He designed this operation for the middle of September, immediately after the castle of San Sebastian fell and before the French works acquired strength, but some error retarded the arrival of his pontoons, the weather became bad, and the attack, which depended as we shall find upon the state of the tides and fords, was of necessity deferred until the 7th of October. Meanwhile to mislead Soult, to ascertain Foy’s true position about St. Jean Pied de Port, and to strengthen his own right, he brought part of Del Parque’s force up from Tudela to Pampeluna. The Andalusian division which had remained at the blockade after the battle of Sauroren then rejoined Giron at Echallar, and at the same time Mina’s troops gathered in the neighbourhood of Roncesvalles. Wellington himself repaired to that quarter on the 1st of October, and in his way, passing through the Alduides, he caused general Campbell to surprize some isolated posts on the rock of Airola, a French scouting detachment was also cut off near the foundry of Baygorry, and two thousand sheep were swept from the valley. [Sidenote: Soult’s Official Correspondence, MSS.] These affairs awaked Soult’s jealousy. He was in daily expectation of an attack without being able to ascertain on what quarter the blow would fall, and at first, deceived by false information that the fourth division had reinforced Hill, he thought the march of Mina’s troops and the Andalusians was intended to mask an offensive movement by the Val de Baygorry. The arrival of light cavalry in the Bastan, lord Wellington’s presence at Roncesvalles, and the loss of the post at Airola seemed to confirm this; but he knew the pontoons were at Oyarzun, and some deserters told him that the real object of the allies was to gain the great Rhune. On the other hand a French commissary, taken at San Sebastian and exchanged after remaining twelve days at Lesaca, assured him, that nothing at Wellington’s head-quarters indicated a serious attack, although the officers spoke of one and there were many movements of troops; and this weighed much with the French general, because the slow march of the pontoons and the wet weather had caused a delay contradictory to the reports of the spies and deserters. It was also beyond calculation that Wellington should, against his military judgment, push his left wing into France merely to meet the wishes of the allied sovereigns in Germany, and as the most obvious line for a permanent invasion was by his right and centre, there was no apparent cause for deferring his operations.