at a loss. No one did me the honour to notice my entrée. No one took any notice; no one vouchsafed me a look! I stood, for a moment, in silence. As all the others were hard at work, and one was doing nothing, I of course concluded that he was the Head of the Department; and, with crude atrocity, addressed him – though with a queer kind of feeling, which I myself didn't exactly understand – "Are you the Quartermaster-General, sir?"
No reply on his part – no look, no movement of the head, no change of countenance! He merely raised his arm, and pointed to the table. By that act alone he indicated a consciousness of being spoken to; and had he, the next moment, been called upon to describe the speaker, why, I firmly believe he couldn't have done it. I then turned towards the table. One of the writers rose from his seat in silence, walked me out into the passage, made an inquiry or two, and walked in again.
The next day I was once more on the march, riding side by side with a brother clerk. "There he is!" said he. I now beheld, on horseback – a regular centaur, part of his horse – that same distinguished individual whom, the day before, I had so unceremoniously addressed, as he stood reeking before the fire, while great guns were banging right and left, the troops advancing, and he at the best of all possible points to direct and control the vast machinery that he had set in motion.
Life at headquarters proved to be much what I had anticipated. In attending the movements of the army, we officials had sometimes very little work; sometimes, especially when the troops remained a few days stationary, a great deal. While they moved from day to day, we seldom had much to do but to follow them, and make ourselves as comfortable as we could at the end of the day's march. The military movements from Aire to Toulouse were curious. From Aire we went right down to the south, as far as Tarbes and Vic Bigorre – a course which almost brought us back again to the Spanish frontier and the foot of the Pyrenees; then up again to the Garonne and Toulouse. A sailor would have called it tacking. Of course, one could not follow even an advancing and victorious army without undergoing some hardships. On one occasion, after much previous fatigue, in passing a wild and mountainous district, we were suddenly overtaken by a snow-storm. While nodding on Sancho's back from sheer exhaustion, I was caked on the left, from head to foot, with snow, which first began to melt with the warmth of the body, then froze hard with the keenness of the wind. The next moment the sun blazed forth, to the right, with scorching heat. Thus roasted on one side, and frozen on the other, I dozed and nodded on, with just sufficient consciousness to form virtuous resolutions of knocking off the snow, but without sufficient energy to carry them into effect. After all, though, a civilian following the army, supplied pretty regularly with rations for himself, pony, and servant – tolerably sure, too, of a good billet at night, and generally provided with a few dollars, easily convertible into francs – has no business to talk of hardships. The real hardships of a campaign fall on the marching officers and privates. What they endure is past conception. Gingham and I were much together, and carried out our plan of campaigning in company as far as circumstances would allow. At headquarters, also, I fell in again with my old acquaintance and fellow-voyager, Mr Commissary Capsicum, who gloried in giving good dinners. He was never better pleased than when I accepted his invitations, but always gave me a good blowing-up if I dined with Gingham in preference.
Amongst all my reminiscences of campaigning, none are more vividly impressed upon my mind, than the reminiscence of a campaigning appetite, which I am persuaded is altogether extraordinary, and a thing per se. Did you ever visit Cintra? Now there's the Cintra appetite, and a very good one it is, too. This, also, has its distinguishing feature – namely, that on the one hand, while you are riding about (or, if