1804.] Trip from Bayonne, in France, to St. Sebaftian, in Spain. 111 
moft ambition was, by the exeicife of his 
numerous talents, to recommend himfelf 
to the paffing ftranger, and fo procure an 
extra prefent at his hands. 
After a very comfortable dinner at 
Ainhoué, we mounted our mules, and 
proceeded towards Spain: but before we 
departed, an incident took place, which 
powertully marked the ancient and deep- 
rooted prejudices fubfifting in the minds 
of the natives of both kingdoms againft 
each other. 
We had been fo haraffed in Bayonne, 
by all-defcriptions of perfons, with end- 
Jefs tales of the robberies and murders, 
not to mention other outrages certainly 
awaiting us, from the inftant we entered 
Spain, that although we could not be 
prevailed on to renounce our project of 
vifiting that moft interefting peninfula, 
we fuffered our complaifance {fo far to get 
the better of our own opinions as to pro- 
vide ourfelves with two pair of piftols, 
powder, and balls. 
Thefe piftols had not hitherto been 
loaded; but, after dinner, while we were 
bufy charging them, and making due 
preparations for our defence, when we 
thould have entered the Spanifh territory, 
the owner of our mules, whom we after- 
wards difcovered, on this and feveral 
other journies, in which we employed 
him, to be, as he had been reported tous, 
a man of fenfe and refpectable charaéter, 
as well as of fubftance in his line—our 
mule-mafter came to inform us that he 
was ready to proceed. No fooner did he 
enter our chamber and difcover our em- 
ployment, than he changed colour, and 
with every mark of the utmoft con- 
cern and mortification, faid, in tolerable 
French, ‘* Gentlemen, do you know what 
you are doing? -Do you confider that 
in ten minutes you will be in my country, 
where you will be out of the hards of 
thefe ... . Frenchmen, and be as fafe 
as if you were at home by your own fire- 
fide?” We inflantly put up our pittols 
in the trunks, and never once, in the 
courfe of ten months that we travelled in 
Spain, recolleéted that we had fuch in- 
ftruments in our poffeffion. Our ready 
confidence in this honett Ba/gue, for he 
was of this part of the country, gained 
us a place in his good will, of which we 
had on other occafions unequivocal proofs. 
But to return to our journey, we left Ain- 
houé, and going down a long defcent, 
came to a {mall river, the Nivelle, which 
runs north-welterly, and falls into the Bay 
of Bifcay, at St. John de Luz. 
On this ftream is a ftone bridge of one 
arch, and in the middle of the parapet is 
a pillar, with the arms of France on the 
north and thofe of Spain on the fouth fide, 
ferving to point out the limit between the 
two kingdoms, A few fteps on this bridge 
carried us out of France into Spain, eX- 
citing a crowd of fenfations which, in 
order to be conceived, mui be felt, for 
they cannot be deicribed. 
We continued our journey for about 
a league (or rather an hour, travelling in 
Spain being more commonly meafured by 
the time employed in paffing from one 
place to another, than by the abfolute 
diftance between them) through vales, 
feparating beautiful conical hills, covered 
with fine verdure to the top, and having: 
trees negligently fcattered over their 
flopes, fometimes fingle, and at others in 
irregular clumps. ‘The fummits are ge- 
nerally covered with a cottage, a chapel, © 
or a hermitage. - 
At length we approached the foot of 
a broad high mountain, extended like a 
curtain before us, and feeming to bar our 
future progrefs. Clofe under it lies a 
convent of Benedi€tines, with a village 
called Urdaix, which gives its name to 
the mountain behind it. On entering 
this village, fome officers of the revenue 
civilly accofted us, enquirmg whether or 
not we had in our pofleffion any articles 
contraband. On our an{wering in the ne~- 
gative, and on an explanation from our 
muleteer, in which the word Inglefes (Eng- 
lifhmen) was more than once pronounced, 
thefe officers prefented to us fome good 
Arragon wine, wifhed us a good journey, 
and allowed us to depart, without in- 
fpecting our baggage or our paflport, 
afking or feeming to expeét any gratuity, 
or giving us any interruption whatever. 
We now began to mount what is call- 
ed the Puerto, or Pals of Urdaix, or of 
Maya, from a village on the oppofite 
fide. 
Puerto in Spanifh and port in French, 
are terms univerfally ufed all along the 
Pyrenees, to denote the loweft parts of 
their ridges, over which roads have been 
found or made praéticable, between the 
two kingdoms. Of thefe, two have been 
rendered fit for carriages; cone on the 
great road from Bayonne, by Tolofa, to 
Maarid, on which, in 1788, a ftagescoach, 
drawn with mules, was eitablifhed, and 
croffing the centre of the Pyrenees forty 
miles to the weftward of Urdaix; the 
other, near the eaftern extremity of the 
Pyrenees, on the road from Narbonne to 
Barcelona, basa 
All the other puertos are acceffible to 
Qz muleg 
