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Title: Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places

Author: Archibald Forbes

Release Date: December, 2005 [EBook #9460]
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CAMPS, QUARTERS AND CASUAL PLACES

BY ARCHIBALD FORBES, LL.D.




NOTE

My obligations for permission to incorporate some of the articles in this
volume are due to Messrs. George Routledge and Sons, Mr. James Knowles of
the _Nineteenth Century_, Mr. Percy Bunting of the _Contemporary Review_,
and the Proprietor of _McClure's Magazine_.

LONDON, _June_ 1896.




CONTENTS


1. MATRIMONY UNDER FIRE

2. REVERENCING THE GOLDEN FEET

3. GERMAN WAR PRAYERS

4. MISS PRIEST'S BRIDECAKE

5. A VERSION OF BALACLAVA

6. HOW I "SAVED FRANCE"

7. CHRISTMAS IN A CAVALRY REGIMENT

8. THE MYSTERY OF MONSIEUR REGNIER

9. RAILWAY LIZZ

10. MY NATIVE SALMON RIVER

11. THE CAWNPORE OF TO-DAY

12. BISMARCK BEFORE AND DURING THE FRANCO-GERMAN WAR

13. THE INVERNESS "CHARACTER" FAIR

14. THE WARFARE OF THE FUTURE

15. GEORGE MARTELL'S BANDOBAST

16. THE LUCKNOW OF TO-DAY

17. THE MILITARY COURAGE OF ROYALTY

18. PARADE OF THE COMMISSIONAIRES

19. THE INNER HISTORY OF THE WATERLOO CAMPAIGN




MATRIMONY UNDER FIRE


The interval between the declaration of the Franco-German war of 1870-71,
and the "military promenade," at which the poor Prince Imperial received
his "baptism of fire," was a pleasant, lazy time at Saarbruecken; to which
pretty frontier town I had early betaken myself, in the anticipation,
which proved well founded, that the tide of war would flow that way first.
What a pity it is that all war cannot be like this early phase of it, of
which I speak! It was playing at warfare, with just enough of the grim
reality cropping up occasionally, to give the zest which the reckless
Frenchwoman declared was added to a pleasure by its being also a sin. The
officers of the Hohenzollerns--our only infantry regiment in garrison--
drank their beer placidly under the lime-tree in the market-place, as
their men smoked drowsily, lying among the straw behind the stacked arms
ready for use at a moment's notice. The infantry patrol skirted the
frontier line every morning in the gray dawn, occasionally exchanging with
little result a few shots with the French outposts on the Spicheren or
down in the valley bounded by the Schoenecken wood. The Uhlans, their
piebald lance-pennants fluttering in the wind, cantered leisurely round
the crests of the little knolls which formed the vedette posts, despising
mightily the straggling chassepot bullets which were pitched at them from
time to time in a desultory way; but which, desultory as they were, now
and then brought lance-pennant and its bearer to the ground--an occurrence
invariably followed by a little spurt of lively hostility.

I had my quarters at the Rheinischer Hof, a right comfortable hotel on the
St. Johann side of the Saar, where most of the Hohenzollern officers
frequented the _table d'hote_ and where quaint little Max, the drollest
imp of a waiter imaginable, and pretty Frauelein Sophie the landlord's
niece, did all that in them lay to contribute to the pleasantness and
comfort of the house. Not a few pleasant evenings did I spend at the table
of the long dining-room, with the close-cropped red head of silent and
genial Hauptmann von Krehl looming large over the great ice-pail, with its
_chevaux de frise_ of long-necked Niersteiner bottles--the worthy
Hauptmann supported by blithe Lieutenant von Klipphausen, ever ready with
the _Wacht am Rhein_; quaint Dr. Diestelkamp, brimful of recollections of
"six-and-sixty" and as ready to amputate your leg as to crack a joke or
clink a glass; gay young Adjutant von Zuelow--he who one day brought in a
prisoner from the foreposts a red-legged Frenchman across the pommel of
his saddle; and many other good fellows, over most of whom the turf of the
Spicheren, or the brown earth of the Gravelotte plain, now lies lightly.

But although the Rheinischer Hof associates itself in my mind with many
memories, half-pleasant, half-sad, it was not the most accustomed haunt of
the casuals in Saarbruecken, including myself. Of the waifs and strays
which the war had drifted down to the pretty frontier town the great
rendezvous was the Hotel Hagen, at the bend of the turn leading from the
bridge up to the railway station. The Hagen was a free-and-easy place
compared with the Rheinischer, and among its inmates there was no one who
could sing a better song than manly George--type of the Briton at whom
foreigners stare--who, ignorant of a word of their language, wholly
unprovided with any authorisation save the passport signed "Salisbury,"
and having not quite so much business at the seat of war as he might have
at the bottom of a coal-mine, gravitates into danger with inevitable
certainty, and stumbles through all manner of difficulties and bothers by
reason of a serene good-humour that nothing can ruffle and a cool
resolution before which every obstacle fades away. Was there ever a more
compositely polyglot cosmopolitan than poor young de Liefde--half
Dutchman, half German by birth, an Englishman by adoption, a Frenchman in
temperament, speaking with equal fluency the language of all four
countries, and an unconsidered trifle of some half-dozen European
languages besides? Then there was the English student from Bonn, who had
come down to the front accompanied by a terrible brute of a dog, vast,
shaggy, self-willed, and dirty; an animal which, so to speak, owned his
owner, and was so much the horror and disgust of everybody that on account
of him the company of his master--one of the pleasantest fellows alive--
was the source of general apprehension. There was young Silberer the
many-sided and eccentric, an Austrian nobleman, a Vienna feuilletonist and
correspondent, a rowing man, a gourmet, ever thinking of his stomach and
yet prepared for all the roughness of the campaign--warm-hearted,
passionate, narrow-minded, capable of sleeping for twenty-three out of the
twenty-four hours, and the wearer of a Scotch cap. There was Kuester, a
German journalist with an address somewhere in the Downham Road; and Duff,
a Fellow of ---- College, the strangest mixture of nervousness and cool
courage I ever met.

We were a kind of happy family at the Hagen; the tone of the coterie was
that of the easiest intimacy into which every newcomer slid quite
naturally. Thus when on the 31st July there was a somewhat sensational
arrival, the stolid landlord had not turned the gas on in the empty saal
before everybody knew and sympathised with the errand of the strangers.
The party consisted of a plump little girl of about eighteen with a bonny
round face and fine frank eyes; her sister who was some years older; and a
brother, the eldest of the three. They had come from Silesia on rather a
strange tryst. Little Minna Vogt had for her _Braeutigam_ a young Feldwebel
of the second battalion of the Hohenzollerns, a native of Saarlouis. The
battalion quartered there was under orders to join its first battalion at
Saarbruecken, and young Eckenstein had written to his betrothed to come and
meet him there, that the marriage-knot might be tied before he should go
on a campaign from which he might not return. The arrangement was
certainly a charming one; we should have a wedding in the Hagen! There was
no nonsense about our young _Braut_. She told me the little story at
supper on the night of her arrival in the most matter-of-fact way
possible, drank her two glasses of red wine, and went off serenely to bed
with a dainty lisping _Schlafen Sie wohl!_

While Minna was between the sheets in the pleasant chamber in the Hagen
her lover was lying in bivouac some fifteen miles away. In the afternoon
of the next day his battalion approached Saarbruecken and bivouacked about
two miles from the town. Of course we all went out to welcome it; some
bearing peace-offerings of cigars, others the drink-offering of potent
Schnapps. The Vogt family were left the sole inmates of the Hagen,
delicacy preventing their accompanying us. The German journalist, however,
had a commission to find out young Eckenstein and tell him of the bliss
that awaited him two short miles away. Right hearty fellows were the
officers of the second battalion--from the grizzled Oberst down to the
smooth-faced junior lieutenant; and the men who had been marching and
bivouacking for a fortnight looked as fresh as if they had not travelled
five miles. Kuester soon found the young Feldwebel; and the Hauptmann of
his company when he heard the state of the case, smiled a grim but kindly
smile, and gave him leave for two days with the proviso, that if any
hostile action should be taken in the interval he should rejoin the
colours immediately and without notice. "No fear of that!" was
Eckenstein's reply with a significant down glance at his sword; and then,
after a cheery "good-night" to the hardy bivouackers, we visitors started
in triumph on our return to the Hagen, the young Feldwebel in our midst It
was good to see the unrestraint with which Minna--she of the apple face
and frank eyes--threw herself round the neck of her betrothed as she met
him on the steps of the Hagen, and his modest manly blush as he returned
the embrace. Ye gods! did not we make a night of it! Stolid Hagen came out
of his shell for once, and swore, _Donner Wetter_ that he would give us a
supper we should remember; and he kept his word. The good old pastor of
the snow-white hair and withered cheeks--he had been engaged to perform
the ceremony of the morrow--we voted into the chair whether he would or
not; and on his right sat Minna and Eckenstein, their arms interlacing and
whispering soft speeches which were not for our ears. The table was
covered with bottles of Blume de Saar, the champagne peculiar of the Hagen;
and the speed with which the full bottles were converted into "dead
marines" was a caution to teetotallers. Then de Liefde the polyglot gave
the health of the happy couple in a felicitous but composite speech, in
which half a dozen languages were impartially intermixed so that all might
understand at least a portion. George the jolly insisted in leading off
the honours with a truly British "three times three;" and that horrible
dog of Hyndman's gave the time, like a beast as he was, with stentorian
barkings. Then Minna and her sister retired, followed by Herr Pastor; and
after a considerable number of more bottles of Blume de Saar had met their
fate we formed a procession and escorted the happy Eckenstein to the
Rheinischer Hof where he was to sleep.

Next morning by eleven, we had all reassembled in the second saal of the
Hagen. In the great room the marriage-breakfast was laid out, and in the
kitchen Hagen and his Frau were up to their eyes in mystic culinary
operations. Minna looked like a rosebud in her pretty low-necked blue
dress, and the pastor in his cassock helped to the diversity of colour. We
had done shaking hands with the bride and bridegroom after the ceremony,
and were sitting down to the marriage feast, when young Eckenstein started
and made three strides to the open window. His accustomed ear had caught a
sound which none of us had heard. It was the sharp peremptory note of the
drum beating the alarm. As it came nearer and could no longer be mistaken,
the bright colour went out from poor Minna's cheek and she clung with a
brave touching silence to her sister. In two minutes more Eckenstein had
his helmet on his head and his sword buckled on, and then he turned to say
farewell to his girl ere he left her for the battle. The parting was
silent and brief; but the faces of the two were more eloquent than words.
Poor Minna sat down by the window straining her eyes as Eckenstein,
running at speed, went his way to the rendezvous.

When I got up to the Bellevue the French were streaming in overwhelming
force down the slope of the Spicheren into the intervening valley. It was
a beautiful sight; but I am not going to describe it here. Ere an hour was
over the shells and chassepot bullets were sweeping across the Exercise
Platz, and it was no longer a safe spot for a non-combatant like myself.
Before I got back into the Hagen after paying my bill at the Rheinischer
and fetching away my knapsack, the French guns were on the Exercise Platz.
I heard for the first time the angry screech of the mitrailleuse and saw
the hailstorm of its bullets spattering on the pavement of the bridge.
Somehow or other the whole of our little coterie had found their way into
the Hagen; by a sort of common impulse, I imagine. The landlady was
already in hysterics; the Vogt girls were pale but plucky. Presently the
shells began to fly. The Prussians had a gun or two on the railway
esplanade above us, the fire of which the French began to return fiercely.
Every shell that fell short tumbled in or about the Hagen; and a company
of the Hohenzollerns was drawn up in the street in front of it, in trying
to dislodge which the French fire could not well miss the Hagen and the
houses opposite. A shell burst in the back-yard and the landlady fainted.
Another came crashing in through a first-floor window, and, bursting,
knocked several bedrooms into one. Then we thought it time to get the
women down into the cellar--rather a risky undertaking since the door of
it was in the backyard. However, we got them all down in safety and came
up into the second saal to watch the course of events. Hagen gave a
fearful groan as a shell broke into the kitchen behind us, and, bursting
in the centre of the stove, sent his _chefs-d'oeuvre_ of cookery sputtering
in all directions. He gave a still deeper groan as another shell crashed
into the principal dining-room and knocked the long table, laid out as it
was for the marriage-feast, into a chaos of splinters, tablecloth, and
knives and forks. The Restauration Kueche on the other side was in flames,
so was the stable of the hotel to the left rear. In this pleasing
situation of affairs George produced a pack of cards and coolly proposed a
game of whist. Kuester, de Liefde, and Hyndman joined him; and the game
proceeded amidst the crashing of the projectiles. Silberer and myself took
counsel together and agreed that the occupation of the town by the French
was only a question of a few hours at latest. We were both correspondents;
and although the French would do us no harm our communications with our
journals would inevitably be stopped--a serious contingency to contemplate
at the beginning of a campaign. We both agreed that evacuation of the
Hagen was imperative; but then, how to get out? The only way was up the
esplanade to the railway station, and upon it the French shells were
falling and bursting in numbers very trying to the nerves. However, there
was nothing for it but to make a rush through the fire; and saying
good-bye to the whist-players we sallied forth. To my disgust I found that
Silberer positively refused to make a rush of it. Although an Austrian all
his sympathies were Prussian, and he had the utmost contempt for the
French. In his broken language his invariable appellation for them was
"God-damned Hundsoehne!" and he would not run before them at any price. I
would have run right gladly at top-speed; but I did not like to run when
another man walked, and so he made me saunter at the rate of two miles an
hour till we got under shelter. After a hot walk of several miles, we
reached the Hotel Till in the village of Duttweiler. After all the French,
although they might have done so, did not occupy Saarbruecken; and towards
evening our friends came dropping into the Hotel Till, singly or in pairs.
Kuester and George brought the Vogt sisters out in a waggon--it was
surprising to see the coolness and composure of the girls. By nightfall we
were all reunited, except one unfortunate fellow who had been slightly
wounded and whom a Saarbruecken doctor had kindly received into his house.

On the 6th August came the Prussian repossession of Saarbruecken and the
desperate storm of the Spicheren. The 40th was the regiment to which was
assigned the place of honour in the preliminary recapture of the Exercise
Platz height. Kameke rode up the winding road to the Bellevue; then came
the march across the broad valley and after much bloodshed the final storm
of the Spicheren, in which the 40th occupied about the left centre of the
Prussian advance. Three times did the blue wave surge up the green steep,
to be beaten back three times by the terrible blast of fire that crashed
down upon it from above. Yet a fourth time it clambered up again, and this
time it lipped the brink and poured over the intrenchment at the top. But
I am not describing the battle.

When it was over or at least when it had drifted away across the farther
plateau, I followed on in the broad wake of dying and dead which the
advance had left. The familiar faces of the Hohenzollerns were all around
me; but either still in death or writhing in the torture of wounds. About
the centre of the valley lay the genial Hauptmann von Krehl, more silent
than ever now, for a bullet had gone right through that red head of his
and he would never more quaff of the Niersteiner; neither would Lieutenant
von Klipphausen ever again stir the blood of the sons of the Fatherland
with the _Wacht am Rhein_; he lay dead close by the first spur of the
slope--what of him at least a bursting shell had left. On a little flat
half up sat quaint Dr. Diestelkamp, like Mark Tapley jolly under
difficulties; by his side lay a man who had just bled to death as the good
doctor explained to me. While he had been applying the tourniquet under a
hot fire his right arm had been broken; and before he could pull himself
up and go to the rear another bullet had found its billet in his thigh.
There the little man sat, contentedly smoking till somebody would be good
enough to come and take him away. Von Zuelow too--he of the gay laugh and
sprightly countenance--was on his back a little higher up, with a bullet
through the chest. I heard the ominous sound of the escaping air as I
raised him to give him a drink from my flask. What needs it to become
diffuse as to the terrible sights which that steep and the plateau above
it presented on this beautiful summer evening? It was farther to the
right, in ground more broken with gullies and ravines, that the second
battalion of the Hohenzollerns had gone up; and I wandered along there
among the carnage eking out the contents of my flask as far as I could,
and when the wounded had exhausted the brandy in it filling it up with
water and still toiling on in a task that seemed endless. At last, in a
sitting posture, his back against a hawthorn tree in one of the grassy
ravines, I saw one whom I thought I recognised. "Eckenstein!" I cried as I
ran forward; for the posture was so natural that I could not but think he
was alive. Alas! no answer came; the gallant young Feldwebel was dead,
shot through the throat. He had not been killed outright by the fatal
bullet; the track was apparent by the blood on the grass along which he
had crawled to the hawthorn tree against which I found him. His head had
fallen forward on his chest and his right hand was pressed against his
left breast. I saw something white in the hollow of the hand and easily
moved the arm for he was yet warm; it was the photograph of the little
girl he had married but three short days before. The frank eyes looked up
at me with a merry unconsciousness; and the face of the photograph was
spotted with the life-blood of the young soldier.

I sent the death-token to Saarlouis by post to the young widow. I never
knew whether she received it, for all the address I had was Saarlouis.
Eckenstein I saw buried with two officers in a soldier's grave under the
hawthorn. Any one taking the ascent up the fourth ravine Forbach-ward from
the bluff of the Spicheren, may easily find it about halfway up. It may be
recognised by the wooden cross bearing the rude inscription: "Hier ruhen
in Gott 2 Officiere, 1 Feldwebel, 40ste Hohenzol. Fus. Regt."




REVERENCING THE GOLDEN FEET

1879


By Christmas 1878 the winter had brought to a temporary standstill the
operations of the British troops engaged in the first Afghan campaign, and
I took the opportunity of this inaction to make a journey into Native
Burmah, the condition of which seemed thus early to portend the interest
which almost immediately after converged upon it, because of King Thebau's
wholesale slaughter of his relatives. Reaching Mandalay, the capital of
Native Burmah, in the beginning of February 1879, I immediately set about
compassing an interview with the young king. Both Mr. Shaw, who was our
Resident at Mandalay at the time of my visit, and Dr. Clement Williams
whose kindly services I found so useful, are now dead, and many changes
have occurred since the episode described below; but no description, so
far as I am aware, has appeared of any visit of courtesy and curiosity to
the Court of King Thebau of a later date than that made by myself at the
date specified. One of my principal objects in visiting Mandalay, or, in
Burmese phrase, of "coming to the Golden Feet," was to see the King of
Burmah in his royal state in the Presence Chamber of the Palace. Certain
difficulties stood in the way of the accomplishment of this object. I had
but a few days to spend in Mandalay. With the approval of Mr. Shaw, the
British Resident, I determined to pursue an informal course of action, and
with this intent I enlisted the good offices of an English gentleman
resident in Mandalay, who had intimate relations with the Ministers and
the Court.

This gentleman, Dr. Williams, was good enough to help me with zeal and
address. The line of strategy to adopt was to interest in my cause one of
the principal Ministers. Of these there were four, who constituted the
_Hlwot-dau_, or High Court and Council of the Monarchy. These "Woonghys"
or "Menghyis," as they were more commonly called--"Menghyi," meaning
"Great Prince"--were of equal rank; but the senior Minister, the
Yenangyoung Menghyi, who had precedence, was then in confinement, and,
indeed, a decree of degradation had gone forth against him. Obviously he
was of no use; but a more influential man than he ever was, and having the
additional advantages of being at liberty, in power and in favour, was the
"Kingwoon Menghyi." He was in effect the Prime Minister of the King of
Burmah. His position was roughly equivalent to that of Bismarck in
Germany, or of Gortschakoff in Russia, since, in addition to his internal
influence, he had the chief direction of foreign affairs. Now this
"Kingwoon Menghyi" had for a day or two been relaxing from the cares of
State. Partly for his own pleasure, partly by way of example, he had laid
out a beautiful garden on the low ground near the river. Within this
garden he had the intention to build himself a suburban residence, which
meanwhile was represented by a summer pavilion of teak and bamboo. He was
a liberal-minded man, and it was a satisfaction to him that the shady
walks and pleasant rose-groves of this garden should be enjoyed by the
people of Mandalay. He was a reformer, this "Kingwoon Menghyi," and
believed in the humanising effect of free access to the charms of nature.
His garden laid out and his pavilion finished, he was celebrating the
event by a series of _fetes._ He was "at home" in his pavilion to
everybody; bands of music played all day long and day after day, in the
kiosks, among the young palm trees and the rosebushes. Mandalay, high and
low, made holiday in the mazy walks of his garden and in an improvised
theatre, wherein an interminable _pooey,_ or Burmese drama, was being
enacted before ever-varying and constantly appreciative audiences. Dr.
Williams opined that it would conduce to the success of my object that we
should call upon the Minister at his garden-house and request him to use
his good offices in my behalf.

It was near noon when we reached the entrance to the garden. Merry but
orderly sightseers thronged its alleys, and stared with wondering
admiration at a rather attenuated jet of water which rose into the clear
air some thirty feet above a rockwork fountain in the centre. Dignitaries
strolled about under the stemless umbrellas like huge shields, with which
assiduous attendants protected them from the sun; and were followed by
posses of retainers, who prostrated themselves whenever their masters
halted or looked round. Ladies in white jackets and trailing silk skirts
of vivid hue were taking a leisurely airing, each with her demure maid
behind her carrying the lacquer-ware box of betel-nut. As often as not the
fair ones were blowing copious clouds from huge reed-like cheroots. Sounds
of shrill music were heard in the distance. Walking up the central alley
between the rows of palms and the hedges of roses, we found in the veranda
a mixed crowd of laymen and priests, the latter distinguishable by their
shaved heads and yellow robes. The Minister was just finishing his
morning's work of distributing offerings to the latter, in commemoration
of the opening of his gardens. In response to a message, he at once sent
to desire that we should come to him. The great "shoe-question," the
_quaestio vexata_ between British officialism and Burmah officialism, did
not trouble me. I had no official position; I wanted to gain an object. I
have a respect for the honour of my country, but I could not bring myself
to realise that the national honour centres in my shoes. So I parted with
them at the top of the steps leading up into the Minister's pavilion, and
walking on what is known as my "stocking-feet," and feeling rather
shuffling and shabby accordingly, was ushered through a throng of
prostrate dependents into the presence of the Menghyi. He came forward
frankly and cordially, shook hands with a hearty smile with Dr. Williams
and myself, and beckoned us into an inner alcove, carpeted with rich rugs
and panelled with mirrors. Placing himself in a half-sitting,
half-kneeling attitude which did not expose his feet, he beckoned to us to
get down also. I own to having experienced extreme difficulty in keeping
my feet out of sight, which was a point _de rigueur_; but his Excellency
was not censorious. There was with him a secretary who had resided several
years in Europe, and who spoke fluently English, French, and Italian. This
gentleman knew London thoroughly, and was perfectly familiar both with the
name of the _Daily News_ and of myself. He introduced me formally to his
Excellency, who, I ought to have mentioned, was the head of the Burmese
Embassy which had visited Europe a few years previously. That his
Excellency had some sort of knowledge of the political character of the
_Daily News_ was obvious from the circumstance that when its name was
mentioned he nodded and exclaimed, "Ah! ah! Gladstone, Bright!" in tones
of manifest approval, which was no doubt accounted for by the fact that he
himself was a pronounced Liberal. I explained that I had come to Mandalay
to learn as much about Burmese manners, customs, and institutions as was
possible in four days, with intent to embody my impressions in letters to
England; and that as the King was the chief institution of the country, I
had a keen anxiety to see him and begged of his Excellency to lend me his
aid toward doing so. He gave no direct reply, but certainly did not frown
on the request. We were served with tea (without cream or sugar) in pretty
china cups, and then the Menghyi, observing that we were looking at some
quaint-shaped musical instruments at the foot of the dais, explained that
they belonged to a band of rural performers from the Pegu district, and
proposed that we should first hear them play and afterwards visit the
theatre and witness the _pooey_. We assenting, he led the way from his
pavilion through the garden to a pretty kiosk half-embosomed in foliage,
and chairs having been brought the party sat down. We had put on our shoes
as we quitted the dais. The Menghyi explained that it was pleasanter for
him, as it must be for us, that we should change the manner of our
reception from the Burmese to the European custom; and we were quite free
to confess that we would sooner sit in chairs than squat on the floor.
More tea was brought, and a plateful of cheroots. After we had sat a
little while in the kiosk we were joined by the chief Under-Secretary for
Foreign Affairs, the Baron de Giers of Burmah, a jovial, corpulent,
elderly gentleman who had the most wonderful likeness to the late Pio
Nono, and who clasped his brown hands over his fat paunch and kicked about
his plump bare brown feet in high enjoyment when anything that struck him
as humorous was uttered. He wholly differed in appearance from his
superior, who was a lean-faced and lean-figured man, grave, and indeed
somewhat sad both of eye and of visage when his face was in repose. As we
talked, our conversation being through the interpreting secretary, there
came to the curtained entrance to the kiosk a very dainty little lady. I
had noticed her previously sauntering around the garden under one of the
great shield-like shades, with a following of serving-men and
serving-women behind her. She greeted the Menghyi very prettily, with the
most perfect composure, although strangers were present. She was clearly a
great pet with the Menghyi; he took her on his knee and played with her
long black hair, as he told her about the visitors. The little lady was in
her twelfth year, and was the daughter of a colleague and a relative of
the Menghyi. She had an olive oval face, with lovely dark eyes, like the
eyes of a deer. She wore a tiara of feathery white blossoms. In her ears
were rosettes of chased red gold. Round her throat was a necklace of a
double row of large pearls. Her fingers--I regret to say her nails were
not very clean--were loaded with rings set with great diamonds of
exceptional sparkle and water; one stone in particular must have been
worth many thousands of pounds. She wore a jacket of white silk, and round
her loins was girt a gay silken robe that trailed about her bare feet as
she walked. She shook hands with us with a pretty shyness and immediately
helped herself to a cheroot, affably accepting a light from mine. The
Menghyi told us she was a great scholar--could read and write with
facility, and had accomplishments to boot.

By this time the provincial band had taken its place under one of the
windows of the kiosk, and it presently struck up. Its music was not
pretty. There were in the strange weird strain suggestions of gongs,
bagpipes, penny whistles, and the humble tom-tom of Bengal. The gentleman
who performed on an instrument which seemed a hybrid between a flute and a
French horn, occasionally arrested his instrumental music to favour us
with vocal strains, but he failed to compete successfully with the
cymbals. I do not think the Menghyi was enraptured by the music of the
strollers from Pegu, for he presently asked us whether we were ready to go
to the _pooey_. He again led the way through a garden, passing in one
corner of it a temporary house of which a company of Burmese nuns,
short-haired, pallid-faced, unhappy-looking women, were in possession; and
passing through a gate in the wicker-work fence ushered us into the
"state-box" of the improvised theatre. There is very little labour
required to construct a theatre in Burmah. Over a framework of bamboo
poles stretch a number of squares of matting as a protection from the sun.
Lay some more down in the centre as a flooring for the performers. Tie a
few branches round the central bamboo to represent a forest, the perpetual
set-scene of a Burmese drama; and the house is ready. The performers act
and dance in the central square laid with matting. A little space on one
side is reserved as a dressing and green room for the actresses; a similar
space on the other side serves the turn of the actors; and then come the
spectators crowding in on all four sides of the square. It is an orderly
and easily managed audience; it may be added an easily amused audience.
The youngsters are put or put themselves in front and squat down; the
grown people kneel or stand behind. Our "state-box" was merely a raised
platform laid with carpets and cushions, from which as we sat we looked
over the heads of the throng squatting under and in front of us. Of the
drama I cannot say that I carried away with me particularly clear
impressions. True, I only saw a part of it--it was to last till the
following morning; but long before I left the plot to me had become
bewilderingly involved. The opening was a ballet; of that at least I am
certain. There were six lady dancers and six gentlemen ditto. The ladies
were arrayed in splendour, with tinsel tiaras, necklaces, and bracelets,
gauzy jackets and waving scarfs; and with long, light clinging silken
robes, of which there was at least a couple of yards on the "boards" about
their feet. They were old, they were ugly, they leered fiendishly; their
faces were plastered with powder in a ghastly fashion, and their coquetry
behind their fans was the acme of caricature. But my pen halts when I
would describe the gentlemen dancers. I believe that in reality they were
not meant to represent fallen humanity at all; but were intended to
personify _nats,_ the spirits or princes of the air of Burmese mythology.
They carried on their heads pagodas of tinsel and coloured glass that
towered imposingly aloft. They were arrayed in tight-bodiced coats with
aprons before and behind of fantastic outline, resembling the wings of
dragons and griffins, and these coats were an incrusted mass of spangles
and pieces of coloured glass. Underneath a skirt of tartan silk was
fitfully visible. Their brown legs and feet were bare. The expression of
their faces was solemn, not to say lugubrious--one performer had a most
whimsical resemblance to Mr. Toole when he is sunk in an abyss of dramatic
woe. They realised the responsibilities of their position, and there were
moments when these seemed too many for them. The orchestra, taken as a
whole, was rather noisy; but it comprised one instrument, the "bamboo
harmonicon," which deserves to be known out of Burmah because of its
sweetness and range of tone. There were lots of "go" in the music, and
every now and then one detected a kind of echo of a tune not unfamiliar in
other climes. One's ear seemed to assure one that _Madame Angot_ had been
laid under contribution to tickle the ears of a Mandalay audience, yet how
could this be? The explanation was that the instrumentalists, occasionally
visiting Thayet-myo or Rangoon, had listened there to the strains of our
military bands, and had adapted these to the Burmese orchestra in some
deft inscrutable manner, written music being unknown in the musical world
of Burmah.

Next day the Kingwoon Menghyi took the wholly unprecedented step of
inviting to dinner the British Resident, his suite, and his visitor--
myself. Mr. Shaw accepted the invitation, and I considered myself
specially fortunate in being a participator in a species of intercourse at
once so novel, and to all seeming so auspicious.

About sundown the Residency party, joined _en route_ by Dr. Williams, rode
down to the entrance to the gardens. Here we were warmly received by the
English-speaking secretary, and by the jovial bow-windowed minister who so
much resembled the late Pio Nono. We were escorted to the verandah of the
pavilion, where the Menghyi himself stood waiting to greet us, and were
ushered up to the broad, raised, carpeted platform which may be styled the
drawing-room. Here was a semicircle of chairs. On our way to these, a long
row of squatting Burmans was passed. As the Resident approached, the
Menghyi gave the word, and they promptly stood erect in line. He explained
that they were the superior officers of the army quartered in the capital--
generals, he called them--whom he had asked to meet us. Of these officers
one commanded the eastern guard of the Palace, the other the western; two
others were aides-de-camp after a fashion. Just as the Menghyi and his
subordinate colleagues represented the Ministry, so these military people
represented the Court. The former was the moderate constitutional element
of the gathering; the latter the "jingo" or personal government element,
for the Burmese Court was reactionary, and those military sprigs were of
the personal suite of the King and were understood to abet him in his
falling away from the constitutional promise with which his reign began.
Their presence rendered the occasion all the more significant. That they
were deputed from the Palace to attend and watch events was pretty
certain, and indeed the two aides went away immediately after dinner,
their excuse being that his Majesty was expecting their personal
attendance. After a little while of waiting, the _mauvais quart d'heure_
having the edge of its awkwardness taken off by a series of introductions,
dinner was announced, and the Menghyi, followed by the Resident, led the
way into an adjoining dining-room. Good old Pio Nono, who, I ought to have
said, had been with the Menghyi a member of the Burmese Embassy to Europe,
jauntily offered me his arm, and gave me to understand that he did so in
compliance with English fashion. The Resident sat on the right of the
Menghyi, I was on his left; the rest of the party, to the number of about
fifteen, took their places indiscriminately; Mr. Andrino, an Italian in
Burmese employ, being at the head of the table, Dr. Williams at the foot.
Our meal was a perfectly English dinner, served and eaten in the English
fashion. The Burmese had taken lessons in the nice conduct of a knife and
fork, and fed themselves in the most irreproachably conventional manner,
carefully avoiding the use of a knife with their fish. Pio Nono, who sat
opposite the Menghyi, tucked his napkin over his ample paunch and went in
with a will. He was in a most hilarious mood, and taxed his memory for
reminiscences of his visit to England. These were not expressed with
useless expenditure of verbiage, nor did they flow in unbroken sequence.
It was as if he dug in his memory with a spade, and found every now and
then a gem in the shape of a name, which he brandished aloft in triumph.
He kept up an intermittent and disconnected fire all through dinner, with
an interval between each discharge, "White-bait!" "Lord Mayor!"
"Fishmongers!" "Cremorne!" "Crystal Palace!" "Edinburgh!" "Dunrobin!"
"Newcastle!" "Windsor!"--each name followed by a chuckle and a succession
of nods. The Menghyi divided his talk between the Resident and myself. He
told me that of all the men he had met in England his favourite was the
late Duke of Sutherland; adding that the Duke was a nobleman of great and
striking eloquence, a trait which I had not been in the habit of regarding
as markedly characteristic of his Grace. He spoke with much warmth of a
pleasant visit he had paid to Dunrobin, and said he should be heartily
glad if the Duke would come to Burmah and give him an opportunity of
returning his hospitality. Here Pio Nono broke in with one of his
periodical exclamations. This time it was "Lady Dudley." Of her, and of
her late husband, the Menghyi then recalled his recollections, and if more
courtly tributes have been paid to her ladyship's charms and grace, I
question if any have been heartier and more enthusiastic than was the
appreciation of this Burmese dignitary. The soldier element was at first
somewhat stiff, but as the dinner proceeded the generals warmed in
conversation with the Resident. But the aides were obstinately
supercilious, and only partially thawed in acknowledgment of compliments
on the splendour of their jewelry. Functionaries attached to the personal
suite of his Majesty wore huge ear-gems as a distinguishing mark. The
aides had these in blazing diamonds, and were good enough to take out the
ornaments and hand them round. The civil ministers wore no ornaments and
their dress was studiously plain. We were during dinner entertained by
music, instrumental and vocal, sedulously modulated to prevent
conversation from being drowned. The meal lasted quite two hours, and when
it was finished the Menghyi led the way to coffee in one of the kiosks of
the garden. I should have said that no wine was on the table at dinner.
The Burmese by religion are total abstainers, and their guests were
willing to follow their example for the time and to fall in with their
prejudices. After coffee we were ushered into the drawing-room, and
listened to a concert. The only solo-vocalist was the prima donna _par
excellence,_ Mdlle. Yeendun Male. The burden of her songs was love, but I
could not succeed in having the specific terms translated. Then she sang
an ode in praise of the Resident, and gracefully accepted his pecuniary
appreciation of her performance. Pio Nono then beckoned to her to flatter
me at close quarters; but, mistaking the index, she addressed herself to
the Residency chaplain in strains of hyperbolical encomium. The mistake
having been set right, much to the reverend gentleman's relief, the
songstress overpowered my sensitive modesty by impassioned requests in
verse that I should delay my departure; that, if I could not do so, I
should take her away with me; and that, if this were beyond my power, I
should at least remember her when I was far away. The which was an
allegory and cost me twenty rupees.

When the good-nights were being said, the Menghyi gratified me by the
information that the King had given his consent to my presentation, and
that I was to have the opportunity next morning of "Reverencing the Golden
Feet."

The Royal Palace occupied the central space of the city of Mandalay. It
was almost entirely of woodwork, and was not only the counterpart of the
palace which Major Phayre saw at Amarapoora, but the identical palace
itself, conveyed piecemeal from its previous site and re-erected here. Its
outermost enclosure consisted of a massive teak palisading, beyond which
all round was a wide clear space laid out as an esplanade, the farther
margin of which was edged by the houses of ministers and court officials.
The Palace enclosure was a perfect square, each face about 370 yards. The
main entrance, the only one in general use, was in the centre of the
eastern face, almost opposite to which, across the esplanade, was the
_Yoom-dau_, or High Court. This gate was called the _Yive-dau-yoo-Taga_,
or the Royal Gate of the Chosen, because the charge of it was entrusted to
chosen troops. As I passed through it on my way to be presented to his
Majesty, the aspect of the "chosen" troops was not imposing. They wore no
uniform, and differed in no perceptible item from the common coolies of
the outside streets. They were lying about on charpoys and on the ground,
chewing betel or smoking cheroots, and there was not even the pretence of
there being sentries under arms. Some rows of old flintlock guns stood in
racks in the gateway, rusty, dusty, and untended; they might have been
untouched since the last insurrection. Crossing an intermediate space
overgrown with shrubbery, we passed through a high gateway cut in the
inner brick wall of the enclosure; and there confronted us the great
Myenan of Mandalay--the Palace of the "Sun-descended Monarch." The first
impression was disappointing, for the whole front was covered with
gold-leaf and tawdry tinsel-work which had become weather-worn and dingy.
But there was no time now to halt, inspect details, and rectify perchance
first impressions. A message came that the Kingwoon Menghyi, my host of
the previous evening--substantially the Prime Minister of Burmah, desired
that we--that was to say, Dr. Williams, my guide, philosopher, and friend,
and myself--should wait upon him in the _Hlwot-dau_, or Hall of the
Supreme Council, before entering the Palace itself. The _Hlwot-dau_ was a
detached structure on the right front of the Palace as one entered by the
eastern gate. It was the Downing Street of Mandalay. Its sides were quite
open, and its fantastic roof of grotesquely carved teak plastered with
gilding, painting, and tinsel, was supported on massive teak pillars
painted a deep red. Taking off our shoes we ascended to the platform of
the _Hlwot-dau_, where we found the Menghyi surrounded by a crowd of minor
officials and suitors squatting on their stomachs and elbows, with their
legs under them and their hands clasped in front of their bent heads. The
Menghyi came forward several paces to meet us, conducted us to his mat,
and sitting down himself and bidding us do the same, explained that as it
was with him a busy day, he would not be able personally to present me to
the King as he had hoped to have done, but that he had made all
arrangements and had delegated the charge of us to our old friend whom I
have ventured to call "Pio Nono." That corpulent and jovial worthy made
his appearance at this moment along with his English-speaking subordinate,
and with cordial acknowledgments and farewells to the Menghyi we left the
_Hlwot-dau_ under their guidance. They led us along the front of the
Palace, passing the huge gilded cannon that flanked on either side the
central steps leading up into the throne-room; and turning round the
northern angle of the Palace front, conducted us to the Hall of the
_Bya-dyt_, or Household Council. We had to leave our shoes at the foot of
the steps leading up to it. The _Bya-dyt_ was a mere open shed; its lofty
roof borne up by massive teak timbers. What splendour had once been its in
the matter of gilding and tinsel was greatly faded. The gold-leaf had been
worn off the pillars by constant friction, and the place appeared to be
used as a lumber-room as well as a council-chamber. On the front of one of
a pile of empty cases was visible, in big black letters, the legend,
"Peek, Frean, and Co., London." State documents reposed in the receptacle
once occupied by biscuits. Clerks lay all around on the rough dusty
boards, writing with agate stylets on tablets of black papier-mache; and
there was a constant flux and reflux of people of all sorts, who appeared
to have nothing to do and who were doing it with a sedulously lounging
deliberation that seemed to imply a gratifying absence of arrears of
official work. We sat down here for a while along with Pio Nono and his
assistant, who busied himself in dictating to a secretary a description of
myself and a catalogue of my presents to be read by the herald to his
Majesty when I should be presented. Then Pio Nono went away and presently
came back, saying that it was intended to bestow upon me some souvenirs of
Mandalay, and that to admit of the preparation of these the audience would
not take place for an hour or so. He invited us in the meantime to inspect
the public apartments of the Palace itself and the objects of interest in
the Palace enclosure. So we got up, and still without our shoes walked
through the suite leading to the principal throne-room or great hall of
audience.

These were simply a series of minor throne-rooms. The first one in order
from the private apartments was close to the _Bya-dyt_. It must be borne
in mind that the whole suite, including the great audience hall, were not
rooms at all in our sense of the word. They were simply open-roofed
spaces, the roofs gabled, spiked, and carved into fantastic shapes, laden
with dingy gold-leaf garishly picked out with glaring colours and studded
with bits of stained glass; the roofs, or rather I should say, the one
continuous roof, supported on massive deep red pillars of teak-wood. The
whole palace was raised from the ground on a brick platform some 10 feet
high. The partitions between the several walls were simply skirtings of
planking covered with gold-leaf. The whole palace seemed an armoury. Some
ten or twelve thousand stand of obsolete muskets were ranged along these
partitions and crammed into the anteroom of the throne-room proper. The
whole suite was dingy, dirty, and uncared-for; but on a great day, with
the gilding renewed, carpets spread on the rugged boards, banners waving,
and the courtiers in full dress, no doubt the effect would have been
materially improved. The vista from the throne of the great hall of
audience looked right through the columned arcade to the "Gate of the
Chosen"; and that we might imagine the scene more vividly, we considered
ourselves as on our way to Court on one of the great days, and going back
to the gate again began our pilgrimage anew. The pillared front of the
Palace stretched before us raised on the terrace, its total length 260
feet. Looking between the two gilded cannon, we saw at the foot of the
central steps a low gate of carved and gilded wood. That gate, it seemed,
was never opened except to the King--none save he might use those central
steps. Raising our eyes we looked right up the vista of the hall to the
lofty throne raised against the gilded partition that closed at once the
vista and the hall. We had been looking down the great central nave, as it
were, toward the west gate, in the place of which was the throne. But
along the eastern front of the terrace ran a long colonnade, whose wings
formed transepts at right angles to the nave. The throne-room was shaped
like the letter T, the throne being at the base of the letter and the
cross-bar representing the colonnade. Entering at the extremity of one of
these, we traversed it to the centre and then faced the nave. The throne
was exactly before us, at the end of the pillared vista. Five steps led up
to the dais. Its form was peculiar, contracting by a gradation of steps
from the base upwards to mid-height, and again expanding to the top, on
which was a cushioned ledge such as is seen in the box of a theatre. On
the platform, which now was bare planks, the King and Queen on a great
reception day would sit on gorgeous carpets. The entrance was through
gilded doors from a staircase in the ante-room beyond. There was a rack of
muskets round the foot of the throne, and just outside the rails a
half-naked soldier lay snoring. Our Burman companion assured us that
seeing the throne-room now in its condition of dismantled tawdriness, I
could form no idea of the fine effect when King and Court in all their
splendour were gathered in it on a ceremonial day. I tried to accept his
assurances, but it was not easy to imagine such forlorn dinginess changed
into dazzling splendour. Just over the throne, and in the centre of the
Palace and of the city, rose in gracefully diminishing stages of fantastic
woodcarving a tapering _phya-sath_ or spire similar to those surmounting
sacred buildings, and crowned with the gilded _Htee_, an honour which
royalty alone shared with ecclesiastical sanctity. The spire, like
everything else, had been gilt, but it was now sadly tarnished and had
lost much of its brilliancy of effect.

Having looked at the hall of audience we strolled through the Palace
esplanade. A wall parted this off from the private apartments and the
pleasure grounds occupying the western section of the Palace enclosure. A
series of carved and gilded gables roofed with glittering zinc plates was
visible over the wall. The grounds were said to be well planted with
flowering shrubs and fruit trees and to contain lakelets and rockeries.
Built against the outer wall and facing the enclosed space were barracks
for soldiers and gun sheds. The accommodation was as primitive as are the
weapons, and that was saying a good deal. Pio Nono led us across to a big
wooden house, scarcely at all ornamented, which was the everyday abode of
the "Lord White Elephant." His "Palace," or state apartment, was not
pointed out to us. His lordship, in so far as his literal claim to be
styled a white elephant, was an impostor of the deepest dye and a very
grim and ugly impostor to boot. He was a great, lean, brown, flat-sided
brute, his ears, forehead, and trunk mottled with a dingy cream colour.
But he belonged all the same to the lordly race. "White elephants" were a
science which had a literature of its own. According to this science, it
was not the whiteness that was the criterion of a "white elephant." So
much, indeed, was the reverse, that a "white elephant" according to the
science may be a brown elephant in actual colour. The points were the
mottling of the face, the shape and colour of the eyes, the position of
the ears, and the length of the tail. Certainly the "Lord White Elephant"
had, to the most cursory observation, a peculiar and abnormal eye. The
iris was yellow, with a reddish outer annulus and a small, clear, black
pupil. It was essentially a shifty, treacherous eye, and I noticed that
everybody took particularly good care to keep out of range of his
lordship's trunk and tusks. The latter were superb--long, massive, and
smooth, their tips quite meeting far in front of his trunk. His tail was
much longer than in the Indian elephants, and was tipped with a bunch of
long, straight, black hair. Altogether he was an unwholesome,
disagreeable-looking brute, who munched his grass morosely and had no
elephantine geniality. He was but a youngster--the great, old, really
white elephant which Yule describes had died some time back, after an
incumbency dating from 1806. The "White Elephant" was never ridden now,
but the last King but one used frequently to ride its predecessor, acting
as his own mahout. We did not see his trappings, as our visit was paid
unawares when he was quite in undress; but Yule says that when arrayed in
all his splendour his head-stall was of fine red cloth, studded with great
rubies, interspersed with valuable diamonds. When caparisoned he wore on
his forehead, like other Burmese dignitaries including the King himself, a
golden plate inscribed with his titles and a gold crescent set with
circles of large gems between the eyes. Large silver tassels hung in front
of his ears, and he was harnessed with bands of gold and crimson set
freely with large bosses of pure gold. He was a regular "estate of the
realm," having a _woon_ or minister of his own, four gold umbrellas, the
white umbrellas which were peculiar to royalty, with a large suite of
attendants and an appanage to furnish him with maintenance wherewithal.
When in state his attendants had to leave their shoes behind them when
they enter his Palace. In a shed adjacent to that occupied by the "Lord
White Elephant" stood his lady wife, a browner, plumper, and generally
more amiable-looking animal. Contrary to universal experience elsewhere,
elephants in Burmah breed in captivity, but this union was unfertile and
the race of "Lord White Elephants" had to be maintained _ab extra_. The
so-called white elephants are sports of nature, and are of no special
breed. They are called Albinoes, and are more plentiful in the Siam region
than in Burmah.

By this time the hour was approaching that had been fixed for the
presentation, and we returned to the _Bya-dyt_. The summons came almost
immediately. Ushered by Pio Nono and accompanied by several courtiers, we
traversed some open passages and finally reached a kind of pagoda or kiosk
within the private gardens of the Palace. The King was not to appear in
state, and this place had been selected by reason of its absolute
informality. There was no ornament anywhere, not so much as a speck of
gilding or an atom of tinsel. We solemnly squatted down on a low platform
covered with grass matting, through which pierced the teak columns
supporting the lofty roof. A space had been reserved for us in the centre,
on either side of which, their front describing a semicircle, a number of
courtiers lay crouching on their stomachs but placidly puffing cheroots.
On our left were two or three superior military officers of the Palace
guard, distinguishable only by their diamond ear-jewels. My presents--
they were trivial: an opera-glass, a few boxes of chocolate, and a
work-box--were placed before me as I sat down. There were other offerings
to right and to left of them--a huge bunch of cabbages, a basket of
_Kohl-rabi_, and three baskets of orchids. In the clear space in front I
observed also a satin robe lined with fur, a couple of silver boxes, and a
ruby ring. These, I imagined, were also for presentation, but it presently
appeared they were his Majesty's return gifts for myself. Before us, at a
higher elevation, there was a plain wooden railing with a gap in the
centre, and the railing enclosed a sort of recess that looked like a
garden-house. Over a ledge where the gap was, had been thrown a rich
crimson and gold trapping that hung low in front, and on the ledge were a
crimson cushion, a betel box, and a tall oval spittoon in gold set with
pearls. A few minutes passed, beguiled by conversation in a low tone, when
six guards armed with double-barrelled firearms of very diverse patterns,
mounted the platform from the left side and took their places on either
side, squatting down. The guards wore black silk jackets lined with fur
and with scarlet kerchiefs bound round their heads. Then a door opened in
the left side of the garden-house, and there entered first an old gaunt
beardless man--the chief eunuch--closely followed by the King, otherwise
unattended. His Majesty came on with a quick step, and sat down, resting
his right arm on the crimson cushion on the ledge in the centre of the
railing. He wore a white silk jacket, and a _loonghi_ or petticoat robe of
rich yellow and green silk. His only ornaments were his diamond
ear-jewels. As he entered all bent low, and when he had seated himself a
herald lying on his stomach read aloud my credentials. The literal
translation was as follows:--"So-and-so, a great newspaper teacher of the
_Daily News_ of London, tenders to his Most Glorious Excellent Majesty,
Lord of the Ishaddan, King of Elephants, master of many white elephants,
lord of the mines of gold, silver, rubies, amber, and the noble
serpentine, Sovereign of the empires of Thunaparanta and Tampadipa, and
other great empires and countries, and of all the umbrella-wearing chiefs,
the supporter of religion, the Sun-descended Monarch, arbiter of life, and
great, righteous King, King of kings, and possessor of boundless
dominions, and supreme wisdom, the following presents." The reading was
intoned in a uniform high recitative, strongly resembling that used when
our Church Service is intoned; and the long-drawn "Phya-a-a-a-a" (my lord)
which concluded it, added to the resemblance, as it came in exactly like
the "Amen" of the Liturgy.

The reading over, the return presents were picked up by an official and
bundled over to me without any ceremony, the King meanwhile looking on in
silence, chewing betel and smoking a cheroot. Several of the courtiers
were following his example in the latter respect. Presently the King spoke
in a distinct, deliberate voice--

"Who is he?"

Dr. Williams acting as my introducer, replied in Burmese--

"A writer of the _Daily News_ of London, your Majesty."

"Why does he come?"

"To see your Majesty's country, and in the hope of being permitted to
reverence the Golden Feet."

"Whence does he come?"

"From the British army in Afghanistan, engaged in war against the Prince
of Cabul."

"And does the war prosper for my friends the English?"

"He reports that it has done so greatly and that the Prince of Cabul is a
fugitive."

"Where does Cabul lie in relation to Kashmir?"

"Between Kashmir and Persia, in a very mountainous and cold region."

There had been pauses more or less long between each of these questions;
the King obviously reflecting what he should ask next; then there was a
longer, and, indeed, a wearisome pause. Then the King spoke again.

"Where is the Kingwoon Menghyi?"

"In Court, your Majesty," replied Pio Nono. "It is a Court day."

"It is well. I wish the Ministers to make every day a Court day, and to
labour hard to give prompt justice to suitors, so that there be no
complaint of arrears."

With this laudable injunction, his Majesty rose and walked away, and the
audience was over.

The King of Burmah, when I saw him, was little over twenty, and he had
been barely four months on the throne. He was a tall, well-built,
personable young man, very fair in complexion, with a good forehead,
clear, steady eyes, and a firm but pleasant mouth. His chin was full and
somewhat sensual-looking, but withal he was a manly, frank-faced young
fellow, and was said to have gained self-possession and lost the early
nervous awkwardness of his new position with great rapidity. Circumstances
had even then occurred to prove that he was very far from destitute of a
will of his own, and that he had no favour for any diminution of the Royal
Prerogative. As we passed out of the Palace after the interview a house in
the Palace grounds was pointed out to me, within which had been imprisoned
in squalid misery ever since the mortal illness of the previous King, a
number of the members of the Burmese blood royal.

_P.S._--A few days after my visit, all these unfortunately were massacred
with fiendish refinements of cruelty.




GERMAN WAR PRAYERS 1870-71


In the multifarious ramifications of their military organisation the
Germans by no means neglect religion. Each army corps is partitioned into
two divisions and each division has its field chaplain. In those corps in
which there is a large admixture of the Catholic element, there is a
cleric of that denomination to each division as well as a Protestant
chaplain. The former is known as a _Feldgeistliger_, a word which in
itself means nothing more distinctive than a "field ecclesiastic," while
the Protestant chaplain has usually the title of _Feldpastor_. Of the
priest I can say but little. The pastors, for the most part, are young and
energetic men. They may be divided into two classes: those who have at
home no stated charges, and those who have temporarily left their charge
for the duration of the war. The former generally are regularly posted to
a division; the latter, equally recognised but not perhaps quite so
official, are chiefly to be found in the lazarettoes, in the battlefield
villages whither the wounded are borne to have their fresh wounds roughly
seen to, and on the battlefield itself. Not that the regular divisional
chaplains do not face the dangers of the battlefield with devoted courage;
but their duties, in the nature of their special avocation, lie more among
the hale and sound who yet stand up before an enemy, than with the poor
fellows who have been stricken down. Earnestness and devotion are the
chief characteristics of those pastors. It struck me that their education
was not of a very high order--certainly not on a par with that of the
average regimental officer.

The _Feldpastor_ wears an armlet of white and light purple to denote his
calling; but indeed it is not easy to mistake him for anything else than
he is. He has his quarters with the Divisional General, and preaches
whenever and wherever it is convenient to get a congregation. A church is
passed on the wayside, a regiment halts and defiles into it, and the
pastor mounts the steps of the altar and holds forth therefrom for half an
hour. There is a quiet meadow near a village, in which a brigade is lying.
Looking over the hedge, you may see in the meadow a hollow square of
helmeted men with the general and the pastor in the centre, the latter
speaking simple, fervent words to the fighting men. When, as during the
siege of Paris, a division occupies a certain district for a long time,
you may chance--let me say on a New Year's night--on the village church
all ablaze with light. The garrison have decorated the gaunt old Norman
arches with laurels and evergreens; they have cleared out the
market-vendor's stock of tallow-dips to illuminate the church wherewithal.
The band has been practising the glorious _Nun Danket alle Gott_ for a
week; the vocalists of the regiments have been combining to perfect
themselves in part-singing. The gorgeous trumpery of Roman Catholic church
paraphernalia, unheeded as it is, looks strangely out of place and
contrasts curiously with the simple Protestant forms.

The church is crowded with a denser congregation than ever its walls
contained before. The _Oberst_ sits down with the under-officer; the
general gropes for half a chair between two stalwart _Kerle_ of the line.
Hymn-cards are distributed as at the Brighton volunteer service in the
Pavilion on Easter Sunday. As the pastor enters and takes his way up the
altar steps--he goes not to the pulpit--there bursts out a volume of vocal
devotional harmony, which is so pent in the aisles and under the arches
that the sound seems almost to become a substance. Then the pastor
delivers a prayer and there is another hymn. He enunciates no text when he
next begins to speak; he chops not a subject up into heads, as the
grizzled major who listens to him would partition out his battalion into
companies. There is no "thirteenthly and lastly" in his simple address.
But he gets nearer the hearts of his hearers than if he assailed them with
a battery of logic with multitudinous texts for ammunition. For he speaks
of the people at home, in the quiet corners of the Fatherland; he tells
the soldier in language that is of his profession, how the fear of the
Lord is a better arm than the truest-shooting _Zuendnadelgewehr_; how
preparedness for death and for what follows after death, is a part of his
accoutrement that the good soldier must ever bear about with him.

Herr Pastor has other functions than to preach to the living. The day
after a battle, his horse must be very tired before the stable-door is
reached. The burial parties are excavating great pits all over the field,
while others pick up the dead in the vicinity and bear them unto the brink
of the common grave. Herr Pastor cannot be ubiquitous. If he is not near
when the hole is full, the _Feldwebel_ who commands the party bares his
head, and mutters, "In the name of God, Amen," as he strews the first
handful of mould on the dead--it may be on friends as well as on foes. If
the pastor can reach the brink of the pit, it is his to say the few words
that mark the recognition of the fact that those lying stark and grim
below him are not as the beasts that perish. The Germans have no set
funeral service, and if they had, there would be no time for it here.
"Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, in sure and certain hope of
the resurrection to eternal life, _durch unsern Herr Jesu Christe_. Amen;"
words so familiar, yet never heard without a new thrill.

