"The consternation of my picquet had now reached its height. Still our scouts asserted the country to be quiet around us, though, with a strange gleam in his eyes, the Indian said, that when he shouted in the woods he heard an echo.
"'From whence?' I asked, suspiciously.
"'From the great barrows by the lake—where the bones of my forefathers lie. The white man treads there now; but they were great warriors, and many were the scalps that dried before their tents.'
"I was but a young officer then, being fresh from our Scottish Fencibles, otherwise I would have doubled my sentinels; but the idea never occurred to me, and my sergeant failed to suggest it. The affair was becoming intolerable. This mysterious assassination of brave men roused my blood to fever heat, and I resolved that on the next night I should take the duty of sentinel with a firelock, and remain on my post as such, not for one hour merely, but for the entire night, in the hope of solving this terrible enigma.
"On the evening I came to this conclusion the post was visited by Charley Halket from the fort, the captain of our first company, who came cantering up on a fine bay horse. I was glad to see him, for Halket was one of the most lively and devil-may-care fellows in the corps, and he sang the best song and was the best stroke at billiards in our whole brigade. Charley would drink his two bottles at mess overnight and wing a fellow in the morning, without keeping his arm in a cold bath, and with an accuracy that showed he had a constitution of iron; he hunted fearlessly, shot fairly, rode like a mad-cap; gambled, but simply for excitement, and spent his money like a good-hearted fellow. He was always laughing and jovial, and I was about to relate the disasters that had befallen my party, when the pale and anxious expression of his usually merry face arrested me, and I feared that the fort had been taken by surprise in rear of our post.
"'What the devil is the matter, Halket?' said I. 'I have always predicted to Preston that we should never have our legs under his mahogany at Valleyfield again—never taste his Fifeshire mutton, or test his fine old Burgundy. What is up? Has the fort fallen, Charley, that you come here with your bay thoroughbred covered with foam, even to its bang-up tail?'
"'No, my dear Middleton; but I wish to pass your post.'
"'To the front?' I asked, with astonishment.
"'Yes.'
"'It is impossible!'
"'Even if out of uniform?'
"'In or out of uniform, none can pass or repass save our scouts, whose lives are of little value. Preston's orders are strict and decisive.'
"'But if in disguise?' he urged, earnestly, and lowering his tone, as he stooped from his saddle.
"'Worse and worse!'
"'How? explain, pray,' he demanded, as his earnestness became tinged with irritation.
"'You might be deemed a deserter by General Burgoyne if found more than two miles from camp or quarters.'
"'A deserter!—I?—pooh, man, absurd!'
"'A general officer has joined the rebels already. Then you might be hanged as a spy by Montgomery, whose troops are certainly closing up, if we may judge from the murderous outrages committed by his Indian allies upon the picquets stationed here.'
"'It is for that very reason, Middleton, that I am most anxious to ride southward for about twelve miles into the country along the shore of the lake, towards Misiskoui.'
"'You could not return; my sentinels have positive orders to fire instantly on all——'
"'Who have not the parole and countersign,' said he, smiling; 'they are Quebec and WOLFE. You see that I have both!'
"'From whom?'
"'My friend André, of the Cameronians—the fort-major.'
"'He is very rash! I wish he had this infernal picquet to command; the duty might teach him caution.'
"'But, my dear Middleton——'
"'Say no more, Charley—come, don't be rash; duty is duty; and I must perform mine. Moreover, I value your life and my own honour too much to risk either to further some mad-cap ramble of yours.'
"'Zounds, sir!' he began, furiously.
"'Now don't call me out, Charley; I am on duty and can't go, and when I am relieved and you are cool, you won't ask me. But tell me, Charley, what affair is this that seems so urgent? The country in front is full of perils; already eight or nine sentinels have been assassinated, and yonder grave covers one of three fine fellows I have lost.'
"'Listen to me, Jack,' said he, dismounting, and throwing the reins of his horse over his arm, and leading me a little way apart from the soldiers who were smoking and lounging before the log-hut; 'you remember Ella Carleton?'
"'I should rather think I do' said I, reddening, and giving him a very knowing wink, to which he made not the slightest response; 'Ella, whom we used to meet so much a year ago at Montreal.'
"'The same,' said he.
"'I remember her perfectly—a charming girl, with features that were pale but beautifully regular, and with eyes and hair so dark.'
"'Exactly,' said Halket, whose eyes sparkled with pleasure. 'Her father, you are aware, is a rich land-owner, in the American interest.'
"'Many a bottle of champagne I have drunk in his house in the Rue de Notre Dame.'
"'Yet he is an old curmudgeon who hates us red-coats, and for that reason, as well as for a few others that were more cogent, Ella and I were privately married about a year ago.'
"'Married?—whew! Here's news for the mess to discuss over their wine and walnuts!' I exclaimed, while laughing to conceal an irrepressible emotion of pique.
"'I depend on your honour,' said he, earnestly.
"'To the death, Charley; but you have quite taken my breath away. Married—you never looked a bit like it!'
"'We were married a year ago at the cathedral in the Place d'Armes unknown to all—even to yourself, Rohallion, and others my most intimate friends,' said Halket, speaking rapidly and with growing emotion; 'in a month she will be a mother—think of that, Jack! She is residing at one of her father's country clearings near the Missiskoui River, in an old hunting-lodge, built by Simon de Champlain, who first discovered the lake. She has written to me by a circuitous route, saying that Montgomery's advanced posts are within a few miles; that her father and all his men are with the rebels; that the Iroquois are ravaging the country, burning, killing, and scalping all before them; and thus, for the love I bear her, and for the sake of our child that is yet unborn, I must strive to save her, and have her conveyed to Fort St. John. This is all my story, Middleton. She is about twelve miles distant from this outpost; I think I know the way, and am certain I should be back before the morning-gun is fired. If not, I must risk all—commission, rank, reputation, everything—but Ella must be saved! You understand me now, don't you, my dear friend?' said he, earnestly, as he grasped my hand, and I could see that the poor fellow's eyes were filled with tears.
"'Perfectly, Charley; I would risk my life to save or serve her or you; but I think we may find those who will do both more effectually than either you or I.'
"'Who do you mean?'
"'The Delaware scout, and old Abe Treherne, the hunter, will get over the ground in half the time, and knowing, as they do, every track and trail in the forest, with ten degrees more safety than you could ever hope for.'
"I at once proposed the affair to them, and Treherne entered into it with great readiness. His reward was to be a pair of handsome pistols and ten guineas. He knew the old hunting-lodge on Carleton's clearing quite well, and with the assistance of the horse, undertook to bring the lady to the picquet-house in safety, and long before sunrise. The Delaware, however, shook his head.
"'Le Vipre Noir has some darned doubts, I guess,' said the hunter; 'the woods about the Missiskoui are full of the mocassin prints of the Yankees and the Iroquois; the tracks, I reckon, are dangerous enough; and there will be an almighty trouble in bringing a fine lady a-horse-back through the bush; for all that, Delaware, you'll venture to bring the White Chief his squaw safe from the hunting-place beyond the river?'
"'From the Missiskoui, where once I had a wigwam, and where my squaw and her little papooses perished at the hands of the white men?' said the savage, in a husky and guttural voice, while his stealthy eyes filled with a malevolent gleam, as he sat sullenly smoking under a tree.
"'You're a darned fool, Vipre,' said Treherne, angrily. 'Look ye har—what's the use o' thinking o' that now? What's past is past, ain't it?'
