{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_76046/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_76046","id":"gutenberg_76046","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/76046","summary":null,"tags":["Adventure stories","Category: Adventure","Category: British Literature","Category: Historical Novels","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Conduct of life -- Juvenile fiction","Courage -- Juvenile fiction","Grandfathers -- Juvenile fiction","Highlands (Scotland) -- History, Military","Loyalty -- Juvenile fiction","Soldiers -- Juvenile fiction","Storytelling -- Juvenile fiction","Voyages and travels -- Juvenile fiction","War stories","Youth -- Conduct of life -- Juvenile fiction","Youth and death -- Juvenile fiction"],"text":"[Illustration: Cover art]\n\n\n\n[Frontispiece: \"Hurrah, my lads; remember Egypt!\" shouted Sir John\nMoore.  _p._ 310]\n\n\n\n  Shoulder\n    to Shoulder:\n\n  A\n  STORY OF THE STIRRING TIMES OF OLD.\n\n\n  BY\n\n  GORDON STABLES, M.D., C.M.\n  (_Surgeon Royal Navy_),\n\n  AUTHOR OF \"ON TO THE RESCUE\"; \"HEARTS OF OAK\";\n  \"EXILES OF FORTUNE\";\n  ETC. ETC.\n\n\n  \"Be Britain still to Britain true,\n    Amang oursels united;\n  For never but by British hands\n    Maun British wrangs be righted.\"--BURNS.\n\n\n  NEW EDITION.\n\n\n  _LONDON:_\n  JOHN F. SHAW AND CO.,\n  48, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.\n\n\n\n\n  _COPYRIGHT BOOKS UNIFORM WITH THIS VOLUME._\n\n  THE CRUISE OF THE ARCTIC FOX        DR. GORDON STABLES.\n  CLEARED FOR ACTION                  W. B. ALLEN.\n  EXILES OF FORTUNE                   DR. GORDON STABLES.\n  A REAL HERO                         G. STEBBING.\n  A TANGLED WEB                       E. S. HOLT.\n  BEATING THE RECORD                  G. STEBBING.\n  THRO' UNKNOWN WAYS                  L. E. GUERNSEY.\n  IN SHIPS OF STEEL                   DR. GORDON STABLES.\n  IN CLOISTER AND COURT               E. EVERETT-GREEN.\n  THE UGLY DUCKLING                   HANS ANDERSEN.\n  ODEYNE'S MARRIAGE                   E. EVERETT-GREEN.\n  ENGLAND'S HERO PRINCE               DR. GORDON STABLES.\n  ANDERSEN'S FAIRY TALES              H. C. ANDERSEN.\n  FACING FEARFUL ODDS                 DR. GORDON STABLES.\n  SHOULDER TO SHOULDER                DR. GORDON STABLES.\n  EDGAR NELTHORPE                     ANDREW REED.\n  WINNING AN EMPIRE                   G. STEBBING.\n  HONOUR NOT HONOURS                  DR. GORDON STABLES.\n  IDA VANE                            ANDREW REED.\n  GRAHAM'S VICTORY                    G. STEBBING.\n  THE END CROWNS ALL                  EMMA MARSHALL.\n  HER HUSBAND'S HOME                  E. EVERETT-GREEN.\n  FOSTER SISTERS                      L. E. GUERNSEY.\n  DOROTHY'S STORY                     L. T. MEADE.\n  A TRUE GENTLEWOMAN                  EMMA MARSHALL.\n  BEL MARJORY                         L. T. MEADE.\n  WINNING GOLDEN SPURS                H. M. MILLER.\n  ON TO THE RESCUE                    DR. GORDON STABLES.\n  DASHING DAYS OF OLD                 DR. GORDON STABLES.\n  TWO SAILOR LADS                     DR. GORDON STABLES.\n  IN SEARCH OF FORTUNE                DR. GORDON STABLES.\n  ENGLAND, HOME, AND BEAUTY           DR. GORDON STABLES.\n  HEARTS OF OAK                       DR. GORDON STABLES.\n  OLD ENGLAND ON THE SEA              DR. GORDON STABLES.\n\n  LONDON: JOHN F. SHAW & CO.,\n  48, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS.\n\n\nBook I\n\n_IN THE HIGHLANDS A HUNDRED YEARS AGO._\n\nCHAPTER\n\nI. AULD-DA\n\nII. MY HERO--BONNIE PRINCE CHARLIE\n\nIII. THE FIRST ACT IN A TRAGEDY--A WILD AND LAWLESS MAN--MUIRACHIE\nTHE DWARF\n\nIV. THE DUKE AT FONTENOY--CULLODEN MOOR--THE CAVE--A BRAVE HIGHLAND\nLASSIE--A RACE FOR LIFE--\"TO HORSE!  TO HORSE!\"\n\nV. ROYALS TO THE RESCUE--THAT FAITHFUL DWARF--HAND TO HAND WITH DIRK\nAND CLAYMORE--\"THE RED-COATS ARE COMING!\"\n\nVI. A HIGHLAND SCHOOL A HUNDRED YEARS AGO\n\nVII. HARD TIMES FOR A TEACHER.--THE TAWSE--LITTLE RACHEL--A DROLL\nADVENTURE--MY GRANDFATHER STUCK FAST IN THE CHIMNEY\n\nVIII. THE CONSPIRATORS--A DEED OF DARKNESS--A FEAST TO\nFOLLOW--STRANGE SCHOOL-CUSTOMS--A FIGHT IN THE FOREST--LAST DAYS AT\nSCHOOL\n\nIX. LEAVING HOME--A HUMBLE TRADE--\"I'LL NOT SERVE UNDER A FRASER OR\nLOVAT: I AM A ROBERTSON AND A LOYALIST\"\n\nX. THE KING'S SHILLING--IN CORNEY'S CAVE--\"SURRENDER IN THE KING'S\nNAME!\"--CAPTURE AND ESCAPE\n\nXI. SWORN TO SHOOT AT SIGHT--AN ADVENTURE ON THE ROAD--\"PLEASE, SIR,\nARE YOU THE COLONEL?\"--\"WE'LL CALL YOU JOHN\"\n\n\n\nBook II.\n\n_OFF TO JOIN HIS REGIMENT._\n\nI. FIRST MONTHS OF SOLDIER-LIFE--THE PLEASURE OF DRILL--A PASSAGE OF\nARMS--EN ROUTE FOR EDINBURGH CASTLE--AN OLD-TIME TROOPER\n\nII. THE VOYAGE OF THE \"VENGEFUL\"--TERRIBLE SUFFERINGS AT SEA\n\nIII. LIFE AT THE CASTLE--A DANCE ON THE DINNER-TABLE--HOW A QUARREL\nWAS SETTLED--A DROLL DUEL AND THE ENDING THEREOF\n\nIV. WHAT A BATTLE SEEMS LIKE TO THE SOLDIER--TERRIBLE TIMES IN\nPARIS--CIVIL WAR AND MURDER\n\nV. FIGHTING AT TOULON--TERRIBLE SORTIES--EVACUATION--OFF TO\nCORSICA--CAPTURED BY BRIGANDS--CAPTAIN DRAKE'S FIRST FIGHT\n\nVI. MY GRANDFATHER IS PROMOTED--AN UNLUCKY ESCAPADE--SAVED BY A\nRIBBON--MASSACRE OF FRENCH NOBLES--NAPOLEON BONAPARTE TO THE FORE\n\nVII. POLICY AND AMBITION OF NAPOLEON--REBELLION IN IRELAND--ATTEMPTS\nAT INVASION--THE WHOLE WORLD OF EUROPE IN A BLAZE\n\nVIII. GRANDFATHER GOES ON FURLOUGH--A CHANGE AND MANY A CHANGE--POOR\nLITTLE RACHEL--BATTLE OF ALEXANDRIA--THE GALLANT 42ND--NIGHTFALL ON\nTHE FIELD OF BATTLE\n\n\n\nBook III.\n\n_FROM WAR TO GENTLE PEACE._\n\nI. THE DUKE OF KENT AS GRANDFATHER KNEW HIM--DISCIPLINE AND THE LASH\nIN THE BRAVE DAYS OF OLD--TONAL'S DILEMMA, AND HOW HE GOT OUT OF IT\n\nII. AWFUL CONDITION OF GIB--GRANDFATHER STABBED--A VENDETTA--THE DUKE\nWAS THE BEST-HATED MAN ON THE ROCK\n\nIII. MYSTERY--A GRUESOME BOX--A MEETING OF CONSPIRATORS--TERRIBLE\nTHREATS--THE MUTINY\n\nIV. WARNED BY A DYING SOLDIER--MORE MUTINY--HE FELL FORWARD DEAD--WAR\nBREAKS OUT ONCE MORE--NAPOLEON'S PLANS AND MOVEMENTS--MURDER!\n\nV. NAPOLEON'S SCHEME FOR INVADING BRITAIN--A BRIGHT\nPROMISE--GRANDFATHER MEETS HIS FATE\n\nVI. AN IRISH FAIR AT DUNDALK--GREAT FUN AND NO END OF FIGHTING--THE\nBOMBARDMENT OF COPENHAGEN--GRANDFATHER GETS MARRIED\n\nVII. THE FRENCH IN SPAIN AND PORTUGAL--BRITISH TO THE RESCUE--SIR\nARTHUR--SIR JOHN MOORE--SPLENDID GENERALSHIP OF NAPOLEON\n\nVIII. TREACHERY AND FOOLERY--A RACE FOR LIFE AND A RUN FOR THE\nSEA--TOM GRAHAME'S BABY--SORROW, SUFFERING, AND DANGER--IT MUST BE\nDEATH OR VICTORY\n\nIX. FIGHTING AGAINST FEARFUL ODDS--DEATH OF MOORE--THE EMBARKATION--A\nWIFE AND A NEW SET OF BAGPIPES\n\nX. \"I'M A SOLDIER'S WIFE; I'LL SHARE A SOLDIER'S TOILS\"--GIRL\nHEROINES--STORMING OF BERGEN-OP-ZOOM--STRANGE ADVENTURES--BORN ON A\nBATTLEFIELD\n\nXI. ACROSS THE WIDE ATLANTIC--A STRANGE PARADE--THE BAREFOOT\nSQUAD--SHIPWRECK--A FEARFUL FIGHT\n\nXII. RED-EYE, THE INDIAN CHIEF--A TERRIBLE ADVENTURE WITH A BEAR--BAD\nNEWS!--STOLEN OR KILLED BY INDIANS\n\nXIII. \"WHERE IS RED-EYE?  I WILL KILL HIM!\"--A SOLEMN SCENE--THE\nMOONLIT FOREST\n\nXIV. THE FIGHT WITH SAVAGES--A LONE GRAVE IN THE FOREST--RETURN OF\nSPRING--NAPOLEON AT ST. HELENA\n\n\n\n\n  To\n\n  DR. JOHN ROBERTSON\n\n  THIS BOOK IS INSCRIBED,\n  WITH MANY A KINDLY WISH,\n  BY HIS COUSIN,\n\n                      THE AUTHOR\n\n\n\n\nBook I.\n\nIn the Highlands a Hundred Years Ago.\n\n\n\nSHOULDER TO SHOULDER.\n\n\n\nBook I.\n\n_IN THE HIGHLANDS A HUNDRED YEARS AGO._\n\n\nCHAPTER I.\n\nAULD-DA.\n\nNever for a moment--as we sat together in the twilight--could the\ndear old man have imagined that, just thirty years after his death,\nhis grandson would be here, in a wigwam, writing the story of his\nromantic life.\n\nThat story, let me tell you, is also the story of the old days, when\n\n  \"Wild war's deadly blast was blowing\";\n\nthe story of the times when Napoleon was still the world's hero, his\nglory putting in the shade even that of Wellington himself, and many\nanother great and notable general.\n\nAh, me! how long ago it seems now since I used to lift the \"sneck\" of\nAuld-da's door, and slip quietly in, just as the shades of evening\nwere deepening into night.\n\n\"Is that you, Williamie?\" he would say, without turning his head.\n\n\"Yes, Auld-da\"; and, next moment, I would be sitting on the\n\"creepie\"* by his feet, with my arm leaning on his knee, waiting for\na story.\n\n\n* Creepie: a low stool.\n\n\nA little, little boy, they tell me I was then, with pale face and\ndark-blue wondering eyes.  Not over strong, you may guess, because I\nlived in the realms of romance, and because fairy tales--stories of\nwater-kelpies, that lurk in the darkest pools of forest-shaded\nrivers, and eat men's flesh at midnight; stories of brownies and\nspunkies, that bob their lights before belated travellers to lure\nthem far across the moor to the bog, in which they sink and\nperish--and all the legends of my native Scottish land were, to me,\nas dear as the very air I breathed.\n\nBut, pale-faced though I was, and not likely, then, to grow up an\nathlete, I was my grandfather's favourite.\n\nIn Scotland, far north, although in the sweet summer-time one can see\nto read nearly all night long, yet in winter,\n\n  \".... When the rain rains cauld,\n  And frost and snow on every hill,\"\n\nthe days are very short indeed, and gloaming comes on at four in the\nafternoon, or even earlier.  But, then, there is all the long,\ndelightful forenights to spend by the cheerful low fires of peat and\nwood; so, with games and music, one never does feel weary, and\nbed-time comes far, far too soon.\n\n* * * * *\n\nA very humble cottage was Auld-da's--only a but and a ben, with\nattics--but it was sufficient for all his needs; and his little\ngarden, where, in the soft, sweet summer time, old-fashioned flowers\ngrew in banks, where the honeysuckle twined over the hedge, and the\nroses trailed above the porch, was pleasant indeed.\n\nA better or a bigger house than this might have been his, had he\ncared for it, but he dearly loved the children, as he called my\nbrothers and sisters, and liked to be near us all.\n\nVery old he was, as I remember him.  Probably bordering upon eighty.\nBut he bore his years well, though winter's snows had whitened his\nhair and furrowed his war-bronzed face.\n\nWhen not working in his garden, he was ever, ever reading, and,\nstrange to say, with the exception of the weekly paper, his books\nwere only two.  One was the Bible, which, every year of his life, he\nread from beginning to end, always, he used to tell us, discovering\nsome new truth or truths in it; the other, a very large, well-thumbed\nvolume, called _Looking unto Jesus_.\n\nBut at eventide, when\n\n  \"The day was done, and the darkness\n    Fell from the wings of night,\n  As a feather is wafted downwards\n    From an eagle in its flight,\"\n\nthen my aunt, who kept house for her father, took the books away, and\nleft him for a while to sit in his easy-chair and look at the fire.\n\nAnd this was my hour--\"the children's hour,\" as Longfellow so\nprettily calls it.\n\nIt is pleasant to sit and look at a fire on a low hearth, just\nbetween the dark and the daylight, and, child though I was, I knew,\nas if by instinct, that scenes in his past life were rising up before\nhim in the peat fire's fitful glow.\n\n\"Tell me a story.\"\n\n\"Tell you a story, Williamie, laddie?  Was that it?\"\n\nHe bends down to move a log, and a merrier light bursts up through\nthe curling smoke, and throws the room behind us into darker gloom.\n\n\"Yes, auld-da, and mind it must be all true.\"\n\n\"Tell me,\" I would say if he paused to consider.  \"Did you ever kill\na man?\"\n\nThis was a blood-thirsty query to put, but I think it comes natural\nto all little boys to revel in thoughts of gore.\n\nMy question, however, was one that my grandfather could seldom be\nprevailed upon to answer directly.\n\n\"O, Williamie!\" he might begin.  \"War is a terrible, terrible\nthing----\"\n\nBut that was the very reason I wanted to hear about it.\n\nThe old man would often recite to me whole plays, from beginning to\nend; for he was possessed of a marvellous memory.  But ever my\nthoughts would revert to fighting and slaughter by land and by sea;\nso, _nolens volens_, he had to return to war.\n\nIt was thus, during these delightful twilight hours by the low hearth\nin winter, or out in the woods when summer days were fine, that I\nlearned, bit by bit, the whole story of my grandfather's life, and\nthat, too, of many and many of his messmates.\n\n  \"For a boy's will is the wind's will,\n  And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.\"\n\n* * * * *\n\nWhatever my lot in life, I never could forget that kind Auld-da, who,\nnext to my parents themselves, was the dearest and best friend I ever\nknew.  But were I inclined to forget those old days I could not, just\nfor one reason which may seem strange to many.  There grows, then, in\nmy orchard an old apple-tree--long may it flourish--which every year\nis laden with fruit.  The apples are a species of codlin, somewhat\npear-shaped but raised in ridges, very white on one side, very rosy\non the other, and the scent is like that of no other in all my place.\nWell, I never pass that tree when autumn winds are bringing down the\nnearly-ripe fruit, without my thoughts reverting to the days o' auld\nlang syne.\n\nThat was the apple, laden with which, Auld-da used to return from the\ncity of Aberdeen, every quarter day.\n\nThese were red-letter days to my sister Leonora and me, for the old\nHighland soldier, my grandfather, would be up betimes, and after an\nearly breakfast, would start alone for the distant city of Aberdeen,\nto draw his half-pay, or retiring allowance.  There were coaches\nrunning on the road, grand old-fashioned four-in-hands, that could\ntake one into town very quickly.  But these the sturdy veteran\ndespised.  Many a weary march he had made in his soldier days; he was\nnot going to fail now.\n\nSo, wet day or dry day, in sunshine, sleet or snow, away he would\ntrudge.  A stick he carried, but it was but to twirl in his hand, and\nI never saw it touch the ground.\n\nHow eagerly Sissie and I used to watch for his home-returning--not,\nmind you, reader, for the sake of the apples and nuts, not for the\nsake of the prospective and certain half-crown each, that he always\ngave us, but for sake of the dear old man himself.  Sometimes we\nwould see him, in the winter-time, when a whole mile off, a little\nblack dot, which by-and-by became a man walking sturdily towards us,\nbetween the great white banks left by the snow-plough.  Then how\nmadly we would rush to meet him and lead him home and into my\nmother's house, where dinner was waiting, and where he would spend\nthe evening up to nearly the midnight hour.\n\nAuld-da preached me many a sermon in the long forenights.  I think I\nhave never quite forgotten them.  They were spoken so earnestly and\nwith such an air of truth and experience.  And the burden of almost\nevery such discourse was love and trust and hope in the goodness of a\nHeavenly Father, and in Him who died.\n\nI must not give you the impression, however, that Auld-da was a\nsolemn man--by no means, only in his thinking, philosophising moods.\nOut of doors he was always as merry as merry could be.  He would\noften visit the servants working in the fields, especially in the\nharvest, and the droll old stories he told them kept all hands\nlaughing continuously.\n\nIn the hey-day of his manhood he had been--like all true soldiers of\nthose good old times--a splendid swordsman.  His claymore and pike\nwere as sharp as razors.  With that claymore he could have cut a\nhorse's head off with one blow, or broken the bayonet from the musket\nof a charging enemy, and slain him where he stood.\n\nOne piece of clever swordsmanship in my grandfather's younger days,\nunknown now, I believe, was as follows: The performer, who had to be\nextra expert, stood facing the edge of an open door, and bringing his\nface or nose within two inches--the sword's breadth--of the\ndoor-edge, cause the claymore to describe circles without touching\neither door or nose.  The sword's edge being very keen, this was a\ntrick that required a steady hand, a steady head, courage, and a\nsupple wrist.  If anyone who reads this would like to try the trick,\nI advise him to practise with a paper-cutter in the first off-go.\n\nWe have heard of people being born with silver spoons in their\nmouths: my grandfather was not, but Highlanders seemed in those days\nto be born with swords between their lips.  Their performances with\nthe claymore would have eclipsed those of the Arabs, and they are\nperhaps the finest swordsmen in the world.\n\nWhen out in the harvest-field, it used to give my grand-da great\npleasure to be allowed to put an edge on the men's scythes.  The\nservants declared that after this they cut like razors, and the\nlabour was lightened by one half.\n\nBut such was my grandfather in his green old age.  No Pharisaical\nChristian he, but a believer in the truest sense of the word, happy\nand contented, ever looking forward with faith and joy to a brighter\nworld beyond the tomb.\n\n* * * * *\n\nHe wore away at last in his 89th year, and I think the last words he\nspoke were to me.\n\nI stood by his bedside trying in vain to repress the tears.\n\nI laid my hand gently on his, as it lay cold and white on the\ncoverlet.\n\n\"Do you know me, Auld-da?\" I said.\n\n\"O, yes,\" came the answer, faint but clear.  \"Don't I know my own\nladdie!  Mercy!  Mercy!\"\n\nShortly after this he expired, and my parents led me heart-broken\nfrom the room.  Beside the Bass o' Ury--a strange green knoll in the\ngrave-yard, said by some to have been the burying-place of chiefs of\nold--my dear Auld-da lies sleeping, and the river sings his lullaby.\n\nNear him, alas! lie my father and mother too.  Is it any wonder that\nthe place should be sacred to me, or that, slightly altering the\nwords of Thorn, the Inverurie poet, I should say:\n\n  \"Move noiseless, gentle Ury, around his lonely bed,\n  And I'll love the gentle Ury, where'er my footsteps tread\n  For sooner shall thy fairy wave return from yonder sea,\n  Than I forget yon lowly grave and a' it hides from me.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II.\n\nMY HERO--BONNIE PRINCE CHARLIE.\n\nThere was one subject, and one only, upon which, boy though I was, I\ndared to differ from my grandfather.  And that related to Bonnie\nPrince Charlie and the so-called \"rebellion\" of 1745.\n\nIf it was rebellion for Prince Charles to attempt in fair and honest\nfight to win back the throne that belonged of right to the ancient\nStuart line, then was I, at the age of seven, one of the rankest\nlittle rebels that ever waved a wooden sword and cut off the heads of\ntansies, imagining every one of them to be a fallen foe.\n\nNor could you have wondered at it, had you but heard the sweet and\nplaintive songs my mother sang,\n\n  \"As she rocked me in my cradle,\n    Or crooned* me on her knee--\n  And I would not sleep, she sang so sweet,\n    Those dear old songs to me.\"\n\n\n* Crooned: sang low lullabies.\n\n\nIt has been said, dear boy and girl readers, that I, the author of\nthis book, have Jacobite tendencies.  This is not the truth.  I love\nthe Queen as only Scotsmen can love her; I have served her loyally,\nand would to-morrow, or to-night, spill my last drop of blood\nfighting for her and my native land.  I love her all the better\nbecause she has some of the old Stuart blood in her veins.\n_But_--listen--had I been a man, or even a lad, in the --45, I would\nhave done as my ancestors, the Gordons, did, side by side with those\nof Lord George Gordon Byron--I would have fought till the bitter end\nfor Bonnie Prince Charlie.\n\nYes, and I love the Queen as much as I hate and despise the atrocious\nmemory of ----, but stay!  I will not even write his name in the same\nsentence as that of her kind Majesty.\n\nThe memory, I was going to say, of the \"bloody Duke of Cumberland,\"\nwho stained our Highland heather with the blood of old, white-haired\nmen and helpless babies.\n\nIt is told of this fiend, that, while walking across the fatal field\nof Culloden after the battle, and accompanied by one of his officers,\na poor Highland soldier sat in the agonies of death against a bank,\nlooking towards them.\n\n\"Shoot me that grinning Scot!\" cried the Duke.\n\nThe reply of the officer was that of a brave Englishman and a true\nsoldier.\n\n\"Your Grace,\" he said, \"I am your humble servant, but not your\nexecutioner.\"\n\nThe inhuman coward--all cruel men are cowards--then seized a musket\nfrom one of his attendants and, rushing forward, shot the man himself.\n\n* * * * *\n\nOne hundred and fifty years have passed and gone since the battle in\nwhich the once bright sun of the Royal Stuarts set behind the red\nclouds of battle on Culloden Moor, but the memory of the terrible\natrocities committed by the Duke and his minions dwells in the hearts\nof the Highlanders, as if they had been committed but yester e'en.\n\nTourists to the land of green heath and shaggy wood see or know\nlittle, if anything, of this.  The Scots are far too proud to speak\nof what their forefathers suffered after the \"rebellion,\" to\nstrangers or foreigners.  But in many a humble cottage home, by\nmountain, stream, or sea, those sweet old Jacobite songs are still\nsung, and their pathetic music, and no less pathetic words, never\nfail to bring the \"saut,* saut tear\" to the eye of the listener.\n\n\n* Salt.\n\n\nAnd the songs never fail to lead to a story of the terrible times,\ntold by the low fire of logs and peats that burns upon the hearth;\ntold, in all probability, by the head of the house to the big-eyed,\neager-faced bairnies that gather round his knee, and drink in every\nword.  But the ending of the true tale is invariably somewhat as\nfollows:\n\n\"And now, children, let us thank our Heavenly Father that we live in\ntimes of peace, under the reign of a pious Queen, and shall never see\nthe babe torn from the young mother's arms to be tossed on bayonets,\nwhile she is dragged to death and worse.  Come, bring the Book, and\nthen for bed.\"\n\nThe Scots are of the poetic temperament.  This, among those who dwell\namidst the wild mountains, is somewhat imbued with superstition, but\nall are musical to the core and from the core.  There is just this\ndifference between the Celt and the Saxon, or purely English--the\nlatter have no natural love for music until it is taught to them;\neven then, seldom indeed it is a sacred fire burning on the heart as\nits altar, but your Celt, be he Scotch or Irish, sings without\nbook-teaching, sings as naturally as does the mavis in the bonnie\nwoods, or the lintie on the golden furze.\n\nAh! me, but those old, old songs are plaintive and sorrowful even to\na degree, yet tender and sweet beyond compare.  They seem to have\nbeen written with the very heart's blood of the heroes who died for\ntheir native land.\n\nBut the fate of Prince Charlie, instead of crushing the patriotism of\nhis countrymen, only intensified it, and around his memory are woven\nmany of the sweetest, saddest ballads we possess.  Some South Britons\npretend to despise these--Germans or Italians do not--but bide a wee\ntill war comes, and this country has to bleed and to suffer, and then\neven John Bull will know the power that song has, either to cheer the\nsoldier in his camp, or lead him on to death or victory.\n\nOn hearing the soldiers singing in their camp on the night before the\nbattle of Inkermann, someone feelingly wrote:\n\n  \"'T was strange in that dark hovel drear,\n  With war's impending horrors near,\n  Those homely, doric tones to hear;\n        Or list the vocal flow\n  Of sad, but sacred, home-love, blent\n  With chivalrous and hold intent,\n  And thoughts on deadly conflict bent,\n        And battle's wildest throe.\n\n  \"No recreant will that soldier prove\n    Within whose valiant breast\n  The gentle thoughts of woman's love,\n    With warlike ardour rest.\"\n\n\nWell, I am not ashamed to confess that it was the songs sung by\nmother, or \"crooned,\" rather than sung, that made a little rebel of\nme at seven years of age.  But the stories of the awful tragedies and\nsufferings of the clans, with many of which I count kinship, had much\nto do with it.  The story of our Prince and his deeds of valour took\nstrong hold of an imaginative child.\n\nThat sweet old song, \"He's owre the hills that I lo'e weel,\" how well\ndo I recollect it of my father, as he sang it.  Let me give but a\nverse or so, it is so expressive of the feeling of those by-gone\nwarlike days.\n\n[Illustration: HE'S OWRE THE HILLS THAT I LO'E WEEL.]\n\n  HE'S OWRE THE HILLS THAT I LO'E WEEL.\n\n  DUET.\n\n  1st VOICE.  With animation.\n\n  He s owre the hills that I lo'e weel.  He s owre the hills we\n\n  2nd VOICE.\n\n  daur na name; He's owre the hills a - yont Dumblane, Wha soon will\n\n  get his welcome hame.  My Fa-ther's gane to fight for Him, My\n\n  brith-ers win - na bide at hame, My mith-er greets* and\n\n  prays for them, And 'deed she thinks they're no to blame.\n\n\n    He's owre the hills.  &c\n  The whigs may scoff, and the whigs may jeer,\n  But ah! that love maun be sincere,\n  Which still keeps true whate'er betide,\n  And for his sake leaves a' beside.\n\n\n* Greets--Weeps.\n\n\nThere is something so thoroughly expressive of true patriotism in\nthose last two lines:\n\n  \"My mither greets and prays for them,\n  And 'deed she thinks they're no' to blame.\"\n\n\nThat Scottish mother is like a Spartan of old.  The Spartan handed\nher son his large shield before he went to battle.  \"Go, my son,\" she\nwould say, \"to battle against the foe.  You fight for the ashes of\nyour fathers, for the temples of your gods.  Here is your shield.\nCome back with it or on it.\"\n\nAnd the Highland mother says, \"Here is your sword, my own boy.  Never\nheed my foolish tears.  Go fight for your Prince, and lawful King,\nand I will stay at home to pray.\"\n\nAnd even the young soldier's sister must speak with a dash of naivet\u00e9\nand pluck:\n\n  \"What lads ere did, our laddies will do,\n  Were I a laddie, I'd follow him too.\"\n\n* * * * *\n\nBut the martial fire and spirit in that true soldier-song:\n\n  \"Cam' ye by Athol, lad wi' the philabeg,*\n    Down by the Tummel and banks o' the Garry,\n  Saw ye the lads, wi' their bonnets and white cockades,\n    Leaving their mountains to follow Prince Charlie?\"\n\nso fired my young blood, as my father sang it, that it took a whole\nhour in the field of tansies with my wooden sword to allay my\nexcitement.\n\n\n* Kilt.\n\n\nI followed all the story of our Prince, and the humour of Johnnie\nCope's defeat used to make me chuckle with glee.  In my imagination I\ncould see the wild and impetuous rush of the Highlanders, dashing on\nlike a mountain torrent that nothing could withstand.  Wedge-shaped\nwas their first formation, firing their pistols but once, then\ndashing them at the heads of the foe, as they drew their claymores\nand dirks, and charged, while slogan after slogan rent the morning\nair.  I could see the foe as they backward reeled, dazed and\nastonished; I could see the Prince, with his bonnie yellow hair\nfloating on the breeze, as he led on his fiery soldiers.  Then the\nflight and the race.\n\nAh! it was in the race that Johnnie Cope, the general, showed his\nskill.  He won that, though he couldn't win the fight.  He not only\noutstripped his pursuers, but took the cake from his own followers.\nThey literally were his followers now.  And the song makes Cope say\nof the Highlanders:\n\n  \"If I'd stayed any longer,\n  They'd have broken my legs,\n  So I bade them good-day\n                In the morning.\"\n\n\nBut then, my hero's story took the wrong turning.  The clansmen\nquarrelled among themselves, and many forsook his cause.\nThus--disaster.\n\nA disaster that culminated at Culloden.*  In his beautiful\nsong--wedded to music so charming--the Anglo-Scottish bard, Lord\nByron, speaks of the Gordons, his ancestors, thus:\n\n  \"Shades of the dead, have I not heard your voices\n    Rise on the night-rolling breath of the gale?\n  Surely the soul of some hero rejoices,\n    And rides on the wind o'er his own Highland vale.\n  Round Loch-na-garr, while the stormy mist gathers,\n    Winter presides in his cold, icy car;\n  Clouds there encircle the forms of my fathers!\n    They dwell 'mid the tempests of dark Loch-na-garr.\n\n  \"Ill-starred, though brave, did no vision foreboding\n    Tell you that fate had forsaken your cause?\n  Ah! were ye then destined to die at Culloden,\n    Tho' victory crowned not your fall with applause?\n  Still were ye happy, in death's earthy slumbers;\n    You rest with your clan in the caves of Brae-mar,\n  The pibroch resounds to the piper's loud numbers,\n    Your deeds to the echoes of dark Loch-na-garr.\"\n\n\n* To English readers: The \"o\" is long, as it is in Balmoral and Oban.\n\n\nBut the sorrows of my hero Prince made him all the dearer to me.\n\nI used to cry when my mother sang that touching ballad, \"O, wae 's\nme!* for Prince Charlie.\"\n\n\n* Woe is me!\n\n\nI could in fancy see the little bird coming to the hall-door, and\nsinging my Prince's sorrow, and the old man, whose son was slain,\nweeping as he listens to that \"lilt o' dool and sorrow.\"\n\n  \"O! when I heard the wee bird sing,\n    The tears came dripping rarely,\n  I took the bonnet aff my head,\n    For weel I lo'ed Prince Charlie.\"\n\n\nAnd the birdie sings on:\n\n  \"Dark night came on, the tempest howled\n    Got o'er the woods and valleys,\n  And where was't that our Prince lay doon,\n    Whose home should've been a palace?\n\n  \"He rolled him in his Highland plaid\n    That covered him but sparely,\n  And slept beneath a bush o' broom,\n    O! wae 's me for Prince Charlie!\"\n\n\nBut my mother consoled me when she told me of his wanderings through\nthe Highland wilds, and that although\n\n  \"O'er hills that were by right his own,\n    He roamed a weary stranger;\n  On every side pressed hard by want,\n    On every side by danger,\"\n\nstill he ever found a kindly welcome in the houses, or rather huts,\nof the peasantry, who shielded him and bielded him, though thirty\nthousand pounds was offered for his head.  Then came his romantic\nescape and \"Flora Macdonald's Lament.\"\n\nBut one winter's evening--I mind it well--while I sat at Auld-da's\nfireside, I broached the subject of Prince Charlie for the first\ntime---and for the last.\n\nHe kicked a burning log till the sparks flew up the chimney, and I\ncould see a red spot burning on his cheek.\n\nBut he soon cooled down.\n\n\"Ah! dear boy,\" he said, \"never speak of the Pretender to me.  Your\nfather's kin were rebels to a man, but your mother's forbears, the\nRobertsons of the Braes of R----, were royalists all.\n\n\"It was for this very reason that, when compelled to become a\nsoldier, I joined the 1st Regiment or Royal Scots.\n\n\"So old is this regiment, Williamie, that it was called for fun,\n'Pontius Pilate's Guards.'\n\n\"That regiment was at Culloden, on the right and royal side, and in\nit fought your ancestors, boy, and mine.  Robertsons even from Struan\nitself.\n\n\"The Duke of Kent was my colonel.  The Duke of Kent was our dear\nQueen's father, a daughter of the regiment we well might call her.\"\n\n* * * * *\n\nI remembered then that once when the Queen was ailing, I had seen the\nold man shed tears, and it occurred to me now to put the following\nsilly question:\n\n\"Auld-da, do you love the Queen--much?\"\n\nAt this moment I think I can see the mild blue eyes he turned upon me.\n\n\"Love her, boy?  Love my Queen?  Don't I pray for her every night?\nAnd I had the high honour of once talking to her when she was little\nmore than a baby.  She a baby--I a simple soldier.  Yes,\nboy--I--love--the Queen.\n\n\"Her father was the means of saving my life,\" he said, after a pause.\n\n\"Tell me that story.\"\n\n\"Not to-night.  Some other time.\n\n\"But as for your Prince Charlie,\" he added, giving that log of wood\nanother kick, \"why, that much for him and his cause, which ended even\nas that log will end, in smoke and sparks----\"\n\n\"And in blood,\" I ventured to put in.\n\nHe paid no heed to that remark.\n\n\"There's a verse of an old Scotch song,\" he said, \"that goes thus:\n\n  \"'O, but you've been long o' coming,\n    Long, long, long o' coming;\n  O, but you've been long o' coming,\n    But you're welcome, Royal Charlie.'\n\n\n\"Well, we soldiers of the gallant 1st used to sing that, but we put\nthe 'royal' in the right place:\n\n  \"'O, but you've been long in coming,\n    But you're _royal-welcome_, Charlie.'\"\n\n\nI was silent for a time, now.  I was watching the sparks and the\nrolling smoke.\n\nBut I was just as much a rebel as ever.\n\n\"So,\" I said at last, \"my father's clan, the Gordons, fought at\nCulloden, and my mother's, the Robertsons, also.\"\n\n\"True, boy, true, and both under a different banner.\"\n\n\"How funny!\"\n\n\"Ah! laddie, war is a terrible thing, and there was little fun at\nCulloden, and less after it.\n\n\"And our family on the Braes of R---- would have been killed, and\ntheir houses laid in ashes by the Pretender's flying and vanquished\ntroops, had not a special Providence seemed to intervene.\n\n\"And thereby hangs a tale, dear child.\"\n\n\"A story, Auld-da?  A story with fighting in it?  O, tell us, tell\nus.\"\n\n\"To-morrow, then, boy, to-morrow, if we are both spared.\"\n\nSo I said good-night, and left him dreaming over the fire, thinking\nover the earthly past, and the future that, for him, was all beyond\nthe grave.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III.\n\n  THE FIRST ACT IN A TRAGEDY--A WILD AND LAWLESS\n  MAN--MUIRACHIE THE DWARF.\n\nNext day seemed a long one to me.  And school, with its tasks, its\nbooks and its slates and its drawing, was very irksome.  As soon,\nhowever, as I got clear out and away, I started to run.  For a whole\nmile I went on at a jog-trot, and finally plunged into a wood.  The\nrest of the boys who came my way I had by this time left far behind.\nI did not care much for them anyhow; I much preferred to be alone,\nbecause the birds and the beasts, and all kinds of creatures, seemed\nto speak to me, and even the wild flowers nodded as I passed; while\nthe feathery larch-trees and the pines whispered many a secret into\nmy listening ear.\n\nBesides, these lads were but lowland farmers' sons, and their chief\nconversation was about horses and cattle and crops.  I rather\nglorified in the fact that I hated and despised all such menial ties,\nand that I could trace my descent through a long line of men who had\nfought in many a blood-stained field, both in their own country and\nfar abroad.\n\nThese boys had not grandfathers who could tell them stories to make\ntheir flesh creep, and their hair stir as if the wind were blowing\nthrough it.  Their grandfathers were old, feeble men, who hadn't a\nsoul among them above a turnip or a leek; who had never been ten\nmiles, in all their lives, beyond the fields that grew the corn for\ntheir porridge; men who were not only old, but looked old, bent and\ngrizzled, and who, when you talked to them, put one hand behind an\near and yelled, \"Eh--h? what d' ye say?  Canna hear a single wird,\"\nand then stumped off looking uglier and sourer than ever.  But my\nAuld-da was a hero and a warrior to boot.\n\nAs I trotted home that afternoon, with the stout saugh (willow) wand\nI carried, I smote off the head of many a tansy, but I spared the\nthistles.\n\nI spared them because their pink or crimson blooms looked so bonnie\nagainst the green of the ferns; because they scented the evening air\nwith their sweet perfume; because they made beds for the bumble-bees,\nbut most of all, I spared them because they were the emblems of my\nnative land--the land I had already learned to love.\n\nI am sure Auld-da liked his \"laddie,\" as he fondly called me, to come\nin of an evening and listen to his stories, or even his soliloquies.\nIt is better even to speak to a boy than talk to a burning peat.\n\n\"Finished your dinner already, laddie?\"\n\n\"Yes, Auld-da.  It was only porridge and milk; that soon goes down,\nyou know.\n\n\"Weren't you going to tell me a story, Auld-da?\" I said, after a\npause.\n\n\"A story!  Well, boy, I have nothing but the truth to relate.\"\n\nThough a Celt of Celts, Auld-da had no superstition.  That had been\nborn in him, no doubt, but contact with a rough world had worn it\naway long, long ago.  But he had a genuine love for history and for\npoetry, and could repeat many of the longest poems of Burns and of\nScott, ay, and even lengthy extracts from Ossian, but this, best in\nthe Gaelic language.\n\n\"Well, Williamie, you know,\" he began to-night, \"when the Pretender\nlanded----\"\n\n\"No, no,\" I cried, \"you must begin your story quite like a story, you\nknow.\"\n\n\"Shall I begin,\" he said, as he stirred up the fire till our shadows\ndanced on the opposite wall, \"shall I begin with the words, 'Once\nupon a time'?\"\n\n\"O, no, Auld-da! that is only fit for children.  I'm nearly a man,\nyou know.  I'm quite seven.  But tell me, in the first place, where\nour people lived in those old days.\"\n\nAuld-da looked at me and said:\n\n\"I seem to be there now, laddie, high up among the wild hills; far\nabove are the dark woods, but far above these the mighty mass of bold\nBen Wyvis, that sternly stands with his snow-clad shoulder to the\nwest.  Sailing round and round in the blue silence of the sky, is an\neagle--Jove's own bird, they say--and not a sound save his wild\nscream pierces the stillness of the scene.\"\n\n\"A bit of poetry now, Auld-da?  I beg.\"\n\n\"Well, well,\" he says, smiling.\n\n  \"What lonely magnificence stretches around,\n  Each sight how sublime, how awful each sound,\n  All hushed and serene as a region of dreams,\n  The mountains repose 'midst the roar of the streams.\"\n\n\nI am not sure that I can give my grandfather's exact words, but I can\nfollow the thread of his narrative as if told to me only the day\nbefore yesterday.\n\n\"But,\" he continued, \"that which I have tried to describe to you was\nthe wildest portion of the scenery, and lay far back and above the\nbonnie Braes of R----.  And what I am about to tell you of happened\nmany, many years before I was born.  My people had not come from\nStruan a very long time.  The house they occupied then was rather a\npretentious sort of a building, and stood well up on a brae-land, and\nnot far from a lovely and well-wooded dingle, where in spring and\nsummer it was a treat to listen to the song of merle and thrush.  At\nthe bottom of this dingle was a fishing-stream, that, as a rule, ran\nsinging over its pebbly bed to mingle its waters with the river that\nshould bear it onwards to the sea.\n\n\"This river is and was the _Beauly_,* and not far from the bonnie\nbanks, all among its woods and wilds, stood the castle of the Frasers\nof Lovat--_Belladrum_.\n\n\n* Beauly: pronounce Bewley.\n\n\n\"Simon Fraser, the Lord of Lovat, was a cousin of my father's father,\nand it was on his account, I believe, that our people had come from\nStruan to settle in his lovely district, on a farm under the rebel\nlord.\n\n\"The town of Beauly, now so charming and pretty, was then but a\nhamlet, and the road leading along the south bank of the bonnie bay\nwas little more than a bridle-path.\n\n\"My father's father, boy, was then a young and stalwart man.  He\nlived, I may tell you, to the patriarchal age of 101, and was found,\none day, sitting in the forest, his back against a pine-tree, his\nsnuff-box in his hand--dead.\"\n\n\"Dead, Auld-da?\"\n\n\"Ay, dead, dear boy.  God had taken him.  Every forenoon, in summer,\nhe used to go for a walk into the cool, green depths of the wood, but\nthat day he was missing, and that is how they found him.\n\n\"But, as I say, some years before the war broke out, and the fiery\ncross was sent through the glens to call the clans to arms, he was\nliving a very peaceful life indeed.  My father and sisters were but\nlittle tow-headed mites, my grandmother--Heaven rest her soul--was\nnot very old.  But a younger sister lived with them, and it is around\nher that this true story centres.  Fiona* was her name.  Fiona\nStuart, just turned eighteen, with dark-brown eyes and tresses like\nthe raven.  They said she looked like some beautiful Italian girl,\nand the blue-eyed maidens of the braes and glens called her Gipsy.\nThey were jealous of her beauty, as well they might be, for there was\nnot a lad, far away or near, who did feel happy for all the week, if\nhe got but a word or a smile from Fiona at the little church on\nSunday.\n\n\n* Pronounce Feeona\n\n\n\"At this time there was living at the castle a wild young Highlander,\ncalled Raoul McIvor, but usually known as Raoul Dhu, or Black Ronald.\nHe was a great musician, both on pipes and violin, and this is,\nperhaps, the reason that he was so much and so often with Lord Lovat.\nThose were the high-drinking days, which I trust will never come\nagain, and Raoul Dhu was nothing if not a bacchanalian and a\nreveller.  In this respect he was eminently suitable as a companion\nfor my grandfather's cousin, the arch-rebel Lovat.\n\n\"Raoul was a tall and handsome Highlander, who spent most of his time\non the hills or lakes, shooting or fishing.\n\n\"One day he crossed our people's farm, and entered to beg for a glass\nof water.  By his side was a splendid deerhound, which Fiona bent\ndown to caress, her beautiful hair flowing over the dog's shoulders\nas she did so.\n\n\"'If you would care for that dog,' said Raoul, with an affectation of\ngallantry, 'you shall have him.'\n\n\"The dignity of this Highland maiden was offended.  With cheeks on\nfire, she stood erect and angry.  She looked at him just once,\nthanked him with a word, then court'sied and withdrew.\n\n\"Just then her brother-in-law entered.\n\n\"'What!' he said, 'is it water you are drinking in the house of a\nRobertson?  Sit down, sir.  You're a friend of my kinsman, Lord\nLovat, but were you an enemy, no one leaves my house without bite and\nsup.'\n\n\"Raoul gladly took a seat, and so agreeable did he prove himself to\nbe, that when at last Robertson bade him good-bye, it was with an\ninvitation to return.\n\n\"So, laddie, Raoul Dhu came and came again; and, as he also took to\nvisiting the little church on Sunday, some said he was about to\nbecome a Protestant.\n\n\"'Pooh!' said an old man, who was reputed to be gifted with the\nsecond sight; 'Raoul Dhu worships but one saint, and that is St.\nFiona.  Yet the sweet bit lassie will never wed a rake like Raoul\nDhu.'\n\n\"If she would not, it was no fault of his.  But Fiona gave him little\nencouragement, indeed.\n\n\"Raoul learned the meaning of her indifference one afternoon.  The\ngirl was walking near the edge of the great forest, that stretched\naway and away for many a mile towards the wild mountains.  She was\nalone, if one can be called alone who has a book and a faithful\ncollie dog.\n\n\"Perhaps Fiona did not know, so absorbed was she in her book, how far\nshe had come.  But she was startled at last by the report of a gun\nclose by her.\n\n\"Next moment, a poor, bleeding hare rushed almost into her arms.  The\ncreature was crying in a most human way, as wounded hares do.  