They are slightly uncouth in several matters, these _Feldpastoren_, and
would not quite suit sundry metropolitan charges one wots of. They do not
wear gloves, nor are they addicted to scent on their pocket-handkerchiefs.
Their boots are too often like boats, and when they are mounted there is
frequently visible an interval of more or less dusky stocking between the
boot-top and the trouser-leg. They slobber stertorously in the consumption
of soup, and cut their meat with a square-elbowed energy of determination
that might make one think that they had vanquished the Evil One and had
him down there under their knife and fork. But they are simple-hearted and
valiant servants of their Master. Who was it, in the bullet-storm that
swept the slope of Woerth, from facing which the stout hearts of the
fighting men blenched and quailed, that there walked quietly into it, to
speak words of peace and consolation to the dying men whom that terrible
storm had beaten down? A smooth-faced stripling with the _Feldpastor's_
badge on his arm, the gallant Christian son of an eminent Prussian divine,
Dr. Krummacher of Berlin. At one of the battles (I forget which) a pastor
came to fill a grave, not to consecrate it. Shall I ever forget the
unswerving hurry to the front of Kummer's divisional chaplain when the
_Landwehrleute_, his flock, were going down in their ranks as they held
with stubbornness unto death the villages in front of Maizieres les Metz?
Let the _Feldpastoren_ slobber and welcome, say I, while they gild their
slobbering with such devotion as this! But there must be times and seasons
when Herr Pastor is not at hand; nor can the ministration of any pastor
stand in the stead of private prayer. The German soldier's simple needs in
this matter are not disregarded. Each man is served out when he gets his
kit with a tiny gray volume less than quarter the size of this page, the
title of which is _Gebetbuch fuer Soldaten_--the Soldier's Prayer-Book. It
is supplied from the Berlin depot of the Head Society for the Promotion of
Christian Knowledge in Germany, and it is a compendium of simple war
prayers for almost every conceivable situation, with one significant
exception--there is no prayer in defeat. The word is blotted out of the
German war vocabulary. It has been said that the belief in the divinity of
our Saviour is rapidly on the wane in Germany. If this war prayer-book
avails aught, the taint of the heresy may not enter into the army.

Germany is at war. While Paris is frantically shouting _A Berlin!_, while
all Germany is singing and meaning _Die Wacht am Rhein_, Moltke's order
goes forth into the towns and villages of the Fatherland for the
mobilisation of the Reserves. Hans was singing _Die Wacht am Rhein_ last
night over his beer; but there is little heart for song left in him as he
looks from that paper on the deal table into Gretchen's face. She is
weeping bitterly as her children cling around her, too young to realise
the cause of their parents' sorrow. Hans rises moodily, and pulling down
what military belongings he has not given into the arsenal after the last
drill, falls a turning over of them abstractedly. By chance his hand rests
upon the little gray volume, the _Gebetbuch fuer Soldaten_. It opens in his
hand, and he comes and sits down by Gretchen and reads in a voice that
chokes sometimes, the


PRAYER IN STRAIT AND SORROW

O Lord Jesus Christ! let the crying and sighing of the poor come before
Thee. Withhold not Thy countenance from the tears and beseechings of the
woebegone. Help by Thine outstretched arm, and avert our sorrow from us.
Awake us who are lying dead in sin and in great danger, and whose thoughts
often wander from Thee. Let us trust with all our hearts that nothing can
be so broad, so deep, so high, nor so arduous that Thy grace and favour
cannot overcome it; that we so can and must be holpen out of every
difficulty and discomfiture when Thou takest compassion upon us. Help us,
then, through grace, and so I will praise Thee from now to all eternity.


Hans has bidden good-bye to Gretchen, and has kissed the children he may
never see more. He has marched with his fellows to the depot, and got his
uniform and arms. The _Militaerzug_ has carried him to Kreuznach, and
thence he has marched sturdily up the Nahe Valley and over the ridge into
the Kollerthaler Wald. His last halt was at Puttingen, but Kameke has sent
an aide back at the gallop to summon up all supports. The regiment stacks
arms for ten minutes' breathing-time while the cannon-thunder is borne
backward on the wind to the ears of the soldiers. In two hours more they
will be across the French frontier, storming furiously up the Spicheren
Berg. As Hans gropes in his tunic pocket for his tinder-box, the little
war prayer-book somehow gets between his fingers. He takes it out with the
pipe-light, and finds in its pages a prayer surely suited to the
situation--the prayer


FOR THE OUTMARCHING

O gracious God! I defile from out my Fatherland and from the society of my
friends,[1] and out of the house of my father into a strange land, to
campaign against the enemies of our king. Therefore I would cast myself
with life and soul upon Thy divine bosom and guardianship; and I pray
Thee, with prostrate humility, that Thou willst guide me with Thine eye,
and overshadow me with Thy wings. Let Thine angels camp round about me,
and Thy grace protect me in all the difficulties of the marches, in all
camps and dangers. Give me wisdom and understanding for my ways and works.
Give success and blessing to our ingoings and outcomings, so that we may
do everything well, and conquer on the field of battle; and after victory
won, turn our steps homeward as the heralds who announce peace. So shall
we praise Thee with gladsomeness, O most gracious Father, for Thy dear
Son's sake, Jesus Christ!

[Footnote 1: Every now and then one comes across a German word
untranslatable in its compact volume of expressiveness. How weakly am I
forced to render _Freundschaft_ here! "Outmarching," though a literal, is
a poor equivalent for _Ausmarsch_. In the old Scottish language we find an
exact correspondent for _aus_; the "Furthmarch" gives the idea to a
hair's-breadth.]

It is the morning of Gravelotte. King Wilhelm has issued his laconic order
for the day, and all know how bloody and arduous is the task before his
host. The French tents are visible away in the distance yonder by the
auberge of St. Hubert, and already the explosion of an occasional shell
gives earnest of the wrath to come. The regiment in which Hans is a
private has marched to Caulre Farm, and is halted for breakfast there
before beginning the real battle by attacking the French outpost
stronghold in Verneville. The tough ration beef sticks in poor Hans'
throat. He is no coward, but he thinks of Gretchen and the children, and
the Reserve-man draws aside into the thicket to commune with his own
thoughts. He has already found comfort in the little gray volume, and so
he pulls it out again to search for consolation in this hour of gloom. He
finds what he wants in the prayer


FOR THE BATTLE

Lord of Sabaoth, with Thee is no distinction in helping in great things or
in small. We are going now, at the orders of our commanders, to do battle
in the field with our enemies. Let us give proof of Thy might and honour.
Help us, Lord our God, for we trust in Thee, and in Thy name we go forth
against the enemy. Lord Christ, Thou hast said, "I am with thee in the
hour of need; I will pull thee out, and place thee in an honourable
place." Bethink Thee, Lord, of Thy word, and remember Thy promise. Come to
our aid when we are sore pressed, when the close grapple is imminent, when
the enemy overmatches us, and we have been surrounded by them. Stand by us
in need, for the aid of man is of no avail. Through Thee we will vanquish
our enemies, and in Thy name we will tread under the foot those who have
set themselves in array against us. They trust in their own might, and are
puffed up with pride; but we put our trust in the Almighty God, who,
without one stroke of the sword, canst smite into the dust not only those
who are now formed up against us, but also the whole world. God, we await
on Thy goodness. Blessed are those who put their trust in Thee. Help us,
that our enemies may not get the better of us, and wax triumphant in their
might; but strike disorder into their ranks, and smite them before our
eyes, so that we may overwhelm them. Show us Thy goodness, Thou Saviour,
of those who trust in Thee. Art Thou not God the Lord unto us who are
called after Thy name? So be gracious unto us, and take us--life and soul--
under the protection of Thy grace. And since Thou only knowest what is
good for us, so we commend ourselves unto Thee without reserve, be it for
life or for death. Let us live comforted; let us fight and endure
comforted; let us die comforted, for Jesus Christ, Thy dear Son's sake.
Amen.


Alvensleben is sitting on his horse on the little hillock behind the
hamlet of Flavigny, pulling his gray moustache, and praying that he might
see the _Spitze_ of Barneckow's division show itself on the edge of the
plain up from out the glen of Gorze. Rheinbaben's cavalry are half of them
down, the other half of them are rallying for another charge to save the
German centre. Hans is in the wood to the north of Tronville, helping to
keep back Leboeuf from swamping the left flank. The shells from the French
artillery on the Roman Road are crashing into the wood. The bark is jagged
by the slashes of venomous chassepot bullets. Twice has Ladmirault come
raging down from the heights of Bruville, twice has he been sent
staggering back. Now, with strong reinforcements, he is preparing for a
third assault. Meanwhile there is a lull in the battle. Hans, grimed and
powder-blackened, may let the breech of his _Zuendnadelgewehr_ cool and may
wipe his blood-stained bayonet on the forest moss. He has a moment for a
glance into the little gray volume, and it opens in his blackened fingers
at the prayer


IN THE AGONY OF THE BATTLE

O Thou Lord and Ruler of Thine own people, awake and look now in grace
upon Thy folk. Lord Jesus Christ, be now our Jesus, our Helper and
Deliverer, our rock and fortress, our fiery wall, for Thy great name's
sake. Be now our Emmanuel, God with us, God in us, God for us, God by the
side of us. Thou mighty arm of Thy Father, let us now see Thy great power,
so that men shall hail Thee their God, and the people may bend their knees
unto Thee. Strengthen and guide the fighting arm of Thy believing
soldiers, and help them, Thou invincible King of Battles. Gird Thyself up,
Thou mighty fighting Hero; gird Thy sword on Thy loins, and smite our
enemy hip and thigh. Art Thou not the Lord who directest the wars of the
whole world, who breakest the bow, who splinterest the spear, and burnest
the chariots with fire? Arouse Thyself, help us for Thy good will, and
cast us not from Thee, God of our Saviour; cease Thy wrath against us, and
think not for ever of our sins. Consider that we are all Thine handiwork;
give us Thy countenance again, and be gracious unto us. Return unto us, O
Lord, and go forth with our army. Restore happiness to us with Thy help
and counsel, Thou staunch and only King of Peace, who with Thy suffering
and death hast procured for us eternal peace. Give us the victory and an
honourable peace, and remain with us in life and in death. Amen.


Hans has marched from before Metz towards the valley of the Meuse, and the
regimental camp for the night is on the slopes of the Ardennes, over
against Chemery. The setting sun is glinting on the windows of the Chateau
of Vendresse, where the German King is quartered for the night. The birds
are chirruping in the bosky dales of the Bar. The morrow is fraught with
the hot struggle of Sedan, but honest Hans, a simple private man, knows
nought of strategic moves and takes his ease on the sward while he may. He
has oiled the needle-gun and done his cooking; a stone is under his head
and his mantle is about him. As he ponders in the dying rays of the
setting sun there comes over him the impulse to have a look into the pages
of the _Gebetbuch_, and he finds there this prayer


IN THE BIVOUAC

Heavenly Father, here I am, according to Thy divine will, in the service
of my king and war-master, as is my duty as a soldier; and I thank Thee
for Thy grace and mercy that Thou hast called me to the performance of
this duty, because I am certain that it is not a sin, but is an obedience
to Thy wish and will. But as I know and have learnt through Thy gracious
Word that none of our good works can avail us, and that nobody can be
saved merely as a soldier, but only as a Christian, I will not rely on my
obedience and upon my labours, but will perform my duties for Thy sake,
and to Thy service. I believe with all my heart that the innocent blood of
Thy dear Son Jesus Christ, which He has shed for me, delivers and saves
me, for He was obedient to Thee even unto death. On this I rely, on this I
live and die, on this I fight, and on this I do all things. Retain and
increase, O God, my Father, this belief by Thy Holy Ghost. I commend body
and soul to Thy hands. Amen.


It is the evening of Sedan, the most momentous victory of the century. The
bivouac fires light up the sluggish waters of the Meuse, not yet run clear
from blood. The burning villages still blaze on the lower slopes of the
Ardennes, and the tired victors, as they point to the beleaguered town,
exclaim in a kind of maze of sober triumph, "_Der Kaiser ist da!_" Hans is
joyous with his fellows, chaunts with them Luther's glorious hymn, _Nun
Danket alle Gott_; and as the watch-fire burns up he rummages in the
_Gebetbuch_ for something that will chime with the current of his
thoughts. He finds it in the prayer


AFTER THE VICTORY

God of armies! Thou hast given us success and victory against our enemies,
and hast put them to flight before us. Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us,
but to Thy holy name alone be all the honour! Thou hast done great things
for us, therefore our hearts are glad. Without Thy aid we should have been
worsted; only with God could we have done mighty deeds and subdued the
power of the enemy. The eye of our general Thou hast quickened and guided;
Thou hast strengthened the courage of our army, and lent it stubborn
valour. Yet not the strategy of our leader, nor our courage, but Thy great
mercy has given us the victory. Lord, who are we, that we dare to stand
before Thee as soldiers, and that our enemies yield and fly before us? We
are sinners, even as they are, and have deserved Thy fierce wrath and
punishment; but for the sake of Thy name Thou hast been merciful to us,
and hast so marked the sore peril of our threatened Fatherland, and hast
heard the prayer of our king, our people, and our army, because we called
upon Thy name, and held out our buckler in the name of the Lord of
Sabaoth. Blessed be Thy holy name for ever and ever. Amen.


The surrender of the French army of Sedan has been consummated, and
Napoleon has departed into captivity; while Hans, marching down by Rethel,
and through grand old Rheims, and along the smiling vinebergs of the Marne
Valley, is now _vor Paris_. He is on the _Feldwache_ in the forest of
Bondy before Raincy, and his turn comes to go on the uttermost sentry
post. As the snow-drift blows to one side he can see the French
watch-fires close by him in Bondy; nearer still he sees the three stones
and the few spadefuls of earth behind which, as he knows, is the French
outpost sentry confronting him. The straggling rays of the watery moon now
obscured by snow-scud, now falling on him faintly, could not aid him in
reading even if he dared avert his eyes from his front. But Hans had come
to know the value of the little gray volume; and while he lay in the
_Feldwache_ waiting for his spell of sentry go, he had learnt by heart the
following prayer


FOR OUTPOST SENTRY DUTY

Lord Jesus Christ, I stand here on the foremost fringe of the camp, and am
holding watch against the enemy; but wert Thou, Lord, not to guard us,
then the watcher watcheth in vain. Therefore, I pray Thee, cover us with
Thy grace as with a shield, and let Thy holy angels be round about us to
guard and preserve us that we be not fallen upon at unawares by the enemy.
Let the darkness of the night not terrify me; open mine eyes and ears that
I may observe the oncoming of the enemy from afar, and that I may study
well the care of myself and of the whole army. Keep me in my duty from
sleeping on my post and from false security. Let me continually call to
Thee with my heart, and bend Thyself unto me with Thine almighty presence.
Be Thou with me and strengthen me, life and soul, that in frost, in heat,
in rain, in snow, in all storms, I may retain my strength and return in
health to the _Feldwache_. So I will praise Thy name and laud Thy
protection. Amen.


It is the evening of the 2nd of December. Duerot has tried his hardest to
sup in Lagny, and has been balked by German valour. But not without
terrible loss. On the plateau and by the party wall before Villiers, dead
and wounded Germans lie very thick. In one of the little corries in the
vineberg poor Hans has gone down. The shells from Fort Nogent are bursting
all around, endangering the _Krankentraeger_ while prosecuting their duties
of mercy and devotion. Hans has somehow bound up his shattered limb; and
as he pulled his handkerchief from his pocket the little _Gebetbuch_ has
dropped out with it. There is none on earth to comfort poor Hans; let him
open the book and find consolation there in the prayer


FOR THE SICK AND WOUNDED

Dear and trusty Deliverer, Jesus Christ, I know in my necessity and pains
no whither to flee to but to Thee, my Saviour, who hast suffered for me,
and hast called unto all ailing and miserable ones, "Come unto Me, all ye
who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Oh, relieve me,
also, of Thy love and kindness, stretch out Thy healing and almighty hand,
and restore me to health. Free me with Thy aid from my wounds and my
pains, and console me with Thy grace who art vouchsafed to heal the broken
heart, and to console all the sorrowful ones. Dost Thou take pleasure in
our destruction? Our groaning touches Thee to the heart, and those whom
Thou hast cast down Thou wilt lift up again. In Thee, Lord Jesus, I put my
trust; I will not cease to importune Thee that Thou bringest me not to
shame. Help me, save me, so I will praise Thee for ever. Amen.


Alas for Gretchen and her brood! The 4th of December has dawned, and still
Hans lies unfound in the corrie of the vineberg. He has no pain now, for
his shattered limb has been numbed by the cruel frost. His eyes are waxing
dim and he feels the end near at hand. The foul raven of the battlefield
croaks above him in his enfeebled loneliness, impatient for its meal. The
grim king of terrors is very close to thee, poor honest soldier of the
Fatherland; but thou canst face him as boldly as thou hast faced the foe,
with the help of the little book of which thy frost-chilled fingers have
never lost the grip. The gruesome bird falls back as thou murmurest the
prayer


AT THE NEAR APPROACH OF DEATH

Merciful heavenly Father, Thou God of all consolation, I thank Thee that
Thou hast sent Thy dear Son Jesus Christ to die for me. He has through His
death taken from death his sting, so that I have no cause to fear him
more. In that I thank Thee, dear Father, and pray Thee receive my spirit
in grace, as it now parts from life. Stand by me and hold me with Thine
almighty hand, that I may conquer all the terrors of death. When my ears
can hear no more, let Thy Spirit commune with my spirit, that I, as Thy
child and co-heir with Christ, may speedily be with Jesus by Thee in
heaven. When my eyes can see no more, so open my eyes of faith that I may
then see Thy heaven open before me and the Lord Jesus on Thy right hand;
that I may also be where He is. When my tongue shall refuse its utterance,
then let Thy Spirit be my spokesman with indescribable breathings, and
teach me to say with my heart, "Father, into Thy hands I commit my
spirit." Hear me, for Jesus Christ's sake. Amen.


Would it harm the British soldier, think you, if in his kit there was a
_Gebetbuch fuer Soldaten_?




MISS PRIEST'S BRIDECAKE

1879


In broad essentials the marryings and givings in marriage of India
nowadays do not greatly differ from these natural phenomena at home; but
to use a florist's phrase, they are more inclined to "sport." The old days
are over when consignments of damsels were made to the Indian
marriage-market, in the assured certainty that the young ladies would be
brides-elect before reaching the landing ghat. The increased facilities
which improved means of transit now offer to bachelors for running home on
short leave have resulted in making the Anglo-Indian "spin" rather a drug
in the market; and operating in the same untoward direction is the growing
predilection on the part of the Anglo-Indian bachelor for other men's
wives, in preference to hampering himself with the encumbrance of a wife
of his own. Among other social products of India old maids are now
occasionally found; and the fair creature who on her first arrival would
smile only on commissioners or colonels has been fain, after a few--yet
too many--hot seasons have impaired her bloom and lowered her
pretensions, to put up with a lieutenant or even with a dissenting
_padre_. Slips between the cup and the lip are more frequent in India than
in England. Loving and riding away is not wholly unknown in the
Anglo-Indian community; and indeed, by both parties to the contract,
engagements are frequently regarded in the mistaken light of ninepins.
Hearts are seldom broken. At Simla during a late season a gallant captain
persistently wore the willow till the war broke out, because he had been
jilted in favour of a colonel; but his appetite rapidly recovered its tone
on campaign, and he was reported to have reopened relations by
correspondence from the tented field with a former object of his
affections. Not long ago there arrived in an up-country station a box
containing a wedding trousseau, which a lady had ordered out from home as
the result of an engagement between her and a gallant warrior. But in the
interval the warrior had departed elsewhere and had addressed to the lady
a pleasant and affable communication, setting forth that there was
insanity in his family and that he must have been labouring under an
access of the family disorder when he had proposed to her. It was hard to
get such a letter, and it must have been harder still for her to gaze on
the abortive wedding-dress. But the lady did not abandon herself to
despair; she took a practical view of the situation. She determined to
keep the trousseau by her for six months, in case she might within that
time achieve a fresh conquest, when it would come in happily. Should
fortune not favour her thus far she meant to advertise the wedding-gear
for sale.

Miss Priest was no "spin" lingering on in spinsterhood against her will.
It is true that when I saw her first she had already been "out" three
years, but she might have been married a dozen times over had she chosen.
I have seen many pretty faces in the fair Anglo-Indian sisterhood, but
Miss Priest had a brightness and a sparkle that were all her own. At
flirting, at riding, at walking, at dancing, at performing in amateur
theatricals, at making fools of men in an airy, ruthless, good-hearted
fashion, Miss Priest, as an old soldier might say, "took the right of the
line." There was a fresh vitality about the girl that drew men and women
alike to her. You met her at dawn cantering round Jakko on her pony.
Before breakfast she had been rinking for an hour, with as likely as not a
waltz or two thrown in. She never missed a picnic to Annandale, the
Waterfalls, or Mashobra. Another turn at the Benmore rink before dinner,
and for sure a dance after, rounded off this young lady's normal day
during the Simla season. But if pleasure-loving, capricious, and reckless,
she scraped through the ordeal of Simla gossip without incurring scandal.
She was such a frank, honest girl, that malign tongues might assail her
indeed, but ineffectually. And she had given proof that she knew how to
take care of herself, although her only protectress was a perfectly
inoffensive mother. On the occasion of the Prince of Wales's visit to
Lahore, had she not boxed the ears of a burly and somewhat boorish swain,
who had chosen the outside of an elephant as an eligible _locale_ for a
proposal, the uncouth abruptness of which did not accord with her notion
of the fitness of things?

Miss Priest may be said to have lived in a chronic state of engagements.
The engagements never seemed to come to anything, but that was on account
mostly of the young lady's wilfulness. It bothered her to be engaged to
the same man for more than from a week to ten days on end. No bones were
broken; the gentleman resigned the position at her behest, and she would
genially dance with him the same night. Malice and heartburning were out
of the question with a lissom, winsome, witching fairy like this, who
played with her life as a child does with soap-bubbles, and who was as
elusory and irresponsible as a summer-day rainbow. But one season at
Mussoorie Miss Priest contracted an engagement somewhat less evanescent.
Mussoorie of all Himalayan hill-stations is the most demure and proper.
Simla occasionally is convulsed by scandals, although dispassionate
inquiry invariably proves that there is nothing in them. The hot blood of
the quick and fervid Punjaub--casual observers have called the Punjaub
stupid, but the remark applies only to its officials--is apt to stir the
current of life at Murree. The chiefs of the North-West are invariably so
intolerably proper that occasional revolt from their austerity is all but
forced on Nynee Tal, the sanatorium of that province. But Mussoorie,
undisturbed by the presence of frolicsome viceroys or austere
lieutenant-governors, is a limpid pool of pleasant propriety. It is not so
much that it is decorous as that it is genuinely good; it is a favourite
resort of clergymen and of clergymen's wives. It was at Mussoorie that
Miss Priest met Captain Hambleton, a gallant gunner. They danced together
at the Assembly Rooms; they rode in company round the Camel's Back; they
went to the same picnics at "The Glen." The captain proposed and was
accepted. For about the nineteenth time Miss Priest was an engaged young
lady. And Captain Hambleton was a lover of rather a different stamp from
the men with whom her name previously had been nominally coupled. He was
in love and he was a gentleman; he had proposed to the girl, not that he
and she should be merely engaged but that they should be married also.
This view of the subject was novel to Miss Priest and at first she thought
it rather a bore; but the captain pegged away and gradually the lady came
rather to relish the situation. Men and women concurred that the wayward
pinions of the fair Bella were at last trimmed, if not clipped; and to do
her justice the general opinion was that, once married, she would make an
excellent wife. As the close of the Mussoorie season approached the
invitations went out for Bella Priest's wedding, and for "cake and wine
afterwards at the house." The wedding-breakfast is a comparatively rare
_tamasha_ in India; the above is the formula of the usual invitation at
the hill-stations.

It happened that just two days before the day fixed for the marriage of
Miss Priest and Captain Hambleton, there was a fancy-dress ball in the
Assembly Rooms at Mussoorie. I think that as a rule fancy-dress balls are
greater successes in India than at home. People in India give their minds
more to the selection and to the elaboration of costumes; and there is
less of that _mauvaise honte_ when masquerading in fancy costume, which
makes a ball of this description at home so wooden and wanting in go. At a
fancy ball in India "the devil" acts accordingly, and manages his tail
with adroitness and grace. It is a fact that at a recent fancy-dress ball
in Lahore a game was played on the lap of a lady who appeared as "chess,"
with the chess-men which had formed her head-dress. This Mussoorie ball,
being the last of the season, was to excel all its predecessors in
inventive variety. A _padre's_ wife conceived the bright idea of appearing
as Eve; and only abandoned the notion on finding that, no matter what
species of thread she used, it tore the fig-leaves--a result which,
besides causing her a disappointment, imperilled her immortal soul by
engendering doubts as to the truth of the Scriptural narrative of the
creation. Miss Priest determined to go to this ball, although doing so
under the circumstances was scarcely in accordance with the _convenances_;
but she was a girl very much addicted to having her own way. Captain
Hambleton did not wish her to go, and there was a temporary coolness
between the two on the subject; but he yielded and they made it up. The
principle as to her going once established, Miss Priest's next task was to
set about the invention of a costume. It was to be her last effort as a
"spin"; and she determined it should be worthy of her reputation for
brilliant inventiveness. She had shone as a _Vivandiere_, as the Daughter
of the Regiment, as a Greek Slave, Grace Darling, and so forth, times out
of number; but those characters were stale. Miss Priest had a form of
supple rounded grace, nor had Diana shapelier limbs. A great inspiration
came to her as she sauntered pondering on the Mall. Let her go as Ariel,
all gauze, flesh-tints, and natural curves. She hailed the happy thought
and invested in countless yards of gauze. She had the tights already by
her.

Now Miss Priest, knowing the idiosyncrasy of Captain Hambleton, had little
doubt that he would put his foot down upon Ariel. But she knew he loved
her, and with characteristic recklessness determined to trust to that and
to luck. She too loved him, even better, perhaps, than Ariel; but she
hoped to keep both the captain and the character. She did not, however,
tell him of her design, waiting perhaps for a favourable opportunity. But
even in Arcadian Mussoorie there are the "d----d good-natured friends" of
whom Byron wrote; and one of those--of course it was a woman--told Captain
Hambleton of the character in which Miss Priest intended to appear at the
fancy ball. The captain was a headstrong sort of man--what in India is
called _zubburdustee_. Instead of calling on the girl and talking to her
as a wise man would have done, he sat down and wrote her a terse letter
forbidding her to appear as Ariel, and adding that if she should persist
in doing so their engagement must be considered at an end. Miss Priest
naturally fired up. Strangely enough, being a woman, she did not reply to
the captain's letter; but when the evening of the ball came, she duly
appeared as Ariel with rather less gauze about her shapely limbs than had
been her original intention. She created an immense sensation. Some of the
ladies frowned, others turned up their noses, yet others tucked in their
skirts when she approached; and all vowed that they would decline to touch
Miss Priest's hand in the quadrille. Miss Priest did not care a jot for
these demonstrations, and she never danced square dances. Among the
gentlemen she created a perfect furore.

Captain Hambleton was present at the ball. For the greater part of the
evening he stood near the door with his eye fixed on Miss Priest,
apparently rather in sorrow than in anger. His gaze seemed but to
stimulate her to more vivacious flirtation; and she "carried on above a
bit," as a cynical subaltern remarked, with the gallant major to whom she
had been penultimately engaged. Toward the close of the evening Captain
Hambleton relinquished his post of observation, seemed to accept the
situation, and was observed at supper-time paying marked attention to a
married lady with whom his name had been to some extent coupled not long
before his engagement to Miss Priest.

Next morning Miss Priest took time by the forelock. She waited for no
further communication from Captain Hambleton; he had already sent his
ultimatum and she had dared her fate. The morrow was the day fixed for the
marriage. Many people had been bidden. Mussoorie, including Landour, is a
large station, and the postal delivery of letters is not particularly
punctual. So she adopted a plan for warning off the wedding-guests
identical with that employed in Indian stations for circulating
notifications as to lawn-tennis gatherings and unimportant intimations
generally. At the head of the paper is written the notification,
underneath are the names of the persons concerned. The document is
intrusted to a messenger known as a _chuprassee_, who goes away on his
circuit; and each person writes "Seen" opposite his or her name in
testimony of being posted in the intelligence conveyed in the
notification. Miss Priest divided the invited guests into four rounds and
despatched four _chuprassees_, each bearing a document curtly announcing
that "Miss Priest's marriage will not come off as arranged, and the
invitations therefore are to be regarded as cancelled."

Miss Priest had no fortune, and her mother was by no means wealthy. It may
seem strange to English readers--not nearly so much so, however, as to
Anglo-Indian ones--that Captain Hambleton had thought it a graceful and
kindly attention to provide the wedding-cake. It had reached him across
the hills from Peliti's the night of the ball, and now here it was on his
hands--a great white elephant. Whether in the hope that it might be
regarded as an olive-branch, whether that he burned to be rid of it
somehow, or whether, knowing that Miss Priest was bound to get married
some day and thinking that it would be a convenience if she had a
bridecake by her handy for the occasion, there is no evidence. Anyhow, he
sent it to Mrs. Priest with his compliments. That very sensible woman did
not send it back with a cutting message, as some people would have done.
Having considerable Indian experience, she had learned practical wisdom
and the short-sighted folly of cutting messages. She kept the bridecake,
and enclosed to the gallant captain Gosslett's bill for the dozen of
simkin that excellent firm had sent in to wash it down wherewithal.

Bridecakes are bores to carry about from place to place, and Miss Priest
and her mother were rather birds of passage. Peliti declined to take this
particular bridecake back, for all Simla had seen it in his window and he
saw no possibility of "working it in." So the Priests, mother and
daughter, determined to realise on it in a somewhat original and indeed
cynical fashion. The cake was put up to be raffled for.

All the station took tickets for the fun of the thing. Captain Hambleton
was anxious to show that there was no ill-feeling, and did not find
himself so unhappy as he had expected--perhaps from the _redintegratio
amoris_ in another quarter; so he took his ticket in the raffle like other
people. It is needless to say that he won; and the cake duly came back to
him.

Had Captain Hambleton been a superstitious man, he might have regarded
this strange occurrence as indicating that the Fates willed it that he
should compass somehow a union with Miss Priest. But the captain had no
superstition in his nature; and, indeed, had begun to think that he was
well out of it; besides which it was currently reported that Miss Priest
had already re-engaged herself to another man. But the bridecake was upon
him as the Philistines upon Samson; and the question was, what the devil
to do with it? He could not raffle it over again; nobody would take
tickets. He had half a mind to trundle it over the _khud_ (_Anglice_,
precipice) and be done with it; but then, again, he reflected that this
would be sheer waste and might seem to indicate soreness on his part. It
cost him a good many pegs before he thought the matter out in all its
bearings, for, as has been said, he was a gunner, but as he sauntered away
from the club in the small hours a happy thought came to him.

He would give a picnic at which the bogey bridecake should figure
conspicuously, and then be laid finally by the process of demolition. His
leave was nearly up; he had experienced much hospitality and a picnic
would be a graceful and genial acknowledgment thereof. And he would ask
the Priests just like other people, and no doubt they would enter into the
spirit of the thing and not send a "decline." Bella, he knew, liked
picnics nearly as well as balls, and it must be a powerful reason indeed
that would keep her away from either.

Captain Hambleton's picnic was the last of the season, and everybody
called it the brightest. "The Glen" resounded to the laughter at tiffin,
and the shades of night were falling ere stray couples turned up from its
more sequestered recesses. Amid loud cheers Miss Priest, although still
Miss Priest, cut up her own bridecake with a serene equanimity that proved
the charming sweetness of her disposition. There was no marriage-bell yet
all went merry as a marriage-bell, which is occasionally rather a sombre
tintinnabulation; and the _debris_ of the bridecake finally fell to the
sweeper.

I would fain that it were possible, having a regard to truth, to round off
this little story prettily by telling how in a glade of "The Glen" after
the demolition of the bridecake, Miss Priest and the captain "squared
matters," were duly married and lived happily ever after, as the
story-books say. But this consummation was not attained. Miss Priest
indeed was in the glade, but it was not with the captain, or at least this
particular captain; and as for him, he spent the afternoon placidly
smoking cigarettes as he lay at the feet of his married consoler. To the
best of my knowledge Miss Priest is Miss Priest still.




A VERSION OF BALACLAVA


Referring to a particular phase of this memorable combat, Mr. Kinglake
wrote: "The question is not ripe for conclusive decision; some of those
who, as is supposed, might throw much light upon it, have hitherto
maintained silence." It was in 1868 that the fourth volume--the Balaclava
volume--of Mr. Kinglake's History was published. Since he wrote,
singularly few of those who could throw light on obscure points of the
battle have broken silence. Lord George Paget's Journal furnished little
fresh information, since Mr. Kinglake had previously used it extensively.
There is but a spark or two of new light in Sir Edward Hamley's more
recent compendium. As the years roll on the number of survivors diminishes
in an increasing ratio, nor does one hear of anything valuable left behind
by those who fall out of the thinning ranks. The reader of the period, in
default of any other authority, betakes himself to Kinglake. There are
those who term Kinglake's volumes romance rather than history--or, more
mildly, the romance of history. But this is unjust and untrue. It would be
impertinent to speak of his style; that gift apart, his quest for accurate
information was singularly painstaking, searching, and scrupulous. Yet it
cannot be said that he was always well served. He had perforce to lean on
the statements of men who were partisans, writing as he did so near his
period that nearly all men charged with information were partisans.
British officers are not given to thrusting on a chronicler tales of their
own prowess. But _esprit de corps_ in our service is so strong--and, spite
of its incidental failings that are almost merits what lover of his
country could wish to see it weakened?--that men of otherwise implicit
veracity will strain truth, and that is a weak phrase, to exalt the
conduct of their comrades and their corps. No doubt Mr. Kinglake
occasionally suffered because of this propensity; and, with every respect,
his literary _coup d'oeil_, except as regards the Alma where he saw for
himself, and Inkerman where no _coup d'oeil_ was possible, was somewhat
impaired by his having to make his picture of battle a mosaic, each
fragment contributed by a distinct actor concentrated on his own
particular bit of fighting. If ever military history becomes a fine art we
may find the intending historian, alive to the proverb that "onlookers see
most of the game," detailing capable persons with something of the duty of
the subordinate umpire of a sham fight, to be answerable each for a given
section of the field, the historian himself acting as the correlative of
the umpire-in-chief.

[Illustration: MAP OF BALACLAVA PLAIN.

EXPLANATIONS.

       *       *       *       *       *

Figures 1 to 6 indicate Redoubts.

A. Point of collision.

B. "C" Troop R.H.A.'s position during combat, in support Heavy Cavalry.

C. "C" Troop in action against fugitive Russian Cavalry about D., range
about 750 yards.

E. Lord Lucan's position watching advance of Russian Cavalry mass.

F. Position "C" Troop when approached by Cardigan and Paget after Light
Cavalry charge.

G. Position "C" Troop in support Light Cavalry charge.

H. Russian Cavalry mass advancing at trot up "North" valley.

HH. Russian Cavalry General and Staff trotting along Causeway heights,
with view into both valleys.

K. Line of Light Cavalry charge.

L. Light Brigade during Heavy Cavalry charge.

M. "I" Troop R.H.A. during ditto.

N. Lord Raglan's position (approximate).

O. Scarlett's five squadrons beginning their advance.

P. Russian Cavalry mass halted.]

It is true that the battle of Balaclava was fought to "a gallery"
consisting of the gazers who looked down into the plain from the upland of
the Chersonese. But of close and virtually independent spectators of the
battle's most thrilling episodes, so near the climax of the Heavy Cavalry
charge that they heard the clash of the sabres, so close to the lip of the
Valley of Death that they discerned the wounds of our stricken troopers
who strewed its sward and could greet and be greeted by the broken groups
that rode back out of the "mouth of hell," there was but one small body of
people. This body consisted of the officers and men of "C" Troop, Royal
Horse Artillery. "C" Troop had been encamped from 1st October until the
morning of the battle close to the Light division, in that section of the
British position known as the Right Attack. When the fighting began in the
Balaclava plain on the morning of the 25th, it promptly started for the
scene of action. Pursuing the nearest way to the plain by the Woronzoff
road, at the point known as the "Cutting" it received an order from Lord
Raglan to take a more circuitous route, as by the more direct one it was
following it might become exposed to fire from Russian cannon on the
Fedoukine heights. Pursuing the circuitous route it came out into the
plain through the "Col" then known as the "Barrier," crossed the "South"
or "Inner" valley, and reached the left rear of Scarlett's squadrons
formed up for the Heavy Cavalry charge. Here it received an order from
Brigadier-General Strangways, who commanded the Artillery, with which it
could not comply; and thenceforward "C" Troop throughout the day acted
independently, at the discretion of its enterprising and self-reliant
commander. What it saw and what it did are recorded in a couple of
chapters of a book entitled _From Coruna to Sevastopol_. [Footnote: _From
Coruna to Sevastopol_: The History of "C" Battery, "A" Brigade (late "C"
Troop), Royal Horse Artillery. W.H. Allen and Co.] This volume was
published some years ago, but the interesting and vivid details given in
its pages of the Balaclava combats and the light it throws on many obscure
incidents of the day have been strangely overlooked. The author of the
chapters was an officer in the Troop whose experiences he shared and
describes, and is a man well known in the service to be possessed of acute
observation, strong memory, and implicit veracity. The present writer has
been favoured by this officer with much information supplementary to that
given in his published chapters, which is embodied in the following
account throughout which the officer will be designated as "the 'C' Troop
chronicler."

The "Plain of Balaclava" is divided into two distinct valleys by a low
ridge known as the "Causeway Heights," which bisects it in the direction
of its length and is everywhere easily practicable for all arms. The
valley nearest to the sea and the town of Balaclava has been variously
termed the "South" and the "Inner" valley; it was on the slope descending
to it from the ridge that our Heavy Cavalry won their success; the valley
beyond the ridge is the "North" or "Outer" valley, down which, their faces
set eastward, sped to glorious disaster the "noble six hundred" of the
Light Brigade. On the north the plain is bounded by the Fedoukine heights;
on the west by the steep face of the Chersonese upland whereon was the
allied main position before Sevastopol during the siege; on the south by
the broken ground between the plain and the sea; on the east by the River
Tchernaya and the Kamara hills. Our weakness in the plain invited attack.
At Kadikoei, on its southern verge, Sir Colin Campbell covered Balaclava
with a Scottish regiment, a Field battery, and some Turks. Near the
western end of the South valley were the camps of the cavalry division.
Straggled along the Causeway heights was a series of weak earthworks whose
total armament consisted of nine iron guns, and among which were
distributed some six or seven battalions of Turkish infantry. At daybreak
of 25th October the Russian General Liprandi with a force of 22,000
infantry, 3300 cavalry, and 78 guns, took the offensive by driving the
Turkish garrisons out of these earthworks in succession, beginning with
the most easterly--No. 1, known as "Canrobert's Hill." The Turks holding
it fought well and stood a storm and heavy loss before they were expelled.
The other earthworks fell with less and less resistance, and the first
three, with seven out of their nine guns, remained in the Russian
possession.

During the morning, while the Russians were taking the earthworks along
the ridge, our two cavalry brigades, in the words of General Hamley, had
been manoeuvring so as to threaten the flanks of any force which might
approach Balaclava, without committing themselves to an action in which
they would have been without the support of infantry. Ultimately, until
his infantry should become available, Lord Raglan drew in the cavalry
division to a position on the left of redoubt No. 6, near the foot of the
Chersonese upland.

While it was temporarily quiescent there Liprandi was engaging in an
operation of enterprise rare in the record of Russian cavalry. General
Ryjoff at the head of a great body of horse started on an advance up the
North valley. Presently he detached four squadrons to his left, which
moved toward where Sir Colin Campbell was in position at the head of the
Kadikoei gorge, was repulsed without difficulty by that soldier's fire, and
rode back whence it had come. The main body of Russian horse, computed by
unimaginative authorities to be about 2000 strong, continued up the valley
till it was about abreast of redoubt No. 4 [Footnote: See Map.], when it
halted; checked apparently, writes Kinglake, by the fire of two guns from
a battery on the edge of the upland. The "C" Troop chronicler states that
in addition to "a few" shots fired by this battery (manned by Turks), the
guns of "I" troop R.H.A., temporarily stationed in a little hollow in
front of the Light Brigade [Footnote: See Map.], fired rapidly one round
each, "haphazard," over the high ground in their front. General Hamley
assigns no ground for the Russian halt, but mentions that just at the
moment of collision between our Heavies and the Russian mass "three guns"
on the edge of the upland were fired on the latter. From whatever cause,
the Russian cavalry wheeled obliquely to the leftward, crossed the
Causeway heights about redoubt No. 5, and began to descend the slope of
the South valley. Kinglake heard of no ground for believing that the
Russian horse thus wheeling southward, were cognisant of the presence of
the Heavies in the valley they were entering. But the "C" Troop chronicler
states that as the Troop was crossing the plain a few Russian horsemen
were seen by it trotting fast along the top of the ridge [Footnote: See
Map.], who, when almost immediately afterwards the head of the Russian
column showed itself on the skyline, were set down as the General
commanding it and his staff.

Kinglake observes that the Russians have declared their object in this
operation to have been the destruction of a non-existent artillery park
near Kadikoei, while some of our people imagined it to have been a real
attempt on Balaclava. But up the centre of the North valley was neither
the directest nor the safest way to Kadikoei, much less to Balaclava. Is it
not more probable that the enterprise was of the nature merely of a sort
of "snap-offensive"; while as yet the allied infantry visibly pouring down
the slopes of the upland were innocuous because of distance and while the
sole occupants of the plain were a couple of weak cavalry brigades and a
single horse battery? Ryjoff on the ridge could see in his front at least
portions of the Light Brigade; its fire told him the horse battery was
thereabouts too, and there were those shots from the cannon on the upland.
Is it not feasible that, looking down on his left to Scarlett's poor six
squadrons--his two following regiments were then some distance off--and
seeing those squadrons as yet without accompanying artillery, he should
have judged them his easier quarry and ordered the wheel that should bring
his avalanche down on them?

Kinglake recounts how, while our cavalry division yet stood intact near
the foot of the upland, Lord Raglan had noticed the instability of the
Turks under Campbell's command at Kadikoei and had sent Lord Lucan
directions to move down eight squadrons of Heavies to support them; how
Scarlett started with the Inniskillings, Greys, and Fifth Dragoon Guards,
numbering six squadrons, to be followed by the two squadrons of the Royals;
how the march toward Kadikoei was proceeding along the South valley, when
all of a sudden Elliot, General Scarlett's aide-de-camp, glancing up
leftward at the ridge "saw its top fretted with lances, and in another
moment the skyline broken by evident squadrons of horse." Then, Kinglake
proceeds, Scarlett's resolve was instantaneous; he gave the command "Left
wheel into line!" and confronted the mass gathering into sight over
against him. Soon after Scarlett had started Lord Lucan had learned of the
advance up the North valley of the great mass of Russian cavalry, which he
had presently descried himself, as also its change of direction southward
across the Causeway ridge; and after giving Lord Cardigan "parting
instructions" which that officer construed into compulsory inactivity on
his part when a great opportunity presented itself, he had galloped off at
speed to overtake Scarlett and give him directions for prompt conflict
with the Russian cavalry. Thus far Kinglake.

The testimony of the "C" Troop chronicler differs from the above statement
in every detail. He significantly points out that Kinglake does not, as is
his custom, quote the words of Lord Raglan's order directing the march of
the Heavies to Kadikoei. His averment is to the following effect. When the
cavalry division after its manoeuvring of the morning was retiring by Lord
Raglan's command along the South valley toward the foot of the upland, it
was followed as closely as they dared by some Cossacks who busied
themselves in spearing and capturing the unfortunate Turks flying from the
ridge toward Kadikoei athwart the rear of the British squadrons. Eventually
the Cossacks reached the camp of the Light Brigade and set about stabbing
and hacking at the sick and non-effective horses left standing at the
picket-lines. Lord Raglan from his commanding position on the upland saw
those Cossacks working mischief in our lines, and sent a message to Lord
Lucan "to take some cavalry forward and protect the camp from being
destroyed." The "C" Troop chronicler has in his possession a letter from
the actual bearer of this message, to the effect that he duly delivered it
to Lord Lucan and that consequent on it his lordship moved forward some
heavy cavalry into the plain toward the picket-lines. Testimony to be
presently noted will indicate the importance of this statement. The
chronicler denies that Lord Lucan, as Kinglake states, galloped after
Scarlett after having given Lord Cardigan his "parting instructions." No
doubt he did give those instructions, when apprised by Lord Raglan's
aide-de-camp of the threatening advance of Russian horse. But what he then
did, assured as he was of the stationary attitude of the heavy squadrons
sent out to protect the camp, was to ride forward along the ridge-line to
discern for himself where, if indeed anywhere, the Russians were intending
to strike. He most daringly remained at a forward and commanding point of
the ridge [Footnote: See Map.] until actually chased off his ground by the
van of the Russian wheel, and he then galloped straight down the slope to
join Scarlett drawing out his squadrons for the conflict with the Russian
mass whose leading files Elliot's keen eye had discerned on the skyline.

If Kinglake were right as to his alleged movement of the Heavies toward
Kadikoei and its sudden arrestment because of Elliot's discovery, "C"
Troop, as it approached them, would have seen the squadrons still in
motion. But the chronicler testifies that "C" Troop, while moving to the
scene of action and when still more than a mile and a half distant (at
least fifteen minutes at the pace the weakened gun-teams travelled), had a
full view of the South valley. And it then saw five squadrons of heavy
cavalry thus early halted in the plain near the cavalry picket-lines,
fronting towards the ridge and apparently perfectly dressed--the Greys
(two squadrons deep) in the centre, recognised by their bearskins; a
helmeted regiment (also two squadrons deep) on the left (afterwards known
to be the 5th Dragoon Guards); and one helmeted squadron on the right (2nd
squadron Inniskillings). A sixth squadron (1st Inniskillings) was visible
some distance to the right rear and it was also fronting towards the
ridge. This force, so and thus early positioned, consisted, avers the
chronicler, of the identical troops which Kinglake erroneously describes
as straggling hurriedly into deployment under the urgency of Scarlett and
Lucan to cope with the suddenly disclosed adversary.

When "C" Troop and its chronicler reached the rear of the formed-up
squadrons they were found in the same formation as when first observed,
but the whole had in the interval been moved somewhat to the right,
farther into the plain, with intent no doubt to be clear of obstacles on
the previous front. Kinglake speaks throughout of the force that first
charged under Scarlett--"Scarlett's three hundred," as consisting of three
squadrons ranked thus:--


-------------------  -------------------    -------------------
     2nd squad.           lst squad.      2nd squad. Inniskillings

      \__________________________/
                  Greys.


And, although his words are not so clear as usual, he appears to believe
that the 5th Dragoon Guards, whom in his plan he places some little
distance to the left rear of the Greys, were actually the last to move to
the attack, of all the five regiments participating in the heavy cavalry
onslaught. The "C" Troop chronicler, noting details, be it remembered,
from his position immediately in rear of the cavalry force which first
charged, describes its composition and formation thus:--


   -------------------          -------------------  -------------------
Front squad. 5th Dr. Guards.     1st squad. Greys.        2nd squad.
                                                         Inniskillings.
   -------------------          -------------------
Rear squad. 5th Dr. Guards.      2nd squad. Greys.


in all five squadrons, instead of Mr. Kinglake's three. Nor, according to
the chronicler, did the three squadrons in first line start
simultaneously, as Kinglake distinctly conveys. The leading squadron of
the Greys moved off first, and just as it was breaking into a gallop was
temporarily hampered by the swerving of the horse of Colonel Griffiths,
who was struck in the head by a bullet from the halted Russians' carbine
fire. Next moved, almost simultaneously, the 2nd squadron Inniskillings
and the front squadron 5th Dragoon Guards; thirdly, the 2nd squadron
Greys, and finally the rear squadron 5th Dragoon Guards. Lord Lucan is
represented as having been "personally concerned in or approving of
everything connected with the five squadrons at this moment," galloping to
each in succession, giving orders when and in what sequence it was to
start, what section of the Russian front it was to strike, and exerting
himself to the utmost to have everything fully understood. His errors were
in omitting to call in the outlying regiments of the brigade, and either
now--or earlier before he left the ridge, specifically to order Lord
Cardigan to fall on the flank of the Russians at the moment when their
front should be _aux prises_ with Scarlett's heavy squadrons. "C" Troop's
position was such that it could command, over the heads of the stationary
Heavies, the gradual slope up to the Russian front, and every detail of
the charge was under its eyes. Scarlett's burnished helmet and plain blue
coat were conspicuous in front. The Troop also had the opportunity of
making a deliberate study of the Russian cavalry both before and during
the combat.

Its front had the appearance of three strong squadrons; its formation was
either close or quarter distance column--probably the former, since the
column could nowhere be seen through from front to rear; its depth halted
was about the same as its breadth of front; its pace across the ridge was
a sharp trot and its discipline was indicated by the smartness with which
it took ground to the left. Kinglake describes the serried mass as
encircled by a loose fringe of satellites, but the "C" Troop chronicler
saw neither skirmishers, flankers, nor scouts; and no guns were discerned
or heard, although General Hamley says that as the huge cohort swept down
batteries darted out from it and threw shells against the troops on the
upland. No Lancers were seen with the column, certainly none with pennons.
The "partial deployment" of which Kinglake speaks, consisting of "wings or
forearms" devised to cover the flanks or fold inwards on the front, did
not make itself apparent to any observer of "C" Troop; and indeed the
present writer never knew a Russian who had heard of it, the species of
formation adumbrated, so far as he is aware, being confined to Zulu impis.
It was noticed, and this is not rare, that on the halt the centre pulled
up a little earlier than the flanks, so that the latter were somewhat
prolonged and advanced. The halt was quite brief and a slower advance
ensued without correction of the frontal dressing. Presently there was
another halt and some pistol or carbine fire from the central squadron on
the advancing first squadron of the Greys. Kinglake makes the Russian
front meet our assault halted, but the "C" Troop chronicler declares that
when the collision occurred the mass were actually moving forward but at
"a pace so slow that it could hardly be called a trot." General Hamley
describes "the impetus of the enemy's column carrying it on, and pressing
our combatants back for a short space," and the chronicler speaks of the
Russians as surging forward after the impact, but without bearing back our
people.

It is extremely difficult for the reader of a detailed narrative of a
combat that may become a landmark in the military history of a nation, to
realise that it may have been fought and finished in no longer time than
it has taken him to read the few paragraphs of introductory matter. Mr.
Kinglake has devoted a whole volume to the battle of Balaclava, and
four-fifths of it deals with the two cavalry fights--Scarlett's charge,
and the charge of the Light Brigade. The latter deed was enacted from
start to finish within the space of five-and-twenty minutes; as regards
the former, from the first appearance of the Russian troopers on the
skyline to their defeat and flight a period of eight minutes is the
outside calculation. General Hamley, an eyewitness, says "some four or
five minutes." During those minutes "C" Troop R.H.A. under Brandling's
shrewd and independent guidance was moving slowly forward on the right of
the ground that had been covered by the charging Heavies. There was no
opportunity for its intervention while the melley lasted. Even when the
Russian squadrons broke it could not for the moment act while the redcoats
were still blended with the gray. But Brandling saw that his chance was
nigh; he galloped forward to the point marked C on the map, unlimbered,
and stood intent. Kinglake states that the fugitive Russians, hanging
together as closely as they could, retreated by the way they had come and
Hamley describes them as vanishing beyond the ridge. Kinglake also says
that "I" Troop R.H.A. (accompanying the Light Brigade) fired a few shots
at the retreating horsemen, against whom Barker's battery, from its
position near Kadikoei, also came into action. The "C" Troop chronicler
traverses those statements. His testimony is that the Russian line of
retreat was by their left rear along the slope of the South valley, and
not immediately over the ridge; that the mass was spread over acres of
ground; and that their officers were trying to rally the men and had
actually got some ranks formed, when "C" Troop opened fire from about
point C in the general direction of point D. "I" Troop was out of sight,
he says, and Barker out of range; neither came into action; but "C" Troop,
of whose presence in the field Kinglake apparently was unaware, fired
forty-nine shot and shells, broke up the attempted rally, and punished the
Russians severely. The range was about 750 paces.

At the time when the Light Brigade started on its "mad-brained" charge
down the North valley, "C" Troop was halted dismounted on the slope of the
South valley a little below redoubt No. 5. In rear of it was the Heavy
Cavalry Brigade, halted on the scene of its recent victorious combat. Lord
Lucan was some little distance to the front. "C" Troop presently saw him
trot away over the ridge in the direction of the Light Brigade, a scrap of
paper in his hand at which he kept looking--doubtless the memorable order
which Nolan had just brought him--and a group of staff officers, among
whom was Nolan, behind him. Out of curiosity Brandling with his trumpeter
rode up to the crest, whence he commanded a view into the North valley. By
and by some of the Heavies were moved over the crest, no doubt the Royals
and Greys which Scarlett was to lead forward in support of the Light
Brigade. All was still quiet but for an occasional shot from a Russian
battery about redoubt No. 2, when suddenly Brandling came galloping back
shouting "Mount! mount!" and telling his officers as he came in that the
Light Cavalry had begun an advance on the other side of the ridge. But
that he had happened to ride to the crest, the charge of the Light Brigade
would have begun and ended without the knowledge of "C" Troop. No order
from any source reached it, and Brandling, acting on his own initiative,
took his guns rapidly to the front along the inner edge of the ridge and
unlimbered at point G. He durst not fire into the bottom of the North
valley where our light horsemen were mixed up with the enemy; all the
diversion he could effect was to open on the Russian cannon-smoke directly
in his front, about redoubt No. 2. Even from this he had soon to desist,
being without support and threatened by the Russian cavalry, and he
retired by the way he had advanced, to point F, where the troop halted
near the Heavies, whose advance Lord Lucan had arrested resolving that
they at all events should not be destroyed. These regiments had been moved
toward the ridge out of the line of fire in the North valley, and were
kept shifting their position and gradually retiring, suffering frequent
casualties from the Russian artillery about redoubt No. 2 until they
finally halted near the crest in the vicinity of "C" Troop's latest
position at point F.

At this point only the left-hand gun of "C" Troop was on the crest, with a
view into the North valley; the other guns were on the southern slope. But
little had been previously seen of the terrible and glorious experiences
of the Light Brigade; and now what was witnessed was not the glory but the
horror of battle. For the wounded of the charge were passing to the rear,
shattered and maimed, some staggering on foot, others reeling in their
saddles, calling to the gunners and the Heavies to look at a "poor broken
leg" or a dangling arm. Brandling and his officers held their flasks to
the poor fellows' mouths as long as the contents lasted. The "C" Troop
chronicler, whose narrative I have been following, tells how Captain
Morris, who commanded the 17th Lancers, was carried past the front of the
troop towards Kadikoei, dreadfully wounded about the head and calling
loudly: "Lord, have mercy on my soul!" Kinglake gives a wholly different
account of Captain Morris's removal from the field; but the "C" Troop
chronicler is quite firm on his version, and explains that the 17th
Lancers and "C" Troop having lain together shortly before the war all the
people of the latter knew and identified Captain Morris.

Balaclava is rather an old story now, and some readers may require to be
reminded that the Light Brigade charged in two lines, the first line being
led by Lord Cardigan, the second by Lord George Paget; that the first line
rode into the Russian batteries considerably in advance of the second, the
latter having advanced at a more measured pace; and that the second line,
with sore diminished ranks and accompanied by a couple of groups rather
than detachments of the first, came back later than did the few survivors
of Cardigan's regiments other than the groups referred to. The aspersion
on Cardigan was that he returned prematurely, instead of remaining to
share the fortunes of the second line of his brigade, and this he did not
deny. Kinglake's statement is that "he rode back alone at a pace
decorously slow, towards the spot where Scarlett was halted." He adds that
General Scarlett maintained that Lord Lucan was present at the time; but
Lord Lucan's averment was that Lord Cardigan did not approach him until
afterwards when all was over. Kinglake relates further that when Lord
George Paget came back at the head of the last detachment, some officers
rode forward to greet him one of whom was Lord Cardigan. Seeing him
approach composedly from the rear Lord George exclaimed: "Halloa, Lord
Cardigan, weren't you there?" to which, according to one version of the
story, Cardigan replied: "Wasn't I, though? Here, Jenyns, didn't you see
me at the guns?"

The reasonable inferences from Kinglake are that Cardigan's first halt was
made and that his earliest remarks were uttered when he reached Scarlett,
and that he and Paget met after the charge for the first time when the
alleged question and answer passed.