"'She appealed to them, and they laughed at her. She appealed to Manitto, but his face was hidden behind a cloud, and he saw neither her nor what the pale-faces did to her. She is with Manitto now—but I yet am here.'
"'We may have a scrimmage, Delaware—can you bite yet?' asked Treherne, testily.
"The savage pointed to his scalping-knife and grinned.
"'Will you venture with me for twelve bottles of the raal Jamaiky fire-water?'
"'Oui, ja, yes!' said the savage, eagerly, in his mixed jargon; 'I neither fear the feathered arrows of the rebel Iroquois, or the lead bullets of the Yankees. Go! Le Vipre Noir is a warrior!'
"'Delaware,' said I, patting his muscular shoulder, 'what are the greatest of human virtues?'
"'Courage and contempt of death,' he replied, loftily, while shaking the two heron's plumes in his scalp lock.
"'Good,' said Halkett, who had listened to all this preamble with irrepressible anxiety and impatience; 'here are ten guineas as an earnest of future reward, Delaware. You will risk this for me?'
"'For you?' said the Indian, scornfully, putting the coins, however, in the musk-rat pouch, which dangled at his wampum girdle.
"'For her, then?' said Halket, persuasively.
"'For neither,' replied the Delaware, while a lurid gleam shone in his sombre eyes.
"'How, fellow?' asked Charley, with alarm.
"'I do so for the reward—for the fire-water and gold that will buy me powder and blankets; but neither for the squaw nor the papoose of the pale-face.'
"'Risk it for what you will, but only serve me; and you, Treherne——'
"'Make your terms with this darned crittur of a Redskin, and you can settle with me after, sir,' said Treherne, who had been regarding his compatriot with a somewhat doubtful expression. 'Come, Vipre Noir, we must keep the hair on our heads, if we can, certainly; so put fresh priming into the pan of your rifle, my dark serpent, for the dew is falling heavily; if the rebel Redskins come on us, it must be our scalps agin theirs! I'm your brother—let us be off to the bush ere the sun sets.'
"Charley Halkett hastily wrote a note to his wife, telling her to place implicit confidence in the two scouts as true and tried men, who would convey her safely to the British outpost in front of Fort St. John, where he, all eagerness and impatience, awaited her; and on being furnished with this, Treherne slung his long rifle across his body, stuck a short black pipe in his moustachioed mouth, mounted Halkett's horse, and, with the swift-footed and agile Indian running by his side, crossed the open bit of prairie before the log-hut, and rapidly disappeared in the dense and virgin forest that lay beyond.
"That forest soon grew dark; twilight stole along the shores of the silent lake; the last red rays of lingering light faded upward from the lone mountain tops; one by one the bright stars came twinkling out, and the old and clamorous anxiety occurred to us all; and each poor fellow, as he was left on his post, felt himself a doomed man, who might die without seeing his destroyer, or who might disappear as others had so mysteriously done, without leaving a trace behind.
"Slowly and wearily our autumn night wore on, and with our pistols cocked, Halkett and I visited the sentinels almost half-hourly. The sky was moonless, and the silence around our lonely post was oppressive; to the listening ear there came no sounds save those of insect life among the long and reedy prairie grass.
"All at once, afar in distance from the deep recesses of the vast pine forest, there rose the shrill war-whoop of the red man!
"Like the yell of an unchained fiend, it rung upon the still night air; but died away, and all became silent—more silent apparently than before, and I felt the hand of Halkett clutch my arm like a vice, while hot bead-drops rolled over his temples.
"I had terrible forebodings, but remained silent, and with reiterated advice to my sentinels to be 'on the alert,' returned to the picquet-house. Poor Charley Halkett's alarm excited all my compassion; the boldest, frankest, and jolliest fellow in the corps had become a nervous, crushed, and miserable wretch!
"I thought that lingering night would never pass away. It passed, however, as others do; the morning came in, bright and sunny, and without one of our sentinels being missed or molested; and it seemed, certainly, a very singular feature in those mysterious deaths, that the only night on which no fatality occurred, should be that on which we actually had an alerte, and when Treherne and the Delaware were away in the direction of Missiskoui, and not scouting in front of the post!
"Morning had come, but there was yet no appearance of our messengers or Ella Carleton, and old sympathies made me doubly anxious on her account.
"Halkett, who was pale with sleeplessness and intense anxiety, walked with me a little way beyond our advanced sentinels, who were now shouting to each other their happy congratulations that nothing had occurred during the night—in short, that they were all there.
"Lake Champlain, in its calm loveliness, shone brightly under the morning sun, its surface unruffled by the wind, and not a sail or boat was visible in all the blue extent of its far stretching vista. The gorgeous azalias were still in their bloom, so were the snowy blossoms of the sumach, and the glorious yellow light fell in flakes between the towering pines of the ancient forest, while the dewy prairie grass glittered as it rippled beneath the pleasant breeze.
"The distant landscape and the dim blue hills that look down on the winding Hudson seemed calm and tranquil, the silence around us was intense, the hum of a little waterfall alone breaking the stillness of the autumn morning.
"Poor Charley was like a madman, and it was in vain that I suggested to him that Treherne and the Delaware might have been compelled to make a long detour; that Ella might be ill and unable to travel on horseback, that her father might have returned, that Montgomery's advanced guard might be now far beyond the Missiskoui, that our scouts might have lost their way in going or in returning, not that I believed either possible for a moment, but I was glad to say anything that would serve to account for their delay, or soothe his gnawing anxiety; so in exceeding misery he returned to Fort St. John. The moment that morning parade was over he hastened to me again, and slowly the terrible day passed over, without tidings of Ella Carleton or her guides, and as night drew near I had almost to use force to prevent Halkett from setting out on foot for the old hunting-lodge on the Missiskoui, a place he could never have reached alone.
"Suddenly we were roused, about sunset, by a shout from the picquet, and as we looked up, the Delaware stood before us—alone!
"His aspect was fierce but weary; his hunting shirt was torn and bore traces of blood. His story was brief. They had been attacked by Indians in a deep gulley some miles distant, in the grey dawn of the morning; Treherne had been killed and the lady carried off! The Indian showed his wounds, and then claimed his reward.
"Poor Halkett, on hearing of this catastrophe, fell, as if struck by a ball, and was laid on the hard bed of planks whereon the soldiers slept. He was in a delirium, yet passive and weak as a child.
"So the hostile Indians were in our neighbourhood! I thought with horror of what the poor girl—on the eve of becoming a mother—might suffer at their merciless hands; and all her delicate beauty, her merry laugh, the singular combination of elegance and espièglerie in her manner, came vividly back to memory, as I had seen her last, happy, radiant, and smiling, amid the glare and glitter of a garrison ball in the city of Montreal.
"I questioned the Delaware closely; but his story was simple and unvarying, so he received food, rum, and the reward which Halkett had promised.
"An irrepressible anxiety stole over me as night deepened, so taking my servant's musket and bayonet, I primed, loaded, and fixed a new flint with care; and proceeding to the distance of fifty yards in front of my line of sentinels, on the open space where the prairie grass grew thick and rank, I resolved to pass some hours there as an advanced sentinel.