Fiona\nbent over it, but its eyes were already glazing, and the beautiful\ncreature died in her arms.\n\n\"She was still bending over it, and, I believe, shedding tears--her\nhonest collie doing his best to comfort her--when she heard footsteps\nbehind her.\n\n\"'Fiona!' said a voice she well knew.\n\n\"'Raoul Dhu,' she answered, 'was it you who killed this gentle\ncreature?'\n\n\"'Sport, Fiona!  Sport, my fair one!'\n\n\"There was something in his voice that offended her.\n\n\"She stooped once more, just to touch the hare, as if in pity for its\nfate, then bowing, was about to go.\n\n\"'One moment, Fiona.  I would speak with you.  I--I--I am a blunt,\noutspoken man, Fiona, and, when dealing with men, more fond of giving\nblows, I fear, than of making fine speeches.  Fiona, I love you, and\nthere's an end to it.  You must marry me.'\n\n\"'Ronald McIvor,' she answered, with dignity, 'maidens of my clan are\nnot accustomed to be dictated to, even by their kinsmen.  As to\nmarrying you, that I would never think of, even if I were free; but I\nam not.  My heart is not my own to give.  It is far, far away with my\nsoldier boy, with ma ghaol ma chree, my Ian* Robertson.  He is now\nfighting for his King and country in a foreign countrie.'\n\n\n* Ian, pronounced Eean.\n\n\n\"Her heart was far away, as she said, and her eyes, also, at that\nmoment had a far-away look in them.  She was gazing southwards and\neastwards, over the mountains, over the sea.  But it was not the\nlandscape she was gazing on.  She saw not that, she saw but her\nsoldier--an officer he was in the bold and gallant 1st.  Saw him,\ntoo, as he stood before her on that last sad day when she bade him\nadieu.\n\n\"Raoul thought she never, looked more beautiful than she did then.\nBut the love of wild and lawless men like this is like that of the\nwild beasts of the jungle, hardly, at times, to be distinguished from\nanger and hate.\n\n\"'He is a traitor,' he cried; 'a traitor to his lawful King--not your\nhateful, cow-lipped George, but a royal Stuart who will soon be here\nto claim his own.  I hate your Ian, and, if we meet, I will sheath my\ndirk in his bosom.'\n\n\"'You dare not!'\n\n\"She was like a beautiful lioness at bay now.\n\n\"'I dare not!  What is that, Raoul Dhu dare not?'\n\n\"He seized her arm in his passion and fury, so cruelly, too, that she\nscreamed aloud.\n\n\"But help was at hand.\n\n\"Neither Fiona nor Raoul Dhu had noticed some creature that had leapt\nthe green turf forest fence, and was creeping nearer and nearer\nthrough the long strong heather.\n\n\"It was a boy, or young man--you scarcely could have told which.  A\nface wild and uncouth, though not unpleasant, a head all unkempt, a\nbroad chest and long, long arms, as wiry as the sapling oak.\n\n\"He was close behind Raoul when Fiona screamed.\n\n\"Next moment he had sprung like a tiger on the strong man's back, and\nthose sinewy arms of his tightened round his neck and held it as in a\nvice.  Raoul's face grew almost black.  He writhed and strained, and\nfinally fell to the ground.\n\n\"The dwarf, for in height he was but little more, held a little\nlonger, then slowly relaxed his grip and rose from the ground.\n\n\"'O, Muirachie,' cried Fiona, 'you have killed him!'\n\n\"'She'll no pe deaded whatefer, Miss Fiona.  No, no.  When ta dew\nfalls ta rascal Raoul Dhu no pe deaded.  O, no.  Come, come!'\n\n\"I fear that poor Muirachie's English was not of the purest, but he\ndid his best, and none can do more.\n\n\"A quarter of an hour after this Fiona was safe at home.\n\n\"She did not tell the adventure quite as it happened.  Well she knew,\nthat if she had done so, her stalwart brother-in-law would have\nfollowed Raoul and dirked him, even in the drawing-room of his\nkinsman, Simon Fraser, of Lovat.\n\n\"And now,\" said Auld-da, \"the curtain drops, dear boy, on the first\nact of this Highland tragedy.  An interval of four-and-twenty hours,\nWilliamie, must elapse between the first and last acts.\"\n\nAuld-da was a good disciplinarian, and I knew his word was law, and\nso I said, \"Good-night!\" and went home to bed--to think and dream.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV.\n\n  THE DUKE AT FONTENOY--CULLODEN MOOR--THE CAVE--A\n  BRAVE HIGHLAND LASSIE--A RACE FOR LIFE--\"TO\n  HORSE!  TO HORSE!\"\n\n\"The wild and lawless times came soon after this, my laddie,\" said\nAuld-da, next evening, when I was once more seated by his knee.\n\n\"Plenty of fighting I hope, Auld-da?\"\n\n\"Alas! yes, fighting and trouble too.  But let me tell you.  Your\nPrince Charlie landed, and the fiery cross was sent through the glens\nto assemble the clans near Braemar.  How quickly the clans answered\nthe summons is historical.  Would it had only been in a better cause,\nbut, dear boy, I can see the finger of God in it now; ay, and in all\nthe trouble that followed.\"\n\nI sat uneasy on my stool for a moment as Auld-da said this, for I\ncould not help thinking of all the Bloody Duke's atrocities after the\nterrible fight of Culloden, but I did not dare to interrupt the dear\nold man.\n\n\"With the rebellion itself, boy, I have nothing to do at present,\nexcept in so far as it affected your mother's ancestors and mine.\n\n\"Just a word or two, however,\" he continued, after a thoughtful\npause, \"about this Duke of Cumberland.  I do not want to defend his\nterrible conduct after the victory of Culloden.  No Englishman that I\never yet met has done that, but the Duke has been called a coward\nbecause of his cruelty.  He was a brave, dashing man and an able\nleader nevertheless, and he was probably the only Saxon who could\nhave quelled the rebellion.\n\n\"Have you heard of the battle of Fontenoy, laddie?\"\n\n\"Only at school, Auld-da; and at school everything is so dry, you\nknow.\"\n\n\"True, true, and to have the cane and the 'tawse'* over a poor boy's\nhead is not the best way to develop his mental powers, or brighten\nhis memory.\n\n\n* A leather strap with which the boys were flogged on the hands.\n\n\n\"George II., then, was reigning in 1745, and the Duke of Cumberland\nwas his son.  In the spring of this year Louis XV. collected a great\narmy of 76,000 in Flanders, under the command of Marshal Saxe, a man\nof undoubted military genius.  In the early part of May, Saxe laid\nsiege to Tournay.  Now the British were then in alliance with the\nDutch and with the Austrians.  But neither came up to the scratch at\nthe time their men were wanted most.  Britain sent nearly 30,000 men\nto Europe--fellows who could fight--and among these were the Royal\nScots.  The Dutch had promised 50,000 men, and sent 23,000; while the\nAustrians only mustered eight or nine squadrons of cavalry, under the\ncommand of Marshal Konigsagg, who wanted everything his own way, and\nlooked upon our Duke of Cumberland as little more than a boy.\n\n\"Prince Waldeck commanded the Dutch, and at his earnest supplication,\nCumberland marched to relieve Tournay.\n\n\"The Allies, having made up their minds to do so, ought to have\nstruck at once, but instead of that they shilly-shallied and\ndilly-dallied till Marshal Saxe was prepared and ready for battle.\nFor this clever general left 5,000 men to continue the blockade of\nTournay, and with 60,000 soldiers marched to near Fontenoy, where he\nquietly chose his own battle-field, and as quietly entrenched it, on\nthe braes that slope upwards from the right banks of the Scheldt.  It\nwas a splendid position.  Fontenoy and a valley lay in their front.\nBoth Fontenoy and the village of Antoine were strongly garrisoned and\nfortified, and there were redoubts between the two.\n\n\"On the 10th of May, nothing daunted at the terrible obstacles to be\novercome, Cumberland advanced and drove in the French outposts.  Then\nnight fell, and his army lay on their arms till four next morning,\nwhen the battle began in earnest.\n\n\"The Duke, in person, led the Hanoverians and British, advancing\nagainst the French left.  But now blundering began; for Ingoldsby was\nsent to clear a wood, and, mistaking some sharp-shooters who occupied\nit for a whole division, retreated.\n\n\"Meanwhile the Dutch, under Prince Waldeck, had been sent to attack\nthe French right, also Fontenoy itself, supported by one of our\nHighland regiments.  Those Dutch fight well at times.  They did not\nthat day.  They proved arrant cowards.  The Highlanders positively\nprodded them on to fight, but at last they fairly gave way, leaving\nthis single Scottish regiment to face a hail of shot from the\nbatteries and 5,000 French foot.\n\n\"This regiment had to retreat, or rather they were called upon to\nsupport the Duke, who had dashed on with his brave troops.\n\n\"The fighting now, in battery and in redoubt as well as in the open,\nwas close and awful.  The British and Hanoverians lay in heaps, and\nthe French suffered too.\n\n\"But victory seemed in the hands of the Duke, and even Marshal Saxe\nthought he had lost the day; till suddenly an officer rode up to him\njust as he was about to seek safety in flight.\n\n\"'Sir, sir,' he cried, 'the Dutch are not coming up; they are leaving\nthose brave English and Hanoverians to their fate.'\n\n\"'Good! send, then, all the troops from Fontenoy and Antoine to our\nassistance, and sad shall the fate of the brave English be.'\n\n\"Saxe therefore endeavoured now, with all his troops--notable among\nwhom was an Irish regiment--who, as Walter Scott says,\n\n  \"'Move to death with military glee.'\n\n\n\"Yes, to death, but would it not be to victory also?  Ay, boy, for\nthe British and Hanoverians now got massed, and, in this condition,\nwere attacked by artillery and by foot, in front and on both\nflanks--truly a terrible tulzie.  How well we fought is a matter of\nhistory, for when obliged to retire at last, the Duke left behind him\n4000 British dead and wounded, and 2000 Hanoverians.\n\n\"But no prisoners save the wounded fell into the hands of the French,\nand never a standard.\n\n\"The Duke, in this fearful battle, had been the first to advance, and\nhe was the last to retreat.\n\n\"So you see, boy, the Duke was no coward.\"\n\n\"But what cowards the Dutch were, Auld-da,\" I replied evasively.\n\n\"True, boy, true; and so terribly enraged at them were the British,\nthat had there not been an enemy coming up behind, they would have\nfallen upon them in force, and the strangest battle in history would\nhave been fought.\n\n\"But now, lad, let us return to the Braes of R----, when the fiery\ncross was carried through Strathglass and the glens around.  Several\nfamilies made no response.  Among these were our own Robertsons,\ndespite the fact that Lord Lovat was a cousin.\n\n\"Even before this, Raoul Dhu had shown his enmity to our family in\nmany ways.  He had taunted my father's father.\n\n\"'Charlie our Prince,' he said one day, 'will soon be landed.  Of\ncourse, Robertson, you will be the first to join his standard?'\n\n\"'Indeed and indeed, Raoul,' was the bold reply.  'I'll be after\ndoing nothing of the sort.'\n\n\"'What, not follow the fiery cross!'\n\n\"'I'll follow no cross save that which our Saviour carried, Raoul.\nIf the Prince does land, it will only be to bring ruin and bloodshed\non our poor country; to give the eyes of our young men to the ravens,\nour women and children to rapine and massacre.  No, Raoul, I will not\nfollow that cross.  And I'd tell Lord Lovat that to his face, and the\nChief Lochiel as well.  Verily theirs is a losing cause----'\n\n\"'Is that why you will not fight, Robertson?'\n\n\"'No, Raoul Dhu, the Robertsons never were cowards, but would spend\nthe last drop of their blood in a cause that was just.  If you dare\nsay the reverse----'\n\n\"Robertson drew himself up and fingered his dirk.\n\n\"'If I dared?' said Raoul, 'What then?'\n\n\"'I'd stretch you dead among the heather.'\n\n\"'Ah! my friend, Raoul Dhu takes a lot of frightening, but I speak\nfor your own sake when I tell you that, if you join not our standard\nwhen it flutters on the Braes of Mar, Heaven help your wife, your\nchildren, and the beautiful Fiona as well.  Good-day.'\n\n\"One evening, about a month after this, Muirachie the dwarf came\nrushing in panting and breathless.\n\n\"'O,' he cried in Gaelic, 'I have heard----I----'\n\n\"'What is it, Muirachie?'\n\n\"'O, the pretty lady, master, I have heard that Raoul Dhu means\nmischief.'\n\n\"'Let him come, my lad; he'll find the Robertsons can hold their own.'\n\n\"But if Raoul meant mischief then, he had no chance to carry it out,\nso quickly was he marched off from the glen with Lord Lovat's forces.\n\n\"Well, the summer passed away quietly enough, and there were few\nyoung men left about even to till the land or gather in the scanty\nharvest.\n\n\"Report and rumour reached our family, sometimes of victory to the\nrebels, sometimes of defeat, but there was nothing reliable.  News\ncame slowly in those days, boy, and oftentimes the glittering swords\nor bayonets of a foe far outstripped the runner.*\n\n\n* Runner: a message-bearer or postman.\n\n\n\"But although from first to last Robertson felt certain that\nCharlie's cause would be defeated, he never attempted to minimise the\ndanger.  Well he knew that a beaten rebel army would do all in their\npower to destroy any of the loyalists they came across.\n\n\"Robertson would fight to the last, however.  When peace returned he\nwould be safe.\n\n\"The farm he held in no way resembled a fort, but, nevertheless, if\nstrengthened on three sides by ramparts and palisades, a few resolute\nmen would--Robertson believed--be able to hold it for a day, if not\ntwo, against stragglers from a beaten army.\n\n\"Winter came on, and a dreary one it was.\n\n\"Robertson determined now to strengthen his place, for rumours were\nfloating in the air that Prince Charlie was in full retreat back\nthrough Scotland, pursued by the implacable Duke of Cumberland.\n\n\"All the men, Williamie, that your ancestor could muster were ten,\nincluding Muirachie, the faithful dwarf.\n\n\"But trenches were thrown up, and a strong, loop-holed, wooden fence,\nand, on the whole, the farm soon looked quite formidable.\n\n\"The men were principally shepherds, but strong, hardy fellows, and\nall were accustomed to shoot, for many a hare, and many a deer even,\nthey had brought down on Lord Lovat's estate.\n\n\"No doubt the Prince would make one last stand at Inverness, or near\nit, and the man most to be dreaded, if he were not already slain, was\nRaoul Dhu.  Even Fiona knew this, and shuddered when she thought of\nthe revenge he might take on her and hers.\n\n\"Then came the fearful battle at Culloden Moor, only a few miles from\nInverness.\n\n\"Ill news flies apace, and it was speedily known that the clans were\nbeaten and scattered.\n\n\"They ran in all directions, the Prince himself flying from the fatal\nfield on horseback.\n\n\"Then stragglers, war-worn and weary, began to come into Beauly.\n\n\"Some passed on up the glens; others stayed in the village to rant,\nand revel, and drink.\n\n\"It was just a day after the fight that, in the midst of a posse of\nthese revellers, there appeared a tall, dark man, in tattered dress\nwhich was all blood-stained.\n\n\"It was Raoul Dhu, and a dozen hands at least were held out to bid\nhim welcome.\n\n\"He tossed off a bumper of fiery whisky, and, throwing himself into a\nchair, assumed a nonchalant air.\n\n\"'Yes, my lads,' he said, 'we are beaten, but I will not have it that\nwe are vanquished.  Our cause is not lost.  We shall rise again.  I\nswear it on my dirk.'\n\n\"As he spoke he drew the dagger from its scabbard, and kissed its\nhilt.\n\n\"'Scotland ought to have risen to a man.  Why did it not?'\n\n\"'Shame on all cowards!' cried the men.  'Where shall we find one?\nWe will fling him dead into the nearest loch.'\n\n\"'Pah!' said Raoul, 'they are too numerous.  There is Robertson of\nthe Braes, not three miles distant.'\n\n\"'Ay, ay,' shouted the rebels.  'Robertson!  Robertson! let us dig\nthe fox out, give his house to the flames, and his flesh to the\neagles!'\n\n\"'Stay, men, stay.  We must not be rash.  Rashness lost us many a\nfight.  Let us wait till night falls.  Few of Prince Charlie's brave\nfellows have come this way.  No red-coats will follow.  They will go\nBadenoch way, after the main body.  And, see here, at Robertson's\nfarm is one bonnie birdie that I wanted to cage before the --45.  She\nmust be treated kindly, and put under my protection.  But when night\nfalls I am with you.\n\n\"'Now, piper, play up, and we shall dance.'\n\n\"No one who had seen that Highland reel so mad, so merry, could have\nbelieved that these very men were vanquished soldiers, who might soon\nbe surrounded by the Duke's troops, and cut to pieces.\n\n\"There was a spy among them, though, hidden in a corner--none other\nthan Muirachie himself.  At a time when the revelry was at its\nwildest he managed to escape unseen, and hurried away to the Braes.\n\n\"On hearing the news that the dwarf brought, Robertson immediately\ncalled in his men, closed his ports, and prepared for action.\n\n\"Well he knew he had to play a dangerous and deadly game, for Raoul\nDhu's band of revenge-seeking rebels would doubtless be increased by\nscores, when it commenced its march to the Braes.\n\n\"His difficulty was to know what to do with his children, his wife,\nand sister-in-law.  Rather, he told his men, than they should fall\ninto the power of those drunken and infuriated rebels, he would shoot\nthem with his own hand.\n\n\"'No, no, Mister McRobb'--it was faithful Muirachie who spoke--'it is\nmysel' that knows ta place to hide ta poor leddies in whetefer.'\n\n\"'Place of concealment?  Where?  where?'\n\n\"'Ta whisky-still down ta glen.'\n\n\"'You can guide them there?'\n\n\"To pe surely, Mister McRobb.  Muirachie can do it.'\n\n\"The shades of evening were already falling, and there was no time to\nlose.  In a few minutes, therefore, Robertson's family had commenced\na perilous descent towards the stream, and soon, guided by Muirachie,\nfound themselves within a cave.  It was so concealed as to render\ndetection impossible.*\n\n\n* In the same still, since those days, many and many a gallon of\nwhisky has been made and smuggled.  It is only a few years since it\nwas discovered and raided by the Excise.\n\n\n\"Muirachie lit a big oil lamp which, at all events, rendered the\ndungeon a little less dreadful.  Then he hurried away.\n\n\"'I must help ta kill ta foe,' he said as he took his leave.\n\n\"'Can they possibly hold out till the Royalist soldiers arrive?'\nThis was the question that Mrs. Robertson anxiously asked her sister\nas soon as they were left alone.\n\n\"'No,' answered Fiona; 'if we have to await assistance, all will be\nlost and your husband slain.'\n\n\"'Sister, sister, what shall we do?'\n\n\"'Not wait for assistance,' was the calm response, 'but seek it.'\n\n\"'What mean you, Fiona?'\n\n\"Fiona had hastily proceeded to wrap herself in a Highland\nshepherd-tartan plaid.  She next put on her head a bonnet of the\nshape now called Tam-o'-Shanter, and under this she soon tucked her\nbonnie hair.  Then she seized a crook that she found in a corner.\n\n\"'Sister Mary,' she said resolutely, 'the 1st regiment is with the\nDuke.  If not already dead, my Ian is there.  I am going to seek the\nDuke's assistance to save us.'\n\n\"'But, girl, girl--\n\n\"'Detain me not a moment,' she cried.  'Every minute is precious.  A\nminute lost may mean a life.  Pray for me, Mary; that is all you can\ndo.'\n\n\"She was gone, and poor Mary threw herself on a rude bedstead to weep\nand to pray, her children crowding round and trying to console her.\n\n\"There was a struggling moon shining through the rifts in the dark\nand threatening clouds, and giving now and then a little light, and\nthe wind moaned drearily among the silver birchen trees hardly yet in\nleaf.\n\n\"But a louder moan soon fell on Fiona's ear as she staggered down the\ndangerous steep.  It was the roar of the stream beneath.  To her it\nwas a hopeful sound.  Though falling oft, and bruising her tender\nlimbs, she kept steadily on, and the streamlet guided her to the\nriver, and in another hour she had passed Beauly on the left, and was\nhurrying along the road that leads to Inverness.\n\n\"No braver deed was ever done by any girl, I think,\" continued\nAuld-da, \"whether Scotch or English.  Indeed, I doubt whether an\nEnglish girl would have attempted it, or been possessed of the\nstrength to carry it out.\n\n\"Once clear of the town, and a mile or two on the road to Inverness,\na distance of about fourteen miles to the camp, near Culloden, lay\nbefore her, and now the danger and horror began.  The night seemed to\ngrow rather darker.  Fiona had the eyes of an eagle as far as sight\nwas concerned, and she needed these to-night, and ears as well as\neyes.  For a time all was silent, and she walked on briskly enough.\nDown to the left she could hear the low sob of the sea on the beach,\nand she even caught glimpses of it now and then, sleeping quietly\nunder the stars; to her right were birchen woods, and the night wind\nsoughed mournfully through their drooping branches, while the stems\nof the trees could be seen against the heather, like spirits that\nseemed to walk and move as she ran briskly on.\n\n\"Now and then an owl flew overhead, and its weird cry was startling\nin the extreme.\n\n\"More than once she stumbled over guns and belts, and even claymores,\nthat had been thrown hastily away by the fugitives.\n\n\"A sudden thought seemed to strike her, and, bending down, she picked\none of these swords up.  If attacked, this Highland maiden meant to\nsell her life dearly.\n\n\"But what is that dark object by the wayside?  She stops to gaze\nfearfully towards it.  A low groan is borne to her ears, and a voice\nsaying in piteous tones, 'Water, water, in Heaven's name!'\n\n\"There is the sound of a rippling rill near; she hesitates not a\nmoment, but, doffing her Highland bonnet, turns it outside in and\nfills it.\n\n\"A ray of moonlight falls upon the form of the wounded soldier who\nhas crept off the wood to die.  He blesses her as he drinks, and\nwhispers 'Farewell!'  But now she hears voices, and, drawing her\nplaid close round her, she crouches beneath a tree.\n\n\"They were not red-coats, she could see that at a glance, but kilted\nrebels, and as soon as they passed, she hurried on once more.\n\n\"She sees many a sad sight in the darkling, and meets many men flying\nonwards to the west.  All these she avoids.\n\n\"But a very narrow escape she has from death or worse.  She remembers\nthere is a near cut through a part of the wood that will save her\nmiles, and, knowing every inch of the country, determines to take it.\n\n\"Suddenly, on turning round the corner of a rock, a glare of light\nfrom a camp-fire falls on her face and form.  Around this sit or lie\nhalf a score of reckless Highlanders, some with recent cuts upon\ntheir faces that made them hideous to behold.\n\n\"'A spy! a spy!' cried one.\n\n[Illustration: \"A spy!  A spy!\" cried one.]\n\n\"'Spy or not spy, a right fair maid.  By my soul I shall catch her\ndead or alive.'\n\n\"A pistol shot or two rang out as Fiona dashed back into the darkness\nof the wood, and a bullet whizzed closely past her ear.\n\n\"For the first time now since she had departed, the danger of her\nsituation rose up before her mind.  What a fearful thing it would be\nto fall into the clutches of these reckless and lawless men!  Fear\nlent speed to her feet, and she flew on, hardly knowing or caring\nwhither.  Her pursuer, coming straight from the firelight, could at\nfirst see but indistinctly; but he soon recovered sight, and ran like\na deer after the figure in front.  The wood was now more open, and\nthis added to the chance of her being caught.  It was, indeed, a race\nfor life.\n\n\"And now she sees the wood again but a little way ahead, and\nincreases her speed.  If she can once get into the shade of the\ntrees, she thinks she will be safe.\n\n\"The increase in speed was but a last spurt, however, and now she\nfeels her strength fast failing her.  She stops and presses a hand to\nher brow.\n\n\"'God give me strength!\" she mutters.\n\nNext moment she has turned on her pursuer like a tigress at bay.\n\n\"'Stand!' he cries, 'or I'll dirk you.'\n\n\"'Come a yard nearer,' she shouts, 'and you are a dead man!'\n\n\"But dirk in hand he rushes in.\n\n\"The girl's claymore gleams for a moment in the uncertain light; then\ncomes a dull thud.\n\n\"The man falls heavily on his face.\n\n\"Killed or wounded she stops not to see, but goes hurrying on, and\nnext minute she is safe within the shadows of the friendly wood.\n\n\"On she walks now, but cautiously, and has the good luck soon to\nreach the road once more, only two Scots miles from Inverness.\n\n\"But the town she must avoid.  There is greater danger there than in\nthe darkling forest.\n\n\"The moon has sunk, but the stars are very bright, for the sky has\ncleared.  And far in the east and south she espies a glare in the sky.\n\n\"'That must be the Duke's camp!' she thinks.\n\n\"Joy now takes the place of fear, and she walks bravely on, her head\nerect, as becomes a fearless Highland maiden, but her hand upon the\nclaymore.\n\n\"She is near the camp, but still in the darkness, though watch-fires\nlight the bush around her.  Suddenly there is a rattle as of a musket\nbeing brought to the shoulder.\n\n\"'Who goes there?\"\n\n\"'Friend.'\n\n\"'The watchword.  Speak quickly, or I fire.'\n\n\"'I'm a woman!' cried poor Fiona.  'You will not shoot a girl.  I\nhave a message for the Duke.\"\n\n\"'Advance, girl.'\n\n\"She drew near to the sentry, who was one of the 1st, or Royal Scots.\nLoyal Scots would have been a good name for them in those days as\nwell as ever since.\n\n\"The sentry held up a light.\n\n\"'I must do my duty,' he said.  'Hand over that claymore.  Why it\ndrips with gore!  Are you a rebel?'\n\n\"'I am not; I am a loyal and royal Scot.'  But she added, 'I fear I\nhave slain a rebel.'\n\n\"Hearing voices, three figures muffled in cloaks, with swords that\nclanked upon the ground, came from a tent and approached the spot.\n\n\"'Captain McDonald,' said the sentry, 'this is a young lady who\nclaims audience with the Duke.\"\n\n\"'The Duke cannot be seen, Miss Stranger,' said the officer, 'but\ncome to our tent.  We would hear your story.'\n\n\"A young officer was sitting writing at a rude table in the tent as\nthe party entered.  His back was towards her, but as soon as she\nspoke he started to his feet and looked at her.\n\n\"'What, Fiona!'\n\n\"'It is I, Ian.  O, thank Heaven you are safe!'\n\n\"The officer had taken the girl in his arms, and was gazing fondly in\nher face.\n\n\"But now her eyes swam, and all became dark.  When she again looked\nup, Ian was bending over her as she lay on a plaid.\n\n\"'Have I been long ill?'\n\n\"'Only a few minutes, Fiona, ma chree.'\n\n\"'Then there may still be time to assist my dear brother-in-law, his\nwife, and children.  But see, Ian, day is already breaking.  You must\nto horse if precious lives would be saved.'\n\n\"And hurriedly now she told her lover and his comrades all the story.\n\n\"Not more hurriedly than Captain McDonald gave the orders that\nfollowed.\n\n\"'To horse, to horse, immediately, sergeant!' he shouted.  'Thirty\nmen armed to the teeth.  If not here within ten minutes, I will\ncleave the last man with my sword!'\n\n\"And now, laddie,\" said Auld-da, pausing, \"have you had enough for\nto-night?\"\n\n\"No, no, no,\" I cried.  \"Tell me how it ended.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V.\n\n  ROYALS TO THE RESCUE--THAT FAITHFUL DWARF--HAND\n  TO HAND WITH DIRK AND CLAYMORE--\"THE\n  RED-COATS ARE COMING!\"\n\nA glimmer of coming daylight was spreading high up in the east, and\none by one the stars were paling before it, as that warlike band\ngalloped away from the camp: thirty-three in all were they.  Good men\nand true.\n\n\"The largest and strongest horse carried Ian, and behind him sat\nFiona herself, for she was the guide.\n\n\"And now, dear boy, we must go back a few hours in this true story,\nto see what happened to sturdy Robertson and his faithful men.\n\n\"It was nearly twelve o'clock, and the honest farmer was beginning to\nthink that after all no attack would be made on his little\nstronghold, when suddenly Muirachie grasped his master's arm.\n\n\"'Hist!' he said in Gaelic, 'they are coming, I can hear their\nfootsteps.'\n\n\"At the same moment the faithful dwarf's collie, Kooran, sprang up\nwith a growl, and would have given voice had not Muirachie seized her\nby the muzzle.\n\n\"Next moment, the tramp of armed men could be heard by all.\n\n\"'This side, this side,' whispered Robertson.  'Each man to a\nloop-hole, but do not fire till I give the order.'\n\n\"Raoul Dhu was the first to advance towards the farm.\n\n\"'Hullo! fortified, are you?' he muttered, and drew back\n\n\"Robertson could have shot him where he stood, but generously\npermitted him to retreat.\n\n\"'Come forth, you traitor to your lawful King and country,' cried\nRaoul now.  'Come forth, I say, and I'll fight you with dirk or\nclaymore.'\n\n\"There was no response from the darkened fort.\n\n\"'Shut up your women folks.  We don't want to kill females and\nchildren, and we're going to fire.  But, Robertson, we'll hang you\nand all the traitor hounds you have beside you, and Fiona shall be\nmine.'\n\n\"Then came a lull for the space of five minutes at least.\n\n\"It was the stillness that precedes a storm.  A long line of smoke\nand fire followed it, but the bullets hardly pierced the palisade.\nIt was briskly replied to from the forts, and more than one man was\nseen to fall.\n\n\"Raoul and his men sought shelter now, and for the next half hour an\nintermittent fire was kept up from the bush.\n\n\"It was not even replied to, for, determined not to waste his\nammunition, Robertson had caused his little force to lie down, and\nthe bullets pattered harmlessly on the walls behind them.\n\n\"In their cave, half down the wooded ravine, Mrs. Robertson heard the\nfiring, and even the loud, threatening voices of the assailants, but,\nwoman-like, she could but weep.  O, yes, she prayed also, as perhaps\nshe had never prayed before, and even caused her little ones to kneel\ndown and add their voices to hers in supplication.\n\n\"It seemed, for two long hours, or probably nearer three, that those\nprayers had been heard, and that the attack on the farm was\nrelinquished.\n\n\"Then, in the distance, those in the fort heard a murmur of many\nvoices coming nearer and nearer up the brae.\n\n\"They carried torches, too, which they wildly waved aloft.  By this\nlight Robertson noted that Raoul's attacking force was now full fifty\nstrong.\n\n\"The defenders did not wait for the onslaught this time, but poured a\nwithering fire into the advancing ranks.  Volley after volley; but\nthough many were seen to reel and fall, the rest kept rushing on, the\ncommander shouting:\n\n\"'Ready, lads, with the axes; and failing that, we'll rout them out\nwith fire and smoke.'\n\n\"Soon the hatchets were thundering on the palisade, and those who\nwielded them were comparatively safe from the port-hole fire.\n\n\"Something must be done, and that at once.\n\n\"'Follow me!' cried Robertson.\n\n\"The rebels, in the glare of the torchlight, could see nothing of the\nraid that your ancestor and his men now made from a door to the east,\nand the very closeness of their ranks made Robertson's fire most\ndeadly.  Two volleys were poured in at short range.  So short,\nindeed, that one bullet probably killed or wounded two men.\n\n\"'Now for the claymores!' shouted Robertson.\n\n\"The attack followed close on the shout, and men fell before it as if\nmowed down by the reaper's scythe.\n\n\"They fled now to the adjoining copse, and the defenders poured a\nvolley after them into the wood.\n\n\"But that copse was not to protect them, for somehow a fallen torch\nset a light to the undergrowth, and the fire was speedily raging and\nlicking up everything before it.\n\n\"The attacking party was obliged to fly, but, lit up by the glare,\nmany became an easy prey to the defenders, who were once more behind\nthe palisade.\n\n\"But startling now was the voice that Robertson heard at his elbow.\n\n\"'O, mister, mister'--it was the dwarf who spoke-- 'ta leddies, ta\nleddies and children!'\n\n\"'What!  You think the fire will reach them?'\n\n\"'To pe surely, mister.  They will pe smother in ta cave whatefer.\nBut Muirachie will save them.'\n\n\"He waited no word of command.  He simply disappeared.\n\n\"But what had now become of the besiegers?  Will Raoul was not the\nman to be easily discouraged, though his men were worn out, and none\nwould return.  He had, therefore, to lead them back to Beauly, and\nthere revelling and drinking were resumed.  Such was the custom of\nthe period.  Then sleep followed.\n\n\"Day had broken and morning well advanced before Raoul Dhu resumed\nhis attack.  It was still more determined than that which had gone\nbefore it, and to the horror of the defenders it was seen that the\nrebels had armed themselves with a battering-ram.  Moreover, they had\ncrept up the side of the ravine, and had their instrument planted\nalmost before Robertson could fire a shot.\n\n\"Nothing, it seemed, was able to save them now.  Their destruction\nwas but a matter of time.\n\n\"Crash! crash! crash! went the ram, and the palisade flew into\nflinders before that iron-shod beam.\n\n\"One volley more was fired, then the Robertsons retreated to their\nlast trench.\n\n\"They would die fighting, at all events.\n\n\"And the end speedily came, dear boy.\"\n\n\"What, Auld-da,\" I cried, excitedly, \"did Raoul Dhu slay the poor\nmen?\"\n\n\"The end came, dear boy, thus,\" said Auld-da, in his quiet way:\n\"Raoul Dhu, who seemed to possess a charmed life--for his mother,\nthey said, had been witched at the time of his birth--dashed though\nthe breach followed by his men.  He seemed surprised to find an inner\ntrench that had still to be stormed.  But with a wild shout the\nrebels leapt at it.\n\n\"It would be hand to hand now with dirk and claymore, and,\noverpowering them by numbers, the enemy would make short work of the\ndefenders.  Even at this awful moment Robertson had time to think of\nthose he was about to leave behind him.\n\n\"'God help my wife and bairns!' he cried, as he drew his dirk.\n\n\"There was no more shouting, for, when hand to hand, laddie, men do\nnot shout.  There were sounds, however, in that trench and above it,\nthat would have made your blood run cold.  The clash of steel, the\ndull thuds of dirks driven home, short cries and groans, gaspings and\noaths.  Oh! war is a terrible thing, my boy.\n\n\"But hark!  Just at this moment, when all seemed lost, high above the\ndin of the hand-to-hand conflict rose a soldiers' cheer.\n\n\"'The red-coats are coming!' shouted Raoul Dhu.  'Back, men, to the\nopening!  Quick!'\n\n\"The red-coats were coming.  Ay, and they had come, and next minute\nwere pouring in through the opening in the palisade.\n\n\"But let us drop the curtain, laddie, over the scene.  It is too\ndreadful to describe.\n\n\"Suffice it to say that no quarter was given.  Every rebel inside\nthat palisade was slain.\n\n\"Ian, Fiona's lover, and Raoul Dhu seemed to single each other out,\nand fought for many minutes with all the beauty and coolness of\nskilled swordsmen; but Ian's sword found flesh at last, and Raoul Dhu\nfell to the ground, pierced through the chest.\n\n\"With one foot on his foe, and right arm drawn back, Ian was about to\ngive the _coup de grace_ which Raoul, too proud to sue for mercy,\ncalmly awaited, when Fiona herself rushed upon the scene, and threw\nherself on her lover's breast.\n\n\"'No, no, no!' she cried.  'For my sake, kill him not!  To slay a\nfallen foe were murder.  Spare him.'\n\n\"'I will,' said Ian, and he sheathed his sword.\"\n\n\"But, Auld-da,\" I persisted, \"the sword was all dripping with blood\nand gore, wasn't it?\"\n\n\"Haven't you had enough of that, laddie?\" said Auld-da, smiling.\n\"I'll tell you no more, because my story is ended.  You see, my boy,\nGod had heard the children's prayers.\"\n\n\"But what became of--of--of everybody, Auld-da?\"\n\n\"That is soon told.  Raoul Dhu was taken prisoner, and, I believe,\nafterwards suffered the extreme penalty of the law at Edinburgh.\n\n\"When peace was once again restored, Ian was married to Fiona in the\nlittle church adown the glen, for the soldier was now on leave.\n\n\"The children grew up; my father was one of them, my Uncle Peter\nanother.\n\n\"The farm, however, was burned, and, sad to say, poor Muirachie lost\nhis life in attempting to save the cattle.\n\n\"Then the Robertsons went higher up, and nearer to the forest.\n\n\"It was there that I was born, boy.  But I shall tell you no more\nto-night.  Old men like me tire soon.\"\n\nAnd so I left him dozing over the fire.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI.\n\nA HIGHLAND SCHOOL A HUNDRED YEARS AGO.\n\nI went home the other day.\n\nHome to Scotland, I mean.  For though I may be found all winter long\nat work here in my wigwam, in one of the sweetest sylvan nooks of\nbonnie Berks, \"My heart's in the Highlands,\" as the old song says.\n\nWell, I work here for my boys and my girls, that is, for the\nthousands--I think I may say thousands at least--of lads and lasses\nwho do me the honour of reading my books and stories.\n\nEngland has endeared itself to me by many a tie of friendship and of\nlove.  But home is home, you know, and so in spring-time, when the\nlight green tassels droop from the larch-trees, with their tiny\ncrimson buds, when the mavis makes the woodlands ring with his glad\nclear notes, and the linnet sings its own sweet wee love-song among\nthe banks of golden furze that hug the ground on our Scottish\nmoorlands--I go home.  And I go home again in autumn, when the purple\nand crimson of heather and heath cover mountain and brae, and the\nwhirr of the gorcock is heard on the hills.  When streams roll wilder\nas they dash onwards to the sea, and solemn pine forests nod dark in\nthe breeze.\n\nWaxing poetical, I do believe!  Well, I am taken that way sometimes.\n\nAnyhow, I went home the other day, and as I sat on a rock high up in\nthe Deeside Highlands, and gazed around on scenery that, for wild and\nlonesome grandeur, is hardly to be surpassed in all broad Scotland, I\ndo believe that the tears would have dropped from my eyes, had not\nthe Wizard of the North come to my aid, and bade me declaim as\nfollows:\n\nI had to stand up to do it, mind you.\n\n  \"This is my own, my native land.\n  * * * * *\n  \"O Caledonia! stern and wild,\n  Meet nurse for a poetic child!\n  Land of brown heath and shaggy wood,\n  Land of the mountain and the flood,\n  Land of my sires! what mortal hand\n  Can e'er untie the filial band\n  That knits me to thy rugged strand?\"\n\n\n\"Well,\" said a voice close behind me, \"after that I think you had\nbetter come home and take tea with me.\"\n\nI was so taken aback, and so shy at being caught rhapsodizing, as one\nmight call it, that had there been a fox's burrow anywhere near, I\nshould have dived head first into it.\n\nThe speaker was the village minister, a good and clever little man,\nwho plays and sings, and does any number of nice things.\n\nOf course, I would go and have tea; so down the mountain-side we went\ntogether.\n\nThere was nobody else at the minister's house except an old maiden\nlady, who spends most of her time in visiting the poor and--gossiping.\n\nI soon found out that she and I were not on the same platform as\nregards boys.\n\n\"O, I _hate_ boys,\" she said emphatically.\n\n\"Well, _I_ don't,\" I observed mildly.\n\n\"O, but _I do_,\" she snapped, \"and I never see a boy without thinking\nof a monkey.  Boys are noisy, chattering, howling, whistling, teasing\nbrats, and never out of wickedness except when asleep.  Gentle or\nsimple, they are all the same at heart, just as full of mischief as\nthis delicious new-laid egg is full of----\"\n\nShe cut the top off, viciously too, as if the poor egg had been a boy.\n\nThere was a chicken in it!\n\nWell, I couldn't stand it any longer.  I just laughed and laughed,\nand leant back and laughed, till the minister's chair began to crack.\nYes, and the minister joined me too, right heartily.\n\nBut Miss Steelyard pierced me through and through with those\nindignant little grey eyes of hers, till I began to think I'd gone\ntoo far.\n\n\"Ah! well, Miss Steelyard,\" I said winningly, \"I suppose there are\nboys and boys.\"\n\n\"No, I won't admit it,\" she snapped.  \"They are all boys, every one\nof them--'deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked.'\"\n\nWell, I wasn't going to stand that.\n\n\"For my own part,\" I said, \"I rather like a boy who has some spirit,\nand who even plays tricks.  There is never any saying what a bad boy\nmay turn out.  He might stand at the head of a great republic, Miss\nSteelyard.\"\n\n\"O, yes,\" said this lady, witheringly, \"or dangle at the end of a\nlong rope.\"\n\nAs I saw there was no soothing the old maid, I sipped my tea in\nsilence till the parson changed the subject to trout-fishing.\n\nBut I maintain, nevertheless, dear readers, that there are boys and\nboys.\n\nTo which of these catalogues my grandfather belonged when he was a\nboy, it is not for me to say, but for you to judge.\n\n* * * * *\n\nIt was about thirty-five years after the terrible events I have tried\nto record in last chapter, before my grandfather--plain John\nRobertson, but called Ian when his foot was on his native heath--saw\nthe light of day.\n\nThe day before his birth there had been several strange happenings,\nall duly related by his mother's nurse, an ancient dame, called\nYonish MacPhee.  Her name was not MacPhee--fa--fi--fum, though it\nmight have been, for Yonish wore a mob-cap, and dreamt dreams and saw\nvisions.\n\nCome to think of it, I dare say the mob-cap had not much to do either\nwith the dreams or visions, but it was a weird looking head-dress of\nbleached cotton, with flaps all round the front, that sometimes\nalmost hid her thin yellow face, and sometimes blew right back on her\nneck, or stuck straight out like the lugs of an oar-eared rabbit.  No\nwonder people said she was a witch.  Anyhow, the day before his\nbirth, Yonish saw four magpies sitting all in a row on the limb of a\ndead tree.  This was a bad omen!\n\nThen about fifty red-deer came out of the forest and ate up about\nhalf an acre of green springing oats.  This was good for the deer,\nbut bad for the farmer.  Yonish would have gone to \"hush-oo\" them\naway, but they would have tossed the old lady on their horns, and\nplayed skittles with her.\n\nThat day, too, a raven set upon the chimney and croaked, the cream\nturned sour, and the nanny-goat let down no milk.\n\nBut in spite of all these omens, grandfather was declared to be the\nfinest child ever seen in the parish, with his father's nose, and the\nvery blue eyes of his mother.  I myself won't take the nose in,\nbecause I have been told that my great grandfather's nose was very\nlarge.  He snuffed, and there was no want of accommodation for the\nsnuff.\n\nThat is the mildest way of putting it.\n\nWell, then, my grandfather began to grow up.  I have no\nauthentication of this.  I simply reason from analogy.  