The "C" Troop chronicler's narrative of events is right in the teeth of
these inferences. While the troop was halted at point F and after a great
many wounded and disabled men had already passed it going to the rear,
Lord Cardigan came riding by at a "quiet pace" close under the crest. He
had passed the troop on his left for several horse-lengths, when he came
back and halted within a yard or two of the left-hand gun, the only one
fairly on the crest. He was not alone, but attended by Cornet Yates of his
own old regiment the 11th Hussars, a recently commissioned ranker. "Lord
Cardigan was in the full dress _pelisse_ (buttoned) of the 11th Hussars,
and he rode a chestnut horse very distinctly marked and of grand
appearance. The horse seemed to have had enough of it, and his lordship
appeared to have been knocked about but was cool and collected. He
returned his sword, undid a little of the front of his dress and pulled
down his underclothing under his waistbelt. Then, in a quiet way, as if
rather talking to himself, he said, 'I tell you what it is: those
instruments of theirs,' alluding to the Russian weapons, 'are deuced blunt;
they tickle up one's ribs!' Then he pulled his revolver out of his
holster as if the thought had just struck him, and said, 'And here's this
d----d thing I have never thought of until now.' He then replaced it, drew
his sword, and said, 'Well, we've done our share of the work!' and
pointing up toward the Chasseurs d'Afrique on our left rear (ignorant of
their opportune service), he added, 'It's time they gave those dappled
gentry a chance.' Afterwards he asked, 'Has any one seen my regiment?' The
men answered, 'No, sir.'" Brandling was holding aloof; and his lordship
turned his horse and rode away farther back.

Just then a cheer was raised by some Heavies who had lately formed in
front of "C" Troop. Cardigan, so the chronicler tells, looked backward to
see the occasion, and saw the cheer was in compliment to the 8th Hussars
coming back with Colonel Sewell in front and Colonel Mayow, the
brigade-major, behind on the left. Cardigan wheeled, trotted back towards
the 8th, turned round in front of Colonel Sewell, and took up the "walk."
Then occurred something "painful to witness. It was seen from the left of
'C' Troop that the moment Cardigan's back was toward the 8th as he headed
them, Colonel Mayow pointed toward him, shook his head, and made signs to
the officers on the left of the Heavies as much as to say, 'See him; he
has taken care of himself.'" Men in the ranks of the 8th also pointed and
made signs to the troopers of the Heavies as they were passing left to
left. There was, as well, a little excited undertalk from one corps to the
other. Colonel Sewell neither saw nor took part in this wretched business;
and of course Cardigan did not know that he was being thus ridiculed and
disparaged while he was smiling and raising his sword to the cheers of the
Heavies and the gunners.

Immediately after this episode the returning 4th Light Dragoons came
obliquely across the North valley at a sharp pace, but fell into the
"walk" as they came within a hundred yards of "C" Troop. Lord George
Paget, who led what remained of the regiment, rode up to the flank of "C"
Troop and halted on the very spot where Cardigan had stood a few minutes
earlier. Lord George had the look of a man who had ridden hard, and was
heated and excited. He exclaimed in rather a loud tone, "It's a d----d
shame; there we had a lot of their guns and carriages taken, and received
no support, and yet there's all this infantry about--it's a shame!"
Meanwhile Lord Cardigan had come back and was close behind Lord George
while he was speaking, without the other knowing it. He called out, "Lord
George Paget!"; and on the latter turning round said to him in an
undertone, "I am surprised!"; and "tossing his head in the air added some
other remark which was not heard." Lord George lowered his sword to the
salute, and, without speaking turned his horse and rode on after his men.
The "C" Troop chronicler is positive that both officers visited "C" Troop
before going to any general or to any other command, and that they met
there for the first time after the combat.

When Lord Raglan came down from the upland after all was over, the "C"
Troop chronicler says that he went straight for Lucan then in front of the
Heavy Cavalry brigade, having first sent for Cardigan to meet him. After a
few moments the latter repassed the troop on his way toward the remnant of
his brigade. "Then Lord Raglan took Lucan a little forward by himself out
of hearing of the group of staff officers, and his gesticulations of head
and arm were so suggestive of passionate anger, that the onlookers did not
need to be told that the Commander-in-Chief did not charge the blame
chiefly on Cardigan." Lord Raglan's subsequent interview with General
Scarlett, which occurred in the hearing of "C" Troop, was of a different
character. After complimenting the gallant old warrior his lordship said,
"Now tell me all about yourself." Scarlett replied, "When the Russian
column was moving down on me, sir, I began by sending first a squadron of
the Greys at them, and--" but at the word "and" Lord Raglan struck in,
saying, "And they knocked them over like the devil!" He then turned his
horse away, as if he did not need to hear any more.




HOW I "SAVED FRANCE"


These be big words, my masters! I can only say they are not mine,--I am
far too modest to utter any such high-sounding phrase on my own
responsibility,--but they are the exact terms used by a high municipal
dignitary in characterising the result of what he was pleased to term my
"chivalrous conduct." My sardonic chum, on the contrary,--an individual
wholly abandoned to the ignoble vice of punning,--asserts that my conduct
was simply "barbarous." It will be for the reader to judge.

St. Meuse--let us call it St. Meuse--is a town of what is still French
Lorraine; and to St. Meuse I came drifting up the Marne Valley, over the
flat expanse of the plain of Chalons, and by St. Menehould, the proud
stronghold of pickled pigs' feet, in the second week of September 1873.
St. Meuse was one of the last of the French cities held in pawn by the
Germans for the payment of the milliards. The last instalment of
blood-money had been paid and the _Pickelhaubes_ were about to evacuate
St. Meuse as soon as the cash had been methodically counted, and after
they should have leisurely filled their baggage trains and packed their
portmanteaus. My intention in going to St. Meuse was to witness this
evacuation scene, and to be a spectator of the return of light-heartedness
to the French population of the place, on the withdrawal of the Teuton
incubus which for three years had lain upon the safety-valve of their
constitutional sprightliness. I had been a little out of my reckoning of
time, and when I reached St. Meuse I found that I had a week to stay there
before the event should occur which I had come to witness; but the
interval could not be regarded as lost time, for St. Meuse is a very
pleasant city and the conditions which were so soon to terminate presented
a most interesting field of study.

You must know that St. Meuse is a fortress. It has a citadel or at least
such fragments of a citadel as the bombardment had left, and the quaint
old town is surrounded with bastions which are linked by curtains and
flanked by lunettes, the whole being girdled by a ditch, beyond the
counterscarp of which spreads a sloping glacis which makes a very pleasant
promenade. The defensive strength of the place is reduced to zero in these
days of far-reaching rifled siege artillery, for it lies in a cup and is
surrounded on all sides by hills the summits of which easily command the
fortifications. But the consciousness that it is obsolete as a fortress
has not yet come home to St. Meuse. It has, in truth, a very good opinion
of itself as a valorous, not to say heroic, place; nor can it be denied
that its title to this self-complacency has been fairly earned. In the
Franco-German war, spite of its defects, it stood a siege of over two
months and succumbed only after a severe bombardment which lasted for
several days. And while as yet it was not wholly beleaguered, it was very
active in making itself disagreeable to the foreign invader. It was a
patrolling party from St. Meuse that intercepted the courier on his way
from the battlefield of Sedan to Germany, carrying the hurried lines to
his wife which the Crown Prince of Prussia scrawled on the fly-leaf of an
orderly book while as yet the last shots of the combat were dropping in
the distance; carrying too the notes of the momentous battle which William
Howard-Russell had jotted down in the heat of the action and had taken the
same opportunity of despatching. St. Meuse, then, had balked the Princess
of the first tidings of her husband's safety, and the great English
newspaper of the earliest details of the most sensational battle of the
age. It had fallen at last, but not ingloriously; and the iron of defeat
had not entered so deeply into its soul as had been the case with some
French fortresses, of which it could not well be said that they had done
their honest best to resist their fate. Its self-respect, at least, was
left to it, and it was something to know that when the German garrison
should march away, it was bound to leave to St. Meuse the artillery and
munitions of war of the fortress just as they had been found on the day of
the surrender.

I came to like St. Meuse immensely in the course of the days I spent in it
waiting for the great event of the evacuation. The company at the _table
d'hote_ of the Trois Maures was varied and amusing. The Germans ate in a
room by themselves, so that the obnoxious element was not present overtly
at the general _table d'hote._ But we had a few German officials in plain
clothes--clerks in General Manteuffel's bureau, contractors, cigar
merchants, etc., who spoke French even among themselves, and were
painfully polite to the French habitues who were as painfully polite in
return. There was a batch of Parisian journalists who had come to St.
Meuse to watch the evacuation, and who wrote their letters in the cafe
over the way to the accompaniment of _verres_ of absinthe and bocks of
beer. Then there was the gallant captain of gendarmes, who had arrived in
St. Meuse with a trusty band of twenty-five subordinates to take over from
the Germans the municipal superintendence of the place, and, later, the
occupation of the fortress. He was the most polite man I ever knew, this
captain of gendarmes, with a clever knack of turning you outside in in the
course of half an hour's conversation, and the peculiar attribute of
having, to all appearance, eyes in the back of his head. To him, as he
placidly ate his food, there came, from time to time, quiet and rather
bashful-looking men in civilian attire of a slightly seedy description.
Sometimes they merely caught his eye and went out again without speaking;
sometimes they handed to him little notes; sometimes they held with him a
brief whispered conversation during which the captain's nonchalance was
imperturbable. These respectable individuals who, if they saw you once in
conversation with their chief, ever after bowed to you with the greatest
empressement, were members of the secret police.

As for the inhabitants of St. Meuse, they appeared to await the hour of
their delivery with considerable philosophy. Physically they are the
finest race I ever saw in France; their men, tall, square, and muscular,
their women handsome and comely. Numbers of both sexes are fair-haired,
and the sandiness of hair which we are wont to associate with the Scottish
Celt is by no means uncommon. A sardonic companion whom I had picked up by
the way, attributed those characteristics to the fact that in the great
war St. Meuse was a depot for British prisoners of war who had in some way
contrived to imbue the native population with some of their own physical
attributes. He further prophesied a wave of Teuton characteristics as the
result of the German occupation which was about to terminate; but his
insinuations seemed to me to partake of the scurrilous, especially as he
instanced Lewes, once a British depot for prisoners of war, as a field in
which similar phenomena were to be discerned. But, nevertheless, I
unquestionably found a good deal of what may be called national hybridism
in St. Meuse. I used to buy photographs of a shopkeeper over whose door
was blazoned the Scottish name Macfarlane. Outwardly Macfarlane was a
"hielanman" all over. He had a shock-head of bright red hair such as might
have thatched the poll of the "Dougal cratur;" his cheek-bones were high,
his nose of the Captain of Knockdunder pattern, and his mouth of true
Celtic amplitude. One felt instinctively as if Macfarlane were bound to
know Gaelic, and that the times were out of joint when he evinced greater
fondness for _eau sucree_ than for Talisker. It was with quite a sense of
dislocation of the fitness of things that I found Macfarlane could talk
nothing but French. But although he had torn up the ancient landmarks, or
rather suffered them to lapse, he yet was proud of his ancestry. His
grandfather, it appeared, was a soldier of the "Black Watch" who had been
a prisoner of war in St. Meuse, and who, when the peace came, preferred
taking unto himself a daughter of the Amalekite and settling in St. Meuse,
to going home to a pension of sevenpence a day and liberty to ply as an
Edinburgh caddie.

As for the German "men in possession," they pursued the even tenor of
their way in the precise yet phlegmatic German manner. Their guards kept
the gates and bridges as if they meant to hold the place till the crack of
doom, instead of being under orders to clear out within the week. The
recruits drilled on the citadel esplanade, straightening their legs and
pointing their toes as if their sole ambition in life was to kick their
feet away into space, down to the very eve of evacuation. Their battalions
practised skirmishing on the glacis with that routine assiduity which is
the secret of the German military success. Old Manteuffel was living in
the prefecture holding his levees and giving his stiff ceremonious
dinner-parties, as if he had done despite to Dr. Cumming's warnings and
taken a lease of the place. The German officers thronged their cafe, each
man, after the manner of German officers, shouting at the pitch of his
voice; and at the cafe of the under-officers tough old _Wachtmeisters_ and
grizzled sergeants with many medals played long quiet games at cards, or
knocked the balls about on the chubby little pocketless tables with cues
the tips of which were as large as the base of a six-pounder shell.

The French journalists insisted I should accept it as an article of faith,
that these two races dwelling together in St. Meuse hated each other like
poison. They would have it that while discipline alone prevented the
Germans from massacring every Frenchman in the place, it was only a
humiliating sense of weakness that hindered the Frenchmen from rising in
hot fury against the Germans who were their temporary masters. I am afraid
the gentlemen of the Parisian press came rather to dislike me on account
of my obdurate scepticism in such matters. That there was no great
cordiality was obvious and natural. Some of the Germans were arrogant and
domineering. For instance, having a respect for the Germans, it pained and
indeed disgusted me to hear a colonel of the German staff, in answer to my
question whether the evacuating force would march out with a rearguard as
in war time, reply, "Pho, a field gendarme with a whip is rearguard enough
against such _canaille!_" But in the mouths of Hans and Carl and Johann,
the stout _Kerle_ of the ranks, there were no such words of bitter scorn
for their compulsory hosts. The honest fellows drew water for the
goodwives on whom they were billeted, did a good deal of stolid
love-making with the girls, and nursed the babies with a solicitude that
put to shame the male parents of these youthful hopes of Troy. I take
leave, as a reasonable person, to doubt whether it can lie in the heart of
a family to hate a man who has dandled its baby and whether a man can be
rancorous against a family whose baby he has nursed. But fashion's sway is
omnipotent in emotion as in dress. Ever since the war, journalists,
authors, and public opinion generally had hammered it into the French
nation that if it were not to be a traitor to its patriotism, the first
article of its creed must be hatred against the Germans; and that the
bitterer this hate the more fervent the patriotism. It was not indeed
incumbent on Frenchmen and Frenchwomen to accept this creed, but it
behoved them at least to profess it; and it must be admitted that they did
this for the most part with an intensity and vigour which seemed to prove
that with many profession had deepened into conviction.

While as yet the evacuation had been a thing of the remote future, the
people of St. Meuse had borne the yoke lightly, and indeed had, I believe,
privily congratulated themselves on the substantial advantages in the way
of money spent in the place and the immunity from taxation which were
incidental to the foreign occupation. But as the day for the evacuation
drew closer and closer, one became dimly conscious of an electrical
condition of the social atmosphere which any trifle might stimulate into a
thunderstorm. Blouses gathered and muttered about the street-corners,
scowling at and elbowing the German soldiers as they strode to buy
sausages to stay them in the homeward march. The gamins, always covertly
insolent, no longer cloaked their insolence, and wagged little tricolour
flags under the nose of the stolid German sentry on the Pont St. Croix. At
the _table d'hote_ the painful politeness of the German civilians had no
effect in thawing the studied coldness of the French habitues.

As for myself, I was a neutral, and professing to take no side, flattered
myself that I could keep out of the vortex of the soreness. Soon after my
arrival at St. Meuse I had called upon the Mayor at his official quarters
in the Hotel de Ville, and had received civil speeches in return for civil
speeches. Then I had left my card on General Manteuffel, with whom I
happened to have a previous acquaintance; and those formal duties of a
benevolent neutral having been performed I had held myself free to choose
my own company. Circumstances had some time before brought me into
familiar contact with very many German officers, and I had imbibed a
liking for their ways and conversation, noisy as the latter is. Several of
the officers then in St. Meuse had been personal acquaintances in other
days and it was at once natural and pleasant for me to renew the
intercourse. I was made an honorary member of the mess; I spent many hours
in the officers' casino; I rode out with the officers of the squadron of
Uhlans. All this was very pleasant; but as the day of the evacuation
became close I noticed that the civility of the French captain of
gendarmes grew colder, that the cordiality of the French habitues of the
_table d'hote_ visibly diminished, and that I encountered not a few
unfriendly looks when I walked through the streets by myself. It began to
dawn upon me that St. Meuse was getting to reckon me a German sympathiser,
and as there was no half-way house, therefore not in accord with the
emotions of France and St. Meuse.

On the afternoon immediately preceding the morning that had been fixed for
the evacuation, there came to me a polite request that I should visit M.
le Maire at the Hotel de Ville. His worship was elaborately civil but
obviously troubled in mind. He coughed nervously several times after the
initiatory compliments had passed, and then he began to speak. "Monsieur,
you are aware that the Germans are going to-morrow morning?"

I replied that I had cognisance of this fact. "Do you also know that the
last of the German officials depart by the 5 A.M. train, not caring to
remain here after the troops are gone?"

Of this also I was aware.

"Let me hope," continued the Mayor, "that you are going along with them,
or at all events will ride away with Messieurs the officers?"

On the contrary, was my reply, I had come not only to witness the
evacuation but to note how St. Meuse should bear herself in the hour of
her liberation; I desired to witness the rejoicings; I was not less
anxious to be a spectator of any disturbance if such unhappily should
occur. Why should M. le Maire have conceived this desire to balk my
natural curiosity?

M. le Maire was obviously not a little embarrassed; but he persevered and
was candid. This deplorable occupation was now so nearly finished and
happily, as yet, everything had been so tranquil, that it would be a
thousand pities if any untoward event should occur to detract from the
dignified attitude which the territory now to be evacuated had maintained.
It was of critical importance in every sense that St. Meuse should not
give way to riot or disorder on that occasion. He hoped and believed it
would not--here M. le Maire laid his hand on his heart--but a spark, as I
knew, fired tinder, and the St. Meuse populace were at present figurative
tinder. I might be that spark.

"You much resemble a German," said M. le Maire, "with that great yellow
beard of yours, and your broad shoulders, as if you had carried arms. Our
citizens have seen you much in the society of Messieurs the German
officers; they are not in a temper to draw fine distinctions of
nationality; and, dear sir, I ask you to go away with the Germans lest
perchance our blouses, reckoning you for a German, should not be very
tender with you when the spiked helmets are out of the place. The truth
is," said the worthy Maire with a burst of plain speaking, "I'm afraid
that you will be mobbed and that there will be a row, and that then the
Germans may come back and the evacuation be postponed, and I'll get wigged
by the Prefect and the Minister of the Interior and bully-ragged in the
newspapers, and St. Meuse will get abused and the fat will be generally in
the fire!"

Here was an awkward fix. I could not comply with the Mayor's request; that
was not to be thought of for reasons I need not mention here. I had no
particular desire to be mobbed. Once before I had experienced the tender
mercies of a French mob and I knew that they were very cruel. But stronger
than the personal feeling was my sincere sympathy with the Mayor's
critical position; and also my anxiety, by what means might be within my
power, to contribute to the maintenance of a tranquillity so desirable.
But, then, what means were within my power? I could not go; I could not
promise to stop indoors, for it was incumbent on me to see everything that
was to be seen. And if through me trouble came I should be responsible
heaven knows for what!--with a skinful of sore bones into the bargain.

"If Monsieur cannot go,"--the Mayor broke in upon my cogitation,--"if
Monsieur cannot go, will he pardon the exigency of the occasion if I
suggest one other alternative? It is,"--here the Mayor hesitated--"it is
the yellow beard which gives to Monsieur the aspect of a German. With only
whiskers nobody could take Monsieur for anything but an Englishman. If
Monsieur would only have the complaisance and charity to--to--"

Cut off my beard! Great powers! shear that mane that had been growing for
years!--that cataract of hair that has been, so to speak, my oriflamme;
the only physical belonging of which I ever was proud, the only thing, so
far as I know, that I have ever been envied! For the moment the suggestion
knocked me all of a heap. There came into my head some confused
reminiscence of a story about a girl who cut off her hair and sold it to
keep her mother from starving, or redeem her lover from captivity, or
something of the kind. But that must have been before the epoch of parish
relief, and kidnapping is now punishable by statute. What was St. Meuse to
me that for her I should mow my hirsute glories? But then, if people grew
savage, they might pull my beard out by the roots. And there had been
lately dawning on me the dire truth that its tawny hue was becoming
somewhat freely streaked with gray, a colour I abhor, except in eyes. I
made up my mind.

"I'll do it, sir," said I to the Mayor, with a manly curtness. My heart
was too full for many words.

He respected my emotion, bowed in silence over the hand which he had
grasped, and only spoke to give me the address of his own barber.

This barber was a patriot of unquestioned zeal; but I am inclined to think
his extraction was similar to that of Macfarlane, for he combined
patriotism with profit in a most edifying manner. He shaved the German
officers during the whole of their stay in St. Meuse; he accompanied them
on their march to the frontier; he earned the last centime in Conflans;
and then, driving forward to the frontier line, he unfurled the tricolour
as the last German soldier stepped over it. It is seldom that one in this
world sees his way to being so adroitly ambidextrous.

But this is a digression. In twenty minutes, shorn and shaven, I was back
again in the Mayor's parlour. The tears of gratitude stood in his eyes. I
learned afterwards that a decoration was contingent on his preservation of
the public peace on the occasion of the evacuation.

Started by the Mayor, the report rapidly circulated through St. Meuse that
I had cut off my beard rather than that it should be possible that any one
should mistake me for a German. From being a suspect I became a popular
idol. The French journalists entertained me to a banquet at night at which
in libations of champagne eternal amity between France and England was
pledged. Next morning the Germans went away and then St. Meuse kicked up
its heels and burst into exuberant joy. The Mayor took me up to the
station in his own carriage to meet the French troops, and introduced me
to the colonel of the battalion as a man who had made sacrifices for _la
belle France_. The colonel shook me cordially by the hand and I was
embraced by the robust vivandiere, who struck me as being in the practice
of sustaining life on a diet of garlic. When we emerged from the station I
was cheered almost as loudly as was the colonel, and a man waved a
tricolour over my head all the way back to the town, treading at frequent
intervals on my heels. In the course of the afternoon I happened to
approach the civic band which was performing patriotic music in the Place
St. Croix. When the bandmaster saw me he broke off the programme and
struck up "Rule Britannia!" in my honour, to the clamorous joy of the
audience, who were thwarted in their aim of carrying me round the Place
shoulder-high only by the constancy with which I clung to the railings
which surround Chevert's statue. But the crowning recognition of my
sacrifice came at the banquet which the town gave to the French officers.
The Mayor proposed the toast of "our English friend." "We had all," he
said, "made sacrifices for _la Patrie_--he himself had sustained the loss
of a wooden outhouse burned down in the bombardment; the gallant colonel
on his right had spilt his blood at St. Privat. Them it behoved to suffer
and they would do it again cheerfully, for it was, as he had said, for _la
Patrie_. But what was to be said of an honourable gentleman who had
sacrificed the most distinguishing ornament of his physical aspect without
the holy stimulus of patriotism, and simply that there might be obviated
the risk of an embroilment to the possible consequence of which he would
not further allude? Would it be called the language of extravagant
hyperbole, or would they not rather be words justified by facts, when he
ventured before this honourable company to assert that his respected
English friend had by his self-sacrifice saved France from a great peril?"
The Mayor's question was replied to by a perfect whirlwind of cheering.
Everybody in the room insisted upon shaking hands with me and I was forced
to get on my legs and make a reply. Later in the evening I heard the Mayor
and the town clerk discussing the project of conferring upon me the
freedom of the city.




CHRISTMAS IN A CAVALRY REGIMENT

1875


The civilian world, even that portion of it which lives by the profusest
sweat of its brow, enjoys an occasional holiday in the course of the year
besides Christmas Day. Good Friday brings to most an enforced cessation
from toil. Easter and Whitsuntide are recognised seasons of pleasure in
most grades of the civilian community. There are few who do not compass
somehow an occasional Derby day; and we may safely aver that the amount of
work done on New Year's Day is not very great. But in all the year the
soldier has but one real holiday--a holiday with all the glorious
accompaniments of unwonted varieties of dainties and full liberty to be as
jolly as he pleases without fear of the consequences. True, the individual
soldier may have his day's leave, nay, his month's furlough; but his
enjoyments resulting therefrom are not realised in the atmosphere of the
barrack-room, but rather have their origin in the abandonment for the
nonce of his military character and a _pro tempore_ return into civilian
life. Christmas Day is the great regimental merry-making, free to and
appreciated by the veteran and the recruit alike; and as such it is looked
forward to for many a month prior to its advent and talked of many a day
after it is past and gone.

About a month before Christmas the observer skilled in the signs of the
times may begin to notice the tokens of its approach. Self-deniant
fellows, men who can trust themselves to carry a few shillings about with
them without experiencing a chronic sensation that the accumulated pelf is
burning a hole in their pockets, busy themselves in constructing
"dimmocking bags" for the occasion, such being the barrack-room term for
receptacles for money-hoarding purposes. The weak vessels, those who
mistrust their own constancy under the varied temptations of dry throats,
empty stomachs, and a scant allowance of tobacco, manage to cheat their
fragility of "saving grace" by requesting their sergeant-major to put them
"on the peg,"--that is to say, place them under stoppages, so that the
accumulation takes place in his hands and cannot be dissipated by any
premature weaknesses of the flesh. Everybody becomes of a sudden
astonishingly sober and steady. There is hardly any going out of barracks
now; for a walk involves the expenditure of at least "the price of a
pint," and in the circumstances this extravagance is not allowable. The
guard-room is unwontedly empty--nobody except the utterly reckless will
get into trouble just now; for punishment at this season involves the
forfeiture of certain privileges and the incurring of certain penalties--
the former specially prized, the latter exceptionally disgusting at this
Christmas season.

Slowly the days roll on with anxious expectancy, the coming event forming
the one engrossing topic of conversation alike in barrack-room, in stable,
in canteen, and in guard-room. The clever hands of the troop are deep in
devising a series of ornamentations for the walls and roof of the common
habitation. One fellow spends all his spare time on the top of a table
with a bed on top of that again, embellishing the wall above the fireplace
with a florid design in a variety of colours meant to be an exact copy of
the device on the regiment's kettledrums, with the addition of the legend,
"A Merry Christmas to the old Straw-boots," inscribed on a waving scroll
below. The skill of another decorator is directed to the clipping of
sundry squares of coloured paper into wondrous forms--Prince of Wales's
feathers, gorgeous festoons, and the like--with which the gas pendants and
the edges of the window-frames are disguised out of their original
nakedness and hardness of outline, so as to be almost unrecognisable by
the eye of the matter-of-fact barrack-master himself. What is this
felonious-looking band up to--these four determined rascals in the
forbidden high-lows and stable overalls who go slinking mysteriously out
at the back gate just at the gloaming? Are they Fenian sympathisers bound
for a secret meeting, or are they deserters making off just at the time
when there is the least likelihood of suspicion? Nay, they are neither;
but, nevertheless, their errand is a nefarious one. Watch at the gate for
an hour and you will see them come back again each man laden with the
spoils of the shrubberies--holly, mistletoe, and evergreens--ruthlessly
plundered under cover of the darkness. A couple of days before "the day,"
the sergeant-major enters the barrack-room, a smile playing upon his
rubicund features. We all know what his errand is and he knows right well
that we do; but he cannot refrain from the customary short patronising
harangue, "Our worthy captain--liberal gent you know--deputed me--what you
like for dinner--plum-puddings, of course--a quart of beer a man; make up
your minds what you'll have--anything but game and venison;" and so he
vanishes grinning a saturnine grin. The moment is a critical one. We ought
to be unanimous. What shall we have? A council of deliberation is
constituted on the spot and proceeds to the discussion of the weighty
question. The suggestions are not numerous. The alternative lies between
pork and goose. The old soldiers, for some inscrutable reason, go for
goose to a man. The recruits have a carnal craving after the flesh of the
pig. I did once hear a "carpet-bag" recruit[1] hesitatingly broach the idea
of mutton, but he collapsed ignominiously under the concentrated stare of
righteous indignation with which his heterodox suggestion was received.
Goose versus pork is eagerly debated. As regards quantity the question
is a level one, since the allowance from time immemorial has been a goose
or a leg of pork among three men.

[Footnote 1: "Carpet-bag" recruit is the barrack-room appellation of
contempt for the young gentleman recruit who joins his regiment _omnibus
impedimentis_--who, in fact, brings his baggage with him, to find it, of
course, utterly useless.]

At length the point is decided during the evening stable-hour, according
as old or young soldiers predominate in the room. The sergeant-major is
informed of the conclusion arrived at, and in the evening the corporal of
each room accompanies him on a marketing expedition into the town. Another
important duty devolves upon the said corporal in the course of this
marketing tour. The "dimmocking bags" have been emptied; the accumulations
in the sergeant-major's hands have been drawn, and the corporal, freighted
with the joint savings, has the task of expending the same in beer. In
this undertaking he manifests a preternatural astuteness. He is not to be
inveigled into giving his order at a public-house,--swipes from the
canteen would do as well as that,--nor do the bottled-beer merchants tempt
him with their high prices for dubious quality. No, he goes direct to the
fountain-head. If there be a brewery in the place he finds it out and
bestows his order upon it, thus triumphantly securing the pure article at
the wholesale price. His purchasing calculation is upon the basis of two
gallons per man. If, as is generally the case, the barrack-room he
represents contains twelve men, he orders a twenty-four gallon barrel of
porter--always porter; and if he has a surplus left he disburses it in the
purchase of a bottle or two of spirits, for the behoof of any fair
visitors who may haply honour the barrack-room with their presence.

It is Christmas Eve. The evening stable-hour is over and all hands are
merrily engaged in the composition of the puddings; some stoning fruit,
others chopping suet, beating eggs, and so forth. The barrel of beer is in
the corner but it is sacred as the honour of the regiment! Nothing would
induce the expectant participants in its contents to broach it before its
appointed time shall come. So there is beer instead from the canteen in
the tin pails of the barrack-room, and the work of pudding-compounding
goes on jovially to the accompaniments of song and jest. Now, there is a
fear lest too many fingers in the pudding may spoil it--lest a multitude
of counsellors as to the proportions of ingredients and the process of
mixing may be productive of the reverse of safety. But somehow a man with
a specialty is always forthcoming, and that specialty is pudding-making.
Most likely he has been the butt of the room--a quiet, quaint, retiring,
awkward fellow who seemed as if he never could do anything right. But he
has lit upon his vocation at last--he is a born pudding-maker. He rises
with the occasion, and the sheepish "gaby" becomes the knowing practical
man; his is now the voice of authority, and his comrades recant on the
spot, acknowledge his superiority without a murmur, and perform "ko-tow"
before the once despised man of undeveloped abilities. They pull out their
clean towels with alacrity in response to his demand for pudding-cloths;
they run to the canteen enthusiastically for a further supply on a hint
from him that there is a deficiency in the ingredient of allspice. And
then he artistically gathers together the corners of the cloths and ties
up the puddings tightly and securely; whereupon a procession is formed to
escort them into the cook-house, and there, having consigned them into the
depths of the mighty copper, the "man of the time" remains watching the
caldron bubble until morning, a great jorum of beer at his elbow the ready
contribution of his now appreciative comrades.

The hours roll on; and at length out into the darkness of the
barrack-square stalks the trumpeter on duty, and the shrill notes of the
_reveille_ echo through the stillness of the yet dark night. On an
ordinary morning the _reveille_ is practically negatived, and nobody
thinks of stirring from between the blankets till the "warning" sounds
quarter of an hour before the morning stable-time. But on this morning
there is no slothful skulking in the arms of Morpheus. Every one jumps up,
as if galvanised, at the first note of the _reveille_. For the fulfilment
of a time-honoured custom is looked forward to--a remnant of the old days
when the "women" lived in the corner of the barrack-room. The soldier's
wife who has the cleaning of the room and who does the washing of its
inmates--for which services each man pays her a penny a day, has from time
immemorial taken upon herself the duty of bestowing a "morning" on the
Christmas anniversary upon the men she "does for." Accordingly, about a
quarter to six, she enters the room--a hard-featured, rough-voiced dame,
perhaps, with a fist like a shoulder of mutton, but a soldier herself to
the very core and with a big, tender heart somewhere about her. She
carries a bottle of whisky--it is always whisky, somehow--in one hand and
a glass in the other; and, beginning with the oldest soldier administers a
calker to every one in the room till she comes to the "cruity," upon whom,
if he be a pullet-faced, homesick, bit of a lad, she may bestow a maternal
salute in addition, with the advice to consider the regiment as his mother
now, and be a smart soldier and a good lad.

Breakfast is not an institution in any great acceptation in a cavalry
regiment on Christmas morning. When the stable-hour is over a great many
of the troopers do not immediately reappear in the barrack-room. Indeed
they do not turn up until long after the coffee is cold; and, when they do
return there is a certain something about them which, to the experienced
observer, demonstrates the fact that, if they have been thirsty, they have
not been quenching their drought at the pump. It is a standing puzzle to
the uninitiated where the soldier in barracks contrives to obtain drink of
a morning. The canteen is rigorously closed. No one is allowed to go out
of barracks and no drink is allowed to come in. A teetotallers'
meeting-hall could not appear more rigidly devoid of opportunities for
indulgence than does a barrack during the morning. Yet I will venture to
say, if you go into any barrack in the three kingdoms, accost any soldier
who is not a raw recruit, and offer to pay for a pot of beer, that you
will have an instant opportunity afforded you of putting your free-handed
design into execution any time after 7 A.M. I don't think it would be
exactly grateful in me to "split" upon the spots where a drop can be
obtained in season; many a time has my parched throat been thankful for
the cooling surreptitious draught and I refuse to turn upon a benefactor
in a dirty way. Therefore suffice it to say that many a bold dragoon when
he re-enters the barrack-room to get ready for church parade, has a
wateriness about the eye and a knottiness in the tongue which tell of
something stronger than the matutinal coffee. Indeed, when the trumpet
sounds which calls the regiment to assemble on the parade-ground, there is
dire misgiving in the mind of many a stalwart fellow, who is conscious
that his face, as well as his speech, "berayeth him." But the lynx-eyed
men in authority who another time would be down on a stagger like a
card-player on the odd trick and read a flushed face as a passport to the
guard-room, are genially blind this morning; and so long as a man
possesses the capacity of looking moderately straight to his own front and
of going right-about without a flagrant lurch, he is not looked at in a
critical spirit on the Christmas church parade. And so the regiment
marches off to church, the band playing merrily in its front. I much fear
there is no very abiding sense in the bosoms of the majority of the sacred
errand on which they are bound.

But there are two of the inmates of each room who do not go to church. The
clever pudding-maker and a sub of his selection are left to cook the
Christmas dinner. This, as regards the exceptional dainties, is done at
the barrack-room fire, the cook-house being in use only for the now
despised ration meat and for the still simmering puddings. The handy man
cunningly improvises a roasting-jack, and erects a screen consisting of
bed-quilts spread on a frame of upright forms, for the purpose of
retaining and throwing back the heat. He is a most versatile genius, this
handy man. Now we see him in the double character of cook and salamander,
and anon he develops a special faculty as a clever table-decorator as
well. This latter qualification asserts itself in the face of difficulties
which would be utterly discomfiting to one of less fertility of resource.
There is, indeed, a large expanse of table in every barrack-room; but the
War Department has not yet thought proper to consider private soldiers
worthy to enjoy the luxury of table-linen. Yet bare boards at a Christmas
feast are horribly offensive to the eye of taste. Something must be done;
something has already been done. Ever since the last issue of clean
sheets, one or two whole-souled fellows have magnanimously abjured these
luxuries _pro bono publico_. Spartan-like they have lain in blankets, and
saved their sheets in their pristine cleanliness wherewithal to cover the
Christmas table. So now these are brought forth, not snow-white certainly,
nor of a damask texture, being indeed somewhat sackclothy in their
appearance, but still they are immeasurably in advance of the bare boards;
and when the covers are laid, with each man's best knife and fork, with a
little additional crockery-ware borrowed of a beneficent married woman and
with the dainty sprigs of evergreen stuck on every available coign, the
effect is triumphantly enlivening.

By the time these preparations are complete the men are back from church;
and after a brief attendance at stables to water and feed they assemble
fully dressed in the barrack-room, hungrily silent. The captain enters the
room and _pro forma_ asks whether there are "any complaints?" A chorus of
"No, sir," is his reply; and then the oldest soldier in the room with
profuse blushing and stammering takes up the running, thanks the officer
kindly in the name of his comrades for his generosity, and wishes him a
"Happy Christmas and many of 'em" in return. Under cover of the responsive
cheer the captain makes his escape, and a deputation visits the
sergeant-major's quarters to fetch the allowance of beer which forms part
of the treat. Then all fall to and eat! Ye gods, how they eat! Let the man
who affirmed before the Recruiting Commission that the present scale of
military rations was liberal enough show himself now, and then for ever
hide his head! The troopers seem to have become sudden converts to
Carlyle's theory on the eloquence of silence. It reigns supreme, broken
only by the rattle of knives and forks and by an occasional gurgle
indicative of a man judiciously stratifying the solids and liquids, for a
space of about twenty minutes, by which time--be the fare goose or pork--
it is, barring the bones, only "a memory of the past." The puddings,
turned out of the towels in which they have been boiled, then undergo the
brunt of a fierce assault; but the edge of appetite has been blunted by
the first course and with most of the men a modicum of pudding goes on the
shelf for supper. The soldier is very sensitive on the subject of his
Christmas pudding. I remember once seeing a cook put on the table and
formally "strapped" for allowing the pudding to stick to the bottom of the
pot for lack of stirring.

At length dinner is over. Beds are drawn up from the sides of the room so
as to form a wide circle of divans round the fire, and the big barrel's
time has come at last. A clever hand whips out the bung, draws a pailful,
and reinserts the bung till another pailful is wanted, which will be very
soon. The pail is placed upon the hearthstone and its contents are
decanted into the pint basins, which do duty in the barrack-room for all
purposes from containing coffee and soup to mixing chrome-yellow and
pipe-clay water. The married soldiers come dropping in with their wives,
for whom the corporal has a special drop of "something short" stowed in
reserve on the shelf behind his kit. A song is called for; another
follows, and yet another and another. Now it is matter of notice that the
songs of soldiers are never of the modern music-hall type. You might go
into a hundred barrack-rooms or soldier's haunts and never hear such a
ditty as "Champagne Charley" or "Not for Joseph." The soldier takes
especial delight in songs of the sentimental pattern; and even when for a
brief period he forsakes the region of sentiment, it is not to indulge in
the outrageously comic but to give vent to such sturdy bacchanalian
outpourings as the "Good Rhine Wine," "Old John Barleycorn," and "Simon
the Cellarer." But these are only interludes. "The Soldier's Tear," "The
White Squall," "There came a Tale to England," "Ben Bolt," "Shells of the
Ocean," and other melodies of a lugubrious type, are the special
favourites of the barrack-room. I remember once hearing a cockney recruit
attempt "The Perfect Cure" with its accompanying gymnastic efforts; but he
was I not appreciated, and indeed, I think broke down in the middle for
want of encouragement.

Songs and beer form the staple of the afternoon's enjoyment, intermingled
with quiet chat consisting generally of reminiscences of bygone
Christmases. Here and there a couple get together who are "townies," i.e.
natives of the same district; and there is a good deal of undemonstrative
feeling in the way they talk of the scenes and folks of boyhood. There is
no speechifying. Your soldier is not an oratorical animal. Not but what he
heartily enjoys a speech; but he somehow cannot make one, or will not try.
I remember me, indeed, of a certain quiet Scotsman who one Christmastime
being urgently pressed to sing and being unblessed with a tuneful voice,
volunteered in utter desperation a speech instead. He referred in feeling
language to the various troop-mates who had left us since the preceding
Christmas, made a touching allusion to the happy home circle in which the
Christmases of our boyhood had been spent, referred to the manner in which
the old "Strawboots" had cut their way to glory through the dense masses
of Russian horsemen on the hillside of Balaclava, and wound up
appropriately by proposing the toast of "our noble selves." He created an
immense sensation, was vociferously applauded, and, indeed, was the hero
of the hour; but ere next Christmas he was among the "have beens" himself,
and his mantle not having devolved upon any successor we had to content
ourselves with the songs and the beer.

It is a lucky thing for a good many that there is no roll-call at the
Christmas evening stable-hour. The non-commissioned officers mercifully
limit their requirements to seeing the horses watered and bedded down by
the most presentable of the roisterers, whose desperate efforts to
simulate abject sobriety in order to establish their claim for
strong-headedness are very comical to witness. It has often been matter of
wonderment to me how the orders for the following day which are "read out"
at the evening stable-hour, are realised on Christmas evening with
clearness sufficient to ensure their being complied with next day without
a hitch; but the truth is that, as we shall presently see, a certain order
of things for the morning after Christmas has become stereotyped.

This interruption of the evening stable-hour over the circle re-forms
round the fire, and the cask finally becomes a "dead marine." The cap is
then sent round for contributions towards a further instalment of the
foundation of conviviality, which is fetched from the canteen or the
sergeant's mess; and another and yet another supply is sent for, as long
as the funds hold out and somebody keeps sober enough to act as Ganymede.
The orderly sergeant is not very particular to-night about his
watch-setting report, for he knows that not many have the physical ability
to be absent if they were ever so eager. And so the lights go out; the sun
of the dragoon may be said to set in beer and he is left to do his best to
sleep himself sober. For in the morning the reins of discipline are
tightened again. The man who is foolish enough to revivify the drink which
"is dying out in him" by a refresher is apt to find himself an inmate of
the black-hole on very scant warning. Headaches and thirst are curiously
rife, and the consumption of "fizzers"--a temperance beverage of an
effervescent character vended by an individual with the profoundest trust
in human nature on the subject of deferred payments--is extensive enough
to convert the regiment into a series of walking reservoirs of carbonic
acid gas. The authorities display a demoniacal ingenuity in working the
beer out of the system of the dragoon. The morning duty on the day
following Christmas is invariably "watering order with numnahs," the
numnah being a felt saddle-cloth without stirrups. Every man without
exception rides out--no dodging is permitted--and the moment the malicious
fiend of an orderly officer gets clear of the barracks he gives the word
"Trot!" Six miles of it without a break is the set allowance; and it beats
vinegar, pickles, tea smoked in a tobacco-pipe, or any other nostrum, as
an effectual generator of sobriety. Six miles at the full trot without
stirrups on a rough horse I can conscientiously recommend to the
inebriated gentleman who fears to encounter a justly irate wife at two in
the morning. I wont answer for the integrity of his cuticle when it is
over; but I will stake my existence on the abject profundity of his
sobriety. The process would extract the alcohol from a cask of spirits of
wine, let alone dispel an average skinful of beer.

And thus evaporates the last vestige of the dragoon's Christmas festivity.
It may be urged that the enjoyments of which I have endeavoured to give a
faithful narrative are gross and have no elevating tendency. I fear the
men of the spur and sabre must bow to the justice of the criticism; and I
know of nothing to advance in mitigation save the old Scotch proverb: "It
is ill to mak' a silk purse out o' a sow's ear."




THE MYSTERY OF MONSIEUR REGNIER


In these modern days men live fast and forget fast; yet, since it was
barely twenty-six years ago, numbers among us must still vividly remember
the lurid autumn of 1870. Eastern and Northern France had been deluged
with French and German blood. During the month of fighting from the 2nd of
August to the 1st of September the regular armies of France had suffered
defeat on defeat, and were now blockaded in Metz or were tramping from the
catastrophe of Sedan to captivity in Germany. The Empire in France had
fallen like a house of cards; Napoleon the Third was a prisoner of war in
Cassel; the Empress and the ill-fated Prince Imperial were forlorn exiles
in England. To the Empire had succeeded, at not even a day's notice--for
in France a revolution is ever a summary operation--the Government of
National Defence with the watchword of "War to the bitter end" rather than
cede a foot of territory or one stone of a fortress. The Germans made no
delay. The blood-tint had scarcely faded out of the waters of the Meuse,
the unburied dead of Sedan yet festered in the sun-heat, and the blackened
ruins of Bazeilles still smoked and stank, when their heads of columns set
forth on the march to Paris. The troops were full of ardour; but in the
Royal headquarters there was not a little disquietude. The old King made a
long stay in the old cathedral city of Rheims, while men all over Europe
were asking each other whether the catastrophe of Sedan had not virtually
ended the war and were hoping for the white dove of peace to alight on the
blood-stained land. But that happy consummation was not yet to be. When
King Wilhelm crossed the frontier he had proclaimed that he warred not
with the French nation but with its ruler. That ruler was now his prisoner;
but Wilhelm had for adversary now the French nation, because it had taken
up the quarrel which might have gone with the _Decheance_ and in effect
had made it its own. In the absence of overtures there was no alternative
but to march on Paris.

But Bismarck, although he carried a blithe front, was far from
comfortable. He would fain have had peace--always on his own terms; but
the question with him was with whom could he negotiate, capable, in the
existing confusion, of furnishing adequate guarantees for the fulfilment
of conditions? That requisite he could not discern in the self-constituted
body which styled itself the Government of National Defence, but of which
he spoke as "the gentlemen of the pavement." He had all the monarchical
dislike and distrust of a republic, and before the German army had
invested Paris he already had begun to ponder as to the possibility of
reinstating the dethroned dynasty. Possibly indeed, he had already felt
the pulse of Marshal Bazaine on this subject.

It was on the 23rd of September when the Royal headquarters was at
Ferrieres, Baron Rothschild's chateau on the east of Paris, that there
either presented himself to Bismarck an intriguant, or that the Chancellor
evoked for himself an instrument for whom the way was made open to
penetrate the beleaguerment of Metz and submit to Bazaine certain
considerations. In connection with this mission we heard a good deal at
the time of a mysterious "Mons. M." and an equally mysterious "Mons. N."
Both were myths: "M." and "N." were alike pseudonyms of the real
go-between, a certain Edmond Regnier who died in Paris on the 23rd of
January 1894, after a strange and varied career of which the episode to be
detailed in this article is the most remarkable. In a now very rare
pamphlet published by Regnier in November 1870, he describes himself as a
French landed proprietor with financial interests in England yielding him
an income of L800 per annum, and as having come to England with his family
in the end of August of that year in consequence of the proximity of
German troops to his French residence. The painstaking compilers of the
indictment against Bazaine give rather a different account of the
character and antecedents of M. Regnier. Their information is that he
received an imperfect education, sufficiently proven by his extraordinary
style and vicious orthography. He studied, with little progress, law and
medicine; later he took up magnetism. He was curiously mixed up in the
events of the revolution of 1848. He had some employment in Algeria as an
assistant surgeon. Returning to France he developed a quarry of
paving-stone, and afterwards married in England a wife who brought him a
certain competence. "Regnier," continues the Report, "is a sharp,
audacious fellow; his manners are vulgar--vain to excess he considers
himself a profound politician. Was he induced to throw himself into the
midst of events by one of the monomanias which are engendered by periods
of storm and revolution? Was he simply an intriguer, plying his trade? It
is difficult to tell. But however that may be, the established fact is
that we find him in England in September 1870 besieging with his projects
the _entourage_ of the Empress."

Regnier's siege of the forlorn colony at Hastings took the form of a
bombardment of letters, his principal victim being Madame Le Breton, the
lady-in-waiting of the Empress and the sister of the unfortunate General
Bourbaki, then in command of the Imperial Guard at Metz. He was about to
have his passport vised by the German Ambassador in London, rather an
equivocal proceeding for a French subject; and on the 12th of September he
wrote thus to Madame Le Breton, desiring that the letter should be
communicated to Her Majesty:--


The Ambassador in London of the North German Confederation may possibly
say, "I think the King of Prussia would prefer treating for peace with the
Imperial Government rather than with the Republic." If so, I shall start
to-morrow for Wilhelmshoehe, after having paid a visit to the Empress. The
following are the propositions I intend to submit to the Emperor: (1) That
the Empress-Regent ought not to quit French territory; (2) That the
Imperial fleet _is_ French territory; (3) That the fleet which greeted Her
Majesty so enthusiastically on its departure for the Baltic, or at least a
portion of it, however small, be taken by the Regent for her seat of
government, thus enabling her to go from one to another of the French
ports where she can count upon the largest number of adherents, and so
prove that her government exists both _de facto_ and _de jure_. Further,
that the Empress-Regent issue from the fleet four proclamations--viz. to
foreign governments, to the fleet, to the army, and to the French people.


It will suffice to quote two of those suggested proclamations:--


To foreign governments! To firmly insist upon the fact that the Imperial
Government is the _actual_ government, as it is the government by right.
To the fleet! That just as the Emperor remained to the last in the midst
of his army, sharing the chances of war, so also does the Regent, the only
executive power legally existing, come with gladness to trust her
political fortune to the Imperial fleet.


There followed a voluminous screed of irrelevant dissertation.

Regnier confessedly made no way with the Empress. He saw, indeed, Madame
Le Breton on the 14th, but only to be told, in language worthy of a
patriot sovereign, that "Her Majesty's feeling was that the interests of
France should take precedence of those of the dynasty; that she would
rather do nothing than incur the suspicion of having acted from an undue
regard for dynastic interests, and that she has the greatest horror of any
step likely to bring about a civil war." Those high-souled expressions
ought to have given definite pause to Regnier's importunity; but that
busybody was indefatigable. A second letter to Madame Le Breton for the
Empress simply elicited from the gentlemen of her suite the information
that Her Majesty, having read his communications, had expressed the
greatest horror of anything approaching a civil war. A final letter from
him, containing the following significant passage:--


I myself, or some other person, ought already to have been secretly and
confidentially in communication with M. de Bismarck; our conditions for
peace must be more acceptable than those to which the _soi-disant_
Republican Government may have agreed; every action of theirs ought to be
turned to our advantage--we ourselves must _act_,


evoked the ultimatum that "the Empress would not stir in the matter."
Regnier then said that as he found no encouragement at Hastings he would
probably go to Wilhelmshoehe, where he would perhaps be better understood;
and he produced a photographic view of Hastings on which he begged that
the Prince Imperial would write a line to his father. On the following
morning the Prince's equerry returned him the photographic view at the
foot of which were the simple and affectionate words: "Mon cher Papa, je
vous envoie ces vues d'Hastings; j'espere qu'elles vous plairont.
Louis-Napoleon." I am personally familiar with the late Prince Imperial's
handwriting and readily recognise it in this brief sentence. Regnier
averred that it was with Her Majesty's consent that this paper was given
him; but admitted that he was told she added: "Tell M. Regnier that there
must be great danger in carrying out his project, and that I beg him not
to attempt its execution." In other words, the Empress was willing that he
should visit the Emperor at Cassel, authenticating him thus far by the
Prince Imperial's little note; but she put her veto on his undertaking
intrigues detrimental to the interests of France.

Regnier by no means took the road for Wilhelmshoehe. At 7 P.M. of Sunday
the 18th he read in the special _Observer_ that Jules Favre was next day
to have an interview with Bismarck at Meaux. Eager to anticipate the
Republican Foreign Minister he promptly took the night train for Paris. No
trains were running beyond Amiens and he did not reach Meaux until
midnight of the 19th, to learn that Bismarck and the headquarters had that
day gone to Ferrieres. At 10 A.M. of the 20th he reached that chateau and
appealed to Count Hatzfeld, now German Ambassador in London, for an
immediate interview with Bismarck, stating that he had come direct from
Hastings. He was informed that the Chancellor had an appointment with
Jules Favre at eleven and that it was improbable he could be received in
advance. But Bismarck having been apprised of his arrival the fortunate
Regnier was immediately ushered into his presence. Regnier congratulates
himself on having anticipated the French Minister, ignorant of the
circumstance that on the previous day the latter had two interviews with
Bismarck and that their then impending interview was simply for the
purpose of communicating to Favre the German King's final answer to the
French proposals.

Regnier says that he drew from his portfolio the photograph of Hastings
with the Prince Imperial's little note to his father at its foot and
handed the paper in silence to Bismarck; and that after the latter had
looked at it for some moments, Regnier said, "I come, Count, to ask you to
grant me a pass which will permit me to go to Wilhelmshoehe and give this
autograph into the Emperor's hands." Why he should have applied to
Bismarck for this is not apparent, since he might have gone direct from
Hastings to Wilhelmshoehe without any necessity for invoking the
Chancellor's offices. It seems extremely probable that the request for a
pass was a mere pretext to gain an interview, and the more so since
Bismarck made no allusion to the subject, but after a few moments,
according to Regnier, addressed that person as follows:--


Sir, our position is before you; what can you offer us? with whom can we
treat? Our determination is fixed so to profit by our present position as
to render impossible for the future any war against us on the part of
France. To effect this object, an alteration of the French frontier is
indispensable. In the presence of two governments--the one _de facto_, the
other _de jure_--it is difficult, if not impossible, to treat with either.
The Empress-Regent has quitted French territory, and since then has given
no sign. The Provisional Government in Paris refuses to accept this
condition of diminution of territory, but proposes an armistice in order
to consult the French nation on the subject. We can afford to wait. When
we find ourselves face to face with a government _de facto_ and _de jure_,
able to treat on the basis we require, then we will treat.


Regnier suggested that Bazaine in Metz and Uhrich in Strasburg, if they
should capitulate, might do so in the name of the Imperial Government.
Bismarck replied that Jules Favre was assured that the garrisons of those
fortresses were staunchly Republican; but that his own belief was that
Bazaine's army of the Rhine was probably Imperialist. Then Regnier offered
to go at once to Metz. "If you had come a week earlier," said Bismarck,
"it was yet time; now, I fear, it is too late." Upon this the Chancellor
went away to meet Jules Favre with the parting words to Regnier, "Be so
good as to present my respectful homage to his Imperial Majesty when you
reach Wilhelmshoehe." At a subsequent meeting the same evening Regnier
repeated his anxiety to go at once to Metz and Strasburg and make an
agreement that these places should be surrendered only in the Emperor's
name. Bismarck was clearly not sanguine, but he said, "Do what you can to
bring us some one with power to treat with us, and you will have rendered
great service to your country. I will give orders for a 'general
safe-conduct' to be given you. A telegram shall precede you to Metz, which
will facilitate your entrance there. You should have come sooner." So
these two parted; Regnier received his "safe-conduct" and started from
Ferrieres early on the morning of the 21st. But this indefatigable
letter-writer could not depart without a farewell letter:--


I shall leave (he wrote to Bismarck) your advanced posts near Metz, giving
orders for the carriage to await my return. I shall wrap myself in a
shawl, which will hide a portion of my face. In the event of Marshal
Bazaine acceding to my conditions, either Marshal Canrobert or General
Bourbaki, acquainted with all that will be requisite for the success of my
plans, may go out with my papers, dressed in my clothes, wrapped in my
shawl, and depart for Hastings, after giving me his word of honour that
for every one, except the Empress, he was to be simply Mons. Regnier. If
everything succeeded according to my anticipation, he might then establish
his identity, and place himself at the head of the army, with orders to
defend the Chamber assembled, if possible, at a seaport town, where a
loyal portion of the fleet should also be present. If the project should
miscarry, the Marshal or the General would return and resume his post.


Bismarck must have smiled grimly as he read this strange farrago; yet,
whatever may have been his motives, he furthered the errand on which
Regnier was going to Metz.

That person reached the headquarters of Prince Frederick Charles at Corny,
outside of Metz, on the afternoon of 23rd September and was promptly
presented to the Prince, who said that Count Bismarck had informed him of
his wish to enter Metz and had left it to him to decide as to the
expediency of complying with it. This, said the Prince, he was prepared to
do and he gave Regnier the requisite pass. The same evening that active
individual presented himself at the French forepost line, and having
stated that he had a mission to Marshal Bazaine and desired to see him
immediately, he was driven to Ban-Saint-Martin where the Marshal was
residing. Bazaine at once received him in his study. At the outset a
discrepancy manifests itself in the subsequent testimony of the
interlocutors. The Marshal states that Regnier said he came on the part of
the Empress with the consent of Bismarck; while Regnier declares that he
did not state to the Marshal that he had any mission from the Empress. On
other points, with one important exception, the versions given of the
interview by the two participants fairly agree, and Bazaine's account of
it may be summarised. After Regnier had stated that his commission was
purely verbal he went on to observe that it was to be regretted that a
treaty of peace had not put an end to the war after Sedan; that the
maintenance of the German armies on French territory was ruinous to the
country; and that it would be doing France a great service to obtain an
armistice preparatory to the conclusion of peace. That as regarded this,
the French army under the walls of Metz--the only army remaining
organised--would be in a position to give guarantees to the Germans if it
were allowed its liberty of action; but that without doubt they would
exact as a pledge the surrender of the fortress of Metz.


I replied (says Bazaine) that certainly if we--the "Army of the Rhine"--
could extricate ourselves from the _impasse_ in which we now were, with
the honours of war--that is to say, with arms and baggage--in a word
completely constituted as an army, we would be in a position to maintain
order in the interior, and would cause the provisions of the convention to
be respected; but a difficulty would occur as to the fortress of Metz, the
governor of which, appointed by the Emperor, could not be relieved except
by His Majesty himself.


One of Regnier's stated objects, continues the Marshal, was to bring it
about that either Marshal Canrobert or General Bourbaki should go to
England, inform the Empress of the situation at Metz, and place himself at
her disposition. The departure of whichever of the two high officers
should undertake this duty was to be surreptitious; and for this Regnier
had provided with Prussian assistance. Seven Luxembourg surgeons who had
been in Metz ever since the battle of Gravelotte had written to Marshal
Bazaine for leave to go home through the Prussian lines. This letter, sent
to the Prussian headquarters, was replied to in a letter carried into Metz
by Regnier and by him given to Bazaine, to the effect that the _nine_
surgeons were free to depart. As there were but seven surgeons, the
implication is obvious that the safe-conduct was expanded to cover the
incognito exit, along with the surgeons, of Regnier and the French officer
bound for Hastings.

