THK FAT BRIGAND. 149 



most extraordinary race; brave as it is possible to imagine, and 

 capable of enduring every sort of privation and fatigue, but quite 

 ignorant of all the rules and customs of war. They submitted to no 

 authority but their own immediate chief, and recognized no law but 

 his will. 



Among these mountain chiefs the one most distinguished for his 

 daring bravery and hatred of the French, was a short fat man, as big 

 round as the capstan of a line of battle ship, who went by the name 

 of the " Brigand Gross," from his enormous size, which, however, 

 did not in the least impede his activity, for I have seen him run 

 almost as fast as an antelope. He was a man of the greatest personal 

 courage, and shewed more natural talents in his military arrange- 

 ments than many from whom much more might have been expected; 

 but he could neither read nor write, and was obliged to employ a 

 priest as his secretary when it was necessary to have recourse to pen 

 and ink. He fixed his head-quarters in an old castle among the 

 Pyrenees, where he had collected a strong force of able bodied 

 peasants of determined bravery, who were ready to lay down their 

 lives at his command. This man had been a rich farmer, living in a 

 quiet simple manner in a small village among the Pyrenees on the 

 confines of France, when the invasion of Spain brought a division of 

 the French army to his peaceful abode. They sacked his dwelling, 

 took away or destroyed his cattle, polluted his wife and two sisters, 

 and then set fire to his houses and barns. His wife, then far gone 

 with child, died in his arms : his sisters did not long survive ; and 

 his people were many of them killed or wounded in defending their 

 master's property. All was gone ! all hopes of happiness were de- 

 stroyed, and this outraged man took a dreadful oath over the smoking 

 ruins of his home, never while he existed to spare a Frenchman's 

 life ; and most tremendously did the Brigand Gross keep his word ! 

 He buried his wife and the child, to which she had prematurely given 

 birth, bade farewell to his once happy home, and accompanied by the 

 only survivor of his family, who happened also to be the pastor of 

 the village, he devoted his whole soul to the cause he had embraced, 

 and thought of nothing but the fulfilment of his oath. He soon 

 found plenty of followers to second his wishes, who had equal cause 

 of hatred to the French ; and from his lofty tower he would some- 

 times pour down upon their small garrisons in resistless force, plant 

 ambuscades for the destruction of their convoys, or occupying the 

 strong passes in the mountains, drive them down to the sea-side, 

 where he knew they must encounter our broadsides. His informa- 

 tion was always the best : not a Frenchman could stir without his 

 being aware of it ; he seemed endowed with ubiquity ; and if the 

 French, irritated by his petty successes, went in pursuit of him, he 

 was never to be found. Sometimes they surrounded him, as they 

 thought, on all sides, when he always baffled the pursuit by dis- 

 persing his followers, and appointing a rendezvous some twenty 

 miles off, so that when they closed upon him, sure of their prey, they 

 found nothing, and heard of his being in full force somewhere else. 

 In all these plans he was greatly assisted by his late pastor, who sup- 

 plied his literary deficiencies, and seemed to have so far changed his 



