In the afternoon we followed the stream and drove to Biarritz. A succession of vehicles of every kind, crowded with passengers, gave strong evidence of the attractions either of the place or else of the Emperor and Empress, who had been there for a week or two; and the mob of extravagantly dressed ladies, French and English, who thronged the bathing-places and the sandy plain in front of the Villa Eugénie, accounted for the enormous black boxes under which all the vehicles seemed to groan. The view from the cliffs on the western side of Biarritz is strikingly beautiful, embracing as it does the long range of the Pyrenees descending to the sea in a grand mass above Fuenterrabia, and prolonged as far as the eye could reach along the coast of Biscay. The next morning we left Bayonne at four o’clock for Burgos. We had seats in the coupé, the occupants of the berlina on this journey being a son of Queen Christina, with his bride. In Spain every one seems to travel by the diligence; you seldom meet a private carriage; there are no posting arrangements; and owing to the way in which the diligences on the great roads are crowded, it is very difficult indeed to stop on the road without running great risk of indefinite delays in getting places again. The drive was very charming. The sun rose before we reached St. Jean de Luz,[6] and we enjoyed to the full the lovely scenery. Crossing the Bidassoa at Irun, the famous Ile de Faisans was seen--a mere stony bank in the middle of the stream, recently walled round and adorned with a sort of monument--and then ensued a delay of an hour whilst our luggage was examined and _plombé_ in order that it might pass out of Guipuzcoa into Castile without a second examination.