Regnier gave me (writes Bazaine) so many details of his _soi-disant_
relations with the Empress and her _entourage_ that, notwithstanding the
strangeness of the apparition, I put faith in his mission, and believed
that I ought not, in the general interest, to neglect the opportunity
opened to me of putting myself in communication with the outside world. I
consequently told him that he would be duly brought into relations with
Marshal Canrobert and General Bourbaki, whom I would inform in regard to
his proposals, and whom I would place at liberty to act as each might
choose in the matter.

Finally Regnier produced the photograph of Hastings with the Prince
Imperial's signature at the foot, and begged the Marshal to add his, which
he did "as a souvenir of the interview" explained Regnier, according to
the Marshal; according to Regnier, that he could exhibit the signature to
Bismarck in proof that he had the Marshal's assent to his proposals.
Diplomacy conducted by chance signatures on casual photographs has a
certain innocent simplicity, but is not in accordance with modern methods.
Perhaps, however, the strangest thing in connection with this strange
interview is Bazaine's final comment:--


All this which I have narrated was only a simple conversation to which I
attached a merely secondary importance, since M. Regnier had no written
authority from the Empress nor from M. de Bismarck.... This personage,
therefore, appeared to act without the knowledge of the German military
authorities, and it was not until considerably later that I became
convinced of their cognisance, and of their mutual understanding as
regards M. Regnier's visit to Metz.


And this in the face of General Stiehle's letter to him in his hand,
brought in by Regnier, sanctioning the exit of the _nine_ surgeons; and
the Marshal's promise to Regnier that he and the officer who should accept
the mission to Hastings should quit the camp incognito along with the
Luxembourg surgeons.

Reference has been made to a discordance between the testimony of Marshal
Bazaine and of Regnier on a very important point in regard to this
interview. In his notes taken at the time the latter writes:--


The Marshal tells me of his excellent position, of the long period for
which he can hold out; that he considers himself as the Palladium of the
Empire. He speaks of the very healthy condition of the troops; and, if I
may judge by his own rosy face, he is quite right. He tells of all the
successful sallies he had made, and of the facility with which he can
break through the besieging lines whenever he chooses to do so.


Later, he contradicts all this, explaining that finding himself in the
Prussian lines and his papers liable to be read, he had written just the
reverse of what he was told by the Marshal. He says that what Bazaine
actually informed him was that the bread ration had been already
diminished and would be necessarily further reduced in a few days; that
the horses lacked forage and had to be used for food; and that in such
conditions and taking into account the necessity of carrying four or five
days' rations for the army and keeping a certain number of horses in
condition to drag the guns and supplies, there would be great difficulty
in holding out until the 18th of October. Bazaine, for his part,
vehemently denied having given Regnier any such information, and it seems
utterly improbable that he should have done so. It is nevertheless the
fact that the 18th of October was the last day on which rations were
issued to the army outside Metz. Regnier must have been a wizard; or
Bazaine must have leaked atrociously; or there must have been lying on the
Marshal's table during the interview with Regnier, the most recent state
furnished by the French intendance, that of the 21st of September which
specified the 18th of October as the precise date of the final exhaustion
of the army's supplies.

At midnight of the 23rd Regnier went to the outposts and next morning to
Corny, where he found a telegram from Bismarck authorising the departure
for Hastings of a general from the army of Metz. He was back again at
Ban-Saint-Martin on the afternoon of the 24th, when Marshal Canrobert and
General Bourbaki were summoned to headquarters to meet him and the
Luxembourg surgeons were assembled. Canrobert declined the proposed
mission on the plea of ill-health. Bourbaki had to be searched for and was
ultimately found at St. Julien with Marshal Lebceuf. As he dismounted at
the headquarters he asked Colonel Boyer--they had both been of the
intimate circle of the Empire--whether he knew the person walking in the
garden with the Marshal?

"No," replied Boyer.

"What?" rejoined Bourbaki; "have you never seen him at the Tuileries?"

"No," said Boyer. "I forget names, but not faces--I never saw this fellow.
He is neither a familiar of the Tuileries nor an employe." Whereupon the
two aristocrats despised the bourgeois Regnier. But Bourbaki,
nevertheless, had to endure the presentation to him of the "fellow," who
promptly entered on a political discourse to the effect that the German
Government was reluctant to treat with the Paris Government, which it did
not consider so lawful as that of the Empress, and that if it treated with
her the conditions would be less burdensome; that the intervention of the
army of Metz was indispensable; that it was all-important that one of its
chiefs should repair to the side of the Empress to represent the army with
her; and that he, Bourbaki, was the fittest person to occupy that position
on the declinature of Marshal Canrobert. Bourbaki turned from the man of
verbiage to Bazaine and asked, "Marshal, what do you wish me to do?" The
Marshal answered that he desired him to repair to the Empress.

"I am ready," answered Bourbaki, "but on certain conditions: you will have
the goodness to give me a written order; to announce my departure in army
orders; not to place a substitute in my command; and to promise that,
pending my return, you will not engage the Guard." His terms were accepted;
he was told that he was to leave immediately and he went to his quarters
to make his preparations.

It was understood that the general's departure was to be by way of being
incognito, so that it should not get wind. He had no civilian clothes and
Bazaine fitted him out in his; Regnier had obtained from one of the
Luxembourger surgeons a cap with the Geneva Cross which completed the
costume. At the Prussian headquarters General Stiehle, Prince Frederick
Charles's chief of staff, desired to pay his respects to a man whose
brilliant courage he admired. Bourbaki's bitter answer to Regnier who
communicated to him Stiehle's wish, was that he would see "none of them,
nor even eat a morsel of their bread," which, he said, would choke him. He
presently started with the surgeons, travelling in Regnier's name and on
Regnier's passport, on an enterprise which was to lead to the wreck of a
fine career. At the same time Regnier quitted Corny on his return to
Ferrieres to report to Bismarck, having promised Bazaine that he would
return to Metz within six days. His bolt was about shot. But he had not
realised this fact. He maintains in his curious pamphlet that, to quote
his own words, "the Minister had given me to understand that if I were
backed by Bazaine and his army he would treat with me as if I were the
representative of the Emperor or the Regent. I had obtained from the
Marshal a capitulation with the honours of war, which the Minister--for
the furtherance of our political ends--had consented to accord to him." He
hurried expectant to Ferrieres; there to be summarily disillusioned.
Bismarck gave him an interview on the 28th, and crushed him in a few
trenchant sentences:--


I am surprised and sorry (said the Chancellor) that you, who appeared to
be a practical man, after having been permitted to enter Metz with the
certainty of being able to leave it, a favour never before accorded,
should have left it without some more formal recognition of your right to
treat than merely a photograph with the Marshal's signature on it. But I,
Sir, am a diplomatist of many years' standing, and this is not enough for
me. I regret it; but I find myself compelled to relinquish all further
communication with you till your powers are better defined.


Regnier expressed his regret at having been so cruelly deceived but
thanked Bismarck for his kindness, whereupon the latter offered to give
him a last chance. "I would certainly," he said, "have treated with you as
to peace conditions, had you been able to treat in the name of a Marshal
at the head of 80,000 men; as it is, I will send this telegram to the
Marshal: 'Does Marshal Bazaine authorise M. Regnier to treat for the
surrender of the army before Metz in accordance with the conditions agreed
upon with the last-named?'" On the 29th came Bazaine's somewhat diffuse
reply:--


I cannot reply definitely in the affirmative to the question. Regnier
announced himself the emissary of the Empress without written credentials.
He asked the conditions on which I could enter into negotiations with
Prince Frederick Charles. My answer was that I could only accept a
convention with the honours of war, not to include the fortress of Metz.
These are the only conditions which military honour permits me to accept.


Regnier bombarded the Chancellor with letters until the 30th, when Count
Hatzfeld informed him that the Minister would listen to nothing more until
Regnier could show full powers without evasion; that the matter must
imperatively be conducted openly and above board; and that his Excellency
hoped Regnier would be able to get clear of it with honour, and that soon.

So Regnier quitted Ferrieres in great dejection. He gives vent ruefully to
the belief that Bismarck regarded him as an unaccredited agent of the
Empress, while, curiously enough, the partisans of the Empress took him
for an emissary of Bismarck. Reaching Hastings on the 3rd of October he
found that the Empress was now at Chislehurst. He had telegraphed in
advance to "M. Regnier," the name which he had instructed General Bourbaki
to pass under until the true Regnier should reach England. But Bourbaki
had cast away the false name at the instigation of a brother officer while
passing through Belgium. On arriving at Chislehurst he learned from the
Empress that he had been made the victim of a mystification on the part of
Regnier, and that she had never expressed the desire to have with her
either Marshal Canrobert or himself. This intelligence, of which the
newspapers had given him a presentiment, struck him to the heart. Although
covered by his chief's order he found himself in a false position; and he
wrote to the late Lord Granville, then Foreign Secretary, begging his good
offices to obtain for him an authorisation to return to his post. An
assurance was given that this would be accorded, and he hurried to
Luxembourg there to await intimation of permission to re-enter Metz. Some
delay occurred in the transmission of the Royal order to this effect and
although Bourbaki was assured that the decision would shortly reach him,
he became impatient, went into France, and placed himself at the
disposition of the Provisional Government. But thenceforth he was a soured
and dispirited man. The _ci-devant_ aide-de-camp of an Emperor writhed
under the harrow of Gambetta and Freycinet.

As for Regnier, on his return to England he seems to have haunted
Chislehurst. Once, so he frankly writes, after waiting a full hour in
expectation of an audience of the Empress Madame Le Breton came to tell
him that Her Majesty was sorry to have kept him waiting so long, but that
she had now definitely resolved not to receive him. Yet he hung on, and
the same evening he tells that he was called somewhat abruptly into a room
in which stood several gentlemen, when a lady suddenly rose from a couch
and addressed him standing. At last he was face to face with the Empress.
"Sir," said Her Majesty, "you have been persistent in wishing to speak
with me personally; here I am; what have you to say?" Then Regnier, by his
own account, harangued that august and unfortunate lady in a manner which
in print seems extremely trenchant and dictatorial. It was all in vain, he
confesses; he could not alter the convictions of the Empress. He says that
"she feared that posterity, if she yielded, would only see in the act a
proof of dynastic selfishness; and that dishonour would be attached to the
name of whoever should sign a treaty based on a cession of territory."
Probably Her Majesty spoke from a more lofty standpoint than Regnier was
able to comprehend or appreciate.

Regnier's subsequent career during that troublous period was both curious
and dubious. General Boyer states that on the 28th of October he found
Regnier _tete-a-tete_ with Prince Napoleon (Plon-Plon). Later he went to
Cassel, where he busied himself in trying to implicate in political
machinations sundry French officers who were prisoners there. Presently we
find him at Versailles, figuring among the conductors of the _Moniteur
Prussien_, Bismarck's organ during the German occupation of that city, in
which journal he published a series of articles under the title of _Jean
Bonhomme_. During the armistice after the surrender of Paris he betook
himself to Brussels, where he told General Boyer that he had gone to
Versailles to attempt a renewal of negotiations tending towards an
Imperial restoration. He showed the general the original safe-conduct
which Bismarck had given him at Ferrieres, and a letter of Count Hatzfeld
authorising him to visit Versailles. The last item during this period
recorded of this strange personage--and that item one so significant as to
justify Mrs. Crawford's shrewd suspicion "that Regnier played a double
game, and that Prince Bismarck, if he chose, could clear up the mystery
which hangs over Regnier's curious negotiations"--is found in a page of
the _Proces Bazaine_. This is the gem: "On the 18th of February 1871 he
was in Versailles, where he met a person of his acquaintance, to whom he
uttered the characteristic words--'I do not know whether M. de Bismarck
will allow me to leave him this evening.'" He is said to have later been
connected with the Paris police under the late M. Lagrange. Whether
Regnier was more knave or fool--enthusiast, impostor, or "crank"--will
probably be never known.




RAILWAY LIZZ

BY AN HOSPITAL MATRON


We see many curious phases of humanity--we who administer to the sick in
the great hospitals which are among the boasts of London. The mask worn by
the face of the world is dropped before us. We see men as they are, and
while the sight is often not calculated to enhance our estimate of human
nature, there are occasionally strong reliefs which stand out from the
mass of shadow. There are curious opinions entertained in the outer world
as to the internal economy of hospitals, not a few "laymen" imagining that
the main end of such establishments is that the doctors may have something
to experiment upon for the advancement of their professional theories--
something which, while it is human, is not very valuable in the social
scale and therefore open to be hacked and hewn and operated upon with a
freedom begotten of the knowledge that the subject is a mere vile corpus.

Nor is this the only delusion. Many people think that the hospital nurse
is but another name for a heartless harpy, brimful of callous selfishness.
Her attentions--kindness is an inadmissible word--are believed to be
purely mercenary. Those who themselves can afford to fee her or who have
friends able and willing to buy her services, may purchase civil treatment
and careful nursing while the poor wretch who has neither money nor
friends may languish unheeded. There is no greater mistake than this. Year
by year the character of hospital nursing has improved. It is not to be
denied that in times gone by there were nurses the mainsprings of whose
actions may be said to have been money and gin; but these have long since
been driven forth with contumely. I have seen a poor wretch of a
discharged soldier without a single copper to bless himself with, nursed
with as much tender assiduity and real feeling as if he were in a position
to pay his nurses handsomely.

Indeed, in most hospitals now the practice of accepting money presents is
altogether forbidden; and if the prohibition, as in the case of railway
porters and guards, is sometimes looked upon in the light of a dead
letter, there is, I sincerely believe, no such thing as any grasping after
a guerdon nor any neglect in a case where it is evident no guerdon is to
be expected. There is an hospital I could name in which the nurses are
prohibited from accepting from patients any more substantial recognition
of their services than a nosegay of flowers. The wards of this hospital
are always gay with bright, fragrant posies, most of them the
contributions of those who, having been carefully tended in their need,
retain a grateful recollection of the kindness and now that they are in
health again take this simple, pretty way of showing their gratitude. It
is two years ago since a rough bricklayer's labourer got mended in the
accident ward of this hospital of some curiously complicated injuries he
had received by tumbling from the top of a house. Not a Sunday afternoon
has there been since the house-surgeon told him one morning that he might
go out, that he has not religiously visited the "Albert" ward and brought
his thank-offering in the shape of a cheap but grateful nosegay.

Those nurses who thus devote themselves to the tending of sick have often
curious histories if anybody would be at the trouble of collecting them.
It is by no means always mere regard for the securing of the necessaries
of life which has brought them to the thankless and toilsome occupation.
We have all read of nunneries in which women immured themselves, anxious
to sequester themselves from all association with the outer world and to
devote themselves to a life of penance and devotion. After all their piety
was aimless and of no utility to humanity. There was a concentrated
selfishness in it which detracted from its ambitious aspiration. But in
the modern nuns of our hospitals methinks we have women who, abnegating
with equal solicitude the pleasures and dissipations of the world, find a
more philanthropic opening for their exertions in their retirement than in
sleeping on hair pallets, and in eating nothing but parched peas.

It was towards the autumn of a recent year that a modest-looking young
woman applied to me for a situation on our nursing staff. She wore a
widow's dress and seemed a self-contained, reserved little woman, with
something weighing very heavily on her mind. Her testimonials of character
were ample and of a very high order but they did not enlighten me with any
great freedom as to her past history, and she for her part appeared by no
means eager to supplement the meagre information furnished by them.
However, people have a right to keep their own counsel if they please, and
there was no sin in the woman's reticence. We happened to be very short of
efficient nurses at the time and she was at once taken upon trial; her
somewhat strange stipulation, which she made absolute, being agreed to--
that she should not be compelled to reside in the hospital, but merely
come in to perform her turn of nursing, and that over, be at liberty to
leave the precincts when she pleased. I say the stipulation was a strange
one, because attached to it there was a considerable pecuniary sacrifice
as well as a necessity for entering a lower grade.

She made a very excellent nurse, with her quiet, reserved ways and her
manner of moving about a ward as if she studied the lightness of every
footfall. But she had her peculiarities. I have already said that she was
not given to be communicative, and for the first three months she was in
the place I do not believe she uttered a word to any one within the walls
except on subjects connected with the performance of her duties. Then,
too, she manifested a curious fondness for being on duty in the accident
ward. Most nurses have very little liking for this ward--the work is very
heavy and unremitting and frequently the sights are more than usually
repulsive. But she specially made application to be placed in it, and the
more terrible the nature of the accident the more eager was her zeal to
minister to the poor victim. It seemed almost a morbid fondness which she
developed for waiting, in particular, upon people injured by railway
accidents. When some poor mangled plate-layer or a railway-porter crushed
almost out of resemblance to humanity would be borne in and laid on an
empty cot in the accident ward, this woman was at the bedside with a
seemingly intuitive perception of what would best conduce to soothe and
ease the poor shattered fellow; and she would wait on him "hand and foot"
with an intensity of devotion far in excess of what mere duty, however
conscientiously fulfilled, would have demanded of her. Indeed, her
partiality for railway "cases" was so marked that it appeared to amount to
a passion; and among the other nurses, never slow to fix upon any
peculiarity and base upon it some not unfriendly nickname, our quiet
friend went by the name of "Railway Lizz." Nobody ever got any clue to the
reason, if there was one, for this predilection of hers. Indeed, nobody
ever was favoured with the smallest scrap of her confidence. I confess to
have felt much interest in the sad-eyed young widow and to have several
times given her an opening which she might have availed herself of for
narrating something of her past life; but she always retired within
herself with a sensitiveness which puzzled me not a little, satisfied as I
was that there was nothing in her antecedents of a character which would
not bear the light.

There are few holidays within an hospital. Physical suffering is not to be
mitigated by a gala day; the pressure of disease cannot be lightened by
jollity and merry-making. One New Year's Eve, when the world outside our
walls was glad of heart, a poor shattered form was borne into the accident
ward. It was a railway-porter whom a train had knocked down and passed
over, crushing the young fellow almost out of the shape of humanity.
Railway Lizz was by his side in a moment, wetting the pain-parched lips
and smoothing the pillow of the half-conscious sufferer. The house-surgeon
came and went with that silent shake of the head we know too surely how to
interpret, and the mangled railway-porter was left in the care of his
assiduous nurse. It was almost midnight when I again entered the accident
ward. The night-lamp was burning feebly, shedding a dull dim light over
the great room and throwing out huge grotesque shadows on the floor and
the walls. I glanced toward the railway-porter's bed, and the tell-tale
screen placed around it told me that all was over and that the life had
gone out of the shattered casket. As I walked down the room toward the
screen I heard a low subdued sound of bitter sobbing behind it; and when I
stepped within it, there was the sad-faced widow-nurse weeping as if her
heart would break. When she saw me she strove hard to repress her emotion
and to resume the quiet, self-possessed demeanour which it was her wont to
wear; but she failed in the attempt and the sobs burst out in almost
convulsive rebellion against the effort to repress them. I put my arm
round the neck of the poor young thing and stooping down kissed her wet
cheek as a tear from my own eye mingled with her profuse weeping. The
evidence of feeling appeared to overpower her utterly; she buried her head
in my lap, and lay long there sobbing like a child. When the acuteness of
the emotion had somewhat spent itself I gently raised her up, and asked of
her what was the cause of a grief so poignant. I found that I was now at
last within the intrenchments of her reserve; with a deep sigh she said,
in her Scottish accent, that it was "a lang, lang story," but if I cared
to hear it she would tell it. So sitting there, we two together in the dim
twilight of the night-lamp, with the shattered corpse of the
railway-porter lying there "streekit" decently before us, she told the
following pathetic tale:--

"I am an Aberdeen girl by birth. My father was the foreman at a factory, a
very stiff, dour man, but a gude father, and an upright, God-fearing man.
When I was about eighteen, I fell acquainted with a railway-guard, a
winsome, manly lad as ever ye would wish to see. If ye had kent my Alick,
ye wadna wonder at me for what I did. My father was a proud man, and he
couldna bear that I should marry a man that he said wasna my equal in
station; and in his firm, masterful way he forbade Alick from coming about
the house, and me from seeing him. It was a sair trial, and I dinna think
ony father has a right to put doon his foot and mar the happiness of twa
young folks in the way mine did. The struggle was a bitter ane, between a
father's commands and the bidding of true luve; and at last, ae night
coming home from a friend's house, Alick and I forgathered again, and he
swore he would not gang till I had promised I would marry him afore the
week was out.

"I'll not trouble ye with lang details of the battle that I fought with
mysel', and how in the end Alick conquered. We were married in the West
Kirk the Sunday after, and we twa set up our simple housekeeping in a
single room in a house by the back of the Infirmary. Oh, mem, we were
happy young things! Alick was the fondest, kindest man ye could ever think
of. Sometimes he wad take me a jaunt the length of Perth in the van with
him, and point out the places of interest on the road as we went flashing
by them. Then on the Sunday, when he was off duty, we used to take a walk
out to the Torry Lighthouse, or down by the auld brig o' Balgownie, and
then hame to an hour's read of the Bible afore I put down the kebbuck and
the bannocks. My father keepit hard and unforgiving; they tellt me he had
sworn an oath I should never darken his door again, and at times I felt
very sairly the bitterness of his feeling toward me, whan I was sitting up
waiting for Alick's hame-coming whan he was on the night turn; but then he
wad come in with his blithe smile and cheery greeting and every thought
but joy at his presence wad flee awa as if by magic. Some of the friends I
had kent when a lassie at home still keepit up the acquantance, and we
used sometimes to spend an evening at one of their houses. The New Year
time came, and Alick and myself got an invitation to keep our New Year's
Eve at the house of a decent, elderly couple that lived up near the Kitty
Brewster Station--quiet, retired folk that had been in business and made
enough to live comfortable on. It was Alick's night for the late mail
train from Perth, but he would be at Market Street Station in time to get
up among us to see the auld year out and the new ane in; and I was to
spend the evening there and wait for his arrival.

"It was a vera happy time. The auld couple were as kind as kind could be,
and their twa or three young folks keepit up the fun brisk and lively.
I took a hand at the cairts and sang a lilt like the rest; but I was
luiking for Alick's company to fill up my cup of happiness. The time wore
on, and it was getting close to the hour at which he might be expectit. I
kenna what ailed me, but I felt strangely uneasy and anxious for his
coming. 'Here he is at last!' I said to myself, as my heart gave a jump at
the sound of a foot on the gravel walk. As it came closer, I kent it wasna
Alick's step, and a strange, cauld grip of fear and doubt caught me at the
heart. Mr. Thomson, that was the name of our old friend, was called out,
and I overheard the sound of a whispered conversation in the passage. Then
he put his head in and called out his wife; I could see his face was as
white as a sheet, and his voice shook in spite of himself. The boding of
misfortune came upon me with a force it was in vain to strive against, and
I rose up and gaed out into the passage amang them. The auld man was
shakin' like an aspen leaf; the gudewife had her apron ower her face and
was greeting like a bairn, and in the door stood Tarn Farquharson, a
railway-porter frae the station. I saw it aa' quicker nor I can tell it to
you, leddy. I steppit up to Tarn and charged him simple and straught.

"'Tam, what's happent to my Alick?'

"The wet tears stood in Tarn's e'en as he answered, 'Dinna speer, Lizzie,
my puir lass, dinna speer, whan the answer maun be a waefu' ane.'

"'Tell me the warst, Tam,' says I; 'let me hear the warst, an' pit me oot
o' my pain!'

"The words are dirlin' and stoonin' in my ears yet--

"'The engine gaed ower him, and he's lyin' dead at Market Street.'

"I didna faint, and I couldna greet. Something gied a crack inside my
head, and my e'en swam for a minute; but the next I was putting on my
bonnet and shawl and saying good-nicht to Mrs. Thomson. They tried to stop
me. I heard Tam whisper to the auld man, 'She maunna see him. He is
mangled oot o' the shape o' man.'

"But I wasna to be gainsaid, and Tam took my airm as we gaed doon through
the toon to Market Street. There they tried hard to keep him oot frae my
sight. They tellt me he wasna fit to be seen, but there's nae law that can
keep a wife frae seeing her husband's corpse. He was lying in a
waiting-room covered up with a sheet, and, oh me, he was sair, sair
mangled--that puir fellow there is naething to him; but the winsome, manly
face, with the sweet, familiar smile on it, was nane spoiled; and lang,
lang, I sat there, us twa alane, with my hand on his cauld forehead,
playing wi' his bonnie waving hair. They left me there, in their
considerate kindliness, till the cauld light o' the New Year's morning
began to break, and syne they came and tellt me I maun go. But I wadna
gang my lane. He was mine, and mine only, sae lang as he was abune the
mools; and I claimed my dead hame wi' me, to that hoose he had left sae
brisk and sprichtly whan he kissed me in the morning. Four of the
railway-porters carried him up to that hame which had lost its hame-look
for me now. I keepit him to mysel' till they took him awa' frae me and
laid him under a saugh tree in the Spittal Kirkyard."

She paused in her story, overcome by the bitter memory of the past, and I
wanted no formal application now to give me the clue to her strange
preference for the accident ward and her hitherto inexplicable fondness
for "railway cases." Poor thing, with what inexpressible vividness must
the circumstances in which this New Year's night was passing with her have
recalled the sad remembrances of that other New Year's night the narrative
of which she had just given me! Presently she recovered her voice, and
briefly concluded the little history.

"Leddy, I was wi' bairn whan my Alick was taken from me. Oh, how I used to
pray that God would be gude to me, and give me a living keepsake of my
dead husband! I troubled naebody. I never speered if my father would do
anything for me; but I got work at the factory, and I lived in prayerful
hope. My hour of trouble came, and a fatherless laddie was born into this
weary world, the very picture o' him that was sleeping under the tree in
the Spittal Kirkyard. I needna tell ye I christened him Alick, and the
bairn has been my joy and comfort ever since God gifted me with him. I
found the sichts and memories of Aberdeen ower muckle for me, sae I came
up to London here, and ye ken the rest about me. It was because of being
with my bairn that I wouldna agree to live in the hospital here like the
rest of the nurses, and whan I gang hame noo to my little garret, he will
waken up out of his saft sleep, rosy and fresh, and hold up his bonnie
mou', sae like his father's, for 'mammie's kiss.'"




MY NATIVE SALMON RIVER


None of the greater rivers of Scotland makes so much haste to reach the
ocean as does the turbulent and impatient Spey. From its parent lochlet in
the bosom of the Grampians it speeds through Badenoch, the country of
Cluny MacPherson, the chief of Clan Chattan, a region to this day redolent
of memories of the '45. It abates its hurry as its current skirts the
grave of the beautiful Jean Maxwell, Duchess of Gordon, who raised the
92nd Highlanders by giving a kiss with the King's shilling to every
recruit, and who now since many long years

  Sleeps beneath Kinrara's willow.

But after this salaam of courtesy the river roars and bickers down the
long stretch of shaggy glen which intervenes between the upper and lower
Rocks of Craigellachie, whence the Clan Grant, whose habitation is this
ruggedly beautiful strath, takes its slogan of "Stand fast,
Craigellachie," till it finally sends its headlong torrent shooting miles
out through the salt water of the Moray Firth. In its course of over a
hundred miles its fierce current has seldom tarried; yet now and again it
spreads panting into a long smooth stretch of still water when wearied
momentarily with buffeting the boulders in its broken and contorted bed;
or when a great rock, jutting out into its course, causes a deep black
sullen pool whose sluggish eddy is crested with masses of yellow foam.
Merely as a wayfaring pedestrian I have followed Spey from its source to
its mouth; but my intimacy with it in the character of a fisherman extends
over the five-and-twenty miles of its lower course, from the confluence of
the pellucid Avon at Ballindalloch to the bridge of Fochabers, the native
village of the Captain Wilson who died so gallantly in the recent fighting
in Matabeleland. My first Spey trout I took out of water at the foot of
the cherry orchard below the sweet-lying cottage of Delfur. My first
grilse I hooked and played with trout tackle in "Dalmunach" on the Laggan
water, a pool that is the rival of "Dellagyl" and the "Holly Bush" for the
proud title of the best pool of lower Spey. My first salmon I brought to
the gaff with a beating heart in that fine swift stretch of water known as
"The Dip," which connects the pools of the "Heathery Isle" and the "Red
Craig," and which is now leased by that good fisherman, Mr. Justice North.
I think the Dundurcas water then belonged to the late Mr. Little Gilmour,
the well-known welter-weight who went so well to hounds season after
season from Melton Mowbray, and who was as keen in the water on Spey as he
was over the Leicestershire pastures. A servant of Mr. Little Gilmour was
drowned in the "Two Stones" pool, the next below the "Holly Bush;" and the
next pool below the "Two Stones" is called the "Beaufort" to this day--
named after the present Duke, who took many a big fish out of it in the
days when he used to come to Speyside with his friend Mr. Little Gilmour.

In those long gone-by days brave old Lord Saltoun, the hero of Hougomont,
resided during the fishing season in the mansion-house of Auchinroath, on
the high ground at the mouth of the Glen of Rothes. One morning, some
five-and-forty years ago, my father drove to breakfast with the old lord
and took me with him. Not caring to send the horse to the stable, he left
me outside in the dogcart when he entered the house. As I waited rather
sulkily--for I was mightily hungry--there came out on to the doorstep a
very queer-looking old person, short of figure, round as a ball, his head
sunk between very high and rounded shoulders, and with short stumpy legs.
He was curiously attired in a whole-coloured suit of gray; a droll-shaped
jacket the great collar of which reached far up the back of his head,
surmounted a pair of voluminous breeches which suddenly tightened at the
knee. I imagined him to be the butler in morning dishabille; and when he
accosted me good-naturedly, asking to whom the dogcart and myself
belonged, I answered him somewhat shortly and then ingenuously suggested
that he would be doing me a kindly act if he would go and fetch me out a
hunk of bread and meat, for I was enduring tortures of hunger.

Then he swore, and that with vigour and fluency, that it was a shame that
I should have been left outside; called a groom and bade me alight and
come indoors with him. I demurred--I had got the paternal injunction to
remain with the horse and cart. "I am master here!" exclaimed the old
person impetuously; and with further strong language he expressed his
intention of rating my father soundly for not having brought me inside
along with himself. Then a question occurred to me, and I ventured to ask,
"Are you Lord Saltoun?" "Of course I am," replied the old gentleman; "who
the devil else should I be?" Well, I did not like to avow what I felt, but
in truth I was hugely disappointed in him; for I had just been reading
Siborne's _Waterloo_, and to think that this dumpy old fellow in the
duffle jacket that came up over his ears was the valiant hero who had held
Hougomont through cannon fire and musketry fire and hand-to-hand bayonet
fighting on the day of Waterloo while the post he was defending was
ablaze, and who had actually killed Frenchmen with his own good sword, was
a severe disenchantment. When I had breakfasted he asked leave of my
father to let me go with him to the waterside, promising to send me home
safely later in the day. When he was in Spey up to the armpits--for the
"Holly Bush" takes deep wading from the Dundurcas side--the old lord
looked even droller than he had done on the Auchinroath doorstep, and I
could not reconcile him in the least to my Hougomont ideal. He was
delighted when I opened on him with that topic, and he told me with great
spirit of the vehemence with which his brother-officer Colonel Macdonnell,
and his men forced the French soldiers out of the Hougomont courtyard, and
how big Sergeant Graham closed the door against them by main force of
muscular strength. Before he had been in the water twenty minutes the old
lord was in a fish; his gillie, old Dallas, who could throw a fine line in
spite of the whisky, gaffed it scientifically, and I was sent home
rejoicing with a 15 lb. salmon for my mother and a half-sovereign for
myself wherewith to buy a trouting rod and reel. Lord Saltoun was the
first lord I ever met, and I have never known one since whom I have liked
half so well.

Spey is a river which insists on being distinctive. She mistrusts the
stranger. He may be a good man on Tweed or Tay, but until he has been
formally introduced to Spey and been admitted to her acquaintance, she is
chary in according him her favours. She is no flighty coquette, nor is she
a prude; but she has her demure reserves, and he who would stand well with
her must ever treat her with consideration and respect. She is not as
those facile demi-mondaine streams, such as the Helmsdale or the Conon,
which let themselves be entreated successfully by the chance comer on the
first jaunty appeal. You must learn the ways of Spey before you can
prevail with her, and her ways are not the ways of other rivers. It was in
vain that the veteran chief of southern fishermen, the late Francis
Francis, threw his line over Spey in the _veni, vidi, vici_ manner of one
who had made Usk and Wye his potsherd, and who over the Hampshire Avon had
cast his shoe. Russel, the famous editor of the _Scotsman_, the Delane of
the north country, who, pen in hand, could make a Lord Advocate squirm,
and before whose gibe provosts and bailies trembled, who had drawn out
leviathan with a hook from Tweed, and before whom the big fish of Forth
could not stand--even he, brilliant fisherman as he was, could "come nae
speed ava" on Spey, as the old Arndilly water-gillie quaintly worded it.

Yet Russel of the _Scotsman_ was perhaps the most whole-souled salmon
fisher of his own or any other period. His piscatorial aspirations
extended beyond the grave. Who that heard it can ever forget the
peroration, slightly profane perhaps, but entirely enthusiastic, of his
speech on salmon fishing at a Tweedside dinner? "When I die," he exclaimed
in a fine rapture, "should I go to heaven, I will fish in the water of
life with a fly dressed with a feather from the wing of an angel; should I
be unfortunately consigned to another destination, I shall nevertheless
hope to angle in Styx with the worm that never dieth." To his editorial
successor Spey was a trifle more gracious than she had been to Russel; but
she did not wholly open her heart to this neophyte of her stream, serving
him up in the pool of Dellagyl with the ugliest, blackest, gauntest old
cock-salmon of her depths, owning a snout like the prow of an ancient
galley.

Spey exacts from those who would fish her waters with success a peculiar
and distinctive method of throwing their line, which is known as the "Spey
cast." In vain has Major Treherne illustrated the successive phases of the
"Spey cast" in the fishing volume of the admirable Badminton series. It
cannot be learned by diagrams; no man, indeed, can become a proficient in
it who has not grown up from childhood in the practice of it. Yet its use
is absolutely indispensable to the salmon angler on the Spey. Rocks,
trees, high banks, and other impediments forbid resort to the overhead
cast. The essence and value of the Spey cast lies in this--that his line
must never go behind the caster; well done, the cast is like the dart from
a howitzer's mouth of a safety rocket to which a line is attached. To
watch it performed, strongly yet easily, by a skilled hand is a liberal
education in the art of casting; the swiftness, sureness, low trajectory,
and lightness of the fall of the line, shot out by a dexterous swish of
the lifting and propelling power of the strong yet supple rod, illustrate
a phase at once beautiful and practical of the poetry of motion. Among the
native salmon fishermen of Speyside, _quorum ego parva pars fui,_ there
are two distinct manners which may be severally distinguished as the easy
style and the masterful style. The disciples of the easy style throw a
fairly long line, but their aim is not to cover a maximum distance. What
they pride themselves on is precise, dexterous, and, above all, light and
smooth casting. No fierce switchings of the rod reveal their approach
before they are in sight; like the clergyman of Pollok's _Course of Time_
they love to draw rather than to drive. Of the masterful style the most
brilliant exponent is a short man, but he is the deepest wader in Spey. I
believe his waders fasten, not round his waist, but round his neck. I have
seen him in a pool, far beyond his depth, but "treading water" while
simultaneously wielding a rod about four times the length of himself, and
sending his line whizzing an extraordinary distance. The resolution of his
attack seems actually to hypnotise salmon into taking his fly; and, once
hooked, however hard they may fight for life, they are doomed fish.

Ah me! These be gaudy, flaunting, flashy days! Our sober Spey, in the
matter of salmon fly-hooks, is gradually yielding to the garish influence
of the times. Spey salmon now begin to allow themselves to be captured by
such indecorous and revolutionary fly-hooks as the "Canary" and the
"Silver Doctor." Jaunty men in loud suits of dittoes have come into the
north country, and display fly-books that vie in the variegated brilliancy
of their contents with a Dutch tulip bed. We staunch adherents to the
traditional Spey blacks and browns, we who have bred Spey cocks for the
sake of their feathers, and have sworn through good report and through
evil report by the pig's down or Berlin wool for body, the Spey cock for
hackle, and the mallard drake for wings, have jeered at the kaleidoscopic
fantasticality of the leaves of their fly-books turned over by adventurers
from the south country and Ireland; and have sneered at the notion that a
self-respecting Spey salmon would so far demoralise himself as to be
allured by a miniature presentation of Liberty's shop-window. But the
salmon has not regarded the matter from our conservative point of view;
and now we, too, ruefully resort to the "canary" as a dropper when
conditions of atmosphere and water seem to favour that gaudy implement.
And it must be owned that even before the "twopence-coloured" gentry came
among us from distant parts, we, the natives, had been side-tracking from
the exclusive use of the old-fashioned sombre flies into the occasional
use of gayer yet still modest "fancies." Of specific Spey hooks in favour
at the present time the following is, perhaps, a fairly correct and
comprehensive list: purple king, green king, black king, silver heron,
gold heron, black dog, silver riach, gold riach, black heron, silver
green, gold green, Lady Caroline, carron, black fancy, silver spale, gold
spale, culdrain, dallas, silver thumbie, Sebastopol, Lady Florence March,
gold purpie, and gled (deadly in "snawbree"). The Spey cock--a cross
between the Hamburg cock and the old Scottish mottled hen--was fifty years
ago bred all along Speyside expressly for its feathers, used in dressing
salmon flies; but the breed is all but extinct now, or rather, perhaps,
has been crossed and re-crossed out of recognition. It is said, however,
to be still maintained in the parish of Advie, and when the late Mr. Bass
had the Tulchan shootings and fishings his head keeper used to breed and
sell Spey cocks.

Probably the most extensive collection of salmon fly-hooks ever made was
that which belonged to the late Mr. Henry Grant of Elchies, a property on
which is some of the best water in all the run of Spey. His father was a
distinguished Indian civil servant and of later fame as an astronomer; and
his elder brother, Mr. Grant of Carron, was one of the best fishermen that
ever played a big fish in the pool of Dellagyl. Henry Grant himself had
been a keen fisherman in his youth, and when, after a chequered and roving
life in South Africa and elsewhere, he came into the estate, he set
himself to build up a representative collection of salmon flies for all
waters and all seasons. His father had brought home a large and curious
assortment of feathers from the Himalayas; Mr. Grant sent far and wide for
further supplies of suitable and distinctive material, and then he devoted
himself to the task of dressing hundred after hundred of fly-hooks of
every known pattern and of every size, from the great three-inch hook for
heavy spring water to the dainty little "finnock" hook scarcely larger
than a trout fly. A suitable receptacle was constructed for this
collection from the timber of the "Auld Gean Tree of Elchies"--the largest
of its kind in all Scotland--whose trunk had a diameter of nearly four
feet and whose branches had a spread of over twenty yards. The "Auld Gean
Tree" fell into its dotage and was cut down to the strains of a "lament,"
with which the wail and skirl of the bagpipes drowned the noise of the
woodmen's axes. Out of the wood of the "Auld Gean Tree" a local artificer
constructed a handsome cabinet with many drawers, in which were stored the
Elchies collection of fly-hooks classified carefully according to their
sizes and kinds. The cabinet stood--and, I suppose, still stands--in the
Elchies billiard-room; but I fear the collection is sadly diminished, for
Henry Grant was the freest-handed of men and towards the end of his life
anybody who chose was welcome to help himself from the contents of the
drawers. Yet no doubt some relics of this fine collection must still
remain; and I hope for his own sake that Mr. Justice A.L. Smith the
present tenant of Elchies, is free of poor Henry's cabinet.

It is a popular delusion that Speyside men are immortal; this is true only
of distillers. But it is a fact that their longevity is phenomenal. If Dr.
Ogle had to make up the population returns of Strath Spey he could not
fail to be profoundly astonished by the comparative blankness of the
mortality columns. Frederick the Great, when his fellows were rather
hanging back in the crisis of a battle, stung them with the biting taunt,
"Do you wish to live for ever?" If his descendant of the present day were
to address the same question to the seniors of Speyside, they would
probably reply, "Your Majesty, we ken that we canna live for ever; but,
faith, we mak' a gey guid attempt!" A respected relative of mine died a
few years ago at the age of eighty-five. Had he been a Southron, he would
have been said to have died full of years; but of my relative the local
paper remarked in a touching obituary notice that he "was cut off
prematurely in the midst of his mature prime." When I was young, Speyside
men mostly shuffled off this mortal coil by being upset from their gigs
when driving home recklessly from market with "the maut abune the meal;"
but the railways have done away in great measure with this cause of death.
Nowadays the centenarians for the most part fall ultimate victims to
paralysis. In the south it is understood, I believe, that the third shock
is fatal; but a Speyside man will resist half a dozen shocks before he
succumbs, and has been known to walk to the kirk after having endured even
a greater number of attacks.

Among the senior veterans of our riverside I may venture to name two most
worthy men and fine salmon fishers. Although both have now wound in their
reels and unspliced their rods, one of them still lives among us hale and
hearty. "Jamie" Shanks of Craigellachie is, perhaps, the father of the
water. He himself is reticent as to his age and there are legends on the
subject which lack authentication. It is, however, a matter of tradition
that Jamie was out in the '45; and that, cannily returning home when
Charles Edward turned back at Derby, he earned the price of a croft by
showing the Duke of Cumberland the ford across Spey near the present
bridge of Fochabers, by which the "butcher duke" crossed the river on his
march to fight the battle of Culloden. It is also traditioned that Jamie
danced round a bonfire in celebration of the marriage of "bonnie Jean,"
Duchess of Gordon, an event which occurred in 1767. Apart from the Dark
Ages one thing is certain regarding Jamie, that the great flood of 1829
swept away his croft and cottage, he himself so narrowly escaping that he
left his watch hanging on the bed-post, watch and bed-post being
subsequently recovered floating about in the Moray Firth. The greatest
honour that can be conferred on a fisherman--the Victoria Cross of the
river--has long belonged to Jamie; a pool in Spey bears his name, and many
a fine salmon has been taken out of "Jamie Shanks's Pool," the swirling
water of which is almost at the good old man's feet as he shifts the "coo"
on his strip of pasture or watches the gooseberries swelling in his pretty
garden. His fame has long ago gone throughout all Speyside for skill in
the use of the gaff: about eight years ago I was witness of the calm,
swift dexterity with which he gaffed what I believe was his last fish. In
the serene evening of his long day he still finds pleasant occupation in
dressing salmon flies; and if you speak him fair and he is in good humour
"Jamie" may let you have half a dozen as a great favour.

The other veteran of our river of whom I would say something was that most
worthy man and fine salmon fisher Mr. Charles Grant, the ex-schoolmaster
of Aberlour, better known among us who loved and honoured the fine old
Highland gentleman as "Charlie" Grant. Charlie no longer lives; but to the
last he was hale, relished his modest dram, and delighted in his quiet yet
graphic manner to tell of men and things of Speyside familiar to him
during his long life by the riverside. Charles Grant was the first person
who ever rented salmon water on Spey. It was about 1838 that he took a
lease from the Fife trustees of the fishing on the right bank from the
burn of Aberlour to the burn of Carron, about four miles of as good water
as there is in all the run of Spey. This water would to-day be cheaply
rented at L250 per annum; the annual rent paid by Charles Grant was two
guineas. A few years later a lease was granted by the Fife trustees of the
period of the grouse shootings of Benrinnes, the wide moorlands of the
parishes of Glass, Mortlach, and Aberlour, including Glenmarkie the best
moor in the county, at a rent of L100 a year with four miles of salmon
water on Spey thrown in. The letting value of these moors and of this
water is to-day certainly not less than L1500 a year.

Charles Grant had a great and well-deserved reputation for finding a fish
in water which other men had fished blank. This was partly because from
long familiarity with the river he knew all the likeliest casts; partly
because he was sure to have at the end of his casting-line just the proper
fly for the size of water and condition of weather; and partly because of
his quiet neat-handed manner of dropping his line on the water. There is a
story still current on Speyside illustrative of this gift of Charlie in
finding a fish where people who rather fancied themselves had failed--a
story which Jamie Shanks to this day does not care to hear. Mr. Russel of
the _Scotsman_ had done his very best from the quick run at the top of the
pool of Dalbreck, down to the almost dead-still water at the bottom of
that fine stretch, and had found no luck. Jamie Shanks, who was with Mr.
Russel as his fisherman, had gone over it to no purpose with a fresh fly.
They were grumpishly discussing whether they should give Dalbreck another
turn or go on to Pool-o-Brock the next pool down stream, when Charles
Grant made his appearance and asked the waterside question, "What luck?"
"No luck at all, Charlie!" was Russel's answer. "Deevil a rise!" was
Shanks's sourer reply. In his demure purring way Charles Grant--who in his
manner was a duplicate of the late Lord Granville--remarked, "There ought
to be a fish come out of that pool." "Tak' him out, then!" exclaimed
Shanks gruffly. "Well, I'll try," quoth the soft-spoken Charlie; and just
at that spot, about forty yards from the head of the pool, where the
current slackens and the fish lie awhile before breasting the upper rapid,
he hooked a fish. Then it was that Russel in the genial manner which made
provosts swear, remarked, "Shanks, I advise you to take a half year at Mr.
Grant's school!" "Fat for?" inquired Shanks sullenly. "To learn to fish!"
replied the master of sarcasm of the delicate Scottish variety.

Respectful by nature to their superiors, the honest working folk of
Speyside occasionally forget themselves comically in their passionate
ardour that a hooked salmon shall be brought to bank. Lord Elgin, now in
his Indian satrapy, far away from what Sir Noel Paton in his fine elegy on
the late Sir Alexander Gordon Cumming of Altyre called

  The rushing thunder of the Spey,

one day hooked a big fish in the "run" below "Polmet". The fish headed
swiftly down stream, his lordship in eager pursuit, but afraid of putting
any strain on the line lest the salmon should "break" him. Down round the
bend below the pool and by the "Slabs" fish and fisherman sped, till the
latter was brought up by the sheer rock of Craigellachie. Fortunately a
fisherman ferried the Earl across the river to the side on which he was
able to follow the fish. On he ran, keeping up with the fish, under the
bridge, along the margin of "Shanks's Pool," past the "Boat of Fiddoch"
pool and the mouth of the tributary; and he was still on the run along the
edge of the croft beyond when he was suddenly confronted by an aged man,
who dropped his turnip hoe and ran eagerly to the side of the young
nobleman. Old Guthrie could give advice from the experience of a couple of
generations as poacher, water-gillie, occasional water-bailiff, and from
as extensive and peculiar acquaintance with the river as Sam Weller
possessed of London public-houses. And this is what he exclaimed: "Ma
Lord, ma Lord, gin ye dinna check him, that fush will tak' ye doun tae
Speymouth--deil, but he'll tow ye oot tae sea! Hing intil him, hing intil
him!" His lordship exerted himself accordingly, but did not secure the old
fellow's approval. "Man! man!" Guthrie yelled, "ye're nae pittin' a
twa-ounce strain on him; he's makin' fun o' ye!" The nobleman tried yet
harder, yet could not please his relentless critic. "God forgie me, but ye
canna fush worth a damn! Come back on the lan', an' gie him the butt wi'
pith!" Thus adjured, his lordship acted at last with vigour; the sage,
having gaffed the fish, abated his wrath, and, as the salmon was being
"wetted," tendered his respectful apologies.

In my time there have been three lairds of Arndilly, a beautiful Speyside
estate which is margined by several miles of fishing water hardly inferior
to any throughout the long run of the river. Many a man, far away now from
"bonnie Arndilly" and the hoarse murmur of the river's roll over its
rugged bed, recalls in wistful recollection the swift yet smooth flow of
"the Dip;" the thundering rush of Spey against the "Red Craig," in the
deep, strong water at the foot of which the big red fish leap like trout
when the mellowness of the autumn is tinting into glow of russet and
crimson the trees which hang on the steep bank above; the smooth restful
glide into the long oily reach of the "Lady's How," in which a fisherman
may spend to advantage the livelong day and then not leave it fished out;
the turbulent half pool, half stream, of the "Piles," which always holds
large fish lying behind the great stones or in the dead water under the
daisy-sprinkled bank on which the tall beeches cast their shadows; the
"Bulwark Pool;" the "Three Stones," where the grilse show their silver
sides in the late May evenings; "Gilmour's" and "Carnegie's," the latter
now, alas! spoiled by gravel; the quaintly named "Tam Mear's Crook" and
the "Spout o' Cobblepot;" and then the dark, sullen swirls of "Sourdon,"
the deepest pool of Spey.

The earliest of the three Arndilly lairds of my time was the Colonel, a
handsome, generous man of the old school, who was as good over High
Leicestershire as he was over his own moors and on his own water, and who,
while still in the prime of life, died of cholera abroad. Good in the
saddle and with the salmon rod, the Colonel was perhaps best behind a gun,
with which he was not less deadly among the salmon of the Spey than among
the grouse of Benaigen. His relative, old Lord Saltoun, was hard put to it
once in the "Lady's How" with a thirty-pound salmon which he had hooked
foul, and which, in its full vigour, was taking all manner of liberties
with him, making spring after spring clean out of the water. The beast was
so rebellious and strong that the old lord found it harder to contend with
than with the Frenchmen who fought so stoutly with him for the possession
of Hougomont. The Colonel, fowling-piece in hand, was watching the
struggle, and seeing that Lord Saltoun was getting the worst of it awaited
his opportunity when the big salmon's tail was in the air after a spring,
and, firing in the nick of time, cut the fish's spine just above the tail,
hardly marking it elsewhere. The Colonel occasionally fished the river
with cross-lines, which are still legal although their use is now
considered rather the "Whitechapel game." He resorted to the cross-lines,
not in greed for fish but for the sake of the shooting practice they
afforded him. When the hooked fish were struggling and in their struggles
showing their tails out of water, he several times shot two right and left
breaking the spine in each case close to the tail.

The Colonel was succeeded by his brother, who had been a planter in
Jamaica before coming to the estate on the death of his brother. Hardly
was he home when he contested the county unsuccessfully on the old
never-say-die Protectionist platform against the father of the present
Duke of Fife; on the first polling-day of which contest I acquired a black
eye and a bloody nose in the market square of a local village at the hands
of some gutter lads, with whose demand that I should take the Tory rosette
out of my bonnet I had declined to comply. Later, this gentleman became an
assiduous fisher of men as a lay preacher, but he was as keen after salmon
as he was after sinners. He hooked and played--and gaffed--the largest
salmon I have ever heard of being caught in Spey by an angler--a fish
weighing forty-six pounds. The actual present laird of Arndilly is a lady,
but in her son are perpetuated the fishing instincts of his forbears.

My reminiscences of Spey and Speyside are drawing to an end, and I now
with natural diffidence approach a great theme. Every Speyside man will
recognise from this exordium that I am about to treat of "Geordie." It is
quite understood throughout lower Speyside that it is the moral support
which Geordie accords to Craigellachie Bridge, in the immediate vicinity
of which he lives, that chiefly maintains that structure; and that if he
were to withdraw that support, its towers and roadway would incontinently
collapse into the depths of the sullen pool spanned by the graceful
erection. The best of men are not universally popular, and it must be said
that there are those who cast on Geordie the aspersion of being "some
thrawn," for which the equivalent in south-country language is perhaps "a
trifle cross-grained." These, however, are envious people, who are jealous
of Geordie's habitual association with lords and dukes, and who resent the
trivial stiffness which is no doubt apparent in his manner to ordinary
people for the first few days after the illustrious persons referred to
have reluctantly permitted him to withdraw from them the light of his
countenance. For my own part I have found Geordie, all things considered,
to be wonderfully affable. That his tone is patronising I do not deny; but
then there is surely a joy in being patronised by the factotum of a duke.

I have never been quite sure, nor have I ever dared to ask Geordie,
whether he considers the Duke to be his patron, or whether he regards
himself as the patron of that eminent nobleman. From the "aucht-and-forty
daugh" of Strathbogie to the Catholic Braes of Glenlivat where fifty years
ago the "sma' stills" reeked in every moorland hollow, across to beautiful
Kinrara and down Spey to the fertile Braes of Enzie, his Grace is the
benevolent despot of a thriving tenantry who have good cause to regard him
with esteem and gratitude. The Duke is a masterful man, whom no factor
need attempt to lead by the nose; but on the margin of Spey, from the
blush-red crags of Cairntie down to the head of tide water, he owns his
centurion in Geordie, who taught him to throw his first line when already
he was a minister of the Crown, and who, as regards aught appertaining to
salmon fishing, saith unto his Grace, Do this and he doeth it.

Geordie is a loyal subject, and when a few years ago he had the
opportunity of seeing Her Majesty during her momentary halt at Elgin
station, he paid her the compliment of describing her as a "sonsie wife."
But the heart-loyalty of the honest fellow goes out in all its tender yet
imperious fulness towards the Castle family, to most of the members of
which, of both sexes, he has taught the science and practice of killing
salmon. Hint the faintest shadow of disparagement of any member of that
noble and worthy house, and you make a life enemy of Geordie. On no other
subject is he particularly touchy, save one--the gameness and vigour of
the salmon of Spey. Make light of the fighting virtues of Spey fish--exalt
above them the horn of the salmon of Tay, Ness, or Tweed--and Geordie
loses his temper on the instant and overwhelms you with the strongest
language. There is a tradition that among Geordie's remote forbears was
one of Cromwell's Ironsides who on the march from Aberdeen to Inverness
fell in love with a Speyside lass of the period, and who, abandoning his
Ironside appellation of "Hew-Agag-in-Pieces," adopted the surname which
Geordie now bears. This strain of ancestry may account for Geordie's
smooth yet peremptory skill as a disciplinarian. It devolves upon him
during the rod-fishing season to assign to each person of the fishing
contingent his or her particular stretch of water, and to tell off to each
as guide one of his assistant attendants.

It is a great treat to find Geordie in a garrulous humour and to listen to
one of his salmon-fishing stories, told always in the broadest of
north-country Doric. His sense of humour is singularly keen,
notwithstanding that he is a Scot; and it is not in his nature to minimise
his own share in the honour and glory of the incident he may relate. One
of Geordie's stories is vividly in my recollection, and may appropriately
conclude my reminiscences of Speyside and its folk. There was a stoup of
"Benrinnes" on the mantelpiece and a free-drawing pipe in Geordie's mouth.
His subject was the one on which he can be most eloquent--an incident of
the salmon-fishing season, on which the worthy man delivered himself as
follows:--

"Twa or three seasons back I was attendin' Leddy Carline whan she was
fushin' that gran' pool at the brig o' Fochabers. She's a fine fusher,
Leddy Carline: faith, she may weel be, for I taucht her mysel'. She hookit
a saumon aboot the midst o' the pool, an' for a while it gied gran' sport;
loupin' and tumblin', an' dartin' up the watter an' doon the watter at sic
a speed as keepit her leddyship muvin' gey fast tae keep abriesht o't.
Weel, this kin' o' wark, an' a ticht line, began for tae tak' the spunk
oot o' the saumon, an' I was thinkin' it was a quieston o' a few meenits
whan I wad be in him wi' the gaff; but my birkie, near han' spent though
he was, had a canny bit dodge up the sleeve o' him. He made a bit whamlin'
run, an' deil tak' me gin he didna jam himself intil a neuk atween twa
rocks, an' there the dour beggar bade an' sulkit. Weel, her leddyship
keepit aye a steady drag on him, an' she gied him the butt wi' power; but
she cudna get the beast tae budge--no, nae sae muckle as the breadth o' my
thoomb-nail. Deil a word said Leddy Carline tae me for a gey while, as she
vrought an' vrought tae gar the saumon quit his neuk. But she cam nae
speed wi' him; an' at last she says, says she, 'Geordie, I can make
nothing of him: what in the world is to be done?' 'Gie him a shairp upward
yark, my leddy,' says I; 'there canna be muckle strength o' resistance
left in him by this time!' Weel, she did as I tellt her--I will say this
for Leddy Carline, that she's aye biddable. But, rugg her hardest, the
fush stuck i' the neuk as gin he waur a bit o' the solid rock, an' her
leddyship was becomin' gey an' exhaustit. 'Take the rod yourself,
Geordie,' says she, 'and try what you can do; I freely own the fish is too
many for me.' Weel, I gruppit the rod, an' I gied a shairp, steady, upward
drag; an' up the brute cam, clean spent. He hadna been sulkin' aifter aa';
he had been fairly wedged atween the twa rocks, for whan I landit him, lo
an' behold! he was bleedin' like a pig, an' there was a muckle gash i' the
side o' him, that the rock had torn whan I draggit him by main force up
an' oot. The taikle was stoot, ye'll obsairve, or else he be tae hae
broken me; but tak' my word for't, Geordie is no the man for tae lippen
tae feckless taikle.