"The sky was dark and cloudy, the stars were obscured by vapour, the silence was intense, and it smote upon my heart with a sense that was in some degree appalling, though I knew that my sentinels and the rest of the picquet were all within hail. The tall prairie grass waved solemnly and noiselessly to and fro; the sombre forest beyond, with the myriad cones of its black pines stretched far away to the distant mountains, but not a sound came from thence, nor from the lone shores of the vast lake of Champlain, whose vista receded away for miles upon my right. Even if the night-herons were wading among its waters I could not hear them, and the whistle of the cat-bird was silent.
"Through the dark, I could see where the wild sumach, with its white blossoms and scarlet berries, waved over the graves of those who had perished on this fatal out-post. Their aspect was solemnizing in such a dark and silent hour, and the familiar faces of the dead men seemed to hover before me. But there was something mysterious and unaccountable in the total disappearance of those whose blood we had only traced upon the grass of the prairie.
"Around where I stood this grass was more than a yard in height and thick as ripened corn. It was waving steadily to and fro as the breath of the night wind agitated it.
"I had been in that solitary place about two hours, and midnight was at hand, when an emotion like a thrill—a tremor, not of fear, but of warning—a 'grue,' as we Scots call it, came over me. I felt the approach of some unseen thing, and cast a hurried glance around me. Something unusual about the appearance of the prairie-grass caught my eye.
"Where, when hitherto I had looked in a direct line to the front, the surface, while swaying to and fro, seemed a flat and unbroken mass, there was now visible a dark line, a hollow furrow, as if some animal was crawling slowly and stealthily through it.
"With every nerve braced, with all the powers of vision concentrated, I watched this new appearance, and the hollow track seemed to draw nearer and nearer to me, slowly, silently, and almost imperceptibly, as if a snake or some such reptile were crawling towards my post; and, ere long, it was not more than fifteen yards distant.
"I placed a handkerchief over the lock of my musket to muffle the click of the lock in cocking, then I took a steady aim and fired!
"On this, 'piercing the night's dull ear,' there rang a wild, shrill, and savage cry—a cry like that we had heard on the preceding night—and a dark figure, bounding from among the grass, came rushing towards me, but I stood, with bayonet charged, ready to receive him on its point.
"He was an Indian, brandishing a tomahawk; but, within a few feet of where I stood, he fell prone on his face, wallowing in blood. The report of my musket, and his cry, brought all the picquet to the front. We dragged him into the log-hut, and discovered that I had shot our missing scout, the Delaware, Le Vipre Noir, the ball having entered his left shoulder, and traversed nearly the entire length of his body. He was mortally wounded, but the powers of life were strong within him. I was greatly concerned by this misfortune, which might procure us the enmity of his entire tribe; but why was he stealing upon our post in the manner he had done?
"Before this could be resolved, and while we were staunching the welling blood, and doing all in our humble power to soothe suffering and prolong existence, a pale and bloody figure, who had given our sentries the pass-word, staggered into the hut, and sunk, half fainting, against the guard-bed. He was old Abe Treherne, the scout, cut, gashed, and apparently dying.
"He was almost as speechless as the Delaware; but, on seeing each other, though weak and deplorable their condition, the eyes of these men glared with rage and hate, and they made such incredible efforts to reach each other, knife in hand, that the soldiers of my picquet had to hold them asunder by force.
"'Search the hunting-pouch of the darned thief—the accursed red-skin!' said Treherne, in a hollow voice. 'May I never hew hickory again if I don't have his scalp and his heart tew!'
"I was about to make the search, when Charley Halket anticipated me, and shudderingly drew forth its cold and clammy contents.
"There were four human scalps; three were recognised as belonging to our own men, the murdered sentinels, and the fourth had attached to it the long, black, silky hair of a woman—the soft and ripply tresses of Ella Carleton!
"'The red-skin fell on us suddenly in the bush, with knife and tomahawk,' said Treherne, speaking with difficulty, and at intervals; 'he took me unawares from behind, and well nigh clove my head—darned if I don't think the tommy's stickin' there yet! I fought hard for my precious life—harder for the poor lady, I guess; but I swowned, after a time, and then he dragged her into the bush.'
"'Ella—Ella!' exclaimed Halket, wringing his hands.
"'The last I saw, 'tween the leaves and the blood that poured into my eyes, was the glitter of his scalping-knife; and the last I heard was her death-cry. Shoot the varmint, captain! I searched the bush for her till I was weary. Shoot the critter dead, soldiers! Ah! he was well named Le Vipre Noir, by that son of a Delaware dog, his father.'
"The savage scarcely heard the end of this, for Halket, maddened by the contents of the hunting-pouch, and brief story of Treherne, placed a foot upon the prostrate body of the Delaware, then, slowly and deliberately, while his teeth were set, his eyes flashing fire, his brows knit by rage and grief, and, while an unuttered malediction hovered on his lips, he passed his sword-blade twice through the heart of the scout. The latter, for a moment, writhed upward on the steel, like a dying serpent, and then expired.
"Poor Abe Treherne died soon after, for his wounds were mortal.
"So our false Delaware proved, after all, to have been in the American interest, and inspired by some real or imaginary wrongs, to have been the assassin of our sentinels.*
* Several sentinels of an outpost were thus actually assassinated during the American war. A Scottish periodical of the time gives a Highland regiment—the 74th, I think—the credit of furnishing the victims.
"Fort St. John soon after fell into the hands of the Yankees under General Montgomery; we were all made prisoners of war, and my poor friend, Charley Halket, died, and (far from his kindred, who lie in the Abbey Kirk of Culross) we buried him amid the snow as we were being marched, under escort, up the lakes, towards Ticonderoga."
Such was the major's story of the advanced picquet.
CHAPTER VI.
COSMO JOINS.
"Ye'll try the world soon, my lad,
And Andrew, dear, believe me,
Ye'll find mankind an unco squad,
And muckle may they grieve ye.
For care and trouble set your thought,
Even when your end's attained;
And a' your views may come to nought,
When every nerve is strained."—BURNS.
After a careful search through some of the old dog-eared Army Lists, which, with Burns' poems, Brown's "Self-interpreting Bible," and Abercrombie's "Martial Achievements of the Scots Nation," formed the chief literary stores in his snuggery, the old quartermaster discovered that in the 94th, the famous old Scots brigade, there was a Captain Richard Warriston. He was the only one of that name in the service, and doubtless the same officer whom Quentin had mentioned in his letter as having so kindly befriended him; and by Lord Rohallion's direction, Girvan at once addressed a letter to the officer commanding the regiment for some information regarding the runaway.
In due time an answer came from Colonel James Campbell, to state "that no volunteer named Quentin Kennedy had attached himself to the 94th Regiment," thus the household of the old castle were sorely perplexed what to do, and had to trust to time or to Quentin himself for clearing up the mystery that overhung his actions.
In little more than ten days after Cosmo's name had appeared in the War Office Gazette, Quentin received the unwelcome information that the new lieutenant-colonel, his enemy, had arrived at head-quarters, and that a parade in full marching order was to take place on the morrow, when he would formally take over the command of the corps from poor Major Middleton.
Though daily expected, these tidings fell like a knell upon Quentin's heart, and the old sickly emotion that came over him, when Warriston brought the fatal Gazette to the mess-room, returned again in all its force.
"I think this Guardsman will prove a thorough Tartar," said Captain Askerne, in whose rooms Quentin first heard Cosmo's arrival canvassed; "and I fear that he won't make himself popular among the Borderers."
"From what do you infer that?" said some one.
"He refused to let the drums beat the 'Point of War' this morning."
"The devil he did!" said Colville.
"That looks ill, damme!" added Monkton.