Most boys do\ngrow, for they have not much else to do or think about.\n\nFrom swaddling bands to kilts.  And having arrived at the latter\nstage, he began to take notice of things, putting this and that\ntogether as it were, and drawing his own conclusions.\n\nAt seven years of age he was sent to school, and then his mind began\nto expand as well as his body.  It was a day-school, of course, and\nstood about a mile and a half from his father's house.\n\nI dare say it was a very humble sort of an edifice; it was pulled\ndown long ago.  But this school was kept up by the Kirk, and the\ncurriculum was of no mean order.\n\nIt stood a little way off the road, I have been told, and was a long,\nlow, stone building, thatched with heather, and not unlike a tiny\nchurch, for the door was in the eastern gable, and there were two\nwindows at each side with real glass in them, each pane being very\ngreen and with a bull's eye in the centre.\n\nThose windows did not draw up nor down; and when the dominie wanted\nventilation he simply opened the door \"wide to the wall.\"\n\nThe scholars, as they were called, were about thirty or more, and\ncame from far and near.  They were of both sexes, the girls occupying\none side of the school, the boys the other.  Near the far gable, and\nclose to the fire, there was a kind of little pulpit, and here the\ndominie reigned serene, monarch of all he surveyed.\n\nHere too, in a drawer, was the tawse--terrible weapon of punishment,\nespecially on a cold day when one's hands are blue: flogging, in the\nEnglish sense, was never permitted in Scottish schools.  The palms or\nfingers were warmed with the brutal tawse, and oftentimes boys were\nslashed around the bare feet and ankles, and their howls for mercy\nwould be heart-rending.  But mercy was unknown to the souls of those\nold-time dominies.  My own knowledge of Latin was all flogged into me\nwith the tawse, and I used to believe the dominie had no soul, only\njust a gizzard like a hen or a cock.\n\nWhen young Ian first went to school, he thought he knew a thing or\ntwo; for he had been taught at home, and could already read the New\nTestament and make pot-hooks and figures on a slate.  He thought he\nknew as much as the teacher, but he was very soon undeceived.\n\nWhy, this dominie could not only read Virgil and Horace, but he could\neven talk good English.  So could the boy Ian.\n\nBut Gaelic was always spoken in the play-ground, and English and\nGaelic in school.\n\nOn Fridays not a word of Gaelic was allowed to be uttered.\n\nThe schoolmaster was said to be an angel out of doors, but a\nperfect--well, not an angel--in the school-room.\n\nThere was a sturdy independence about Ian, that did not tend to make\nthe dominie love him.  The first day he came, the teacher had him up,\nand addressed him in English.\n\n\"How old are you?\"\n\n\"Seven.\"\n\n\"Say seven, sir.\"\n\n\"Seven, sir.\"\n\n\"What is your name?\"\n\n\"Ian.\"\n\n\"Ian, _Sir_.\"\n\n\"No, Ian Robertson.\"\n\n\"Say, John Robertson.\"\n\n\"Shan't!  My name is Ian.\"\n\n\"Well, you'll have a touch of the tawse.\"\n\n\"Does she hurt?\"\n\n\"'Deed, indeed she does.  Now what's your name?\"\n\n\"Sir John Robertson.\"\n\nThen the boy's tongue went off at a tangent as it were, and he\nrattled off the following gibberish:\n\n  \"Sir John Robertson is my name\n    And Scotland is my nation,\n  Forest Farm's my happy home\n    And heaven my expectation.\"\n\n\nSir John, as the boys determined to call him, was now permitted to\ntake his slate and sit down.\n\nBut he was very sulky for a time.\n\nWhy had he been sent to school? he asked himself.\n\nWhat was the good of school, anyhow?  He would have but little time\nnow to catch humble-bumble bees, to chase young rabbits, to look for\nbirds' nests, to fish, and to climb trees.\n\nHow beautiful it was out of doors!  How sweetly the sun shone in\nthrough the green glass of the windows.  He had half a mind to bolt\nand run for it.  He was sure enough the teacher couldn't catch him.\nBut--hillo! here was a boy going to get a thrashing.  There was some\nfun in that.  Not for the culprit, however, for he spat in his hands\nand pulled down his sleeves when the dominie went for the tawse.  But\nwhat a face he made, and how he kicked and jumped and cried when he\ngot the first tingling \"pand\u00e9.\"  My little boy grandfather had to\nthrust his bonnet into his mouth to prevent himself from laughing\naloud.\n\nBut, just as \"pand\u00e9\" number six was descending, the culprit's courage\nfailed him, and he quickly drew in his hand.  Down came the tawse on\nthe dominie's own leg.  All the boys and girls tittered, and the boy\nwas whacked all the way back to his seat, where he cried the whole\nafternoon.\n\nIan then took to drawing little men and women on his slate.  He gave\neach a long tail, and then held them up for the other boys to laugh\naloud at.  He thus succeeded, beyond even his expectations, in\ngetting no less than three boys tawsed.\n\nSchool was fine fun after all.\n\nIt was also a treat for young Ian to see how deftly the dominie threw\nthe tawse.  He was a demon bowler.  When he noticed a boy, say at the\nother end of the school, talking or laughing, he rolled the tawse up\nin a ball and sent it whirling towards the urchin with an astonishing\naccuracy of aim, the result of long practice.  The tawse would alight\nin the culprit's lap, and he had to carry it up--it felt like\ncarrying a snake by the tail--and, presenting it to the pedagogue,\nreceive his \"pand\u00e9s\" and go back to his seat a sadder and a wiser\nloon.\n\nThese \"pand\u00e9s\" reddened all the palms, and sometimes even blistered\nthe wrist.  It was ten times worse for hours to come than the feeling\none experiences after a snow-ball fight.\n\nBut young Ian's first day at school came to an end at last.\n\n\"School's out!\" cried the teacher.\n\nThis wasn't very elegant English, but it had a grand effect.  Books\nand slates and Bibles were bundled away; and a rush was made for the\ndoor.  Here a block occurred, of course, but finally all were free to\nyelp and yell, and dance and scream, till the rocks re-echoed the\npandemoniacal noise.\n\nBut Ian stopped to speak to no one.  He didn't like boys over much,\nand he hated girls, because they were so silly and couldn't do\nanything as it ought to be done.\n\nSo my little morsel of a grandfather flew off like a hare to the\nhills, his bare legs brushing the heather, and his bonnet under his\narm, because a big boy made a grab at it before he left the\nplay-ground.\n\nWhen the children had all gone, the dominie put away the \"tawse,\"\nlocked up the school, and retired to the bosom of his family.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII.\n\n  HARD TIMES FOR A TEACHER--THE TAWSE--LITTLE RACHEL--A\n  DROLL ADVENTURE--MY GRANDFATHER STUCK FAST\n  IN THE CHIMNEY.\n\nThere wasn't much bosom about the dominie's family, for the matter of\nthat.  Only his wife, a great kind-hearted woman, his little daughter\nRachel, and the collie dog.\n\nDominie Freeschal himself was not much of a man, \"judged by points,\"\nas doggy people say.  He lacked size and bone, and he was thin----and\nquite out of show-form, so to speak.\n\nHe was supposed to be \"powerfully learned,\" however, and powerful\nwith the tawse.  In those good old times some of Solomon's _dicta_\nwere construed very literally indeed.\n\n\"Spare the rod and spoil the child\" didn't mean that you were to lock\nup the tawse in the desk, and make a pet of the boy.\n\nQuite the reverse.\n\nA \"scholar\" might consider himself very lucky indeed if he did not\nhave a sound whacking once in three days.  And even the parents\nexpected that the dominie would do his duty towards his pupils in the\nway of flagellation, and do it handsomely too.\n\n\"Now, Mister Freeschal,\" said a father one day, \"I'm going to be\nafter sending my little son to your school, and it's a little\n_nickem_ he is whatsoever, so you'll not be letting him over you at\nall, for he is entirely over his mother.\"\n\n\"I'll see to it, Sandy,\" was the dominie's reply; and he did.\n\nAnother day, another father came to see the schoolmaster on business.\n\n\"I've a complaint to make, Mister Freeschal.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Mister Freeschal, \"it's myself that is sorry for that\nsame.  What is it, Mister Young?\"\n\n\"It's that you don't thrash Tonal enough.  Now for more 'n two weeks\nhe hasn't been crying, for his face is as clean at night as in the\nmorning evermore.  I'm indignant, sure, and if you'll not be doing\nyour duty by the boy, I'll not be after paying you.\"\n\nAnd off he went.\n\nThat same afternoon, young Tonal was called up and told to spell the\nwords \"believe,\" \"deceive,\" and \"relieve.\"\n\nIn each case poor little Tonal had the misfortune to misplace the \"i.\"\n\nA hush fell over the school as the dominie marched off to the desk\nfor the tawse, for every one could tell by the swing of his\ncoat-tails that he meant business.\n\nYoung Tonal licked his palms and prepared for the inevitable.\n\n\"You're wrong in your orthography\" (the dominie put the emphasis on\nthe \"graphy\").  \"Now I'm not going to _deceive_ your father, nor take\nhis money for nothing; but I _believe_ I'll _relieve_ my feelings by\nwhacking you well.  Hold out your hand.\"\n\nAnd Tonal went home with a dirty wet face that night anyhow.  But as\nwill presently be seen, the dominie had succeeded in stirring the\nboy's blood and making a conspirator of him.\n\nThere are exceptions to every rule, however, and one day a boy's\nmother believed that the dominie had tawsed her lad too much, so she\nwent to the school to relieve her feelings.\n\nShe was no great beauty, certainly, but a plain-faced, fair-haired\nwoman, with sinews as tough as gun-tackle.\n\nI think the dominie quailed as she entered the school-room.\n\n\"And it's you that'll be after beating my boy black and blue, is it,\nyou miserable oshach?\"\n\nShe waited for no reply, but just went straight for Mister Freeschal\nwith a broom-handle, which she carried under her arm; and I'm really\nafraid that the boys and girls grinned as the dominie fled round and\nround the school, and finally took refuge in the pulpit, or desk.\n\nMrs. Nairn, for that was the good lady's name, had a visit from the\nminister next day, and it is said she received a most severe\nheckling, but, nevertheless, the teacher never dared touch that boy\nagain.  Johnnie Nairn became quite a hero, and the other pupils used\nto say:\n\n\"O, Johnnie, it's me that would like to have such a mother as you've\ngot.\"\n\nSometimes a boy would be \"one licking to the good.\"  This happened\nwhen the dominie made a mistake and whacked the wrong youngster.\n\n\"Never mind, my lad,\" the schoolmaster would say; \"you're one to the\ngood.  Don't forget to remind me of it next time I'm going to tawse\nyou.\"\n\nAnd the boy never did forget.\n\nThe teacher was no great favourite, you may be sure.\n\nI suppose he ruled his wife by psychal force; it certainly could not\nhave been by physical, for she weighed at least two of him.\n\nThere was a long peat-stack that the boys had to pass on their way\nfrom school, and near this Mrs. Freeschal would often be found, and\nshe had always a kind word and a smile, and sometimes a pea-meal\nbannock for the urchins whose faces were all begrimed with tears.\n\nIn his daughter, Rachel, the dominie was quite bound up.  She was a\nlittle thing of eight, with long fair hair, blue eyes, and brown bare\nlegs and feet.\n\nShe ruled the boys as if she'd been a little queen, and even the\ngirls had to be sweet to her.  Some boys were so much in love with\nRachel that if she gave one a smile and tossed her head defiantly and\nimperiously at another, there was sure to be a fight between the\nrivals on the way home that evening, resulting in torn kilts and\nbleeding noses, and sometimes a black eye.\n\nThis black-eye business was serious, because, whenever the dominie\nsaw a boy so disfigured, he went for the tawse at once, and no\nquestions were asked or answered.  So before two boys began to fight\nit was no unusual thing to bargain that there should be \"no hitting\nin the face.\"\n\n* * * * *\n\nNow it came to pass that before my little sturdy mite of a\ngrandfather had been at this seminary quite six months, he had fought\nhimself half-way up the school, that is, he could thrash about\nfifteen boys, and fifteen could thrash him.  But he was conquering\none every week at least.\n\nSo as he was so brave, and because he used to take his tawsings\nmanfully and never cry, he began to be looked upon as a kind of hero\nin Rachel's eyes.\n\nRachel's father, when he paid a visit to Beauly, always came back\nwith a pocketful of brandy-snaps and sugar-bools* for his wee\ndaughter.  Of course she ate most herself, but had always a few to\nexpend on her boy favourites.\n\n\n* Sugar-marbles.\n\n\nThe dominie didn't like boys not to cry when tawsed, and used to\ndevise other modes of punishing them.\n\nOne of these was \"keeping them in.\"  That is, locking them up for an\nhour or two in the schoolroom after hours.  There was an awful\nlegend, too firmly believed in by the boys, that once upon a time a\nlad was locked up and forgotten, and how he fell asleep, and the rats\nate two of his toes clean off.\n\nSo this mode of punishment was no favourite with the pupils, you may\nbe sure.\n\nOne day Rachel slighted my grandfather--who thought he was madly in\nlove with her.  She put the point of her little tongue out at him and\nimmediately after smiled most sweetly on a bigger boy, Kenneth McRae.\n\nOf course my grandfather determined to fight Kenneth, but not content\nwith that, he was so incensed at his heroine that he called her\n\"little wretch,\" and she began to cry.\n\nThere was a drum-head court-martial at once.  It was in vain that my\ngrandfather pleaded that he meant \"little Rache\"; he was convicted,\nhad six pand\u00e9s on each hand, and was condemned to be kept in that\nbeautiful spring evening for a whole hour after it was dark.\n\nRachel cried all that afternoon, and nobody could tell why.\n\nThe punishment was more than the boy could bear with anything akin to\nequanimity.  It was bad enough while the sun still shone, but when\nthat luminary began to sink, encrimsoning the clouds, and making the\nbull's eye in each pane of glass look like a little setting sun\nitself, then he began to grow impatient, to say the very least of it.\nIf the dominie were to release him at once, then there might still be\ntime to go home by the hill and the forest, because there were many\nbirds' nests to visit.\n\nI am not holding the prisoner up as a paragon of virtue in the way of\nbird-nesting.  He did not rob them, simply because it had never\noccurred to him that there was any fun in making a collection of\neggs.  He had seen one such collection, and also a lot of stuffed\nbirds at a barber's shop in Beauly, and being at heart a naturalist,\nhe was much disgusted; the eggs had lost colour, and seemed\ndreadfully out of place, and the birds were dusty, their necks and\nlegs all awry, and a perfectly idiotic stare in their glass eyes.\n\nBut I must give my daft morsel of a grandfather his due, and say he\nnever robbed a nest.  He would watch these nests from the very\nfoundation; watch the strange architecture day after day till they\nwere lined, and his pleasure at seeing the first bonnie egg was very\nreal indeed.  The birds, he told me, seemed all to know him, and look\nupon him as their champion.  And so he was.  If ever he met a much\nbigger boy in the forest, he lured him away in a diplomatic kind of\nway which was nearly always successful; if the boy was about his own\nsize, he ordered him off, or stripped and fought him.  So even at\nthis early age I think my hero was an embryo soldier.\n\nWell, on this particular evening he was sitting on a stool bemoaning\nhis sad fate, when something like the tapping of a woodpecker fell on\nhis ear.\n\nHe looked quickly up.\n\nThere was a face at the window, looking in at him through a hole\nwhich a snow-ball had made last winter.\n\n\"Ian!\"\n\n\"She has come to laugh at me, I suppose,\" he said to himself.\n\n\"Ian!\"\n\nIt was a still small and pitying voice.  Sorrow in it, but no anger.\n\nHe went quickly towards the broken pane.\n\n\"Ian, I'se sorry for you.\"\n\n\"O, don't say that!  I don't mind a tawsing, but kind words would\nmake me cry.  I wouldn't like to cry before you.\"\n\n\"No; you's a brave boy, and never cries.  Ian! am I a little wretch?\"\n\n\"No----o----; you're little Rachel!\"\n\n\"Ian, put your mouf (mouth) up to the broken hole.  Don't be sy\n(shy); I'm not going to tiss you.  Boys is always sy.\"\n\nIan put his mouth up to the hole anyhow, and Rachel popped a\nsugar-bool in it, and watched him eat it with quite a womanly\ninterest.  Then she fed him with brandy-snaps, and finished off with\ntwo more bools.\n\n\"Now I'se off!\" she cried.  \"I'se going to Beauly to fetch mammy and\ndaddy home, then you'll be free.\"\n\nAway she went, and the schoolroom looked darker now and more lonesome\nthan ever.  The sun had set too, leaving only a few red bars of cloud\nathwart the forest horizon.\n\nHe began pacing up and down like a caged wild beast, But he wasn't\nthat quite.  He felt a hero after the brandy-snaps and sugar-bools,\nand Rachel's kindly words.\n\n\"I won't stop here,\" he cried aloud.  \"There might be ghosts, or\nanything.\"\n\nHe gave the door a kick, and, as he did so, discovered that the key\nwas in it, though on the outside.\n\nEven had he known this before Rachel came to feed him, he was too\nmanly to have asked her to rescue him.  It would have brought trouble\non her.\n\nHe began to think.\n\nHa! what a happy thought!  He would climb up the chimney, slide down\nover the roof, and then turn the key and let himself out.  It was a\nfunny idea, but the very humour of it commended itself to him.\n\nThere was still light enough to read a portion of the good Book by;\nso this droll little grand-dad of mine sat down by the window, and\nread aloud for some time.  Then, jumping up, he prepared for action.\nHe stripped off his jacket, and vest, and kilt.  He seldom wore a\ncap, only a towzie head of yellow hair.\n\nHe had nothing on now but his shirt; that would get black enough, but\nhe could wash it in the burn.\n\nHe peeped fearfully up the chimney now, and could see the sky.  He\nshuddered a little, but went boldly up, head first.\n\nAlas! and alack!  I don't quite know what \"alack\" means, but it\ndoesn't matter.  Anyhow, my grandfather stuck fast in the chimney.\n\nHere was a plight, and he was half-choked, too, with the falling soot.\n\nO! the agony of the next two hours!  He gave himself up for lost; if\nhe didn't die in the chimney, of soot-suffocation, he would be\nroasted alive next morning, when the fire was lit.\n\nHe said his prayers over and over again; then singular to say, he\nfell asleep, sound and fast.\n\nHow long he slept he could not tell himself, but, when he awoke, he\nmade one more struggle for life and liberty, and succeeded.  The rest\nwould be easy.\n\nBut now let me tell you what befell the dominie.  His wife, and he,\nand Rachel when she arrived, first stayed at a friend's house for\nsupper, and at eight o'clock he set out alone to walk home, the whole\nof his family--that is, the whole lot of the two of them--remaining\nin Beauly for the night.\n\nHe had not forgotten his prisoner.  He would get home by nine, he\ntold himself, and, if the young rascal did get a scare, it would\nserve him right.  Ah! little did he know just then where the scare\nwas to come in.  Now, those were the stupid old drinking days, when\npeople believed that spirits warmed them and did them good, and all\nsuch silly nonsense.  So when the dominie met a friend who invited\nhim into an inn, poor prisoner Ian was soon forgotten.\n\nIt was long past twelve, but almost as bright as day, owing to the\nbig, round moon that was shining, when the dominie rather unsteadily\napproached the school.\n\nAt this very time my grandfather was about to slide down, and so he\nsaw the dominie advancing.  Something must be done speedily.  Like\nmost people in this wild land, the schoolmaster was superstitious,\nand Ian seemed to know this.\n\nFirst, then, he emitted the low, mournful cry of a barn owl.  Next\nmoment, with an eldritch yell, he dropped from aloft, right in front\nof the dominie.  Such a sudden apparition, black from head to foot,\nwas enough to frighten anyone.\n\nThe dominie was more than frightened--he was appalled; his hat fell\noff, his eyes bulged out, his arms were half-raised, and he looked\nlike a chicken trying to fly.\n\n\"Wha--wha--where d'ye co--co--come from?\" stammered the dominie.\n\nMy tricky little grand-da shrieked again, and pointed aloft; then\ndown dropped the dominie, in a dwaum.*\n\n\n* A dwaum: fainting brought on by fear.\n\n\nBoy-like, Ian couldn't help giving the dominie's hat just one good\nkick; then he turned the key, gathered up his clothes, and made off\ntowards the stream that ran through the ravine.\n\nA bath at such a time of night was rather risky, but the occasion\ndemanded it.\n\nNext day Ian went to school as usual.  The dominie eyed him narrowly,\nbut said nothing.  No doubt he thought that the adventure with the\nblack sprite, or imp of darkness, was all a dream.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII.\n\n  THE CONSPIRATORS--A DEED OF DARKNESS--A FEAST TO\n  FOLLOW--STRANGE SCHOOL-CUSTOMS--A FIGHT IN THE\n  FOREST--LAST DAYS AT SCHOOL.\n\nMy grandfather grew, and kept on growing.\n\nBut Ian grew not merely in height, as some lads, who never take\nexercise nor the cold morning-tub, do, till they become lanky and\nthin and lantern-jawed, or fat and pasty, with faces like half-cooked\ndumplings, but in strength as well.\n\nAnd though he was wild enough when free, he stuck to his books and\nslates at school.\n\nHe continued, however, to fight his way to the top of the school.\nBut, though he was often tawsed, he was never kept in again.\n\nThis was very satisfactory, for that terrible adventure in the\nchimney he never could forget.  The tawsing, however, was far from\npleasant, and so when one day Tonal, the boy whom the teacher\nthrashed so unmercifully as to make the lad bear malice, came up to\nmy grandfather in the play-ground, and said mysteriously that he\nwanted him that evening to go with him to the dark forest, where he\nwould tell him something, a ready consent was given; for even at this\nearly age my grandfather was fond of adventure.\n\nTonal, who was a great friend of Ian's, led him that night into a\ngloomy defile before he uttered a word.  Then after looking around\nhim, as if he feared they had been followed, he whispered words in\ngrandfather's ears that made him start.\n\n\"You don't mean it surely?\"\n\n\"I do,\" said Tonal, nodding.\n\n\"And the other boys are afraid?\"\n\nTonal nodded again.\n\n\"You and I are friends, Tonal, aren't we?\"\n\n\"Better than brothers.\"\n\n\"Then I will help you.\"\n\nThe two young rascals then shook hands in a most tragical way, as if\nthe deed they were about to commit were nothing less than arson at\nthe least.\n\nJust three days after this, Tonal drew a caricature of the dominie,\nwith a bottle of whisky sticking out of his pocket.  This he held up\nfor the inspection of the other boys, who tittered and laughed; then\ndown flew the tawse, and Tonal picked it up and marched boldly to the\nfront.\n\nBut the slate also had to be produced.\n\nThis was mutiny.  Ten pand\u00e9s on each hand, and to be kept in!\n\nIt was early spring, and night fell about eight o'clock, and a dark\nnight it was.\n\nTonal would have been very much afraid in the lonesome schoolroom,\nhad not the thoughts of what was to come buoyed him up.\n\nAt long last, the key turned softly in the door, and a mysterious\nvoice gave the watchword:\n\n\"Hist!\"\n\n\"I've got it,\" said Tonal, touching Ian's hand with the cold, snaky\ntawse.\n\n\"Well, come on then; I'll run and give the key back to little Rachel.\"\n\n\"Wasn't it in the door?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\nRachel was waiting at the peat-stack.  She was trembling with fear.\n\n\"O, you good little Rachel,\" said my grandfather.\n\nThen a sudden impulse caused him to take her in his arms and give her\na rough kind of a hug.  He had never gone so far in his sweethearting\nbefore, and now, though it was too dark to see it, his face was as\nred as a Christmas turkey's.\n\nRachel hurried back to hang up the key, and the boys flew off to the\nforest.\n\nIn a little glade a fire had already been laid, and soon its gleams\nwere illuminating the brown stems of the pine-trees, and sparks like\ngolden snow were carried high aloft in the rolling smoke.\n\nWith much pomp and ceremony, the conspirators laid the tawse on the\ngleaming wood, and sat down in silence, like a couple of stoical\nIndians, to see it consumed.\n\nIt had always felt like a snake; how like one it seemed now, and how\nit twisted and writhed, and twined and turned.  It settled down at\nlast into a fiery serpent, then it gradually crumbled away and\ndisappeared.\n\nAfter this the boys gave three such wild cheers that the very birds\nwere scared, and some flew, screaming, away into the black darkness\nbeyond.\n\nA little feast now followed.  They had provided themselves with\nbannocks and butter, with potatoes to roast, and a huge mountain\ntrout to grill over the clear embers.\n\nThere is no doubt about one thing, they were entirely happy around\nthis camp-fire, and, boy-like, must commence to talk about their\nprospects.  Tonal was two years older than grandfather, and he was\ndetermined to be a soldier.\n\n\"I can beat the drum a little, you know, so they are sure to take me.\nAnd I may be a drum-major yet, you know.\"\n\n\"Well, I'm going to be a farmer,\" said my grandfather, \"and have as\nmany sheep as there are pine-trees in the forest.  Then----\"\n\n\"Then what?\"\n\n\"Well then, you know, I'll marry Rachel.\"\n\nPoor boys!  Little did they know that\n\n  \"There is a divinity that shapes our ends,\n    Rough hew them as we will.\"\n\n* * * * * *\n\nThe events that immediately succeeded their feast in the forest may\nsoon be told.\n\n1st.  Tonal had already told his father, a very humble and poor\ncottar, that he would enlist.\n\n\"If it be the will of Heaven, go, my boy, and the Lord be ever with\nyou.\"\n\nThis was of course spoken in Gaelic.\n\nSo Tonal did not go back to school to face the dominie's wrath.  He\nwould rather face the French.\n\n2ndly.  My grandfather did go back to school.\n\n3rdly.  The dominie went straight to Beauly and bought a bran-new\ntawse.  But O, the irony of fate, my grandfather was the very first\nit was tried upon.  And he didn't like it either.\n\nNevertheless, in spite of his frequent tawsings, this ancestor of\nmine continued to grow.  It is just possible I am showing the worst\nside of his character.  Perhaps I shouldn't.  For he must always have\nbeen good-hearted.  The boy is the father of the man; the boy I might\nsay is the grandfather of the man.\n\nI know one thing for certain, and that is this: he dearly loved his\nfather and mother, and brothers and sister.  He had only one sister.\n\nThe farm on the Braes was a good one and prolific, and Ian's sturdy\nfather was revered and respected, an elder of the church, and one who\nbrought up his children in the fear and admonition of the Lord, as it\nwas termed.  Every evening there were prayers, and morning prayers\nalso.  But this was quite the reverse of making the children\nrestricted or sad.\n\nMany a jovial dance was got up in the long winter evenings at\nRobertson's house, and on such occasions the father was as merry as\nthe young people, and if he wasn't dancing among them he was beating\ntime to the music of fiddle or bagpipe.\n\nIn the Highlands of Scotland the winters are usually long and stormy,\nbut the peasantry and farmers have many pleasant ways of making it\npass; so that, when at length he went out into the world, my\ngrandfather had a very happy home to look back to.\n\nSchool life, despite an occasional tawsing, was far indeed from\nunbearable.\n\nThere were one or two strange customs connected with the little\nHighland school that do not prevail nowadays.  How would my reader\nlike, for instance, to carry a peat to school with him every winter's\nmorning?  But this was what my grand-dad and all the other boys had\nto do.  The girls were exempt.\n\nIf a boy forgot to bring his peat, he had his hands well warmed with\nthe tawse, and he was not likely to forget next day.\n\nThese peats kept up not only the school fire but the dominie's family\nfire also.\n\nWell, there was no disgrace in bringing a peat to school.  Even the\nminister's son had to do it.\n\nBut the other custom I only mention to condemn.\n\nIt was a great cock-fight that took place before Christmas, or Old\nYule rather, every year.\n\nEvery boy on this great day brought a cock to school with him, and\nthe boy whose cock should be victor was proclaimed king of the school\nfor the whole year, and was exempt from tawsing, except for specially\naggravating conduct.\n\nThe cocks that were killed became the property of the dominie.\n\nThe fight, I am sorry to say, created considerable excitement in the\nparish, and the boys' parents came from far and near to witness it.\nI have been told, though I can scarcely believe it, that even the\nminister himself came to see the fun.\n\nSad fun; yes, and cowardly, cruel fun!\n\nNevertheless, when, on the evening of a great fight, my grandfather\nwas duly crowned king, no prouder boy perhaps ever lived.\n\nEven the cock that won him the honour and glory clapped his wings and\ncrew over and over again, and to complete my grand-dad's happiness,\nlittle Rachel looked upon her hero as sweetly as an angel could have\nlooked, though it could only be an angel of darkness who would attend\na cock-fight.\n\nAs he sat next Rachel that evening, at a party which the dominie got\nup for the occasion, Ian felt his cup of bliss was not only full but\noverflowing.  Rachel had on a lovely snow-white frock and scarf of\nFraser tartan, and Ian was dressed in his Sunday's kilt with an\neagle's feather in his bonnet.\n\nAs king he was asked to open the ball, and of course choose his\npartner.\n\nNow duty whispered to him, \"Ask Mrs. Freeschal to dance.\"\n\nBut duty was left in the lurch for once.  One glance at Rachel's\nbonnie face, and next moment both were whirling through that very\nmazy dance--the Reel of Tulloch.\n\nTom Grahame, a much bigger and older boy than Ian, looked on at the\ndance with the green eye of jealousy.\n\nWhen it was over, and the king was escorting his little queen back to\nher seat, Tom stole up behind his majesty and whispered darkly in his\near.\n\nAnd these were the words he whispered:\n\n\"It's myself that will thrash you to-morrow within an inch of your\nlife.\"\n\n\"Sure, then, Tom Grahame,\" was young Ian Robertson's reply, \"the\nthreat that you throw on me won't keep me awake, and when I sleep it\nisn't dreaming about you I'll be.  Good-night till the morning.\"\n\nThat was a happy evening anyhow, and when he went to school next day\nmy grandfather had almost forgotten all about the coming battle.\n\nBoys will be boys, and they were just as combative in those days as\nnow.  Perhaps more so.\n\nAt this school, when any pitched battle was to be fought, the\nbelligerents and their friends betook themselves to the forest.\n\nThere were no rules of the ring.  A fall decided the end of a round;\nbut if the two fell together, they were allowed to fight it out on\nthe ground like a couple of bears.\n\n\"Is it to be hitting in the face or not?\" said big Tom Grahame.\n\n\"As the fight is for a lady,\" replied my gallant grandfather, \"I'm\ngoing to hit wherever I can, and you may do the self-same.\"\n\nThat was really the most terrible school-combat that had taken place\nfor years.\n\nTom Grahame was a vengeful tyke, and fought with fearful fury.  But\nIan was more skilful, and punished his adversary so well that the\nfight would have ended in his favour, had not Tom used his foot in a\nmost unhandsome fashion.\n\nDown rolled poor Ian, and while the other boys shouted \"Unfair!\" Tom\nthrew himself on top of my little progenitor, and mauled him terribly.\n\nThen in desperation Ian pulled out his kilt pin, and popped it\nstraight into his big antagonist's chest.\n\nThis decided the fight.  It nearly decided the fate of Tom Grahame\nalso.  The big pin had done its work so well--or ill--that Tom was\nconfined to bed for a whole month.\n\nFilled with remorse, my grandfather went every day to see him, and so\ndid the doctor, till he was out of danger.\n\nBut Ian became Tom's nurse, in a manner of speaking, all throughout\nhis illness, and, strange to say, between those two boys sprang up a\nfriendship that lasted for many and many a year, until deep seas\nrolled between, and, as will be seen as we go on, years after this.\nEver after, however, as long as my grandfather remained at school, he\nwas known by the nickname of Preen Mhor.*\n\n\n* Big pin.\n\n\n* * * * *\n\nOne day, and well did my grandfather remember it Mr. Freeschal paid a\nvisit to the farm, and was kindly welcomed in.\n\n\"It's about your boy I've come to speak,\" said the dominie.\n\n\"Why, surely, he hasn't gotten into any more mischief, has he?\"\n\n\"O, no, and if it was that same, it isn't complaining to you I'd be;\nI'd tawse him well.\"\n\nRobertson senior held out his snuff-box, and the dominie, after\ntapping the lid in a sociable kind of way, took a hearty pinch, and\nreturned the mull.\n\nMeanwhile Mrs. Robertson was bustling about getting ready the evening\nmeal, for Highlanders are nothing unless sociable.\n\n\"Your boy,\" said the dominie, \"is about past my lore.  He knows about\nas much as his master.\"\n\n\"It's myself that is delighted, Mr. Freeschal!\"\n\n\"Yes, I've done well for him, and there isn't a boy in all Great\nBritain, France, or Ireland, who can beat him at figures or grammar,\nand his writing is just copper-plate itself, only, if anything,\nbetter.  I could teach him Latin and Greek, you know, if it is a\nparson you'd be making of him.  If not, I tell you, as an honest man\nshould, that it would be taking your money for nothing to keep him\nlonger with me.  And that's what I've come to tell you.\"\n\n\"Well, well, Mr. Freeschal, you have made us all happy, and of course\nyou'll stop to supper?\"\n\nThere was some pretty play for nearly a minute after this, the\ndominie expostulating, the farmer's wife beseeching.  But it ended in\nthe dominie staying, which he had meant to do from the first.\n\nBy-and-by the minister himself dropped in and took a friendly chair\nand a friendly bit of food.\n\nDuring the evening, which was a very jovial one, young Ian's future\nprospects were freely discussed, but nothing definite was arrived at,\nexcept that to educate my grandfather any further would only tend to\nweaken his brain.\n\nStrange reasoning this was, only it contented those simple souls, and\nthat was enough.  There is a good deal of truth in Pope's lines--\n\n  \"From ignorance our comfort flows,\n    The only wretched are the wise.\"\n\n\nThis would be considered somewhat dangerous doctrine nowadays.\n\n* * * * *\n\nGrandfather's last days at school soon arrived, and both teacher and\nhis companions were better to him than ever; and Rachel, now a demure\nlittle maiden of fourteen, told Ian in confidence that he was going\naway out into the world now, and that it just felt to her like death\nor growing old, neither of which she considered very desirable.\n\nWhen the very, very last evening came, she bade him good-bye at the\ncorner of the old peat-stack, and though my grandfather did all he\ncould think of to comfort her, he had to part from her at last in\nsorrow and tears.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX.\n\n  LEAVING HOME--A HUMBLE TRADE--\"I'LL NOT SERVE\n  UNDER A FRASER OF LOVAT: I AM A ROBERTSON AND\n  A LOYALIST.\"\n\nIt was with a heart filled to overflowing that Ian Robertson, my\nfifteen-years-old grandfather, left his old home on the Braes and\nstarted on his journey to the distant town of Inverness.\n\nI purposely pass over the parting with his mother, father, brothers,\nand sister, because I do not wish to have my pages blistered with\ntears.\n\nSturdily did the boy march off, however, with all his chattels tied\nup in a bundle swung over his shoulder on the end of a stick, and a\nfive-shilling-piece in his pocket.\n\nAh! well, many a brave boy has begun the world on less than five\nshillings, and Ian was not the lad to be daunted.\n\nHe paused at the turn of the road to wave his bonnet back at the old\nfarm, and half a mile farther on he mounted a rock that placed him\nwithin view of the old schoolhouse and school.  And--why yonder was\nRachel her own little self standing right on top of the peat-stack\nand waving him adieu!\n\nHis heart went right away back to her with every wave that he gave\nhis blue bonnet, and it was only with a considerable effort that he\nplucked up courage at last to jump down and continue his journey.\n\nAh! those partings of youthful days, how sad they are, and brave is\nthe sensitive boy who can bear them.\n\nNow, the reader, I hope, will think none the less of my hero when I\nsay that, having arrived at a little pine wood, he looked up and down\nthe road to make sure nobody saw him, then entered the plantation,\nand knelt down to pray.\n\nHe prayed just then as he had never prayed before, and felt that in\nthat prayer he was giving himself all away to God.\n\nI am not going to repeat a sentence of the prayer.  Indeed, though I\nknow the soul and substance of it, I could not if I tried.  \"Out of\nthe fulness of the heart the mouth speaketh,\" you know.  It was that\nway with the boy now.\n\nWe are told that the prayer of a righteous man availeth much.  Well,\nI have not painted my grandfather as a saint; but I do most firmly\nbelieve that the prayers of sinners are listened to as well as those\nof better men.\n\nAnyhow, I do know this--my grandfather, even in his boyhood, had\nfaith, and as he rose from his knees, he felt brighter and happier\nand more hopeful than ever he remembered feeling before.\n\nWhether or not his prayers for guidance for his every footstep in\nlife were heard, my story has yet to reveal.\n\n* * * * *\n\nTowards the evening of this eventful day, this tired and weary\nboy-grandfather of mine, with his red bundle on his shoulder, drew\nnear to his destination.\n\nHe was about to learn a trade.  There is no money to be made nowadays\nout of business--at all events, few professional men make large\nfortunes--and it was just the same in the good old times of which I\nam writing.\n\nAnd what was my respected grand-dad going to be?  Why a staymaker, of\nall trades in the world.  A corset is the new name of stays, as I\nneed not tell you.\n\nThere was nothing romantic about the trade, and certainly not a\nvestige of romance about the little old snuffy man he had come to act\nas boy for.  He lived above his shop and workshop, in a dingy house\nin High Street, all alone with his wife and the cat.\n\nNevertheless they gave him a kindly welcome, and a hearty supper also.\n\nAfter this he was lighted down to his bedroom, and as soon as he had\ngot into bed, Mr. Craig, the staymaker, came and blew out his\nfarthing dip.\n\nHis bed was a hard one, a mere shake-down on the floor under the\ncounter.  As soon as the light was out the rats began to scamper\nabout and quarrel and fight and squeak.  This wasn't pleasant at all,\nbut the boy soon fell fast asleep, and did not waken till it was\nbroad daylight.\n\nWell, next day his work began, and very hard it was; and very few\nwere his holidays, for not even on the Sabbath day was he allowed to\ngo for a walk.\n\nAt the end of six months, so proficient was he that he could almost\nmake a pair of stays himself.\n\nPerhaps it was a pity that this tow-haired little grandfather of nine\ndidn't stick to staymaking.  Why, there were wonderful possibilities\nconnected with the business.  He might have become a millionaire and\nbeen thrice Lord Provost of Glasgow city.\n\nBut fate willed it otherwise.\n\nOne day he was sent with a parcel of finished work to the house of a\nlady of some pretensions, who lived on the bonnie banks of Ness, in\nquite a charming house, surrounded by beautiful grounds.\n\nMy grandfather was dressed very neatly, and looked extremely well.\nSo much taken with the lad was the lady, that she began to question\nhim as to his birth and parentage.\n\n\"Why,\" she said, \"you are a third cousin of our own.  For poor brave\nLord Lovat, who was martyred on Tower Hill, was a cousin of my\nhusband's father.  How strange!\"\n\n\"Can you write and read well, boy?\"\n\nShe made him do both.\n\n\"Why,\" she cried in amazement, \"it is shameful that a boy of your\nabilities should be learning the trade of a staymaker.  It is as bad\nas being a tailor.  Come back to-morrow; Mr. Fraser himself will be\nat home, and I will speak to him about you.\"\n\nMy grandfather thanked her and retired.\n\nThat night, in his little bed among the rat-holes he dreamt\nthat--well, I almost forget what he did dream, but I think that there\nwere powdered footmen in it, and a coach-and-four, or something\nequally stupid.\n\n\"So, boy, you'll be going to leave us,\" said Mr. Craig, next night,\nwhen he came back from Falkirk Lodge, and told the staymaker and his\nwife how kind his newly-found cousins had been to him.\n\n\"You'll be going to leave us.  Well, it's no me that will stand in\nyour way.  But come to see us sometimes.  We like you, lad, and as\nlong as you live in Inverness you shan't want a friend.\"\n\nHe did need a friend very much ere long, as we shall see.\n\nMrs. Fraser was a very amiable lady indeed, and my grandfather liked\nher from the very first.  But Fraser himself was haughty and\naffected, and soon gave the boy to understand that he was little\nbetter than a menial, and taken, not really out of charity, but\nbecause he and his lady would permit no cousin of theirs, in whose\nveins flowed the Fraser-of-Lovat blood, to work in a shop like a\ncommon \"snob.\"\n\nAh! well, he might have been like one, but he was independent while\nwith Mr. Craig, even though as poor as one of his bed-fellows, the\nrats.\n\nI have ever failed to see that there was anything to be ashamed of in\npoverty.\n\n  \"Is there, for honest poverty,\n    That hangs his head, and a' that?\n  The coward-slave, we pass him by,\n    We dare be poor for a' that!\n  For a' that, and a' that,\n    Our toils obscure, and a' that;\n  The rank is but the guinea-stamp,\n    The man's the gowd for a' that!\"\n\n\nMy grandfather then began life at Falkirk Lodge, by being clerk to\nhis Cousin Fraser, and amanuensis to his wife.\n\nIt was a pleasant enough sort of existence, and the work was not\nhard.  He had plenty of liberty also, and was even permitted to keep\na dog, called Dash, that poor old honest Craig had given him.  And\nDash was a lovely collie.\n\nI think Dash was about the best friend that the boy had even now.\nFor Mrs. Fraser went much into society, and Ian had to go with her as\na sort of poor relation.\n\nHis manliness resented this, but he never complained, for the lady\nwas most kind.