"Weel, I hear maist things; an' I was tellt that same nicht hoo at the
denner-table Leddy Carline relatit the haill adventur', an' owned, fat was
true aneuch, that the fush had fairly bestit her. Weel, amo' the veesitors
at the Castle was the Dowager Leddy Breadanham; an' it seemed that whan
Leddy Carline was through wi' her narrateeve, the dowager be tae gie a
kin' o' a scornfu' sniff an' cock her neb i' the air; an' she said, wha
but she, that she didna hae muckle opingin o' Leddy Carline as a saumon
fisher, an' that she hersel' didna believe there was a fush in the run o'
Spey that she cudna get the maistery ower. That was a gey big word, min'
ye; it's langidge I wadna venture for tae make use o' mysel', forbye a
south-countra dowager.

"Weel, I didna say muckle; but, my faith, like the sailor's paurot, I
thoucht a deevil o' a lot. The honour o' Spey was in my hauns, an' it
behuvit me for tae hummle the pride o' her dowager leddyship. The morn's
mornin' cam, an' by that time I had decided on my plan o' operautions. By
guid luck I fand the dowager takin' her stroll afore brakfast i' the
floor-gairden. I ups till her, maks my boo, an' says I, unco canny an'
respectfu', 'My leddy, ye'll likely be for the watter the day?' She said
she was, so says I, 'Weel, my leddy, I'll be prood for tae gae wi' ye
mysel', an' I'll no fail tae reserve for ye as guid water as there is in
the run o' Spey!' She was quite agreeable, an' so we sattlit it.

"The Duke himsel' was oot on the lawn whan I was despatchin' the ither
fushin' folk, ilk ane wi' his or her fisherman kerryin' the rod.
'Geordie,' said his Grace, 'with whom will you be going yourself?' 'Wi'
the Dowager Leddy Breadanham, yer Grace!' says I. 'And where do you think
of taking her ladyship, Geordie?' speers he. 'N'odd, yer Grace,' says I,
'I am sattlin in my min' for tae tak' the leddy tae the "Brig o'
Fochabers" pool;' an' wi' that I gied a kin' o' a respectfu' half-wink.
The Duke was no' the kin' o' man for tae wink back, for though he's aye
grawcious, he's aye dignifeed; but there was a bit flichter o' humour
roun' his mou' whan he said, says he, 'I think that will do very well,
Geordie!'

"Praesently me an' her leddyship startit for the 'Brig o' Fochabers' pool.
She cud be vera affauble whan she likit, I'll say that muckle for the
dowager; an' me an' her newsed quite couthie-like as we traivellt. I
saftened tae her some, I frankly own; but than my hert hardent again whan
I thoucht o' the duty I owed tae Spey an' tae Leddy Carline. Of coorse
there was a chance that my scheme wad miscairry; but there's no a man on
Spey frae Tulchan tae the Tug Net that kens the natur' o' saumon better
nor mysel'. They're like sheep--fat ane daes, the tithers will dae; an'
gin the dowager hookit a fush, I hadna muckle doobt fat that fush wad dae.
The dowager didna keep me vera lang in suspense. I had only chyngt her fly
ance, an' she had maist fushed doon the pool a secont time, whan in the
ripple o' watter at the head o' the draw abune the rapid a fush took her
'Riach' wi' a greedy sook, an' the line was rinnin' oot as gin there had
been a racehorse at the far end o't, the saumon careerin' up the pool like
a flash in the clear watter. The dowager was as fu' o' life as was the
fush. Odd, but she kent brawly hoo tae deal wi' her saumon--that I will
say for her! There was nae need for me tae bide closs by the side o' a
leddy that had boastit there was na a fush in Spey she cudna maister, sae
I clamb up the bank, sat doun on ma doup on a bit hillock, an' took the
leeberty o' lichtin' ma pipe. Losh! but that dowager spanged up an' doun
the waterside among the stanes aifter that game an' lively fush; an'
troth, but she was as souple wi' her airms as wi' her legs; for, rinnin'
an' loupin' an' spangin' as she was, she aye managed for tae keep her line
ticht. It was a dooms het day, an' there wasna a ruffle o' breeze; sae nae
doobt the fush was takin' as muckle oot o' her as she was takin' oot o'
the fush. In aboot ten meenits there happent juist fat I had expectit. The
fush made a sidelins shoot, an' dairted intil the vera crevice occupeed by
Leddy Carline's fush the day afore. 'Noo for the fun!' thinks I, as I sat
still an' smokit calmly. She was certently a perseverin' wummun, that
dowager--there was nae device she didna try wi' that saumon tae force him
oot o' the cleft. Aifter aboot ten meenits mair o' this wark, she shot at
me ower her shouther the obsairve, 'Isn't it an obstinate wretch?' 'Aye,'
says I pawkily, 'he's gey dour; but he's only a Spey fush, an' of coorse
ye'll maister him afore ye've dune wi' him!' I'm thinkin' she unnerstude
the insinivation, for she uttert deil anither word, but yokit tee again
fell spitefu' tae rug an' yark at the sulkin' fush. At last, tae mak a
lang story short, she was fairly dune. 'Geordie,' says she waikly, 'the
beast has quite worn me out! I'm fit to melt--there is no strength left in
me; here, come and take the rod!' Weel, I deleeberately raise, poocht ma
pipe, an' gaed doun aside her. 'My leddy,' says I, quite solemn, an'
luikin' her straucht i' the face--haudin' her wi' my ee, like--'I hae been
tellt fat yer leddyship said yestreen, that there wasna a saumon in Spey
ye cudna maister. Noo, I speer this at yer leddyship--respectfu' but
direck; div ye admit yersel clean bestit--fairly lickit wi' that fush,
Spey fush though it be? Answer me that, my leddy!' 'I do own myself
beaten,' says she, 'and I retract my words.' 'Say nae mair, yer
leddyship!' says I--for I'm no a cruel man--'say nae mair, but maybe ye'll
hae the justice for tae say a word tae the same effeck in the Castle whaur
ye spak yestreen?' 'I promise you I will,' said the dowager--'here, take
the rod!' Weel, it was no sae muckle a fush as was Leddy Carline's. I had
it oot in a few meenits, an' by that time the dowager was sae far revived
that she was able to bring it in aboot tae the gaff; an' sae, in the
hinner end, she in a sense maistert the fush aifter aa'. But I'm thinkin'
she will be gey cautious in the futur' aboot belittlin' the smeddum o'
Spey saumon!"




THE CAWNPORE OF TO-DAY


The traveller up the country from Calcutta does not speedily reach places
the names of which vividly recall the episodes of the great Mutiny. It is
a chance if, as the train passes Dinapore, he remembers the defection of
the Sepoy brigade stationed there which Koer Singh seduced from its
allegiance. Arrah may possibly recall a dim memory of Wake's splendid
defence of Boyle's bungalow and of Vincent Eyre's dashingly executed
relief of the indomitable garrison. Benares is a little off the main line--
Benares, on the parade ground of which Neill first put down that
peremptory foot of his, where Olpherts was so quick with those guns of
his, and where Jim Ellicott did his grim work with noose and cross-beam
until long after the going down of the summer sun. But when the
traveller's eye first rests on the gray ramparts of Akbar's hoary fortress
in the angle where the Ganges and the Jumna meet and blend one with
another, the reality of the Mutiny begins to impress itself upon him.
Allahabad was the scene of a terrible tragedy; it was also the point of
departure whence Havelock set forward on Cawnpore with his column, not
indeed of rescue, but of retribution. The journey from Allahabad to
Cawnpore, although perchance performed in the night, is not one to be
slept through by any student of the story of the great rebellion. The
Indian moon pours her flood of light on the little knoll hard by
Futtehpore, where Havelock stood when Jwala Pershad's first round shot
came lobbing, through his staff in among the camp kettles of the 64th.
That village beyond the mango tope is Futtehpore itself, whence the rebel
sowars swept headlong down the trunk road till Maude's guns gave them the
word to halt. The pools are dry now through which, when Hamilton's voice
had rung out the order--"Forward, at the double!" the light company of the
Ross-shire Buffs splashed recklessly past the abandoned Sepoy guns, in
their race with the grenadier company of the 64th that had for its goal
the Pandy barricade outside the village. In that cluster of mud huts--its
name is Aoong--the gallant Renaud fell with a shattered thigh, as he led
his "Lambs" up to the _epaulement_ which covered its front. One fight a
day is fair allowance anywhere, but those fellows whom Havelock led were
gluttons for fighting. Spanning that deep rugged nullah there, down which
the Pandoo flows turbulently in the rainy season, is the bridge across
which in the afternoon of the morning of Aoong, Stephenson with his
Fusiliers dashed into the Sepoy battery and bayoneted the gunners before
they could make up their minds to run away. And it was in the gray morning
following the day of that double battle (the 15th of July) that the
General, having heard for the first time that there were still alive in
Cawnpore a number of women and children who had escaped the massacre of
the boats, told his men what he knew. "With God's help," shouted Havelock,
with a break in his voice that was like a sob, as he stood with his hat
off and his hand on his sword--"with God's help, men, we will save them,
or every man die in the attempt!" One answer came back in a great cheer;
but a sadder answer to the aspiration, a bitter truth that made that
aspiration futile and hopeless, had lain ever since the evening of the day
before in the Beebeegur, and almost as the chief was speaking the Well was
receiving its dead inmates. Where the train begins to slacken its pace on
approaching the station, it is passing over the field of the first--the
creditable--battle of Cawnpore. Fresh from the butchery Nana Sahib
(Dhoondoo Punth) himself had come out to aid in the last stand against the
avengers. Yonder is the mango tope which formed the screen for Hamilton's
turning movement. It needs little imagination to recall the scene. Close
by, at the cross-roads, stands the Sepoy battery, and those horsemen still
nearer are reconnoitring sowars. Beyond the road the Highlanders are
deploying on the plain as they clear the sheltering flank of the mango
trees, amidst a grim silence broken only by the crash of the bursting
shells and the cries of the bullock-drivers as the guns rattle on to open
fire from the reverse flank. The flush rises in Hamilton's face and the
eyes of him begin to sparkle, as he shouts "Ross-shire Buffs, wheel into
line!" and then "Forward!" Quick as lightning the trails of the Sepoy guns
are swung round and shot and shell come crashing through the ranks, while
the rebel infantry, with a swiftness which speaks well for their British
drill, show a front against this inroad on their flank. In silent grim
imperturbability the Highland line stalks steadily on with the long
springy step to be learned only on the heather. Now they are within eighty
yards of the muzzles of the guns, and they can see the colour of the
mustaches of the men plying and supporting them. Then Hamilton, with his
sword in the air and his face all ablaze with the fighting blood in him,
turns round in the saddle, shouts "Charge!" and bids the pipers to strike
up. Wild and shrill bursts over that Indian plain the rude notes of the
Northern music. But louder yet, drowning them and the roll of the
artillery, rings out that Highland war-cry that has so often presaged
victory to British arms. The Ross-shire men are in and over the guns ere
the gunners have time to drop their lint-stocks and ramming-rods; they
fall with bayonets at the charge upon the supporting infantry, and the
supporting infantry go down where they huddle together, lacking the
opportunity to break and run away in time. But the battle rages all day,
and the white soldiers, as they fight their way slowly forward, hear the
bursts of military music that greet the Nana as he moves from place to
place, _not_ in the immediate front. Barrow and his handful of cavalry
volunteers crash into the thick of them with the informal order to his
men, "Give point, lads; damn cuts and guards." Young Havelock, mounted by
the side of the gallant and ill-fated Stirling trudging forward on foot,
brings the 64th on at the double against the great 24-pounder on the
Cawnpore road that is vomiting grape at point-blank range. The night falls
and the battle ceases, but among the wearied fighting men there is none of
the elation of victory; for through the ranks, after the going down of the
sun, had throbbed the bruit, originating no one knew where, that the women
and children in Cawnpore had been butchered on the afternoon of the day
before, while Stephenson and his Fusiliers were carrying the bridge of the
Pandoo Nuddee.

The railway station of Cawnpore is distant more than a mile from the
cantonment. Close to the road and not far from the station, the explorer
easily finds the massive pile of the "Savada House," now allotted as
residences for railway officials. English children play now in the
corridors once thronged by the minions of the Nana, for here were his
headquarters during part of the siege. Its verandas all day long were full
of ministers, diviners, courtiers, and creatures. Here strolled the
supple, panther-like Azimoolah, the self-asserted favourite of home
society in the pre-Mutiny days. Teeka Sing, the Nana's war minister, had
his "bureau" in a tent under the peepul tree there. In that other clump of
trees, where an ayah is tickling a white baby into laughter, was the
pavilion of the Nana himself, who inherited the Mahratta preference for
canvas over bricks and mortar. And here, while the crackle of the musketry
fire and the din of the big guns came softened on the ear by distance, sat
the adopted son of the Peishwa while Jwala Pershad came for orders about
the cavalry, and Bala Rao, his brother, explained his devices for
harassing the sahibs, and Tantia Topee, Hoolass Sing, Azimoolah, and the
Nana himself devised the scheme of the treachery. But the Savada House has
even a more lurid interest than this. Hither the women and children whom
an unkind fate had spared from dying with the men were brought back from
the Ghaut of Slaughter. You may see the two rooms into which 125
unfortunates were huddled after that march from before the presence of one
death into the presence of another. As they plodded past the intrenchment
so long held, and across the plain to the Nana's pavilion, "I saw," says a
spectator, "that many of the ladies were wounded. Their clothes had blood
upon them. Two were badly hurt and had their heads bound up with
handkerchiefs; some were wet, covered with mud and blood, and some had
their dresses torn; but all had clothes. I saw one or two children without
clothes. There were no men in the party, but only some boys of twelve or
thirteen. Some of the ladies were barefoot." Hither, too, were sent later
the women of that detachment of the garrison which had got off from the
ghaut in the boat defended by Vibart, Ashe, Delafosse, Bolton, Moore, and
Thomson, and which had been captured at Nuzzufghur by Baboo Ram Bux. It
had been for those people a turbulent departure from the Suttee Chowra
Ghaut, but it was a yet more fearful returning. "They were brought back,"
testified a spy; "sixty sahibs, twenty-five memsahibs, and four children.
The Nana ordered the sahibs to be separated from the memsahibs, and shot
by the 1st Bengal Native Infantry.... 'Then,' said one of the memsahibs,
'I will not leave my husband. If he must die I will die with him.' So she
ran and sat down behind her husband, clasping him round the waist.
Directly she said this, the other memsahibs said, 'We also will die with
our husbands,' and they all sat down each by her husband. Then their
husbands said, 'Go back,' and they would not. Whereupon the Nana ordered
his soldiers, and they went in, pulling them forcibly away." ...

The drive from the railway station to the European cantonments is pleasant
and shaded. At a bend in the road there comes into view a broad, flat,
treeless parade ground. This plain lies within a circle of foliage, above
which, on the south-eastern side, rise the balconies and flat tops of a
long range of barracks built in detached blocks, while around the rest of
the circle the trees shade the bungalows of the cantonment. Near the
centre of this level space there is an irregular enclosure defined by a
shallow sunk wall and low quickset hedge, and in the middle of this
enclosure rises the ornate and not wholly satisfactory structure known as
the "Memorial Church." It is built on the site of the old dragoon
hospital, which was the very focus of the agony of the siege. It is
impossible to analyse the mingled emotions of amazement, pride, pity,
wrath, and sorrow which fill the visitor to this shrine of British valour,
endurance, and constancy. The heart swells and the eyes fill as one,
standing here with all the arena of the heroism lying under one's eyes,
recalls the episodes of the glorious, piteous story. The blood stirs when
one remembers the buoyant valour of the gallant Moore, who, "wherever he
passed, left men something more courageous and women something less
unhappy," the reckless audacity of Ashe, the cool daring of Delafosse, the
deadly rifle of Stirling, the heroic devotion of Jervis. And a great lump
grows in the throat when one bethinks him of the beautiful constancy and
fearful sufferings of the women; of British ladies going barefoot and
giving up their stockings as cases for grape-shot; of Mrs. Moore's
journeys across to No. 2 Barrack; of the hapless gentlewomen, "unshod,
unkempt, ragged, and squalid, haggard and emaciated, parched with drought,
and faint with hunger, sitting waiting to hear that they were widows." And
what a place it was which the garrison had to defend! Not a foot of all
the space bomb-proof, an apology for an intrenchment such as "an active
cow might jump over." The imagination has to do much work here, for most
of the landmarks are gone. The outline of the world-famous earthwork is
almost wholly obliterated; only in places is it to be dimly recognised by
brick-discoloured lines, and a low raised line on the smooth _maidan_. The
enclosure now existing has no reference to the outlines of the
intrenchment. That enclosure merely surrounds the graveyard, in the midst
of which stands the "Memorial Church," a structure that cannot be
commended from an architectural point of view. But the space enclosed
around its gaunt red walls is pregnant with painful interest. We come
first on a railed-in memorial tomb, bearing an inscription in raised
letters, on a cross let into the tessellated pavement: "In three graves
within this enclosure lie the remains of Major Edward Vibart, 2nd Bengal
Cavalry, and about seventy officers and soldiers, who, after escaping from
the massacre at Cawnpore on the 27th June 1857, were captured by the
rebels at Sheorapore, and murdered on the 1st July." The inmates of these
graves were originally buried elsewhere, and were removed hither when the
enclosure was formed. In another part of the enclosure is a raised tomb,
the slab of which bears the inscription: "This stone marks a spot which
lay within Wheeler's intrenchment, and covers the remains and is sacred to
the memory of those who were the first to meet their death when
beleaguered by mutineers and rebels in June 1857." Two only lie in this
grave, Mr. Murphy and a lady who died of fever. These two perished on the
first day of the siege and had the exclusive privilege of being decently
interred within the precincts of the intrenchment. After the first day of
the siege there was scant leisure for funeral rites. To find the last
resting-place of the remaining dead of this siege, we must quit the
enclosure and walk across the _maidan_ to a spot among the trees by the
roadside under the shadow of No. 4 Barrack. There was an empty well here
when the siege begun; three weeks after, when the siege ended, this well
contained the bodies of 250 British people. With daylight the battle raged
around that sepulchre, but when the night came the slain of the day were
borne thither with stealthy step and scant attendance. Now the well is
filled up, and above it, inside a small ornamental enclosure formed by
iron railings, there rises a monument which bears the following
inscription: "In a well under this enclosure were laid by the hands of
their fellows in suffering the bodies of men, women, and children, who
died hard by during the heroic defence of Wheeler's intrenchment when
beleaguered by the rebel Nana." Below the inscription is this apposite
quotation from Psalm cxli. 7: "Our bones are scattered at the grave's
mouth, as when one cutteth and cleaveth wood upon the earth. But mine eyes
are unto Thee, O God the Lord." At the corners of the flower-plot are
small crosses bearing individual names. One commemorates Sir George
Parker, the cantonment magistrate; a second, Captain Jenkins; a third,
Lieutenant Saunders and the men of the 84th Regiment; a fourth, Lieutenant
Glanville and the men of the Madras Fusiliers; and here, too, lies
stout-hearted yet tender-hearted John MacKillop of the Civil Service the
hero of another well, that from which the team of buffaloes are now
drawing water to make the mortar for the Memorial Church. Thence was
procured the water for the garrison and it was a target also for the rebel
artillery, so that the appearance of a man with a pitcher by day and by
night the creaking of the tackle, was the signal for a shower of grape.
But John MacKillop, "not being a fighting-man," made himself useful as he
modestly put it, for a week as captain of the Well, till a grape-shot sent
him to that other well thence never to return.

The Memorial Church is in the form of a cross, and now that it has been
finished is not destitute of beauty as regards its interior. Perhaps it is
in place, but the noblest monument that could commemorate Cawnpore would
have been the maintenance, for the wonder of the world unto all time, of
the intrenchment and what it surrounded, as nearly as possible in the
condition in which they were left on the evacuation of the garrison. The
grandest monument in the world is the Residency of Lucknow, which remains
and is kept up substantially in the condition in which it was left when
Sir Colin Campbell brought out its garrison in November 1857; and the
Cawnpore intrenchment would have been a still nobler memorial as the
abiding testimony to a defence even more wonderful, although unfortunately
unsuccessful, than that of Lucknow. But the Memorial Church of Cawnpore
will always be interesting by reason of its site and of the memorial
tablets on the walls of its interior. In the left transept is a tablet "To
the memory of the Engineers of the East Indian Railway, who died and were
killed in the great insurrection of 1857; erected in affectionate
remembrance by their brother Engineers in the North-West Provinces." On
the left side of the nave are several tablets. One is to the memory of
poor young John Nicklen Martin, killed in the battle at Suttee Chowra
Ghaut. Another commemorates three officers, two sergeants, two corporals,
a drummer, and twenty privates of the 34th Regiment, killed at the
(second) Battle of Cawnpore on the 28th November 1857; the day on which
the Gwalior Contingent, seduced into rebellion by Tantia Topee, made
itself so unpleasant to General Windham, the "Cawnpore Runners," and other
regiments of that officer's command. A third tablet is "To the memory of
A.G. Chalwin, 2nd Light Cavalry, and his wife Louisa, who both perished
during the siege of Cawnpore in July 1857. These are they which came out
of great tribulation." A fourth commemorates Captain Gordon and Lieutenant
Hensley, of the 82nd Foot, also victims of the Gwalior Contingent. In the
right of the nave there is a tablet "Sacred to the memory of Philip Hayes
Jackson, who, with Jane, his wife, and her brother Ralf Blyth Croker, were
massacred by rebels at Cawnpore on 27th June." Another is to Lieutenant
Angelo, of the 16th Grenadiers Bengal Native Infantry, who also fell in
the boat massacre; and a third is to the memory of the gallant Stuart
Beatson, who was Havelock's adjutant-general, and who, dying as he was of
cholera, did his work at Pandoo Nuddee and Cawnpore in a _dhoolie_. In the
right transept are tablets in memory of the officers of the Connaught
Rangers, and of the officers and men of the 32nd Cornwall Regiment "who
fell in defence of Lucknow and Cawnpore and subsequent campaign"--fourteen
officers and 448 "women and men." And here, too, is perhaps the most
affecting memorial of any--a tablet "In memory of Mrs. Moore, Mrs.
Wainwright, Miss Wainwright, Mrs. Hill, forty-three soldiers' wives and
fifty-five children, murdered in Cawnpore in 1857."

It is easy enough now to follow the footsteps of Mrs. Moore, dangerous as
was that journey of hers, from the intrenchment to the corner of No. 2
Barrack, which she was wont to make when her husband went on duty there to
strengthen the hands of Mowbray Thomson. There is no trace now and the
very memory of its whereabouts is lost, of the bamboo hut in a sheltered
corner which the garrison of this exposed post built for the brave
gentlewoman. But No. 2 Barrack, except that it is finished and tenanted,
stands now very much as it did when Glanville first, and when he fell then
Mowbray Thomson, defended with a success which seems so wonderful when we
look at the place defended and its situation. The garrison was not always
the same. "My sixteen men," writes Thomson, "consisted in the first
instance of Ensign Henderson of the 56th Native Infantry, five or six of
the Madras Fusiliers, two plate-layers, and some men of the 84th. The
first instalment was soon disabled. The Madras Fusiliers were all shot at
their posts. Several of the 84th also fell, but in consequence of the
importance of the position, as soon as a loss in my little corps was
reported, Captain Moore sent us over a reinforcement from the
intrenchment. Sometimes a soldier, sometimes a civilian, came. The orders
given us were not to surrender with our lives, and we did our best to obey
them." And in a line with No. 2 Barrack is No. 4 Barrack, held with equal
stanchness by a party of Civil Engineers who had been employed on the East
Indian Railroad, and who had for their commander Captain Jenkins. Seven of
the engineers perished in defence of this post.

There is nothing more to see on the _maidan_, and one feels his anger
rising at the obliteration of everything that might help towards the
localisation of associations. Let us leave the scene of the defence and
follow the track of the defenders as they marched down to the scene of the
great treachery. The distance from the intrenchment to the ghaut is barely
a mile. Think of that stirrup-cup--that _doch an dhorras_--of cold water,
in which the hapless band pledged one another. The noble Moore cheerily
leads the way down the slope to the bridge with the white rails with an
advance guard of a handful of his 32nd men. The palanquins with the women,
the children, and the wounded follow, the latter bandaged up with strips
of women's gowns and petticoats, and fragments of shirt-sleeves. And then
come the fighting-men--a gallant, ragged, indomitable band. A martinet
colonel would stand aghast--for save a regimental button here and there,
he would find it hard to recognise the gaunt, hairy, sun-scorched squad
for British soldiers. But let who might incline to disown these few
war-worn men in their dirty flannel rags and fragmentary nankeen breeches,
their foes know them for what they are, and make way for the white sahibs
with no dressing indeed in their ranks, but each man with his rifle on his
shoulder, the deadly revolver in his belt, and the fearless glance in the
hollow eye. The wooden bridge with the white rails spans at right angles a
rough irregular glen which widens out as it approaches the river, some
three hundred yards distant from the bridge. It is a mere footpath that
leaves the road on the hither side of the bridge, and skirting the dry bed
of the nullah touches the river close to the old temple. By this footpath
it was that our countrymen and countrywomen passed down to the cruel
ambush which had been laid for them in the mouth of the glen. There are
few to whom the details of that fell scene are not familiar. What a
contrast between the turmoil and devilry of it and the serene calmness of
the all but solitude the ghaut now presents! On the knolls of the farther
side snug bungalows nestle among the trees, under the veranda of one of
which a lady is playing with her children. The village of Suttee Chowra on
the bluff on the left of the ghaut, where Tantia Topee's sepoys were
concealed, no longer exists; a pretty bungalow and its compound occupy its
site. The little temple on the water's edge by the ghaut is slowly
mouldering into decay; on the plaster of the coping of its river wall you
may still see the marks of the treacherous bullets. The stair which, built
against its wall, led down to the water's edge, has disappeared. Tantia
Topee's dispositions for the perpetration of the treachery could not now
succeed, for the Ganges has changed its course and there is deep water
close in shore at the ghaut. In the stream nearest to the Oude side the
river has cast up a long narrow dearah island, in the fertile mud of which
melons are cultivated where once whistled the shot from the guns on the
Oude side of the river. A Brahmin priest is placidly sunning himself on
the river platform of the temple over the dome of which hangs the foliage
of a peepul tree. A dhobie is washing the shirts of a sahib in the stream
that once was dyed with the blood of the sahibs. There is no monument
here, no superfluous reminder of the terrible tragedy. The man is not to
be envied whose eyes are dry, and whose heart beats its normal pulsations,
while he stands here alone on this spot so densely peopled by associations
at once so tragic and so glorious.

The scene of the final massacre lies some distance higher up the river. As
we cross the Ganges canal, the native city lying on our left, there rises
up before us the rich mass of foliage that forms the outer screen of the
beautiful Memorial Gardens. The hue of the greenery would be sombre but
for the blossoms which relieve it, emblem of the divine hope which
mitigated the gloom of despair for our countrywomen who perished so
cruelly in this balefully historic spot. Of the Beebeeghur, the term by
which among the natives is known the bungalow where the massacre was
perpetrated, not one stone now remains on another but neither its memory
nor its name will be lost for all time. Natives are strolling in the shady
flower-bordered walks of the Memorial Gardens, the prohibition which long
debarred their entrance having been wisely removed. In the centre of the
garden rises, fringed with cypresses, a low mound, the summit of which is
crowned by a circular screen, or border, of light and beautiful open-work
architecture. The circular space enclosed is sunken, and from the centre
of this sunken space there rises a pedestal on which stands the marble
presentment of an angel. There is no need to explain what episode in the
tragic story this monument commemorates; the inscription round the capital
of the pedestal tells its tale succinctly indeed, but the words burn.
"Sacred," it runs, "to the perpetual memory of the great company of
Christian people, chiefly women and children, who near this spot were
cruelly massacred by the followers of the rebel, Nana Doondoo Punth of
Blithoor; and cast, the dying with the dead, into the well below, on the
15th day of July 1857." A few paces to the north-west of the monument is
the spot where stood the bungalow in which the massacre was done; and now,
where the sight they saw maddened our countrymen long ago to a frenzy of
revenge, there bloom roses and violets. And a step farther on, in a
thicket of arbor vitae trees and cypresses, is the Memorial Churchyard,
with its many nameless mounds, for here were buried not a few who died
during the long occupation of Cawnpore, and in the combats around it. Here
there is a monument to Thornhill, the Judge of Futtehghur, Mary his wife,
and their two children, who perished in the massacre. Thornhill was one of
the males brought out from the bungalow and shot earlier in the afternoon
than when the women's time came. Another monument bears this inscription:
"Sacred to the memory of the women and children of the 32nd, this monument
is raised by twenty men of the same regiment, who were passing through
Cawnpore, 21st Nov. 1857." And among the tombstones are those of gallant
Douglas Campbell of the 78th, Woodford of the 2nd Battalion Rifle Brigade,
and Young of the 4th Bengal Native Infantry.




BISMARCK

BEFORE AND DURING THE FRANCO-GERMAN WAR


The ex-Chancellor of the German Empire owed nothing of his unique career
to adventitious advantages. Otto von Bismarck-Schoenhausen, who for more
than a generation was the most prominent and most powerful personality of
Europe, was essentially a self-made man. He was a younger son of a cadet
family of a knightly and ancient but somewhat decayed house, ranking among
the lesser nobility of the Alt Mark of Brandenburg. The square solid
mansion in which he was born, embowered among its trees in the region
between the Elbe and the Havel, might be taken by an Englishman for the
country residence of a Norfolk or Somersetshire squire of moderate
fortune. But memories cling around the massive old family place of
Schoenhausen, such as can belong to no English residence of equal date. In
the library door of the Brandenburg mansion are seen to this day three
deep fissures made by the bayonet points of French soldiers fresh from the
battlefield of Jena, who in their brutal lawlessness pursued the young and
beautiful chatelaine of the house and strove to crush in the door which
the fugitive had locked behind her. The lady thus terrified and outraged
was the mother of Bismarck; and the story told him in boyhood of his loved
mother's narrow escape from worse than death, and of his father's having
to conceal her in the depth of the adjoining forest, may well have
inspired their son with the ill-feeling against the French nation which he
never cared to disguise.

The Bismarcks had been fighting men from time immemorial, and the
combatant nature of the great scion of their race displayed itself in
frequent duels during his university career at Goettingen. In the series of
some eight-and-twenty duels in which he engaged during his first three
terms, he was wounded but twice--once in the leg and again on the cheek,
the mark of which latter wound he bears to this day. At one time he seems
to have all but decided to embrace the military career but for family
reasons he became a country gentleman, and if Europe had remained
undisturbed by revolution he might have lived and died a bucolic squire,
"Dyke Captain" of his district, with a seat in the Provincial Diet, a
liking for history and philosophy, a propensity to rowdyism and drinking
bouts of champagne and porter, and a character which defined itself in his
local appellation of "Mad Bismarck." _Dis aliter visum_. The Revolution of
1848 swept over Europe and Bismarck rallied to the support of his
sovereign. When in 1851 the young Landwehr lieutenant was sent to
Frankfort by that sovereign as the representative of Prussia in the German
Diet, he carried with him a reputation for unflinching devotion to the
Crown, for a conservatism which had been styled not only "mediaeval" but
"antediluvian," and for startling originality in his views as well as
fearlessness in expressing them. The latter attribute he displayed when,
in reply to a remark of a French diplomat on a question of policy, "_Cette
politique va vous conduire a Jena_," Bismarck significantly retorted,
"_Pourquoi pas a Leipsic ou a Waterloo?_" During his tenure of office at
Frankfort his conviction steadfastly strengthened that Prussia could
become a great nation only by shaking herself free from the Austrian
supremacy in Germany. "It is my conviction," he placed on record in a
despatch soon after the Crimean War, "that at no distant time we shall
have to fight with Austria for our very existence;" and he was yet more
emphatic when he wrote just before leaving Frankfort to take up his new
position as German Ambassador to Russia in the beginning of 1859: "I
recognise in our relations with the Bund a certain weakness affecting
Prussia, which, sooner or later, we shall have to cure _ferro et igni_"--
with fire and sword--words which embodied the first distinct enunciation
of that policy of "blood and iron" which was destined ultimately to bring
about the unification of Germany. His disgust was so strong that Prussia
did not assert herself against Austria in 1858 when the latter's hands
were full in Italy, that his continued presence at Frankfort was
considered unadvisable. He remained "in ice"--to use his own expression--
at St. Petersburg until early in 1862; and in September of that year,
after a few months of service as Prussian Ambassador at Paris, he was
appointed by King Wilhelm to the high and onerous post of
Minister-President with the portfolio of Foreign Secretary. It was then
that his great career as a European statesman really began.

The impression is all but universal that King Wilhelm throughout the
eventful years which followed was but the figure-head of the ship at the
helm of which stood Bismarck, strong, shrewd, subtle, cynical, and
unscrupulous. This conception I believe to be utterly wrong. I hold
Wilhelm to have been the virtual maker of the united Germany and the
creator of the German Empire; and that the accomplishment of both those
objects, the former leading up to the latter, was already quietly in his
mind long before he mounted the throne. I consider him to have possessed
the shrewdest insight into character. I believe him to have been quite
unscrupulous, when once he had brought himself to cross the threshold of a
line of action. I discern in him this curious, although not very rare,
phase of character, that although resolutely bent on a purpose he was apt
to be irresolute and even reluctant in bringing himself to consent to
measures whereby that purpose was to be accomplished. He was that apparent
contradiction in terms, a bold hesitator; he habitually needed, and knew
that he needed, to have his hand apparently forced for the achievement of
the end he was most bent upon. He knew full well that his aspirations
could be fulfilled only at the bayonet point; and recognising the defects
of the army, he had while still Regent set himself energetically to the
task of making Prussia the greatest military power of Europe. He it was
who had put into the hands of Prussian soldiers the weapon that won
Koeniggraetz. With his clear eye for the right man he had found Moltke and
placed the premier strategist of his day at the head of the General Staff.
Roon he picked out as if by intuition from comparative obscurity, and
assigned to him the work of preparing and carrying out that scheme of army
reform which all continental Europe has copied.

And then, constant in the furtherance of his purposes, Wilhelm
deliberately invented Bismarck. He had steadfastly taken note of the man
whom he chose to be his minister from the big Landwehr lieutenant's first
commission to the Frankfort Diet in 1851; probably, indeed, earlier, when
Bismarck was a rare but forcible speaker in Frederick Wilhelm's
"quasi-Parliament." In Bismarck Wilhelm saw precisely the man he wanted--
the complement of himself; arbitrary as he was, unscrupulous as he was,
but bolder and at the same time more wise. Knowing where he himself was
lacking, he recognised the man who, when he himself should have the
impulse to balk and hesitate, was of that hardier nature--"grit" the
Americans call it--to take him hard by the head and force him over the
fence which all the while he had been longing to be on the other side of.
To a monarch of this character Bismarck was simply the ideal guide and
support--the man to urge him on when hesitating, to restrain him when
over-ardent. Wilhelm had all along thoroughly realised that war with
Austria was among the inevitables between him and the accomplishment of
his aims, and had accepted it as such when it was yet afar off; but when
confronted full with it his nerve failed him, and Bismarck--engaged among
other things for just such an emergency--had to act as the spur to prick
the side of his master's intent. The spur having done its work Wilhelm was
himself again; he really enjoyed Koeniggraetz and would fain have dictated
peace to Austria from the Hofburg of Vienna. In his zeal for promoting
German unity at Prussia's bayonet point he lost his head a little, and on
Bismarck devolved, in his own words, "the ungrateful duty of diluting the
wine of victory with the water of moderation." One of the beads on the
surface of the former fluid was certainly thus early the Imperial idea;
but the time for its fulfilment Bismarck wisely judged not yet ripe. As it
approached four years later, the diary of the Crown Prince depicts with
unconscious humour the amusing progress of the "weakening" of Wilhelm's
opposition to the Kaisership; it weakened in good time quite out of the
sort of existence it had ever had, and Wilhelm was ready for the
Kaisership before the Kaisership was ready for him.

Bismarck as Premier began as he meant to go on, with uncompromising
masterfulness. The Chamber and the nation might probably have fallen in
willingly with Wilhelm's scheme for the reorganisation and reinforcement
of the army, had it been possible to divulge the intent in furtherance of
which the increased armament was being created. But since neither monarch
nor minister could even hint at the objects in view, the nation was set
against that increased armament for which it could discern no apparent
use. So the Chamber, session after session, went through the accustomed
formula of rejecting the military reorganisation bill as well as the
military expenditure estimates. "No surrender" was the steadfast motto of
Bismarck and his royal master. The constitution, such as it was, in effect
was suspended. The Upper House voted everything it was asked to vote;
loans were duly effected, the revenues were collected and the military
disbursements were made, right in the teeth of the popular will and the
veto of the representatives of the nation. Bismarck became the best-hated
man in Prussia. He was compared to Catiline and Strafford; he was
threatened with impeachment; the House and the nation clamoured to the
King for his dismissal and for the sovereign's return to the path of
constitutional government.

But the long "conflict-time" was drawing near its close, and the triumph
of the monarch and his minister over the constitution was approaching. The
policy of doing political evil that national advantage might come was, for
once at least, to stand vindicated. War with Austria as the outcome of
Bismarck's astute if unscrupulous statecraft was imminent when the hostile
parliament was dissolved; and a general election took place amidst the
fervid outburst of enthusiasm which the earlier victories of the Prussian
arms in the "Seven Weeks' War" stirred throughout the nation. The prospect
of war had been unpopular in the extreme, but the tidings of the first
success kindled the flame of patriotism. Bismarck lost for ever the title
of the "best-hated man in Prussia" in the loud volume of the enthusiastic
greetings of the populace, and on the day of Muenchengraetz and Skalitz
Prussia now rejoiced to put her stubborn neck under the great minister's
foot.

The mingled truculence and tortuousness of the diplomacy by which Bismarck
sapped up to the short but decisive war, the issue of which gave to
Prussia the virtual headship of Germany and contributed so greatly toward
the unification of the Fatherland, constitute a striking illustration of
his methods in statecraft. He was fairly entitled to say, "_Ego qui
feci_." He had achieved his aim in defiance of the nation. The Court threw
its weight into the scale against the war; to the Crown Prince the strife
with Austria was notoriously repugnant. The King himself, as the crisis
approached, evinced marked hesitation. How triumphantly the event
vindicated the policy of the great Premier, is a matter of history. He has
frankly owned that if the decisive battle should have resulted in a
Prussian defeat, he had resolved not to survive the shipwreck of his hopes
and schemes. And there was a period in the course of the colossal struggle
of Koeniggraetz, when to many men it seemed that the wielders of the
needle-gun were having the worst of the battle. An awful hour for
Bismarck, conscious of the load of responsibility which he carried. With
great effort he could indeed maintain a calm visage, but his heart was
beating and every pulse of him throbbing. In his torture of suspense he
caught at straws. Moltke asked him for a cigar. As Bismarck handed him his
cigar case he snatched a shred of comfort from the inference that if
matters were very bad Moltke could hardly care to smoke. But Moltke was
not only in a frame for tobacco but Bismarck watched with what deliberate
coolness the great strategist inspected and smelt at cigar after cigar
before making his final selection; and he dared to infer that the man who
best understood the situation was in no perturbation as to the ultimate
outcome. The opportune arrival of the Crown Prince's army on the Austrian
right flank decided the business, and that arrival Bismarck was the first
to discern. Lines were dimly visible on the hither slope of the Chlum
heights; but they were pronounced to be ploughed ridges. Bismarck closed
his field-glasses with a snap and exclaimed, "No, these are not plough
furrows; the spaces are not equal; they are marching lines!" And he was
right.

Eighteen days after the victory of Koeniggraetz the Prussian hosts were in
line on the historic Marchfeld whence the spires of Vienna could be dimly
seen through the heat-haze. The soldiers were eager for the storm of the
famous lines of Florisdorf and King Wilhelm was keen to enter the Austrian
capital. But now the practical wisdom of Bismarck stepped in and his
arguments for moderation prevailed. The peace which ended the Seven Weeks'
War revolutionised the face of Germany. Austria accepted her utter exile
from Germany, recognised the dissolution of the old Bund, and consented to
non-participation in the new North German Confederation of which Prussia
was to have the unquestioned military and diplomatic leadership. Prussia
annexed Hanover, Electoral Hesse, Nassau, Sleswig and Holstein,
Frankfort-on-Main, and portions of Hesse-Darmstadt and Bavaria. Her
territorial acquisitions amounted to over 6500 square miles with a
population exceeding 4,000,000, and the states with which she had been in
conflict paid as war indemnity sums reaching nearly to L10,000,000
sterling. In a material sense, it had not been a bad seven weeks for
Prussia; in a sense other than material, she had profited incalculably
more. She was now, in fact as in name, one of the "Great Powers" of
Europe. The nation realised at length what manner of man this Bismarck was
and what it owed to him. When the inner history of the period comes to be
written, it will be recognised that at no time of his extraordinary career
did Bismarck prove himself a greater statesman than during the five days
of armistice in July 1866, when he fought his diplomatic Koeniggraetz in the
Castle of Nikolsburg and assuaged the wounds of the Austrian defeat by
terms the moderation of which went far to obliterate the memory of the
rancour of the recent strife.

He had been wily enough to secure by vague non-committal half-promises the
neutrality of France during the weeks while Prussia was crushing the armed
strength of Austria in Bohemia. But the issue of Koeniggraetz startled
Napoleon and set France in ferment. Bismarck dared to refuse point-blank
the demand which the French Emperor made for the fortress of Mayence, made
though that demand was under threat of war. The Prussian commanders would
have liked nothing better than a war with France, and Roon indeed had
warned for mobilisation 350,000 soldiers to swell the ranks of the forces
already in the field; but Bismarck was wise and could wait. He allowed
Napoleon to exercise some influence in the negotiations in the character
of a mediator; and to French intervention was owing the stipulation that
the South German States should be at liberty to form themselves into a
South German Confederation of which Napoleon hoped to be the patron. But
Bismarck was a better diplomatist than Napoleon. While he formed and knit
together the North German Confederation in which Prussia was dominant, he
quietly negotiated an alliance offensive and defensive with each of the
Southern States separately. No Southern bund was ever formed, and when the
Franco-German War broke out in 1870 Napoleon saw the shipwreck of his
abortive devices in the spectacle of the troops of Bavaria and Wuertemberg
marching on the Rhine in line with the battalions of Prussia.

The unity of Germany was not yet; that consummation and the Kaisership--
the two greatest triumphs of Bismarck's life--required another and a
greater war to bring about their accomplishment. During the interval
between 1866 and 1870, while the armed strength of Northern Germany was
being quietly but sedulously perfected, Bismarck with dexterous caution
was smoothing the rough path toward the ultimate unification. He would not
have his hand forced by the enthusiasts for "the consummation of the
national destiny." "No horseman can afford to be always at a gallop" was
the figure with which he met the clamourers of the Customs Parliament. He
invoked the terms of the treaty of Prague against the spokesmen of the
Pan-German party inveighing vehemently against the policy of delay. He was
staunch in his conviction that the South for its own safety's sake would
come into the union the moment that the North should engage in war. He was
a few weeks out in his reckoning; the Southern States waited until Sedan
had been fought, when the prospect of the spoils of victory was assured;
and this measured delay on their part was the best justification of
Bismarck's sagacious deliberateness. The negotiations were tedious, but at
length, on the evening of 23rd November 1870 the Convention with Bavaria
was signed, and the unity of Germany was an accomplished fact. Busch
vividly depicts the great moment:--

The Chief came in from the salon, and sat down at the table. "Now," he
exclaimed excitedly, "the Bavarian business is settled and everything is
signed. _We have got our German Unity and our German Emperor_." There was
silence for a moment. "Bring a bottle of champagne," said the Chief to a
servant, "it is a great occasion." After musing a little, he remarked,
"The Convention has its defects, but it is all the stronger on account of
them. I count it the most important thing that we have accomplished during
recent years."

Notwithstanding that there was still before Bismarck a period of twenty
years of virtual omnipotence, it was in the memorable years of 1870 and
1871 that the apostle of blood and iron attained the zenith of his
extraordinary career. Germany was his wash-pot; over France had he cast
his shoe. The years of _Sturm und Drang_ were behind him, during which he
had wrought out the military supremacy of Prussia in spite of herself; and
in 1870 he had no misgivings as to the ultimate result. So confident
indeed was he that before he crossed the French frontier on the second day
after the twin victories of Woerth and Spicheren, he had already resolved
on annexing to the Fatherland the old German province of Alsace which had
been part of France for a couple of centuries. Bismarck was at his best in
1870 in certain attributes; in others he was at his worst, and a bitter
bad worst that worst was. He was at his best in clear swift insight, in
firm masterful grasp of every phase of every situation, in an instinctive
prescience of events, in lucid dominance over German and European policy.
If patriotism consists in earnest efforts to advantage and aggrandise
one's native land _per fas aut nefas_, than Bismarck during the
Franco-German War there never was a grander patriot. His hands were clean,
he wanted nothing for himself except, curiously enough, the only thing
that his old master was strong enough to deny him, the rank of Field
Marshal when that military distinction was conferred on Moltke. He was at
his worst in many respects. He had, or affected, a truculence which was
simply brutal, its savagery intensified rather than mitigated by a bluff,
boisterous bonhomie. Jules Favre complained to him that the German cannon
in front of Paris fired upon the sick and blind in the Blind Institute,
Bismarck in those days of swaggering prosperity had a fine turn of
badinage. "I don't know what you find so hard in that," he retorted, "you
do far worse; you shoot at our soldiers who are hale and useful fighting
men." It is to be hoped that Favre had a sense of humour; he needed it all
to relish the grim pleasantry.

I do not suppose, if he had had a free hand, that Bismarck would have
exhibited the courage of his opinions; but if his sentiments as expressed
count for anything he would fain have seen the methods of warfare in the
Dark Ages reverted to. "Prisoners! more prisoners!" he once exclaimed at
Versailles, after one of Prince Frederick Charles's victories in the Loire
country--"What the devil do we want with prisoners? Why don't they make a
battue of them?" His motto, especially as regarded Francs-tireurs, was "No
quarter," forgetful of the swarms of free companions and volunteer bands
whose gallant services in Prussia's War of Liberation are commemorated to
this day in song and story. It was told him that among the French
prisoners taken at Le Bourget were a number of Francs-tireurs--by the way,
they were the volunteers _de la Presse_ and wore a uniform. "That they
should ever take Francs-tireurs prisoners!" roared Bismarck in disgust.
"They ought to have shot them down by files!" Again, when it was reported
that Garibaldi with his 13,000 "free companions" had been taken prisoners,
the Chancellor exclaimed, "Thirteen thousand Francs-tireurs, who are not
even Frenchmen, made prisoners! Why on earth were they not shot?" And when
he heard that Voights Rhetz having experienced some resistance from the
inhabitants of the open town of Tours, had shelled it into submission,
Bismarck waxed wrath because the General had ceased firing when the white
flag went up. "I would have gone on," said he, "throwing shells into the
town till they sent me out 400 hostages." The simple truth is that in
spite of his long pedigree and good blood Bismarck was not quite a
gentleman in our sense of the word; and as this accounts for his ferocious
bluster and truculent bloodthirsty utterances when he was in power in the
war time, so it was the keynote to his more recent undignified attitude
and howls of querulous impatience of his altered situation. It must be
said of him, however, that he was a man of cool and undaunted courage. I
have seen him perfectly impassive under heavy fire. In Bar-le-Duc, in
Rheims, and over and over again in Versailles, I have met him walking
alone and unarmed through streets thronged with French people who
recognised him by the pictures of him, and who glared and spat and hissed
in a cowed, furtive, malign fashion that was ugly to see.

I vividly remember the first occasion on which I saw Bismarck. It was on
the little tree-shaded _Place_ of St. Johann, the suburb of Saarbruecken,
in the early evening of the 8th August, the next day but one after the
battle of the Spicheren. Saarbruecken was full to the door-sills with the
wounded of the battle and stretcher-parties were continually tramping to
the "warriors' trench" in the cemetery, carrying to their graves soldiers
who had died of their wounds. The Royal Headquarters had arrived a couple
of hours earlier, and I was staring with all my eyes at a fresh-faced,
white-haired old gentleman who was sitting in one of the windows of
Guepratt's Hotel and whom I knew from the pictures to be King Wilhelm. Two
officers in general's undress uniform were walking up and down under the
pollarded lime-trees, talking as they walked. Presently from out a house
opposite the hotel there emerged a very tall burly man of singularly
upright carriage and with a certain air of swashbucklerism in his gait. A
long cavalry sabre trailed and clanked on the rough pavement as he
advanced to join the two sauntering officers under the trees. He wore the
long blue double-breasted frockcoat with yellow cuffs and facings and
white cap which I knew to be the undress uniform of the Bismarck
Cuirassiers, but he was only partially in undress since the long
cuirassier thigh-boots in which he strode were conventionally full
uniform. The wearer of this costume was Bismarck; nor did I ever see him
otherwise attired except on four occasions--at the Chateau Bellevue on the
morning after Sedan, in the Galerie des Glaces in the Chateau of
Versailles on 18th January, in the Place de la Concorde of capitulated
Paris, and in the triumphal entry into Berlin; when he appeared in full
uniform. Saluting His Majesty and then the two officers whom I recognised
as Moltke and Roon, he joined the pedestrian couple, taking post between
them and joining in their promenade and conversation. We heard his voice
and laugh above the rumble of the waggon wheels on the causeway; the other
two spoke little--Moltke, as he moved with bent head and hands clasped
behind his back, scarcely anything.

One would have imagined that those three men, the chief makers of that
empire which was soon to come to the grand but not brilliant old gentleman
in the window-seat, were on the most intimate and cordial terms. In
reality they were jealous of each other with an inconceivable intensity.
Bismarck had umbrage with Moltke because the great strategist withheld
from the great statesman the military information which the latter held he
ought to share. Moltke has roundly disclosed in his posthumous book his
conviction that Roon's place as Minister of War was at home in Germany,
not on campaign, embarrassing the former's functions. Roon envied Moltke
because of the latter's more elevated military position, and disliked
Bismarck because that outspoken man made light of Roon's capacity. I have
known the headquarter staff of a British army whose members were on bad
terms one with the other, and the result, to put it mildly, was
unsatisfactory. But those three high functionaries, each with bitterness
in his heart against his fellows, nevertheless co-operated earnestly and
loyally in the service of their sovereign and for the advantage of their
country. Their common patriotism had the mastery in them of their mutual
hatred and jealousy. Ardt's line: _"Sein Vaterland muss groesser sein!"_
was the watchword and inspiration of all three, and dominated their
discordancies.

On the 17th August, the day of comparative quietude intervening between
the day of Mars-la-Tour and the day of Gravelotte I was wandering about
among the hamlets and farmsteads to the southward of Mars-la-Tour, waiting
the arrival in their appointed bivouacs about Puxieux of my early friends
of the Saxon Army Corps. Since in the battle of the previous day some
32,000 men had fallen killed or wounded within a comparatively small area,
it may be imagined--or rather, without having seen the horror of carnage
it cannot be imagined--how shambles-like was the aspect of this Aceldama.
Scrambling up through the Bois la Dame with intent to obtain a wider view
from the plateau above it, I found in a farmyard in the hamlet of
Mariaville a number of wounded men under the care of a single and rather
helpless surgeon. The water supply was very short and I volunteered to
carry some bucketsful from the stream below. The surgeon told me that
among his patients was Count Herbert Bismarck, the Chancellor's eldest
son, who--as was also his younger brother Count "Bill"--was a volunteer
private in the 2nd Guard Dragoons, and who had been shot in the thigh in
the desperate charge made by that fine regiment to extricate from
annihilation the Westphalian regiments which had suffered so severely near
Bruville. A little later I saw Bismarck who had left the King on the
Flavigny height, and who was riding about, as I assumed, in quest of his
wounded son's whereabouts. I ventured to inform him on this point and he
thanked me with some emotion. He was greatly moved at the meeting with his
son but their interview was short; then he addressed himself to reproving
the surgeon for not having had the Mariaville poultry killed for the use
of the wounded, and presently rode away to order up a supply of water in
barrels. I remember thinking him an exceedingly practical man.

The English Warwick was styled the "King-maker"; but it was for the
Prussian Bismarck to be Emperor-breaker and Emperor-maker within the same
six months. The most wretched morning of Napoleon's life was that
following the fatal day of Sedan, spent in and before the weaver's cottage
on the Donchery road with Bismarck by his side, telling him in stern if
courteous terms that as a prisoner of war his power to exercise the
Imperial functions had fallen from him. It has been said that "the egg
from which was hatched the German Empire was laid on the battlefield of
Sedan." But, not to speak of the offer of the Imperial Crown to King
Frederick Wilhelm by the Frankfort Parliament in 1848, Bismarck more than
a year before the Austro-Prussian war had spoken to Lord Augustus Loftus,
then British Ambassador to Prussia, of his ultimate intention that the
King of Prussia should become the Emperor of an united Germany. The
_Kaiserthum_ permeated the air of Northern Germany throughout the years
from 1866 to 1870. But Bismarck had the true statesman's sense of the
proper sequence of things. He would move no step toward the Kaisership
until German unity was in near and clear sight. Then, and not till then,
in spite of the Crown Prince's ardour, was the Imperial project brought
forward, discussed, and finally carried through by Bismarck's tact and
diplomacy.

On the 18th January 1871, the anniversary of the coronation of the first
king of his house, Wilhelm was proclaimed German Emperor in the Galerie
des Glaces of the Chateau of Versailles. Behind the grand old monarch on
the dais were ranged the regimental colours which had been borne to
victory at Woerth and the Spicheren, at Mars-la-Tour, Gravelotte, and
Sedan. On Wilhelm's right was his handsome and princely son; to right and
to left stood potentates and princes and the leaders of the hosts of
United Germany. Stalwart and square, somewhat apart on the extreme left of
the great semicircle of which his sovereign was the centre, with a face of
deadly pallor--for he had risen from a sick-bed--stood Bismarck in full
cuirassier uniform leaning on his great sword, the man of all others who
might that day most truly say, _"Finis Coronat Opus."_ His strong massive
features were calm and self-possessed, yet elevated as it were by some
internal power which drew all eyes to the great immobile figure with the
indomitable lineaments instinct with will--force and masterfulness. After
the solemn religious service His Majesty in a loud yet broken voice
proclaimed the re-establishment of the German Empire, and that the
Imperial dignity so revived was vested in him and his descendants for all
time in accordance with the unanimous will of the German people. Bismarck
then stood forward and read in sonorous tones the proclamation which the
Emperor addressed to the German nation. As his final words rang through
the hall the Grand Duke of Baden strode forward and shouted with all his
force, "Long live the Emperor Wilhelm!" With a tempest of cheering, amidst
waving of swords and of helmets the new title was acclaimed, and the
Emperor with streaming tears received the homage of his liegemen. The
first on bended knees to kiss his sovereign's hand was the Crown Prince,
the second was Bismarck. The band struck up the National Anthem. Louder
than the music, heard above the clamour of the cheering, sounded the
thunder of the French cannon from Mont Valerien, the _Ave Caesar_ from the
reluctant lips of worsted France. Bismarck, impassive as he seemed, must
have had his emotions as he quitted this scene of triumph for the
banquet-table of the Kaiser of his own making. He knew himself for the
most conspicuous man in Europe, the greatest subject in the world. It was
the proudest day of his life.

There were many proud days still to occur in his long life. One of those
was on the occasion of the German entry into Paris during the armistice
which resulted in peace. The war had been of his making, and he chose to
witness with his own eyes the actual triumph of his craft. It was a
strange spectacle. There, helmet on head and sword on thigh, he sat in the
shadow of the crape-shrouded statue of Strasburg on the Place de la
Concorde. About him had gathered a group of extremely sinister French of
the Belleville type. They had recognised him, and their lurid upward
glances at the massive form on the great war-horse were charged with
baleful meaning. Bismarck once or twice looked down on them with a grim
smile under his moustache. At length the most daring of the "patriots"
emitted a tentative hiss. With a little polite wave of his gloved hand
Bismarck bent over his holster and requested "Monsieur" to oblige him with
a light for his cigar. The man writhed as he compelled himself to comply.
Little doubt that in his heart he wished the lucifer were a dagger and
that he had the courage to use it.