"I do not understand," said Quentin, as if looking for information.
"It is," said Askerne, "a custom as old as the days of Queen Anne—older, perhaps, for aught that I know—for the drums and fifes of a corps to assemble before the quarters of every officer who is newly appointed to it, and there to honour the king's commission by beating the 'Point of War.' Though dying out now, and frequently 'more honoured in the breach than the observance,' it is a good old custom, peculiar to many of our Scottish regiments. The officer then gives to the drummers a few crowns or guineas, as the case may be, to drink his health; but the Master of Rohallion bluntly and haughtily told the drum-major that he 'would have no such d—d nonsense, and to dismiss!'"
"The deuce! this augurs ill," said Colville, with his affected lisp, as he arranged his hair in Askerne's little camp mirror.
"Perhaps his exchequer is in a bad way."
"Not improbable, Monkton," said Askerne; "he was one of the most lavish fellows in the household brigade, and he played and betted deeply; but there goes the drum for parade; in a few minutes we shall see what like our new man is."
We shall not afflict the reader with details of this most formal parade, during which the regiment marched past Cosmo in slow and quick time in open column of companies; then followed an inspection of the men, their clothing, arms, accoutrements, and everything, from the regimental colours to the pioneers' hand-saws; but thanks to old Middleton's unwearying zeal and pride in the Borderers, the somewhat fractious lieutenant-colonel discovered nothing to find fault with.
Mounted on a fine dark charger, with gold-laced saddlecloth and holsters, Cosmo, in his new regimentals, looked every inch a handsome and stately soldier; and his appearance, together with his clear, full, mellow voice, when commanding, impressed the corps favourably. Quentin, from the rear rank of Askerne's company, surveyed him earnestly, anxiously, and with secret misgivings; for every feature of his cold, keen, and aristocratic face brought back vividly the mortifying and unpleasant passages in which they had both borne a part at Rohallion, and sadly and bitterly he felt that the worst was yet to come.
The parade over, the regiment was dismissed, but the orderly bugle summoned the officers to the front, where they gathered around Cosmo, who had dismounted and haughtily tossed his reins to an orderly (Allan Grange, the crest-fallen and reduced sergeant), his gentleman's gentleman—that town-bred appendage who had excited alternately the wrath and contempt of sturdy old Jack Andrews, had resigned, having no fancy for the chances of war as a camp-follower; so the Master had to content himself with such unfashionable "helps" as soldiers and batmen.
Quentin, lingering irresolutely, and half hoping to escape observation, was about to retire to his quarters, when Askerne called to him with a friendly smile—
"Kennedy, come to the front; Middleton is about to introduce the officers, and you must not be omitted."
Poor Quentin felt that his doom had come, and he could feel, too, that as his heart sank, the blood left his cheeks. But honest anger and just indignation came to the rescue, and gave him courage.
"Why should I dread this man—why shrink from one I have never wronged?" he asked of himself. "Of what am I afraid? The sooner this introduction is over, and that I know on what terms we are to be, the better. Perhaps he may be desirous of forgetting the past, of committing to oblivion all that has occurred, and may be the first to hold out a friendly hand. Heaven grant it may be so!"
But this suggestion of his own generous heart was little likely to be realized.
With studied politeness and grace, if not with pure cordiality, Cosmo received each officer as he was presented according to his rank, until the junior ensign, Boyle, was introduced.
"Ah!" said Cosmo, detecting one present without epaulettes, "you have a volunteer with you, I see."
"One," said Middleton, "whom I wish especially to introduce to your notice and future care, colonel, as a most promising young soldier, who in a few weeks has passed through all his drills, and is now fit for any duty. Mr. Quentin Kennedy—Colonel Crawford."
The nervous start given by Cosmo, the changing colour of his cheek, the shrinking and dilation of his cat-like eyes, as he raised and almost nervously let fall his eye-glass, were apparent to several; and Quentin saw the whole. Cosmo bowed with marked coldness, and turned so sharply on his heel, that his spurs rasped on the gravel of the barrack-yard.
"Major Middleton," said he, haughtily, before retiring, "tell that young man, Mr.—what's his name——?"
"Mr. Kennedy, sir."
"That when speaking to an officer, he should bring his musket to the recover."
And so ended this—to Quentin—most crushing interview.
"What the devil is up now?" said Monkton to Colville; "it is evident that our new bashaw doesn't like gentlemen volunteers."
"Then he is devilishly unjust—that's all," said Askerne the Grenadier who had begun his military life as a volunteer.
Quentin could have furnished the clue to all this; but to speak of the friendless childhood which cast him among the household at Rohallion, and, more than all, to speak of Flora Warrender, and to make her name the jest of the heedless or unfeeling, were thoughts that could not be endured. He was, silent, and his tongue seemed as if cleaving to the roof of his mouth, while wearily and sadly he turned away to seek the solitude of his bare and scantily-furnished little room.
Middleton, who had followed unobserved, entered after him, and just when Quentin, to relieve his overcharged heart, was on the point of giving way to a paroxysm of rage, even to tears, the worthy old field officer caught his hand kindly, and said with earnestness—
"Don't be cast down, my boy, by what has occurred to-day. He was cold and haughty to every one of us, but it is evidently his way, and may wear off after a time. I hope so, for our Borderers won't stand it. Take courage, lad—take courage, and don't fret about it; Jack Middleton will always be your friend, though a hostile commanding officer is a dangerous rock ahead."
"Oh, major, you are indeed kind and good," said Quentin, as he seated himself at the hard wood table, and covered his burning face with his trembling hands; "but you know not all I have suffered—all I think, and feel, and fear!"
"Chut, Kennedy, look up! 'The English pluck that storms a breach or heads a charge is the very same quality that sustains a man on the long dark road of adverse fortune,' says an author—I forget who—not he of the 'Eighteen Manœuvres,' however; so, Quentin; don't, let Scottish pluck be behind it. To follow the drum is your true road in life, boy, and who but God can tell when that road may end?"
"Major Middleton," said Quentin, bitterly, "the colonel's chilling manner, and more than you can ever know, have crushed the heart within me. I never knew my father—of my mother I have barely a memory," he continued in a broken voice—"a memory, a dream! Fate has made me early a victim—a plaything—a toy! Advise me—I feel my condition so desolate, so friendless again. What future can there be for me, if I continue to serve under him; and how can I hope for happiness, for justice, or advancement under such as he?"
"Obey and suffer in silence; bear and forbear, and you will be sure to triumph in the end. 'He that tholes overcomes,' says our Scottish proverb, and the poor soldier has much to thole indeed; but do your duty diligently, and you may defy any man—even the king himself."
Quentin strove to take courage from the good major's words, and ultimately did so; but Middleton knew not the past of those he spoke of, and was ignorant of the secret rivalry and settled hatred that existed between them, especially in the heart of Cosmo; while Quentin, in his ignorance of military matters, knew not that the Master, if he chose to exert his powers arbitrarily, might dismiss him from the corps at once, unquestioned by any authority for doing so; and that by the stigma thus attached to his name, the chance of any other commanding officer accepting him as a volunteer would be utterly precluded; and that Cosmo did not do so was, perhaps, only by a lingering emotion of justice or of shame for what his family, and chiefly Flora Warrender and that huge bugbear "the world," would say if the story got abroad.
