The loss of the allies since crossing the Nive had exceeded 5,000; that of the French was 6,000, besides 2,400 Germans who deserted to the British during the night of the 9th in obedience to orders from home. Ever since he assumed the command Soult had shown military ability of a rare order. Bayonne, the base of all his operations, was indefensible before he fortified it. A great proportion of his troops were raw conscripts, or demoralised by defeat, before he inspired them with his own courage and vigour. He was practically dependent for subsistence in his own country on the very system of pillage which had roused a patriotic frenzy of resentment in Spain and other lands ravaged by French armies. He now stood at bay in the south of France, as Wellington had so long stood at bay in Portugal, and continued there during the early part of 1814 a defensive campaign not unworthy of comparison with the prodigious exploits of Napoleon himself against the invaders of his eastern provinces. [Pageheading: _THE INVESTMENT OF BAYONNE._] A respite of two months succeeded the battles on the Nive. During this interval Wellington's difficulty in paying his troops was great, owing to the enormous drain of specie from England into Central Europe. He was further embarrassed by the appearance of the Duke of Angoulême, elder son of Charles, Count of Artois, afterwards Charles X., at his headquarters. The British government was by no means committed to a restoration of the Bourbons, and Wellington deprecated the duke's appearance as at least premature. He therefore insisted upon his remaining incognito and as a non-combatant at St. Jean de Luz. Soult was in great straits, not only because he was compelled to "make war support war" by exorbitant requisitions upon the French peasantry, but also because the exigencies of Napoleon were such that large drafts of the best troops were drawn from the army of the south. When hostilities were resumed in the middle of February, 1814, the Anglo-Portuguese and Spanish force combined outnumbered the French by nearly five to three, but Soult retained the decisive advantage of having a strong _point d'appui_ in Bayonne at the confluence of the Nive and Adour. Careful preparations were made by Wellington for throwing a large force across the Lower Adour below Bayonne, in concert with a British fleet. Contrary winds and a violent surf delayed the arrival of the British gunboats, but on February 23 Hope sent over a body of his men on a raft of pontoons in the face of the enemy's flotilla, with the aid of a brigade armed with Congreve rockets, which had been first used at Leipzig, and produced the utmost consternation in the French ranks. The gunboats soon followed, but with the loss of one wrecked and others stranded in crossing the bar. By the joint exertions of soldiers and sailors a bridge was then constructed, by which Hope's entire army with artillery passed over the river, and, two days afterwards, began the investment of