THE INVERNESS "CHARACTER" FAIR

1873


"_Thursday_.--Gathering, hand-shaking, brandy and soda and drams.

"_Friday_.--Drinking, dandering, and feeling the way in the forenoon; the
ordinary in the afternoon; at night a spate of drink and bargaining.

"_Saturday_.--Bargaining and drink.

"_Sunday morning_.--Bargains, drink, and the kirk."

Such was the skeleton programme of the Inverness "Character" Fair given by
a farmer friend to me, who happened to be lazily rusticating in the north
of Scotland during the pleasant month of July. My friend asked me to
accompany him in his visit to this remarkable institution and the
programme was too tempting for refusal. As we drove to the station he
handed me Henry Dixon's _Field and Fern_, open at a page which gave some
particulars of the origin and character of the great annual sheep and wool
market of the north. "Its Character Market," wrote "The Druid,"--no
longer, alas! among us--"is the great bucolic glory of Inverness. The
Fort-William market existed before, but the Sutherland and Caithness men,
who sold about 14,000 sheep and 15,000 stones of wool annually so far back
as 1816, did not care to go there. They dealt with regular customers year
after year, and roving wool-staplers with no regular connection went about
and notified their arrival on the church door. Patrick Sellar, 'the agent
for the Sutherland Association,' saw exactly that some great _caucus_ of
buyers and sellers was wanted at a more central spot; and on 27th February
1817 that meeting of the clans was held at Inverness which brought the
fair into being. Huddersfield, Wakefield, Halifax, Burnley, Aberdeen, and
Elgin signified that their leading merchants were favourable and ready to
attend. Sutherland, Caithness, Wester Ross, Skye, the Orkneys, Harris, and
Lewis were represented at the meeting; Bailie Anderson also 'would state
with confidence that the market was approved of by William Chisholm, Esq.,
of Chisholm, and James Laidlaw, tacksman, of Knockfin;' and so the matter
was settled for ever and aye, and the _Courier_ and the _Morning
Chronicle_ were the London advertising media. This Highland Wool
Parliament was originally held on the third Thursday in June, but now it
begins on the second Thursday of July and lasts till the Saturday; and
Argyllshire, Nairnshire, and High Aberdeenshire have gradually joined in.
The plain-stones in front of the Caledonian Hotel have always been the
scene of the bargains, which are most truly based on the broad stone of
honour; not a sheep or fleece is to be seen and the buyer of the year
before gets the first offer of the cast or clip. The previous proving and
public character of the different flocks are the purchasers' guide far
more than the sellers' description."

Thus far "The Druid"; and my companion as we drove supplemented his
information. It is from the circumstance that not a head of sheep or a
tait of wool is brought to the market but that everything is sold and
bought unseen and even unsampled, that the market derives its appellation
of "character" fair. Of the value of the business transacted, the amount
of money turned over, it is impossible to form with confidence even an
approximate estimate since there is no source for data; but none with whom
I spoke put the turnover at a lower figure than half a million. In a good
season such as the past, over 200,000 sheep are disposed of exclusive of
lambs, and of lambs about the same number. The stock sold from the hills
are for the most part Cheviots and Blackfaces; from the low grounds
half-breds, being a cross between Leicester and Cheviot and crosses
between the Cheviot and Blackface. All the sales of sheep and lambs are by
the "clad score" which contains twenty-one. The odd one is thrown in to
meet the contingency of deaths before delivery is effected. Established
when there was a long and wearing journey for the flocks from the hills
where they were reared down to their purchasers in the lowlands or the
south country, the altered conditions of transit have stimulated farmers
to efforts for the abolition of the "clad score." Now that sheep are
trucked by railway instead of being driven on foot or conveyed from the
islands to their destination in steamers specially chartered for the
purpose, the farmers grudge the "one in" of the "clad score." In 1866 they
seized the opportunity of an exceptionally high market and keen
competition to combine against the old reckoning and in a measure
succeeded. But next year was as dull as '66 had been brisk, and then the
buyers and dealers had their revenge and re-established the "clad score"
in all its pristine firmness of position. The sheep-farmers wean their
lambs about the 24th of August and delivery of them is given to the buyers
as soon as possible thereafter. The delivery of ewes and wethers is timed
by individual arrangement. A large proportion of the old ewes--no ewes are
sold but such as are old--go to England where a lamb or two is got from
them before they are fattened. Most of the lambs are bought by
sheep-farmers who, not keeping a ewe flock, are not themselves breeders,
and are kept till they are three years old--"three shears" as they are
technically called--and sold fat into the south country. There they get
what Mr. M'Combie called the last dip and the butcher sells them as "prime
four-year-old wedder mutton."

The size of some of the Highland sheep farms is to be reckoned by miles
not by acres; and the stock, as in Australia, by the thousand. The largest
sheep-owner, perhaps, that the Highlands ever knew was Cameron of
Corrichollie, now dead. He was once examined before a Committee of the
House of Commons, and came to be questioned on the subject of his
ownership of sheep. "You may have some 1500 sheep, probably, sir?" quoth
the interrogating M.P. "Aiblins," was Corrichollie's quiet reply as he
took a pinch of snuff; "aiblins I have a few more nor that." "Two
thousand, then?" "Yes, I pelieve I have that and a few more forpye,"
calmly responded the Highlander with another pinch. "Five thousand?" "Oh,
ay, and a few more." "Twenty thousand, sir?" cried the M.P., capping with
a burst his previous bid. "Oh, ay, and some more forpye," was the
imperturbable response. "In Heaven's name how many sheep have you, man?"
burst out the astonished catechist. "I'm no very sure to a thousan' or
two," replied Corrichollie in his dry laconic way and with an extra big
pinch; "but I'm owner of forty thousan' sheep at the lowest reckoning."
Lochiel, known to the Sassenach as Mr. Cameron, M.P., is perhaps the
largest living sheep-owner in Scotland. He has at least 30,000 sheep on
his vast tracks of moorland on the braes of Lochaber. In the Island of
Skye Captain Cameron of Talisker has a flock of some 12,000; and there are
several other flocks both in the islands and on the mainland of more than
equal magnitude. Sheep-farming, at least in many instances, is an
hereditary avocation, and some families can trace a sheep-farming ancestry
very far back. The oldest sheep-farming family in Scotland are the
Mackinnons of Corrie in Skye. They have been on Corrie for four hundred
years and they were holding sheep-farms elsewhere even earlier. The
Macraes of Achnagart in Kintail, paid rent to Seaforth for two hundred
years. For as long before they had held Achnagart on the tenure of a bunch
of heather exigible annually and their fighting services as good clansmen.
Two hundred years ago an annual rental of L5 was substituted for the
heather "corve"; the clansmen's service continuing and being rendered up
till the '45. Now clanship is but a name: a Seaforth Mackenzie is no
longer chief in Kintail, and the Macrae who has succeeded his forbears in
Achnagart finds the bunch of heather and the L5 alike superseded by the
very far other than nominal rent of L1000. The modern Achnagart with his
broad shoulders and burly frame, looks as capable as were any of his
ancestry to render personal service to his chief if a demand were made
upon him; and very probably would be quite prepared to accept a reduction
of his money rental if an obligation to perform feudal clan-service were
substituted. Achnagart with his L1000 a year rental by no means tops the
sheep-farming rentals of his county. Perhaps Robertson of Achiltie, whose
sheep-walks stretch up on to the snow-patched shoulders of Ben Wyvis and
far away west to Loch Broom, pays the highest sheep-farming rental in
Ross-shire, when the factor has pocketed his half-yearly check for L800.

Part of this I learn from my friend as we drive to the station; part I
gather afterwards from other sources. The station for which we are bound
is Elgin, the county town of Morayshire. Between Elgin and Inverness, it
is true, we shall see but few of the great sheep-farmers and flock-masters
of the west country, who converge on the annual tryst from other points of
the compass and by various routes--by the Skye railway, by that portion of
the Highland line which extends north of Inverness, through Ross into
Sutherland, by the Caledonian Canal, etc. But it is promised to me that I
shall see many of the notable agriculturists of Moray land, who go to the
market as buyers; and a contingent of sheep-breeders are sure to join us
at Forres, coming down the Highland line from the Inverness-shire
Highlands on Upper Strathspey. There is quite an exceptional throng on the
platform of the Elgin station, of farmers, factors, lawyers, and
ex-coffee-planters--all very plentiful in Elgin; tanners bound for
investments in prospective pelts; and men of no avocation yet as much
bound to visit Inverness to-day as if they meant to invest thousands. In a
corner towers the mighty form of Paterson of Mulben, famous among breeders
of polls with his tribe of "Mayflowers." From beneath a kilt peep out the
brawny limbs of Willie Brown of Linkwood and Morriston, nephew of stout
old Sir George who commanded the light division at the Alma, son to a
factor whose word in his day was as the laws of the Medes and Persians
over a wide territory, and himself the feeder of the leviathan cross red
ox and the beautiful gray heifer which took honours so high at one of the
recent Smithfield Christmas Shows. There is the white beard and hearty
face of Mr. Collie, late of Ardgay, owner erstwhile of "Fair Maid of
Perth" and breeder of "Zarah." Here, too, is a fresh, sprightly gentleman
in a kilt whom his companions designate "the Bourach." Requesting an
explanation of the term I am told that "Bourach" is the Gaelic for
"through-other," which again is the Scottish synonym for a kind of amalgam
of addled and harum-scarum. A jolly tanner observes: "I'll get a
compartment to oursels." The reason of the desire for this exclusive
accommodation is apparent as soon as we start. A "deck" of cards is
produced and a quartette betake themselves to whist with half-crown stakes
on the rubber and sixpenny points. This was mild speculation to that which
was engaged in on the homeward journey after the market, when a Strathspey
sheep-farmer won L8 between Dalvey and Forres. As my friends shuffle and
deal, I look out of window at the warm gray towers of the cathedral,
beautiful still spite of the desecrating hand of the "Wolf of Badenoch."
Our road lies through the fertile "Laigh of Moray," one of the richest
wheat districts in the Empire and as beautiful as fertile. At Alves we
pick up a fresh, hale gentleman, who is described to me as "the laird of
three properties," bought for more than L100,000 by a man who began life
as the son of a hillside crofter. We pass the picturesque ruins of Kinloss
Abbey and draw up at Forres station, whose platform is thronged with noted
agriculturists bound for the "Character" Fair. Here is that spirited
Englishman Mr. Harris of Earnhill, whose great cross ox took the cup at
the Agricultural Hall seven or eight years ago; and the brothers Bruce--he
of Newton Struthers, whose marvellous polled cow beat everything in
Bingley Hall at the '71 Christmas Show and but for "foot and mouth" would
have repeated the performance at the Smithfield Show; and he of Burnside
who likewise has stamped his mark pretty deeply in the latter arena. At
Forres we first hear Gaelic; for a train from Carr Bridge and Grantown in
Upper Strathspey has come down the Highland Railway to join ours, and the
red-haired Grants around the Rock of Craigellachie--where a man whose name
is not Grant is regarded as a _lusus naturae_--are Gaelic speakers to a
man. No witches accost us, and speaking personally I feel no "pricking of
the thumbs" as we skirt the blasted heath on which Macbeth met the witches;
the most graphic modern description of which on record was given to Henry
Dixon in the following quaint form of Shakespearean annotation: "It's just
a sort of eminence; all firs and ploughed land now; you paid a toll near
it. I'm thinking, it's just a mile wast from Brodie Station."

Nairn is that town by the citation of a peculiarity of which King Jamie
put to shame the boastings of the Southrons as to the superior magnitude
of English towns. "I have a town," quoth the sapient James, "in my ancient
kingdom of Scotland, whilk is sae lang that at ane end of it a different
language is spoken from that whilk prevails at the other." To this day the
monarch's words are true; one end of Nairn is Gaelic, the other Sassenach.
Here we obtain a considerable accession of strength. The attributes of one
kilted chieftain are described to me in curious scraps of illustrative
patchwork. "A great litigant, an enthusiastic agriculturist, a dealer in
Hielan' nowt--something of a Hielan' nowt himself, a semi-auctioneer, a
great hand as chairman at an agricultural dinner, a visitor to the Baker
Street Bazaar when the Smithfield Shows were held there and where the
Cockneys mistook him for one of the exhibits and began pinching and
punching him." Stewart of Duntalloch swings his stalwart form into our
carriage--a noted breeder of Highland cattle and as fine a specimen of a
Highlander as can be seen from Reay to Pitlochrie. "Culloden! Culloden!"
chant the porters in that curious sing-song peculiar to the Scotch
platform porter. The whistle of the engine and the talk about turnips and
cattle contrast harshly with that bleak, lonely, moorland swell yonder--
the patches of green among the brown heather telling where moulders the
dust of the chivalrous clansmen. It is but little longer than a century
and a quarter ago since Charles Stuart and Cumberland confronted each
other over against us there; and here are the descendants of the men that
fought in their tartans for the "King over the Water," who are discussing
the right proportion of phosphates in artificial manures and of whom one
asks me confidentially for my opinion on the Leger favourite.

Here we are at Inverness at length; that city of the Clachnacudden stone.
There is quite a crowd in the spacious station of business people who have
been awaiting the arrival of the train from the east, and the buyers and
sellers whom it has conveyed find themselves at once among eager friends.
Hurried announcements are made as to the conditions and prospects of the
market. The card-players have plunged suddenly _in medias res_ of
bargaining. The man who had volunteered to stand me a seltzer and sherry
has forgotten all about his offer, and is talking energetically about clad
scores and the price of lambs. I quit the station and walk up Union Street
through a gradually thickening throng, till I reach Church Street and
shoulder my way to the front of the Caledonian Hotel. I am now in "the
heart of the market," standing as I am on the plain-stones in front of the
Caledonian Hotel and looking up and down along the crowded street. What
physique, what broad shoulders, what stalwart limbs, what wiry red beards
and high cheek-bones there are everywhere! You have the kilt at every
turn, in every tartan, and often in no tartan at all. Other men wear
whole-coloured suits of inconceivably shaggy tweed, and the breadth of the
bonnets is only equalled by that of the accents. Every second man has a
mighty plaid over his shoulder. It may serve as a sample of his wool, for
invariably it is home made. Some carry long twisted crooks such as we see
in old pastoral prints; others have massive gnarled sticks grasped in vast
sinewy hands on the back of which the wiry red hairs stand out like
prickles. There is falling what in the south we should reckon as a very
respectable pelt of rain, but the Inverness Wool Fair heeds rain no more
than thistledown. Hardly a man has thought it worth his pains to envelop
his shoulders in his plaid, but stands and lets the rain take its chance.
There is a perfect babel of tongues; no bawling or shouting, however, but
a perpetual gruff _susurrus_ of broad guttural conversation accentuated
every now and then by a louder exclamation in Gaelic. Quite half of the
throng are discoursing in this language. It is possible to note the
difference in the character of the Celt and Teuton. The former
gesticulates, splutters out a perfect torrent of alternately shrill,
guttural, and intoned Gaelic; he shrugs his shoulders, he throws his arms
about, he thrills with vivacity. The Teuton expresses quiet, sententious
canniness in every gesture and every utterance; he is a cold-blooded man
and keeps his breath to cool his porridge.

On the plain-stones there are a number of benches on which men sit down to
gossip and chaffer. Scraps of dialogue float about in the moist air. If
you care to be an eavesdropper you must have a knowledge of Gaelic to be
one effectively. "It's to be a stout market," remarks stalwart Macrae of
Invershiel, come of a fine old West Highland stock and himself a very
large sheep-farmer. "Sixteen shillings is my price. I'll come down a
little if you like," says the tenant of Belmaduthy to keen-faced Mr.
Mackenzie of Liverpool, one of the largest wool-dealers and sheep-buyers
visiting the market. "You'll petter juist pe coming down to it at once."
"I could not meet you at all." "I'm afraid I'll pe doing what they'll pe
laughing at me for." "We can't agree at all," are the words as a couple
separate, probably to come together again later in the day. "An do reic
thu na 'h'uainn fhathast, Coignasgailean?" "Cha neil fios again'm lieil
thusa air son tavigse thoirtorra, Cnocnangraisheag?" "Thig gus ain fluich
sin ambarfan." Perhaps I had better translate. Two sheep-farmers are in
colloquy, and address each other by the names of their farms, as is all
but universal in the north. Cnocnangraisheag asks Coignasgailean, "Have
you sold your lambs?" The cautious reply is, "I don't know; are you
inclined to give me an offer?" and the proposal ensues, "Come and let us
take a drink on the transaction." Let us follow the two worthies into the
Caledonian. Jostling goes for nothing here and you may shove as much in
reason as you choose, taking your chance of reprisals from the sons of
Anak. The lobbies of the Caledonian are full of men drinking and
bargaining with books in hand. There is no sitting-room in all the house
and we follow the Cnocnangraisheag and his friend into the billiard-room,
where we are promptly served standing. What keenness of
business-discussion mingled with what galore of whisky there is
everywhere! The whisky seems to make no more impression than if it were
ginger-beer; and yet it is over-proof Talisker, as my throat and eyes find
to their cost when I recklessly attempt to imitate Coignasgailean and take
a dram neat. As I pass the bar going out Willie Brown is bawling for soda
with something in it, and Donald Murray of Geanies, one of the ablest men
in the north of Scotland, brushes by with quick decisive step. In the
doorway stands the sturdy square-built form of Macdonald of Balranald, the
largest breeder of Highland cattle in the country. Over the heathery
pasture-land of North Uist 1500 head and more of horned newt of his range
in half-wild freedom. The Mundells and the Mitchells seem ubiquitous. The
ancestors of both families came from England as shepherds when the
Sutherland clearances were made toward the end of last century, and
between them they now hold probably the largest acreage--or rather
mileage, of sheep-farming territory in all Scotland.

It is a "very dour market," that all admit. Everybody is holding back, for
it is obvious prices are to be "desperate high" and everybody wants to get
the full benefit of the rise. The predetermination of the Southern dealers
to "buy out" freely at big prices had been rashly revealed over-night by
one of the fraternity at the after-dinner toddy-symposium in the
Caledonian. He had been sedulously plied with drink by "Charlie Mitchell"
and some others of the Ross and Sutherland sheep-farmers, till reticence
had departed from his tongue. Ultimately he had leaped on the table,
breaking any quantity of glass-ware in the saltatory feat, and had
asserted with free swearing his readiness to give 50s. all round for every
three-year-old wedder in the north of Scotland. His horror-stricken
partners rushed upon him and bundled him downstairs in hot haste, but the
murder was out and the "dour market" was accounted for. Fancy 50s. a head
for beasts that do not weigh 60 lb. apiece as they come off the hill! No
wonder that we townsmen have to pay dear for our mutton.

I push my way out of the heart of the market to find the outlying
neighbourhood studded all over with conversing groups. There is an
all-pervading smell of whisky, and yet I see no man who has "turned a
hair" by reason of the strength of the Talisker. A town-crier ringing a
bell passes me. He halts, and the burden of his cry is, "There is a large
supply of fresh haddies in the market!" The walls are placarded with
advertisements of sheep smearing and dipping substances; the leading
ingredients of which appear to be tar and butter. A recruiting sergeant of
the Scots Fusilier Guards is standing by the Clachnacudden Stone,
apparently in some dejection owing to the little business doing in his
line. Men don't come to the "Character" Fair to 'list. It strikes me that
quite three-fourths of the shops of Inverness are devoted to the sale of
articles of Highland costume. Their fronts are hidden by hangings of
tartan cloth; the windows are decked with sporrans, dirks, cairngorm
plaid-brooches, ram's-head snuff-boxes, bullocks' horns and skean dhus. If
I chose I might enter the emporium of Messrs. Macdougall in my Sassenach
garb and re-emerge in ten minutes outwardly a full-blown Highland chief,
from the eagle's feather in my bonnet to the buckles on my brogues.
Turning down High Street I reach the quay on the Ness bank, where I find
in full blast a horse fair of a very miscellaneous description, and
totally destitute of the features that have earned for the wool market the
title of "Character" Fair. There are blood colts running chiefly to
stomach, splints and bog spavins; ponies with shaggy manes, trim barrels,
and clean legs; and slack-jointed cart-horses nearly asleep--for "ginger"
is an institution which does not seem to have come so far north as
Inverness. Business is lively here, the chronic "dourness" of a market
being discounted by the scarcity of horseflesh.

At four o'clock we sit down to the market ordinary in the great room of
the Caledonian. A member of Parliament occupies the chair, one of the
croupiers is a baronet, the other the chief of the clan Mackintosh. There
is a great collection of north-country notabilities, and tables upon
tables of sheep-farmers and sheep-dealers. We have a considerable
_cacoethes_ of speech-making, among the orators being Professor Blackie of
Edinburgh, whose quaint comicalities convulse his audience. It is pretty
late when the Professor rises to speak, and the whisky has been flowing
free. Some one interjects a whiskyfied interruption into the Professor's
speech, who at once in stentorian tones orders that the disturber of the
harmony of the evening shall be summarily consigned to the lunatic asylum.
I see him ejected with something like the force of a stone from a catapult
and have no reasonable doubt that he will spend the night an inmate of
"Craig Duncan." The speeches over bargaining recommences moistened by
toddy, which fluid appears to exercise an appreciable softening influence
on the "dourness" of the market. Till long after midnight seasoned vessels
are talking and dealing, booking sales while they sip their tenth tumbler.

I have to leave on the Saturday morning, but I make no doubt that the
skeleton programme given at the beginning of this paper will have its
bones duly clothed with flesh.




THE WARFARE OF THE FUTURE


At first sight the proposition may appear startling and indeed absurd; yet
hard facts, I venture to believe, will enforce the conviction on
unprejudiced minds that the warfare of the present when contrasted with
the warfare of the past is dilatory, ineffective, and inconclusive.

Present, or contemporary warfare may be taken to date from the general
adoption of rifled firearms; the warfare of the past may fairly be limited
for purposes of comparison or contrast, to the smooth-bore era; indeed,
for those purposes there is no need to go outside the present century.
Roughly speaking the first five and a half decades of the century were
smooth-bore decades; the three and a half later decades have been rifled
decades, of which about two and a half decades constitute the
breechloading period. Considering the extraordinary advances since the end
of the smooth-bore era in everything tending to promote celerity and
decisiveness in the result of campaigns--the revolution in swiftness of
shooting and length of range of firearms, the development in the science
of gunnery, the increased devotion to military study, the vast additions
to the military strength of the nations, looking to the facilities for
rapid conveyance of troops and transportation of supplies afforded by
railways and steam water-carriage, to the intensified artillery fire that
can now be brought to bear on fortresses, to the manifold advantages
afforded by the electric telegraph, and to the crushing cost of warfare,
urging vigorous exertions toward the speedy decision of campaigns--
reviewing, I say, the thousand and one circumstances encouraging to short,
sharp, and decisive action in contemporary warfare, it is a strange and
bewildering fact that the wars of the smooth-bore era were for the most
part, shorter, sharper, and more decisive. Spite of inferiority of weapons
the battles of that period were bloodier than those of the present, and it
is a mathematically demonstrable proposition that the heavier the
slaughter of combatants the nearer must be the end of a war. There is no
pursuit now after victory won and the vanquished draws off shaken but not
broken; in the smooth-bore era a vigorous pursuit scattered him to the
four winds. When Wellington in the Peninsula wanted a fortress and being
in a hurry could not wait the result of a formal siege or a starvation
blockade, he carried it by storm. No fortress is ever stormed now, no
matter how urgent the need for its reduction, no matter how obsolete its
defences. The Germans in 1871 did attempt to carry by assault an outwork
of Belfort, but failed utterly. It would almost seem that in the matter of
forlorn hopes the Caucasian is played out.

Assertions are easy, but they go for little unless they can be proved;
some examples, therefore, may be cited in support of the contentions
advanced above. The Prussians are proud and with justice, of what is known
as the "Seven Weeks' War of 1866" although as a matter of fact the contest
with Austria did not last so long, for Prince Frederick Charles crossed
the Bohemian frontier on the 23rd of June and the armistice which ended
hostilities was signed at Nikolsburg on the 26th of July. The Prussian
armies were stronger than their opponents by more than one-fourth and they
were armed with the needle-gun against the Austrian muzzle-loading rifle.
When the armistice was signed the Prussians lay on the Marchfeld within
dim sight of the Stephanien-Thurm, it is true; but with the strong and
strongly armed and held lines of Florisdorf, the Danube, and the army of
the Archduke Albrecht between them and the Austrian capital. On the 9th of
October 1806 Napoleon crossed the Saale. On the 14th at Jena he smashed
Hohenlohe's Prussian army, the contending hosts being about equal strength;
on the same day Davoust at Auerstadt with 27,000 men routed Brunswick's
command over 50,000 strong. On the 25th of October Napoleon entered
Berlin, the war virtually over and all Prussia at his feet with the
exception of a few fortresses, the last of which fell on the 8th of
November. Which was the swifter, the more brilliant, and the more
decisive--the campaign of 1866, or the campaign of 1806?

The Franco-German war is generally regarded as an exceptionally effective
performance on the part of the Germans. The first German force entered
France on the 4th of August 1870. Paris was invested on the 21st of
September, the German armies having fought four great battles and several
serious actions between the frontier and the French capital. An armistice,
which was not conclusive since it allowed the siege of Belfort to proceed
and Bourbaki's army to be free to attempt raising it, was signed at
Versailles on the 28th of January 1871, but the actual conclusion of
hostilities dates from the 16th of February, the day on which Belfort
surrendered. The Franco-German war, therefore, lasted six and a half
months. The Germans were in full preparedness except that their rifle was
inferior to the French _chassepot_; they were in overwhelmingly superior
numerical strength in every encounter save two with French regular troops,
and they had on their banners the prestige of Sadowa. Their adversaries
were utterly unready for a great struggle; the French army was in a
wretched state in every sense of the word; indeed, after Sedan there
remained hardly any regulars able to take the field. In August 1805
Napoleon's Grande Armee was at Boulogne looking across to the British
shores. Those inaccessible, he promptly altered his plans and went against
Austria. Mack with 84,000 Austrian soldiers was at Ulm, waiting for the
expected Russian army of co-operation and meantime covering the valley of
the Danube. Napoleon crossed the Rhine on the 26th of September. Just as
in 1870 the Germans on the plain of Mars-la-Tour thrust themselves between
Bazaine and the rest of France, so Napoleon turned Mack and from Aalen to
the Tyrol stood between him and Austria. Mack capitulated Ulm and his army
on the 19th of October and Napoleon was in Vienna on the 13th of November.
Although he possessed the Austrian capital, he was not, however, master of
the Austrian empire. The latter result did not fall to him until the 2nd
of December, when under "the sun of Austerlitz" he with 73,000 men
defeated the Austro-Russian army 85,000 strong, inflicting on it a loss of
30,000 men at the cost of 12,000 of his own soldiers _hors de combat_. It
took the Germans in 1870 a month and a half to get from the frontier to
_outside_ Paris; just in the same time, although certainly not with so
severe fighting by the way but nearly twice as long a march, Napoleon
moved from the Rhine to _inside_ Vienna. From the active commencement to
the cessation of hostilities the Franco-German war lasted six and a half
months; reckoning from the crossing of the Rhine to the evening of
Austerlitz Napoleon subjugated Austria in two and a quarter months.
Perhaps, however, his campaign of 1809 against Austria furnishes a more
exact parallel with the campaign of the Germans in 1870-71. He assumed
command on the 17th of April, having hurried from Spain. He defeated the
Austrians five times in as many days, at Thann, Abensberg, Landshut,
Eckmuhl, and Ratisbon; and he was in Vienna on the 13th of May. Balked at
Aspern and Essling, he gained his point at Wagram on the 5th of July, and
hostilities ceased with the armistice of Znaim on the 11th after having
lasted for a period short of three months by a week.

The Russians have a reputation for good marching, and certainly Suvaroff
made good time in his long march from Russia to Northern Italy in 1799;
almost as good, indeed, as Bagration, Barclay de Tolly, and Kutusoff made
in falling back before Napoleon when he invaded Russia in 1812. But they
have not improved either in marching or in fighting at all commensurately
with the improved appliances. In 1877, after dawdling two months they
crossed the Danube on the 21st to the 27th of June. Osman Pasha at Plevna
gave them pause until the 10th of December, at which date they were not so
far into Bulgaria as they had been five months previously. After the fall
of Plevna the Russian armies would have gone into winter quarters but for
a private quasi-ultimatum communicated to the Tzar from a high source in
England, to the effect that unpleasant consequences could not be
guaranteed against if the war was not finished in one campaign. Alexander,
who was quite an astute man in his way, was temporarily enraged by this
restriction, but recovering his calmness, realised that nowhere in war
books is any particular time specified for the termination or duration of
a campaign. It appeared that so long as an army keeps the field
uninterruptedly a campaign may continue until the Greek kalends. In less
time than that Gourko and Skobeleff undertook to finish the business; by
the vigour with which they forced their way across the Balkans in the
heart of the bitter winter Sophia, Philippopolis, and Adrianople fell into
Russian hands; and the Russian troops had been halted some time almost in
face of Constantinople when the treaty of San Stephano was signed on the
3rd of March 1878. It had taken the Russians of 1877-78 eight weary months
to cover the distance between the Danube and the Marmora. But fifty years
earlier a Russian general had marched from the Danube to the Aegean in
three and a half months, nor was his journey by any means a smooth and
bloodless one. Diebitch crossed the Danube in May 1828 and besieged
Silistria from the 17th of May until the 1st of July. Silistria has
undergone three resolute sieges during the century; it succumbed but once,
and then to Diebitch. Pressing south immediately, he worsted the Turkish
Grand Vizier in the fierce battle of Kuleutscha and then by diverse routes
hurried down into the great Roumelian valley. Adrianople made no
resistance and although his force was attenuated by hardship and disease,
when the Turkish diplomatists procrastinated the audacious and gallant
Diebitch marched his thin regiments forward toward Constantinople. They
had traversed on a wide front half the distance between Adrianople and the
capital when the dilatory Turkish negotiators saw fit to imitate the coon
and come down. Whether they would have done so had they known the weakness
of Diebitch may be questioned; but again it may be questioned whether,
that weakness unknown, he could not have occupied Constantinople on the
swagger. His master was prepared promptly to reinforce him; Constantinople
was perhaps nearer its fall in 1828 than in 1878, and certainly Diebitch
was much smarter than were the Grand Duke Nicholas, his fossil
Nepokoitschitsky, and his pure theorist Levitsky.

The contrast between the character of our own contemporary military
operations and that of those of the smooth-bore era is very strongly
marked. In 1838-39 Keane marched an Anglo-Indian army from our frontier at
Ferozepore over Candahar to Cabul without experiencing any serious check,
and with the single important incident of taking Ghuzni by storm on the
way. Our positions at and about Cabul were not seriously molested until
late in 1841, when the paralysis of demoralisation struck our soldiers
because of the crass follies of a wrong-headed civilian chief and the
feebleness of a decrepit general. Nott throughout held Candahar firmly;
the Khyber Pass remained open until faith was broken with the hillmen;
Jellalabad held out until the "Retribution Column" camped under its walls.
But for the awful catastrophe which befell in the passes the hapless
brigade which under the influence of deplorable pusillanimity and gross
mismanagement had evacuated Cabul, no serious military calamity marked our
occupation of Afghanistan and certainly stubborn resistance had not
confronted our arms. From 1878 to 1880 we were in Afghanistan again, this
time with breech-loading far-ranging rifles, copious artillery of the
newest types, and commanders physically and mentally efficient. All those
advantages availed us not one whit. The Afghans took more liberties with
us than they had done forty years previously. They stood up to us in fair
fight over and over again: at Ali Musjid, at the Pewar Kotul, at
Charasiab, on the Takt-i-Shah and the Asmai heights, at Candahar. They
took the dashing offensive at Ahmed Kheyl and at the Shutur-gurdan; they
drove Dunham Massy's cavalry and took British guns; they reoccupied Cabul
in the face of our arms, they besieged Candahar, they hemmed Roberts
within the Sherpoor cantonments and assailed him there. They destroyed a
British brigade at Maiwand and blocked Gough in the Jugdulluck Pass.
Finally our evacuating army had to macadamise its unmolested route down
the passes by bribes to the hillmen, and the result of the second Afghan
war was about as barren as that of the first.

It was in the year 1886 that, the resolution having been taken to dethrone
Thebau and annex Upper Burmah, Prendergast began his all but bloodless
movement on Mandalay. The Burmans of today have never adventured a battle,
yet after years of desultory bushwhacking the pacification of Upper Burmah
has still to be fully accomplished. On the 10th of April 1852 an
Anglo-Indian expedition commanded by General Godwin landed at Rangoon.
During the next fifteen months it did a good deal of hard fighting, for
the Burmans of that period made a stout resistance. At midsummer of 1853
Lord Dalhousie proclaimed the war finished, announced the annexation and
pacification of Lower Burmah, and broke up the army. The cost of the war
of which the result was this fine addition to our Indian Empire, was two
millions sterling; almost from the first the province was self-supporting
and uninterrupted peace has reigned within its borders. We did not dally
in those primitive smooth-bore days. Sir Charles Napier took the field
against the Scinde Ameers on the 16th of February 1843. Next day he fought
the battle of Meanee, entered Hyderabad on the 2Oth, and on the 24th of
March won the decisive victory of Dubba which placed Scinde at his mercy,
although not until June did the old "Lion of Meerpore" succumb to Jacob.
But before then Napier was well forward with his admirable measures for
the peaceful administration of the great province he had added to British
India.

The expedition for the rescue of General Gordon was tediously boated up
the Nile, with the result that the "desert column" which Sir Herbert
Stewart led so valiantly across the Bayuda reached Gubat just in time to
be too late, and was itself extricated from imminent disaster by the
masterful promptitude of Sir Redvers Buller. Notwithstanding a general
consensus of professional and expert opinion in favour of the alternative
route from Souakin to Berber, 240 miles long and far from waterless, the
adoption of it was condemned as impossible. In June 1801, away back in the
primitive days, an Anglo-Indian brigade 5000 strong ordered from Bombay,
reached Kosseir on the Red Sea bound for the Upper Nile at Keneh thence to
join Abercromby's force operating in Lower Egypt. The distance from
Kosseir to Keneh is 120 miles across a barren desert with scanty and
unfrequent springs. The march was by regiments, of which the first quitted
Kosseir on the 1st of July. The record of the desert-march of the 10th
Foot is now before me. It left Kosseir on the 20th of July and reached
Keneh on the 29th, marching at the rate of twelve miles per day. Its loss
on the march was one drummer. The whole brigade was at Keneh in the early
days of August, the period between its debarkation and its concentration
on the Nile being about five weeks. The march was effected at the very
worst season of the year. It was half the distance of a march from Souakin
to Berber; the latter march by a force of the same strength could well
have been accomplished in three months. The opposition on the march could
not have been so severe as that which Stewart's desert column encountered.
Nevertheless, as I have said, the Souakin-Berber route was pronounced
impossible by the deciding authority.

The comparative feebleness of contemporary warfare is perhaps
exceptionally manifest in relation to the reduction of fortresses. During
the Franco-German War the frequency of announcements of the fall of French
fortresses used to be the subject of casual jeers. The jeers were
misplaced. The French fortresses, labouring under every conceivable
disadvantage, did not do themselves discredit. All of them were more or
less obsolete. Excluding Metz and Paris, neither fortified to date, their
average age was about a century and a half and few had been amended since
their first construction. They were mostly garrisoned by inferior troops,
often almost entirely by Mobiles. Only in one instance was there an
effective director of the defence. That they uniformly enclosed towns
whose civilian population had to endure bombardment, was an obvious
hindrance to desperate resistance. Yet, setting aside Bitsch which was
never taken, the average duration of the defence of the seventeen
fortresses which made other than nominal resistance was forty-one days.
Excluding Paris and Metz which virtually were intrenched camps, the
average period of resistance was thirty-three days. The Germans used siege
artillery in fourteen cases; although only on two instances, Belfort and
Strasburg, were formal sieges undertaken. "It appears," writes Major
Sydenham Clarke in his recent remarkable work on Fortification [Footnote:
_Fortification_. By Major G. Sydenham Clarke, C.M. G. (London: John
Murray).] which ought to revolutionise that art, "that the average period
of resistance of the (nominally obsolete) French fortresses was the same
as that of besieged fortresses of the Marlborough and Peninsular periods.
Including Paris and Metz, the era of rifled weapons actually shows an
increase of 20 per cent in the time-endurance of permanent fortifications.
Granted that a mere measurement in days affords no absolute standard of
comparison, the striking fact remains that in spite of every sort of
disability the French fortresses, pitted against guns that were not
dreamed of when they were built, acquitted themselves quite as well as the
_chefs-d'oeuvre_ of the Vauban school in the days of their glory." Even in
the cases of fortresses whose reduction was urgently needed since they
interfered with the German communications--such as Strasburg, Toul, and
Soissons--the quick _ultima ratio_ of assault was not resorted to by the
Germans. And yet the Germans could not have failed to recognise that but
for the fortresses they would have swept France clear of all organised
bodies of troops within two months of the frontier battles. During the
Peninsular War Wellington made twelve assaults on breached fortresses of
which five were successful; of his twelve attempts to escalade six
succeeded. The Germans in 1870-71 never attempted a breach and their
solitary effort at escalade, on the Basse Perche of Belfort, utterly
failed.

The Russians in 1877 were even less enterprising than had been the Germans
in 1870. They went against three permanently fortified places, the
antediluvian little Matchin which if I remember right blew itself up; the
crumbling Nicopolis which surrendered after one day's fighting; and
Rustchuk which held out till the end of the war. They would not look at
Silistria, ruined, but strong in heroic memories; they avoided Rasgrad,
Schumla, and the Black Sea fortresses; Sophia, Philippopolis, and
Adrianople made no resistance. The earthworks of Plevna, vicious as they
were in many characteristics, they found impregnable. I think Suvaroff
would have carried them; I am sure Skobeleff would if he had got his way.

The vastly expensive armaments of the present--the rifled breech-loader,
the magazine rifle, the machine guns, the long-range field-guns, and so
forth, are all accepted and paid for by the respective nations in the
frank and naked expectation that these weapons will perform increased
execution on the enemy in war time. This granted, nor can it be denied, it
logically follows that if this increased execution is not performed
nations are entitled to regard it as a grievance that they do not get
blood for their money, and this they certainly do not have; so that even
in this sanguinary particular the warfare of to-day is a comparative
failure. The topic, however, is rather a ghastly one and I refrain from
citing evidence; which, however, is easily accessible to any one who cares
to seek it.

The anticipation is confidently adventured that a great revolution will be
made in warfare by the magazine rifle with its increased range, the
machine gun, and the quick-firing field artillery which will speedily be
introduced into every service. It does not seem likely that smokeless
powder will create any very important change, except in siege operations.
On the battlefield neither artillery nor infantry come into action out of
sight of the enemy. When either arm opens fire within sight of the enemy
its position can be almost invariably detected by the field-glass,
irrespective of the smokelessness or non-smokelessness of its ammunition.
Indeed, the use of smokeless powder would seem inevitably to damage the
fortunes of the attack. Under cover of a bank of smoke the soldiers
hurrying on to feed the fighting line are fairly hidden from aimed hostile
fire. It may be argued that their aim is thus reciprocally hindered; but
the reply is that their anxiety is not so much to be shooting during their
reinforcing advance as to get forward into the fighting line, where the
atmosphere is not so greatly obscured. Smokeless powder will no doubt
advantage the defence.

It need not be remarked that a battle is a physical impossibility while
both sides adhere to the passive defensive; and experience proves that
battles are rare in which both sides are committed to the active
offensive, whether by preference or necessity. Mars-la-Tour (16th August
1870) was the only contest of this nature in the Franco-German War.
Bazaine had to be on the offensive because he was ordered to get away
towards Verdun; Alvensleben took it because it was the only means whereby
he could hinder Bazaine from accomplishing his purpose. But for the most
part one side in battle is on the offensive; the other on the defensive.
The invader is habitually the offensive person, just for the reason that
the native force commonly acts on the defensive; the latter is anxious to
hinder further penetration into the bowels of its land; the former's
desire is to effect that penetration. The defensive of the native army
need not, however, be the passive defensive; indeed, unless the position
be exceptionally strong that is according to present tenets to be avoided.
When, always with an underlying purpose of defence, its chief resorts to
the offensive for reasons that he regards as good, his strategy or his
tactics as the case may be, are expressed by the term
"defensive-offensive."

It says a good deal for the peaceful predilections of the nations, that
there has been no fairly balanced experience affording the material for
decision as to the relative advantage of the offensive and the defensive
under modern conditions. In 1866 the Prussians, opposing the needle-gun to
the Austrian muzzle-loader, naturally utilised this pre-eminence by
adopting uniformly the offensive and traditions of the Great Frederick
doubtless seconded the needle-gun. After Sadowa controversy ran high as to
the proper system of tactics when breech-loader should oppose
breech-loader. A strong party maintained that "the defensive had now
become so strong that true science lay in forcing the adversary to attack.
Let him come on, and then one might fairly rely on victory." As
Boguslawski observes--"This conception of tactics would paralyse the
offensive, for how can an army advance if it has always to wait till an
enemy attacks?" After much exercitation the Germans determined to adhere
to the offensive. In the recent modest language of Baron von der Goltz:
[Footnote: _The Nation in Arms_, by Lieutenant-Colonel Baron von der
Goltz. (Allen.)] "Our modern German mode of battle aims at being entirely
a final struggle, which we conceive of as being inseparable from an
unsparing offensive. Temporising, waiting, and a calm defensive are very
unsympathetic to our nature. Everything with us is action. Our strength
lies in great decisions on the battlefield." Perhaps also the guileless
Germans were quite alert to the fact that Marshal Niel had shattered the
French army's tradition of the offensive, and gone counter to the French
soldier's nature by enjoining the defensive in the latest official
instructions. Had the Teutons suborned him the Marshal could not have done
them a better turn.

Their offensive tactics against an enemy unnaturally lashed to the stake
of the defensive stood the Germans in excellent stead in 1870. On every
occasion they resorted to the offensive against an enemy in the field;
strictly refraining, however, from that expedient when it was a fortress
and not soldiers _en vive force_ that stood in the way. At St. Privat
their offensive would probably have been worsted if Canrobert had been
reinforced or even if a supply of ammunition had reached him; and a loss
there of one-third of the combatants of the Guard Corps without result
caused them to change for the better the method of their attack. But in
every battle from Weissenburg to Sedan with the exception of the confused
_melee_ of Mars-la-Tour, the French, besides being bewildered and
discouraged, were in inferior strength; after Sedan the French levies in
the field were scarcely soldiers. There was no fair testing of the
relative advantages of defence and offence in the Russo-Turkish War of
1877-78; and so it remains that in an actual and practical sense no firm
decision has yet been established. All civilised nations are, however,
assiduously practising the methods of the offensive.

It may nevertheless be anticipated that in future warfare between evenly
matched combatants the offensive will get the worst of it at the hands of
the defensive. The word "anticipate" is used in preference to "apprehend,"
because one's sympathy is naturally for the invaded state unless it has
been wantonly aggressive and insolent. The invaded army, if the term may
be used, having familiar knowledge of the terrain will take up a position
in the fair-way of the invader; affording strong flank _appui_ and a
far-stretching clear range in front and on flanks. It will throw up
several lines, or still better, tiers of shallow trenches along its front
and flanks, with emplacements for artillery and machine guns. The invader
must attack; he cannot turn the enemy's position and expose his
communications to that enemy. He takes the offensive, doing so, as is the
received practice, in front and on a flank. From the outset he will find
the offensive a sterner ordeal than in the Franco-German War days. He will
have to break into loose order at a greater distance, because of the
longer range of small arms, and the further scope, the greater accuracy,
and the quicker fire of the new artillery. He too possesses those weapons,
but he cannot use them with so great effect. His field batteries suffer
from the hostile cannon fire as they move forward to take up a position.
His infantry cannot fire on the run; when they drop after a rush the aim
of panting and breathless men cannot be of the best. And their target is
fairly protected and at least partially hidden. The defenders behind their
low epaulement do not pant; their marksmen only at first are allowed to
fire; these make things unpleasant for the massed gunners out yonder, who
share their attentions with the spraying-out infantry-men. The
quick-firing cannon of the defence are getting in their work methodically.
Neither its gunners nor its infantry need be nervous as to expending
ammunition freely since plenteous supplies are promptly available, a
convenience which does not infallibly come to either guns or rifles of the
attack. The Germans report as their experience in the capacity of
assailants that the rapidity and excitement of the advance, the stir of
strife, the turmoil, exhilarate the soldiers, and that patriotism and
fire-discipline in combination enforce a cool steady maintenance of fire;
that in view of the ominous spectacle of the swift and confident advance,
under torture of the storm of shell-fire and the hail of bullets which
they have to endure in immobility, the defenders, previously shaken by the
assailants' artillery preparation, become nervous, waver, and finally
break when the cheers of the final concentrated rush strike on their ears.
That this was scarcely true as regarded French regulars the annals of
every battle of the Franco-German War up to and including Sedan
conclusively show. It is true, however, that the French nature is
intolerant of inactivity and in 1870 suffered under the deprivation of its
_metier;_ but how often the Germans recoiled from the shelter trenches of
the Spicheren and gave ground all along the line from St. Privat to the
Bois de Vaux, men who witnessed those desperate struggles cannot forget
while they live. Warriors of greater equanimity than the French soldier
possesses might perhaps stand on the defensive in calm self-confidence
with simple breech-loaders as their weapons, if simple breech-loaders were
also weapons of the assailants. But in his magazine rifle the soldier of
the future can keep the defensive not only with self-confidence, but with
high elation, for in it he will possess a weapon against which it seems
improbable that the attack (although armed too with a magazine or
repeating rifle) can prevail.

The assailants fall fast as their advance pushes forward, thinned down by
the rifle fire, the mitraille, and the shrapnel of the defence. But they
are gallant men and while life lasts they will not be denied. The long
bloody advance is all but over; the survivors of it who have attained thus
far are lying down getting their wind for the final concentration and
rush. Meanwhile, since after they once again stand up they will use no
more rifle fire till they have conquered or are beaten, they are pouring
forth against the defence their reserve of bullets in or attached to their
rifle-butts. The defenders take this punishment, like Colonel Quagg, lying
down, courting the protection of their earth-bank. The hail of the
assailants' bullets ceases; already the artillery of the attack has
desisted lest it should injure friend as well as foe. The word runs along
the line and the clumps of men lying prostrate there out in the open. The
officers spring to their feet, wave their swords, and cheer loudly. The
men are up in an instant, and the swift rush focussing toward a point
begins. The distance to be traversed before the attackers are _aux prises_
with the defenders is about one hundred and fifty yards.

It is no mere storm of missiles which meets fair in the face those
charging heroes; no, it is a moving wall of metal against which they rush
to their ruin. For the infantry of the defence are emptying their
magazines now at point-blank range. Emptied magazine yields to full one;
the Maxims are pumping, not bullets, but veritable streams of death, with
calm, devilish swiftness. The quick-firing guns are spouting radiating
torrents of case. The attackers are mown down as corn falls, not before
the sickle but the scythe. Not a man has reached, or can reach, the little
earth-bank behind which the defenders keep their ground. The attack has
failed; and failed from no lack of valour, of methodised effort, of
punctilious compliance with every instruction; but simply because the
defence--the defence of the future in warfare--has been too strong for the
attack. One will not occupy space by recounting how in the very nick of
time the staunch defence flashes out into the counter-offensive; nor need
one enlarge on the sure results to the invader as the unassailed flank of
the defence throws forward the shoulder and takes in flank the dislocated
masses of aggressors.

One or two such experiences will definitively settle the point as to the
relative advantage of the offensive and the defensive. Soldiers will not
submit themselves to re-trial on re-trial of a _res judicata_. Grant,
dogged though he was, had to accept that lesson in the shambles of Cold
Harbour. For the bravest sane man will rather live than die. No man burns
to become cannon-fodder. The Turk, who is supposed to court death in
battle for religious reasons of a somewhat material kind, can run away
even when the alternative is immediate removal to a Paradise of unlimited
houris and copious sherbet. There are no braver men than Russian soldiers;
but going into action against the Turks tried their nerves, not because
they feared the Turks as antagonists, but because they knew too well that
a petty wound disabling from retreat meant not alone death but unspeakable
mutilation before that release.

It is obvious that if, as is here anticipated, the offensive proves
impossible in the battle of the future, an exaggerated phase of the
stalemate which Boguslawski so pathetically deprecates will occur. The
world need not greatly concern itself regarding this issue; the situation
will almost invariably be in favour of the invaded and will probably
present itself near his frontier line. He can afford to wait until the
invader tires of inaction and goes home.

Magazine and machine guns would seem to sound the knell of possible
employment of cavalry in battle. No matter how dislocated are the infantry
ridden at so long as they are not quite demoralised, however _ruse_ the
cavalry leader--however favourable to sudden unexpected onslaught is the
ground, the quick-firing arms of the future must apparently stall off the
most enterprising horsemen. Probably if the writer were arguing the point
with a German, the famous experiences of von Bredow might be adduced in
bar of this contention. In the combat of Tobitschau in 1866 Bredow led his
cuirassier regiment straight at three Austrian batteries in action,
captured the eighteen guns and everybody and everything belonging to them,
with the loss to himself of but ten men and eight horses. It is true, says
the honest official account, that the ground favoured the charge and that
the shells fired by the usually skilled Austrian gunners flew high. But
during the last 100 yards grape was substituted for shell, and Bredow
deserved all the credit he got. Still stronger against my argument was
Bredow's memorable work at Mars-la-Tour, when at the head of six squadrons
he charged across 1000 yards of open plain, rode over and through two
separate lines of French infantry, carried a line of cannon numbering nine
batteries, rode 1000 yards farther into the very heart of the French army,
and came back with a loss of not quite one half of his strength. The
_Todtenritt_, as the Germans call it, was a wonderful exploit, a second
Balaclava charge and a bloodier one; and there was this distinction that
it had a purpose and that that purpose was achieved. For Bredow's charge
in effect wrecked France. It arrested the French advance which would else
have swept Alvensleben aside; and to its timely effect is traceable the
sequence of events that ended in the capitulation of Metz. The fact that
although from the beginning of his charge until he struck the front of the
first French infantry line Bredow took the rifle-fire of a whole French
division yet did not lose above fifty men, has been a notable weapon in
the hands of those who argue that good cavalry can charge home on unshaken
infantry. But never more will French infantry shoot from the hip as
Lafont's conscripts at Mars-la-Tour shot in the vague direction of
Bredow's squadrons. French cavalry never got within yards of German
infantry even in loose order; and the magazine or repeating rifle held
reasonably straight will stop the most thrusting cavalry that ever heard
the "charge" sound.

Fortifications of the future will differ curiously from those of the
present. The latter, with their towering scarps, their massive
_enceintes_, their "portentous ditches," will remain as monuments of a
vicious system, except where, as in the cases of Vienna, Cologne, Sedan,
etc., the dwellers in the cities they encircle shall procure their
demolition for the sake of elbow-room, or until modern howitzer shells or
missiles charged with high explosives shall pulverise their naked expanses
of masonry. In the fortification of the future the defender will no longer
be "enclosed in the toils imposed by the engineer" with the inevitable
disabilities they entail, while the besieger enjoys the advantage of free
mobility. Plevna has killed the castellated fortress. With free
communications the full results attainable by fortress artillery
intelligently used, will at length come to be realised. Unless in rare
cases and for exceptional reasons towns will gradually cease to be
fortified even by an encirclement of detached forts. Where the latter are
availed of, practical experience will infallibly condemn the expensive and
complex cupola-surmounted construction of which General Brialmont is the
champion. "A work," trenchantly argues Major Sydenham Clarke, "designed on
the principles of the Roman catacombs is suited only for the dead, in a
literal or in a military sense. The vast system of subterranean chambers
and passages is capable of entombing a brigade, but denies all necessary
tactical freedom of action to a battalion."

The fortress of the future will probably be in the nature of an intrenched
camp. The interior of the position will provide casemate accommodation for
an army of considerable strength. Its defences will consist of a circle at
intervals of about 2500 yards, of permanent redoubts which shall be
invisible at moderate ranges for infantry and machine guns, the garrison
of each redoubt to consist of a half battalion. Such a work was in 1886
constructed at Chatham in thirty-one working days, to hold a garrison of
200 men housed in casemates built in concrete, for less than L3000, and
experiments proved that it would require a "prohibitory expenditure" of
ammunition to cause it serious damage by artillery fire. The supporting
defensive armament will consist of a powerful artillery rendered mobile by
means of tram-roads, this defence supplemented by a field force carrying
on outpost duties and manning field works guarding the intervals between
the redoubts. Advanced defences and exterior obstacles of as formidable a
character as possible will be the complement of what in effect will be an
immensely elaborated Plevna, which, properly armed and fully organised,
will "fulfil all the requirements of defence" while possessing important
potentialities of offence.

An illustration is pertinent of the pre-eminent utility of such fortified
and strongly held positions, of whose characteristics the above is the
merest outline. In the event of a future Franco-German War, the immensely
expensive cordon of fortresses with which the French have lined their
frontier, efficiently equipped, duly garrisoned and well commanded, will
unquestionably present a serious obstacle to the invading armies. The
Germans talk of _vive force_--shell heavily and then storm; the latter
resort one for which they have in the past displayed no predilection.
Whether by storm or interpenetration, they will probably break the cordon,
but they cannot advance without masking all the principal fortresses. This
will employ a considerable portion of their strength, and the invasion
will proceed in less force, which will be an advantage to the defenders.
But if instead of those multitudinous fortresses the French had
constructed, say, three such intrenched-camp fortresses as have been
sketched, each quartering 50,000 men, it would appear that they would have
done better for themselves at far less cost. Each intrenched position
containing a field army 50,000 strong would engross a beleaguering host of
100,000 men. The positions of the type outlined are claimed to be
impregnable; they could contain supplies and munitions for at least a
year, detaining around them for that period 300,000 of the enemy. No
European power except Russia has soldiers enough to spare so long such a
mass of troops standing fast, and simultaneously to prosecute the invasion
of a first-rate power with approximately equal numbers. France at the cost
of 150,000 men would be holding supine on her frontier double the number
of Germans--surely no disadvantageous transaction.

In conclusion, it may be worth while to point out that the current
impression that the maintenance by states of "bloated armaments" is a keen
incentive to war, is fallacious. How often do we hear, "There must be a
big war soon; the powers cannot long stand the cost of standing looking at
each other, all armed to the teeth!" War is infinitely more costly than
the costliest preparedness. But this is not all. The country gentleman for
once in a way brings his family to town for the season, pledging himself
privily to strict economy when the term of dissipation ends, in order to
restore the balance. But for a State, as the sequel to a season of war
there is no such potentiality of economy. Rather there is the grim
certainty of heavier and yet heavier expenditure after the war, in the
still obligatory character of the armed man keeping his house. Therefore
it is that potentates are reluctant to draw the sword, and rather bear the
ills they have than fly to other evils inevitably worse still. Whether the
final outcome will be universal national bankruptcy or the millennium, is
a problem as yet insoluble.




GEORGE MARTELL'S BANDOBAST

[Footnote: _Bandobast_ is an Indian word, which, like many others, has
been all but formally incorporated into Anglo-Indian English. The meaning
is, plan, scheme, organised arrangement.]


George Martell was an indigo-planter in Western Tirhoot, a fine tract of
Bengal stretching from the Ganges to the Nepaul Terai, and roughly bounded
on the west by the Gunduck, on the east by the Kussi. Planter-life in
Tirhoot is very pleasant to a man in robust health, who possesses some
resources within himself. In many respects it more resembles active rural
life at home than does any other life led by Anglo-Indians. The joys of a
planter's life have been enthusiastically sung by a planter-poet; and the
frank genial hospitality of the planter's bungalow stands out pre-eminent,
even amidst the universal hospitality of India. The planter's bungalow is
open to all comers. The established formula for the arriving stranger is
first to call for brandy-and-soda, then to order a bath, and finally to
inquire the name of the occupant his host. The laws of hospitality are as
the laws of the Medes and Persians. Once in the famine time a stranger in
a palki reached a planter's bungalow in an outlying district, and sent in
his card. The planter sent him out a drink but did not bid him enter. The
stranger remained in the veranda till sundown, had another drink, and then
went on his way. This breach of statute law became known. There was much
excuse for the planter, for the traveller was a missionary and in other
respects was a _persona ingrata_. But the credit of planterhood was at
stake; and so strong was the force of public opinion that the planter who
had been a defaulter in hospitality had to abandon the profession and quit
the district. It was on this occasion laid down as a guiding illustration,
that if Judas Iscariot, when travelling around looking for an eligible
tree on which to hang himself, had claimed the hospitality of a planter's
bungalow, the dweller therein would have been bound to accord him that
hospitality. Not even newspaper correspondents were to be sent empty away.