"Better trust to the chances of war," thought Cosmo, grimly, as he lay sullenly at length, smoking, on a luxurious fauteuil in his ample quarters, which were furnished with all the comforts and elegance with which a Jew broker could surround him; "a brat, a boy, a chick—a d—ned foundling! With all my conscious superiority of rank, birth, and, what are better, strength of mind and character, why do I dread this Quentin Kennedy? Why and how does he seem to be so inextricably woven up with me, my fate and fortune—it may be, with the house of Rohallion itself? Last of all, why the devil do I find him here?" (This question he almost shouted aloud as he kicked away the cushion of the fauteuil.) "Why do I dread him? Dread—I—shame! what delusion is this—what depression is it that his presence—the very idea of his existence—and contact bring upon me? In all this there is some strange fate—I know not what; but I shall trust to the chances of war for a riddance, and to the perilous work I shall cut out for him in particular."
And so he trusted; but with what success we shall see ere long.
CHAPTER VII.
THE DEPARTURE.
"Our native land—our native vale—
A long and last adieu;
Farewell to bonny Teviotdale,
And Cheviot mountains blue!
The battle-mound, the border-tower,
That Scotia's annals tell;
The martyr's grave—the lover's bower—
To each, to all—farewell."—PRINGLE.
Cosmo studiously and ungenerously omitted the slightest mention of Quentin's name or existence in the letters which he wrote home to Carrick, well knowing that if he did so, the kind old general, his father, would at once address the authorities at the Horse Guards on the subject of the young volunteer's advancement; and he knew, that if appointed to any other corps than the Borderers, Quentin would be beyond his influence, and free from the wiles and perils in which he had mentally proposed to involve his future career.
At last came the day so long looked forward to by all the regiment—the day of its departure for foreign service, as it proved in the Spanish Peninsula, the land to which, after several useless and bloody expeditions to Holland, Flanders, Sweden, and Italy, the thoughts and hopes and all the sympathies of Britain turned, with the desire of driving out the victorious French, and restoring the Bourbon dynasty—almost an old story now, so remote have the struggles before Sebastopol and the wars of India made the great battles of those days seem to be.
The regiment had been under orders, and in a state of readiness for weeks; but until, for it and for others, the route came in the sabretasche of an orderly dragoon who rode spurring in "hot haste" to Colchester Barracks, its members knew not for what country they were destined.
The drums beat the générale, the signal for marching, early in the morning of a soft September day, and the four pipers of the regiment played loud and high a piobroch, that rang wildly, in all its various parts, through the calm air, waking every echo of the old barrack square; for the piobroch, we may inform the uninitiated, is a regular piece of music, containing several portions; beginning with an alarm, after which follow the muster, the march, the fury of the charge, the shrill triumph of victory, and the low sad wail for the slain.
With our battalion of the Borderers, there were to march on this morning another of the Gordon Highlanders—the 92nd—one of the most noble of our national corps, together with a strong detachment of the 91th, under Captain Warriston, so the enthusiasm of all was at its height when, in heavy marching order, with great coats rolled on the knapsacks, blankets folded behind them, havresacks and wooden canteens slung, the companies fell in, and there seemed to be a rivalry between the kilted pipers of the 92nd and the Borderers as to who should excel most, or (as Cosmo, who was not inspired by overmuch nationality, said to Middleton) who should "make the most infernal noise."
Silent and grim, and keeping somewhat haughtily aloof from all his officers, Cosmo sat on his black horse, gnawing the chin-strap of his shako, as if controlling some secret irritation, while watching the formation of the corps, looking very much the while as if longing to find fault with some one.
"And so we are destined to reinforce the army under Sir John Moore?" said Quentin, for lack of something more important to remark.
"Yes," said Askerne, as he adjusted the cheek-scales of his tall grenadier cap; "Sir John is a glorious fellow, and quite the man of to-day."
"I would rather be the man of to-morrow," said Monkton, with an air that implied a joke, though there was something prophetic in the wish.
"I knew Moore when he was serving as a subaltern with the 82nd in America—he is a brave, good fellow, and a countryman of our own, too," said Middleton, whose orderly brought forward his horse at that moment; "and now," he added, putting his foot in the stirrup, "a long good-bye to the land of roast-beef, and to poor old Scotland, too! I wonder who among us here will see her heather hills and grassy glens again—God bless them all!" And reverentially the fine old man raised his hand to his cap as he spoke.
A crowd formed by the soldiers' wives and children of the regiment, now gathered round him, for the old major knew all their names and little necessities, and was adored by them all. Now he was distributing among them money, advice, and letters of recommendation to parish ministers and others, and to none was he more kind than to the weeping wife of Allan Grange, who, by his reduction to the ranks, lost nearly every chance of accompanying the troops abroad.
To the screaming of the bagpipes had now succeeded the wailing of women, for many soldiers' wives and children were to be left behind, and to be transferred to their several parishes in Scotland; many to remote glens that are desolate wildernesses now; and it was touching to see these poor creatures, looking so pale and miserable in the cold grey light of the early morning, each with her wondering little brood clinging to her skirts, as she hovered about the company to which her husband belonged, his quivering lip and glistening eye alone revealing the heart that ached beneath the coarse red coat, amid the monotony of calling rolls and inspecting arms.
On one of the waggons which was piled high with baggage, huge chests of spare arms, iron-bound trunks, camp-beds and folded tents, Quentin tossed the little portmanteau which contained his entire worldly possessions; then the baggage-guard, looking so serviceable and warlike with their havresacks and canteens slung crosswise, came with bayonets fixed, and the great wains rumbled away through the echoing, and as yet empty streets of Colchester.
None of the officers were married men, fortunately for themselves perhaps, at such a juncture. The colours were brought forth with their black oilskin cases on; the advanced guard marched off, and just as the sun began to gild the church vanes and chimney-tops, and while reiterated cheers rang from the thousands of soldiers who crowded the barrack windows, and whose turn would come anon, the troops moved off, the brass bands of other regiments—the usual courtesy—playing them out, the whole being under the command of the senior officer present, Lieutenant-Colonel Napier of Blackstone, who afterwards fell at the head of the 92nd Highlanders on the field of Corunna.
In the excitement of the scene, Quentin felt all its influences and marched happily on. He forgot his affronts, his piques and jealousies, and as the young blood coursed lightly through his veins, he felt that he could forgive even Cosmo, were it only for Lady Winifred's sake, when he saw him riding with so stately and soldier-like an air between Major Middleton and Buckle the adjutant, at the end of the column, where the splendid grenadiers with their black bearskin caps and braided wings, made a martial show such as no company of the line could do in the shorn uniform of the present day.
All the happy impulses of youth made Quentin's spirit buoyant; thus his light heart beat responsive to the crash of the drums and cymbals, and to every note of the brass band. Thus, when on looking to the rear, he saw so many hundred bayonets and clear barrels (they were not browned in those days) flashing in the sun, with the long array of plumed Highlanders that wound through the streets after his own regiment, he forgot, we say, his grievances, and the cold and haughty Master—we believe he forgot even Flora Warrender—he forgot all but that he was a soldier—one of the old 25th, and bound for the seat of war! Ah, there is something glorious in these emotions—this flushing up of the spirit in a young and generous breast; but alas! the time comes when we look back to the long-past days with envy, regret, and, it may be—wonder!
The sorrowful parting, the hurried embraces, the last kisses, the sad and lingering glances of farewell being exchanged along the line of march every moment, by husbands and wives, by parents and children, as group after group gradually dropped to the rear of the column they could but follow with their eyes and hearts, ceased after a time to impress him by their very number and frequency; thus he soon laughed with the gay, and enjoyed all the silly banter of the heedless, as the officers began to group by twos and threes, after Colchester was left behind, and the troops were permitted to "march at ease" along the dusty highway between the meadows and ploughed fields.
