destroying of toll-bars! I think that was the most foolish and diabolical action ever any person in our country was guilty of. But, besides the state of the roads, we had three rivers to cross before we could reach the French. However, we did cross them. General Picton, with the third division of the army, crossed or forded what they call the _Cave de Pau_ on the 26th of last month, and we got over the river on the following day. Our army completed their positions early in the afternoon, and Lord Wellington (for he is a prompt man) immediately began to give Soult notice that he must seek different quarters for the night. Well, the action began, and a dreadful and sanguinary battle it was. Our third division suffered terribly. But we drove the French from their heights--we routed them. We thus obtained possession of the navigation of the Adour, one of the principal commercial passages in France; and Soult found there was nothing left but to retreat, as he best might, to Toulouse (from whence I write this letter), and there we followed him; and from here, too, though after hard fighting, we forced him to run for it. You may say what you like, father, but Lord Wellington is a first-rate general--though none of us over-and-above like him, for he is terribly severe; he is a disciplinarian, soul and body of him, and a rigid one. We have beaten all Bonaparte's generals; and I should like to meet with him, just to see if we can beat him too. You used to talk so much about him, that if I live to get to Paris, I shall see him, though I give a shilling for it. What I mean by that is, that I think the game is up with him; and four or five Irish soldiers, of my acquaintance, have thought it an excellent speculation to club together, and to offer the Emperor Alexander and the rest of them (who, I daresay, will be very glad to get rid of him on cheap terms), a price for him, and to bring him over to Britain, and exhibit him round the country at so much a-head----" "Oh depravity!--depravity!" cried James, rising in a fury, and flinging the letter from him. "Oh, that a bairn o' mine should be capable o' pennin sic disgracefu language!" He would allow no more of the letter to be read--he said his son had turned a mere reprobate; he would never own him more.