On the 26th Soult putting his left wing on Cole’s track, ordered Reille to follow the crest of the mountains and seize the passes from the Bastan in Hill’s rear, while D’Erlon pressed him in front. Hill would thus, Soult hoped, be crushed or thrown off from Pampeluna, and D’Erlon could thus reach the valley of Zubiri with his left, while his right, descending the valley of Lanz, would hinder Picton from joining Cole. A retreat by those generals, on separate lines, would then be inevitable, and the French army could issue in a compact order of battle from the mouths of the two valleys against Pampeluna. COMBAT OF LINZOAIN. (July, 1813.) All the columns were in movement at daybreak, but every hour brought its obstacle. The fog still hung heavy on the mountain-tops. Reille’s guides were bewildered, refused to lead the troops along the crests, and at ten o’clock, having no other resource, he marched down the Mendichuri pass and fell into the rear of Soult’s column, the head of which, though retarded also by the fog and rough ground, had overtaken Cole’s rear-guard. The leading infantry struck hotly upon some British light companies under Colonel Wilson, while a squadron, passing their flank, fell on the rear; but Wilson, facing about, drove them off, and thus fighting Cole reached the heights of Linzoain. There Picton met him, with intelligence that Campbell had reached Eugui in the Val de Zubiri, and that the third division, having crossed the woody ridge, was also in that valley. The junction of all was thus secured, the loss of the day was less than two hundred, and neither wounded men nor baggage had been left behind; but at four o’clock the French seized some heights which endangered Cole’s position, and he again fell back a mile, offering battle at a puerto, in the ridge separating the valley of Zubiri from that of Urros, which last, though descending on a parallel line, did not open on Pampeluna. During this skirmish, Campbell, coming from Eugui, showed his Portuguese on the ridge above the French right flank; he was however distant, Picton’s troops were still further off, and there was light for an action if Soult had pressed one; but, disturbed with intelligence received from D’Erlon, and doubtful what Campbell’s troops might be, he put off the attack until next morning, and after dark the junction of all the allies was effected.