"I have never seen so jolly a morning as this," said Ensign Boyle, as he trudged along with the regimental colour crossed on his left shoulder; "never since first I saw my own name in print!"
"How in print?" asked Quentin, with simplicity; "you do not mean on the title-page of a book?"
"Not at all—nothing so stupid—I mean in the Army List——"
"Where you have never been tired of contemplating it since—eh, Pimple?" asked Monkton; "but I hope you have left your flirting jacket and best epaulettes with the heavy baggage—you only need your fighting traps now."
"I say, Pimple," said Colyear, the senior ensign, who, of course, had the King's colour, "how much of the ready had that flax-spinner's daughter, about whom Monkton quizzes you so much?"
"Rumour said twenty thousand pounds."
"The devil! You might have done worse—aw—eh!"
"We're all doing worse, damme, marching for embarkation on this fine sunny morning," said Monkton. "There goes the band again to the old air; but, save you, Pimple, few among us leave 'girls behind us' with twenty thousand pounds."
"Adieu to Colchester, its morning drills and monotonous guards, and that devilish incessant patter of little drum-boys practising their da-da, ma-ma, on the drum from sunrise till sunset," said Colville, looking back to where the strong old Saxon castle and the brick steeple of St. Peter were being shrouded in yellow morning haze exhaled by the sun from the river Colne.
"Bon voyage," cried a gay staff-officer, lifting his plumed cocked hat, as he cantered gaily past; "good-bye, gentlemen."
"Adieu, Conyers," replied Monkton; "can I do anything for you?"
"Where?"
"Among the ladies in Lisbon?"
The officer made no reply, but rode hurriedly on.
"That is the fellow who had to quit Wellesley's staff for eloping with some hidalgo's wife, the night after Vimiera," said Askerne. "Monkton, you hit him hard there."
"Don't you think old Jack Middleton looks dull this morning?" asked some one.
"The colonel is in a devil of a temper, I think," replied Askerne.
"Perhaps he has left his love behind him," suggested Boyle, raising his stupid white eyebrows sentimentally; "don't you think so, Kennedy?"
"Pimple, allow me to rebuke you," said Monkton, with an air of mock severity. "An ensign may wear a faded rose next his beating heart; but in a field-officer, such an insane proceeding is not to be thought of."
While this empty talk was in progress, about eight miles from Colchester, a troop of the Scots Greys approached en route for that place; and, as they drew near, the drums and fifes of the Borderers struck up a lively national quick step; the Greys brandished their swords, and gave a hearty cheer on coming abreast of the colours of each regiment, and loud were the hurrahs which responded.
This little episode, and the thoughtless banter which preceded it, had raised Quentin's spirits to a high state of effervescence. Fresh hope had come with all her ruddiest tints to brighten the future and blot out the past, and with all the glorious confidence of youth, he was again building castles in the air, on this morning march, when the sun that shone so joyously on the green English landscape, added to the brilliance of his thoughts and enhanced his joy and happiness.
From his day-dreams, however, he was roughly awakened by the harsh voice of the Master of Rohallion, who half reined in his horse, and turning round with his right hand planted on the crupper, said with great sternness:
"Captain Askerne, I must remind you that, though officers may converse together when the men are marching at ease, such a privilege can by no means be accorded to a mere volunteer. Mr. Kennedy, rejoin your section, and keep your place, sir!"
Askerne's dark and handsome face coloured up to the rim of his bearskin cap, and his eyes sparkled with rage at the colonel's petulant wantonness; while poor Quentin, who, lost in his bright day-dreamings, had certainly, but unconsciously, diverged a few paces from the line of march to converse with his friends, fell sadly back into the ranks, and felt that the dark cloud was enveloping him again.
CHAPTER VIII.
ON THE SEA.
"A varied scene the changeful vision showed,
For where the ocean mingled with the cloud,
A gallant navy stemmed the billows broad.
Blent with the silver cross to Scotland dear,
From mast and stern, St. George's symbol flow'd,
Mottling the sea their landward barges row'd,
And flashed the sun on bayonet, brand, and spear,
And the wild beach returned the seaman's jovial cheer."
Vision of Don Roderick.
The kingdom of Spain was at this time the great centre of European political interest. France, Prussia, and Russia had scarcely sheathed their swords at Tilsit, when the terrible conspiracy of Ferdinand, the Prince of the Asturias, against his father, Charles IV.—a plot imputed to Michael Godoy, who, from a simple cavalier of the Royal Guard, had, by the queen's too partial favour, obtained the blasphemous title of the Prince of Peace—afforded the Emperor Napoleon, whose creature he was, a pretext for interfering in the affairs of the Spanish Bourbons. He decoyed the royal family to Bayonne, compelled their renunciation of the crown and kingdom of Spain, into which he poured at once his vast armies, and, after the fashion of the cat in the fable, who absorbed the whole matter in dispute by the monkeys, he solved the problem by seizing the Spanish empire, and gifting it to his brother Joseph, formerly King of Naples.
Portugal, at this juncture, deserted by her government and by her pitiful king, who fled to Rio de Janeiro, in Brazil, fell easily into the power of a French army, under Marshal Junot, who was thereupon created Duke of Abrantes, a town on the Portuguese frontier.
All Europe cried aloud at these lawless proceedings, and the Spaniards, so long our enemies, with our old allies the Portuguese, were alike filled with fury and resentment. The peasantry flew to arms, and the provinces became filled by bands of guerillas, brave but reckless; so the whole peninsula was full of tumult, treason, bloodshed, and crime.
"England," says General Napier, "both at home and abroad, was, in 1808, scorned as a military power, when she possessed (without a frontier to swallow up large armies in expensive fortresses) at least two hundred thousand of the best equipped and best disciplined soldiers in the universe, together with an immense recruiting establishment through the medium of the militia."
War, not "Peace at any price," was the generous John Bull's motto, and, to aid these patriots, a British army proceeded to the peninsula in June, 1808, under the command of Lieutenant-General Sir Arthur Wellesley. Some sharp fighting ensued along the coast, the prologue to the long and bloody, but glorious drama, that was only to terminate on the plains of Waterloo.
On the 21st of August we fought and won the battle of Vimiera, and nine days after followed the convention of Cintra, by which the French troops were compelled to evacuate the ancient Lusitania, and were conveyed home in British ships; but still the marshals of the empire, with vast armies, the heroes of Jena, Austerlitz, and a hundred other battles so glorious to France, were covering all the provinces of Spain, from the steeps of the Pyrenees to the arid plains of Estremadura.
"Soldiers, I have need of you," says the emperor, in one of his bulletins. "The hideous presence of the leopard contaminates the peninsula of Spain and Portugal. In terror he must fly before you! Let us bear our triumphal eagles to the pillars of Hercules, for there also we have injuries to avenge! Soldiers, you have surpassed the renown of modern armies, but have you yet equalled the glory of those Romans, who, in one and the same campaign, were victorious upon the Rhine and the Euphrates, in Illyria and upon the Tagus? A long peace and lasting prosperity shall be the reward of your labours."
The standard of freedom was first raised among the Asturians, the hardy descendants of the ancient Goths, and in Galicia; then Don José Palafox, by his valiant defence of the crumbling walls of Zaragossa, showed the Spaniards what brave men might do when fighting for their hearths and homes.
