ar line. It was contrary
to his wish to compromise any club. The confiscated cargo was the last
he had intended delivering, but he told me with a smile that ten
thousand stand of rifles had already found their way to Vera. There was
no legitimate explanation of the capture of the hare by the tortoise,
although Travers was prepared to swear he was in French waters--he
thought he was, no doubt--but he was just on the wrong side of the
limit. There was one comfort. On the way to Bayonne a boat-load of men
had been landed at Socoa on leave, amongst them the Basque pilot, who
might otherwise have been helped to a short shrift, and the dog's death
from a yard-arm.

Carlist sympathizers endeavoured to procure me a conveyance to Irun, but
nobody cared to affront the loss of horses, for Belcha's band
requisitioned the cattle even of those identical in political
feeling--the good of the cause was their plea--so at last I was forced
to say I should be glad of a trap to Los Pasages, a few miles off,
whence I might be able to go forward on foot.

While I was waiting for the arrival of the vehicle, and reading _El
Diario_, the local daily paper--a sheet the size of the palm of one's
hand--until I had the contents by rote, an incident occurred to beguile
suspense. The vanguard of the corps of Sanchez Bregua, the commander of
the Republican Army of the North, rode into the city. They had come from
Zarauz, a seaside village four leagues away--a section of mounted
Chasseurs in a uniform like to that of the old British Light Dragoons.
The troopers were in campaign order, with rifled carbines slung over
their backs, pugarees hanging from their shakoes over their necks, and
were dust-covered and sunburnt, but soldierly. They were horsed
unevenly, and for light cavalry carried too great a burden. But that is
not a fault peculiar to Spanish light cavalry. The average weight of the
British Hussar equipped is eighteen stone. A quarter of an hour later
the main body came in sight, a long column of infantry marching by
fours. It was headed by a party of Civil Guards, acting as guides. As
the column reached the open space by the quay, it deployed into line of
companies, a movement capitally executed. The men were bigger and
tougher than those of the French Line. Their uniform was similar, except
that they had wings to their capotes instead of worsted epaulettes. All
wore mountain-shoes, but were not hampered with tenting equipage on
their knapsa