Note 258 — PASSAGE OF THE BIDASSAO.

“The cattle brought for the consumption of the troops through a great part of Spain, arrived in a jaded and lean condition—those who lived to reach the place of slaughter—for the roads along which they had been driven might easily be traced by their numerous carcasses, lying half-buried or unburied by the way-side—sad proofs of the wasteful inhumanity of war! The weather had been more stormy than was usual even on that coast and at that season. The transports at Passages were moored stem and stem in rows, and strongly confined by their moorings; yet they were considered in danger even in that land-locked harbour: some were driven forward by the rising of the swell, while others, close alongside, were forced backwards by its fall, so that the bowsprits of some were entangled in the mizen-chains of others. The cold on the mountains was so intense, that several men perished. A picket in the neighbourhood of Roncesvalles was snowed up: the parties who were sent to rescue it drove bullocks before them as some precaution against the danger of falling into chasms, and the men were brought off; but the guns could not be removed, and were buried under the snow in the ditch of the redoubt.”—Southey.