"In a few days," said Napoleon, boastfully, in the October of 1808, "I go to put myself at the head of my armies, and, with the aid of God, to crown the King of Spain in Madrid, and plant my eagles on the towers of Lisbon."
The Junta of the Asturias craved the assistance of Britain, even while the shattered wrecks of Trafalgar lay rotting on the sandy coast of Andalusia. Three years had committed those days of strife to oblivion, or nearly so, and arms, ammunition, clothing, and money were freely given to the patriots, while all the Spanish prisoners were sent home. Then, Sir John Moore, who commanded the British forces in Portugal, a small but determined "handful," was ordered to advance into Spain against the vast forces of the Duke of Dalmatia, which brings us now to the exact period of our own humble story, from which we have no intention of diverging again into the history of Europe.
The body of troops among which our hero formed a unit, sailed in transports from Spithead, and in the Channel, and when Portland lights were twinkling out upon the weather-beam, poor Quentin endured for the first time the horrors of sea-sickness, and lay for hours half-stifled in a close dark berth, unheeded and forgotten, overpowered by the odour of tar, paint, and bilge, and by a thirst which he had not the means of quenching, for he was helpless, unable to move and longed only for death.
It was no spacious, airy, and gigantic Himalaya, no magnificent screw-propeller like the Urgent, the Perseverance, or any other of our noble steam transports that, on this occasion received the head-quarters of the "King's Own Borderers," but a clumsy, old, and leaky tub, bluff-bowed and pinck-built, with her top-masts stayed forward, and her bowsprit tilted up at an angle of 45 degrees, and having a jack-staff rigged thereon. She was a black-painted bark of some four hundred tons, with the figures "200 T."—(signifying Transport No. 200)—of giant size appearing on her headrails. Between floors or decks hastily constructed for the purpose, the poor soldiers were stowed in darkness, discomfort, and filth. The officers were little better off in the cabin, and hourly their servants scrambled, quarrelled, and swore in the cooks' galley, about their several masters' rank and seniority in the order of boiling kettles and arranging frying-pans, whilst the hissing spray swept over them every time the old tub staggered under her fore course, and shipped a sea instead of riding buoyantly over it.
In the mighty stride taken by civilization of late years, when steam and electricity alike conduce to the annihilation of time and space, the soldiers of the Victorian age know little of what their fathers in the service underwent, when old George III. was King. In stench, uncleanness, and lack of comfort and accommodation, our shipping were then unchanged from those which landed Orange William's Dutchmen at Torbay, or which conveyed our luckless troops in after years to the storming of the Havannah or the bombardment of Bocca Chica.
After Quentin had recovered his strength (got his "sea-legs" as the sailors have it) he presented his pale, wan face on deck one morning, when the whole fleet, with the convoy, a stately 74-gun ship, were scattered, with drenched canvas, like sea-birds with dripping wings, as they scudded before a heavy gale, through the dark grey waters of the Bay of Biscay, the waves of which were rolling in foam, under a cold and cheerless October sky.
On that comfortless voyage to the seat of war, many were the secret heart-burnings he felt; many were the cutting slights put upon him by his cold and hostile commanding officer, who went the tyrannical length of even raising doubts as to whether he should mess in the cabin or among the soldiers; but to Cosmo's ill-concealed rage and confusion, the motion was carried unanimously and emphatically in the poor lad's favour; that the cabin was his place, as a candidate for his Majesty's commission.
Cosmo gave a smile somewhat singular in expression, and unfathomable in meaning, when Major Middleton communicated to him the decision of the officers; but though victorious in this instance, young as he was, the new affront sank deep in Quentin's heart, and he felt that there was "a shadow on his path" there could be no avoiding now.
So rapidly had events succeeded each other since that evening on which the Master had so savagely struck him down in the avenue, that Quentin frequently wondered whether his past or his present life were a dream. His last meeting with Flora Warrender among the old and shady sycamores—Flora so loving, so tender, and true!—his last farewell of old John Girvan (but one of whose guineas remained unchanged); that horrid episode of the dead gipsy, when he sought shelter in the ruined vault of Kilhenzie; the drive in the carrier's waggon; his volunteering at Ayr; the march to Edinburgh, with the voyage to England in the armed smack, and his subsequent military life, all appeared but a long dream, in which events succeeded each other with pantomimic rapidity; and it was difficult to believe that only months and not years, must have elapsed since the kind and fatherly quartermaster closed the gate of Rohallion Castle behind him. And now he was sailing far away upon the open sea, bound for Spain—a soldier going to meet the victorious veterans of Napoleon, in England alike the bugbear of the politician and the truant school-boy; and he was in the 25th too—that corps of which, from childhood, he had heard so much, and under the orders, it might be said truly at the mercy, of his personal enemy and bad angel, the cold, proud Master of Rohallion!
He found it difficult indeed to realize the whole and disentangle fact from fancy—reality from imagination; but that the faces of Monkton, Boyle, and the good Captain Warriston, when he saw him occasionally, were as links in the chain of events, and gave them coherency.
At times, especially after dreams of home (for such he could not but consider Rohallion), there came keen longings in his heart to see Flora once again and hear her voice, which often came plainly, sweetly, and distinctly to his ear in sleep. Of her, alas! he had not one single memento; not a ring, a miniature, a ribbon, a glove—not even a lock of her soft hair—the hair that had swept his face on that delightful day when he carried her through the Kelpie's pool in the Girvan, and which he had kissed and caressed, in many a delicious hour spent with her in the yew labyrinth of the old garden, by the antique arch that spanned the Lollards' Linn, under the venerable sycamores that cast their shadows on the haunted gate, or where the honey bee hummed on the heather braes that sloped so sweetly in the evening sunshine towards the blue Firth of Clyde.
From soft day-dreams of those past hours of happiness he was roused on the evening of the 3rd October by the boom of a heavy gun from the convoy, and several signals soon fluttered amid the smoke that curled upward through her lofty rigging. They were to the effect that land ivas in sight—the fleet of transports to close in upon the convoy—the swift sailers to take the dull in tow; and now from the grey Atlantic rose a greyer streak, which gradually became broken and violet-coloured in the sheen of the sun that was setting in the western waves, as the hills of Portuguese Estremadura came gradually into form and tint, on the lee-bow of the transport.
Next morning, when day broke, he found the whole fleet at anchor in Maciera Bay, and all the hurry and bustle on board of immediate preparations to land the troops on the open and sandy beach, where, when the tide meets the river, a dangerous surf rolls at times, and from thence they were, without delay, to march to the front.
It was a glorious day, though in the last month of autumn. The ruddy sun of Lusitania was shining gaily on the hills and valley of Maciera, and on the plain beyond, where already the grass was growing green above the graves of our soldiers, who fell three months before at the battle of Vimiera. But little recked the newcomers of that, as the boats of the fleet covered all the bay, whose surface was churned into foam by hundreds of oars, while clouds of shakos and Highland bonnets were waved in the air, and swords and bayonets were brandished in the sunshine, as with loud hurrahs, that were repeated from the ships, and re-echoed by the rocks and indentations of the shore, the soldiers of the Borderers and the 92nd anticipated a share in the laurels that had been won at Rolica and Vimiera—hopes many were destined never to realize; for like the thousands who, elsewhere, were marching under Moore and others, towards Castile and Leon, full of youth and health, joy and spirit, many were doomed but to suffer and die, unhonoured and unurned.