\n\nBut something very strange happened about six months after my\nboy-grandfather came to reside at the Lodge.  For one evening Fraser\ncame home unusually elated.\n\n\"It is done,\" he cried, \"done, my dear.  All finished and done.\"\n\nHere he embraced Mrs. Fraser.\n\nThen he turned round to Ian.\n\n\"Leave the room,\" he said haughtily.\n\nMy grandfather bit his lip, and turned a trifle red in the face.  But\nhe turned to go.\n\nJust as the lad was leaving, this proud Fraser called him back.\n\n\"Here,\" he cried, \"I don't want to be rough with you.  Take this\nshilling and spend it as you please.\"\n\n\"Donald,\" he added, addressing a servant, \"you see I am not a\nbad-hearted fellow, and I've had good news to-day, so I give my\nlittle kinsman a shilling, and here is one for you.\"\n\nDonald put the shilling in his pocket.\n\nIan, my plucky grand-dad, felt inclined at first to throw the\nshilling in the grate, and run right away back to his old friend\nCraig.  But Mrs. Fraser looked so gentle and kind that he had not the\nheart to vex her.  So he followed Donald's example, and put the coin\nin his pocket.\n\nThen he walked out.\n\nThat same evening he happened to enter the great kitchen, that was\nhonoured by the title of servants' hall.\n\n\"Ha!\" cried the butler, \"here comes another young soldier..\n\n  \"And he's going to fight the French,\n  For King George upon the throne.\"\n\n\nIan looked so puzzled that everybody laughed.\n\n\"I'm no soldier,\" said my grandfather, \"and don't want to be.\"\n\n\"Och!\" cried Donald, \"that won't do at all.  For sure you took the\nKing's shilling as well as myself did.\"\n\n\"Yes, you are enlisted,\" said the butler, \"right enough.  Haven't you\nheard that master has been made Captain in the Black Watch, and wants\nto take all the young Highlanders with him he can get?\"\n\nThen my grandfather's wrath was aroused.  He brought his sturdy\nlittle fist to the table with a bang.\n\n\"I will not serve under a Fraser of Lovat,\" he cried.  \"Cousins of\nours though the Frasers are, they were rebels.  I am a Robertson and\na loyalist.\"\n\nThen he dashed out, regardless of the platoon fire of laughing that\nfollowed him.\n\nCaptain Fraser was away for a whole week, and when he returned he was\nin uniform.\n\nMy grandfather met him respectfully in the hall.\n\n\"Salute your officer!\" said Fraser haughtily.\n\n\"You are not my officer, sir.\"\n\n\"You are a soldier legally enlisted, young man, and to-morrow you\njoin your company at Fort Augustus.  I am not going to make you a\nprivate soldier, for my own sake.  You will still be my clerk, and if\nyou behave well, your promotion will come.\"\n\nMy grandfather made no reply.\n\nHad he tried to, the words would have been those of anger.\n\nHe simply bowed, and walked out.\n\nIt was a beautiful morning in spring.  The sky was soft and blue, the\nair was balmy, and the rippling of the river, not far off, soothed\nhis mind.\n\nFar, indeed, was he from being happy, however, and as he stood on the\ncool green walk of the old garden, gazing upwards at the sky, he felt\nthat he would have given a good deal for the luxury of a hearty cry.\nBut then we can't always cry when we wish to.  Presently, a soft warm\nmuzzle was thrust into his hand, and looking down, lo! there were the\nbrown eyes of his favourite collie, Dash, turned upwards to\nhis--anxiously--enquiringly.\n\nThey said as plainly as dog's eyes could talk, \"What mood are you in\nthis morning, master? for I am ready for anything.  I shall remain\nquiet and sympathise with you and love you, or we can go for a grand\nold game of romps together.\"\n\nDash's appeal was irresistible, and next minute Sidney and he had\nleft the garden together, and side by side were scampering over the\nfields and by the hedgerows, with the glad sun shining down on them,\nshining into their very hearts, while the wild flowers, that grew\neverywhere around them, seemed part and parcel of their young lives.\n\nYes, Dash, like Ian himself, was young.  O, give youth a young dog, I\nsay; the natures of the two are in unison, their minds are _en\nrapport_, and let your old dogs go pottering around with elderly\npeople.  But little more than a year had yet passed over Dash's\nsmooth head and bonnie brow.  Life to him as yet was all a bright and\nbeautiful show, in which every creature that moved was just as happy\nand full of fun as he himself was.  \"What were the cocks crowing\nfor?\" he would have asked you.  \"Why did the birds sing so sweetly\nand so merrily?\"  Why? because they were all so brimful of happiness\nand joy, that they would have died if unable to give vent to their\nfeelings.  Even the trees sang softly to the passing winds, and the\ndimpled ponds and purling brooklets laughed gladsomely upwards at the\nblue sky and the fleecy, floating clouds.  Everything was joyful like\nthe dog himself.  He went scampering on in front of the boy, and\npicked up a round stone that he found on the grass.  \"Why, Mr.\nStone,\" he seemed to say, \"don't you join in the general jollity all\naround you?  Why should you lie there so still and quiet when Nature\nall is gay?  I'll teach you a lesson.\"\n\nAnd he tosses the stone high in the air, catching it ere it fell,\nthough it makes his teeth bleed just a little.  Then he rolls it in\nfront of him, ever so funnily; then he covers it with grass, and\nrolls and tumbles over it; then pretends it is lost entirely, and\nthat there isn't a ghost of a chance of ever finding it again at all.\nThen--\"Wow!\" he has found it again, and once more the fun grows fast\nand furious, till my grandfather forgets his grief, and is fain to\nlaugh aloud and take a hand in the sport, and round and round they\n\"whish\" and run, a madcap collie and a madcap boy.\n\nSoldiers and all are forgotten for the time being; grief and sorrow\nare no more real now than half-forgotten dreams, and that dreadful\nold Cousin Fraser, who had arisen on the horizon of the lad's life,\nvanishes like a darkling cloud when it meets the moon.\n\nOn and on they scampered, the madcap collie and the madcap boy.  On\nand on.  They neither knew nor cared whither.\n\nBut they brought up at last in the midst of a wild, hobgoblin kind of\na heathy moor, where the sun shone very brightly; and here Dash threw\nhimself down to rest and pant, his pink ribbon of a tongue hanging\nout at one side of his mouth across teeth whiter far than alabaster.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X.\n\n  THE KING'S SHILLING--IN CORNEY'S CAVE--\"SURRENDER\n  IN THE KING'S NAME\"--CAPTURE AND ESCAPE.\n\nMy grandfather found himself at long last among the birchen woods\nthat in those days lay not far off the bay that leads to Beauly.  The\nday was already far spent, and Dash and he were getting hungry.\n\nSuddenly he sat down upon a stone close to the sea, and Dash laid his\nbeautiful muzzle on his knee and looked up sympathisingly in his face.\n\n\"Whatever is to be done now, doggie!\" said my grandfather.\n\n\"Never mind, master, never mind.\"\n\nThat is about all the advice a dog can give one in times of trouble,\nbut the look of unquenchable affection that is conveyed by the eyes\nis better far, and more soothing, than the set phrases of sympathy\nvouchsafed to one from human lips.\n\n\"Here I am, Dash, in one of the prettiest of pickles.  I've turned my\nback on Inverness, on Falkirk Lodge at any rate, and now here I am\nwith nothing in the world except what I stand up in, just as poor as\nyou, Dash, and as hungry as a hawk.  What a fool I was to leave the\nCraigs.  I wasn't so very unhappy there, Dash, even though I did\nsleep under the counter; the rats daren't come near me when you were\nthere.  Heigho! hungry and tired, and nothing to get food with.\n\n\"O yes, by the way, there is that shilling.\"\n\nHe took the coin from his pocket and looked at it.\n\n\"That shilling, Dash, would keep you and me alive and well for three\ndays.  But I would not break it to save my life--no, nor your life,\nDash.  The King's shilling!  Well, if I had wanted it I would have\nasked for it, and could have fought for my country as bravely as did\nthe Robertsons of old.\n\n\"Dash, I _could_ be a soldier, but never, _never_ a slave!\n\n\"There goes the King's shilling.\"\n\nHe flung it far into the sea as he spoke.\n\n\"Some cod-fish may swallow it, Dash, and I hope it will agree better\nwith him than it has with me.  Come, doggie, we'll gather some\ndulse.\"*\n\n\n* A kind of edible seaweed.\n\n\nDash didn't care for it, but he made pretence to eat some just to\nplease his master.\n\nThere was a fisherman's hut not far off, and near the door, sitting\nat her knitting on an upturned coble, a buxom fisher-lass.\n\nMy grandfather drew near, and addressing her in Gaelic, begged for a\ndrop of water for his dog.\n\n\"My father and I are just going to have a bit of dinner; you and the\ndoggie must come in and take pot-luck.\"  That was the lassie's reply.\n\n\"To be sure,\" cried her grey-bearded father from the doorway, \"the\nlad must come in and the beastie too.  What says the Good Book?  'Be\nye careful to entertain strangers, for some have entertained angels\nunawares.'\"\n\nMy grandfather thanked them, and gladly entered the hut.  \"But,\" he\nsaid, laughing, \"Dash here may be an angel, but there isn't much\nangel about me.  Why, I'm a runaway.  I'm not sure, indeed, that I'm\nnot a deserter.\"\n\nThen he told the good people all the story.\n\nAnd the old man's wrath was aroused.\n\n\"Is it,\" he cried, \"is it that they would be making a soldier of you\nby force?  The villains!  Let the French do that, but Britons will\nnever bow to it!\"\n\nMy grandfather thought that meal the most delicious he had ever eaten\nin his life.  And it was only boiled haddock and potatoes after all.\n\nDash was of the same opinion.\n\n\"Now, boy,\" said the old man, as he bade him good-bye, \"go home to\nyour people on the Braes, and defy your proud Cousin Fraser.  Pride\nalways goes before a fall.  The Lord Himself be with you, laddie.\nGood-day, good-day.\"\n\n* * * * *\n\nIt now occurred to my grandfather that the old fisherman's advice was\nvery good indeed, and that he had best go and see his people.\n\nHe walked briskly on now, with Dash galloping and barking around him.\n\nSomething would turn up.\n\nIn the bright lexicon of youth, there ought to be no such word as\n\"Fail.\"\n\n\"Dear boy, you're welcome home.\"\n\nThese were his father's first words.\n\n\"If nothing better happens, why, you can join your brothers at the\nfarm.\"\n\nIan had half expected a scolding, and the tears came to his eyes as\nhis mother embraced him.  He spent three or four very happy days at\nthe farm, and visited many times and oft his old friends and his old\nhaunts.\n\nRachel had grown wonderfully, and was a trifle more reserved and shy,\npretending to take more interest in the dog than in his master.\n\n\"Love me, love my dog.\"\n\nThere is truth in that old saying.\n\nBut there was one friend he missed, and that was Tom Grahame, the boy\nhe had nearly slain with his big kilt pin.\n\nThe boy had gone south--nobody knew his destination--to seek his\nfortune, as resolute young Scotch lads did in those days, and do\nstill.\n\nMeanwhile, to return for a moment to Falkirk Lodge, the wrath of the\nnewly-fledged Captain Fraser knew no bounds.\n\nHe was deprived of the services of a good clerk, and his company of a\nsoldier.\n\nHe wrote at once to the commandant at Fort Augustus, describing poor\nIan, from head to foot, from his blue bonnet to his brogue sheen,*\nand branding him as a deserter.\n\n\n* Highland boots or shoes.\n\n\nNow every soldier was valuable in those warlike days, so the\ncommandant lost no time in attempting to arrest my grand-dad.  He was\njust sitting down to dinner one day, when little Rachel rushed in.\n\n\"O Ian, Ian,\" she cried, the tears rolling over her cheeks, \"the\nsoldiers are coming, three of them with guns and bayonets and all.\nO, where can you hide?  They will hang you and shoot you and all.\"\n\nThis was a time for action and coolness too.  There was no fear about\nIan.  But quite the reverse.  He comforted and reassured poor Rachel.\n\n\"They can never take me,\" he said; \"I am no deserter, but I want some\nfun.  I'll go to the forest, father; the soldiers will tire looking\nfor me in a week's time.  Put some food for me now and then in\nCorney's Cave.  Don't cry, Rachel.  This is quite a romance.  Dash\nand I will be playing at being outlaws.  Good-bye.\"\n\nHe sprang out by the back door, just as the feather bonnets and\nbayonets of a sergeant and a file of soldiers appeared on the brae.\n\nDash went with him.\n\nCorney's Cave was the very place in which Ian's father and\ngrandmother and Fiona had been hidden during the terrible fight at\nthe old farm, after Culloden.  Though used as a whisky-still, it was\nat present out of employment.  There was no fear of any smoke being\nseen, as this found its way, by a kind of natural chimney in the\nrocks, into a shepherd's hut.\n\nHere my grandfather could lie quiet for a month or more, if he chose,\nwithout the possibility of being captured.\n\nHe lit himself a fire, for there was plenty of dry peats and wood in\na corner; then making Dash lie down, he went out to pull heather for\na couch.  He was very systematic with his work.  The heather was tied\nup in little bundles, and when about two score of these were placed\nside by side, the green ends upwards, they formed a bed that many a\nfugitive king, in olden times, would have reposed upon with delight.\n\nJust before darkling, Dash emitted a low growl, and next moment a\ntiny, bare-headed gillie crept into the cave.\n\nHe brought plenty of cakes and cheese and milk for Ian and Dash.  He\nalso told my grandfather all about the soldiers.  They had searched\nall day in the forest, but had now returned to Beauly, as no one on\nthe Braes or near there would give them food.\n\nThen the lad said good-night and slipped away as silently as a\nheather newt.\n\nIt was certainly lonesome enough in that cave, and but for the\npresence of Dash, I believe my grandfather would have dreaded a visit\nfrom ghosts or water-kelpies.\n\nAs it was, after making up a good fire, which lit the whole cave up\nin the most cheery way, Ian and Dash enjoyed a hearty supper.\n\nThen he said his prayers and lay down to sleep, a Highland plaid his\nonly covering.\n\nHe had \"backed\" the fire and stowed away a kindling peat, so he had\nno fear for the morrow.\n\nFor quite a long time he lay awake, thinking and wondering how all\nthis was going to end.  The strangeness of the situation and his\nsurroundings, no doubt, helped to make him wakeful.  The fire burned\nlower and lower, the black roof at one moment enveloped in shadow and\ndarkness, and next, lit up with flickering gleams of light.  Outside\nwas the low moan of the wind and the murmur of the stream over its\nstony bed; but presently these sounds seemed to draw farther and\nfarther off, and soon were heard no more.\n\nFor Ian slept.\n\nHe strolled only a little way from the cave next forenoon, but as the\nsun began to sink in the west, the irksomeness of cave-life became\nunbearable, and he determined to risk all and treat himself and Dash\nto a stroll in the forest.  Among those grand old trees, with the\ngreen, cool moss beneath his feet, he forgot his troubles, and\nsoldiers were soon banished from his thoughts away.\n\nHe had a rude awakening.\n\nFor while lying on his back listening to the sweet even-song of the\nbirds, and watching the crimson light of the westering sun,\nflickering on the branches of the lofty pines, Dash suddenly sprang\nup and barked.  Ian was on his feet in a moment.\n\n\"Now we have you!  Surrender in the King's name!\"\n\n[Illustration: \"Surrender, in the King's name!\"]\n\nSo near were the soldiers to him, that he seemed to look down the\nmuzzles of their muskets.\n\nThey fired as he darted off through the woods, and one bullet\nwhistled close past his head.  Then the chase began.\n\nAs well might they have attempted to follow a red-deer on foot.\n\nIan soon left them far behind.  Then patted Dash's faithful head, and\ntook matters very leisurely.\n\nThey made a long detour, however, and only Apache Indians could have\nfollowed their trail back to the cave.  Here was the wee gillie\nwaiting by the fire.  He was very glad to see Ian, and told him all\nthe news.  My grandfather kept him quite a long time chatting by the\nfire and he promised to come again after dusk next evening.\n\nThe place looked gloomier when the gillie went, but Ian heaped more\nwood on the fire, and the excellent supper sent by his mother made\nhim feel once more happy.\n\nIt wasn't such a disagreeable life, this, after all.  Many a better\nman than he had been an outlaw, he told himself.  There was King\nBruce, for instance, and Sir William Wallace, and many a brave knight\nbesides on whose heads a price was set, and who lived in caves and\nforests, just as he was living now.\n\nAh! brighter days would come.\n\nFor a whole week poor Ian stuck to his cave, only venturing out after\ndusk.\n\nThe soldiers still hung around the woods, so the gillie told Ian, and\nthe sergeant had even declared that he would stop \"till Doomsday in\nthe afternoon,\" rather than return without his prisoner.\n\nIan thought that cave-life till Doomsday in the afternoon would\nbecome rather monotonous.  However, he unluckily made up his mind,\none evening, to pay a visit to his old dominie's house.\n\nThe soldiers would hardly be in that neighbourhood.\n\nSo, as soon as gloaming, and the gillie had come and gone, and\ndarkness was creeping down and filling up the glens, he crept out of\nhis hiding, and made his way up the steep rocks, and on to the\nbrae-lands above.  Although it must have been well on to nine\no'clock, much to his joy he noticed lights still glimmering in the\ndominie's window.\n\nHe had left Dash tied up, and walked very cautiously, frequently\nlooking round when he heard the slightest sound.  There was just one\nlittle copse to pass through, then he should be safe.\n\nAlas! he had no sooner entered, than he was seized and thrown down.\n\nHis captors were the soldiers.\n\nThey bound his hands behind his back, then told him to march.\n\nThe men chatted right merrily all the way to Beauly, but Ian spoke\nhardly a word.\n\nNo, he had not let down his heart.  Not a bit of it; he was only\nmeditating how best he could escape.\n\n\"Well,\" said the sergeant, as they neared a small inn--the landlord\nand his daughter were well-known to Ian's father--\"Well, lad, you\nhave led us a nice dance, but I bear no ill-will.  Come in here with\nus, and we'll wet your whistle.\"\n\nIan didn't want his whistle wetted, but he had to enter all the same.\n\nThey were kindly received, and shown into the best room.\n\n\"Poor boy,\" said the girl, aloud, \"and have they caught you after\nall?\"\n\nBut she took the opportunity of whispering in his ear, \"Pretend to\nsleep, and fly when I put out the lights.\"\n\n\"Yes, we've caught the young rascal,\" said the sergeant, \"and I've a\ngood mind to catch you also.\"\n\nBut Ellen glided off like an eel, and presently returned with cakes\nand cheese, and a huge black bottle, and I need hardly say what that\ncontained.\n\nThey forced Ian to drink some, though he had never touched spirits\nbefore.\n\nAfter this, the men proceeded to make themselves merry.  And right\nmerry they seemed to be.  As Ian passed his glass as often as any of\nthem, though he managed to spill it, instead of drinking it, they\npatted him on the shoulder, and told him he would make a splendid\nsoldier.  The lad volunteered a song, and was rapturously encored.\nThen he kept up the delusion by talking nonsense.\n\nPresently he pretended to tumble off his chair.\n\nMy grandfather now began to snore aloud.\n\n\"He's safe enough, anyhow,\" said the sergeant.  \"So, lads, another\ntoast.\"\n\nBy one o'clock the fun grew fast and furious, and presently in came\nEllen.\n\n\"Now, soldiers, it's bed-time.\"\n\n\"No, no, no.\"\n\n\"Father will give you no more to-night.  Pay, and go to bed.\"\n\n\"We'll sit here till morning dawns, my beautiful, winsome,\ncharming----\"\n\nEllen cut short the oration in true Highland fashion, by a sounding\nslap across the speaker's cheek.\n\n\"Ye'll sit in the dark, then,\" she cried, and out went the candle.\n\nNow was Ian's chance.  In the confusion that followed, he made his\nway to the door, and by two o'clock was safe and sound once more in\nthe cave.\n\nDash was delighted, and, the fire being replenished, both had supper,\nand then went to sleep together on the heather couch.\n\nWhen he awoke next morning, Ian could hardly believe for a time that\nhis adventure had been aught else save a troubled dream.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI.\n\n  SWORN TO SHOOT AT SIGHT--AN ADVENTURE ON THE\n  ROAD--\"PLEASE, Sir, ARE YOU THE COLONEL?\"--\"WE'LL\n  CALL YOU JOHN.\"\n\nWhen the faithful little gillie returned to the cave that night, he\nbrought with him a kindly letter of advice from the dominie.  He had\nseen the soldiers that very forenoon, and so incensed were they, that\nthey had sworn to shoot my grandfather on sight, without further\nparley.  And there was no doubt they meant to carry this awful threat\ninto execution.\n\n\"Now, dear boy,\" the latter continued, \"I advise you to make an\nattempt to leave the place as soon as possible.  By day will be\nsafest, for then the soldiers are there in the forest.  At night they\nkeep watch around the houses.  If you get safely to Inverness, go to\nsee a man of law called John Chisholm.  Take this letter with you,\nand he'll receive you kindly, and tell you what is best for you to\ndo.\"\n\n\"My daughter Rachel encloses a little note for you.  So sorry that\nneither of us can see you, but it would not be safe.  Good-bye, and\nthe Lord be with you.\"\n\nNext day the gillie came at eleven o'clock.\n\n\"The soldiers,\" he said, \"are scouring the forest.  Now will be your\nchance.\"\n\nA short time after this Ian entered his father's house and took a\nhurried farewell of all.  A most affecting farewell it was, and many\nwere the tears that were shed.\n\nEven poor Dash knew that the parting had come, and sadly woe-begone\nhe looked.\n\n\"Be kind to dear Dash, sister,\" were among the last words the lad\nsaid.\n\nThen he hurried away from the home which it would be many and many a\nlong year before he should see again--if ever.\n\nRachel's note was to my grandfather a very precious one, though\nsimple:\n\n\n\"DEAR IAN,--Fly quickly, O, fly.  They will shoot you dead if you\ndon't.  With fond love and prayers I send you a four-bladed clover.\n\n\"But, dear Ian, trust more in God than even the four-bladed\nclover.--Your little RACHEL.  Amen! so let it be.\"\n\n\nMy grandfather put the letter in his bosom and hurried on.\n\nAt Beauly he was well known, but not a soul would have thought of\ngiving him away.\n\nHe went in to thank Ellen for assisting him to escape, and stayed and\nchatted quite a long time.\n\nSo safe did he feel, that he must even visit the little old fisherman\non the border of the bay, and bid him and his daughter a long\nfarewell.\n\nA little farther on he overtook three Forty-second soldiers.  He\nwould have darted into the woods, but he sighted them all at once on\nrounding the bend of the road, and one happening to look round\nsighted him.\n\nWith country courtesy, they waited till he came up, and his heart\nbeat high and uneasily as he joined them.\n\nWould they recognise him and make him prisoner?  That was the thought\nuppermost in his mind.  But his fears were for a time set to rest,\ntill one of them began to laugh.\n\n\"Can't help thinking how neatly Sergeant McGregor was done,\" he said\nin Gaelic.\n\nThen the others laughed, and one turning round to Ian said, \"Do you\ncome from Beauly?\"\n\n\"From far beyond,\" replied grandfather evasively.  \"But,\" he added,\n\"I didn't stop long enough to get any news.\"\n\n\"Ah, well, you know, the sergeant and a file were after a deserter,\nnot much older, maybe, than yourself.\"\n\nMy grandfather felt his colour come and go, while his heart thumped\nwildly against his ribs.\n\n\"Why,\" cried another soldier, \"by all descriptions, this young fellow\nwould pass for the deserter.\"\n\nThen all laughed, and Ian laughed too, as if he enjoyed the joke\nimmensely.  But he found courage to say--and he spoke the truth when\nhe said it--\n\n\"I've never been a soldier yet, but if I were I should stick to my\ncolours.\"\n\n\"Good, my boy, good, and it's a soldier you ought to be.\"\n\nMy grandfather knew now the crisis had passed, so he said to the\nfirst speaker:\n\n\"Tell me the story, soldier.\"\n\n\"O, McGregor of ours and his men had been watching the woods for,\nmaybe, a month.  But they collared their man at last and led him down\nto the Charlie Stuart Inn, at Beauly, and so they all marched inside.\nWell, the deserter was just rolling in money that his father had\ngiven him, for they do say he is a near connection of the Lovat\nfamily.  So he ordered a splendid supper, and he made all the three\nof them so full with one thing or another, that before two in the\nmorning they went comfortably to bed beneath the table.\n\n\"Then,\" continued the soldier, \"the young rascal of a deserter coolly\nblackened all their faces till you couldn't have told them from\nnegroes, rammed their muskets up the chimney, with their butt-ends\nstuck in the fire.\"\n\n\"Didn't they go off?\" said Ian.\n\n\"I tell you they were all asleep under the table.\"\n\n\"But the guns, I mean.\"\n\n\"Well, I suppose they did after a bit, but they didn't waken the men.\"\n\n\"And the deserter went off, of course?\"\n\n\"Yes, and he's safe in the woods now.\"\n\n\"Is he, indeed?\" said grandfather, hardly able to suppress a smile.\n\n\"It will never be let down on McGregor,\" added the soldier.  \"It was\nthe girl Ellen who waked them next morning, and when they looked at\neach other and found they were all black men, I--I--ha, ha, ha, I\nwould have given worlds to have seen the fun.\"\n\nAnd talking thus cheerfully they reached Inverness, but my\ngrandfather was not at all sorry when at last they bade him good-bye\nand went off.\n\n* * * * *\n\nJohn Chisholm was a florid-faced, white-haired, very fat man.\n\nBut good-hearted, and reputed the cleverest lawyer in the capital of\nthe Highlands.\n\nHe bade my sixteen-year-old grandfather be seated.\n\nThen he mounted a pair of horn-rimmed spectacles and quietly perused\nthe dominie's letter.\n\nAfter this he looked at my grandfather over his glasses and said:\n\n\"Humph!\"\n\nWell, that expression \"Humph!\" isn't even here or there.\n\n\"I assure you, my boy, I'm a sort of sorry for you.  You have been\ncompletely sold, or rather bought, and there is only one thing I can\nadvise.\"\n\n\"Yes, sir?\"\n\n\"Are you averse to becoming a soldier?\"\n\n\"O, no, indeed, sir; I think I'd rather like going to the wars.\n\n\"But,\" he added manfully, \"I'd rather be shot than fight under my\nrebel-cousin, Fraser.\"\n\n\"Bravo!  Well, go and be shot like a good boy.\"\n\n\"I'm afraid I don't quite understand, sir.\"\n\n\"Don't you?  Why, go straight away to Fort George, where there is a\nrecruiting-squad of that grand old regiment, the 1st Royals,\nstationed, and enlist.  Nothing can be more simple.\"\n\nMy grandfather thanked him profusely, and took his leave.\n\nThat night he slept in his old bed beneath Mr. Craig's counter.  Mr.\nCraig, his wife, and the cat were all delighted to see him, and gave\nhim quite a hearty welcome, and when they parted next day, the old\nlady took what she called an eternal leave of him.\n\n\"We'll never see you more, poor boy,\" she said.\n\nAnd she never did.\n\nThe recruiting-sergeant of the 1st Royals was a most dignified and\ndashing soldier, with a long powdered cue dangling over the upper\npart of his spine, and covering his scarlet jacket with a layer of\nsnow-white dust.  He was in the square when my grandfather entered\nthe gloomy portals of this renowned fort, and was pointed out to him\nby a sentry.\n\n\"That is the sergeant with all the ribbons a-fluttering from his cap.\"\n\nIan approached somewhat timidly.\n\nHe saluted, and being the first military salute ever he had made, I\ndare say it was rather an awkward one.\n\n\"Well, my man, what can I do for you?\" said the gallant\nnon-commissioned officer, bending as far as his high stock would\npermit him to do.\n\n\"Please, sir, are you the colonel?\"\n\nThe sergeant laughed, and a smile rippled over the faces of a few men\nnear by.\n\n\"No, lad, I'm only a general.  The colonel has had a shave, and gone\nto bed for fear of catching cold after it.  Perhaps I can do for the\ntime being.  What is your business?\"\n\n\"I've come to enlist, if you please.\"\n\n\"Enlist!  Why you do the grand old regiment an honour which it will\nnot soon forget.  But come along, lad; I must, have my little joke.\nFollow me, and I'll make a man of you before you are five minutes\nolder.\"\n\nHe led the way in through a narrow passage, and my grandfather soon\nfound himself in a long narrow room, with a ceiling so low that he\ncould have touched it.  There were a table, some forms, and a chair\nin it, and at the former the smart sergeant sat down, and pulled\ntowards him some official-looking paper, an ink-bottle, and a huge\nquill pen.\n\n\"Now, then, I want to know something about you.\"\n\n\"Well, sir, my father--\n\n\"O, come, come, I don't want you to go back to Noah altogether.  Give\nme your name, age, &c., place of birth, and everything else.\"\n\nMy grandfather did so.  The sergeant wrote all down.  Then he shoved\na shilling across the table.\n\n\"I beg your pardon, sir, but I don't think I should take that.\"\n\n\"Not take the King's money?\"\n\n\"No, sir; I got the King's shilling before, and Dash and I threw it\ninto the sea.\"\n\nThe sergeant dropped his quill pen as suddenly as if he had been shot.\n\n\"What!\" he cried, \"you've enlisted before?\"\n\n\"It was not enlistment, sir, it was fraud; my lawyer, Mr. Chisholm,\ntold me so.\"\n\n\"Come,\" said the sergeant, \"this gets interesting.  A boy who has a\nlawyer should be an ensign to begin with, to say the least of it.\nTell me all about it, boy.\"\n\nThen he got the whole story, and laughed heartily at it.\n\n\"You'll take this shilling, nevertheless, my boy, and I've no doubt\nyou'll pass the doctors all right.  But,\" he added, \"as you seem to\nhave some qualms of conscience--a very awkward possession for a\nsoldier to begin life on--here is another shilling out of my own\npurse, to send back in a letter to your pretty cousin, whose nose I'd\ndearly like to pull.\n\n\"You may write to him here, and I'll sign it.\n\n\"Tell him you return his coin, and that his kilted warriors needn't\nknock about the damp woods any longer looking for you, as you now\nbelong to the oldest regiment in Britain, and the finest that ever\ncrossed bayonets with a warlike foe.\"\n\nIan did as he was told.\n\n\"How beautifully you write, boy!\" the sergeant said, as he peeped\nover his shoulder.  \"It's my opinion you'll soon be an orderly.\"\n\nMy grandfather smiled, though he had not the faintest notion what was\nmeant by an orderly.\n\n\"My mother always thought me very orderly, sir.\"\n\nAgain the facetious sergeant laughed.\n\n\"Well, now,\" he said, \"I'll put you in charge of a soldier who will\nsee you all right, and put you up to getting your kit and everything\nelse.\n\n\"But one thing I must tell you, and I would tell you a good many if I\nhad time.  You must always do your duty briskly, heartily, and\npleasantly, and be obedient to orders.  We've all got to do that,\nlad.  You will only be a small cog in a mighty great wheel.  That\nwheel is the British Army, that rolls round the world and crushes\neverything that dares to oppose it.\n\n\"Your name is Ian?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\"\n\n\"And the English is 'John.'  Keep the Ian till you go back home\nagain--if ever you do.  We'll call you John.  And now, my brave lad,\nI shake hands with\n\n  \"PRIVATE JOHN ROBERTSON, OF THE 1ST ROYALS.\"\n\n\n\n\n\nBook II.\n\nOff to Join his Regiment\n\n\n\nBook II\n\n_OFF TO JOIN HIS REGIMENT_\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I.\n\n  FIRST MONTHS OF SOLDIER-LIFE--THE PLEASURE OF DRILL--A\n  PASSAGE OF ARMS--EN ROUTE FOR EDINBURGH CASTLE--AN\n  OLD-TIME TROOPER.\n\nPrivate John Robertson had been for three whole months in Fort\nGeorge, and drilling every day.  Yes, those were stirring times, and\nsoldiers were so valuable that they had, figuratively speaking, to be\nmade by machinery.\n\nNobody likes to be drilled for the first time, or to form part in the\nawkward squad of \"Jockie Raws\" as they used to be called.\n\nI think that from the very first my grandfather considered himself\nbetter in every way than the lads he was drilled with.  Well, there\nis no harm, but quite the reverse, I think, in a young man having a\ngood opinion of himself.  But these companions of his were young\nfellows who had been shepherds, plough-boys, or mechanics, and few of\nthem had very much English to bless themselves with, although I\ngrieve to say they soon learned bad words.\n\n\"You would make good men when trained,\" the drill-sergeant said,\n\"but,\" he added, \"you are far from a pretty picture just at present.\"\n\nWell, they were of all shapes and sizes, and they wouldn't \"dress.\"\nThey kept their thumbs to the seams of their trousers, and their\nheads in the air, but when told to dress* they sidled about like\ncrabs, and their eyes went squinting right and left in the most\ncomical way imaginable.\n\n\n* Dress: form in a straight line.\n\n\nOne would have pitied that smart sergeant.\n\nAt times his brows were lowered till you could hardly have seen an\neye in his head.  At times he beat his legs with his cane.\n\n\"Oh! oh! oh! what _are_ you doing?\" he would cry.  \"Take the time\nfrom me.  McLeod, you are out of step.  Donaldson, you dunce, you\nought to be shot.\"\n\nThere was a captain here who used to watch Sergeant Brown drilling\nhis awkward squad, and much amused he seemed to be.  But he was even\nmore irascible than Brown.  For instance, there were times not a few\nwhen, losing his patience altogether, the sergeant would advance a\nfew steps towards his \"Jockie Raws,\" and switch one across the face\nwith his gloves.\n\nThen forward Captain Drake would dash.\n\n\"Don't soil your gloves, Sergeant,\" he would shout.  \"Don't even lose\nyour temper; I never lose mine at all, at all.\"\n\nBut next moment he would dash his fist straight out at the man whom\nthe sergeant had flicked, and no matter how big he was, down he\nrolled, and took up ground on his back in the square.\n\nYes, Captain Drake had a beautiful fist, and those were rough times\nfor recruits and soldiers generally.\n\n* * * * *\n\nThe words I am now going to write are purposely put parenthetically,\nso that if they look too like a little bit of preaching they can be\nskipped.  There is an old saying then: _poeta nascitur non fit_.  The\npoet is born not made.  This is certainly true.  But we hear often\nenough the same thing said about the soldier.  \"Some men are soldiers\nborn.\"  This is not so true.  Anyhow, depend upon it that, given the\nraw material, a good soldier or a bad can be made out of it.  A\nsoldier can be made or marred.  Some who read this book will\nthemselves become officers in the army.  I pray them, therefore,\nnever to forget that _good soldiers are made by kindness and\nencouragement, and marred by rough treatment_.  Find out the good\nthat is in a man.  Fan that.\n\nWhether my dear Auld-da was a good soldier or an indifferent, his\nstory will tell; and tell, too, I have family pride enough to\nbelieve, in his favour.\n\nIn those wild and warlike times it was most difficult, be assured,\nfor a young fellow to rise from the ranks, and having so risen, to\nkeep on and on through good report and ill report, and never be\nbroken.\n\nBut I am of opinion that it was the words of kindness and\nencouragement he received that first helped this soldier-grandfather\nof mine to step out of the ranks and prove himself worthy of the\ntrust and confidence of his superiors.\n\nAnd just one last word: just as often as not those very superiors\nwere far indeed from being patterns themselves.\n\n* * * * *\n\nI am sure that my grandfather was very proud indeed when he first\nhandled a musket.  I know this from experience, having myself been a\nfull private in the Volunteers when I was in my teens.  But when one\ngets one's rifle and learns how to handle it--unloaded I mean--the\nvery exactness and detail of the motions are delightful.  Then comes\ncompany-drill, which seems to a beginner as senseless as the first\nsteps we learn at a dancing-school.  But battalion-drill stirs the\nblood, methinks, especially if you have a few miles' march to the\nfield of parade, with plenty of room for man\u0153uvres.  And what can\nbe more jolly than skirmishing in an open country?  Nothing in the\nform of exercise is more exhilarating, whether it takes place when\nthe summer sun is glistening on the greenery of the woods, or in\nwinter when the crisp dry snow covers all the land as if with a white\ncocoon.  Why, the very trumpet or bugle calls inspire you, and if you\nare blessed with a good imagination you can easily believe you are\nengaged in actual warfare, instead of only playing at being soldiers.\n\nBut the prettiest exercise of all, in my opinion, is that with the\nbayonet.  It has to be seen or experienced to be believed in.\n\nWell, my grand-dad, of course, went through all these; yes, and he\nand his companions in arms were kept very hard at it too.  It was no\nchild's play learning to be a soldier in the latter end of the\neighteenth century.  Pretty early to bed and precious early to rise,\ndrill, drill, drill all day long in summer's sun or winter's snow,\nand with about a score of masters--more or less--to serve, Tommy\nAtkins's life was then no sinecure.\n\nAlthough my grandfather often used to say in after-days that with his\ngood sword he could shiver spear or pike, and bend or break an\nenemy's bayonet off his gun, still he took very much to\nbayonet-exercise at first, and delighted the heart of his\ndrill-sergeant.\n\nEven at this early age, in a passage of arms at the New Year's fete,\nthe lad quite distinguished himself by his skill and agility.  And\nhis instructor was a proud man accordingly.  But his pupil had the\nhigh honour of being called to a box occupied by ladies of title and\nrank, and literally caressed by them.  I dare say he felt a trifle\nshy, especially when such remarks as the following were made in his\npresence, and while he was being turned round and round for\ninspection.\n\n\"Doesn't he look a perfect picture, Lady Jane?\"\n\n\"A love of a lad!\"\n\n\"And a perfect angel with the bayonet!\"\n\n\"Look at his dainty cue!\"  The lady lifted it on her closed fan as\nshe spoke.\n\n\"And cheeks like raspberries!\"\n\n\"Heigho!\" sighed a stout old lady, in a comfortable chair, \"if I were\nonly a hundred years younger I'd be a soldier myself.\"\n\n\"I dare say you have a dainty little dear of a sweetheart, haven't\nyou?\" asked a lady.\n\nMy sixteen-year-old grandfather dropped his eyes.\n\n\"Yes, did you say?  And what is her pretty name?\"\n\n\"Rachel.\"\n\n\"How sweet!  And now we'll let you go.\"\n\nHe saluted and left.\n\n\"Bless the little innocent!\" were the last words that he heard.\n\n\"Find it rather hot up there, Robertson?\" said the captain who used\nto knock the recruits down.\n\n\"Just a little, sir.\"\n\n\"Ha, ha, good thing ladies don't often mix with our soldiers.  Blame\nme if pretty Lady Jane yonder wouldn't spoil a whole battalion.\n\n\"By the way, young cockalorum,\" he added, \"would you like to be a\nmess servant or my servant.  You'd have less to do.  Speak out.\nNobody wants to force you.\"\n\n\"Then, sir, I'd rather stick to ordinary duty.\"\n\n\"Quite right, my lad.  Quite right.  Well, look here, you play so\nprettily with the bayonet that I think it would do you good to learn\nsword-exercise.  I'll send for you sometimes, and give you a lesson.\nSo shall Sergeant-Major Rae after we get down to Edinburgh.  He is\nnearly as good as myself with the broadsword.\"\n\nThis on the whole had been a very happy day for grand-dad, and when\nhe turned in that night, he thought everyone had been so kind to him,\nespecially Captain Drake.*  He made a firmer determination than ever,\ntherefore, to stick hard to drill, and just learn all he could, and,\nas his sergeant said, look upon himself as still merely a schoolboy.\n\n\n* For obvious reasons names of officers who figure in this story must\nbe fictitious.\n\n\nSome of the recruits had got to be wild and reckless even already.\nThey were rather encouraged than otherwise by the older soldiers.\n\nSwearing, I am sorry to say, or the use of very ugly language, was\nall too prevalent in the British Army in those days.  So was\ndrinking.  But apart from the use of expletives, the privates were in\nthe habit of passing very rude remarks, indeed, about their officers\nand superiors generally.  It is conduct of this kind that often leads\nto mutiny in regiments, but in the old war-times the officers were\noften much to blame for such a state of affairs.\n\nThere were many happenings, too, that would scarcely be permitted in\nour time.\n\nOne day, as my grandfather was doing sentry-go by a gate near the\nsquare, he noticed Captain Drake coming from the direction of the\nofficers' mess, and a couple of unarmed privates, under the charge of\na sergeant, marching from the men's side of the square.\n\nThey took up a position within hearing distance of my grand-dad, and\nCaptain Drake, note-book in hand, confronted him.\n\n\"Been at it again, Sergeant?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir, and I've warned them ever so many times, but they will\nkeep on argle-bargling.\"\n\n\"Any insubordination?  They keep quiet when you speak to them?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir, and 'no' to your first question.  Only to-day McGruer\nthrew a spoon at Pope's head.\"\n\n\"Hit him?\"\n\n\"Yes, Captain Drake; you can see the mark on the bridge of Pope's\nnose now.\"\n\n\"The Pope's nose, eh?  Ha, ha.  Well, did Pope throw anything back?\"\n\n\"The salt-cellar, sir.  Missed McGruer and brought up on big\nPlayfair's head.  Big Playfair went for Pope, and there was five\nminutes of a rough room, sir.\"\n\n\"Well, Playfair can't be blamed.  This isn't a case for the halberts,\nSergeant.  The men shall punish each other.\"\n\n\"You shall fight, men, and fight fairly, and after this there must be\npeace, and I'll flog the man who breaks it.  Nine o'clock to-morrow,\nSergeant.\"\n\nCaptain Drake turned on his heel and marched off.\n\nAt nine o'clock next morning, sure enough, the two men, stripped to\nthe waist, stood confronting each other in fighting attitude.\n\nAll the junior officers, were present, and one or two of the seniors.\n\nAt a given signal the men commenced.  It was an ugly scene, as all\nsuch are.  Many rounds were fought, and much blood was spilt, to the\ndelight of the spectators, but at last McGruer was knocked out of\ntime.  