The indigo-planter is "up in the morning early" and away at a swinging
canter on his "waler" nag, out into the _dahaut_ to visit the _zillahs_ on
which his crop is growing. He returns when the sun is getting high with a
famous appetite for a breakfast which is more than half luncheon. After
his siesta he may look in upon a neighbour--all Tirhoot are neighbours and
within a radius of thirty miles is considered next door. He would ride
that distance any day to spend an hour or two in a house brightened by the
presence of womanhood. His anxious period is _mahaye_ time, when the
indigo is in the vats and the quantity and quality of the yield depend so
much on care and skill. But except at _mahaye_ time he is always ready for
relaxation, whether it takes the form of a polo match, a pig-sticking
expedition, or a race-meeting at Sonepoor, Muzzufferpore, or Chumparun.
These race-meetings last for several days on end, there being racing and
hunting on alternate days with a ball every second night. It used to be
worth a journey to India to see Jimmy Macleod cram a cross-grained "waler"
over an awkward fence, and squeeze the last ounce out of the brute in the
run home on the flat. The Tirhoot ladies are in all respects charming; and
it must remain a moot point with the discriminating observer whether they
are more delightful in the genial home-circles of which they are the
centres and ornaments, or in the more exciting stir and whirl of the
ballroom. After every gathering hecatombs of slain male victims mournfully
cumber the ground; and one all-conquering fair one, now herself conquered
by matrimony and motherhood, wrung from those her charms had blighted the
title of "the destroying angel."

George Martell was an honest sort of a clod. He stood well with the ryots,
and the mark of his factory always brought out keen bidding at Thomas's
auction-mart in Mission Row and was held in respect in the Commission Sale
Rooms in Mincing Lane. He was a good shikaree and could hold his own
either at polo or at billiards; but being somewhat shy and not a little
clumsy he did not frequent race-balls nor throw himself in the way of
"destroying angels." He had been over a dozen years in the district and
had not been known to propose once, so that he had come to be set down as
a misogynist. Among his chief allies was a neighbouring planter called
Mactavish. Mactavish in some incomprehensible way--he being a gaunt,
uncouth, bristly Scot, whose Highland accent was as strong as the whisky
with which he had coloured his nose--had contrived to woo and win a bonny,
baby-faced girl, the ripple of whose laughter and the dancing sheen of
whose auburn curls filled the Mactavish bungalow with glad bright
sunshine. When Mac first brought home this winsome fairy Martell had
sheepishly shunned the residence of his friend, till one fine morning when
he came in from the _dahaut_ he found Minnie Mactavish quite at home among
the pipes, empty soda-water bottles, and broken chairs that constituted
the principal articles of furniture in his bachelor sitting-room. Minnie
had come to fetch her husband's friend and in her dainty imperious way
would take no denial. So George had his bath, got a fresh horse saddled,
nearly chucked Minnie over the other side as he clumsily helped her to
mount her pony, and rode away with her a willing if somewhat clownish
captive. Arriving at the bungalow Mactavish, honest George was bewildered
by the transformation it had undergone. Flowers were where the spirit-case
used to stand. There was a drawing-room with actually a piano in it; the
_World_ lay on the table instead of the _Sporting Times_, and the servants
wore a quiet, tasteful livery. Mac himself had been trimmed and titivated
almost out of recognition. He who had been wont to lounge half the day in
his _pyjamas_ was now almost smartly dressed; his beard was cropped, and
his bristly poll brushed and oiled. If George had a weak spot in him it
was for a simple song well sung. Mrs. Mac, accompanying herself on the
piano, sang to him "The Land o' the Leal" and brewed him a mild peg with
her own fair hands. George by bedtime did not know whether he was on his
head or his heels.

He lay awake all night thinking over all he had seen. Mactavish now was
clearly a better man than ever he had been before. He had told George he
was living more cheaply as a married man than ever he had done as a
bachelor; and in the matter of happiness there was no comparison. George
rose early to go home; but early as it was Mrs. Mac was up too, and
arrayed in a killing morning _neglige_ that fairly made poor George
stammer, gave him his _chota hazri_ and stroked his horse's head as he
mounted. About half-way home George suddenly shouted, "D----d if I don't
do it too!" and brought his hand down on his thigh with a smack that set
his horse buck-jumping.

In effect, George Martell had determined to get married. But where to find
a Mrs. Martell? Mrs. Mactavish had told him she had no sisters and that
her only relative was a maiden grand-aunt, whom George thought must be a
little too old to marry unless in the last resort. If he took the field at
the next race-meeting the fellows would chaff the life out of him; and
besides, he scarcely felt himself man enough to face a "destroying angel."
As he pondered, riding slowly homeward, a thought occurred to him. When he
had been at home a dozen years ago his two girl-sisters had been at
school, and their great playmate had been a girl of eleven, by name Laura
Davidson. Laura was a pretty child. He had taken occasional notice of her;
had once kissed her after having been severely scratched in the struggle;
and had taken her and his sisters to the local theatre. What if Laura
Davidson--now some three-and-twenty--were still single? What if she were
pretty and nice? He remembered that the colour of her hair was not unlike
Mrs. Mac's, and was in ringlets too. And what if she were willing to come
out and make lonely George Martell as happy a man as was that lucky old
Mac?

It was mail-day, and George, taking time by the forelock, sat down and
wrote to his sister what had come into his head. By the return mail he had
her reply: Laura Davidson was single; she was nice; she was pretty; she
had fair ringlets; she had a hazy memory of George and the kissing
episode, and was willing to come out and marry him and try to make him
happy. But she could not well come alone; could George suggest any method
of _chaperonage_ on the voyage?

In the district of Champarun, which in essentials is part of Tirhoot, lies
the quaint little cavalry cantonment of Segowlie. It is the last relic of
the old Nepaul war, which caused the erection of a chain of cantonments
along the frontier all of which save Segowlie, are now abandoned. There is
just room for one native cavalry regiment at Segowlie, and the soldiers
like the station because of excellent sport and the good comradeship of
the planters. At Segowlie at the time I am writing of there happened to be
quartered a certain Major Freeze, whose wife, after a couple of years at
home, was about returning to India. George had some acquaintance with the
Major and a far-off profound respect for his wife, who was an admirable
and stately lady. It occurred to him to try whether it could not be
managed that she should bring out the future Mrs. Martell. He saw the
Major, who was only too delighted at the prospect of a new lady in the
district, and the affair was soon arranged. Mrs. Freeze wrote that she and
Miss Davidson were leaving by such-and-such a mail; and knowing that
Martell was rather lumpy when a lady was in the case, she thoughtfully
suggested that he should go down to Bombay and meet them so as to get over
the initial awkwardness by making himself useful and gain his intended's
respect by swearing at the niggers.

All went well. But George Martell was not quite his own master, he was
only part of a "concern" and was bound to do his best for his partners. It
happened, just about the time the P. and O. steamer was due at Bombay,
that the most ticklish period of the indigo-planters' year was upon
Martell. The juice had begun to flow from the vats. He had no assistant
and he did not dare to leave the work, so he telegraphed to Bombay to
explain this to Mrs. Freeze, and added that he would meet her and her
companion at Bankipore where their long railway journey would end. Miss
Davidson did not understand much about the absorbing crisis of indigo
production, and she had a spice of romance in her composition; so that
poor Martell did not rise in her estimation by his default at Bombay. When
the ladies reached Bankipore there was still no Martell, but only a
_chuprassee_ with a note to say that the juice was still running, and that
Martell sahib could not leave the factory but would be waiting for them at
Segowlie. At this even Mrs. Freeze almost lost her temper.

They have a "State Railway" now in Tirhoot, but at the time I am writing
of there was only one _pukha_ road in all the district. The ladies
travelled in palanquins, or palkis, as they are more familiarly called. It
is a long journey from Bankipore to Segowlie, and three nights were spent
in travelling. Bluff old Minden Wilson stood on the bank above the ghat to
welcome Mrs. Freeze across the Ganges. One day was spent at young Spudd's
factory, the second at the residence of a genial planter rejoicing in the
quaint name of Hong Kong Scribbens; on the third morning they reached
Segowlie. But still no Martell; only a _chit_ to say that that plaguy
juice was still running but that he hoped to be able to drive over to
dinner. Miss Davidson went to bed in a huff; and Major Freeze was
temporarily inclined to think that her home-trip had impaired his good
lady's amiability of character.

Martell did turn up at dinner-time. But he was hardly a man at any time to
create much of an impression, and on this occasion he appeared to
exceptional disadvantage. He was stutteringly nervous; and there were some
evidences that he had been ineffectually striving to mitigate his
nervousness by the consumption of his namesake. He wore a new dress-coat
which had not the remotest pretensions to fit him, and the bear's-grease
which he had freely used gave unpleasant token of rancidity. The dinner
was an unsatisfactory performance. Miss Davidson was extremely
_distraite_, while Martell became more and more nervous as the meal
progressed and was manifestly relieved when the ladies retired. Soon after
they had done so the Major was sent for from the drawing-room. He found
Miss Davidson sobbing on his wife's bosom. He asked what was the matter.
The girl, with many sobbing interruptions, gasped out--

"He's the wrong man! O Heavens, I never saw _him_ before! The man I
remember who gave me sweets when I was a child had black hair; _he_ has
red! Oh, what shall I do? Oh, please send that man away and let me go
home!"

And then Miss Davidson went off into hysterics.

Here was a pretty state of matters! The Major and his wife could not see
their way clear at all. Consultation followed consultation, with visits on
the Major's part to poor Martell in the dining-room irregularly
interspersed. It was almost morning before affairs arranged themselves
after a fashion. The new basis agreed upon was that the previously
existing arrangement should be regarded as dead, and that a courtship
between Martell and Miss Davidson should be commenced _de novo_--he to do
his best to recommend himself to the lady's affections, she to learn to
love him if she could, red hair and all. And so George went home, and the
Segowlie household went to bed.

Poor George at the best had a very poor idea of courting acceptably; and
surely no man was more heavily handicapped in the enterprise prescribed
him. He had to court to order, and to combat, besides, both the bad
impression made at starting and the misfortune of his red hair. The poor
fellow did his best. He used to come and sit in Mrs. Freeze's drawing-room
hours on end, glowering at Miss Davidson in a silence broken by spasmodic
efforts at forced talk. He brought the girl presents, gave her a horse,
and begged of her to ride with him. But the great stupid fellow had not
thought of a habit and the girl felt a delicacy in telling him that she
had not one. So the horse ate his head off in idleness, and George's heart
went farther and farther down in the direction of his boots. He had so
bothered Mrs. Freeze that she had washed her hands of him, and had bidden
him worry it out on his own line.

In less than a month the crisis came. Miss Davidson could not bring
herself to think of poor George as affording the makings of a husband. She
told Mrs. Freeze so, and begged, for kindness sake, that the Major would
break this her determination to Mr. Martell and desire him to give the
thing up as hopeless. The Major thought the best course to pursue was to
write to George to this effect. Next morning in the small hours the poor
fellow turned up in the Segowlie veranda in a terribly bad way. He would
not accept his fate at second-hand in this fashion; he must see Miss
Davidson and try to move her to be kind to him. In the end there was an
interview between them, from which George emerged quiet but very pale. His
notable matrimonial bandobast had proved the deadest of failures; and the
poor fellow's lip trembled as he thought of Mactavish's happy home and his
own forlorn bungalow.

But although he had red hair and did not know in the least what to do with
his feet, George Martell was a gentleman. The lady continuing anxious to
go home, he insisted on his right to pay her return passage as he had done
her passage outward, urging rather ruefully that, having taken a shot at
happiness and having missed fire, he must be the sole sufferer. It is a
little surprising that this uncouth chivalry did not melt the lady, but
she was obdurate, although she let him have his way about the passage
money. So in the company of an officer's wife going home Miss Davidson
quitted Segowlie and journeyed to Bombay. Poor old George, with a very
sore heart, was bent on seeing the last of her before settling down again
to the old dull bachelor life. He dodged down to Bombay in the same train,
travelling second class that he might not annoy the girl by a chance
meeting; and stood with a sad face leaning on the rail of the Apollo
Bunder, as he watched the ship containing his miscarried venture steam out
of Bombay harbour on its voyage to England.

The same night he set out on his return to his plantation. At near
midnight the mail-train from Bombay reaches Eginpoora, at the head of the
famous Bhore ghat. Some refreshment is ordinarily procurable there, but it
is not much of a place. George Martell had had a drink, and was sauntering
moodily up and down the platform waiting for the whistle to sound. As he
passed the second class compartment reserved for ladies he heard a low,
tremulous voice exclaim, "Oh, if I could only make them understand that
I'd give the world for a cup of tea!" George, if uncouth, was a practical
man. His prompt voice rang out, "_Qui hye, ek pyala chah lao!_" Promptly
came the refreshment-room _khitmutghar_, hurrying with the tea; and
George, taking off his hat, begged to know whether he could be of any
further service.

It was a very pleasant face that looked out on him in the moonlight, and
there was more than mere conventionality in the accents in which the
pleasant voice acknowledged his opportune courtesy. Insensibly George and
the lady drifted into conversation. She was very lonely, poor thing; a
friendless girl coming out to be governess in the family of a _burra
sahib_ at Chupra. Now Chupra is only across the Gunduck from Tirhoot, so
George told his new acquaintance they were both going to nearly the same
place, and professed his cordial willingness to assist her on the journey.
He did so, escorting her right into Chupra before he set his face homeward;
and he thenceforth got into a habit of visiting Chupra very frequently.
Need I prolong the story? I happened to be in Bankipore when the Prince of
Wales visited that centre of famine-wallahs. It fell to my pleasant lot to
take Mrs. Martell in to dinner at the Commissioner's hospitable table.
Mrs. Mactavish was sitting opposite; and I went back to my bedroom-tent in
the compound without having made up my mind whether she or Mrs. Martell
was the prettier and the nicer. So you see George Martell did not make
quite so bad a _bandobast_ after all.




THE LUCKNOW OF TO-DAY--1879


It was in Cawnpore on my way up country, during the Prince of Wales's tour
through India, that there were shown to me some curious and interesting
mementoes of the siege of Lucknow. The friend in whose possession they
were was near Havelock as he sat before his tent in the short Indian
twilight, a short time before the advance on Lucknow made by him and
Outram in September 1857. Through the gloom of the falling twilight there
came marching towards the General a file of Highlanders escorting a tall,
gaunt Oude man, on whose swarthy face the lamplight struck as he salaamed
before the General Lord Sahib. Then he extracted from his ear a minute
section of quill sealed at both ends. The General's son opened the strange
envelope forwarded by a postal service so hazardous, and unrolled a morsel
of paper which seemed to be covered with cabalistic signs. The missive had
been sent out from Lucknow by Brigadier Inglis, the commander of the
beleaguered garrison of the Lucknow Residency, and its bearer was the
stanch and daring scout, Ungud. As I write the originals of this
communication and of others which came in the same way lie before me; and
two of those missives in their curious mixture of characters may be found
of interest to readers of to-day.


LUKHNOW, _Septr. 16th._ (Recd. 19th.)

MY DEAR GENERAL--The last letter I recd. from you was dated 24th ult'o,
since when I have rec'd [Greek: no neus] whatever from y'r [Greek: kamp]
or of y'r [Greek: movements] but am now [Greek: dailae expekting] to
receive [Greek: inteligense] of y'r [Greek: advanse] in this [Greek:
direktion]. Since the date of my last letter the enemy have continued to
persevere unceasingly in their efforts against this position & the firing
has never ceased day or night; they have about [Greek: sixten] guns in
position round us--many of them 18 p'rs. On 5th inst. they made a very
determined attack after exploding 2 mines and [Greek: suksaeded] for a
[Greek: moment] in [Greek: almost geting] into one of our [Greek:
bateries], but were eventually repulsed on all sides with heavy loss.
Since the above date they have kept up a cannonade & musketry fire,
occasionally throwing in a shell or two. My [Greek: waeklae loses]
continue very [Greek: hevae] both in [Greek: ophisers] & [Greek: men]. I
shall be quite out of [Greek: rum] for the [Greek: men] in [Greek: eit
dais], but we have been [Greek: living] on [Greek: redused rations] & I
hope to be [Greek: able] to [Greek: get] on [Greek: til] about [Greek:
phirst prox]. If you have not [Greek: relieved] us by [Greek: then] we
shall have [Greek: no meat lepht], as I must [Greek: kaep] some few [Greek:
buloks] to [Greek: move] my [Greek: guns] about the [Greek: positions].
As it is I have had to [Greek: kil] almost all the [Greek: gun buloks],
for my men c'd not [Greek: perphorm] the [Greek: ard work without animal
phood]. There is a report, tho' from a source on which I cannot implicitly
rely, that [Greek: mansing] has just [Greek: arived] in [Greek: luknow]
havg. [Greek: lepht part] of his [Greek: phors outside] the [Greek:
sitae]. It is said that [Greek: he] is in [Greek: our interest] and that
[Greek: he] has [Greek: taken] the [Greek: above step] at the [Greek:
instigation] of B[Greek: riti]sh [Greek: athoritae]. But I cannot say
whether [Greek: su]ch [Greek: be the kase], as all I have to go upon is
[Greek: bazar rumors]. I am [Greek: most anxious] to [Greek: hear] of yr.
[Greek: advanse] to [Greek: enable mae] to [Greek: rae-asure our native
soldiers]. [Footnote: The reader will observe that the words are English,
though the characters are Greek.]--Yours truly,

J. INGLIS, _Brigadier_,

H.M. 32'd Reg't.

To Brig'r Havelock, Commg. Relieving Force.


The other missive is of an earlier date, and was brought out in the same
manner as the first.


_August 16_. (Recd. 23rd August.)

MY DEAR GENERAL--A note from Colonel Tytler to Mr. Gubbins reached last
night, dated "Mungalwar, 4th instant," the latter part of which is as
follows:--"You must [Greek: aid] us in [Greek: everae] way even to cutting
y'r way out if we [Greek: kant phorse our] way in. We have [Greek: onlae a
small phorse]." This has [Greek: kaused mae] much [Greek: uneasiness], as
it is quite [Greek: imposible] with my [Greek: weak] & [Greek: shatered
phorse] that I can [Greek: leave] my [Greek: dephenses]. You must bear in
mind how I am [Greek: hampered], that I have upwards of [Greek: one undred
& twentae-sik wounded], and at the least [Greek: two undred & twenae
women], & about [Greek: two undred] & [Greek: thirtae children], & no
[Greek: kariage] of any [Greek: deskription], besides [Greek: sakriphising
twentae-thrae laks] of [Greek: treasure] & about [Greek: thirtae guns] of
[Greek: sorts]. In consequence of the news rec'd I shall soon put the
[Greek: phorse] on [Greek: alph rations], unless I [Greek: hear phrom]
you. [Greek: Our provisions] will [Greek: last] us [Greek: then] till
[Greek: about] the [Greek: tenth] [Greek: september]. If you [Greek: hope]
to [Greek: save this no time must] be [Greek: lost] in pushing forward. We
are [Greek: dailae] being [Greek: ataked] by the [Greek: enemae], who are
within a few yards of our [Greek: dephenses]. Their [Greek: mines] have
[Greek: alreadae weakened our post], & I have [Greek: everae] [Greek:
reason] to [Greek: believe] that are carrying on [Greek: others]. Their
[Greek: aeteen] [Greeks: pounders] are within 150 yards of [Greek: some
oph our bateries], & [Greek: phrom] their [Greek: positions & [Greek: our
inabilitae] to [Greek: phorm working] [Greek: parties], we [Greek: kanot
repli] to [Greek: them. Thae damage done ourlae] is very [Greek: great].
My [Greek: strength] now in [Greek: europeans] is [Greek: thrae undred] &
[Greek: phiphtae], & about [Greek: thrae hundred natives], & the men
[Greek: dreadphulae] [Greek: harassed], & owing to [Greek: part] of the
[Greek: residensae] having been [Greek: brought down] by [Greek: round
shot] are without [Greek: shelter]. Our [Greek: native] [Greek: phorse]
hav'g been [Greek: asured] on Col. Tytler's authority of y'r [Greek: near]
[Greek: aproach some twentae phive dais ago are naturallae losing
konphidense], [Greek: and iph thae leave] us I do not [Greek: sae how the
dephenses] are to be [Greek: manned]. Did you [Greek: reseive a letter &
plan phrom] the [Greek: man] [Greek: Ungud]?--Kindly answer this
question.--Yours truly,

J. INGLIS, _Brigadier_.

Cawnpore is an engrossing theme, and Bithoor alone would furnish material
for an article; but my present subject is Lucknow, and I must get to it.
There is a railway now to Lucknow from Cawnpore, but the railway bridge
across the Ganges is not yet finished and passengers must cross by the
bridge of boats to the Oude side. Behind me, as the gharry jingles over
the wooden platform, is the fort which Havelock began, which Neill
completed, and in which Windham found the shelter which alone saved him
from utter defeat. Before me is the low Gangetic shore, with the dumpy
sand-hills gradually rising from the water's edge. A few years ago there
used to ride at the head of that noble regiment the 78th Highlanders, a
smooth-faced, gaunt, long-legged, stooping officer on an old white horse.
The Colonel had a voice like a girl and his men irreverently called him
the "old squeaker"; but although you never heard him talk of his deeds he
had a habit of going quietly and steadily to the front, taking fighting
and hardship philosophically as part of the day's work. Those sand-banks
were once the scene of some quiet, unsensational heroism of his. He
commanded the two companies of Highlanders whom Havelock threw on the
unknown shore as the vanguard of his advance into Oude. No prior
reconnaissance was possible. Oude swarmed with an armed and hostile
population. The chances were that an army was hovering but a little way
inland, waiting to attack the head of the column on landing. But it was
necessary to risk all contingencies, and Mackenzie accepted the service as
he might have done an invitation to a glass of grog. In the dead of the
night the boats stood across with the little forlorn hope with which
Havelock essayed to grapple on to Oude. Landing in the rain and darkness,
it was Mackenzie's task to grope for an enemy if there should be one in
his vicinity. There was not; but for four-and-twenty hours his little band
hung on to the Oude bank as it were by their eyelids, detached,
unsupported, and wholly charged with the taking care of themselves until
it was possible to send a reinforcement. The charge of this vague,
uncertain, tentative enterprise, fraught with risks so imminent and so
vast, required a cool, steady-balanced courage of no common order.

"Onao!" shouts the conductor of the train at the first station from
Cawnpore, and we look out on a few railway bungalows and a large native
village apparently in a ruinous state. All this journey is studded with
battlefields, and this is one of them. If I had time I should like to make
a pilgrimage to the street mouth into which dashed frantically Private
Patrick Cavanagh of the 64th, who, stung to madness by the hesitation of
his fellows, was cut to pieces by the tulwars of the mutineers. We jog on
very slowly; the Oude and Rohilcund Railway is to India in point of
slowness what the Great Eastern used to be to us at home; but every yard
of the ground is interesting. Along that high road passed in long,
strangely diversified procession the people whom Clyde brought away from
Lucknow--the civilians, the women, the children, and the wounded of the
immortal garrison. That swell beyond the mango trees under which the _nhil
gau_ are feeding, is Mungalwar, Havelock's menacing position. No wonder
though the outskirts of this town on the high road present a ruined
appearance. It is Busseerutgunge, the scene of three of Havelock's battles
and victories, fought and won in a single fortnight. We pass Bunnee, where
Havelock and Outram tramping on to the relief, fired a royal salute in the
hope that the sound of it might reach to the Residency and cheer the
hearts of its garrison. And now we are on the platform of the Lucknow
station which has more of an English look about it than have most Indian
stations. There is a bookstall, although it is not one of Smith's; and
there are lots of English faces in the crowd waiting the arrival of the
train. The natives, one sees at a glance, are of very different physique
from the people of Bengal. The Oude man is tall, square-shouldered, and
upright; he has more hair on his face than has the Bengali, and his
carriage is that of a free man. The railway station of Lucknow is flanked
by two earthwork fortifications of considerable pretensions.

Lucknow is so full of interest and the objects of interest are so widely
spread that one is in doubt where to begin the pilgrimage. But the
Alumbagh is on the railway side of the canal and therefore nearest; and I
drive directly to it before going into the town. From the station the road
to the Alumbagh turns sharp to the left and the two miles' drive is
through beautiful groves and gardens. Then the plain opens up and there is
the detached temple which so long was one of Outram's outlying pickets;
and to the left of it the square-walled enclosure of the Alumbagh itself
with the four corners flanked by earthen bastions. The top of the wall is
everywhere roughly crenelated for musketry fire, and on two of its faces
there are countless tokens that it has been the target for round shot and
bullets. The Alumbagh in the pre-Mutiny period was a pleasure-garden of
one of the princes of Oude. The enclosed park contained a summer palace
and all the surroundings were pretty and tasteful. It was for the
possession of the Alumbagh that Havelock fought his last battle before the
relief; here it was where he left his baggage and went in; here it was
that Clyde halted to organise the turning movement which achieved the
second relief. Hither were brought from the Dilkoosha the women and
children of the garrison prior to starting on the march for Cawnpore; here
Outram lay threatening Lucknow from Clyde's relief until the latter's
ultimate capture of the city. But these occurrences contribute but
trivially to the interest of the Alumbagh in comparison with the
circumstance that within its enclosure is the grave of Havelock. We enter
the great enclosure under the lofty arch of the castellated gateway. From
this a straight avenue bordered by arbor vitae trees, conducts to a square
plot of ground enclosed by low posts and chains. Inside this there is a
little garden the plants of which a native gardener is watering as we open
the wicket. From the centre of the little garden there rises a shapely
obelisk on a square pedestal and on one side of the pedestal is a long
inscription. "Here lie," it begins, "the mortal remains of Henry
Havelock;" and so, methinks, it might have ended. There is needed no
prolix biographical inscription to tell the reverent pilgrim of the deeds
of the dead man by whose grave he stands--so long as history lives, so
long does it suffice to know that "here lie the mortal remains of Henry
Havelock"--and the text and verse of poetry grate on one as redundancies.
He sickened two days before the evacuation of the Residency and died on
the morning of the 24th of November in his dooly in a tent of the camp at
the Dilkoosha. The life went out of him just as the march began, and his
soldiers conveyed with them, on the litter on which he had expired, the
mortal remains of the chief who had so often led them on to victory.

On the following morning they buried him here in the Alumbagh, under the
tree which still spreads its branches over the little garden in which he
lies. There stood around the grave-mouth Colin Campbell and the chivalrous
Outram, and stanch old Walter Hamilton, and the ever-ready Fraser Tytler;
and the "boy Harry" to whom the campaign had brought the gain of fame and
the loss of a father; and the devoted Harwood with "his heart in the
coffin there with Caesar;" and the heroic William Peel; and that "colossal
red Celt," the noble, ill-fated Adrian Hope, sacrificed afterwards to
incompetent obstinacy. Behind stood in a wide circle the soldiers of the
Ross-shire Buffs and the "Blue Caps" who had served the dead chief so
stanchly, and had gathered here now, with many a memory of his ready
praise of valour and his indefatigable regard for the comfort of his men,
stirring in their war-worn hearts--

  Guarded to a soldier's grave
  By the bravest of the brave,
  He hath gained a nobler tomb
  Than in old cathedral gloom.
  Nobler mourners paid the rite,
  Than the crowd that craves a sight;
  England's banners o'er him waved,
  Dead he keeps the name he saved.

The burial-place was being temporarily abandoned, and as the rebels
desecrated all the graves they could discover it was necessary to
obliterate as much as possible the tokens of the interment. A big "H" was
carved into the bark of the tree and a small tin plate fastened to its
trunk, to guide to the subsequent investigation of the spot. Dr. Russell
tells us that when he visited the Alumbagh before his return home after
the mutiny in Oude was stamped out, he found the hero's grave a muddy
trench near the foot of a tree which bore the mark of a round shot and had
carved into its bark the letter "H." The tree is here still and the dent
of the round shot, and faintly too is to be discerned the carved letter
but the bark around it seems to have been whittled away, perhaps by the
sacrilegious knives of relic-seeking visitors. There is the grave of a
young lieutenant in a corner of the little garden and a few private
soldiers lie hard by.

I turn my face now toward the Charbagh bridge, following the route taken
by Havelock's force on the 25th of September--the memorable day of the
relief. There is the field where, as at a table in the open air Havelock
and Outram were studying a map, a round shot from the Sepoy battery by the
Yellow House ricochetted between them. There is the spot where stood the
Yellow House itself, whence after a desperate struggle Maude's
artillerymen drove the Sepoy garrison and its guns. Presently with a sweep
the road comes into a direct line with the Charbagh bridge over the canal.
Now there is not a house in the vicinity; the Charbagh garden has been
thrown into the plain and the steep banks of the canal are perfectly
naked. But then the scene was very different. On the Lucknow side the
native city came close up to the bridge and lined the canal. The tall
houses to right and left of the bridge on the Lucknow side were full of
men with firearms. At that end of the bridge there was a regular
overlapping breastwork, and behind it rose an earthwork battery solidly
constructed and armed with five guns, one a 42-pounder, all crammed to the
muzzle with grape. Let us sit down on the parapet and try to realise the
scene. Outram with the 78th has made a detour to the right through the
Charbagh garden to clear it of the enemy, and, gaining the canal bank, to
bring a flanking fire to bear on its defenders. There is only room for two
of Maude's guns; and there they stand out in the open on the road trying
to answer the fire of the rebel battery. Thrown forward along the bank to
the left of the bridge is a company of the Madras Fusiliers under Arnold,
lying down and returning the musketry fire from the houses on the other
side. Maude's guns are forward in the straight throat of the road where it
leads on to the bridge close by, but round the bend under cover of the
wall the Madras Fusiliers are lying down. In a bay of the wall of the
Charbagh enclosure General Neill is standing waiting for the effect of
Outram's flank movement to develop, and young Havelock, mounted, is on the
other side of the road somewhat forward. Matters are at a deadlock. It
seems as if Outram had lost his way. Maude's gunners are all down; he has
repeatedly called for volunteers from the infantry behind, and now his
gallant subaltern, Maitland, is doing bombardier's work. Maude calls to
young Havelock that he shall be forced to retire his guns if something is
not done at once; and Havelock rides across through the fire and in his
capacity as assistant adjutant-general urges on Neill the need for an
immediate assault. Neill "is not in command; he cannot take the
responsibility; and General Outram must turn up soon." Havelock turns and
rides away down the road towards the rear. As he passes he speaks
encouragingly to the recumbent Fusiliers, who are getting fidgety at the
long detention under fire. "Come out of that, sir," cried one soldier, "a
chap's just had his head taken off there!" It is a grim joke that reply
which tickles the Fusiliers into laughter: "And what the devil are we here
for but to get our heads taken off?" Young Havelock is bent on the
perpetration of what, under the circumstances, may be called a pious
fraud. His father, who commands the operations, is behind with the
Reserve, and he disappears round the bend on the make-belief of getting
instructions from the chief. The General is far in the rear but his son
comes back at the gallop, rides up to Neill, and saluting with his sword,
says, "You are to carry the bridge at once, sir." Neill, acquiescing in
the superior order, replies, "Get the regiment together then, and see it
formed up." At the word and without waiting for the regiment to rise and
form the gallant and eager Arnold springs up from his advanced position
and dashes on to the bridge, followed by about a dozen of his nearest
skirmishers. Tytler and Havelock, as eager as Arnold, set spurs to their
horses and are by his side in a moment. The brave and ardent 84th,
commanded by Willis, dashes to the front. Then the hurricane opens. The
big gun crammed to the muzzle with grape, sweeps its iron sleet across the
bridge in the face of the gallant band, and the Sepoy sharpshooters
converge their fire on it. Arnold drops shot through both thighs, Tytler's
horse goes down with a crash, the bridge is swept clear save for young
Havelock erect and unwounded, waving his sword and shouting for the
Fusiliers to come on, and a Fusilier corporal, Jakes by name, who, as he
rams a bullet home into his Enfield, says cheerily to Havelock, "We'll
soon have the ---- out of that, sir!" And corporal Jakes is a true
prophet. Before the big gun can be loaded again the stormers are on the
bridge in a rushing mass. They are across it, they clear the barricade,
they storm the battery, they are bayoneting the Sepoy gunners as they
stand. The Charbagh bridge is won, but with severe loss which continues
more or less all the way to the Residency; and when one comes to know the
ground it becomes more and more obvious that the strategy of Havelock,
overruled by Outram, was wise and prescient, when he counselled a wide
turning movement by the Dilkoosha, over the Goomtee near the Martiniere,
and so along its northern bank to the Badshah-bagh, almost opposite to the
Residency and commanding the iron bridge.

I recross the Charbagh bridge and bend away to the left by the byroad
along the canal side by which the 78th Highlanders penetrated to the front
of the Kaiser-bagh. Most of the native houses are now destroyed, whence
was poured so deadly a fire on the advancing Ross-shire men that three
colour-bearers fell in succession, and the colour fell to the grasp of the
gallant Valentine McMaster, the assistant-surgeon of the regiment. And now
I stand in front of the main entrance to the Kaiser-bagh, hard by the spot
where stood the Sepoy battery which the Highlanders so opportunely took in
reverse. Before me on the _maidan_ is the plain monument to Sir
Mountstuart Jackson, Captain Orr, and a sergeant, who were murdered in the
Kaiser-bagh when the success of Campbell's final operations became
certain. I enter the great square enclosure of the Kaiser-bagh and stand
in the desolation of what was once a gay garden where the King of Oude and
his women were wont to disport themselves. The place stands much as
Campbell's men left it after looting its multifarious rich treasures. The
dainty little pavilions are empty and dilapidated, the statues are broken
and tottering. Quitting the Kaiser-bagh, I try to realise the scene of
that informal council of war in one of the outlying courtyards of the
numerous palaces. I want to fix the spot where on his big waler sat
Outram, a splash of blood across his face, and his arm in a sling; where
Havelock, dismounted, walked up and down by Outram's side with short,
nervous strides, halting now and then to give emphasis to the argument,
while all around them were officers, soldiers, guns, natives, wounded men,
bullocks, and a surging tide of disorganisation momentarily pouring into
the square. But the attempt is fruitless. The whole area has been cleared
of buildings right up to the gate of the Residency, only that hard by the
Goomtee there still stands the river wing of the Chutter Munzil Palace
with its fantastic architecture, and that the palace of the King of Oude
is now the station library and assembly rooms. The Hureen Khana, the
Lalbagh, the courts of the Furrut Bux Palace, the Khas Bazaar, and the
Clock Tower have alike been swept away, and in their place there opens up
before the eye trim ornamental grounds with neat plantations which extend
up to the Baileyguard itself. One archway alone stands--a gaunt
commemorative skeleton--a pedestal for the statue of a noble soldier. It
was from a chamber above the crown of this arch that the sepoy shot Neill
as he sat on his horse urging the confused press of guns and men through
the archway. The spot is memorable for other causes. This archway led into
that court which is world-famous under the name of Dhooly Square. Here it
was that the native bearers abandoned the wounded in the doolies which
poor Bensley Thornhill was trying to guide into the Residency; here it was
where they were butchered and burned as they lay, and here it was where
Dr. Home and a handful of men of the escort did what in them lay to cover
the wounded and defended themselves for a day and a night against
continuous attacks of countless enemies.

The _via dolorosa_, the road of death up which Outram and Havelock fought
their way with Brazier's Sikhs and the Ross-shire Buffs, is now a pleasant
open drive amid clumps of trees, leading on to the Residency. A strange
thrill runs through one's frame as there opens up before one that
reddish-gray crumbling archway spanning the roadway into the Residency
grounds. Its face is dented and splintered with cannon-shot and pitted all
over by musket-bullets. This is none other than that historic Baileyguard
gate which burly Jock Aitken and his faithful Sepoys kept so stanchly. You
may see the marks still of the earth banked up against it on the interior
during the siege. To the right and left runs the low wall which was the
curtain of the defence, now crumbled so as to be almost indistinguishable.
But there still stands, retired somewhat from the right of the archway,
Aitken's post--the guard-house and treasury, its pillars and facade cut
and dented all over with the marks of bullets fired by "Bob the Nailer"
and his comrades from the Clock Tower which stood over against it. And in
the curtain wall between the archway and the building is still to be
traced the faint outline of the embrasure through which Outram and
Havelock entered on the memorable evening. The turmoil and din and
conflicting emotions of that terrible, glorious day have merged into a
strange serenity of quietude. The scene is solitary, save for a native
woman who is playing with her baby on a spot where once dead bodies lay in
heaps. But the other older scene rises up vividly before the mind's eye
out of the present calm. Havelock and Outram and the staff have passed
through the embrasure here, and now there are rushing in the men of the
ranks, powder-grimed, dusty, bloody; but a minute before raging with the
stern passion of the battle, now full of a woman-like tenderness. And all
around them as they swarm in there crowd a mass of folk eager to give
welcome. There are officers and men of the garrison, civilians whom the
siege has made into soldiers; women, too, weeping tears of joy down on the
faces of the children for whom they had not dared to hope for aught but
death. There are gaunt men, pallid with loss of blood, whose great eyes
shine weirdly amid the torchlight and whose thin hands tremble with
weakness as they grip the sinewy, grimy hands of the Highlanders. These
are the wounded of the long siege who have crawled out from the hospital
up yonder, as many of them as could compass the exertion, with a welcome
to their deliverers. The hearts of the impulsive Highlanders wax very
warm. As they grasp the hands held out to them they exclaim, "God bless
you!" "Why, we expected to have found only your bones!" "And the children
are living too!" and many other fervid and incoherent ejaculations. The
ladies of the garrison come among the Highlanders, shaking them
enthusiastically by the hand; and the children clasp the shaggy men round
the neck, and to say truth, so do some of the mothers. But Jessie Dunbar
and her "Dinna ye hear it?" in reference to the bagpipe music, are in the
category of melodramatic fictions.

The position which bears and will bear to all time the title of the
Residency of Lucknow, is an elevated plateau of land, irregular in
surface, of which the highest point is occupied by the Residency building,
while the area around was studded irregularly with buildings, chiefly the
houses of the principal civilian officials of the station. When Campbell
brought away the garrison in November 1857 it lapsed into the hands of the
mutineers, who held it till his final occupation of the city and its
surroundings in March of the following year. They pulled down not a few of
the already shattered buildings, and left their fell imprint on the spot
in an atrociously ghastly way by desecrating the graves in which brave
hands had laid our dead country-people and flinging the exhumed corpses
into the Goomtee. When India once more became settled the Residency, its
commemorative features uninterfered with, was laid out as a garden and
flowers and shrubs now grow on soil once wet with the blood of heroes. The
_debris_ has been removed or dispersed; the shattered buildings are
prevented from crumbling farther; tablets bearing the names of the
different positions and places of interest are let into the walls; and it
is possible, by exploring the place map in hand, to identify all the
features of the defence. The avenue from the Baileyguard gate rises with a
steep slope to the Residency building. On either side of the approach and
hard by the gate, are the blistered and shattered remnants of two large
houses; that on the right is the banqueting house which was used as the
hospital during the siege; that on the left was Dr. Fayrer's house. The
banqueting house is a mere shell, riven everywhere with shot and pitted
over by musket-bullets as if it had suffered from smallpox. The
ground-floor has escaped with less damage but the banqueting hall itself
has been wholly wrecked by the persistent fire which the rebels showered
upon it, and to which, notwithstanding the mattresses and sandbags with
which the windows were blocked, several poor fellows fell victims as they
lay wounded on their cots. Dr. Fayrer's house is equally a battered ruin.
In its first floor, roofless and forlorn, its front torn open by shot and
the pillars of its windows jagged into fantastic fragments, is the veranda
in which Sir Henry Lawrence, 4th July 1857, died, exposed to fire to the
very last. At the top of the slope of the avenue and on the left front of
the Residency building as we approach it--on what, indeed, was once the
lawn--has been raised an artificial mound, its slopes covered with
flowering shrubs, its summit bearing the monumental obelisk on the
pedestal of which is the terse, appropriate inscription: "In memory of
Major-General Sir Henry Lawrence and the brave men who fell in defence of
the Residency. _Si monumentum quaeris Circumspice!_" Beyond this lies the
scathed and blighted ruin of the Residency House, once a large and
imposing structure, now so utterly wrecked and shivered that one wonders
how the crumbling reddish-gray walls are kept erect. The veranda was
battered down and much of the front of the building lies bodily open, the
structure being supported on the battered and distorted pillars assisted
by great balks of wood. Entering by the left wing I pass down a winding
stair into the bowels of the earth till I reach the spacious and lofty
vaults or _tykhana_ under the building. Here, the place affording
comparative safety, lived immured the women of the garrison, the soldiers'
wives, half-caste females, the wives of the meaner civilians and their
children. The poor creatures were seldom allowed to come up to the
surface, lest they should come in the way of the shot which constantly
lacerated the whole area, and few visitors were allowed access to them.
Veritably they were in a dungeon. Provisions were lowered down to them
from the window orifices near the roof of the vaulting, and there were
days when the firing was so heavy that orders were given to them not even
to rise from their beds on the floor. For shot occasionally found a way
even into the _tykhana_; you may see the holes it made in penetrating. The
miserables were billeted off ten in a room, and there they lived, without
sweepers, baths, dhobies, or any of the comforts which the climate makes
necessities. Here in these dungeons children were born, only for the most
part to die. Ascending another staircase I pass through some rooms in
which lived (and died) some of the ladies of the garrison, and passing
from the left wing by a shattered corridor am able to look up into the
room in which Sir Henry Lawrence received his death-wound. Access to it is
impossible by reason of the tottering condition of the structure; and
turning away I clamber up the worn staircase in the shot-riven tower on
the summit of which still stands the flagstaff on which were hoisted the
signals with which the garrison were wont to communicate with the
Alumbagh. The walls of the staircase and the flat roof of the tower are
scratched and written all over with the names of visitors; many of the
names are those of natives, but more are those of British soldiers, who
have occasionally added a piece of their mind in characteristically strong
language.

I set out on a pilgrimage under the still easily traceable contour of the
intrenchment. Passing "Sam Lawrence's Battery" above what was the
water-gate, I traverse the projecting tongue at the end of which stood the
"Redan Battery" whose fire swept the river face up to the iron bridge.
Returning, and passing the spot where "Evans's Battery" stood, I find
myself in the churchyard in a slight depression of the ground. Of the
church, which was itself a defensive post, not one stone remains on
another and the mutineers hacked to pieces the ground of the churchyard.
The ground is now neatly enclosed and ornamentally planted and is studded
with many monuments, few of which speak the truth when they profess to
cover the dust of those whom they commemorate. There are the regimental
monuments of the 5th Madras Fusiliers, the 84th (360 men besides
officers), the Royal Artillery, the 90th (a long list of officers and 271
men). The monument of the 1st Madras Fusiliers bears the names of Neill,
Stephenson, Renaud, and Arnold, and commemorates a loss of 352 men. There
is a monument to Mr. Polehampton the exemplary chaplain, and hard by a
plain slab bears the inscription, "Here lies Henry Lawrence, who tried to
do his duty; may the Lord have mercy on his soul!" words dictated by
himself on his deathbed. Other monuments commemorate Captain Graham of the
Bengal Cavalry and two children; Mr. Fairhurst the Roman Catholic chaplain;
Major Banks; Captain Fulton of the 32nd who earned the title of "Defender
of Lucknow;" Lucas, the travelling Irish gentleman who served as a
volunteer and fell in the last sortie; Captain Becher; Captain Moorsom;
poor Bensley Thornhill and his young daughter; "Mrs. Elizabeth Arne, burnt
with a shell-ball during the siege;" Lieutenant Cunliffe; Mr. Ommaney the
Judicial Commissioner; and others. The nameless hillocks of poor Jack
Private are plentiful, for here were buried many of those who fell in the
final capture; and there are children's graves. Interments take place
still. I saw a freshly-made grave; but only those are entitled to a last
resting-place here who were among the beleaguered during the long defence.
I have seen the medal for the defence of Lucknow on the breast of a man
who was a child in arms at the time of the siege, and such an one would
have the right to claim interment in this doubly hallowed ground. From the
churchyard I pass out along the narrow neck to that forlorn-hope post,
"Innes's Garrison," and along the western face of the intrenchment by the
sides of the sheep-house and the slaughter-house, to Gubbins's post. The
mere foundations of the house are visible which the stout civilian so
gallantly defended, and the famous tree, gradually pruned to a mere stump
by the enemy's fire, is no longer extant. Along the southern face of the
position there are no buildings which are not ruined. Sikh Square, the
Brigade Mess House, and the Martiniere boys' post, are alike represented
by fragmentary gray walls shivered with shot and shored up here and there
by beams. The rooms of the Begum Kothi near the centre of the position,
are still laterally entire but roofless. The walls of this structure are
exceptionally thick and here many of the ladies of the garrison were
quartered. All around the Residency position the native houses which at
the time of the siege crowded close up on the intrenchment, are now
destroyed; and indeed the native town has been curtailed into
comparatively small dimensions and is entirely separated from the area in
which the houses of the station are built.

Quitting the Residency I drive westward by the river side, over the site
of the Captan Bazaar, past also that huge fortified heap the Muchee Bawn,
till I reach the beautiful enclosure in which the great Imambara stands.
This majestic structure--part temple, part convent, part palace, and now
part fortress--dominates the whole _terrain_, and from its lofty flat roof
one looks down on the plain where the weekly _hat_ or market is being
held, on the gardens and mansions across the river, and southward upon the
dense mass of houses which constitute the native city. Sentries promenade
the battlements of the Muchee Bawn, and the Imambara--an apartment to
which for space and height I know none in Europe comparable--is now used
as an arsenal, where are stored the great siege guns which William Peel
plied with so great skill and gallantry. Just outside the Imambara, on the
edge of the _maidan_ between it and the Moosabagh, I come on a little
railed churchyard where rest a few British soldiers who fell during Lord
Clyde's final operations in this direction. Then, with a sweep across the
plain to the south and by a slight ascent, I reach the gate of the city
which opens into the Chowk or principal street--the street traversed in
disguise by the dauntless Kavanagh when he went out from the garrison to
convey information and afford guidance to Sir Colin Campbell on his first
advance. The gatehouse is held by a strong force of native policemen,
armed as if they were soldiers; and as I pass the guard I stand in the
Chowk itself, in the midst of a throng of gaily clad male pedestrians,
women in chintz trousers, laden donkeys, multitudinous children, and still
more multitudinous stinks. All down both sides the fronts of the lower
stories are open, and in the recesses sit merchants displaying paltry
jewelry, slippers, pipes, turban cloths, and Manchester stuffs of the
gaudiest patterns. The main street of Lucknow has been called "The Street
of Silver," but I could find little among its jewelry either of silver or
of gold. The first floors all have balconies, and on these sit draped,
barefooted women of Rahab's profession. The women of Lucknow are fairer
and handsomer, and the men bolder and more stalwart, than those in Bengal,
and it takes no great penetration to discern that Lucknow is still ruled
by fear and not by love.

It remained for me still to investigate the scenes of the route by which
Lord Clyde came in on both his advances; but to do justice to these would
demand separate articles. Let me begin the hasty sketch at the Dilkoosha
Palace, two miles and more away to the east of the Residency; for on both
occasions the Dilkoosha was Clyde's base. Wajid Ali's twenty-foot wall has
now given place to an earthen embankment surrounding a beautiful pleasure
park, and there are now smooth green slopes instead of the dense forest
through which Clyde's soldiers marched on their turning movement. On a
swell in the midst of the park, commanding a view of the fantastic
architecture of the Martiniere down by the tank, stands the gaunt ruin of
the once trim and dainty Dilkoosha Palace or rather garden-house. From one
of the pepper-box turrets up there Lord Clyde directed the attack on the
Martiniere on his ultimate operation; and here it was that, as Dr. Russell
tells us, a round shot dispersed his staff on the adjacent leads. After
quietude was restored the Dilkoosha was the headquarters for a time of Sir
Hope Grant, but now it has been allowed to fall into decay although the
garden in the rear of it is prettily kept up. On the reverse slope behind
the Dilkoosha was the camp in one of the tents of which Havelock died. We
drive down the gentle slope once traversed at a rushing double by the
Black Watch on their way to carry the Martiniere, past the great tank out
of the centre of which rises the tall column to the memory of Claude
Martine, and reach the entrance of the fantastic building which he built,
in which he was buried, and which bears his name. We see at the angle of
the northern wing the slope up which the gun was run which played so
heavily on the Dilkoosha up on the wooded knoll there. The Martiniere is
now, as it was before the Mutiny, a college for European boys, and the
young fellows are playing on the terraces. Grotesque stone statues are in
niches and along the tops of the balconies; you may see on them the marks
of the bullets which the honest fellows of the Black Watch fired at them,
taking them for Pandies. I go down into a vault and see the tomb of Claude
Martine; but it is empty, for the mutineers desecrated his grave and
scattered his bones to the winds of heaven. Then I make for the roof,
through the dormitories of the boys and past fantastic stone griffins and
lions and Gorgons, till I reach the top of the tower and touch the
flagstaff from which, during the relief time, was given the answering
signal to that hoisted on the tower of the Residency. I stand in the
niches where the mutineer marksmen used to sit with their hookahs and take
pot shots at the Dilkoosha. I look down to the eastward on the Goomtee,
and note the spot where Outram crossed on that flank movement which would
have been very much more successful than it was had he been permitted to
drive it home. To the north-east beyond the topes is the battle-ground of
Chinhut, where Lawrence received so terrible a reverse at the beginning of
the siege. Due north is the Kookrail viaduct which Outram cleared with the
Rifles and the 79th, and in whose vicinity Jung Bahadour, the crafty and
bloodthirsty generalissimo of Nepaul, "co-operated" by a demonstration
which never became anything more. And to the west there lie stretched out
before me the domes, minarets, and spires of Lucknow, rising above the
foliage in which their bases are hidden, and the routes of Clyde in the
relief and capture. The rays of the afternoon sun are stirring into colour
the dusky gray of the Secunderbagh and of the Nuddun Rusool, or "Grave of
the Prophet," used as a powder magazine by the rebels. Below me, on the
lawn of the Martiniere, is the big gun--one of Claude Martine's casting--
which did the rebels so much service at the other angle of the Martiniere
and which was spiked at last by two men of Peel's naval brigade, who swam
the Goomtee for the purpose. That little enclosure slightly to the left
surrounds "all that can die" of that strange mixture of high spirit, cool
daring, and weak principle, the famous chief of Hodson's Horse. By
Hodson's side lies Captain da Costa of the 56th N.I., attached to
Brazier's Sikhs. Of this officer is told that, having lost many relatives
in the butchery of Cawnpore, he joined the regiment likeliest to be in the
front of the Lucknow fighting, and fell by one of the first shots fired in
the assault on the Kaiser-bagh.

Descending from the Martiniere tower I traverse the park to the westward
passing the grave of Captain Otway Mayne, cross the dry canal along which
are still visible the heaps of earth which mark the stupendous first line
of the rebels' defences, and bending to the left reach the Secunderbagh.
This famous place was a pleasure garden surrounded with a lofty wall with
turrets at the angles and a castellated gateway. The interior garden is
now waste and forlorn, the rank grass growing breast-high in the corners
where the slaughter was heaviest. Here in this little enclosure, not half
the size of the garden of Bedford Square, 2000 Sepoys died the death at
the hands of the 93rd, the 53rd, and the 4th Punjaubees. Their common
grave is under the low mound on the other side of the road. The loopholes
stand as they were left by the mutineers when our fellows came bursting in
through the ragged breach made in the reverse side from the main entrance
by Peel's guns. Farther on--that is, nearer to the Residency--I come to
the Shah Nujeef, with its strong exterior wall enclosing the domed temple
in its centre. It is still easy to trace the marks of the breach made in
the angle in the wall by Peel's battering guns, and the tree is still
standing up which Salmon, Southwell, and Harrison climbed in response to
his proffer of the Victoria Cross. Opposite the Shah Nujeef white girls
are playing on the lawn of that castellated building, for the Koorsheyd
Munzil, on the top of which there was hoisted the British flag in the face
of a _feu d'enfer_, is now a seminary for the daughters of Europeans. A
little beyond, on the plain in front of the Motee Mahal, is the spot where
Campbell met Outram and Havelock--a spot which, methinks, might well be
marked by a monument; and after this I lose my reckoning by reason of the
extent of the demolition, and am forced to resort to guesswork as to the
precise localities.




THE MILITARY COURAGE OF ROYALTY


Writing of the late Alexander III. of Russia, a foreign author has
recently permitted himself to observe: "Marvellous personal courage is not
a striking characteristic of the dynasty of the Romanoffs as it was of the
English Tudors." It will be conceded that periods materially govern the
conditions under which sovereigns and their royal relatives have found
opportunities for proving their personal courage. The Tudor dynasty had
ended before the Romanoff dynasty began. It is true, indeed, that the
ending of the former with the death of Elizabeth in 1603 occurred only a
few years before the foundation of the latter by the election to the
Tzarship of Michael Feodorovitz Romanoff in 1612. But of the five
sovereigns of the Tudor dynasty it happened that only one, Henry VII., the
first monarch of that dynasty, found or made an opportunity for the
display of marked--scarcely perhaps of "marvellous"--personal courage; and
thus the selection of the Tudor dynasty by the writer referred to as
furnishing a contrasting illustration in the matter of personal courage to
that of the Romanoffs was not particularly fortunate. Henry VIII. was only
once in action; he shared in the skirmish known as the "Battle of the
Spurs," because of the precipitate flight of the French horse. Edward VI.
died at the age of sixteen, and the two remaining sovereigns of the
dynasty were women, of whom it is true that Elizabeth was a strong and
vigorous ruler, but in the nature of things had no opportunity for showing
"marvellous personal courage." Henry VII. literally found his crown in the
heart of the _melee_ on Bosworth field, it matters not which of the
alternative stories is correct, that he himself killed Richard, or that
Richard was killed in the act of striking him a desperate blow. But Henry
at Bosworth in 1485 still belonged to the days of chivalry--to an era in
which monarchs were also armour-clad knights, who headed charges in person
and gave and took with spear, sword, and battle-axe. Long before Peter the
Great, more than two centuries after Bosworth, foamed at the mouth with
rage and hacked with his sword at his panicstricken troops fleeing from
the field of Narva on that winter day of 1700, the face of warfare had
altered and the _metier_ of the commander, were he sovereign or were he
subject, had undergone a radical change.

Of a family of the human race it is not rationally possible to predicate a
typical generic characteristic of mind. A physical trait will endure down
the generations, as witness the Hapsburg lip and the swarthy complexion of
the Finch-Hattons, in the face of alliances from outside the races; but,
save as regards one exception, there is no assurance of a continuous
inheritance of mental attributes. What a contrast is there between
Frederick the Great and his father; between George III. and his successor;
between the present Emperor of Austria and his hapless son; between the
genial, wistful, and well-intentioned Alexander II. of Russia and the not
less well-intentioned but narrow-minded and despotic sovereign who
succeeded him! But there may be reserved one exception to the absence of
assurance of inherited mental attributes--one mental feature in which
identity takes the place of dissimilarity, and even of actual contrast.
And that feature--that inherited characteristic of a race whose
progenitors happily possessed it--is personal courage.