Portugal, as we have stated, having been rescued from the grasp of the French by the treaty of Cintra, and Sir John Moore having been ordered to advance into Spain, notification came that a fresh force from Britain, under the orders of Sir David Baird, would land at Corunna, to co-operate with him. Thus the troops on board the little fleet in Maciera Bay were ordered at once to cross the Tagus, traverse Portugal, and join him on the frontiers—a march of more than one hundred and twenty miles, in a land where the art of road-making had died out with the Romans.
At this time the British forces in the Peninsula numbered forty-eight thousand three hundred and forty-one, bayonets and sabres.
On the 15th of the next month the French in Spain, commanded by the Emperor in person made a grand total of three hundred and thirty-five thousand two hundred and twenty-three men, with upwards of sixty thousand horses; yet, with hearts that knew no fear, our soldiers marched to begin that struggle so perilous and unequal, but so glorious in the end!
CHAPTER IX.
PORTALEGRE.
"You ask what's campaigning? As out the truth must,
'Tis a round of complaining, vexation, disgust,
Night marches and day, in pursuit of our foes,
Up hill or down dale, without prog or dry clothes;
And to add to our pleasure in every shape,
The French give us doses of round shot and grape."
Military Panorama, vol. ii.
On the evening of the 11th October, the armed guerillas who hovered on the wooded mountains which look down on the rough old winding Roman highway that leads from the dilapidated citadel of Crato to Portalegre, saw the glitter of arms in the yellow sunshine, the flashing of polished barrels and bright bayonets, and the waving of uncased colours, amid the clouds of rolling dust that betoken the march of troops; and ere long, the same picturesque gentry, in their mantles, sombreros, and sheepskin zamarras, might have heard the martial rattle of the British drum, and the shrill notes of the fife, together with wilder strain of the Scottish bagpipe, echoing between the green and fertile ranges of the sierra that there forms the northern boundary of Alentejo, and the sides of which are clothed in many places by groves of olive, laurel and orange trees; but from the latter the golden fruit had long since been gathered, ere it was quite ripe, to save it alike from the marauding soldiery of friend and foe.
Covered with the dust of a march of twenty miles from the rustic village of Gaviao, they were our old friends of the 25th, the Highlanders, and Warriston's detachment, that were now approaching the head-quarters of the division to which they were to be attached.
On this route from the Bay of Maciera, Quentin had undergone all the misery of a soldier's life during the wet season in Portugal, where the towns were then in ruins and desolate, the country utterly destroyed, and where every one who was not in arms seemed to have fled towards the coast, for, like the breath of a destroying angel, the armies of France had passed over the entire length of the land from Algarve to Galicia, laying all desolate in that wicked spirit of waste which has been so peculiar to the French soldier in all ages.
Each day, in lieu of the old Scottish reveille welcoming the morning, Quentin had heard the sharp note of the warning bugle, or of the drummer beating hastily the générale, through the ruined streets of Santarem, of Abrantes or elsewhere; through the equally silent lines of tents when they encamped on the mountains, or the miserable bivouac when they halted in some wild place where whilom maize or Indian corn grew, summoning the drowsy and weary soldiers to their ranks for the monotonous march of another day.
From the bare boards, the hard-tiled floor, or perhaps the cold ground, whereon our volunteer had slept with his knapsack for a pillow, he had been roused by the voices of the sergeant-major, or Buckle the adjutant, shouting in the grey morning, "Fall in, 25th—stand to your arms—turn out the whole!" while the rain that swept in sheet-like torrents along the desolate streets, and the gale that tore in angry gusts among the ruined gables and shattered windows, formed no pleasant prelude to a day's march that was to be begun without other breakfast, perhaps, than a ration biscuit soaked in the half-stale fluid that filled his wooden canteen.
In camp, the tents were made to hold twelve soldiers each; but some of these were always on duty. All lay with their feet to the pole and their heads to the wall or curtain. Each man's pack was his pillow, and each slept, if he could, with a blanket half under and half over him. The rain always sputtered and filtered through in their faces, till the drenched canvas tightened, and the water was carried off by a little circular trench.
Quentin shared Askerne's tent with his two subalterns.
So the night would pass, till the cry of "Rouse!" rang along the lines, and the bugles sounded the assembly, when the blankets were rolled up and strapped to the knapsacks; the wet tents were struck and folded; the pegs and mallets replaced in their bags, and the troops prepared to march in the grey morning haze, weary, wet, stiff and sore, by reposing on the damp sod.
Quentin had always fancied a bivouac a species of military pic-nic, minus the ladies, pink cream, and champagne; but on the first night he lay in one, when the baggage guard was lagging in the rear and no tents were pitched, as he was drenched in a soaking blanket under the cold October wind that swept down the rocky sierra, he began to have serious doubts whether man was really a warm-blooded animal.
"Ugh!" grumbled Monkton on this night, "who, with brains in his head-piece, would become a soldier?"
"You remind me," said Askerne, as he shook the water for the twentieth time from his bear-skin cap, "of a story I have heard of Maitland, one of our early colonels who served on the staff of the Duke of Marlborough. It was at Blenheim, I think, when he was riding along the line accompanied by the colonel and another aide-de-camp, whose head was suddenly shattered by a cannon shot from the Bavarian artillery. Perceiving that Maitland looked long and fixedly at the fallen man, Marlborough said angrily—
"'Colonel Maitland, what the devil are you wondering at?'
"'Simply, that how a man possessed of so much brains as our poor friend, ever became a soldier,' replied Maitland, and the phlegmatic victor of Blenheim and Ramilies smiled as he rode on."
Then the dinner during a halt on the march was not tempting, and the cuisine was so decidedly bad that even Monkton could not joke about it. The slices of beef fried in a camp-kettle lid, or broiled on an old ramrod—beef that had never been cold (the miserable ration bullocks after being goaded in rear of the troops for miles by muleteers and mounted guerillas, being shot, flayed and cut up the moment the drum beat to prepare for dinner) was always tough as india-rubber; while the soup which the soldiers tried to make with a few handfuls of rice and the bones of the said bullocks, lacked only the snails mentioned by Peregrine Pickle, to make it resemble the famous black broth of the Spartans.
A little more of this common-place detail, and then we have done.
For all Quentin suffered, the novelty of treading a new soil and all the varied scenery of Portugal could scarcely make amends; yet there were times when he could not but view with interest and pleasure the old arches and aqueducts, the stony skeletons of departed Rome, the ruined amphitheatres and temples, especially that of Diana which Quintus Sertorius built at Evora, while remains of baths and cisterns, columns, capitals and cornices of marble and jasper lying prostrate among the reeds and weeds in wild places, made him think of Dominie Skaill and the rapture with which he would have lingered over them. Then there were the beautiful vineyards, the verdant valleys where the lemon and orange trees grew; the steep frowning sierras, wild and barren, but majestic; the fertile plain overlooked by the thirteen spires of Santarem; and the old Roman bridges, spanning rivers that rushed in foam down the granite steeps to mingle with the Tagus.
Little convents perched in solitudes where the French had failed to penetrate, and where now the bells rang in welcome to the British; tiny wayside chapels and holy wells, presided over by local saints; wooden crosses and cairns that marked where some paisano or guerilla had been shot by the French—green mounds that marked where the French, butchered in their turn, had been buried without coffin or shroud, all seemed to tell of the new and strange land he traversed.