Presently the men shook hands, and I am bound to record that\npeace was maintained between them ever after.\n\n* * * * *\n\nThe company got the route at last, and on a cold, blustering morning\nin December were marched to Inverness, and embarked the same evening\non board the packet for Leith.\n\nThe packet was a full-rigged ship.  She carried a few guns--more, I\nthink, for show than defence, for the vessel was a mere tub.  She had\nseen better days, no doubt, and though little over seven hundred\ntons, was reputed to have fought more than one battle against the\nFrench or Dutch--it does not matter which, for grandfather himself\ndid not know.\n\nWe live in comparatively comfortable times, for the voyage from\nEdinburgh to the beautiful capital of the Highlands can be easily\naccomplished by steamer in a day.  And now we shall learn something\nabout this short voyage as accomplished in an old trooper.\n\nAbout fifty soldiers in all, probably more, were crowded down below\nforward, although they had the option of sleeping on deck near the\nfo'c's'le, if they chose.  The officers, including Captain Drake\nhimself, were, of course, aft in the saloon, and had state-rooms such\nas they were.\n\nBut the upper-deck, all between the fore and mizen masts, was crowded\nwith sheep, cattle, and a few horses.  A kind of rude bridge ran\nathwart-ships just abaft the main-mast.  It was little more, indeed,\nthan a plank, easily unshipped, from which the officer of the watch\ncould abuse the sailors who were working the ship.\n\n\"Hee--hoy--oy!  Yo--yea--ea!\"\n\nIt was the sing-song of the men setting or shifting sail, as the good\nship _Vengeful_ got stretching out into the Moray Firth, and began to\nfeel the force of the cold, wild wind that blew from north and east.\n\nNote that I have said \"good ship _Vengeful_.\"  In many respects she\nwas far, indeed, from being a good or a safe ship, so it is out of\ncourtesy to the old craft that I call her so.  I cannot help,\nsomehow, always looking upon a ship as a living thing.  Well, many a\nstorm had this ship braved, many an adventure had she taken part in.\nFrom her lofty sides she had poured a hail of fire and shot that\nscattered death and destruction along the decks of our saucy foes.\nShe had done her duty, and should I despise her in her old age?  No.\nAnd once more I dare to call her good.\n\nWell, she sailed away, and as the short winter's day drew near its\nclose, she was still staggering on up the Firth, but well to the\nnorth, with Kinnaird's Head so far distant that there was little\nprobability of her rounding the point for a day or two to come.\n\nMy hero had never been to sea before, and had he lived for over a\nhundred years, it is unlikely that he could have forgotten that first\nrough night.\n\nThere was little pleasure aft even in the saloon.  A few gathered\nround the table, and pretended to enjoy dinner with the ship's\nofficers, but all save Captain Drake himself, who was an old sailor,\nretired at the earliest opportunity.\n\nThe saloon was deserted now, save by the skipper himself and the\nship's cat.  And the great lamp swung in its gimbals, the\nrudder-chains creaked, the ship's timbers groaned, and every time a\nbig sea struck her on the bows, she shook for minutes after like some\ncreature in the agonies of death.\n\nThe mate came below in a sou'-wester and dripping oilskins, and stood\nin the doorway for a moment with a smile on his rosy face.\n\n\"All alone, sir?\"\n\n\"All alone, mate.  Soldiers have turned in.\"\n\n\"Best thing they could do, sir.\"\n\n\"Think it's going to be a dirty night, then?\"\n\n\"Sure of it.  Later on, you know.  Fact is, sir, it is a blowing half\na gale now, and increasing every hour.\"\n\nAs he spoke, the first officer opened a cupboard, and helped himself\nand his superior to something in tumblers that looked like coffee,\nbut wasn't.\n\nThen he sat down on the edge of a chair.  Sitting on the edge of a\nchair was looked upon as partaking of deference to a superior, in\nthose days.\n\n\"Bring yourself properly to anchor, mate,\" said the captain cheerily.\n\nThen the first officer drew his chair up to the table, and both lit\ntheir pipes.\n\n\"Second mate's watch, I think?\"\n\n\"Yes, just relieved me.  I'll go on again at midnight, sir, 'cause I\nexpect it'll be a case of batten down.\"\n\n\"And those Swedes (soldiers), sir.  Why, I pity them more'n the cows.\nMostly all on deck at present, and wet to the skin.  What they'll do\nwhen I batten them down is more 'n I can tell.\"\n\nThe mate spoke nothing but the truth, and not all the truth.\n\nCome with me, in imagination, along this old-time trooper's decks,\nand we shall see a little of sea-life in the days of yore.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II.\n\n  THE VOYAGE OF THE \"VENGEFUL\"--TERRIBLE SUFFERINGS\n  AT SEA.\n\nAs we crawl up the companion steps that lead from the saloon door to\nthe upper-deck, and leave the companion, we are glad we are in the\npossession of good sea-legs.\n\nWe stand by the bulwark here a few minutes, clinging to the stays,\nuntil our eyes get more accustomed to the darkness.  Yonder, high\noverhead, is a morsel of a moon, and the dark, goblin-like clouds are\npositively racing across its disc.\n\nLook we seawards, and we find the horizon is almost close aboard of\nus, only the waves between tossing their white manes as they madly\ngallop past us.\n\nWhew--ew--ew!  How the wind whistles through the rigging, and across\nthe scanty canvas!\n\nWith uncertain steps we stagger forward.  Here is a very narrow\ngangway betwixt the weather bulwark and the lashed planks that hem or\npen the cattle in.  They are slipping, and sliding, and moaning low\nin their shivering misery.  We hold our lantern up for a moment, but\ntheir pleading eyes appal us, and we hurry on.\n\nNow and then, a bigger wave than usual sends the drenching death-cold\nspray high above us, and we are fain to cower beneath the bulwarks.\nBut we are past the cattle-pens at last, and, but for our lantern,\nwould stumble over not one man, but many.  All young--several, among\nwhom is my grandfather, only boys.  He is lying there near the\nbowsprit, and quite exposed to the elements, his head pillowed on a\ncoil of ropes, but, like most of the others, fast asleep.\n\nWhy do they not go below, where they may at least be dry and warm?\n\nWarm!  Yes; but I doubt the dryness.  Come below and see.\n\nThe broad steps are black and slippery, the forehold has a cook's\nrange in it.  This is forward.  Hammocks all filled, and a bobbing\nlantern hung more aft.  The deck is so low that we clutch the beams\noverhead to balance ourselves as we examine this floating black hole.\nAll round underneath the hammocks, on lockers, on boxes, on the wet\nand fulsome deck itself, lie soldiers in every attitude of\nprostration.  Only a few are sitting up.  Of these, some are uttering\nmaudlin sentiments, or waving their arms and singing songs we should\nnot hear, while others are playing cards in the uncertain light.  But\none or two--strange sight in such a place--are kneeling down in\nprayer.\n\nWe cannot stay long down here.  The odour would make us sick, sailors\nthough we be.  We cannot wonder now that the other recruits prefer\nthe cold, the darkness, and spray on deck.\n\nBut listen!  The storm rages now more wildly than ever, and we can\nhear the bo's'n's pipe, \"All hands shorten sail!\"\n\nThis is the order, and men spring from their hammocks and, hardly\nwaiting to dress, rush roughly past us.\n\nNow, all is noise and confusion.\n\nAs long as she can, the _Vengeful_ must continue tacking.  To lie-to\nmight mean drifting on a lee shore, and no soul could be saved if the\ngood ship once beat her sides against the dark rocks.\n\nAn hour passes by.  There is no abatement in the terrible gale.\n\nThe men are working at the pumps, cheering each other as they do so\nwith snatches of wild song and a merriment that seems sadly out of\nplace.  Quite a mill-stream of dark water is rushing over the side,\nand the jerk, jerk of the pumps can be heard high above the roar of\nthe storm, beating a kind of harsh accompaniment to the men's rough\nmusic.\n\nNo leak is sprung, yet so fast does she make water that the men are\nkept steadily at the pumps.\n\nAnd now comes the order to batten down.\n\n\"Rouse up, you lads!  Rouse up and tumble down below.  Quick's the\nword.\"\n\nMy poor grandfather feels a foot in his ribs, and, hardly knowing\nwhere he is, staggers up, and is almost carried below in the rush.\n\nLuckily we are not down there now.  The hold of a slave-ship were\nsurely sweeter far.  And there imprisoned they must remain.  If\ndaylight brings a lull in this storm the hatches will be thrown open,\nif the ship founders down they must go--drowned or smothered--like\nrats in a hole.\n\nAnd surely this is what it is coming to.\n\nFor, hark! again the bo's'n's pipe.\n\nWe strain our ears to catch the order.\n\n\"Hands lighten ship!\"\n\nYes, the cattle and sheep are to be thrown overboard into the boiling\nsea, else the ship will sink.\n\nO, the pity of it!  and O, the cruelty and terror!\n\nThe poor sheep mute, as they always are, in the agonies of death, are\nspeedily disposed of.\n\nThen comes the worst and saddest sight of all, as the struggling,\nmaddened, and bellowing cattle are hoisted with block and tackle, and\ndropped into the sea.\n\nBut this is slow work, and danger presses.  A gangway is opened at\ngreat risk in the bulwarks, and the remainder of the poor beasts\nliterally slide off the decks, and for minutes you may hear their\nbellowing far astern, amidst the wash and the dash of the billows.\n\n* * * * *\n\nThen the ship plunges on, and the men resume their work at the pumps:\nand resume their songs.\n\nDaylight breaks at last.  Very slowly, but as it spreads over the sea\nfrom east to west, the terrible turmoil of that awful sea is\nawe-striking.  The waves indeed seem mountains high, and tower green\nand threatening over the ship as if bent upon engulfing her.\n\nThe hatches are thrown open later on, and the poor, half-dead\nsoldiers permitted to breathe once more the breath of heaven, and see\nthe light of day.\n\nTruly it has been a fearful night.  Nor has it passed without loss of\nlife, for one poor sailor has \"lost the number of his mess,\" as\nseamen say.  He got entangled among the cattle, and was literally\nrushed overboard with the poor beasts that had been doomed to death.\n\nThe storm lulls in a few hours now, and though the darkling land is\nseen miles to the south, and the wind is still unfavourable, all\ndanger is over for the time.\n\nFive days after this, having encountered head winds, and gale upon\ngale all the way, the _Vengeful_ sails up the Firth of Forth and\nanchors off Leith.\n\nPerhaps never were soldiers more glad to get on shore than those poor\nsea-beaten \"Jockie Raws\" are, my grandfather included.\n\nBut soon, safe in Edinburgh Castle, their sorrows are all forgotten,\nand they are once more the careless, happy-go-lucky young soldiers,\njust the sort of boys that were needed to fight for their King and\ncountry in the brave days of old.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III.\n\n  LIFE AT THE CASTLE--A DANCE ON THE DINNER-TABLE--HOW\n  A QUARREL WAS SETTLED--A DROLL DUEL AND\n  THE ENDING THEREOF.\n\nIf anything could inspire an enthusiastic young soldier like my\ngrandfather with warlike ardour, it was residence in such a romantic\nand mighty castle as that of Edinburgh.  Its history is one of the\ngreatest and grandest that has ever been penned, and its associations\nfull of romance.\n\nHis friend, Captain Drake, lent him books about it, and these,\nboy-like, he gloated over.  They did him good in more ways than one,\nas books and papers invariably do the soldier who cares to read, for\nthey kept him away from the temptations that are inseparable from\nevery large town or city.\n\nBut even a private soldier can choose his companions, though, in\nbarracks or out of barracks, this is sometimes hard to do.\n\nGrandfather John, however, was fond of walking about by himself.  He\ncould not be called quite alone, however, if he had a book and his\nown thoughts.  So he would climb the lofty hills on the Salisbury\nCrags, and when tired of gazing at the lovely scenery, set himself to\nread or think.  Oftentimes, even when reading, his thoughts would\nwander home to the bonnie Braes of R---- and his old school life, and\nhis droll adventures would rise up before his mind's eye, as well as\nthat cosy fireside in his father's house, by which he used to spend\nthe long forenights of winter.\n\nLetters were dear to send in those days; they were dear indeed when\nreceived--dear to the heart, I mean.  The boy used to save up for the\npostage, and this would take him, as a rule, a fortnight at the very\nleast.\n\nHe still kept Rachel's little letter and four-bladed clover.  Indeed,\nhe had invested in a little case for it, and wore it around his neck\nas an amulet on a ribbon of blue.\n\nSentimental was he?  Well, perhaps; but I for one like a lad none the\nless for that.\n\nCaptain Drake and the drill-sergeant continued to be very good\nfriends to John.\n\nUnder pretence of giving him some writing to do, such as copying\nletters, the captain frequently took the lad to his rooms, and after\nthe work was done he would talk to him, and tell him strange, wild\nstories of the life he had led, and of the countries in which he had\nserved.\n\nI have no means of knowing whether these stories were true or merely\nfiction, or part of both; however, they served their turn, and amused\nthe reciter as well as the listener.\n\nI do not think that my grandfather's musical abilities were ever of a\nvery high order.  In fact, like the illustrious Duke of Wellington,\nhe pretended to despise music.  I think it was His Grace who used to\nsay that of all sounds music was the least disagreeable.\n\nBut when I was a bit of a boy, Auld-da often used to get me to sing\nfor him.\n\nHe was an adept at dancing, however, not only Highland reels and\nflings, but hornpipes, and it soon was admitted that no lad in the\nwhole castle was more nimble among the feet than he.\n\nHornpipes are hardly known nowadays, but they were in great repute,\nboth on sea and land, in those old war times.\n\nCaptain Drake saw the lad dancing one day, and was rather taken aback.\n\nNow although I do not think that betting, or wagering as it was\ncalled, had grown up into a national sin and science during the\nNapoleonic wars, still many a strange bet was made.\n\nOne evening, for example, at mess, someone said something about\ndancing.  I rather think it was Dr. McLeod--a stalwart junior surgeon\nwho stood six feet in his stocking-soles, and was well built besides.\nIn those same stocking-soles McLeod often treated his messmates to\nthe Highland fling or sword-dance after dinner.\n\nOn the evening in question the swords he danced across, to the music\nof the bagpipes, were almost as sharp as razors.\n\n\"Well, McLeod,\" said Drake, \"that is very clever, but I am willing to\nwager a week's pay I can find a private in my company who can beat\nyour performance, and not cut his feet either.\"\n\nThe wager was taken at once by Major Lloyd.  \"But what is the dance\nto be?\" he asked.\n\n\"Well, he shall dance a ranting hornpipe on the dinner-table, without\nbreaking either a plate or a bottle.\"\n\nThere was a chorus of laughter.  The thing was deemed an\nimpossibility.\n\nThe wager was accepted after this by three or four officers.\n\nNext afternoon Captain Drake had an interview with my grand-dad, and\ntold him what had happened.\n\n\"Now, lad,\" he said, \"my honour is in your hands, or rather feet.\nCan you do it?\"\n\nMy bold young progenitor's face glowed with excitement, and his eyes\nsparkled merrily.\n\n\"Yes, Captain Drake.  Yes,\" he cried, \"and be so happy to please you.\"\n\nThe music was to be the fife, then a great favourite in the service,\nand after dinner the performers came in.\n\nThe cloth was not even removed, and the long, strong table was\ncrowded with plates, dishes, and bottles.\n\nMy brave little grand-dad was not daunted by this fragile array.  He\nhad been provided with a pair of dancing-pumps.  He bowed to the\ncompany, as the fifer struck up, and at the end of the first measure\nsprang from floor to table as lightly as an indiarubber ball.\n\nNot a step that he did not dance, and there were eleven, and not a\nportion of the table that he did not traverse to the mad, merry lilt\nof the fife.  Yet never an article was broken or even touched.\n\nThe continued laughter ended, just as the hornpipe was finished, in\none wild burst of applause, which seemed to shake the very castle\nwalls.\n\nBig McLeod was a droll fellow, and a very great favourite with the\nofficers.\n\n\"I'm beaten, and we're all beaten.  Bravo! little man.  If you can\nfight as well as you can dance, what a rare soldier you'll make.\nHurrah!  Play up again, fifer!\"\n\nAnd this bold, gay surgeon flung my ancestor on his brawny shoulders,\nand went capering round the room with him, singing an old Irish ditty\nto the old Irish music:\n\n  \"'T was then, my boys, the merry pipes\n    Struck up a lilt so gaily O!\n  Och! 't was rare to see old Father Phipps\n    Beat time with his shill-ail-ee O!\n                  Fill-a-lill-laie,\n                    Liltie-laie,\n    Beat time with his shil-ail-ee O!\"\n\n* * * * *\n\nNext morning Captain Drake gave my youthful progenitor five\nshillings, but told him not to say a word to anybody.\n\nThe boy's eyes filled so suddenly with tears that the captain was\nsurprised.\n\n\"What! boy, you're not going to cry!\"\n\n\"Oh, no, sir--at least--only tears of joy, sir.  I'll be able to\nwrite home now.\"\n\nThe officers' mess at the castle was a large and somewhat mixed one.\nThe officers and men of various regiments lay here, and would for\nsome months to come.\n\nIt was a mixed one, and it was a merry one, but I cannot say that\npeace always reigned in the castle.\n\nThe officers had many ways of amusing themselves, both at home and in\nthe city.  The play was a favourite resort, but balls and parties\nwere frequent enough.\n\nNow, whether or not in those olden times men were braver than they\nare now, I am unable to say.  But one thing is pretty certain, life\nwas less valued, and among officers, and even civilians, quarrels\nthat in our day would be disposed of by a few words of explanation\nwere apt to lead to duels, that might or might not be fought to the\nbitter end, either with pistols or broadswords.\n\nI think that the worst kind of cowardice of any is that displayed by\nthe man who is afraid of being thought afraid.  And an individual of\nthis small moral calibre is apt to be touchy, and apt to take offence\nwhere none is meant.  I have met such people often enough.  I have\none in my mind's eye at this moment who belonged to the\nflagship--well, let me call her the _Dockemshort_.  A little fellow,\nand no great favourite in our mess.  He seemed to carry his eyes upon\nstalks, like the lobsters, and was always on the outlook for someone\nwho might attempt to hurt his dignity.\n\nIn our times we settle disputes by arbitration; in our grandfathers',\nor great-grandfathers' times, what was called honour was a far more\ntender article.\n\nWalter Scott makes two of his heroes who are about to fight address\neach other thus:\n\n  \"'Can nought but blood our feud atone?\n    Are there no means?'\n                  'No, stranger, none.'\"\n\n\nThere were two officers in this mess who seemed directly antithetic.\n\nOne was honest, gigantic McLeod, the surgeon.  He was good-natured\nand lovable, and hated duelling, or fire-eating, as he termed it.\n\nThe other was Lieutenant Blood--well-named, by the way.  A little\nfellow, and fiery.  He was, when in his cups, somewhat of a braggart,\nand would even boast of the number of times he had been out--not only\nwith his own countrymen, but with Frenchmen, Prussians, or Russians,\nor anyone who would oblige him.\n\nWell, at a ball, given in honour of something or of somebody, Blood\nbecame greatly incensed at McLeod for having danced too often with a\nbeautiful young lady that he--Blood--had cast eyes upon.\n\nMcLeod and she were talking together, in a green, quiet corner, when\nLieutenant Blood strutted boldly up.  He took no notice of McLeod,\nwho looked kingly in his uniform, and on whose arm the lady was at\nthat moment leaning.\n\n\"Pardon me, Miss Niven, but I believe the next dance is mine, and\nwith your fair hand.\"\n\n\"Not this time, Captain.  I have my partner here.\"\n\nMcLeod looked down; there was a smile in his eye.  Blood looked up;\nthere was mischief in his.\n\nNothing was said till next evening, when dessert was about half\nthrough.\n\n\"O, by the way, McLeod,\" cried the fire-eater suddenly, \"I consider\nyour conduct last night as simply abominable.\"\n\n\"Hullo!  Hullo!  Hullo!\"\n\nThis from his messmates.\n\n\"You absorbed the whole of Miss Niven's attention, and you did me out\nof several dances.\"\n\n\"But the lady liked it,\" said the surgeon, with a smile.\n\n\"I don't believe the statement, and I don't believe you.\"\n\nBlood snapped his fingers in the air.\n\n\"Pass the salt, Jones,\" said the surgeon quietly.  \"I'm going to\ncatch it.\"\n\nJones made some remark about putting salt on sparrows' tails, and\nBlood's eyes looked daggers.\n\n\"I--I--I--\" he began.\n\n\"Toot! toot!\" cried the doctor.  \"Don't get nervous, Blood, or I\nshall have to put you on the sick-list.\"\n\n\"Now, to tell you the truth,\" he continued calmly, \"Miss Annie----\"\n\n\"Miss Niven, sir!\"\n\n\"Well, she's Miss Niven to you, she's Annie to me.  But she said in\nmy ear, with her face very close to mine, that she did not care to\ndance with you, because you barely reached to her waist.\"\n\n\"For that _insult_, sir, you shall give me _sa-tis-faction_.  You\nunderstand?\"\n\n\"Sa-tis-faction!\" repeated McLeod provokingly.  \"You mean you want to\nfight me with pistols.  I'm not going to fight.  Excuse me for\ncalling the attention of my messmates to the insignificance of your\nperson compared with mine.  Figuratively speaking, Blood, you're only\none target, and I'm three.  And unless your hand shook much more than\nit usually does of a morning, you'd hit me.  No, I'm not going to\nfight you, Blood.  Annie wouldn't like it.\"\n\n\"McLeod, you're a coward!\"\n\nEvery officer sprang to his feet in a moment.\n\n\"That settles it,\" shouted the surgeon.  \"Waiter, throw up that\nwindow.  Quick!\"\n\nWith an agility that no one would have given him credit for, McLeod\nsprang on to the table and over it.  There was the crashing of\nbottles and plates, but next moment the giant had seized the pigmy by\nan arm and a leg, and thrown him like a curling-stone right through\nthe open window.\n\nThere was no duel next morning.  Blood was on the sick-list for a\nweek; but he never said \"Duel\" to the doctor again.\n\n* * * * *\n\nEven Captain Drake himself, kind-hearted though he was, found himself\none evening involved in a dispute with a friend at dessert.\n\nCaptain O'Reilly was an Irishman, but one of the merriest and\nbest-natured men in the Service.\n\nI suppose wine was to blame on this occasion, as on many others.\nO'Reilly had been away over the hills fishing all day, and feeling\ntired, had exceeded somewhat.  Like most of his countrymen, he was\nmost patriotic.  Ireland has many grievances even now.  She had far\nmore then.  But the quarrel commenced with a slight O'Reilly threw at\nthe English, just after someone had sung a charming and patriotic old\nIrish song.\n\nBlood was the first to take the battle up.\n\n\"English music,\" he alleged, was \"as good as Irish\"; and Captain\nDrake sided with him.\n\nThe argument grew so warm that O'Reilly called the English a nation\nof musicless louts and shopkeepers.  Then Drake retired.\n\n\"He means challenging me,\" said O'Reilly heatedly, as the door closed.\n\nNow Drake meant nothing of the sort.\n\n\"He means to challenge me.  But, by this and by that, I'll be first\nwith it.  Doctor McLeod, will you be my second?\"\n\n\"I'd rather not, O'Reilly.\"\n\n\"Certainly you can't,\" said the president, \"because you see, doctor,\nyou'll have to be on the ground with your instruments, to extract the\nbullets after the gentlemen shoot.\"\n\n\"The better plan,\" said big McLeod, laughing, \"would be to extract\nthe bullets before the shooting begins.\"\n\n\"I won't be laughed down,\" shouted O'Reilly.\n\n\"Then,\" retorted the doctor, \"do as the sparrows do: dicht your neb\nand flee up.\"*\n\n\n* Wipe your bill and fly up.\n\n\n\"I shall second Captain Drake,\" cried Blood.\n\n\"And I shall second O'Reilly,\" said Major Jones, a quiet little\nWelshman.\n\nThings were speedily arranged, although Captain Drake would far\nrather have had them arranged in quite a different way.\n\nThe morning broke bright, and clear, and balmy.  The blackbirds were\nsinging on bushes that clung to the cliffs, as Captain Drake opened\nhis window and gazed eastwards, where the sunshine was glittering on\nthe sea.\n\n\"Heigho!\" he said half aloud, \"what a pity that men should thirst for\neach other's blood on a day like this.  I can't make out what was the\nmatter with O'Reilly last night.  I dare say I must shoot him,\nhowever; but I'm very sorry.\"\n\n\"Come in.\"\n\nThis was shouted aloud, and next moment his servant entered his room\nwith a cup of hot milk, and told him that young John Robertson wanted\nto speak with him.\n\n\"O, yes, of course.  He is coming to the park with us to carry my\nextra garments.  Send him in.\"\n\n\"Well, lad, you're early.\"\n\n\"Because I was told to see you alone, sir.\"\n\n\"Leave the room, Spence.\"\n\n\"Now, John, what is it?\"\n\n\"Lieutenant O'Reilly's servant gave me this note for you, sir.  I was\nto let no one see me deliver it.\"\n\nAs soon as Drake read it, he flung himself into a chair, stretched\nout his legs, and laughed right heartily for fully fifteen seconds.\n\n\"Go now, John,\" he said, as soon as he could speak, \"Come back in\nhalf an hour, and we'll be ready for the march.\"\n\nThe note was from O'Reilly, and ran thus:\n\n\n\"DEAR DRAKE,--My morning reflections embitter my soul.  Sorra a bit\nof spite have I at you at all, at all.  But listen, my boy: When the\nword is given, just you fire at my second, and I'll fire at yours.\nThat'll settle it, and maybe settle the seconds too.\n\n  \"Thine to the spine,\n      \"PATRICK O'REILLY.\"\n\n\nThe only one on the field of battle who was really frightened was my\ngrandfather.  So he told me.  He had never believed it possible that\ntwo friends could stand up in this cool-blooded way to take each\nother's lives.  However, the duel proceeded.\n\nDrake, when he shook hands with O'Reilly, gave that officer's hand a\nsqueeze which he fully understood.  The word was given.\n\nBang--bang, went the pistols; Drake deliberately firing at Jones,\nO'Reilly letting off on Blood.  Next moment little Blood sprang two\nfeet in the air, and fell sprawling to the ground.\n\n\"By this and by that,\" cried O'Reilly, \"I'm feared that I've kilt the\nlittle man entirely.\"\n\n\"Hurry, Doctor, hurry,\" gasped Blood, \"I'm shot clean through the\nheart.  Extract the bullet if you can.\"\n\n\"With pleasure!\" said the doctor.\n\nThe coat was taken off.  There was a hole in that, and a hole in the\nshirt, but no hole in the heart; no hole in the skin.  The bullet had\nhit the busk of the little man's stays, glanced off and gone\ngoodness--or badness--only knows whither.\n\nThe principal and the other second, Jones, past whose ear Drake's\nbullet had whizzed, declared that honour was satisfied, and O'Reilly\nshook hands with his friend once more, and all left the field about\nas merry a party as ever drew pistols with deadly intent.  No, not\nquite all, for little Blood appeared considerably crestfallen.\n\nBut why?  Well, it had been discovered that he wore stays, and I do\nbelieve he would have preferred a flesh-wound to that discovery by\nhis messmates.\n\nNor did he get leave to forget it.  That evening, at dinner, quite a\nripple of chaff ran round the table at this dapper little officer's\nexpense, and I fear that big McLeod began it.\n\n\"I think, Blood, you had a wonderful escape.  But for the steel busk\nin your stays, you would now be an ensanguined corpse.\"\n\n\"I move,\" said Jones, \"that we all wear stays.  Couldn't we petition\nthe Horse Guards?\"\n\nThe president, Colonel ----, thought it time to hold up his hand,\nthough he smiled as he did so.\n\nBut Lieutenant Blood had done with duelling for a time at all events.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV.\n\n  WHAT A BATTLE SEEMS LIKE TO THE SOLDIER--TERRIBLE\n  TIMES IN PARIS--CIVIL WAR AND MURDER.\n\n\"And so,\" said Drake one evening, to my grandfather, shortly after\nthe memorable duel in the park, \"so you were really frightened?\"\n\n\"I was sir, and I'm----\"\n\nHe said no more, but hung his head.\n\n\"You are ashamed of being afraid.  Eh?\"\n\n\"I think so, sir.  I'm afraid, too, that I'll never make a soldier.\"\n\n\"Nonsense, lad, nonsense.  Right well do I remember my own first\nfight.  It was my first real fight, too.  It is some years ago now,\nand I was still an ensign, when clouds of war began in the East.  I\nknew nothing at all about fighting then, and I didn't know the least\nlittle bit about politics.\n\n\"Indeed,\" he added laughing, \"I don't know much about politics yet,\nand don't want to.  I know we have a King and a Parliament, and that\nwhen most of them say one way, then they poke up the British lion,\nthen come busier times in the dockyard and busier times in barracks,\nwar is declared and we soldiers go away to fight, but to each of us,\nindividually, a battle is all a muddle.  It is just marching and\ncounter-marching, shooting and fighting, advancing and retreating,\nand so on and so forth--a most puzzling complication.  Sometimes,\nwhen you feel sure that you have beaten the enemy pretty nearly off\nthe face of the earth, you find that it is your side that has been\nbeaten, and that you have to retreat.  At other times when you lie\ndown exhausted after a hard day's fearful fighting, not caring\nwhether you ever awake again after you get to sleep on the hard, cold\nground, because you think that your side has sustained defeat, you\nare gloriously surprised to find out next morning that victory is\ncrowning you with glory, that the enemy is in full retreat, and your\nregiment has received orders to follow them up.\"\n\n\"Along with other regiments, I suppose,\" my grand-daddy ventured to\nremark.\n\n\"Yes, yes, of course with other regiments.  But perhaps it is a\nfoggy, muggy, miserable morning, and you can't see any other\nregiments, only a mounted officer or orderly galloping here and there\nin the mist, looking more like a ghost than a man.  That is war, lad,\nbut that isn't the worst of it.\n\n\"But let me see.  What was I going to tell you about?\"\n\n\"Your first fight, and your first fright, sir.\"\n\n\"O, yes, so it was.  Well, there had been a terrible Reign of Terror\nin France.  Some day you may read an account of those massacres,\ntreason, treachery, and all combined.  I know all about it by heart,\nbut it isn't wholesome reading for young fellows like you, so I shall\nsay little about it.\n\n\"But, briefly, boy--for I can see by your eyes that you want to know\na little--in 1792 war broke out between France and Austria, and\nfighting began on the Flemish frontier.\n\n\"The French had little honour and glory in their first battles\nanyhow.  The Austrians walked through them, or would have done, had\nthey waited, but, instead of that, they not only bolted like so many\nrabbits, but even murdered their own officers.\n\n\"Revolution was smouldering then in Paris.  The armies of France lay\nidle in front of the foe, afraid to attack, ashamed to retire.\n\n\"Then, as the time flew past--by weeks and months--and nothing was\ndone against the foe, the people of Paris became madly incensed\nagainst the King and his profligate court, whom they accused of\ntreason against the people's rights.\n\n\"King Louis behaved like a fool, if he was not one out-and-out.  He\ncould not recognise that the people had a mind and a will of its\nown--that his subjects were not slaves.  His Parliament, or Assembly,\ndesired to banish the priests that resisted its will.  The King would\nnot submit.  The people feared invasion, hardly knowing the day or\nhour when the enemy should conquer and drive in their armies, and\nappear before their gates; the Assembly, therefore, called for\nvolunteers to drill and make ready, and even encamp outside the city.\nThe King saw no necessity.  He even dismissed the Minister whom the\npopulace delighted to honour and obey.\n\n\"This enraged the people beyond measure, and the streets of Paris\nwere filled with a yelling, haranguing, and, I fear, blood-thirsty\nmob.\n\n\"This mob, at midsummer, actually forced its way into the Tuileries.\n\n\"Even this had not the effect of arousing the King to a sense of\nimpending danger.  He was surrounded by his priests, his profligates,\nand worse.\n\n\"But now the Austrians got allies.  The Prussians joined them, and\nFrance was invaded in earnest.  Here was an army of fifty thousand\nPrussians, commanded by the brave Duke of Brunswick, marching along\nthe banks of the Moselle, with an army of Austrians, or two rather,\npouring in from Belgium and the Upper Rhine.\n\n\"And now the end began to draw near, for in the name of the Emperor\nof Austria, and the King of the Prussians, a proclamation was issued\nto the people of France.\n\n\"This manifesto declared that the allied armies were marching on\nParis to take the part of the injured King--so they called him, or\nthought him.\n\n\"'The city of Paris,' it went on, 'and its inhabitants, without class\ndistinction, are hereby warned that they must submit immediately to\ntheir King, Louis XVI.; set that Prince at entire liberty, and show\nhim, and all the Royal Family, that inviolability of respect which\nthe law of Nature and of nations imposes on subjects towards their\nsovereigns.  Their Imperial and Royal Highnesses will hold all the\nmembers of the Assembly, the Municipality, and National Guard of\nParis responsible before military tribunals for all events, and _with\ntheir heads_, without hope of pardon.'\n\n\"They--the allies--further declared that if the Ch\u00e2teau of the\nTuileries were forced or insulted, or the least violence offered to\nthe King or Queen, or any of the Royal Family, and provision not at\nonce made for their preservation, safety, and liberty, they--the said\nallied armies--would deliver the city of Paris to military execution\nand total overthrow.\n\n\"This proclamation was issued on the 25th of July.\"\n\n\"O dear! said my innocent grandfather, that was nearly as bad as\nCulloden, and the massacres that followed.\"\n\nCaptain Drake laughed.\n\n\"Wait a moment, lad, and make sure.\n\n\"That proclamation decided the fate of the King.  The awful Bastille,\nwhich had been so long the city's terror, had already been destroyed,\nand, as soon as word was brought that the Duke, with his Prussians,\nhad crossed the north-east frontier, Danton, who was leader of the\ndemon democrats of Paris, assembled his ragged but desperate army, to\ndestroy for ever the monarchy that the invaders seemed bent on\nsupporting.\n\n\"The Republic was won* in a single day by the populace of Paris,\namidst the roar of cannon and the flash of bayonets.\n\n\n* _Vide_ FYFFE'S _Modern Europe_, vol. i.\n\n\n\"On the 10th of August Danton let loose the armed mob upon the\nTuileries.  Louis quitted the palace, without giving orders to the\nguard either to fight or to retire.\n\n\"There was nothing to defend, for the monarch no longer hoped for\nanything beyond his life; but the guard were ignorant that their\nmaster desired them to offer no resistance, and one hundred and sixty\nof the mob were shot down by them before an order reached the troops\nto abandon the palace.\n\n\"The cruelties which followed the victory of the people indicated the\nfate in store for those whom the invaders came to protect.\n\n\"It is doubtful whether the foreign Courts would have made any\nserious attempt to undo the social changes effected by the Revolution\nin France; but no one supposed that those thousands of self-exiled\nnobles who now returned behind the guns of Brunswick had returned in\norder to take their places peacefully in the new social order.\n\n\"In their own imagination, as much as in that of the people, they\nreturned with fire and sword to repossess themselves of rights of\nwhich they had been despoiled, and to take vengeance on the men who\nwere responsible for the changes made in France since 1789.\n\n\"In the midst of a panic .... Danton inflamed the nation with his own\npassionate courage and resolution; he unhappily also thought it\nnecessary, to a successful national defence, that the reactionary\nparty at Paris should be paralysed by a terrible example.\n\n\"The prisons were filled with persons suspected of hostility to the\nnational cause, and in the first days of September many hundreds of\nthese unfortunate persons were massacred by gangs of assassins, paid\nby a committee of the Municipality.  Danton had made up his mind that\nthe liberty of France could not be saved without striking terror into\nthe hearts of its enemies .... and the sword, once drawn, was not\nsheathed until the best voices of France were silent, and the\nexercise of power had become but another name for the commission of\ncrime.\n\n\"The Republic was then proclaimed, and the war became a crusade of\nDemocracy.\n\n\"You see, my lad, France, not content with having banished Monarchy,\nand turned herself into a Republic, would fain have murdered every\nking and queen in the world, and set up puppet--puppy, if you like\nthe word--presidents in their place.\n\n\"The leader of the French army was Dumourier, who, after checking\nBrunswick, carried the war into Germany itself, which was then in a\npoor condition to defend itself.\n\n\"But I see you are getting tired, lad, and want me to come to my\nfirst fight.\"\n\n\"No,\" said my grandfather.  \"I like to hear you speak, sir.\"\n\n\"I only want to tell you what drew Britain into the turmoil.\n\n\"Well, the French, after crossing the frontier, won the battle of\nJenappes, and the Austrians abandoned the Netherlands.\n\n\"After this victory the French became excited by the fever of\nconquest.  Savoy and Nice were annexed.  Corsica had already been\nreconciled.\n\n\"And now, elated by their luck, there was no saying into what country\nthey might not carry fire and sword.  And not only fire and sword,\nbut Revolution in its blackest and bloodiest garments.\n\n\"For it was decreed that in every country which should be occupied by\nthe armies of the French Republic, the generals thereof should\nannounce the abolition of all existing authorities; of nobility and\nevery feudal right and monopoly; proclaim the sovereignty of the\npeople; form provisional Governments therefrom to which no officer of\na former Government should be eligible.\n\n\"Well, as the agents of the French were fostering sedition in every\nstate, and stirring up bad blood even in Britain itself by the\npreaching of the Rights of Man, and as the people of this country\ncould not forget the fearful massacres of September, we began to get\nimpatient and to thirst for war.\n\n\"When a country thirsts for war, lad, an excuse soon comes.\n\n\"There was a peace party in Britain, but as soon as news came to\nLondon that the French King had been executed, war became inevitable,\nand was declared on the 3rd of February by the French, just to be\nbeforehand with the British.\n\n\"Pitt, our Prime Minister, spared no pains now to isolate France, and\nto crush her by raising a great coalition against her.  Holland at\nonce joined us, then, later on, Naples, Tuscany, Spain, Portugal, and\nthe Papal States.\n\n\"But there were two parties in France itself--the Girondins, who\nwould have saved the King, if they could have at the same time kept\nup their own influence in Paris.  But the populace and Mountain party\nsaw through their falseness.\n\n\"And next came defeat and disaster, and even treason.\n\n\"The French General Dumourier opened the ball against Holland, but as\nthe Austrians had beaten the French at Maestricht, and they were in\nfull retreat before the foe, he had to return and fight the Austrians\nnear Brussels.\n\n\"He was defeated, and Flanders was opened up to Austria.  Then came\nthe treason of this scoundrel Dumourier, for he coolly proposed\nuniting his beaten army with the Austrians, and to attack the Paris\nConvention, and restore Monarchy.  He did not succeed, however, with\nhis army, and was obliged to fly to the Austrian side, and was shot\nat, while he fled, by his own men.\n\n\"This treasonable coward brought ill-luck to the French, and they\nsoon lost all they had won in the autumn before, except Mainz, which\nwas garrisoned by a brave Republican army of 17,000.\n\n\"Castine, a French general, had to fall back upon Weissenburg.\n\n\"But worse than this happened to France, for civil war broke out.\nThe large province of Vend\u00e9e, a peasant people, were ordered to raise\n300,000 men.  They refused.  They had not been pleased at the\nexpulsion of the priests from Paris.  They would rather fight the\nParisians, and in this they were encouraged by their Church, and the\nRoyalists still among them.  So a civil war was inaugurated.\n\n\"The Government of Paris had only raw levies to send against them,\ncomposed for the most part of gutter-grubbers and cut-throats, and\nthese the Vend\u00e9ans soon put out of existence.\n\n\"Hitherto the Gironde party had held sway, but now, with Britain and\nAustria thundering at the northern gates of France, laying siege to\nCond\u00e9 and Valenciennes, and driving the French army back before it,\nthe Girondes lost the confidence of the people, and were openly\ncharged with causing all the terrible troubles, even down to the\ncivil war of La Vend\u00e9e.  The Convention was surrounded by armed men\ncalling themselves a Commune, and the Mountain party arrested and\ncrushed the Girondes.\n\n\"They escaped, however, and now civil war commenced in terrible\nearnest, Lyons, Marseilles, Normandy, and other departments rushing\nto arms to attack Paris.  The Royalists, of course, thought they saw\ntheir opportunity, and joined these against the Mountain party.\n\n\"After the Lyons revolt, Robespierre the Bloody stepped upon the\nstage, and the Reign of Terror--far too awful even to think\nof--commenced.\n\n\"Well, my lad, it was early in the year 1793 that I first saw real\nservice, and this was at Toulon.\"\n\n\"Tell me,\" said my grandfather eagerly.\n\nAnd Captain Drake continued his story.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V.\n\n  FIGHTING AT TOULON--TERRIBLE SORTIES--EVACUATION--OFF\n  TO CORSICA--CAPTURED BY BRIGANDS--CAPTAIN\n  DRAKE'S FIRST FIGHT.\n\n\"Well, John, lad,\" Captain Drake went on, \"when I embarked for the\nfair land of France, soon after the declaration of war, though many\nyears older than you are now, I had never seen a shot fired in anger\nin all my life.\n\n\"With the 2nd battalion of our Royal Scots I embarked at Toulon.