[Sidenote: Plans 5 and 6.] D’Erlon’s advanced camps were near Urdax, and on the Mondarain and Choupera mountains, but his main position was a broad ridge behind Ainhoa, the right covering the bridge of Amotz. Beyond that bridge Clauzel’s position extended along a range of strong hills, trending towards Ascain and Serres, and as the Nivelle swept with a curve quite round his rear his right flank rested on that river also. The redoubts of San Barbe and the camp of Sarre, barring the roads leading from Vera and the Puerto de Echallar, were in advance of his left, and the greater Rhune, whose bare rocky head lifted two thousand eight hundred feet above the sea level overtopped all the neighbouring mountains, formed, in conjunction with its dependants the Commissary and Bayonette, a mask for his right. From the Bayonette the French position run along the summit of the Mandale or Sulcogain mountain, on a single line, but from thence to the sea the ridges suddenly abated and there were two lines of defence; the first along the Bidassoa, the second commencing near St. Jean de Luz stretched from the heights of Bordegain towards Ascain, having the camps of Urogne and the Sans Culottes in advance. Reille’s divisions guarded these lines, and the second was connected with Clauzel’s position by Villatte’s reserve which was posted at Ascain. Finally the whole system of defence was tied to that of St. Jean Pied de Port, by the double bridge-head at Cambo which secured the junction of Foy with the rest of the army. The French worked diligently on their entrenchments, yet they were but little advanced when the castle of San Sebastian surrendered, and Wellington had even then matured a plan of attack as daring as any undertaken during the whole war. This was to seize the great Rhune mountain and its dependents, and at the same time to force the passage of the Lower Bidassoa and establish his left wing in the French territory. He would thus bring the Rhune Commissary and Bayonette mountains, forming a salient menacing point of great altitude and strength towards the French centre, within his own system, and shorten his communications by gaining the command of the road running along the river from Irun to Vera. Thus also he would obtain the port of Fuentarabia, which, though bad in winter, was some advantage to a general whose supplies came from the ocean, and who with scanty means of land-transport had to encounter the perverse negligence and even opposition of the Spanish authorities. Moreover Passages, his nearest port, was restricted in its anchorage-ground, hard to make from the sea and dangerous when full of vessels. [Sidenote: October.] [Sidenote: Foy’s report to Soult, 2d October, MSS.]