Take, for example, the Hohenzollerns. One need not hark back to Carlyle's
original Conrad, the seeker of his fortune who tramped down from the
ancestral cliff-castle on his way to take service under Barbarossa. Before
and since the "Grosse Kurfurst" there has been no Hohenzollern who has not
been a brave man. He himself was the hero of Fehrbellin. His son, the
first king of the line, Carlyle's "Expensive Herr," was "valiant in
action" during the third war of Louis XIV. The rugged Frederick William,
father of Frederick the Great, had his own tough piece of war against the
volcanic Charles XII. of Sweden and did a stout stroke of hard fighting at
Malplaquet. Of Fritz himself the world has full note. Bad, sensual,
debauched Hohenzollern as was his successor, Frederick the Fat, he had
fought stoutly in his youth-time under his illustrious uncle. His son,
Frederick William III., overthrown by Napoleon who called him a
"corporal," did good soldierly work in the "War of Liberation" and fought
his way to Paris in 1814. His eldest son, Frederick William IV., the
vague, benevolent dreamer whom _Punch_ used to call "King Clicquot" and
who died of softening of the brain, even he, too, as a lad had
distinguished himself in the "War of Liberation" and in the fighting
during the subsequent advance on Paris. As for grand old William I., the
real maker of the German Empire on the _quid facit per alium facit per se_
axiom, he died a veteran of many wars. He was not seventeen when he won
the Iron Cross by a service of conspicuous gallantry under heavy fire. He
took his chances in the bullet and shell fire at Koeniggraetz, and again on
the afternoon of Gravelotte. Not a Hohenzollern of them all but shared as
became their race in the dangers of the great war of 1870-71; even Prince
George, the music composer, the only non-soldier of the family, took the
field. William's noble son, whose premature death neither Germany nor
England has yet ceased to deplore, took the lead of one army; his nephew
Prince Frederick Charles, a great commander and a brilliant soldier, was
the leader of another. One of his brothers, Prince Albert the elder, made
the campaign as cavalry chief; whose son, Prince Albert junior, now a
veteran Field-Marshal, commanded a brigade of guard-cavalry with a skill
and daring not wholly devoid of recklessness. Another brother, Prince
Charles, the father of the "Red Prince," made the campaign with the royal
headquarters; Prince Adalbert, a cousin of the sovereign and head of the
Prussian Navy, had his horse shot under him on the battlefield of
Gravelotte.

The trait of personal courage has markedly characterised the House of
Hanover. As King of England George I. did no fighting, but before he
reached that position he had distinguished himself in war not a little;
against the Danes and Swedes in 1700 and in high command in the war of the
Spanish succession from 1701 to 1709. His successor, while yet young, had
displayed conspicuous valour in the battle of Oudenarde, and later in life
at Dettingen; and he was the last British monarch who took part in actual
warfare. Cumberland had no meritorious attribute save that of personal
courage, but that virtue in him was undeniable. At Dettingen he was
wounded in the forefront of the battle; at Fontenoy the "martial boy" was
ever in the heart of the fiercest fire, fighting at "a spiritual white
heat." His grand-nephew the Duke of York was an unfortunate soldier, but
his personal courage was unquestioned. In the present reign a cousin and a
son of the sovereign have done good service in the field; and that
venerable lady herself in situations of personal danger has consistently
maintained the calm courage of her race.

The foreign author has written that "marvellous personal courage is not
the striking characteristic of the dynasty of the Romanoffs." He makes an
exception to this quasi-indictment in favour of the Emperor Nicholas, who,
he admits, "was absolutely ignorant of fear, and could face a band of
insurgents with the calm self-possession of a shepherd surveying his
bleating sheep." The monarch who at the moment of his accession
illustrated the dominant force of his character by confronting amid the
bullet fire the ferocious mutiny of half an army corps, and who crushed
the bloodthirsty _emeute_ with dauntless resolution and iron hand; the man
who, facing the populace of St. Petersburg crazed with terror of the
cholera and red with the blood of slaughtered physicians, quelled its
panic-fury by commanding the people in the sternest tones of his sonorous
voice to kneel in the dust and propitiate by prayers the wrath of the
Almighty--such a man is scarcely, perhaps, adequately characterised by the
expressions which have been quoted. But setting aside this instance of the
fearlessness of Nicholas, facts appear to refute pretty conclusively
reflections on the personal courage of the Romanoffs. No purpose can be
served by cumbering the record by going back into the period of Russia's
semi-civilisation; illustrations from three generations may reasonably
suffice. At Austerlitz Alexander I. was close up to the fighting line in
the Pratzen section of that great battle, and so recklessly did he expose
himself that the report spread rearward that he had fallen. He was riding
with Moreau in the heart of the bloody turmoil before Dresden when a
French cannon-ball mortally wounded the renegade French general, and he
was splashed by the latter's blood. Moreau had insisted on riding on the
outside, else the ball which caused his death would certainly have struck
Alexander. That monarch participated actively and forwardly in most of the
battles of the campaign of 1814 which culminated in the allied occupation
of Paris. Marmont's bullets were still flying when he rode on to the hill
of Belleville and looked down through the smoke of battle on the French
capital. The captious foreign writer has admitted that Nicholas, the
successor of Alexander, was "absolutely ignorant of fear," and I have
cited a convincing instance of his "marvellous personal courage." Two of
his sons--the Grand Dukes Nicholas and Michael--were under fire in the
battle of Inkerman and shared for some time the perils of the siege of
Sevastopol. Alexander II. was certainly a man of real, although quiet and
undemonstrative, personal courage. But for his disregard of the
precautions by which the police sought to surround him he probably would
have been alive to-day. The Third Section was wholly unrepresented in
Bulgaria and His Majesty's protection on campaign consisted merely of a
handful of Cossacks. No cordon of sentries surrounded his simple camp; his
tent at Pavlo and the dilapidated Turkish house which for weeks was his
residence at Gorni Studen were alike destitute of any guards. The imperial
Court of Russia is said to be the most punctiliously ceremonious of all
courts; in the field the Tzar absolutely dispensed with any sort of
ceremony. He dined with his suite and staff at a frugal table in a spare
hospital marquee; his guests, the foreign attaches and any passing
officers or strangers who happened to be in camp. When he drove out his
escort consisted of a couple of Cossacks. In the woods about Biela at the
beginning of the war there still remained some forlorn bivouacs of Turkish
families; he would alight and visit those, his sole companion the
aide-de-camp on duty; and would fearlessly venture among the sullen Turks
all of whom were armed with deadly weapons, try to persuade them to return
to their homes, and, unmoved by their refusal, promise to send them food
and medicine. Dispensing with all etiquette he would see without delay any
one coming in with tidings from fighting points, were he officer,
civilian, or war correspondent. During the September attack on Plevna he
was continually in the field while daylight lasted, looking out on the
slaughter from an eminence within range of the Turkish cannon-fire, and
manifestly enduring keen anguish at the spectacle of the losses sustained
by his brave, patient troops. Later, during the investment of Plevna, his
point of observation was a redoubt on the Radischevo ridge still closer to
the Turkish front of fire, and it was thence he witnessed the surrender of
Osman's army on the memorable 10th December 1877. If Alexander was
fearless alike in camp and in the field on campaign, he was certainly not
less so in St. Petersburg, when he returned thither after the fall of
Plevna.

Alexander II. literally sacrificed his life to his self-regardless concern
for the suffering. After the first bomb had burst on the Alexandra Canal
Road, striking down civilians and Cossacks of the following escort but
leaving the Emperor unhurt, his coachman begged to be allowed to dash
forward and get clear of danger. But Alexander forbade him with the words,
"No, no! I must alight and see to the wounded;" and as he was carrying out
his heroic and benign intention, the second bomb exploded and wrought his
death.

As did the men of the Hohenzollern house in 1870, so in 1877 the adult
male Romanoffs went to the war with scarce an exception. The Grand Duke
Nicholas, brother of the Emperor and Commander-in-Chief of the Russian
armies in Europe, was neither a great general nor an honest man; but there
could be no question as to his personal courage. That attribute he evinced
with utter recklessness when arriving, as was his wont, too late for a
deliberate and careful survey, he galloped round the Turkish positions on
the morning on which began the September bombardment of Plevna, in
proximity to Turkish cannon-fire so dangerous that his staff remonstrated,
and that even the sedate American historian of the war speaks of him as
having "exposed himself imprudently to the Turkish pickets." His son, the
Grand Duke Nicholas, jun., in 1877 scarcely of age, was nevertheless a
keen practical soldier, imbued with the wisdom of getting to close
quarters and staying there. He was among the first to cross the Danube at
Sistova under the Turkish fire, and he fought with great gallantry under
Mirsky in the Schipka Pass. The brothers, Prince Nicholas and Prince
Eugene of Leuchtenberg, members of the imperial house, commanded each a
cavalry brigade in Gourko's dashing raid across the Balkans at the
beginning of the campaign, and both were conspicuous for soldierly skill
and personal gallantry in the desperate fighting in the Tundja Valley. The
Grand Duke Vladimir, the second brother of Alexander III., headed the
infantry advance in the direction of Rustchuk, and served with marked
distinction in command of one of the corps in the army of the Lom. A
younger brother, the Grand Duke Alexis, the nautical member of the
imperial family, had charge of the torpedo and subaqueous mining
operations on the Danube, and was held to have shown practical skill,
assiduity, and vigour. Prince Serge of Leuchtenberg, younger brother of
the Leuchtenbergs previously mentioned, was shot dead by a bullet through
the head in the course of his duty as a staff officer at the front of a
reconnaissance in force made against the Turkish force in Jovan-Tchiflik
in October of the war. He was a soldier of great promise and had
frequently distinguished himself. No unworthy record, it is submitted,
earned in war by the members of a family of which, according to the
foreign author, "personal courage is not the striking characteristic."

That writer may be warranted in stating that the late Tzar had been
frequently accused of cowardice--an indictment to which, it must be
admitted, many undeniable facts lent a strong colouring of probability;
and he further tells of "the Emperor's aversion to ride on horseback, and
of his dread of a horse even when the animal was harnessed to a vehicle."
There is something, however, of inconsistency in his observation that
Alexander III. might well have been a contrast to his grandfather without
deserving the epithet craven-hearted. The melancholy explanation of the
strange apparent change between the Tzarewitch of 1877 and the Tzar of
1894 may lie in the statement that "Alexander's nerves had been
undoubtedly shaken by the terrible events in which he had been a spectator
or actor." In 1877, when in campaign in Bulgaria, Alexander did not know
what "nerves" meant. He was then a man of strong, if slow, mental force,
stolid, peremptory, reactionary; the possessor of dull but firm
resolution. He had a strong though clumsy seat on horseback and was no
infrequent rider. He had two ruling dislikes: one was war, the other was
officers of German extraction. The latter he got rid of; the former he
regarded as a necessary evil of the hour; he longed for its ending, but
while it lasted he did his sturdy and loyal best to wage it to the
advantage of the Russian arms. And in this he succeeded, stanchly
fulfilling the particular duty which was laid upon him, that of protecting
the Russian left flank from the Danube to the foothills of the Balkans. He
had good troops, the subordinate commands were fairly well filled, and his
headquarter staff was efficient--General Dochtouroff, its _sous-chef_, was
certainly the ablest staff-officer in the Russian army. But Alexander was
no puppet of his staff; he understood his business as the commander of the
army of the Lom, performed his functions in a firm, quiet fashion, and
withal was the trusty and successful warden of the eastern marches. His
force never amounted to 50,000 men, and his enemy was in considerably
greater strength. He had successes and he sustained reverses, but he was
equal to either fortune; always resolute in his steadfast, dogged manner,
and never whining for reinforcements when things went against him, but
doing his best with the means to his hand. They used to speak of him in
the principal headquarter as the only commander who never gave them any
bother. So highly was he thought of there that when, after the
unsuccessful attempt on Plevna in the September of the war, the Guard
Corps was arriving from Russia and there was the temporary intention to
use it with other troops in an immediate offensive movement across the
Balkans, he was named to take the command of the enterprise. But this
intention having been presently departed from, and the reinforcements
being ordered instead to the Plevna section of the theatre of war, the
Tzarewitch retained his command on the left flank, and thus in
mid-December had the opportunity of inflicting a severe defeat on Suleiman
Pasha, just as in September he had worsted Mehemet Ali in the battle of
Carkova. It is sad to be told that a man once so resolute and masterful
should later have been the victim of shattered nerves; it is sadder still
to learn that he was a mark for accusations of cowardice. He never was a
gracious, far less a lovable man; but, as I can testify from personal
knowledge, he was a cool and brave soldier in the Russo-Turkish War of
1877.




PARADE OF THE COMMISSIONAIRES

1875


On a Sunday morning in early June, just before the church bells begin to
ring, there is wont to be held the annual general parade and inspection of
the Corps of Commissionaires, on the enclosed grass plot by the margin of
the ornamental water in St. James's Park. On the ground, and accompanying
the inspecting officer on his tour through the opened ranks, there are
always not a few veteran officers, glad by their presence on such an
occasion to countenance and recognise their humbler comrades in arms in
bygone war-dramas enacted elsewhere than within hearing of London Sunday
bells. No scene could be imagined presenting a more practical confutation
of the ignorant calumny that the British army is composed of the froth and
the dregs of the British nation, and that there exists no cordial feeling
between British soldiers and British officers. It is good to see how the
face kindles of the veteran guardsman at the sight and the kindly greeting
of Sir Charles Russell. Doubtless the honest private's thoughts go back to
that misty morning on the slopes of Inkerman, when officer and private
stood shoulder to shoulder in the fierce press, and there rang again in
his ears the cheer with which the Guards greeted the act of valour by the
performance of which the baronet won the Victoria Cross. There is a
feeling deeper than a mere formality in the half-dozen words that pass
between Sir William Codrington and the old soldier of the 7th Royal
Fusiliers, to whom the gallant general showed the way up to the Russian
front, through the shot-torn vineyards on the slopes of the Alma. When one
feeble old ex-warrior is smitten suddenly on parade with a palsied
faintness, it is on the yet stalwart arm of his old chief that he totters
out of the ranks, and the twain do not part till the superior has exacted
a pledge that his humble ex-subordinate shall call upon him on the morrow,
with a view to medical advice and strengthening comforts.

Notwithstanding that in the true old martial spirit it shows what in the
Service is known as a good front, it is not a very athletic or puissant
cohort this, that stands on parade here on the grass within hearing of the
church bells. The grizzled old soldiers, sooth to say, look rather the
worse for wear. There is a decided shortcoming among them of the proper
complement of limbs, and one at least, in speaking of the battlefields he
had seen, might with truth echo the old soldier in Burns's _Jolly
Beggars_--

  And there I left for witness a leg and an arm.

They carry no weapons; to some may belong the knowledge only of the
obsolete "Brown Bess" manual exercise; and not many have been so recently
on active service as to have learnt the handling of the modern
breech-loader. On the whole, a battered, fossil, maimed army of
superannuated fighting men, scarcely fitted to shine in the new tactics of
the "swarm-attack" by which the battles of the future are to be won or
lost. But you cannot jibe at the worn old soldiers as "lean and slippered
pantaloons." Look how truly, with what instinctive intuition, the dressing
is taken up at the word of command; note how the old martial carriage
comes back to the most dilapidated when the adjutant calls his command to
"attention." Age and wounds have not quenched the fighting spirit of the
old soldiers; there is not a man of them but would, did the need arise,
"clatter on his stumps to the sound of the drum." There are few breasts in
those ranks that are not decorated with medals. In very truth the parade
is a record of British campaigns for the last thirty years. Among the
thicket of medals on the bosom of this broken old light dragoon note the
one bearing the legend, "Cabul 1842" within the laurel wreath. Its wearer
was a trooper in the famous "rescue" column. The skeletons of
Elphinstone's hapless force littered the slopes of the Tezeen Valley, up
which the squadron in which he rode charged straight for the tent of the
splendid demon Akbar Khan. He rode behind Campbell at the battle of
Punniar, and won there that star of silver and bronze which hangs from the
famous "rainbow" ribbon. "Sutlej" is the legend on another of his medals,
and he could recount to you the memorable story of Thackwell's cavalry
operations against the Sikh field works, and how that division of seasoned
horsemen reduced outpost duty to a methodical science. "Punjab" medals for
Gough's campaign of 1848-49 are scattered up and down in the ranks. The
sword-cut athwart this wiry old trooper's cheek he got in the hot _melee_
of Ramhuggur, where a certain Brigadier Colin Campbell whom men knew
afterwards as Lord Clyde, found it hard work to hold his own, and where
gallant Cureton and the veteran William Havelock fell at the head of their
light horsemen as they crashed into the heart of 4000 Sikhs. His neighbour
took part in the storm of Mooltan, and saw stout, calm-pulsed Sergeant
John Bennet of the 1st Bombay Fusiliers plant the British ensign on the
crest of the breach and quietly stand by it there, supporting it in the
tempest of shot and shell till the storming party had made the breach
their own. This old soldier of the 24th can tell you of the butchery of
his regiment at Chillianwallah; how Brooks went down between the Sikh
guns, how Brigadier Pennycuick was killed out to the front, and how his
son, a beardless ensign, maddened at the sight of the mangling of his
father's body, rushed out and fought against all comers over the corpse
till the lad fell dead on his dead father; how on that terrible day the
loss of the 24th was 13 officers killed, 10 wounded, and 497 men killed
and wounded; and how the issue of the bloody combat might have been very
different but for the display, on the part of Colin Campbell, of "that
steady coolness and military decision for which he was so remarkable."
Scarcely a great show on a troop-horse would this bent and gnarled old
12th Lancer make to-day, but he and his fellows rode right well on the day
for which he wears this "Cape" medal, with the blue and orange ribbon and
the lion and mimosa bush on the reverse. Because of its prickles the Boers
call the mimosa the "wait-a-bit" thorn, but there was no thought of
waiting a bit among the 12th Lancers at the Berea, when they charged the
savage Basutos and captured their chief Moshesh. This one-armed veteran of
the Royal Fusiliers was left lying wounded in the Great Redoubt on the
Russian slope of the Alma, when the terrible fire of grape and musketry
forced Codrington's brigade of the Light Division temporarily to give
ground after it had struggled so valiantly up the rugged broken banks, and
through the hailstorm of fire that swept through the vineyards. This still
stalwart man was one of the nineteen sergeants of the 33rd--the Duke of
Wellington's Own--who were either killed or wounded in defence of the
colours on the same bloody but glorious day. A few files farther down the
line stands an old 93rd man. The veteran Sutherland Highlander was one of
that "thin red line" which disdained to form square when the Russian
squadrons rode with seeming heart at the kilted men on Balaclava day. He
heard Colin Campbell's stern repressive rebuke--"Ninety-third,
ninety-third, damn all that eagerness!" when the hotter spirits of the
regiment would fain have broken ranks and met the Russians half-way with
the cold steel; he saw the Scotch wife chastise the fugitive Turks with
her tongue and her frying-pan. Speak to his tall, shaggy neighbour of the
"bonny Jocks," and you will call up a flush of pleasure on the
harsh-featured Scottish face; for he was a trooper in the Greys on that
self-same Balaclava day when the avalanche of Russian horsemen thundered
down upon the heavy brigade. He was among those who heard, and with
sternly rapturous anticipation obeyed Scarlet's calm-pitched, far-sounding
order, "Left wheel into line!" He was among those who, when the trumpets
had sounded the charge, strove in vain by dint of spur to overtake the
gallant old chief with the long white moustache, as he rode foremost on
the foe with the dashing Elliot and the burly Shegog on either flank of
him; he was among those who, as they hewed and hacked their way through
the press, heard already from the far side of the _melee_ the stentorian
adjuration of big Adjutant Miller, as standing up in his stirrups the
burly Scot shouted, "Rally, rally on me, ye muckle ----!" Mightily knocked
about has been this man with the empty sleeve, but he does not belie the
familiar sobriquet of his old regiment; he was one of the "Diehards," a
title well earned by the 57th on the bloody height of Albuera, and it was
under their colours that he lost his arm on Inkerman morning. There is
quite a little regiment of men who were wounded in the "trenches" or about
the Redan. There is no "19" now on the buttons of this scarred veteran,
but the number was there when he followed Massy and Molesworth over the
parapet of the Redan on the day when so much good English blood was
wasted. Shoulder to shoulder now, as oft of yore, stand two old soldiers
of the Buffs both of whom went down in the same assault; and an umwhile
bugler of the Perthshire Grey-breeks "minds the day" well also by reason
of the wound that has crippled him for life. As he stands on parade this
calm Sabbath morning, that maimed man of the 60th Rifles can remember
another and a very different Sabbath--the 10th of May 1857 in Meerut--day
and place of the first outburst of the Mutiny; a fell Sabbath of burning,
slaughter, and dismay, of disregard of sex, age, and rank, of fierce
brutality and of nameless agony. He was one of the rifles whose fire in
the assault of Delhi covered the desperate duty of blowing open the
Cashmere Gate, performed with so methodical calmness by Home, Salkeld, and
Burgess; and his comrade hero with the maimed limb, when the hour had come
for a rush to close quarters, followed Reid and Muter over the breastwork
at the end of the serai of Kissengunge. Proud, yet their pride dashed by
sadness, must be the soldiering memories of this stout northman, erstwhile
a front rank man in the old Ross-shire Buffs, a regiment ever true to its
noble Celtic motto of _Cuidichn Rhi_. At Kooshab, in the short, but
brilliant Persian War, he fought in the same field where Malcolmson earned
the Victoria Cross by one of the most gallant acts for which that guerdon
of valour ever has been accorded. He was in Mackenzie's company at
Cawnpore when the Highlanders, stirred by the wild strains of the
war-pibroch, rushed upon the Nana's battery at the angle of the mango tope
with the irresistible fury of one of their own mountain torrents in spate.
And next day he was among those who, with drawn ghastly faces and scared
eyes, looked into that fearful well, filled to the lip with the mangled
corpses of British women and children. He was one of those who, standing
by that well, pledged the oath administered by the bareheaded Ross-shire
sergeant over the long, heavy tress of auburn hair which a demon's tulwar
had severed from the head of an Englishwoman, that while strong arm and
trusty steel lasted to no living thing of the accursed race should quarter
be accorded. And he was one of those who, having battled their way over
the Charbagh Bridge, having threaded the bullet-torn path to the
Kaiser-bagh, and having forced for themselves a passage up to the
embrasures by the Baileyguard Gate, melted from the stern fierceness of
the fray when the siege-worn women and children in the residency of
Lucknow sobbed out upon their necks blessings for the deliverance. His
rear-rank man is an ex-Bengal Fusilier, wounded once at Sabraon, again at
Pegu, and a third time at Delhi. He will not be offended if you hail him
as one of the "old Dirty-shirts;" for it was in honourable disregard of
appearances as they toiled night and day in the trenches of Delhi that the
regiment, which now in the Queen's service is numbered 101, gained the
nickname. Time and space fail one to tell a tithe of the stories of valour
and hardship linked in the medals and wounds borne by men on this
unostentatious parade--a parade the members of which have shed their blood
on the soil of every quarter of the globe. The minutest military annals
scarcely name some of the obscure combats in which men here to-day have
fought and bled. This man desperately wounded at Najou, near Shanghai;
that one wounded in two places at Owna, in Persia; this one with a sleeve
emptied at Aroga, in Abyssinia--who among us remember aught, if, indeed,
we have ever heard, of Najou, Owna, or Aroga? On the breast of this bent,
hoary old man, note these strange emblems, the Cross of San Fernando and
the Order of the Tower and Sword. Their wearer is a relic of the British
Legion in the Carlist War of 1837, and they were won under brave old De
Lacy Evans at the siege of Bilbao.

Over the modest portals of the Commissionaire Barracks in the Strand might
well be inscribed the legend, "To all the military glories of Britain."
But just as we have not long ago seen the pride of a palace in another
land on whose facade is a kindred inscription, abased by the occupation of
a foreign conqueror, so there was a time when the living emblems of
Britain's military glory were wont to undergo much humiliation and
adversity when their career of soldiering had come to an end. Germany
recompenses her veterans by according them, as a right, reputable civil
employ when they have served their time as soldiers; the custom of
Britain, on the contrary, has been too commonly to leave her scarred and
war-worn soldiers to their own resources, or to a pension on which to live
is impossible. We were always ready enough to feel a glow at the
achievements of our arms; but till lately we were prone to reckon the
individual soldier as a social pariah, and to regard the fact of a man's
having served in the ranks as a brand of discredit. To this estimate, it
must be allowed, the ex-soldier himself very often contributed not a
little. Destitute of a future, and often debarred by wounds or by broken
health from any laborious industrial employment, he made the most of the
present; and his idea of making the most of the future not unfrequently
took the form of beer and shiftlessness. Recognising the disadvantages
that bore so hard on the deserving old soldier, recognising too, in the
words of the late Sir John Burgoyne, that "there are many qualities
peculiar to the soldier and sailor, and imbibed by him in the ordinary
course of his service, which, added to good character and conduct, may
render such men more eligible than others for various services in civil
life," Captain Edward Walter founded the Corps of Commissionaires. That
organisation, beginning with seven men, has now a strength of several
hundreds, and its ranks are still open to all the eligible recruits who
choose to come forward. The Commissionaire is no recipient of charity;
what Captain Walter has done is simply to show him how he may earn an
honest and comfortable livelihood, and to provide him, if he desires it,
with a home of a kind which the ex-militaire naturally most appreciates.
The advantages are open to him of a savings-bank and of a sick and burial
fund, and when the evil days come when he can no longer earn his own
bread, the "Retiring Fund" guarantees the thrifty and steady
Commissionaire against the prospect of ending his days in the workhouse.
Among the fruits of Captain Walter's devoted and gratuitous services in
this cause has been a wholesome change in the bias of popular opinion as
to the worth of old soldiers. No longer are they regarded as the mere
chaff and _debris_ of the cannon fodder--"no account men," as Bret Harte
has it; he has furnished them with opportunity to prove, and they have
proved, that they can so live and so work as to win the respect and trust
of their brethren of the civilian world. The man who has done this thing
deserves well, not alone of the British army, but of the British nation.
He has brought it about that the time has come when most men think with
Sir Roger de Coverley. "You must know," says Sir Roger, "I never make use
of anybody to row me that has not lost either a leg or an arm. I would
rather bate him a few strokes of his oar than not employ an honest man
that has been wounded in the Queen's service. If I was a lord or a bishop
... I would not put a fellow in my livery that had not a wooden leg."




THE INNER HISTORY OF THE WATERLOO CAMPAIGN


The actual fighting phase of this memorable campaign was confined to the
four days from the 15th to the 18th of June, both days inclusive. The
literature concerning itself with that period would make a library of
itself. Scarcely a military writer of any European nation but has
delivered himself on the subject, from Clausewitz to General Maurice, from
Berton to Brialmont. Thiers, Alison, and Hooper may be cited of the host
of civilian writers whom the theme has enticed to description and
criticism. There is scarcely a point in the brief vivid drama that has not
furnished a topic for warm and sustained controversy; and the cult of the
Waterloo campaign is more assiduous to-day than when the participators in
the great strife were testifying to their own experiences.

Quite recently an important work dealing chiefly with the inner history of
the campaign has come to us from the other side of the Atlantic. [Footnote:
_The Campaign of Waterloo: a Military History_. By John Codman Ropes. New
York: Charles Scribner's Sons. February 1893.] Its author, Mr. John Ropes,
is a civilian gentleman of Boston, who has devoted his life to military
study. He has given years to the elucidation of the problems of the
Waterloo campaign, has trodden every foot of its ground, and has burrowed
for recondite matter in the military archives of divers nations. A citizen
of the American Republic, he is free alike from national prejudices and
national prepossessions; if he is perhaps not uniformly correct in his
inferences, his rigorous impartiality is always conspicuous. By his
research and acute perception he has let light in upon not a few
obscurities; and it may be pertinent briefly to summarise the inner
history of the campaign, giving what may seem their due weight to the
arguments and representations of the American writer.

The following were the respective positions on the 14th of June:--
Wellington's heterogeneous army, about 94,000 strong with 196 guns, lay
widely dispersed in cantonments from the Scheldt to the Charleroi-Brussels
chaussee, its front extending from Tournay through Mons and Binche to
Nivelles and Quatre Bras. Of the Prussian army under Bluecher, about
121,000 strong with 312 guns, one corps was at Liege, another near the
Meuse above Namur, a third at Namur, and Ziethen's in advance holding the
line of the Sambre. The mass of Bluecher's command had already seen service
and, with the exception of the Saxons, was full of zeal; the corps were
well commanded, and their chief, although he had his limits, was a
thorough soldier. The French army, consisting of five corps d'armee, the
Guard, four cavalry corps and 344 guns--total fighting strength 124,500--
Napoleon had succeeded in assembling with wonderful celerity and secrecy
south of the Sambre within an easy march of Charleroi. Its officers and
soldiers were alike veterans but its organisation was somewhat defective.
Napoleon scarcely preserved the phenomenal force of earlier years; but, in
Mr. Ropes's words, he disclosed "no conspicuous lack of energy and
activity." Soult was far from being an ideal chief of staff. Ney, to whom
was assigned the command of the left wing, only reached the army on the
15th, and without a staff; Grouchy, to whom on the 16th was suddenly given
the command of the right wing, was not a man of high military capacity.

Napoleon's plan of campaign was founded on the circumstance that the bases
of the allied armies lay in opposite directions--the English base on the
German Ocean, the Prussian through Liege and Maestricht to the Rhine. The
military probability was that if either army was forced to retreat, it
would retreat towards its base; and to do this would be to march away from
its ally. Napoleon was in no situation to manoeuvre leisurely, with all
Europe on the march against him. His engrossing aim was to gain immediate
victory over his adversaries in Belgium before the Russians and Austrians
should close in around him. His expectation was that Bluecher would offer
battle about Fleurus and be overwhelmed before the Anglo-Dutch army could
come to the support of its Prussian ally. To make sure of preventing that
junction the Emperor's intention was to detail Ney with the left wing to
reach and hold Quatre Bras. The Prussians thoroughly beaten, drifting
rearward toward their base, and reduced to a condition of comparative
inoffensiveness, he would then turn on Wellington and force him to give
battle.

Mr. Ropes refutes the contention maintained by a great array of
authorities, that Napoleon's design was to "wedge himself into the
interval between the allied armies" by seizing simultaneously Sombreffe
and Quatre Bras, in order to cut the communication between the two armies
and then defeat them in succession. Against this view he successfully
marshals Napoleon himself, Wellington by the mouth of Lord Ellesmere, and
the great German strategist Clausewitz. It will suffice to quote
Napoleon:--

  The Emperor's intention was that his advance should
  occupy Fleurus, the mass concealed behind this town;
  he took good care ... above all things not to occupy
  Sombreffe. To have done so would have caused the
  failure of all his dispositions, for then the battle of Ligny
  would not have been fought, and Bluecher would have had
  to make Wavre the concentration-point for his army.

Wellington alludes pointedly to the obvious danger to the French army of
the suggested wedge position in what the Germans call _die taktische
Mitte_, where, instead of being able to defeat the allies in succession,
it would itself be liable to be crushed between the upper and the nether
millstone.

At daybreak of the 15th Napoleon took the offensive, driving in Ziethen on
and through Charleroi although not without sharp fighting. On that evening
three French corps, the Guard, and most of the cavalry, were concentrated
about Charleroi and forward toward Fleurus, ready to attack Bluecher next
day. Controversy has been very keen on the question whether or not on the
afternoon of the 15th Napoleon gave Ney verbal orders to occupy Quatre
Bras the same evening. Mr. Ropes holds it "almost certain" that the order
was given. From Napoleon's bulletin despatched on the evening of the 15th,
which is the only piece of strictly contemporary evidence, he quotes: "Le
Prince de la Moskowa (Ney) a eu le soir son quartier general aux
Quatres-Chemins;" and he remarks that this must have been the belief in
the headquarter "unless we gratuitously invent an intention to deceive the
public." There is no need for Mr. Ropes to put that strain on himself,
since the main purport of Napoleon's bulletins notoriously was to deceive
the public. But if Napoleon had not intended that Ney should occupy Quatre
Bras on the night of the 15th, the statement that this had been done would
have been a purposeless futility; and if he had intended that Ney should
do so it is unlikely that he should have omitted to give him instructions
to that effect. Grouchy claims to have heard Napoleon censure Ney for his
omission to occupy Quatre Bras; an omission which had its importance, for
the reason, among others, that it was ominous of the Marshal's infinitely
more harmful disobedience of orders next day.

All writers agree that Bluecher ordered the concentration of his army in
the fighting position previously chosen in the event of the French
advancing by Charleroi, "without," in Mr. Ropes's words, "any definite
agreement or undertaking with Wellington that he was to have English aid
in the impending battle." He was content to take his risk of the English
general's possible inability for sundry obvious reasons, to come to his
support. And while the Prussian army with the unfortunate exception of
Buelow's corps, was on the 15th moving toward the chosen position of Ligny,
where its right was to be on St. Amand, its centre on and behind Ligny,
and its left about Balatre, what was happening in the Anglo-Dutch army
lying spread out westward of the Charleroi--Brussels chaussee?

Wellington was at Brussels expecting the French invasion by or west of the
Mons-Brussels road, to meet which he considered his army very well placed,
but could expect no Prussian cooperation. His courier service, with his
forces so dispersed, should have been well organised and alert, but it was
neither; and Napoleon's secrecy and suddenness in taking the offensive
were worthy of his best days. It has been freely imputed to Wellington
that he was thereby in a measure surprised. There is the strange and
probably mythical story in the work professing to be Fouche's _Memoirs_ to
the effect that Wellington was relying on him for information of
Napoleon's plans, and that he--Fouche--played the English commander false.
"On the very day of Napoleon's departure from Paris," say the _Memoirs_,
"I despatched Madame D----, furnished with notes in cipher, narrating the
whole plan of the campaign. But at the same time I privately sent orders
for such obstacles at the frontier, where she was to pass, that she could
not reach Wellington's headquarters till after the event. This was the
real explanation of the inactivity of the British generalissimo which
excited such universal astonishment." Readers of the _Letters of the First
Earl of Malmesbury_ will remember the apparently authentic statement of
Captain Bowles, that Wellington, rising from the supper-table at the
famous ball,

  whispered to ask the Duke of Richmond if he had a good
  map. The Duke of Richmond said he had, and took
  Wellington into his dressing-room. Wellington shut the
  door and said, "Napoleon has humbugged me, by God;
  he has gained twenty-four hours' march on me.... I
  have ordered the army to concentrate at Quatre Bras;
  but we shall not stop him there, and if so I must fight
  him _there_" (passing his thumb-nail over the position of
  Waterloo). The conversation was repeated to me by the
  Duke of Richmond two minutes after it occurred.

Facts, however, are stronger evidence than words; and this confession on
Wellington's part is inconsistent with the circumstance that he had not
hurried to retrieve the time he is represented as having owned that
Napoleon had gained on him--that he had, on the contrary, allowed his
adversary to gain several hours more. Wellington's combination of caution
and decision throughout this momentous period is a very interesting study.
It was not until 3 P.M. (of the 15th) that there reached him tidings
almost simultaneously of firing between the outposts about Thuin and that
Ziethen had been attacked before Charleroi, the two places ten miles apart
and both occurrences in the early morning. Those affairs might have been
casual outpost skirmishes; and the Duke, in anticipation of further
information, took no measures for some hours. At length, in default of
later tidings he determined on the precautionary step of assembling his
divisions at their respective rendezvous points in readiness to march;
further specifically directing a concentration of 25,000 men at Nivelles
on his then left flank, when it should have been ascertained for certain
that the enemy's line of attack was by Charleroi. These orders were sent
out early in the evening--"between 5 and 7." Later in the evening came a
letter from Bluecher announcing the concentration of the Prussian army to
occupy the Ligny fighting position, in which disposition Wellington
acquiesced; but, still uncertain of Napoleon's true line of attack--his
conviction being, as is well known, that Napoleon should have moved on the
British right--he would not definitely fix the point of ultimate
concentration of his army until he should receive intelligence from Mons.
But Bluecher's tidings caused him to issue about 10 P.M. a second set of
orders, commanding a general movement of the army, not as yet to any
specific point of concentration but in prescribed directions towards its
left (eastward). At length, when the news came from Mons that he need have
no further serious solicitude about his right since the whole French army
was advancing by Charleroi, he saw his way clear. Towards midnight, writes
Mueffling the Prussian Commissioner at his headquarters, Wellington
informed him of the tidings from Mons, and added: "The orders for the
concentration of my army at Nivelles and Quatre Bras are already
despatched. Let us, therefore, go to the ball."

There are three definite evidences that before midnight of the 15th
Wellington had resolved to concentrate about Quatre Bras, and had issued
final orders accordingly--his statement to the Duke of Richmond, his
statement to Mueffling, and his statement in his official report to Lord
Bathurst. Yet Mr. Ropes believes that his decision to that effect "could
not have been arrived at very long before he left Brussels" on the morning
of the 16th, which he did "probably about half-past seven." He founds this
belief on two orders dated "16th June" sent to Lord Hill in the early
morning of that day, in which there is no allusion to a concentration at
Quatre Bras. But those were merely supplementary instructions as to points
of detail; for example, one of them enjoined that a division ordered
earlier to Enghien should move instead by way of Braine le Comte, that
being a nearer route toward the final general destination of Quatre Bras
specified in the earlier (the "towards midnight") orders. The latter
orders are not extant, having been lost according to Gurwood, with De
Lancey's papers when he fell at Waterloo; but that they must have been
issued is proved by the fact that they were acted upon by the troops; and
that they were issued before midnight of the 15th is made clear by
Wellington's three specific statements to that effect.

When the Duke left Brussels for the front on the morning of the 16th he
took with him a singularly optimistic paper styled "Disposition of the
British Army at 7 A.M., 16th June," which was "written out for the
information of the Commander of the Forces by Colonel Sir W. de Lancey,"
his Quartermaster-General. In the nature of things for the most part
guess-work, the wish as regarded almost every particular set out in this
document was father to the thought. Wellington was no doubt reasonably
justified in accepting and relying on this flattering "Disposition;" but
its terms, as Mr. Ropes conclusively shows, simply misled him and caused
him also unconsciously to mislead Bluecher, both by the expressions of the
letter written by him to that chief on his arrival at Quatre Bras and
later when he met the Prussian commander at the mill of Brye. Wellington
was indeed trebly fortunate in finding the Quatre Bras position still
available to him--fortunate that Ney on the previous evening had defaulted
from his orders in refraining from occupying it; fortunate that Ney still
on this morning was remaining passive; and more fortunate still that it
had been occupied, defended, and reinforced by Dutch-Belgian troops not
only without orders from him but in bold and happy violation of his
orders. Perponcher's division was scarcely a potent representative of the
Anglo-Dutch army, but there was nothing more at hand; and pending the
coming up of reinforcements Wellington, with rather a sanguine reliance on
Ney's maintenance of inactivity, rode over to Brye and had a conversation
with Bluecher. There are contradictory accounts of its tenor, and Gneisenau
certainly seems to have formed the impression that the Duke gave a
positive pledge of support. Mr. Ropes considers that, misled by the
erroneous "Disposition," Wellington honestly believed he would be able to
co-operate with Bluecher, and that he "certainly did give that commander
some assurance of support by the Anglo-Dutch army in the impending
battle." Mueffling, who was present, states that the Duke's last words were:
"Well, I will come, provided I am not attacked myself;" and this probably
was the final undertaking. Wellington's words were in accordance with the
caution of his character; and it is certain that Bluecher had decided to
fight at Ligny whether assured or not of his brother-commander's support.
That Wellington regarded Bluecher's dispositions for battle as
objectionable is proved by his blunt comment to Hardinge--"If they fight
here they will be damnably licked!"

It would have been possible for Napoleon to have crushed the Prussian army
in the early hours of the 16th when it was in the throes of formation for
battle; and this he would probably have done if Ney had occupied Quatre
Bras on the previous evening. But in Ney's default of accomplishing this
Napoleon, in his solicitude that Wellington should be hindered from
supporting Bluecher, determined to delay his own stroke against the latter
until Ney should be in possession of Quatre Bras with the left wing,
where, in Soult's words, "he ought to be able to destroy any force of the
enemy that might present itself," and then come to the support of the
Emperor by getting on the Prussian rear behind St. Amand. Napoleon's
instructions were explicit that Ney was to march on Quatre Bras, take
position there, and then send an infantry division and Kellerman's cavalry
to points eastward, whence the Emperor might summon them to participate in
his own operations. If Ney had fulfilled his orders by utilising the whole
force at his disposal, in all human probability he would have defeated
Wellington at Quatre Bras, whose troops, arriving in detail, would have
been crushed by greatly superior numbers as they came up. As it was,
although at the beginning of the battle he was in superior strength, Ney
never utilised more than 22,000 men; whereas by its close Wellington had
31,000, and, thanks to the stanchness of the British infantry, was the
victor in a very hard-fought contest. But Mr. Ropes has reason in holding
it humanly certain that he would have been beaten--in which case the
battle of Waterloo would never have been fought--had not D'Erlon's corps
of Ney's command while marching towards Quatre Bras, been turned aside in
the direction of the Prussian right.

In the justifiable belief that Ney was duly carrying out his orders
Napoleon at half-past one opened the battle of Ligny. He had expected to
have to deal with but a single Prussian corps, but the actual fact was
that, while he had 74,000 men on the field, Bluecher had 87,000 with a
superior strength of artillery. The fighting was long and severe. From the
first, recognising the defects of his adversary's position, Napoleon was
satisfied that he could defeat the Prussian army. But he needed to do
more--to crush, to rout it, so that he need give himself no further
concern regarding it. This he saw his way to accomplish if Ney were to
strike in presently on the Prussian right; and so, with intent to stir
that chief to vigorous enterprise, the message was sent him that "the fate
of France was in his hands." The battle proceeded, Bluecher throwing in his
reserves freely, Napoleon chary of his and playing the waiting game
pending Ney's expected co-operation. About half-past five he was preparing
to put in the Guard and strike the decisive blow, when information reached
him from his right that a column, presumably hostile, was visible some two
miles distant marching toward Fleurus. Napoleon sent an aide to ascertain
the facts and until his return postponed the decisive moment. Two hours
later the information was brought back that the approaching column was
D'Erlon's from Ney's wing. This intelligence dispelled all anxiety.
Strangely enough, no instructions were sent to the approaching
reinforcement, and the suspended stroke was promptly dealt. The Prussians,
after desperate fighting, were everywhere driven back. Napoleon with part
of the Imperial Guard broke Bluecher's centre, and the French army deployed
on the heights beyond the stream. In a word, Napoleon had defeated the
Prussians, but had neither crushed nor routed them. There was no pursuit.

D'Erlon's corps on this afternoon had achieved the doubly sinister
distinction of having prevented Ney from gaining a probable victory at
Quatre Bras, and of detracting from the thoroughness of Napoleon's actual
victory at Ligny. While it was leisurely marching towards Frasnes in
support of Ney, it was diverted eastward towards the Prussian right flank
in consequence of an order given (whether authorised or not is uncertain)
by an aide-de-camp of the Emperor. It was about to deploy for action,
when, on receiving from Ney a peremptory order to rejoin his command; and
in absence of a command from Napoleon to strike the Prussian flank, it
went about and tramped back towards Frasnes. D'Erlon's promenade was as
futile as the famous march of the King of France up the hill and then down
again.

Mr. Ropes considers that on the morning of the 17th Napoleon had thus far
in the main fulfilled his programme. This view may be questioned. He had
merely defeated two of the four Prussian corps; he had not wrecked
Bluecher. He had failed to occupy Quatre Bras; the Anglo-Dutch army had
succeeded in effecting a partial concentration and in repulsing his left
wing there. Still it must be admitted that with two corps absolutely
intact and with no serious losses in the Guard and cavalry, Napoleon was
in good shape for carrying out his plan. If Ney had sent him word
overnight that Wellington's army was bivouacking about Quatre Bras in
ignorance, as it turned out, of the result of Ligny, he might have
attacked it to good purpose in conjunction with Ney in the early morning
of the 17th. But Ney was silent and sulky; Napoleon himself was greatly
fatigued, and Soult was of no service to him.

During the night the Prussians "had folded their tents like the Arabs, and
as silently stolen away." They had neither been watched nor followed up,
all touch of them had been lost, and there was nothing to indicate their
line of retreat. This slovenliness on the part of the French would not
have occurred in Napoleon's earlier days; nor in those days of greater
vigour would he have delayed until after midday of the 17th to follow up
an army which he had defeated on the previous evening, and which had
disappeared from before him in the course of the night. The reports which
had been sent in from a cavalry reconnaissance despatched in the morning
indicated that the Prussians were retiring on Namur. No reconnaissance had
been made in the direction of Tilly and Wavre. This was a strange error,
since Bluecher had two corps still untouched, and as above everything a
fighting man, was not likely to throw up his hands and forsake his ally
after one partial discomfiture. Napoleon tardily determined to despatch
Grouchy on the errand of following up the Prussians with a force
consisting of about 33,000 men with ninety-six guns. Thus far all
authorities are agreed; but as regards the character of the orders given
to Grouchy for his guidance in an obviously somewhat complicated
enterprise, there is an extraordinary contrariety of evidence. It is
stated in the _St. Helena Memoirs_ that Grouchy received positive orders
to keep himself always between the main French army and Bluecher; to
maintain constant communication with the former and in a position easily
to rejoin it; that since it was possible that Bluecher might retreat on
Wavre, he (Grouchy) was to be there simultaneously; if the Prussians
should continue their march on Brussels and should pass the night in the
forest of Soignies, he was to follow to the edge of the forest; should
they retire on the Meuse, he was to watch them with part of his cavalry
and himself occupy Wavre with the mass of his force, where he should be in
position for easy communication with Napoleon's headquarters. Those orders
are certainly specific enough, but there is no record of them; and they
may be assumed to represent rather what Napoleon at St. Helena considered
Grouchy should have done, than what he was actually ordered to do.

Grouchy's version, again--and it is adequately corroborated--is to the
effect that about midday of the 17th on the field of Ligny, the Emperor
gave him the verbal order to take the 3rd and 4th Corps and certain
cavalry and "go in pursuit of the Prussians." Grouchy raised sundry
objections which the Emperor overruled and repeated his commands, adding
that "it was for me (Grouchy) to discover the route taken by Bluecher; that
he himself was going to fight the English, and that it was for me to
complete the defeat of the Prussians by attacking them as soon as I should
have caught up with them." So much for Grouchy for the moment.

Soon after the Emperor had given Grouchy this verbal order, tidings came
in from a scouting party that a body of Prussian troops had been seen
about 9 A.M. at Gembloux, considerably northward of the Namur road. The
abstract probability no doubt was that the Prussians would retire towards
their base. But that Napoleon kept an open mind on the subject is
evidenced by his instruction to Grouchy to "go and discover the route
taken by Bluecher," and this later intelligence, it may be assumed, opened
his mind yet further. He thought it well, then, to send to Grouchy a
supplementary written order which in the temporary absence of Marshal
Soult he dictated to General Bertrand. This order enjoined on Grouchy to
proceed with his force to Gembloux; to explore in the directions of Namur
and Maestricht; to pursue the enemy; explore his march; and report upon
his manoeuvres, so that "I (Napoleon) may be able to penetrate what the
enemy is intending to do; whether he is separating himself from the
English, or whether they are intending still to unite in trying the fate
of another battle to cover Brussels or Liege." To me I confess--and the
view is also that of Chesney and Maurice--this written order is simply an
amplification in detail of the previous verbal order, which by instructing
Grouchy "to discover the route taken by Bluecher" clearly evinced doubt in
Napoleon's mind as to the Prussian line of retreat. Mr. Ropes, on the
other hand, bases an indictment on Grouchy's conduct on the argument that
not only was the tone of the written order altogether different from that
of the verbal order, but that the duty assigned to Grouchy by the former
was wholly different from that specified in the latter.

He adds that Grouchy constantly and persistently denied having received
any other than the verbal order, that in this denial Grouchy lied, and
that "the mischievous influence of this deliberate concealment of his
orders by Grouchy caused for nearly thirty years after the battle of
Waterloo to be prevalent a wholly false notion as to the task assigned by
Napoleon to the Marshal." Certainly Grouchy's conduct is inexplicable to
any one holding the belief, as I do, that there is nothing in the written
order to account for Grouchy's denial of having received it. It is more
inexplicable than Mr. Ropes appears to be aware of. It is true, as Mr.
Ropes proves, that Grouchy vehemently denied receiving the written order
in all his works printed from 1818 to 1829. But he had actually
acknowledged its receipt almost immediately after Waterloo. In his son's
little book, _Le Marechal de Grouchy du 16me au 19me Juin, 1815,_ is
printed among the _Documents Historiques Inedits_ a paper styled
"Allocution du Marechal Grouchy a quelques-uns des officiers generaux sous
les ordres, lorsqu'il eut appris les desastres de Waterloo." From this
document I make the following extract: "A few hours later the Emperor
modified his first order, and caused to be written to me by the Grand
Marshal Bertrand the order to betake myself to Gembloux, and to send
reconnaissances towards Namur. 'It is important,' continued the order, 'to
discover the intentions of the Prussians--whether they are separating from
the English, or have the design to take the chance of a new battle.'" It
is strange that this acknowledgment should never have been cited against
Grouchy; stranger still that in the face of it he should have maintained
his denials; yet more strange that those denials were never exposed; and
most strange of all, that finally the "written order" should have appeared
for the first time in a casual article published in 1842, without evoking
any explanation from Grouchy, or any strictures on his persistent
mendacity.

It may be questioned whether the force of 33,000 men entrusted to Grouchy
was not either too large or too small. The main French army, in the
possible contingencies before it, could not safely spare so large a
detachment, as events showed. Grouchy's command was not sufficiently
strong to oppose the whole Prussian army; two corps of which could
certainly have "held" it, while the other two were free to support
Wellington. Mr. Ropes thinks it might have been diminished by one-half,
but then a single Prussian corps could have dealt with it. It is difficult
to discern in what respect the 6000 cavalry assigned to Grouchy should
have been inadequate to such service as could reasonably have been
expected of his whole command.

The British force about Quatre Bras on the morning of the 17th amounted to
about 45,000 men. Early on that morning Wellington was in conversation
with the Captain Bowles previously mentioned, when an officer galloped up
and, to quote Captain Bowles,

  whispered to the Duke, who then turned to me and said,
  "Old Bluecher has had a d----d good licking and has gone
  back to Wavre. As he has gone back, we must go too. I
  suppose in England they will say we have been licked--I
  can't help that."

He quietly withdrew his troops from their positions, an operation which
Ney, with 40,000 men at his disposal, did not attempt to molest,
notwithstanding repeated orders from Napoleon to move on Quatre Bras.
Early in the afternoon Napoleon reached that vicinity with the Guard, 6th
Corps, and Milhaud's Cuirassiers, picked up Ney's command, and mounting
his horse led the French army, following up Wellington's retreat. His
energy and activity throughout the march is described as intense. Those
characteristics he continued to evince during the following night and in
the morning of the eventful 18th. In the dead of night he spent two hours
on the picquet line, and about seven he was out again on the foreposts in
the mud and rain. His anxiety was not as to the issue of a battle with
Wellington, but lest Wellington should not stand and fight. That
apprehension was dispelled when, as he rode along his front about 8 A.M.,
he saw the Anglo-Dutch army taking up its ground. He was aware that at
least one "pretty strong Prussian column"--which actually consisted of the
two corps beaten at Ligny--had retired on Wavre. But notwithstanding the
disquieting vagueness and ineptitude of Grouchy's letter of 10 P.M. of the
17th from Gembloux, and that up to the morning of the battle he had sent
no suggestions or instructions to that officer, he yet trusted implicitly
to him to fend off the Prussians; and it did not seem to occur to him that
Wellington's calm expectant attitude indicated his assurance of Bluecher's
cooperation.

In one of the cavalry charges toward the close of the battle of Ligny,
Bluecher had been overthrown, ridden over, almost taken prisoner, and
severely bruised; but the gallant old hussar was almost himself again next
morning, thanks to copious doses of gin and rhubarb, for the effluvium of
which restorative he apologised to Hardinge as he embraced that wounded
officer, in the extremely plain expression, "_Ich stinke etwas_."
Gneisenau, his Chief of Staff, rather distrusted Wellington's good faith,
and doubted whether it was not the safer policy for the Prussian army to
fall back toward Liege. But Bluecher prevailed over his lieutenants; and on
the evening of the 17th all four Prussian corps in a strength of about
90,000 men, were concentrated about Wavre, some nine miles east of the
Waterloo position, full of ardour and confident of success. That same
night Mueffling informed Bluecher by letter that the Anglo-Dutch army had
occupied the position named, wherein to fight next day; and Bluecher's
loyal answer was that Buelow's corps at daybreak should march by way of St.
Lambert to strike the French right; that Pirch's would follow in support;
and that the other two would stand in readiness. This communication, which
reached Wellington at headquarters at 2 A.M. of the 18th, has been held to
have been the first actually definite assurance of Prussian support. The
story to the effect that on the evening of the 17th the Duke rode over to
Wavre to make sure from Bluecher's own mouth that he could rely on Prussian
support next day, to the truth of which not a little of vague testimony
has been adduced, may be now definitely disregarded. The evidence against
the legend is conclusive. An authoritative contradiction was given to it
in an article in the _Quarterly Review_ of 1842, from the pen of Lord
Francis Egerton, afterwards Lord Ellesmere, who confessedly wrote under
the inspiration of the Duke, and in this instance directly from a
memorandum drawn up by his Grace. Quite recently there have been found and
are now in the possession of the Rev. Frederick Gurney, the grandson of
the late Sir John Gurney, the notes of a "conversation with the Duke of
Wellington and Baron Gurney and Mr. Justice Williams, Judges on Circuit,
at Strath-fieldsaye House, on 24th February 1837." The annotator was Baron
Gurney, to the following effect:--"The conversation had been commenced by
my inquiring of him (the Duke) whether a story which I had heard was true
of his having ridden over to Bluecher on the night before the battle of
Waterloo, and returned on the same horse. He said--'No, that was not so. I
did not see Bluecher on the day before Waterloo. I saw him the day before,
on the day of Quatre Bras. I saw him after Waterloo, and he kissed me. He
embraced me on horseback. I had communicated with him the day before
Waterloo.'" The rest of the conversation made no further reference to the
topic of the ride to Wavre.

It is not proposed to give here any account of the memorable battle, the
main incidents of which are familiar to all. It was of course Wellington's
policy to take up a defensive attitude; both because of the incapacity of
his raw soldiers for manoeuvring, and since every minute before Napoleon
should begin the offensive was of value to the English commander, as it
diminished the length of punishment he would have to endure single-handed.
Further, he was numerically weaker than his adversary, while his troops
were at once of divers nationalities and divers character; his main
reliance was on his British troops and those of the King's German Legion.
Napoleon for his part deliberately delayed to attack when celerity of
action was all-important to him, disregarding the obvious probability of
Prussian assistance to Wellington, and sanguinely expecting that Grouchy
would either avert that support or reach him in time to neutralise it. Mr.
Ropes has written an admirable criticism of the errors of the French in
their contest with the Anglo-Dutch army, for which Ney was for the most
part responsible, since from before 3 P.M. Napoleon was engrossed in
preparing his right flank for defence against the Prussians. The issue of
the great battle all men know. The badness of the roads retarded the
Prussians greatly, and, save in Buelow's corps, there was no doubt
considerable delay in starting; but the proverb that "All's well that ends
well" might have been coined with special application to the battle of
Waterloo.

It only remains briefly to refer to Mr. Ropes's elaborate _resume_ of the
melancholy adventures of Grouchy, on whom he may be regarded as too
severe. Sent out too late on a species of roving commission, more was
expected from him by Napoleon than could have been accomplished by any but
a leader of the highest order, whereas Grouchy had never given evidence of
being more than respectable. He received from his master neither
instructions nor information from the time he left the field of Ligny
until 4 P.M. of the 18th, nor until at Walhain he heard the cannonade of
Waterloo had he any knowledge of the whereabouts of the French main army.
On the morning of the 18th he was late in leaving Gembloux, on not the
most direct route towards Wavre; instead of moving on which, when he heard
the noise of the battle, he should no doubt have marched straight for the
Dyle bridges at Ottignies and Moustier. Had he done so, spite of all
delays he could have been across the Dyle by 4 P.M. But when Mr. Ropes
claims that thus Grouchy would have been able to arrest the march toward
the battlefield of the two leading Prussian corps, one of which was four
miles distant from him and the other still farther away, he is too
exacting. Had Grouchy made the vain attempt, the two nearer Prussian corps
would have taken him in flank and headed him off, while Buelow and Ziethen
pressed on to the battlefield. If he had marched straight and swiftly on
the cannon-thunder of Waterloo, he might perhaps have been in time to
effect something in the nature of a diversion, although it is extremely
improbable that he could have materially changed the fortune of the day;
but instead, acting on the letter of Napoleon's instructions despatched to
him on the morning of the battle, he moved on Wavre and engaged in a
futile action with the Prussian 3rd Corps there. A shrewd and enterprising
man would have at least seen into the spirit of his orders; Grouchy could
not do this, and he is to be pitied rather than blamed.


THE END





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