\n\n\"This great seaport was then held by the Royalists of France.  Held\nagainst the army of the French Republic I mean, and held, I fear, in\na somewhat shaky way.\n\n\"These Royalists had gone so far as to proclaim a successor to their\nmurdered prince, and they prayed the British to come to their\nassistance.\n\n\"This we speedily did, Lord Hood taking possession of the place, to\nhave and to hold in behalf of 'Louis XVII.'\n\n\"But, not long after this, it was entirely invested by the Republican\nforces.  A stern and obstinate resistance was made, and for a time we\nwere, as a rule successful.\n\n\"Sortie after sortie was made, and successfully too, and the\nRoyalists behaved with the greatest gallantry, as they have always\ndone, my boy, and ever will.\"\n\n\"Were you in those sorties?\" asked John.\n\n\"No, lad; I was kept engaged behind the ramparts, for my first fight\nhad not yet come.\n\n\"But the Republicans got so numerous, and our forces were so small\ncompared to the great extent of fortification we had to protect, that\nit was at last deemed expedient to evacuate the place.\n\n\"If the whole truth must be told, as it always should be, even at the\nexpense of one's _amour propre_, the loss of Toulon was mainly caused\nby the terrible artillery-fire conducted by a young officer called\nNapoleon Bonaparte.\"\n\n\"_The_ Napoleon Bonaparte?\"\n\n\"No other, lad.  No other.\"\n\n\"Then we were beaten at Toulon?\"\n\n\"Certainly; that is plain English.\n\n\"Hood was obliged to evacuate.  Discretion is the best part of\nvalour, and, had he not done so, the Republicans would soon have\nseized the place, and not a French Royalist or a Royal Scot would\nhave been left alive.\n\n\"But we embarked the Royalists on board our ships.  We fired the\nTrench shipping, and blew up the magazines and arsenals.\n\n\"Ay, boy, and that was a sight I am not likely to forget till my\ndying day.\n\n\"But all were got safely on board at last, my own company, or rather\nthe company to which I belonged, being the very last to leave the\ndockyard gates.\n\n\"It was about a year after this that an expedition was fitted out to\ngo to Corsica.  The Corsicans, as I have already told you, assented\nin a half-hearted kind of way to be under the dominion of the French\nRepublic, but some of them now saw the error of their ways, and would\nrather hand the island over to Britain.  These were in the minority,\nhowever, so we prepared to fight.\n\n\"In addition to the 1st Royals, we had six good regiments along with\nus.\n\n\"Well, I wasn't much of a sailor just then, and the first part of the\nvoyage, anyhow, was far from agreeable.  We were in troopers, guarded\nby ships of war, which kept a good look-out, I can assure you.  The\nFrench had still some craft afloat, and I, for one, had no great wish\nto take part in a naval engagement.  I hardly know, indeed, what part\nwe would have taken; I dare say it would have been the part of 'cut\nand run.'\n\n\"However, we saw no foe except the elements.  Crossing the Bay of\nBiscay was a fearful experience.  The Bay has a bad name, anyhow, and\nthis time it appeared determined to maintain it.  It was not that the\nwind was terribly boisterous, but the waves were hills high--a\nseething, boiling, foaming mass.  I dare say that if I were a sailor\nI could describe it in more nautically romantic language.  It seemed\nto me, however, that when we got between two seas we would wallow\nthere for a time, and then founder.  Then, when we got on top of a\nbillow, and could see about us a bit, that billow behaved in the most\nheartless manner, shook itself, in fact, and shook us too, then\nkicked us down once more into the trough of the ocean to wallow once\nmore.  Our ship rolled at times till her yard-arms stirred up the\nwater as a Highland bull tosses a bundle of hay; then she would\npretend she was going down, head first, like a sea-unicorn, scaring\nme out of my wits; after this, by way of a change, she would cock\nherself up on one end--the stern, I think seamen call it--like a\npoodle begging with a bit of bread on its nose.\n\n\"You may smile, John, lad, but it was no smiling matter to us.  If\nthat be the way Britannia rules the waves, I'd rather stay at home, I\nthought, and keep a farm.  But we got into beautiful water after we\npassed Gibraltar.  Beautiful weather, too.  The poet calls the\nMediterranean the Blue Levant, and no sky was ever bluer than the\nocean around us was now.  The worst of it was that it fell dead calm.\nFor my part, I thought that was the best of it--I wasn't in any great\nhurry to fight the Corsicans.\n\n\"We got there at last all the same, and on the 22nd of May our guns\nshook the town of Bastia like a select assortment of juvenile\nearthquakes, and there was some fighting.  They told me after the\nbattle that we had taken the town in fine style, though, for the life\nof me, I couldn't see where the fine style came in.\n\n\"But there was more to be done yet.  As for the Bastians, they were\nlike a parcel of well-whipped schoolboys, and ready to promise\nanything.  They gave over not only the city, but all the island, to\nthe British.  A rough lot they were, but they gave us fairly good\ndinners and dances.  Then there was very beautiful and wild scenery\nfurther inland, and we got up shooting parties, though--bar rats, and\nrabbits, and half-wild pigs--there wasn't much to shoot.\n\n\"One day I got separated from my companions, and lost myself in a\nwood.  I wandered on and on till nightfall, when I found myself in a\nkind of rocky glen, and close to a rude sort of a cottage without a\nchimney.  Smoke was curling up through the roof, though, and some\ngoats and a cow were near by.\n\n\"I was very hungry, and here I thought was a chance of getting a bite\nand sup, so I went boldly up and knocked.\n\n\"The door was opened after a time, but only just a little way, and\none of the most awful-looking faces I have ever seen peeped round the\nedge.  It was that of a blear-eyed hag, with dark, dishevelled rags\nof hair, a nose that had been smashed, and a huge cavern of a mouth,\nstudded, apparently, with rusty nails instead of teeth.\n\n\"I suppose I didn't look very terrible; anyhow, seeing it was 'only\nme,' she threw the door quickly open, seized my rifle with one hand,\nand clapped a pistol to my brow with the other.\n\n[Illustration: \"A bleared-eyed hag clapped a pistol to my brow.\"]\n\n\"She speedily disarmed me, and then dragged me in and pointed to a\nstone in a corner near the fire.  Of course I sat down, and as I\ndidn't understand a word she said, I made signs that this Corsican\nlady understood, for she handed me a huge bowl of milk and some fruit.\n\n\"After this I made up my mind that it was time to go.  My rifle stood\nnear the door, and I made for that.  But I never reached it.  The hag\nseized me by the coat-tails and seated me again so roughly on the\nstone that I believed a bone was broken.  I was a prisoner,\nevidently, and guarded by a woman.  What a humiliating position for\nan officer of the 1st Royal Scots!\n\n\"But the worst was to come.\n\n\"I could see that she expected company.  She stuck an extra pistol in\nher leathern cingle, and gave me a nod, as much as to say, 'That's\nfor you, my pretty boy, unless you're good.'  Then she set about\ncooking a savoury stew.\n\n\"In about a couple of hours' time I heard voices singing in the\ndistance.  They had lit two huge lamps, and immediately after the\ndoor was opened, and in walked three brigands, armed with knives and\nshooting-irons.\n\n\"I thought they would despatch me at once, but instead of that they\nstuck their hands to their sides and laughed till the shanty shook\nagain.\n\n\"They ate like ogres, but every now and then they looked at me and\nlaughed again.  Well, there was no laughing in my heart, especially\nwhen they took to drinking next.\n\n\"But my time soon came.  One fellow advanced and pulled my hat off\nand placed it on his own dirty head, another took my necktie, and the\nthird my boots.  Thus by degrees they stripped me naked, and that old\nhag looking on and enjoying the fun.\n\n\"I was afraid they would now turn me out of doors, and had made up my\nmind to struggle and die first.  But this was not to be my fate.\n\n\"For, still laughing as if it were the best joke on earth, they\nrigged me out as a brigand, though a very ragged one, and stuck a\nhuge broad-brimmed hat jauntily on my head.\n\n\"I was next led to the door, and a fellow beckoned me to follow him.\n\n\"It was a lovely star-lit and moon-lit night, with never a breath of\nair, a night that under other circumstances I would have enjoyed to\nthe full.\n\n\"My guide led me on and on for nearly an hour, till at last, coming\nto the brow of a hill, I saw the lights of Bastia and our ships far\ndown beneath.  Then the guide disappeared.\n\n\"I had to make the best of a bad job now.  So I hurried off down\ntowards the town.  Luckily our temporary barracks lay on the\noutskirts, for if I had been obliged to walk through the town, my\nadventures might have ended by someone shooting me.\n\n\"The windows of our mess-place were all open wide, and two figures\nwere walking on the grass, Dr. McLeod and Lieutenant O'Reilly, both\nsmoking.\n\n\"I ran towards them.\n\n\"The doctor clubbed his big fist to knock me down.\n\n\"'It's only me,' I cried; 'for goodness' sake go and tell my servant\nI want him at once.'\n\n\"Instead of doing anything of the sort, the doctor seized me by the\nshoulder, while O'Reilly caught me by the hand, and thus they ran me\nright into the mess-room.\n\n\"Everybody, including the colonel, was on foot in a moment; and when\nthey saw it was only me, why the laughter of those brigands was\nnothing to be compared to the chorus that rang out now on all sides\nof me.\n\n\"When they had nearly finished, I told my dismal story, and glad\nenough I was to get away at last, throw off my brigand rags, and have\na bath.\n\n\"But my strange story ran all through our little army--a dozen\ndifferent editions of it--and it was months before I heard the last\nof it.\n\n\"But to return to our Corsican war, John, and my first real fight.\nThough the Bastians there were agreeable to give over the island to\nBritain, a town called Calvi still held out.  It stands at the head\nof one of the best of Corsican harbours, and commands it.\n\n\"Calvi was going to fight.  Calvi did fight, and as it could not be\ntaken from the sea front, General Stuart determined to storm it from\none side.\n\n\"A battalion of picked men was therefore formed, and embarked on\nboard our ships with artillery and war material of every kind.\n\n\"Our Royal Scots were among the chosen, and hard indeed was the work\nbefore us.\n\n\"We were landed quite three miles from Calvi, which was as well\nfortified by Nature as by art.\n\n\"The road to the town and its outworks, which we had to make, led\nalong the mountain-sides.  These ended in precipices.  But over these\nhills, and along the edge of fearful chasms, our guns had to be\ndragged, and batteries constructed on the very top.\n\n\"Then our fire began, and continued until at last we effected a\nbreach in the walls of the biggest and strongest outwork, called the\nMorello.\n\n\"The storming of this tower and wall was entrusted to the Royals.\n\n\"The Corsicans could fight well behind walls, and the evening before\nthe attack nothing was spoken of in our mess except the coming\nbattle, and engagements of a similar kind that older officers than I\nhad taken part in.\n\n\"'Ah!' said a grey-haired major, 'your work to-morrow will be mere\nchild's play to some of the experiences I had when a youngster out in\nAmerica.  Driven back pell-mell again and again, sometimes under a\n_feu d'enfer_ that decimated our brave lads, and tore whole regiments\nalmost to pieces.'\n\n\"This didn't tend to raise my spirits, anyhow, and I did not sleep a\nvery great deal.  When I did doze off, it was to dream I was storming\nterrible heights and facing fearful odds, with guns roaring around\nme, and men falling dead or wounded on every side.  The guns in my\ndreams, however, were real enough, for our artillery were firing at\nthe breach--though with uncertain aim--to prevent the enemy from\nrepairing it.\n\n\"Next day was one of trial for me.  That is for a time, and so it may\nbe with you, lad, when you first come under fire.\n\n\"I told you I was scared, and now I'll tell you where and when the\nfright and nervousness came in.  It was before we rushed on to the\nstorming, and while we stood to arms, waiting for a whole hour before\nthe signal to engage came.\n\n\"I pretended to laugh and chaff lightly with my fellow-officers.  I\ndare say older heads saw through this mean pretence of courage and\n_sang-froid_.  Perhaps I was a bit white about the gills.  Well,\nthere were several men in the ranks, probably, whiter than I was.\n\n\"But the signal came at last.\n\n\"'On, lads!' shouted the officer in command, drawing his sword, and\npointing to the breach.\n\n\"There was a wild cheer, and our fellows rushed forwards with\nbayonets fixed.  But the climb took the wind out of us, and silence\nsucceeded the cheering.\n\n\"As our men began to fall here and there, and the guns roared loud in\nfront of us, I think my heart made several attempts to jump out of my\nmouth.\n\n\"Then came the main charge--in the deadly breach.  Our fellows did\nnot cheer now.  It was a slogan, a wild yell, that we uttered as we\nran in and on.\n\n\"Now all fear had vanished.  I only saw the foe in front of me.  I\nheeded not the volleys, the blood, the clash of steel; I had no\nthought but that of getting hand-to-hand with the fierce defenders.\n\n\"They were borne backwards at last by the fury of our attack.  Then,\nall at once, the cheering was renewed, and I knew we were victorious.\nWhen I looked up I saw our flag fluttering in the breeze, and, though\nvery much out of breath, I felt not only exceedingly happy, but proud\nas well.\n\n\"Perhaps my pride was excusable, for I had done my share, despite the\nrestless night I had passed, and my absurd state of 'funk' while\nwaiting for the order to advance.\n\n\"But I had no more fighting for two years, during which time our\nRoyals held the stronghold.\n\n\"And now, lad, off you trot, for there goes the first bugle for\ndinner.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI.\n\n  MY GRANDFATHER IS PROMOTED--AN UNLUCKY ESCAPADE--SAVED\n  BY A RIBBON--MASSACRE OF FRENCH NOBLES--NAPOLEON\n  BONAPARTE TO THE FORE.\n\nPromotion was quick in those days; that is, if a young soldier were\nreally deserving.\n\nI have always thought my grandfather one of the smartest men for his\nyears that I ever knew.  He was smart in appearance, soldierly in\nbearing, and most particular as to his toilet, and this without any\nsigns of pride.\n\nIt was these very traits in his character that first brought him into\nnotice with his officers.  They could trust the young fellow, and if\nhe was commissioned to do anything, or to carry a message, he did his\nduty most thoroughly.  Well, if a thing is worth doing at all, it is\nworth doing well.\n\nHe was soon so perfect in his drill that he was made corporal.\n\nThat was a proud day for him, when he was told off to drill a squad\nof Jockie-raws in the barrack-square, in Dublin.  His foot was now on\nthe first step of the ladder of fame, and he was determined that it\nshould not slip.\n\nBut now, as a corporal, he had more temptations to battle against\nthan before.  He was taken more out, and even the sergeants, who, as\na rule, have more pride of place than their superiors, did not\nhesitate to make a companion of him, and a confidant as well.\n\n\"Robertson will soon be one of ourselves.\"  That was what they said,\nor prophesied.\n\nAnother thing in honest John's favour was the education that had been\ndrilled or driven into him by Dominie Freeschal.  His correct English\nand his penmanship were specially in his favour, and he was often\nemployed by the senior officers to write from dictation.\n\nHe was by no means loth to do this, not because it excused him from\nduty--which he dearly loved--but because it brought him into contact\nwith men from whom he could not help learning much.  Moreover, the\nwork was not unremunerative from a pecuniary point of view.  The\nofficers of the Royals were too proud to accept the services of a\nwriter for nothing.\n\n* * * * *\n\nWhen but little over twenty years of age, this progenitor of mine, to\nhis intense delight, found himself the proud owner of a sergeant's\nsash and pike; and now, as I do not wish to hold him up to the\nreader's notice as a paragon of virtue or a plaster saint, I must\nrecord an adventure that he had, not long after his promotion, which\nwas very nearly being his ruin, and, but for a lucky chance, would\nhave broken him, and reduced a really able non-commissioned officer\nto the ranks.\n\nHad it ended thus, he assured me himself, he would never again have\nreturned to the Highland home where his father and mother and people\ndwelt.\n\nSergeant John Robertson had been for some time a Freemason.  I am not\na Freemason myself, so cannot tell you what a Royal Arch is, or\nwhether it requires but one stone to compose it, or a thousand of\nbricks.  Anyhow, that was the rank the young soldier held in the\nlodge to which he belonged, and I dare say there was nothing in it to\nbe otherwise than proud of.\n\nThe regiment, or a portion of it, had been sent to the south of\nIreland, for the French had threatened an invasion, and it was our\npurpose to give them a warm reception, and to prevent anything like a\nrising of the Irish malcontents to meet them.\n\nOne day, grandfather was sent from the camp to march a squad of\nRoyals to a neighbouring town, a distance of about twelve miles.  He\nwas early astir, and he, with his men, accomplished the journey in a\nlittle over three hours.  He was to come back alone, after delivering\nthe squad at the barracks.\n\nThis, having dined, he prepared to do, but as ill-luck would have it,\nhe forgathered with a squad of another sort, some Highland sergeants,\none of whom, to his great surprise and delight, was none other than\nTom Grahame, the boy--boy now no longer--with whom he fought for\nRachel Freeschal, and whom he had stabbed with his kilt-pin.\n\nMy grandfather did not know this tall kilted warrior, who came up to\nhim in the street and held out a hand to shake.\n\n\"Preen Mhor, and is it really yourself I see before me?  Why, Ian,\ndon't you remember the lad you stuck the big pin into and nearly\nkilled, all for the love of sweet little Rachel?\"\n\n\"Tom Grahame, is it you?\"\n\nThe delight was mutual, and naturally enough the two linked arm in\narm and marched off to a neighbouring inn, to talk about those dear\nold times that seemed so far away now, and the people they might\nnever see again.  This was indeed a happy meeting.\n\nAh! dear me, though, I'm sure it would have been happier had they\ntaken nothing stronger than water.\n\nBut other sergeants dropped in, and now the company numbered five\nwithal, and a merry afternoon they spent.\n\nMy grandfather was not used to strong drink, and it is no wonder,\ntherefore, that the fiery stuff he swallowed should have flown to his\nhead.\n\nHe had put an enemy in his mouth, and it had stolen away his brains.\n\nThe Highland sergeants gave him what is called a Scotch convoy.  They\nwalked with him to the third mile-stone, then they all walked back\nhalf a mile to an inn.  Here a bottle of usquebaugh was bought, and\nat the fourth mile-stone the contents were discussed and the bottle\nsmashed.  Taking a hearty leave of poor Tom and his companions, my\nvery naughty grandfather went on by himself.  Presently, as the sun\nbegan to wester, he thought he would treat himself to a little song,\nand did.  And now he heard the sound of horses' hoofs clattering up\nbehind him, and next minute a gentleman's servant pulled up alongside.\n\n\"Soldier,\" he said, \"you look tired; will you have a ride?  This\nhorse can carry you and me both, and never turn a hair.\"\n\n\"Thank you very much.  How far are you going?\"\n\n\"Within two miles of your camp.  Leastways I take it to be yours.  My\nmaster is Colonel W----, of the 42nd, stationed in the town you've\nbeen to, but he lives out this way for the present.\n\n\"Are you too unsteady,\" he added, \"to get up behind?\"\n\n\"Not a bit of it,\" said my grandfather.\n\nSo he mounted, and on they rode, chatting cheerily.\n\nBy-and-by they came to an inn, and naturally, let me say\nhypothetically, my grandfather asked the man to drink, and I suppose\nhad some himself.\n\nInns must have been plentiful enough along that road, for they had\nnot ridden a mile farther before they came to another little hostelry.\n\nThis time the man ordered the \"noggin,\" but as soon as this was\ndisposed of, he said rather gruffly to my grandfather, \"Pay for that.\"\n\n\"Pay yourself--you called for it.  I paid the last, and I'll pay the\nnext.\"\n\n\"What!  You won't pay it?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Then get off my horse.\"\n\nThis was too much for Highland blood, especially Highland blood fired\nwith Irish whisky.  Sergeant John seized the man by the neck and a\nleg, and in two seconds threw him off the horse.  He managed to\nwrench the reins from him as he fell.\n\nHe just stopped long enough to toss a coin to the gaping landlord,\nthen struck his heels in the horse's ribs, and, uttering a yell like\na Mexican cow-boy, dashed madly off.\n\nHe felt more inclined to sing now than ever, though what he did sing\nI cannot say.  Something madly Bacchanalian, I have little doubt.\nAnd as he sang he waved his pike and slew imaginary foes.\n\nNow, not far from the house where lived Colonel W----, was a narrow\nbridge over a stream, a high old Gothic sort of structure from which\nquite half a mile of the road could be seen.\n\nSome men working here, noticing what they thought was a mad soldier\non horseback, quickly formed across the road, and, at considerable\nrisk, succeeded in stopping my grandfather's gallop.\n\nHis career was stopped for one night, and he was made prisoner.\nBefore this, however, the servant himself was seen in the distance,\nand honest John at once rushed to meet him.  He merely meant to\nfrighten the man, but this he succeeded in doing entirely to his own\nsatisfaction, if not to that of the unfortunate servant.\n\nThe rest was all a blank to my soldier grand-dad, till he awoke next\nmorning in a strange room, and found a sentry standing beside the\nwindow with fixed bayonet.\n\n\"Am I a prisoner, then?\"\n\n\"You are, indade, sorr.  Don't ye moind what ye did at all?\"\n\n\"Nothing terrible, I hope?\"\n\n\"Well, as near as a toucher, Sergeant.  Sure, if you hadn't been\ncaught, it's a big hole you would have drilled in the colonel's\nservant, and kilt him entoirely.\"\n\nThe prisoner's agony of mind for the next two hours may be better\nconceived than described.\n\nHe was then brought to the colonel's own room, and, much to his\nastonishment, received with kind words and a smile.\n\n\"But now give an account of this sad affair,\" he said.  \"My servant\ngives me his version, I would like to hear yours.\"\n\n\"I will tell you all I remember, sir, and you will then see that the\nfault was altogether mine, and your servant not at all to blame.\"\n\nHe then told the story as we know it.\n\n\"And that is the truth, Sergeant; the whole truth?\"\n\n\"O, no, sir, not the whole truth.\"\n\n\"And what have you kept back?\"\n\n\"Why, nothing that I can think of.  I have brought myself as far as\nthe bridge; after that it is all a blank.\"\n\nThe colonel smiled.\n\n\"Well,\" he said, \"if I report you to your regiment, you are fully\naware what the consequences will be.\"\n\nMy grandfather hung his head.\n\n\"I will not report you.  There is a morsel of ribbon in your jacket.\nI well know what that denotes.  I am myself a Mason, as--as you know.\nI will forgive you.\"\n\n\"O, sir, what can I do to show my gratitude?  Anything, sir, in the\nworld----\"\n\n\"Stay, don't be too profuse.  But there is one thing I wish you to\ndo.  Promise me, on your honour, that you will not let temptation\novercome you again.\"\n\n\"On my honour as a soldier, sir, I promise you, but----\"\n\n\"But what?\"\n\n\"I had already made the same promise to myself, and I have prayed for\nhelp.\"\n\n\"Good.  Go back now to your camp.  You shall hear no more of this.\nGood morning.\"\n\n\"Good morning, sir, and a thousand thanks.\"\n\nI have only to add that the promise he made to Colonel W---- he stuck\nto, not only for a time, but throughout his whole career.  He may,\nand doubtless did, take his \"ration of grog,\" but never again did he\nexceed.\n\nI cannot say the same for many of the other sergeants, however, for\nthose were hard, wild times.  His own colonel said to my grandfather\none day long after this:\n\n\"I have never seen you even once the worse of liquor, Sergeant\nRobertson.  And I verily believe if I set you astride a wine-cask,\nlike Bacchus, I would find you all right in the morning.\"\n\nMy grandfather's thoughts reverted to that wild night when returning\nfrom K----, but he answered never a word.\n\n* * * * *\n\nTo hark back a little way, or rather a few years, and that is indeed\nbut a short time in a war that lasted for twenty twelve-months.\nCaptain Drake told us then how Hood had to leave Toulon after burning\nthe French fleet.  He said nothing, however, about the horrors of\nbloodshed and massacre that followed the entry of the French\nRepublican forces.  Such stories are perhaps best left untold.\n\nThe burning of the fleet, however, gave us full power in the\nMediterranean.  But the Vend\u00e9ans, though promised help from the\nBritish, were soon overpowered, then Lyons fell.\n\nAfter Robespierre himself had met his deserts in 1794, a new\nGovernment reigned in Paris.\n\nIn June, 1795, the British fleet landed the old nobles of France and\nan army in the Bay of Quiberon, in South Brittany.  The people here\nwere loyal to the backbone, and the expedition would be supported not\nonly by British ships, but by British money.\n\nBut, alas! those nobles spent time quibbling and quarrelling as to\nwho should command their forces.  Then General Hoche swept down on\nthem like an eagle, captured their fort, and hurled them back towards\nthe sea.\n\nIn their fright the fugitives threw themselves into the waves, and\nmany of these were saved by our boats, but all the others who were\nnot killed in battle were made prisoners, and, horrible to relate,\nsix hundred of these were massacred in cold blood.\n\n* * * * *\n\nIn the early part of 1796, that bright particular star, Napoleon\nBonaparte, whom we last heard of at Toulon as a young artillery\nofficer, began to blaze on high, for we found him in command of the\nItalians--Italy at that time was not of much importance, and sadly\npriestridden.  He had advised the Directory, as the French Government\nwas now called, to make a threefold attack on Austria.  Peace had\nbeen concluded with Spain, while Holland and the Lower Rhine were at\npeace, owing to the Treaty of Basle.\n\nIt will do the reader no harm to know that the French General Jourdan\nwas to enter Germany by Frankfort; Moreau to cross the Rhine at\nStrasburg; and Napoleon himself to face the Austrians and Sardinians\non the mountain slopes forty miles to the westward of Genoa.\n\nNapoleon had 40,000 men on the hills above the coast 'twixt Nice and\nGenoa.  The Austrians had an army of equal strength to face this\nforce, and the Sardinian army besides.\n\nTo sever these two armies Napoleon fought for four days, then getting\nbetwixt them he left a force to watch the Austrians, while he swooped\ndown on the Piedmontese, driving them back towards Turin with\nterrible slaughter.  The Government was terrorised, and glad to make\npeace with the young and artful general, giving up to him the\nfortresses of Coni, Ceva, and Tortona, most important strongholds,\nbecause they commanded the entrance to Italy itself.\n\nBut Napoleon got also the town of Valenza, at which place, or near\nit, General Beaulieu was led to understand the French would cross the\nPo.  Here he concentrated his forces and waited to give Napoleon\nbattle.  But the latter was cleverly playing his own game.  He\ncrossed fifty miles lower down.\n\nThere were no telegraphs in those days, so Beaulieu got no inkling of\nthe awful truth until he heard the roar of Napoleon's guns in his\nrear.  It was a grand fight, that at Lodi.\n\nSword in hand at the head of his grenadiers, the future Emperor of\nthe French crossed the Bridge of Lodi, and the Austrians were\nfearfully beaten.\n\nThen into Milan itself marched Napoleon in triumph.  And the Milanese\nhad to purchase their freedom, not only with vast sums of money, but\neven with the spoils of their beautiful churches.  Napoleon next\nmarched into Central Italy, being determined to drive the armies of\nAustria completely out of the field.  He advanced upon Mincio.  In\nthe battle fought by the Austrians and French at Borghetto, Beaulieu\nwas again badly thrashed, and forced to fly into the Tyrol, leaving\nthe French to invest Mantua.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII.\n\n  POLICY AND AMBITION OF NAPOLEON--REBELLION IN\n  IRELAND--ATTEMPTS AT INVASION--THE WHOLE WORLD\n  OF EUROPE IN A BLAZE.\n\nBy the genius and strategy of Napoleon, coupled with a certain dash\nand _\u00e9lan_ that never forsook him till the very last, Austria was\ndriven from Italy.  By the end of March he had even carried the\nmountain passes that guard Carinthia, and pursued the enemy to within\neighty miles of Vienna.  The Emperor sued for peace, and the kind of\npeace made was one dictated by Napoleon himself, and to his own\nadvantage as much as that of France.\n\nIn fact, Napoleon Bonaparte was a capital map-maker.  What was Italy\none day, would be Austria the next, and French territory soon after.\nTreaties, in those days, were as often abrogated as not.  They were\nall very well so long as they suited the convenience of those who had\nmade them.  When they failed to do so, nations tore them up and made\nwar; then the victor made another treaty, and the self-same fate\nprobably awaited that.\n\nNapoleon was probably one of the most graspingly ambitious men that\never lived, and one of the cleverest.  Like a shepherd's collie, he\nseemed to sleep--if ever that great brain of his did sleep--with one\neye open, ready to come down like a wolf on the fold, whenever he saw\nan opening.  He played at the great game of war.  He played for high\nstakes, too; he cared nothing how many crowns or sovereigns he threw\ndown, or how many kings, queens, and knaves opposed him.  Talking of\nkings and queens, by the way, there were a good many about in those\ndays, and some were hardly distinguishable from knaves.\n\n  \"A prince can mak' a belted knight,\n    A marquis, duke, and a' that,\n  But an honest man's aboon his might,\n    Guid faith he mauna fa' that!\"\n\n\nWell, I don't suppose the great Napoleon himself ever attempted to\nmake an honest man.  An honest man might have stood in his way.  He\npreferred fools.  As to Marquises and that kind of folks, he could\nturn them out by the score, and he could make kings too--or mar them.\nIt was all the same to Napoleon.  He dreamt that, like Alexander the\nGreat, he had conquered the world, and he was going to do his best to\nmake that dream come true.  But he didn't mean to imitate Alexander\nany further; he wouldn't sit down and cry because there were no more\nworlds to conquer.  No, those he had conquered and trampled under\nfoot, might do the weeping, he should sit on high and play at being a\ngod.\n\nOn second thought, I beg to retract that wee word \"sit.\"\n\nNo ambitious man ever did or could sit.  Sitting only belongs to the\nhappy and contented.  The brain of ambition is always in a turmoil\nand a whirl.\n\nAmbition is the tower of Babel, which a man builds for himself, and\nthe higher he builds it, the farther from the heaven and the haven of\ncontentment does he place himself.  Because contentment rests on\nearth, and happiness is its twin brother.\n\nHowever, it was Napoleon's very successes that made him popular with\nthe French.  Some people are driven \"daft\" by good luck, and some\nnations are of the same temperament.  Our Gallic neighbours are, for\nexample.  They possess but little of the bull-dog courage, the\nsteadiness and staying power, of the British.  So long as luck\nfavours them, then \"Pah!\" they cry, \"We vill fight till all is blue.\"\nBut when reverses come, their hearts cool down.  They are like the\nsteam that rises, from a burning house as the firemen play on it, on\na hard-frosty night in winter.  It rises high in air, as steam, but\nit soon gets chilled and descends as snow.\n\nBut the ovation that General Napoleon received in December, 1797,\nfrom, this excited people in the great Hall of Legislature, would\nhave turned many a modest head.  Perhaps no young conqueror, ever\nbefore, faced so great and enthusiastic an audience.  We are told\nthat the flags and trophies of all the battles of the Republic were\ndisplayed in the Audience Hall that evening.\n\nThe \"glories\" were set forth in inscriptions such as the following:\n\n\"A hundred and seventy captured flags.\n\n\"A hundred and fifty thousand prisoners taken in battle.\n\n\"Six hundred field guns.\n\n\"Five hundred and fifty siege guns.\n\n\"Five pontoon bridges.\n\n\"Nine 64-gun ships, twelve frigates, and twelve corvettes.\n\n\"Armistice with the King of Sardinia.\n\n\"Convention with Genoa.\n\n\"Armistice with the King of Naples and the Pope of Rome.\n\n\"Preliminaries of Leoben.\n\n\"Liberty granted to the peoples of Bologna, Ferrara, Modena, Massa,\nCarrara, and Lombardy, and to the peoples of the \u00c6gean Sea, Ithaca,\nand Corcyra.\"\n\nThen there were the grand works of art and spoils of the churches.\n\nAnd was the man on whom every eye was turned in this great assembly,\nproud?  Well, he looked so young, so modest, and yet so gallant\nwithal, that ladies got a little off their head about him.\n\nBut in the brief extracts of the speech he made, he did not show a\nvery overwhelming amount of modesty.\n\n\"We, the people of France, must be free, and to be so we must conquer\nkings.  We must overthrow the prejudices of eighteen hundred years,\nto gain a constitution founded on reason.  We have triumphed over\nmany obstacles, as the trophies around you prove.  Though feudalism,\nroyalty, and religion have hitherto governed Europe, from the peace\nnow concluded a Representative Government shall date.  The territory\nof this mighty nation is bounded but by natural limits.  France and\nItaly now see arising, from the graves of their ancestors, immortal\nliberty.  I hand to you the treaty of peace signed at Campo Formio,\nand ratified by the Emperor, a peace that shall ensure liberty,\nprosperity, and glory to the Republic.  France is free, and the whole\nof Europe must be free also.\"\n\nThis speech, though not remarkably eloquent, was a torch that bid\nfair to set the whole of Europe in a blaze.\n\nAustria having made peace with France, Britain was left to fight her\nsingle-handed.  The bombastic doctrines preached by France and put\ninto practice--successfully, too--by so great a war-genius as\nNapoleon, stirred up the worst blood and the lowest classes in many\nEuropean cities.  Men who would never work for themselves could talk.\nWhy should not every nation follow the example of France, and be\nfree?  Why should kings and queens and nobles wallow in wealth, while\nthe poor were left to die for hunger?\n\nThere were insurrections soon at Rome itself, and even the Pope was\ndeposed.  We Britons were autocratically ordered to restore to France\nall the spoils we had taken in the war, and all the lands.\n\nOf course, we didn't.\n\nNo nation, or combination of nations, is ever going to put a foot on\nBritain's neck, or rob her of a single possession, so long as we\nretain that greatest possession of all--possession of the sea.\n\nIn 1798 the Irish rebelled.  They too would be free.  O reader, we\ncannot blame them.  They were a conquered nation, and held down by\nbloodshed, murder, and rapine.\n\nIreland was, indeed, a thorn in the flesh of Great Britain at that\ntime, and it was a thorn that the French would gladly assist in\nextracting, and afterwards keep for itself.\n\nA certain Dr. McNiven repaired to Paris on the sly, and arranged with\nthe Directory all the preliminaries of an invasion, which it was\nbelieved would entirely dismember Ireland from England and Scotland.\nThe United Irishmen meanwhile rose in arms.  It was their purpose to\nseize in one night the Castle of Dublin, the camp, and all the\nartillery.  But the conspirator let the cat out of the bag, and this\nwas disastrous to the cause.\n\nBattles, however, were fought here and there all over Ireland, but in\nevery instance the Irish lost, and so the rebellion was put down,\nwith, as usual, much needless slaughter and terrible cruelty.\n\nThe mission of Dr. McNiven to Paris bore fruit, and was productive of\nsad results to France itself, as well as to poor bleeding Ireland.\n\nAn invasion was actually effected, for the French landed in Kallala\nBay with 1200 men, under General Humbert, and with uniforms for 3000\nmen.  They were quite certain that the Irish would rise to meet and\nassist them.\n\nHumbert drove in the Fencibles, as they were called, who were really\nakin to the Volunteers of the present day.  Then he advanced to\nCastle Bar, and thrashed Lake and his army, although nearly double\nthat of his own in numbers.\n\nThe British were in a fix now, but prepared to meet it by strategy\nand force.  Lord Cornwallis was made Viceroy of Ireland, and arrived\nat Dublin in June.  He flattered, he threatened, he cajoled and\nblarneyed, and finally succeeded in raising an army so big that the\nFrench threw away their guns and ran.\n\nThey were all captured, and, I fear, received but scant grace or\nmercy.\n\nThere was still another expedition from France at the same time.  But\nthis was detected and followed.  The French were overhauled at sea,\nand as pretty a pitched battle on a small scale fought as any English\ntar would wish to be engaged in.\n\nWe won.  But, indeed, the weather had severely damaged the French\nfleet before our war-ships took them in hand.\n\nMay the wind and weather always fight for brave Britons hereafter, as\nit has done in days gone by.\n\nBut the French were not content with invading Ireland, for, to tell\nthe truth, Bonaparte had not much faith to place in the fighting\npowers of the Irish while their feet were placed on Irish bog,\nalthough he knew they were splendid soldiers when well commanded.\nBut the French Directory set about planning an invasion of England,\nor some part of Britain, in a fleet of flat-bottomed boats.\n\nThere lies between Cherbourg and Havre a group of small islands that\nSir Sidney Smith had captured, and garrisoned with marines and\nsailors, in 1795.  With thirty well-armed flat-bottoms the French\ntried to regain these, but two of our ships treated them to such a\nhailstorm that they, having just sense enough to get in out of a\nshore, ran into Sallenelle, and stopped for three weeks to repair.\nThen they determined to try again.\n\nSays General Cust: \"The enemy remained here for three weeks, during\nwhich time he received a great accession of troops and forty more\nflat boats, which enabled him again to put to sea and reach\nunobserved the roadstead of La Hague.\"\n\nOn the 6th of May, availing themselves of a calm, which gave them\nsome advantage over sailing vessels, they stood across to attack the\nislands.\n\nAt daybreak next morning the boats, fifty-two in number, rowed up\nwith great resolution to within musket-shot of the batteries, while\nour brigs with their heavy cannon kept up a fire upon them from a\ndistance of 300 or 400 yards.\n\nThe British ships _Adamant_, _Eurydice_, and _Orestes_ were all this\ntime in the offing, but unable, owing to the calm, to get nearer than\nsix miles.  But our lieutenant, Papps Price, who commanded the\ngarrison, loaded to the muzzle with round shot, grape, and canister,\npoured such an iron storm upon the boats that several of them, cut\ninto chips, went down bodily, and those that could float began to\nseek safety in flight.\n\nThe pity was, reader, that the wind wouldn't blow, and let the ships\nup to sink or capture the whole flotilla.\n\nOf course our sailors whistled for the wind, until they nearly\nwhistled the whites of their eyes out, but all in vain.\n\nAnother attempt was to have been made, but at length the whole of the\ngun-boat fleet returned to Cherbourg.\n\nJust as our ministers did this year in which we live,\n1896--ninety-eight years after the flotilla action--when menaced by\nforeign powers, so did the British minister then.  He adopted and\nincreased every means for the defence and security of the British\nshores.  The Alien Bill was also renewed, and a suspension of the\nHabeas Corpus Act carried.  The greatest alacrity was shown among all\nclasses of the British people to confront the menaced assault on\ntheir country.\n\nParty differences were suspended, and the whole kingdom, united in\nheart and hand, rested in firm confidence, that\n\n        \"Nought shall make us rue,\n  If Britain to herself do rest but true.\"\n\n* * * * *\n\nI feel inclined, being a naval sailor myself, to tell you here how a\nFrench fleet sailed under sealed orders, and under Bonaparte for the\nMediterranean, and how they captured Malta: and how Nelson was sent\nafter them; how Napoleon, landed his army in Egypt and captured\nAlexandria, and fought the battle of the Pyramids, near Cairo.\n\nI say I feel inclined to let loose all this history on you, but must\npull myself up with a round turn.\n\nIn one of my other books, I think, I have described Nelson's great\nvictory of the Nile, and so I must refer you to that.\n\nBut, my dear boy-readers, a knowledge of history may well do us much\ngood, and help us to fight for our country in the days to come.\n\nOur Navy is our first defence.  Long may it float supreme!  If so, we\ncan sleep quietly and calmly in our beds at night, and never fear\ninvasion.\n\nThe\n\n  \"Flag that braved a thousand years,\n    The battle and the breeze,\"\n\nshall guard the front gates of our castles and homes, but our forts\nmust not be forgotten.  They are the guards to the back gates, and\nour brave Volunteers are behind them.\n\nThe year 1799 was no less bloody than its predecessor.\n\nThe French and Napoleon became more and more ambitious, France\nforming a cordon of republics on all sides of her, that bade fair to\nput an end for ever to kings and kingdoms, and place in their stead\nrepublics, mob law, and murder.\n\nRussia saw the danger, so did Prussia and Austria, and against the\nlatter, now preparing a great army to recapture, if possible, all it\nhad lost, the French Republic declared war.\n\nA second coalition now threatened France.\n\nThe whole world of Europe was soon in a blaze.  These were, indeed,\nthe dashing days of old, and yet we do not want them to return.  For,\nas my dear old grandfather used to say:\n\n  \"War is a terrible, terrible thing!\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII.\n\n  GRANDFATHER GOES ON FURLOUGH--A CHANGE AND MANY\n  A CHANGE--POOR LITTLE RACHEL--BATTLE OF\n  ALEXANDRIA--THE GALLANT 42ND--NIGHTFALL ON THE\n  FIELD OF BATTLE.\n\nLate in the year 1800, or early in January, 1801, my grandfather's\ncompany were doing duty in Dublin.\n\nHe had behaved so entirely to the satisfaction of his officers and\ncolonel, that when a longing came over him to behold once more the\nscenes of his boyhood, a furlough was at once granted to him, and, in\na sailing packet, stormy and cold though the weather was, he left\nDublin for Glasgow.  The wind was favourable, though high, and in\nlittle more than two days he landed at his destination.\n\nThe coach road to Edinburgh was clear, and he was lucky enough to\nfind a ship just starting for Inverness.  He stopped for nothing, but\nhurried on board.  He was a good sailor now, but, moreover, he was\nlucky in getting a good ship; and so, on the 10th of January, he\nfound himself again in Inverness.  Every street, almost every house,\nbrought back to his mind recollections of his former life, and days\nof his boyhood.  'T was but a short time ago, after all, for he was\nnow but twenty-one.  But there were changes, and some were sad enough.\n\nNaturally he bent his steps towards the house of his old friend,\nCraig, the staymaker.\n\nHe found it deserted, and the windows boarded up.\n\nHe entered a shop close by, to make enquiries.\n\nThe people had only recently arrived from the south.\n\nBut a woman was there shopping.\n\n\"I knew the Craigs well,\" she said.  \"Indeed, indeed, the pair of\nstays I'm wearing at this very moment was made by the old man\nhimself.\"\n\n\"And where have they gone?\"\n\n\"O, dead and buried years and years ago.  Old folks, you know.  A\npound of sugar, Mr. McDonald.\"\n\nMy grandfather thanked her, and walked away, somewhat saddened by the\nbrief interview.\n\nHe walked out now towards the river, and down along its bonnie banks,\nthat were green even now, though away on the mountains the snow lay\nthick and white.\n\nYes, there was the Lodge.  The house itself was looking much the\nsame, but the gardens were ill-kept, and it was evident, from the\ndrawn blinds, that the Frasers had left.\n\nHe had had no intention, at any rate, to call, but the deaf old\ngardener was leaning over the gate, and him he addressed.\n\n\"You don't remember me?\"\n\n\"No, no, not at all.  You're a bonnie man yoursel', but she doesna\nlike a red-coat.\"\n\n\"And where have the Frasers gone?\"\n\n\"Eh?  What?  O, ay, the Frasers.  Well, ochone! the bonnie leddie is\ndead and away.  And the captain is gone to the wars.  They tell me he\nhas gone to fight for Charlie.  Heigho! it will be bonnie days when\nthe old Stuarts get their own.\"\n\nMy grandfather smiled.  This, then, was all that this poor dottled\ngardener knew about the wars that were then shaking the world to its\nsocial foundation.\n\nHe knew what a shilling was, though.\n\nNow this old man was seventy if a day, but when my grandfather held\nout that shilling he drew back with a start.\n\n\"She'll no' touch it,\" he cried.  \"You'll be wanting me to enlist to\nfight for George.  Na, na, she'd maype fight for Sharlie Stuart, but\nnot for George, no, no, no.\"\n\n  \"He would have taken half a crown, though,\n  But had to be content with 'saxpence.'\"\n\n\nGrandfather started off now to walk to Beauly.\n\nThere were no leaves upon the birchen trees.  The heather was brown,\nthe brachens withered, the voice of song-birds was no longer heard in\nthe woods, only, across the dark waters of the Firth, the white gulls\nskimmed and screamed.  Yet, desolate though the scene was, it cast\nnot a shade of gloom on the young soldier's heart.  It was _home_.\nAnd\n\n  \"Hame is hame, howe'er sae hamely.\"\n\n* * * * *\n\nHe remembered, now, the fisherman's little cottage.  Ah! that must be\nvisited.  So down he went towards the beach.  Yes, yonder stood the\nlittle cot.  But it was roofless and still.  Only the sea winds\nmoaned around its deserted walls.\n\nBefore he reached Beauly he passed the very spot where, years ago, he\nhad knelt in prayer.  Someone unseen seemed to beckon him there to\npray again, and willingly he obeyed.\n\nHe had much to be thankful for, and thankful he was, just pouring out\nhis heart silently before the Unseen God, and praying that, as he had\nhitherto been mercifully preserved, the same kind Father would\nthenceforth keep his eyes from tears, and his feet from falling.\n\nWell, poor young fellow, he needed some consolation; for, on calling\nat the little inn at Beauly, where he had been a prisoner, he found\nEllen, but little changed.\n\nThey talked away right merrily for a time, till at last she asked:\n\n\"Does your people know you are coming?\"\n\n\"No, Ellen; I want to give them a happy surprise.\"\n\n\"I suppose you know your old dominie has left and gone to Glasgow?\"\n\n\"No--o--o; that is news indeed.  And Rachel, she----\"\n\n\"Ah! yes; your little sweetheart, she is dead and gone.\"\n\nGrandfather felt as if a shot had struck him.  He reeled and\nstaggered backward into a chair.  Ellen was shocked at her own\nrashness.  She put her arms around his neck as if he were still a boy.\n\n\"Poor Ian, poor Ian.  Oh, I didn't know you loved her so much.\"\n\nHe dashed away the tears, and rose slowly from his seat.  The sudden\nnews was, indeed, a shock to him, and one from which he did not\nrecover for weeks.\n\n* * * * *\n\nShould I apologise, my dear boy and girl readers, for thus letting\nour little heroine Rachel die?  I think not.  Because you must\nremember that the story I am writing is not mere fiction.  You will,\ndoubtless, believe me when I say that I am more sorry than anyone\nelse could be.  An author ever loves his heroines as well as his\nheroes.\n\nSorrow for the dead is a grief--a chastening grief--for which there\nis no antidote in life, save time, that levels all things.\n\nJohn Robertson went sorrowfully, sadly up the hill.  He took out\nRachel's little letter from its case, and read it over again once\nmore.  The sight of that little four-bladed clover, that his\nchild-sweetheart had given him, brought tears to his eyes once more.\nHe replaced it in his bosom.\n\n\"Yes,\" he told himself, \"I will always keep it there.\"\n\nAt a distance he saw the little school and schoolhouse, ay, and even\nthe peat-stack from which little Rachel had waved him adieu.\n\nBut a new dominie taught and tawsed the boys there now, and he\nwouldn't have gone near it for the world.\n\nHe went on and up the brae.\n\nA collie dog came running down to accost the strange soldier.  It was\nDash, somewhat hoarse and stiff with age.\n\nWould the dog know him?\n\nHe did.  His barking was changed to cries of joy as he jumped and\nplayed around our hero.  In fact, Dash, for the time being, hardly\nknew what to do with himself, or how to behave.\n\nBut a happy thought seemed suddenly to occur to him, and off he went\ntrotting into the house, and, in his own way, conveyed to the young\nsoldier's parents the news that Ian, his master, had returned.\n\nBoth ran out to meet him.\n\nNo--I shall skip the description.  Suffice it to say that Ian's\nmother wept for joy.\n\n\"Ah! but they were not to have me long,\" said my grandfather, as he\ntold me of this joyful meeting, \"for in three days' time the runner\nfrom Beauly brought me a letter, laddie, on the King's service.  I\nwas told thereby that I must join my regiment at once, for it was\nordered on foreign service.\"\n\nSo away went my soldier grandfather.\n\nWould he ever see his parents again?  That was a question none could\nanswer.\n\nIt is well at times we are not permitted to look into the future.\n\nThe present alone is ours.  The past is no more.  Our futures are\nwith God.\n\nMy grandfather joined his company.  His company joined his regiment;\nand by the 1st of March, 1801, they landed with others, under Sir\nRalph Abercromby, at Aboukir Bay, or, rather, they reached the bay.\n\nIt was a pity for Britain, and a pity and even disgrace for the\nBritish Navy, that Napoleon was ever allowed to leave Egypt.  But he\nhad escaped, and had been lucky enough not to meet a British ship on\nhis way to Corsica.\n\nWhen we landed at Aboukir Bay, it had been arranged that we were to\nbe supported by Turkish troops from Syria, as well as by a division\nof British and Indian troops.  But both were late, and Sir Ralph,\nwith his army of seventeen thousand, began the fun, as our soldiers\ntermed it, all alone.\n\nNow, the French general had no less than twenty-seven thousand troops\nat Cairo.  He lacked courage and dash, however, and only sent\ndetachments, which were speedily placed _hors de combat_ before our\ngallant fellows.\n\nOne cannot help feeling a little sorry at the mistakes of even one's\nenemies.  Why, we cannot help asking, did not the French general\nconcentrate?\n\nHad he done so, he would have had some chance of victory, but he\nwould have been defeated just the same, and there would have been all\nthe more honour and glory for our country.\n\nI remember, boys, right well, how my dear Auld-da's description of\nthis glorious fight stirred my young blood as I sat by his knee one\nwinter's evening, and watched his face.\n\n\"I recollect,\" he said, \"that 7th day of March as if it were but\nyesterday.\n\n\"We were all in fine fighting form, so Captain, now Major, Drake told\nme, as I stood beside him, gazing landwards over the bulwarks, while\nthe sun sank slowly towards the blue sea.\n\n\"'Ah, Sergeant, my boy,' he said, laughing, and rubbing his hands,\n'we're going to have a touch of the real thing to-morrow.'\n\n\"'Sure and we are,' put in O'Reilly, 'and it is myself that wishes it\nwere only to-night.  What an Irishman can't stand is the waiting for\nit.'\n\n\"Big Dr. McLeod was there also, towering like a giant in his might\nabove them all.  Near him stood little Blood and dashing Jones--quite\na muster of officers, and all as merry as May bees.\n\n\"'Yes, it's going to be to-morrow morning, Sergeant,' said the\nsurgeon, 'and I hope your cheese-knife is ready and sharp enough to\ncut a head off.  I'm going to sharpen my sword, and my gum-lancet\ntoo, and do my duty among you to the end of the chapter.'\n\n\"'I wonder,' said little Blood, drawing himself up to his full\nheight, which wasn't much, 'if there is a man in our gallant regiment\nwhose blood does not thrill as he looks around him here this night,\nand remembers that we are anchored in the very bay where Nelson\nfought the battle of the Nile?'\n\n\"'Go it, Blood,' cried O'Reilly, 'I like to hear you talk.  It sort\no' strengthens one's nerves.'\n\n\"'I'll go bound for it,' said Drake, 'that Blood will fight to-morrow\nas well as he talks to-night.  Sergeant Robertson,' he continued,\n'I'll keep my eye on you to-morrow too, if I can open it, just to see\nhow well a young Highlander can fight.'\"\n\n\"And were you afraid, Auld-da?\" I asked.\n\n\"Well, no, laddie, I can't say I was, and I remember thinking to\nmyself it was odd that I wasn't.  I slept soundly enough, for I had\nturned in early.\n\n\"We had a hurried breakfast, boy, and the boats were called away\nbefore it was light.  We embarked with as little noise as possible.\nNot that this mattered much.  But the sun had not even risen, though\nhis beams were reddening the long low clouds that lay along the\neastern horizon.\n\n\"What a dash that was for the shore!  Five thousand strong we were.\nThat was all, but we were called the flower of Sir Ralph Abercromby's\nlittle army.\n\n\"I remember the even-down and regular plash with which our oars took\nthe water, and how the boats, almost without hitch, darted shorewards.\n\n\"I remember the wild cheer with which we started, and something else\nas well, for among the first five thousand troops landed were the\n42nd Highlanders.  I was in flank a boat, and coming from one near\nme, I heard a voice I knew right well.\n\n\"'Hurro!  Preen Mhor, here we are again.  See you later on, when we\nlick the Froggies.'\n\n\"And this, as you will guess, was none else than brave Tom Grahame.\nI could not help lifting my cap, and waving it over my head, for the\ndear fellow's voice quite cheered me.\n\n\"'Shoulder to shoulder, Tom,' I cried, in Gaelic, and more than Tom\nraised a cheer at these words, which, you must know, dear laddie,\nform one of the mottoes of our fighting Scottish soldiers all the\nwide world over.\n\n\"If I had felt fear before, boy, Tom's brave Highland voice would\nhave banished it all.\n\n\"But presently every thought was concentrated on the shore, for\nsuddenly puffs of white smoke, balloon-shaped, and with wicked\ntongues of fire, rolled up from Aboukir Castle, and from the French\nartillery posted on the hill.\n\n\"Not a shot was returned, although the cannon-balls tore up the\nwater, and the grape pattered like hailstones around us.  I saw a\nshot alight close to Tom's boat and envelop it in white spray.  I\nfelt my heart leap with anxiety, but next moment I saw my friend's\nred face once more, and I thanked God.\n\n\"No, laddie, I never feared for myself that day.  I was but a humble\nsergeant, but I think I did my duty beside my men.\n\n\"Our leader was General (afterwards Sir John) Moore, and bravely\nindeed did he lead us on.\n\n\"It was a tough climb up that sandy hill, and almost too much for\nsome of our younger English lads.\n\n\"On and on we pushed, keeping well in line.  I saw Drake with his\nsword drawn in front, cheering, as he pointed to the heights.\n\n\"Next moment a round shot tore up the ground in front, and he fell.\nI was the first on the spot, my laddie, and glad I was to help my\nfriend to his feet.  He was unwounded, and we climbed the hill\ntogether.\n\n\"The French general had brought ten or maybe twelve thousand men to\nmeet us.  But so irresistible was our dash that we mowed them down\nbefore us, and they fled like chaff before the wind.  I think I hear\nour slogans yet.  I think I see the darting bayonets, the clash of\nsword and sabre, and the round sun looking down on the carnage, lurid\nand red in the rolling smoke of battle.\"\n\n\"And the French ran away, Auld-da?\"\n\n\"It was more than a mere retreat, laddie; they fled helter-skelter,\nwith the fear of death at their hearts, blocking the narrow roads\nthat led to Alexandria.\n\n\"There were many dead and wounded among our ranks, however.  It is\nalways thus.  In war, my boy, victory has ever to be paid for in\nblood.\n\n\"Among the numerous daring deeds done that day I must mention one,\nfor it came under my own observation.\n\n\"Dr. McLeod, our splendid and spirited surgeon, had followed his\ncompany closely, and did his duty well.  But in the very heat of the\nbattle he had spied brave little Blood hurled beneath a carriage with\nthe ram-rod of the huge gun.  Next moment the wounded officer would\nhave been sabred, had not the giant--bare-headed, and with blood\nstreaming from his brow, that is how I can see him even at this\nmoment in the peat-fire there, laddie--rushed to his rescue.  Man\nafter man went down before the fury of this giant's attack.  Next\nminute he was bearing the insensible form of the tiny officer\ntriumphantly to the rear.\n\n\"He had hoisted him on his shoulder just as he had hoisted me as a\nboy, on the night I danced the hornpipe on the dinner-table.\n\n\"Blood looked dead enough.  But I may tell you he survived, and the\nsurgeon's wound, though it looked bad enough, did not keep him from\nduty.\n\n\"I saw the doctor that night, as I passed through the battle-field to\nvisit Tom Grahame, and asked for Blood.\n\n\"'He'll live, Sergeant, he'll live, and the Lord be praised, for, if\nyou'll remember, I pitched him through a window once in Edinburgh\nCastle, and now we're square, for I think I've saved his life.'\n\n\"Tom Grahame and I had a long talk together about olden times, my\nboy, but I went back early, and slept soundly on the battle-field\namong the falling dew.\n\n\"One of the events of that battle morning had been a charge of French\ncavalry, but this we had staved off by forming a rallying-square, and\nwe soon emptied their saddles for them.\n\n\"I often think,\" continued Auld-da, \"that we might have followed up\nour victory even on the 8th.  But then the gallant Moore, no doubt,\nknew better.  We were but a small force, and in warfare, although\nmuch may be done by dash and daring, the true general will always use\nprecaution.\n\n\"We kept the ground we had taken until the 12th, when all the rest of\nour men and stores being now landed, we were ordered to march.\n\n  \"'March to the battle-field,\n  The foe is on before you.'\n\nYou mind that old song, laddie?  Well the foe really was on before us\nthat day.\"\n\n\"Ah, yes, Auld-da, because you'd driven him on.\"\n\n\"That's it, laddie, that's it.  But then, you know,\" he added with a\nsmile, \"they were only Frenchmen; and frogs are not much to fight\nupon.\n\n\"We were off for Alexandria itself.\n\n\"On the 13th I heard firing, and was told by O'Reilly that we might\nbe wanted at any moment.\n\n\"But we were not.  The 90th and 92nd (Highlanders) had had a tough\nbrush with the enemy, and driven him in, that was all.\n\n\"The real battle had to come.  I think, laddie, we were eighteen or\nnineteen regiments strong.*  But for seven weary days, boy, we lay\ninactive.  The French position was terribly strong, and they were\nbeing reinforced.\n\n\n* General Cust speaks thus concerning the disposition of our\nforces:--\"The army took up a position on the skirt of a sandy\nplain--within sight of the great Egyptian city, the lake of Aboukir\non the left, and the sea on the right.  The 42nd occupied an eminence\nclose to the sea-shore.  From right to left the regiments ranked\nthus--In the first line 58th, 42nd, 40th, Guards, Royals, 92nd, 54th,\n8th, 18th, 90th, and 13th.  In the second line, Minorca regiment, De\nRolle's, Dillon's, the Queen's, 44th, 89th, 130th, 22nd, and 29th\nDragoons, the 27th, 50th, and 79th.  The French occupied a parallel\nposition on a ridge of hills, their centre protected by Fort Cretin,\ntheir right extending to Pompey's Pillar, and their left to\nCleopatra's Needle.\"\n\n\n\"But early on the morning of the 21st, dear laddie, much to the joy\nof O'Reilly, at all events, the silence was broken on the French side\nby the roar of cannon.  It was so early, that when we got the order\nto advance, darkness still prevailed, lit up, every now and then, by\nthe brilliant flashes of the enemy's guns.\n\n\"It is said that the 42nd were first to the front, and that their\nsteady fire checked, for a time, the fury of the advancing French.  I\nonly know my own part, and that I was far too busy to think of\nanything but my own men, many of whom went down before the storm of\niron hail.\n\n\"The most awful charge of the day was that by the French Invincibles.\nIt was furious in the extreme, laddie.  But bravely did we receive\nit, and fearful indeed was the carnage.\n\n\"Indeed this French Legion was all but annihilated.\n\n\"Nothing, I think, but the individual coolness of our regiments\nenabled us to hold our own and defeat the foe.\n\n\"But while the Invincibles littered the ground with their dead and\ntheir bleeding wounded, and finally laid down their arms and\nsurrendered, fresh French troops were being hurled against us, and\nfor a time victory wavered in the balance.\n\n\"The charge and charges of the 42nd were grand in the extreme.  They\nwere led on by brave Moore, and their wild slogan could be heard from\nend to end of the battle-field, high above the rattle of musketry and\nshouting of other combatants.\n\n\"And, laddie, there was the skirl of the bagpipes as well: that\nmartial music, that never fails to steel the hearts of our Scottish\nsoldiers on the day of battle.\n\n\"But the 42nd suffered terribly.  As theirs was the first charge,\nladdie, so theirs, aided by the brigade brought up by Stewart, was\nthe last.\n\n\"The sons of Caledonia had won a glorious fight, and no prouder name\nis attached to their standard than 'Alexandria.'\n\n\"In this battle, boy, fell the gallant Sir Ralph, and much indeed was\nhis loss deplored.\n\n\"One more strange adventure did I myself have on this day, and this I\nmust tell you, laddie, ere you go.\n\n\"I was looking for our wounded in company with brave Surgeon McLeod.\nLooking for the wounded we were, and sometimes bending down to close\nthe eyes of the dead.\"\n\nThe old man paused a moment.\n\n\"O, such ghastly sights, boy,\" he said, \"may you never, never\nwitness!  Even the dead sat or lay in such strange positions that\noften one could scarcely believe that life was extinct.\n\n\"Then the pitiable condition of the dying and the wounded, the\nmoaning, the groaning, the maudlin cries, and the mournful appeals\nfor water.\n\n\"But of this last there was, alas! scarcely enough to wet the throats\nof those who needed it most.\n\n\"Every now and then the flapping of hideous wings overhead would be\nheard, and we could tell that the birds of prey had already commenced\ntheir ghastly work.\n\n\"I had left the doctor for a few minutes, and was among the hillocks\nwhere the French dead lay side-to-side with the kilted warriors of\nthe north, as some poet called them.\n\n\"Morning was already beginning to break, and things were, dimly seen.\nAcross the eastern horizon were spread the first rose-tints of dawn.\nI had my hand to my eyes to hide some ghastly sight, when I could\ndistinctly hear my name called, but in tones so faint and low that at\nfirst I could not tell whence the sound proceeded.\n\n\"'Ian Robertson.  Ian, Ian.'\n\n\"My heart beat tumultuously.  The voice, I thought, must be that of\nTom Grahame.\n\n\"'Ian, it is I.  Come.'\n\n\"A figure half-raised itself from a hole in the sand.\n\n\"I saw at a glance, now, it was none other than my cousin, Captain\nFraser.\n\n\"He was dying, that was evident.\n\n\"'Have you--water?' he gasped.\n\n\"I knelt down, and he drank from my canteen, and seemed to revive\njust a little.\n\n\"'Ian, I--I--used you badly--unfairly.  You can pardon a dying man?'\n\n\"'Don't name it, dear cousin.  Nor are you dying.  I will get\nassistance at once.'\n\n\"'Too late--listen.  Have me carried away--when all is over.  Give\nthe letter to--my little daughter, Ailie.  How dark it is--how\ndark--God bless you--dark, dark!'\n\n\"Ay, it was the darkness of death, laddie.\n\n\"I closed his eyes, and stretched his limbs.\n\n\"Poor Fraser, my kinsman.  He had his faults, but he meant well,\nladdie, and he died a hero's death.\"\n\n* * * * *\n\n  \"When wild war's deadly blast was blawn,\n    And gentle peace returning,\n  Wi' mony a sweet babe fatherless,\n    And mony a widow mourning;\n  I left the lines and tented field,\n    Where lang I'd been a lodger,\n  My humble knapsack a' my wealth,\n    A poor and honest sodger.\"\n\n\nWe had re-conquered Egypt then, reader, and the French.  Right\nbravely had our soldiers done their work, and Britain borne the brunt\nin the terrible struggle that convulsed Europe.\n\nNegotiations for peace were then entered into at London and were\nsigned early in the year 1802.\n\nNapoleon was now First Consul of France and President of Italy.\n\nIt was about this time, and for his gallantry in action, that my\ngrandfather was made colour-sergeant.  It is a question whether he\nwas not as proud of his promotion as Napoleon was of his.  I am\ncertain of one thing: he had more right to be.\n\nWell, peace had come.\n\nQuery: How long would it last?\n\n\n\n\nBook III.\n\nFrom War to Gentle Peace.\n\n\n\nBook III.\n\n_FROM WAR TO GENTLE PEACE._\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I.\n\n  THE DUKE OF KENT AS GRANDFATHER KNEW HIM--DISCIPLINE\n  AND THE LASH IN THE BRAVE DAYS OF OLD--TONAL'S\n  DILEMMA, AND HOW HE GOT OUT OF IT.\n\nA beautiful village on the eastern shores of Kent, a village that\npartly and chiefly went straggling up a little cosy dingle or dell,\nand partly rested on two high cliffs that--one especially--descended\nsheer down towards the dark and heaving ocean, which in stormy\nweather spent its fury against its sides: such was Ramsgate in the\nearly part of this century.\n\nThere were churches on the cliffs and in the hollow; there was also a\nnaval outlook or coastguard station; and there were barracks for\nsoldiers.  A bracing town then as now.  Perhaps even more so, for it\nwas hardly in those days a sea-side watering-place.  There were no\nnoisy trains, no factories worth the name, few vessels in the harbour\nsave those of fisher-folks, and far less bustle and stir.  In fact a\nkind of Sabbath-calm rested here eternally.  To be sure, the coming\nand going of the soldiers occasioned a little excitement, so did the\narrival of a man-o'-war, especially if she stayed long enough to give\nthe sailors a spell on shore.  Then, indeed, the peace was broken in\nmore ways than one.  For Jack and Tommy Atkins might be seen linking\narm in arm along the street, or streets, singing together, drinking\ntogether, and, alas! often fighting together.  In this latter upshot\nthe Jacks generally, if not invariably, had the best of it.\n\nI do not mean to say that a sailor is, on the whole, braver than a\nsoldier, but in times of peace he probably is, for then Tommy Atkins\nrests at home--languishes in barracks, let us say--while Jack is ever\nfacing danger and death afloat on the ocean wave.\n\nIt was in the autumn of 1801 that my grandfather, with his regiment,\nor a portion of it, lay here, and just about this time his Royal\nHighness the Duke of Kent took the command of the Royals, _vice_ Lord\nAdam Gordon, D.D.*\n\n\n* \"D.D.\" in this case does not mean Doctor of Divinity, but\nDischarged Dead.\n\n\nThe Duke was, it must be remembered, the father of our good and\nillustrious Queen Victoria.\n\nIt was here at Ramsgate that my grand-dad first had the honour of\ncoming under his Royal Highness's notice, and was taken on his staff.\n\nIn those days the pay of a company passed through the captain\nthereof, but this had fallen into my grandfather's hands in the\nfollowing way: He was possessed of a little money, and this, or a\nportion of it, he had lent to his captain.  He never got it back, for\nthe officer was impecunious, but he had the pay of the company turned\nover to him, and in those days in foreign lands the men were paid in\nthe coin of the country in which they served.  A captain therefore,\nin paying his men, had usually some pickings left for himself, as\nEnglish coin was more valuable than foreign.\n\nIt was--I may say it.  I trust, without appearing boastful--my\ngrandfather's smartness, sobriety, strict attention to duty and\ndiscipline, and his love of order and cleanliness, that first\nattracted the notice of the Duke, and that his Grace was pleased with\nhim goes without saying.\n\nFrom my grand-dad's account of him, the Duke was a noble-looking man,\na capital soldier, and a most rigid disciplinarian, but withal most\nhumane and kindly, not only to every officer and man under him, but\nto every animal as well.\n\nThe Duke was never known to tread upon a worm; this is not\nfigurative, but simply the truth.\n\nDrake and O'Reilly used to go shooting sea-birds, and brought home\nthe spoils of sport--as they facetiously called the beautiful dead.\n\n\"How came it here?  Who so cruel as shoot it?\"  The speaker was the\nDuke.  He had picked up a lovely gull, its feathers dyed in blood,\nits breast still warm.\n\n\"I'm afraid I did, sorr,\" said O'Reilly, walking up and saluting his\nRoyal Highness.\n\n\"Sir, this is not sport--it is murder!\"\n\nThe Duke turned on his heel and walked away.\n\nThere were no more gulls killed on the cliffs by the officers of the\nRoyals.\n\n* * * * *\n\nThe following anecdote of the Duke's kind-heartedness was believed in\nthe sergeants' mess.  It is possibly true; I cannot say farther.\n\nHowever, as the story goes, the Duke of Kent one day called a\nsergeant towards him, while walking on the square or parade.\n\n\"Sergeant,\" he said, \"I have several times noticed lights in the\nmen's quarters, even at midnight.  What is the meaning of it?\"\n\n\"I beg your pardon, your Royal Highness, but the men occasionally\nlight a clip to hunt for fleas.\"\n\n\"What are they, Sergeant?\"\n\n\"Little animals, sir, that haunt the rooms, and bite.\"\n\n\"Not--eh--bats, Sergeant?\"\n\n\"No, sir.\"\n\n\"Bring me one to look at.\"\n\nUnfortunately a _pulex irritans_ was not difficult to find, for the\nlittle blood-sucker was a plague in the barracks.\n\nThe sergeant rolled the specimen with a wetted finger to make it lie\nstill for the Duke's inspection.\n\nHis Royal Highness turned it over once or twice with his finger,\nthen--\n\n\"Poor little fellow! poor little fellow!\" he said; \"he is still\nalive.  Put him up; put him up.\"\n\nAnd the sergeant, accustomed to obey carefully, returned the flea to\nthe soldier's bed.\n\n* * * * *\n\nWell, the Duke was a very strict disciplinarian, but I doubt if he\nwas ever really cruel.\n\nDiscipline had to be strict in those old days, in the army as well as\nin the navy.  The men were, as a rule, a rough and careless lot, and\nas they took almost every opportunity of drinking that they could\nfind, it is no wonder that they needed careful handling at times.\nBut when it is remembered that in drinking they were only taking\nexample from the officers who led them, it will be admitted that the\npunishment for intoxication was sometimes cruel in the extreme.\n\nAn officer before whom a man might be brought up of a morning,\ncharged with drunkenness, might not himself be sober.  Yet he would\norder that man to the halberts to be flogged, then wend his way\nunsteadily to his mess.\n\nThe punishment was a fearful one.  Three hundred lashes were\nsometimes given for insubordination, after which the unfortunate\nfellow would be handed over to the surgeon, more dead than alive.  An\noffender would sometimes faint under the punishment.  If the doctor\nadvanced, the officer might say, \"Stand back, Doctor, please.  We'll\nflog the faint out of him.\"\n\nIt was not uncommon for a man to die after such brutal\npunishment--sometimes, I am sorry to add, by his own hand.\n\nEven sergeants, at certain times, had power to order a man to be\nflogged.\n\nMalingering, that is, pretending to be sick in order to procure a\ndischarge from the service, was rife at this time.\n\nSome strange stories could be told concerning this.  A man, for\nexample, pretended to be paralysed.  The surgeon pronounced him a\nmalingerer.  The captain doubted the doctor's diagnosis.\n\n\"And I'll prove it to you, McLeod,\" said the officer.\n\n\"How, sir?\"\n\n\"Well, that man is one of the finest swimmers in the regiment.  We\nshall take him out to sea and drop him into deep water.  He'll\nquickly strike out to save himself.\"\n\nThis was really done.  The man perhaps preferred death to the\npunishment he knew he would receive if he moved a limb, which he did\nnot.  He sank like a stone, and it was with some difficulty that his\nlife was saved.\n\nHe was discharged, and that same evening recovered the use of his\nlimbs sufficiently to walk, or rather stagger about the streets, for\nhe was not sober.\n\n* * * * *\n\nA man was brought before O'Reilly, charged with being a malingerer.\nHe was apparently as deaf as a post, and Dr. McLeod only suspected,\nbut could not swear he was shamming.\n\nO'Reilly cleverly made assurance doubly sure.  \"How long have you\nbeen like this, my poor fellow?\" he whispered by his ear.\n\n\"More than a fortnight, sir,\" said the man, completely taken off his\nguard.\n\n\"Then I'm glad you're better, poor fellow.  Twelve dozen at the\nhalberts and a week in the black-hole will complete the cure.\nSergeant Robertson, see to this.\"\n\nJust one other case.  This was feigned paralysis of the right arm.\nIncredible as it may seem, the man was hoisted off his feet by the\nleft hand, and flogged in this position, without even moving the\nright arm.\n\n\"That will stimulate the system,\" said O'Reilly, who was convinced\nthe fellow was shamming.  \"Bring him up in ten days' time, Sergeant,\nif not better, and we will give him three hundred.\"\n\nNext day this man came to my grandfather.\n\n\"See what I can do, Sergeant,\" he said, lifting the \"paralysed arm\"\nabout a foot from his side.\n\nHe was sent to duty next day.\n\nThere was in another regiment, the 54th, if I remember rightly, a man\nflogged terribly for being intoxicated and riotous, although his\ncharacter for ten years was all that could be desired.  He was a\nstrong, robust man, and bore his punishment well, though his back was\nslashed and bleeding.\n\nThe colonel* was considered by the men--and with some just cause,\nperhaps--to be tyrannical.\n\n\n* Hay was, I think, the officer's name.\n\n\nAnyhow, no sooner had this man been released, than he snatched up a\nlarge cannon-ball from a pyramid near by, and hurled it with fearful\nforce at the colonel's head.\n\nThe escape was a narrow one, for the missile grazed his cheek.\n\n\"Your musket!  Your musket!\" cried the colonel, springing towards the\nsentry.\n\nThe sentry, out of humanity, dared to disobey.  But without doubt,\nhad he given the musket up, the colonel would have shot the culprit\non the spot.\n\nHe cooled down almost immediately.\n\nBut, addressing the man as calmly as he could, \"I'll send you where\nyou'll never see England again,\" he said.\n\nThe man was banished to India, sent to what the soldiers called the\nRogues' Regiment.\n\nHe was married and had two children, and the parting from those dear\nones, whom he ne'er should see again, was said to be sad in the\nextreme.\n\nFlogging, on a very extensive scale indeed, was to have been carried\nout once upon a time.  The weather was very hot, the regiment abroad.\nThe company who disobeyed orders had been ordered to parade in heavy\nmarching order.  But they had cut their blankets, retaining only a\nsmall portion to protrude during inspection.  The fraud was\ndiscovered at night, and so incensed was the colonel that he\nthreatened to flog the whole company next morning.\n\nBut far too early for the punishment to be carried out the French\nattacked them.\n\nAt a most critical moment the company stopped and refused to advance.\n\n\"Three cheers for the colonel and the blankets,\" cried a voice in\ntheir midst.\n\nThe colonel rode back.  He was pale as death.\n\n\"For Heaven's sake, my brave fellows, come on.  You shall never hear\nabout the blankets again.\"\n\nThen there was a shout and a cheer of a different sort, and on they\ndashed with a vim and vigour that turned the scale of victory.\n\nI think this proves that officers may easily be merciful as well as\njust.\n\n* * * * *\n\nPoor Dominie Freeschal, of the school on the Braes, might, if he were\nliving in our time, set up a college for preparing young officers for\nthe army.  At least three of his pupils did well as soldiers, my dear\ngrand-dad, honest Tom Grahame, and Touvil, the boy who assisted at\nthat dark orgie in the Highland forest, when the dominie's tawse was\ncommitted to the flames.\n\nHe rose as he had hoped, and as he said he was determined to do, to\nthe leadership of his regiment's band.\n\nHe was transferred into the Royals, on a vacancy occurring in the\nbrigade to which my grandfather belonged, and glad indeed were the\ntwo old schoolfellows to meet again once more.\n\n\"Indeed, Ian,\" he said--\"or is it John I must be calling you now?--I\nmanaged my own transferment.  I'll tell you more about that same\nagain, but it was all through my love and regard for my old\nschoolfellow, Ian Robertson.\"\n\nFrom that day forward Tonal and John continued to be fast friends and\ncompanions.\n\nIt was about this time that the event occurred that led my\ngrandfather ever after to say, and with truthfulness too, that the\nQueen's father had saved his life.\n\nA detachment of the Royals was ordered abroad for foreign\nservice--out west, to America, I think.  The names of the officers\nand non-commissioned officers had to be previously submitted to the\nDuke of Kent, for his sanction.\n\nAs soon as his eye caught sight of my grand-dad's name, he drew his\npen through it.\n\n\"No!\" he said; \"he is much too good a man to lose.\"\n\nThe vessel grandfather ought to have sailed in had not gone far\nbefore she encountered a terrible gale off the coast.  She was driven\non the rocks on a lee shore, stove, and sunk in a few minutes.\n\n_Not a soldier or sailor was saved._\n\nTonal became a great favourite with all the officers, especially with\nthose of the company to which my grandfather belonged.\n\nHe was an excellent piper, and though it was not his duty to play at\nall, he often did so at the mess, and this greatly delighted the\nScottish element, especially the honest giant, Dr. McLeod.\n\nNow Tonal was a strict \"Auld Kirk,\" and if he did deign at times to\nenter the portals of an English church, it was only because he was\nobliged to.\n\nOne day a dignitary of the Church sent to beg assistance.  The organ\nwas out of order, and there would be no music for some weeks unless\nthe band of the Royals could kindly condescend to conduct it.\n\nTonal was thunderstruck.  He would have to rehearse for the occasion,\nand he would have to obey orders.  He was in despair.\n\n\"Och!\" he told McLeod mournfully, \"it is only half-papists they are\nanyhow, and sure if my poor mother, rest her soul, knew I'd be\nplaying to them, it's her ghost that would rise and come all the way\nfrom the old kirkyard of R---- to haunt me.\"\n\nMcLeod himself was a member of the Church of Scotland, so he felt\nsorry for Tonal.\n\nHe pondered over it, and he consulted some other members of the mess,\nand at last they got up a conspiracy.\n\nI have no desire to defend the conspirators, reader; I but record\n_facts_.\n\nTonal was delighted when the plan was laid before him.\n\nThere were more people that first Sunday than usual.  The band was a\ngreat attraction.  Perhaps some of them would have stayed away had\nthey known what was to transpire.\n\nHowever, everything went well till the time of departure, when\nsomething soft and low ought to have been played as the people rose\nto leave the church.\n\nNow I do not myself know a more emphatic, more merry, or\nblood-stirring strathspey to dance to than the old air called \"The\nMiller o' Drone,\" if given with a good bass and a touch of the drum.\nIn its very gleefulness you can hear in every bar the thud, thud, of\nthe jolly old mill as the air runs merrily on.\n\nMy readers may judge of the consternation of the parson and people\nwhen the band struck up the grand old tune as they rose to go.\n\nIt was played with vim, and vigour too, to the very last note.  For\nTonal was on his mettle.\n\nI need hardly tell you that the band was never again requested to\nofficiate.\n\nBut Tonal was more a hero in the mess than ever.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II.\n\n  AWFUL CONDITION OF GIB--GRANDFATHER STABBED--A\n  VENDETTA--THE DUKE WAS THE BEST-HATED MAN ON\n  THE ROCK.\n\nThe scene of our story shifts away now to a far-off land.\n\nIn imagination I walk or wander with my gallant grandfather from\npoint to point of the most famous rock that history can boast of.  It\nis almost the first name that a child learns to lisp at school, when\ncommencing to learn geography, and has been so for the last hundred\nyears.\n\nPersonally speaking, when I myself first visited it, many years ago,\nI was astonished at everything I saw around me and above me.  I had\nbeen taught to believe that it was but a lonesome rock, like a lion\ncouchant, almost isolated from everything worth beholding; a rock\nthat, though armed, was of no use to us, but only held in a spirit of\nbravado, a kind of clenched fist held up as a menace before the face\nof any or every other nation in the world, a John Bull fist, a\nBritish fist, saying as well as words could express it:\n\n\"Here I am, and I've come to stay, and the fate of the foe that would\ndare to face me is a foregone conclusion.\"\n\nBut I did not quite understand this.  We Britons are proud of our\ngreat history, it is true, proud of our associations with an almost\nforgotten past, and with these may, and doubtless does, mingle a\nlittle romance.  We bear no great goodwill for the iconoclast, the\nsnivelling, snarling, unpatriotic idiot who would smash the people's\nidols, and trample them in the dust, who would hardly leave us a\nmuseum of antiquities, or relics that fathers may point to with\npride, as he tells his children the story of the half-forgotten past.\nThese relics may sometimes be but symbols, as, for instance, says the\ngreat Carlyle, \"the clouted shoe that the peasants bore aloft as\nensign in their Bauernkrieg, or Peasant's War.  Or the wallet and\nstaff, round which the Netherland Gueux, glorying in that nickname of\nbeggars, heroically rallied, and prevailed, though against King\nPhilip himself.  _In_trinsic, significance these had, not only\n_ex_trinsic, as the accidental standard of multitudes, more or less\nsacredly uniting together, in which union itself there is ever\nsomething mystical, and borrowing of the god-like.  Under a like\ncategory, too, stand or stood the stupidest heraldic coats of arms;\nmilitary banners everywhere.  Nevertheless, through all there\nglimmers something of a divine idea; as, through military banners\nthemselves, the divine idea of duty, of heroic daring, in some\ninstances of freedom, of right.\"\n\nBut these iconoclasts would tear the shot-rent standards or flags,\naround which so many heroes bled and fell, from the very walls of\nWindsor Castle itself; but a few years ago they would have deprived\nus of that nation's pride, the grand old ship _Victory_, on whose\nblood-slippery deck the hero Nelson fell.  And they would deprive us\nof Gibraltar also.\n\nYet, though we Britons are thus proud of our blood-stained symbols\nand relics, we are also just, and would retain no portion of any\nnation's territory it has a legal right to, and would not use against\nourselves, or hand over to our enemies.\n\nIf you disarm a burglar, are you to give him back the pistol with\nwhich he tried to blow your brains out?  Or are you to hand it over\nto the burglar's friend, who must be your foe?\n\nNo, and so we shall stick to Gibraltar.\n\n  What we have we mean to hold,\n  Though pretended friends at home may scowl:\n      Though blood be shed,\n      And men fall dead,\n  And savage foes around us howl,\n  Still, what we have we'll stick to,\n  As in the dashing days of old.\n\n\nI am not at all proud of my composition, reader.  The verse may be\ndoggerel, but there is truth in it.\n\nWell, I had not been a day in Gibraltar, or Gib as we call it for\nshort, before I found out it was by no means so barren a rock as had\nbeen represented.\n\nThere is a great town there now, though the streets be narrow, and\nhere you may meet people of all nationalities, and in almost every\ngarb, from the felt-hatted cute and clever Yankee to the Arab\nhimself, or even the dastardly Turk.  Vegetables of almost all sorts\ngrow here.  It is the paradise of fruit, and on the mountain-slopes,\nas well as in the cultivated gardens, grow flowers of every hue and\nshape.\n\nBoth the Horse Guards and the Duke of York placed unbounded\nconfidence in the Duke of Kent.  His former good conduct as a\nsoldier, his hatred of intoxicants, and his skill as a\ndisciplinarian, all told in his favour, and unlimited powers were\nplaced in his hands.  He was expected to reduce the Rock to a\ncondition of greater sobriety, and to restore discipline.  Nay, more,\nhe was commanded to do so.\n\nHard indeed and thankless was the task he had before him.\n\nPut not your trust in princes, nor in those in high places, either.\nFine clothes never make the man.  As true and loyal a heart may beat\nbeneath a jacket of fustian as beneath the ermine-trimmed robes of a\npeer.\n\nKings and queens, or their ministers, make many \"nobles.\"  Nature\nmakes a few, but she takes infinitely more pains with them than does\nroyalty, and I know to which category I would rather belong.  It may\nbe treason to speak thus, but it is also the truth.  And having said\nso boldly, I shall be all the more readily believed when I say also\nthat I consider the Duke of Kent to have been one of the grand men of\nthe early part of this century.\n\n\"Much exertion\"--thus spoke the Horse Guards, or the\nCommander-in-Chief, the Duke of York--\"will be necessary on your\npart, in order to restore a due degree of discipline among the\ntroops.\"\n\nAnd the Duke of Kent left England on the 27th of April, 1802, to take\ncommand of the historic fort, determined to do his duty, and relying\non the promise that he would be supported by the high authorities at\nhome.\n\nPut not your trust in princes!\n\nArrived at Gib, the Duke commenced work at once.\n\nThere were all kinds of reforms to make among the rock scorpions, as\nsoldiers who had been here a long time were called.  Even the\nofficers, as well as the men, were simply giving themselves up\nentirely to having what the Americans call a real good time of it.\nIf drunkenness and every vice that follows in its train could be\ncalled happiness, then these men were happy.\n\nIt was then considered no crime to be intoxicated while _off_ duty.\nBut officers were too unsteady sometimes to walk straight or talk\nplainly, even on parade.  This state of things led to much illness\namong all hands, in addition to extreme slovenliness.\n\nIt has been said that, even in the public streets, the men, and\nsometimes their superiors, might be seen at any hour of the day so\nclothed as to resemble a roving horde of lawless plunderers, rather\nthan drilled and organised soldiers.\n\nI can believe that.\n\nIt is, however, stated that the Duke laboured cheerfully seventeen\nhours a day.\n\nThis is an exaggeration.\n\nMy grand-dad, however, has assured me that, what with office work and\nother duties, he himself was never harder worked even while\ncampaigning.\n\nIt is sad to have to add that the Duke came to Gib with the character\nof a martinet and a man who carried discipline, even over his\nofficers, to the extent of positive tyranny.  This is not true.  I\nhave what _I_ consider good authority for stating that he was a man\nof mild mien, though bold and brave as a lion when occasion demanded\nit.\n\nSwearing and the use of terribly vulgar expressions were considered\nquite the thing in those days.  A bad word was never heard on the\nDuke's lips.  He would reason with his officers rather than lose his\ntemper and scold them for what he considered conduct--in private\nlife--that did not accord with the grand old title of \"gentleman.\"\n\nHe was as fair also in his dealings with the sergeants or men, or\nbetween officers and men, as any judge could have been.\n\nI will give but one instance of this.  My grandfather, who now in a\ngreat measure took his ideas of strict discipline from the Duke\nhimself, one day when on duty did a daring thing.  He found two\nfriends--not males--of an officer of pretty high rank quarrelling and\nfighting near the door of the officers' mess.  I am sorry to say that\nneither was sober, but glad to add they did not belong to my gallant\nprogenitor's company.  He, however, had them both arrested and\nconfined to separate rooms, placing a sentry at the door of each\ncompartment.  The wrath of the officer, when this was reported to\nhim, knew no bounds.\n\n\"I'll do for your career,\" he cried.\n\nMy grand-dad answered never a word, but he was reported to the Duke\nas having been guilty of insubordinate, almost mutinous conduct.\n\nSome men would have taken that officer's word, and a really\npainstaking sergeant would have been lost to the company.  Not so the\nkindly Duke.  He investigated the case, with the result that the\nofficer was quietly but sternly reprimanded.\n\nReturning from town about a week after this with letters for\nheadquarters, just in the dusk of the evening, two men rushed\nsuddenly out from a drinking-booth, and attacked my grandfather might\nand main.  The sergeant, however, had not forgotten the use of his\nfists, and one of the would-be assassins speedily found himself in\nthe filthy gutter.  He would have settled the other fellow just as\nquickly, but a third Spaniard appeared upon the scene.\n\nThe _m\u00eal\u00e9e_ now became general--a kind of civil and military riot.\nIt might have been bad indeed for the sergeant, had not Drake himself\nappeared on the scene, and with a few of his men speedily cleared the\ndecks.  But grandfather had been wounded with a stiletto, and,\nalthough he insisted on carrying the letters to headquarters, he lost\nso much blood that it was weeks before he was able to resume duty.\n\n\"That looked like a vendetta,* Sergeant, did it not?\" said the Duke\nquietly when he resumed work.\n\n\n* Act of revenge.\n\n\n\"I'm afraid, your Royal Highness,\" was the reply, \"I'm afraid I dare\nnot say so.\"\n\n\"Humph!\" said the Duke.  \"You see, Sergeant, one may do what is\nright, and yet receive no reward in this world.\"\n\nAs the Duke therefore was no favourite, even the officers did as much\nas they could to thwart all his endeavours to curb vice and\ndrunkenness.\n\nHis Royal Highness, however, was not to be curbed, and many of his\nreforms were excellent indeed.  He diminished the number of\nwine-shops by one-half--humanely, however.  It is not said, even by\nhis enemies, that he turned the families of wine-shopkeepers adrift\nto starve.  In fact it was quite the reverse, for he often supported\nsome of them out of his own pocket.  He weeded out the worst of those\ndens, especially those that were down narrow lanes, and in which foul\nmurder itself was often committed.  Nor would he have wine-shops near\nto the barracks or guardrooms.\n\nIdleness is oftentimes the parent of vice, just as sorrow may be the\nparent of genius, hard work, and fame.  The Duke was a man of the\nworld, and knew this.  He therefore instituted extra drills and dress\nparades, and even confinement to barracks after the second evening\ngun-fire.\n\nHe also established regimental canteens, and made many other reforms\nthat soon began to work for the good not only of the soldiers, but of\nthe civilians themselves.\n\nAll these reforms took time and very hard work, and though the Duke\ngot himself well hated by the Rock scorpions--both officers and\nmen--he persevered and did his duty right honourably and according to\nhis light.\n\nIt is no wonder, therefore, that he became about the best-hated man\non the Rock.\n\nAll this could have but one ending.\n\n_The men mutinied at last._\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III.\n\n  MYSTERY--A GRUESOME BOX--A MEETING OF\n  CONSPIRATORS--TERRIBLE THREATS--THE MUTINY.\n\nThere are slums in Gibraltar to this day.  But they are nothing to\nthe lanes and courts that used to exist at the time the Duke of Kent\ncommanded here.  Narrow were most of these; dark even in daylight;\nreeking with filth and all abomination.  Reeking with vice also, and\nfilled with wine-shops.\n\nNo well-dressed man could have entered one of these after sunset with\nany certainty of ever coming out alive again.\n\nMen who had been missing for weeks were often found in the water with\nugly wounds in them.  They had been enticed into some den of\niniquity, robbed, and murdered.  Sailors often suffered thus after\nlanding from a long voyage and coming on shore to see the sights.\n\nThe victim's body had to be disposed of in some way, and some methods\nof disposal were as original as they were ghastly.\n\nI will give but one instance.\n\nMr. Myers was first mate of a ship called _The Bonito_, outward bound\nfor the Mauritius.  His sailors all liked him, and called him a real\njolly gentleman and full of fun.  It seems, however, that on shore he\nwas sometimes full of something else, quite the reverse of fun when\nit overpowers a man.\n\nMyers busied himself getting cargo on board and on shore--the ship\nwas only touching at Gib on her way out--and everything was nearly\nready.  On the third day, however, the mate went on shore.  He would\nbe off by midnight, he told the captain.  But he did not come.  For\ntwo days an unavailing search was made for the poor fellow, then he\nwas given up for lost.  He might have fallen over a cliff, or been\ndrowned.  Nobody could tell or guess.  It was one of the mysteries of\nthe Rock, and his ship must sail without him.\n\nThe last morning on board a vessel all but ready for sea is always a\nbusy one, and _The Bonito_ had still many cases and packages to hoist\nin.  A man, about ten o'clock, might have been seen with a heavy box\non a kind of trolley, coming down one of the steep streets towards\nthe harbour.  It was almost all the fellow could do to keep the\ntrolley from taking charge, but when half-way down a waggon overtook\nhim.  This was half loaded with cases for _The Bonito_.  The waggoner\nwas hailed and bargained with to take the other box also, which was\nduly lettered and labelled, and it was soon after hoisted on board\nand stowed below with others.\n\nThe ship had been at sea a whole week before the hold was overhauled,\nowing to sickly odours that emanated therefrom.  I need go no\nfarther, for every reader will guess that the mysterious box\ncontained the corpse of the unfortunate Mr. Myers.\n\nIn slums like these, then, it may easily be credited that it is just\nas easy to foster a mutiny as to commit murder.\n\nIt was within about a fortnight of Christmas that, in a back\nupstairs-room in one of these streets or slums, a party of soldiers\nwere assembled.  These men, I am sorry to say, belonged for the most\npart to the Royals.  I am just as proud to say that not a man there\nbelonged to my grandfather's company.  At this meeting there were\npresent delegates from several other regiments, notably the 25th.\nThe company here did not stand by privates.  Indeed there were but\nfew of these here; they were, for the most part, non-commissioned\nofficers and--will it be believed?--officers in mufti of the highest\ngrades.\n\nThe supper was of the best quality that the Rock could afford, and\nthe wines of the choicest.  But it was noticeable that few partook of\nmuch wine.  They but tasted.  There was an ominous quiet brooding\nover the whole company, and until the table was cleared and relaid\nwith fruit and wine the conversation was limited to a painful degree.\n\nI can give but the briefest account of the transactions of this\nmeeting of grim-visaged mutineers.\n\nThe first to speak was a gentleman in mufti.\n\n\"Gentlemen,\" he said, \"fill your glasses and drink to the health of\nMr. Milan, who has invited us here at his own expense, and set before\nus a most excellent meal.  Mr. Milan, gentlemen, is a wine merchant,\nand one who with many others has been thrown into the street,\nfiguratively speaking, by the uncalled-for interference of the tyrant\nK.  (Muttered growls and oaths.)  We all feel sorry for Mr. Milan,\nand wish him health and hopes of better times to come, when----\"\n\nThis officer, for officer he was, drew his finger significantly\nacross his throat and sat quietly down.\n\n\"The whole history of the world,\" said Mr. Milan in reply, \"proves\nthat the throne of a tyrant is but an insecure one at the best; that\nit is ever surrounded by enemies, even in the guise of friends; and\nthat sooner or later it is bound to fall and bury the tyrant himself\nin its ruins.  I can say, gentlemen, that you have done me much\nhonour in coming here to-night.  And I can say for myself and my\nnumerous friends, many of whom have been ruined by this tyrannical\nPharisee, that if we did not know that, in trying to redress our\ngrievances, you were also redressing your own, we would rise and\nraise the people, who would respond to our appeal as one man, and\ncome to your assistance, even if it should terminate in dragging the\ntyrant from his bed at midnight, and hurling his body over the Rock.\"\n\nBoom!  It was like the sound of a far-off gun, though in reality it\ncame from a gong.\n\nBut it was followed by\n\n  \"A silence deep as death,\n  And the boldest held his breath.\"\n\n\nAnd every eye was turned to a door in the end of the room, which was\nnow quickly opened and reclosed.\n\nA masked and hooded figure, draped in black, carrying a Book, a\ncross, and a dagger, advanced slowly and took a place at the head of\nthe table.\n\nFurther than to tell you that the Book was solemnly put down and\nflanked by the cross and the dagger, the latter darkly marked with\nwhat appeared to be blood, I need not describe the fearful ceremony\nof \"swearing in.\"  It was too dreadful, too sacrilegious and\nawe-inspiring, to mention here.\n\nBoom!  Once more that mournful sound--once more the door was opened,\nand the masked figure glided silently out and away.\n\nThe mutineers seemed relieved, but they applied themselves to the\nwine now, and as their tongues were let loose their courage rose.\n\nPitiful indeed is the courage that is born of the wine-cup.\n\nGrievances caused by the Duke were now most freely talked\nover--grievances of men and officers, and those of civilians to boot.\n\nThe grievances of men and officers were much the same.  They were\ntreated no longer as soldiers, but simply as slaves.  There was no\nrest for either night or day--thus spoke the head mutineer, an\nofficer _of very high rank_ on the Rock, but burned up with a hatred\nof the Duke which from the first was fostered by jealousy.  The\nofficers could not engage in the most harmless game of either cards,\nbilliards, or dice with the certainty that they would not be called\naway in the midst of it by command of this \"cow-lipped, goggle-eyed\ntyrant, who was undoubtedly mad--mad over his plans of reform, his\nshabby canteen, his reforms, his stupid general orders, and cursed\nparades.\"\n\nThe men were treated even worse than the officers; were denied all\nfun and pleasure; were locked up at night like a parcel of\nschoolboys; were black-holed for the slightest offence, and flogged\nalmost to the death for frolics that would have been laughed at in\ndays gone by, when soldiers were soldiers and not Sunday-school\nchildren, as K. had made them now.\n\nWere war proclaimed, they said, they would fight like Britons, fight\nlike heroes for their country and their King, but not under such a\nhumbugging, sycophantic, Father Mathew Rock-scorpion as he who now\nheld the sceptre in one hand and the cat-o'-nine-tails in the other.\n\nThere was but little of the Demosthenic about this speech, but such\nas it was it roused the men to fury, and without doubt, could they\nhave laid hands at that moment on the Duke, they would have torn him\nlimb from limb.  When quietness was restored, a proposal was made and\ncarried unanimously, somewhat to the following effect: The Duke, some\ntime soon--the date was not agreed upon that night--was to be seized\nand conveyed on board one of his Majesty's ships of war, with orders\nnot to return on pain of death, and that his Royal Highness the Duke\nand Governor was to be sent off from the Ragged Staff.\n\n\"Sent off from the Ragged Staff,\" asked one mutineer, \"but dead or\nalive?\"\n\n\"I do not counsel violence,\" said the head mutineer, \"but----\"\n\nHe was interrupted.\n\n\"Kill him!\"\n\n\"Twist his neck!\"\n\n\"Drown him in his own canteen!\"\n\n\"Help him over the Rock!\"\n\n\"Hush, friends, and hear me.  I do not counsel violence, I say, but\nif an accident should happen to the tyrant, his blood be on his own\nhead.\"\n\n\"Amen!\" from many of the conspirators.\n\n* * * * *\n\nThe Duke's enemies in town, among the civilians that is, spoiled\ntheir own plans.\n\nThey had an idea that to stir up mutiny, or to bring it to a head,\ndrink was necessary.  No greater mistake could they have made in\ntheir own vile cause.  Conspiracies are only successfully hatched in\nthe dark.  The mutineers must be clear-brained and as silent as the\ngrave.  A drunken mob is a headless one; an intoxicated regiment has\nneither power to act, nor will to govern.\n\nIt was the evening of the 24th December, and it was or had been\npay-day, a busy day with my grandfather, as well as with other\npay-sergeants, and he noticed nothing unusual.\n\nDrake, who was still my grand-dad's best friend, was that day acting\nas adjutant.  Some suspicion that everything was not right had\nentered his mind, and rightly or wrongly, I cannot say which, he had\ngiven orders that the soldiers should not be allowed to go into the\ntown.\n\nThis order was disobeyed, however, and in the low drinking-places\nthey proceeded to squander their pay just as soldiers did in those\ndays.  But louder than ever now, and on all sides, rose expressions\nof discontent against some of their officers, but especially against\nthe Duke himself.\n\nIt was evident that mischief was brewing, and that the time had come\nwhen the mutiny should break out.\n\nThat day the civilian enemies of his Grace plied the men of the\nRoyals with wine until they were more like maniacs than soldiers.\nThey overdid it.\n\nIt was quite dusk, yet my grandfather was still busy writing, when a\nsentry brought him a note which had been thrown into the passage.\n\nThe words were meant as a warning, and a warning they proved.\n\n\n\"_Your Major Drake and the Adjutant will lie duly murdered to-night.\nBeware!_--A FRIEND.\"\n\n\nGrand-dad lost no time in finding out his friend and showing him the\nnote.\n\n\"Done for a lark, I suppose, Sergeant,\" he said.\n\nHowever, he looked grave.\n\nThe time flew by.  Grandfather heard the second evening gun fired,\nbut the corps had not returned, or only a few.  This looked ominous,\nand the gates were closed.\n\nThe officers were still at dinner--and more than one of these seemed\nunusually quiet and subdued to-night, and were evidently ill-at-ease,\nnervous, and expectant--when shouting was heard.\n\nIt emanated from the drunken mutineers, who were encouraging each\nother as they dashed on and up to the barrack gate.\n\nThese they smashed in.\n\n\"To arms!  To arms!\" was now the wild cry, and speedily indeed did\nthey seize their muskets and bayonets.\n\n\"To death with the adjutant! let us begin with him, who would stop\nour leave!  Hurrah! lads.  Hurrah!\"\n\nThe 25th were in barracks.\n\nThe 54th were in barracks, and though the former regiment could not\nbe trusted--thanks to the warning received--the grenadier company\nthere were under arms and prepared.\n\nThe adjutant would certainly have been killed if found.  So too Drake\nand Blood.  The former had gone to the barracks of the 54th.  Blood\nwas not to be found.\n\nO'Reilly rushed out to meet the infuriated soldiers, after him went\nDr. McLeod, followed by my grandfather.\n\nO'Reilly had a narrow escape.  He was mistaken for the Duke.\n\n\"It's the Duke.  It's the Duke.  Down with him!  Kill him!\"\n\nO'Reilly was speedily thrown down, but next moment the doctor was\nknocking the men about right and left, with those brawny fists of his.\n\n\"Would you kill your own O'Reilly?  Back, you drunken squabs!  I tell\nyou it's not the Duke.\"\n\n\"Follow me, men,\" cried a ringleader next, \"on to the barracks of the\njolly 25th.  Then for the tyrant Duke!\"\n\nOn they sped or staggered, but to their intense surprise, the 25th\nrefused to come and join them.\n\nA move was next made towards the barracks of the 54th.  They at all\nevents would join the mutiny.\n\nAbout half of the Royals were left, trying to persuade the 25th to\nturn out.  The grenadiers gave the others so warm a reception, that\ntheir Dutch courage* began rapidly to evaporate, as courage of this\nsort always does, and when met with a galling fire from the barracks\nof the 54th, with men in their midst falling here and there--dead,\nwounded, or drunk, they knew not which--these mutineers speedily\nretreated.\n\nBut the worst had yet to come.\n\n\n* Dutch courage is, I believe, not so called out of disrespect for\nthe Dutch themselves, who are as brave as any soldiers need be, and\nin olden times as good sailors as the British themselves.  Dutch\ncourage is simply Hollands gin, which on some stations, notably the\nEast African, can be bought for 6d. a bottle, and has been the means\nof killing many a man-o'-war's-man and invaliding many an officer.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV.\n\n  WARNED BY A DYING SOLDIER--MORE MUTINY--HE FELL\n  FORWARD DEAD--WAR BREAKS OUT ONCE MORE--NAPOLEON'S\n  PLANS AND MOVEMENTS--MURDER!\n\nIn a couple of hours at most the first mutiny was quelled.\n\nSo quiet and apparently contrite were the men of the Royals, that the\nkind-hearted Duke addressed them, and in a short speech, after\ncommenting strongly upon the heinousness of their crime, told them\nthat as this was Christmas, a holy and forgiving time, he freely\nforgave them, and hoped they would be as good men and true in the\nfuture as they had been in the past.\n\nThe soldiers raised a cheer, though I am afraid it was not altogether\na hearty one, and were then allowed to return to duty.\n\nBut there was anger at the hearts of the Royals against the men of\nthe 25th, among whom, by the way, were a great many foreigners.  The\nRoyals hissed them as they passed, and roundly rated them for being\ncowards and traitors to their cause.\n\nSeveral stand-up fights were the result, and more than one man was\nremoved bleeding to the guardroom.  It was probably this disaffection\nbetwixt the Royals and the 25th that after all saved the Duke's life.\n\nBut he had been warned in a strange way of the fate that was\nimpending over him, and it would really thus appear that it was the\nvery disinterestedness and kindness to those under him that resulted\nin his life being saved.  The Duke was a man of such activity and\nspirit that he in person would often visit rooms in the barracks to\ninspect their sanitary condition, for well he knew that health and\ncleanliness go hand-in-hand.  He was also a constant visitor to the\nhospital.  One day, some time before the mutiny, the Duke was walking\nthrough the hospital, attended by Dr. McLeod himself, who was\npointing out to him with honest pride many little improvements he had\nmade.  He was telling him also the story of every important case, and\nthe Duke had many a kindly word to say to the suffering patients.\n\n\"I think, sir,\" said McLeod presently, \"that man,\" pointing to a bed\nin a distant corner, \"would like to speak with your Royal Highness.\"\n\n\"But,\" he added, \"let me first tell you that he is dying, and dying\nfrom the effects of drunkenness and evil living.\"\n\n\"Poor, unhappy man!  Is there no hope, Surgeon?\"\n\n\"None, I fear.\"\n\nThe dying soldier's voice was little more than a whisper, but the\nDuke bent over him to listen.\n\n\"What can I do for you, soldier?\"\n\n\"Ah!  Governor, sir,\" replied the man, speaking with nervousness and\ndifficulty, \"you can do nothing for me.  I'm in the clutches of\ndeath, but I can do much for you, if you'll take warning and hear the\ntruth from a dying mar's lips.\"\n\nHe paused for a moment.\n\n\"Go on, my good fellow, I am listening.\"\n\n\"I have been one of the worst and most reckless of men in your\nregiment, and I have done the most I could to excite my comrades to\nmutiny.  I was, till laid down here with sickness, one of the\ncommittee sworn to seize you on parade and eject you from the Rock,\nor throw you headlong from it.  Can you forgive me?  I can die in\npeace if you do.\"\n\n\"I forgive you, my poor fellow, as I myself hope to be forgiven,\"\nsaid the Duke solemnly.\n\n\"God bless you.  God bless you.  I can now go before the great\ncourt-martial, but I'll say the Duke forgave me, and may God forgive\nme too.\"\n\nHis Royal Highness just patted the dying man's hand, and silently\nleft the ward.\n\nBut to return to the would-be mutineers.  It was usual for each man\nto receive a shilling on Christmas Day in addition to his pay.\n\nOn the 26th, having spent their money, or \"wetted Christmas,\" as they\ncalled it, the 25th, being still taunted and even assaulted by the\nmen of the Royals, determined to stand it no longer.  They would kill\nthe Duke, and they would kill a few of the Royals also.\n\nAs night drew in, therefore, they could no longer be restrained.\n\nA third of the whole regiment flew to arms, and with terrible yells\nand imprecations rushed to attack the barracks of the Royals.\n\nThere was much more bloodshed that night, but, to their honour be it\ncredited, the Royals showed their contrition by nobly defending the\nperson of his Royal Highness.\n\nThe artillery, too, did the same, and so also the King's and the\n54th, so that before morning the mutiny was quelled.  Many were\nwounded, and some were killed.\n\nBut although the Duke could be as forgiving as any general that ever\nlived, he felt now that the time had come to make an example of some\nof the ringleaders of this horrible mutiny.  Ten of these were\ntherefore tried by court-martial and condemned to die.\n\nThe sentences on all but three, however, were commuted to banishment\nfrom the Rock--perhaps to India, I do not know.\n\nBut the other three, two foreigners and an Irishman called Reilly, as\nreckless a young fellow, we are told, as ever presented arms or drew\na trigger, expiated their crimes at the musket's mouth.\n\nAll three, I was given to understand, refused to have their eyes\nbandaged.\n\nReilly bared his chest and stood as firm as a rock.\n\n\"Aim here, comrades,\" he cried, \"Reilly forgives you.  He fears not\ndeath----\"\n\nThe muskets rang out clear and sharp in the morning air, and he fell\nforward dead.  Just one or two slight quivering or convulsive\nmotions, and all was over.\n\nSo ended the mutiny at Gibraltar, a mutiny from which the youngest\nreader may learn, methinks, a lesson.  For hard it is to reform a\npeople, an army, or even oneself, if evil habits have once been\nformed.\n\n* * * * *\n\nIn the year eighteen hundred and three, and in the spring of that\nyear, war once more broke out between Britain and France, and was\ncontinued with many a desperate and bloody encounter onwards to the\nbitter end.  Those were stirring days again at home, as well as\nabroad.  Throughout every town and city, ay, and even village, the\nrecruiting-sergeant was busy indeed, and not only was the usual\nshilling given, but free kit, bounty and all.\n\nThe country would sink more deeply into debt than ever.  But what\nsignified it?  Soldiers would have asked you, Aren't we going to\nthrash the French?  The French were our hereditary enemies.  We hated\nthem--there is no other name for it--and they hated us.  Happily, we\nnowadays bear none of that hatred to, and mistrust of, our Gallic\nneighbours.  And did we not fight shoulder to shoulder with them in\nthe war against Russia?\n\nI was but a boy when this Crimean war commenced, but well do I\nremember the anger of my grand-dad when we formed an alliance with\nFrance.  Sooner far, he told me, would he have joined hands with\nRussia itself.  The thoughts of such an alliance seemed to embitter\nhis old age.\n\n\"Depend upon it, boy,\" he said to me, \"it is an alliance that never\nwill work us any good.\"\n\nMalta was, as far as my reading goes, the first bone of contention\nbetween the French and ourselves in the renewed struggle, or rather\nlet me call it the first cause of that struggle.\n\nMalta was considered to be the key to Egypt, and the French were once\nmore casting eagle-glances towards that much-coveted country.\n\nThe First Consul, Napoleon, in spite of the remonstrances of Prussia,\nwhose political status had at this time sunk to a very low ebb,\noccupied Hanover, and despatched a fleet to blockade the Elbe at\nCuxhaven, to stop the trade between this country and Prussia.  As a\nreprisal, we told the Prussians that unless the French withdrew we\nshould blockade, not only the Elbe, but the Weser as well.  But\nPrussia's remonstrances with Napoleon were all in vain.\n\nFor two long years the Hanoverians suffered all the penalties and\nindignities inseparable from the usurpation of their country by a\ndomineering nation like the French.\n\nIn the end, however, their sufferings bore fruit, for they and the\nwhole of Germany north were at length aroused from the lethargy into\nwhich they had sunk, and compelled to take up arms against the\noppressor.\n\nBut Russia now became displeased at this French occupation of\nHanover.  What might it not end in?  Hitherto Russia had been little\nbetter than a tool in Napoleon's hand.  So the Great Bear of the\nNorth began to growl.\n\nThe outbreak of war betwixt this country and France made the\nambitious Napoleon, or First Consul, a greater hero than ever in the\neyes of the French.  It needed but the occurrence of some plot\nagainst his life, and in favour of the old royal family, to ensure\nhis being placed upon the throne.  Such a conspiracy had actually\nexisted for some time.  Then quickly followed the execution or murder\nof the chief conspirators, some of whom were actually strangled at\nnight in prison, so horrible were the times.  This dreadful fate\nhappened to Pichegru, a general.\n\nHardly less terrible was the murder of the Duke of Enghien.  Exiled\nfrom his country, this man--although he had fought for his own in the\nfirst coalition against France--was now living peacefully in Baden;\nbut him the First Consul determined to sacrifice.  He was surrounded\nwith spies of the low-caste or Communistic order, who regard neither\nGod nor man, and having no consciences are prepared to swear anything\nif it serves their turn.  On the 10th of March, 1804, while sitting\nquietly reading in his home at Ettenheim, a troop of soldiers who had\ncrossed the Rhine from France suddenly surrounded the house.\nResistance, or even remonstrance, was in vain.  He was hurried away\nwithout being able to bid farewell to his weeping relatives.  His\npoor dog, who would have followed his master, was bludgeoned before\nhis eyes.\n\nIn five days' time he arrived at the fortification of Vincennes, and\nhardly allowed rest or refreshment ere he was hurried--at night it\nwas--before a mock tribunal of six officers.  The trial lasted but a\nfew minutes.  He was beckoned away, his arms pinioned, and shot\nbeside his already-dug grave.\n\nThrough rivers of blood, on stepping-stones of murders like these,\nNapoleon crossed to the site of his further ambitions and glories,\nand was proclaimed Emperor of the French.\n\nAlas! we are too prone even now to associate civilization with\nurbanity of manners, with regal pomp and state, with riches, with\ngaiety, and with dresses loaded with gems rich and rare.  This is\nhuman nature.  But Paris, even at this time, when such fearful\nmurders as those I have described were taking place in her very\nmidst, was as gay and careless as is our London of to-day.\n\n* * * * *\n\nTo follow the undoubtedly great but heartless Emperor of France\nthrough all his series of victories and defeats, even in epitome,\nwould be a task for which my readers, I fear, would scarcely thank\nme, especially as history is making itself every day around us with a\nspeed we scarce can follow.  But even as I write these lines in early\nJanuary, our fleets are re-forming, our armies are being re-massed,\nand there is the terrible possibility hovering around us of an\ninvasion of our shores by a powerful foreign foe, it is well we\nshould remember something of Napoleon's pet scheme to carry the war\ninto our native land.  This, indeed, was his greatest ambition.\nCould he have dictated his terms of peace with Britain from the Tower\nof London or Windsor Palace, with his foot upon the British lion, he\nwould, I believe, have died contented.\n\nHe concentrated an army at Boulogne that was powerful enough to have\noverwhelmed all the forces of fencibles and regulars we could have\nopposed to it on English ground.  The only difficulty was how to land\nthem.\n\nBut the very thought that he might be able to do so cast a cloud of\ngloom and fear over all our land, from England's southermost shores\nfar north to the Scottish Highlands themselves.\n\nIn Scotland north at this time things were about as bad as they could\nbe.  There was poverty as well as doubt; the crops failed in many\nplaces, the oats were blighted, starvation stared the people in the\nface, and grim death seemed to stalk about the streets of hamlets and\nvillages.  From the far-off Braes of R----, where the effects of\ncruel war were felt, as in other places, many a prayer rose up morn\nand even from Robertson's hearth for the preservation of the boy whom\nfate had made a soldier.\n\nAll Napoleon needed, so he believed, was the possession of the\nChannel for a few days.  At the present time, reader, the possession\nof the silver streak of sea that guards us--for even a few\nhours--would suffice to land an enemy upon our coast.  And a fog\nmight at any time favour one.\n\nNapoleon's plan was clever.  He would endeavour to lure our great\ncommander, Nelson, away across the ocean, by means of a fleet which\nshould pretend to sail for the purpose of making war against our\npossessions in the West Indies.\n\nAdmiral Villeneuve was, therefore, ordered off to Martinique.  He was\nthere to join with other ships, and return with all haste to free the\nFrench fleet, blockaded at Brest and other parts of the coast.\nVilleneuve did succeed in luring Nelson after him, and the French\nadmiral had a sixteen days' start homeward, before Nelson had an\ninkling of his designs.  Now came the extreme danger.  It was\nimpossible for Nelson to overtake and smash Villeneuve, for fleets\ncannot rush across the ocean with the speed of a single ship.  They\nare bound to keep together.\n\nKnowing this, Nelson at once chose the fastest, fleetest brig in his\nsquadron, and sent her off in all haste with despatches for England.\n\nOnly think of it, reader.  The whole fate of this mighty nation\ndepended, for the time being, on the quickness with which one little\nBritish ship could cross the ocean.\n\nA single accident; the carrying away of a spar while cracking on; a\nwhite squall; the shot of the enemy; the springing of a leak, would\nhave meant the triumphant ending of Napoleon's schemes and the\nconquest of Merrie England.\n\nWas not this indeed a race for life, a race for the life of our own\ndear fatherland?\n\nWould the brave little brig win?\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V.\n\n  NAPOLEON'S SCHEME FOR INVADING BRITAIN--A BRIGHT\n  PROMISE--GRANDFATHER MEETS HIS FATE.\n\nBy God's blessing, the brig did win.  The very winds seemed to favour\nher, and, in a few hours after receiving the message of our hero Lord\nNelson, orders were sent to Sir Robert Calder, who was at that time\nblockading the French in the harbours of Ferrol and Rochefort, to\nraise the blockade and hasten to meet Villeneuve, or lay wait for him\noff Cape Finisterre.\n\nOn July the 22nd, 1805, to his astonishment, the French admiral met\nthe British fleet.\n\nWhat a hearty welcome they gave him!\n\nWhat a hearty hiding!\n\nThis would have been worse had Villeneuve stayed, but he ran, and\nmanaged in a crippled condition to make an entrance into Ferrol.\n\nBut even yet Napoleon must play another card, his last, and the\nFrench admiral received orders to attempt a movement on Brest and\nRochefort.  He tried to obey, but our strength was beyond his power\nand courage, so he fled to Cadiz, without attempting to fight us.\n\nBritain was saved!\n\nNapoleon was furious!\n\nBut the great army with which he had designed to pay us so unwelcome\na visit, he now let loose upon Austria.\n\nThe capitulation of the Austrians at Ulm, a bloodless capitulation of\ntwenty-five thousand men, put the people of Paris mad with rejoicing.\nTheir Emperor was ten times a hero!  What had they to fear now, even\nif the whole world were in arms against them?\n\nThe French always were an ebullient nation, but their ebulliency\nreceived a sad check only two days after the victory of Ulm and the\nbombastic despatch of forty Austrian standards to Paris.\n\nTrafalgar was fought.\n\nThat great naval victory of ours, in which the fleets of France and\nSpain were smashed, and Britannia crowned once more Queen and\nMistress of the Seas, was decided on the 21st of October.\n\nAlas! that in the hour of triumph our hero should have fallen on the\nblood-slippery, fiery deck of the far-famed flagship, _Victory_.\n\nThe news of this wonderful battle spread like wildfire over Britain,\nay, and over Europe itself.\n\n\"Trafalgar,\" says Fyffe, \"was not only the greatest naval victory, it\nwas the greatest and most momentous victory won either by land or by\nsea, during the whole of the Revolutionary War.  No victory, and no\nseries of victories, of Napoleon produced the same effect upon\nEurope.  Austria was in arms within five years of Marengo, and within\nfour years of Austerlitz.  Prussia was ready to retrieve the losses\nof Jena in 1813, but a whole generation passed before France could\nagain seriously threaten Britain at sea.\n\n\"The prospect of crushing the British Navy, so long as we had the\nmeans to equip a navy, vanished.  Napoleon henceforth set his hopes\non exhausting our resources by compelling every State on the\nContinent to exclude our commerce.\n\n\"Trafalgar forced him, therefore, to enforce his yoke on all Europe,\nor to abandon the hope of conquering Great Britain.\"\n\n* * * * *\n\nHave you ever looked down into the crater of a great volcano, reader\nmine?  I dare say not.  It is a pleasure of a somewhat awesome\nnature, that you still have before you.  The volcano must not be in\nan active state when you peer fearfully over its brink.  But if it be\nbut semi-quiescent, the sight that meets your eyes is indeed a\nwonderful one, especially if the crater be one of considerable\nextent, like that of Kalakahui, in the Fiji Islands.  It is a sight\nthat will be photographed, as it were, on the tablets of your memory,\nindelible for ever and a day--a sight you may dream of many a night\nin bed, and yet if you were asked to describe it, or picture it in\nwords to any of your friends, you would probably remain silent.  No\nlanguage could bring before the mind's eye of another person that\nseething, bubbling, ever-changing lake of fire; its mysterious chasms\nopening up for a moment or two, to vomit forth flames and steam, and\nthen closing as suddenly as if swallowed up in the waves of liquid\nlava; the strange, bright colours of the flames, or the streaks of\nbright crimson, blue, or green fire that creep hither and thither,\nand turn, and twist, and coil like hissing snakes; the clouds of\nsmoke and steam that settle here and there, but vanish as you look at\nthem; little conical hills that rise in this place or that, higher\nand higher, and higher, till they burst at last and spue forth their\nboiling contents, then collapse as quickly and change into lakes!\n\nNo wonder that the ancients looked upon such a place as this with\nfear and trembling, and considered it the gates of the evil place,\nthat led downwards into the bottomless pit.\n\nBut, in reading the history of Europe that for the next ten years\nsucceeded Trafalgar, anyone who has ever looked into such a crater as\nI have tried, though in vain, to describe, cannot help comparing the\ncondition of the Continent and the great Powers--its battles, its\nsieges, its bloodshed, fire, thunder, and strife--with the volcano's\nmolten, seething sea.\n\nIt is a relief to turn for a time from this turmoil of war, of\nintrigue, and murder, to more peaceful scenes at home.\n\nBattalions, companies, and draughts of our regiments were, in those\ndays, beings lifted about here, there, and everywhere, like men and\nknights on a chess-board.  In the summer of 1807 my grandfather was\nnot at all surprised or displeased to find himself back once more in\nDublin barracks.  Both he and his company.\n\nSome changes, however, had taken place among the officers.  Drake was\nstill here, so was O'Reilly, and Dr. McLeod also.\n\nThere was never wanting plenty of work for McLeod to do, and, if he\nwas not labouring in hospital, or among his own men, his services\nwere in request in some other corps lying at the same barracks.\n\nBut Blood died in battle, fighting against fearful odds, sword in\nhand, on a parapet.  In the same action fell Captain Jones, the brave\nWelshman.  A round shot carried his leg away above the knee.\n\nOnly the Royals and one or two other regiments were engaged in this\nskirmish with the French, and they were victorious.\n\nI have observed that my grandfather, like many other old heroes who\nhave fought in great battles, talked of lesser engagements as mere\n\"skirmishes.\"  This seems odd, when you find out that the so-called\nskirmish lasted perhaps three or four hours, with much loss on either\nside.\n\nAgain, old heroes are in the habit of referring to a wound that has\nnot actually severed a limb, or cut a man in two, as \"only a scratch.\"\n\nMy grand-dad had a terrible scar on the left shoulder that must have\ncut far into the deltoid muscle.  I remember well that when I first\nsaw it, while the old warrior, stripped to the waist, was enjoying\nhis morning ablution, I cried out in childish terror, \"O, Auld-da,\nlook at your shoulder.  What a terrible cut!  Didn't you cry awfully?\"\n\nHe smiled, but went on towelling.\n\n\"Only a scratch, dear boy.  Only a scratch!\"\n\nWell, during this spell in Dublin, my hero undertook recruiting\nduties.  The fact is that smart, handsome men were usually picked out\nfor work of this kind, and were proud of it.  I dare say that they\nreceived pickings and perquisites more than enough to buy the ribbons\nof red, white, and blue, that fluttered so gaily from their caps.  On\na market-day it was nothing unusual for a dashing young sergeant to\nenlist half a dozen or more.\n\nMajor Drake drew my grandfather aside one day, and had a quiet talk\nwith him about several things.\n\n\"Now, Sergeant,\" he said at last, \"our regiment, they tell me\"--here\nhe read a portion of a letter he had received from\nheadquarters--\"needs filling up to its full strength, and you are the\nman to help to do it.  You generally bring in three recruits to any\nother sergeant's one.  Well, there is a great fair to take place near\nDundalk, and I'm going to send you round, and I expect you to return\nhere with quite a haul of young fellows.  I believe in a mixture of\nblood myself, and that is why we are recruiting here, but at that\nfair at Dundalk you'll find plenty of good honest Irish and Scots,\nand you're to do your best to bring at least a round dozen.  And you\nneedn't spare expense.\"\n\nMy grand-dad saluted, and said, \"Certainly not, sir.\"\n\n\"But,\" added Drake, \"if I have a fault to find with you, it is\nthis----\"  He paused and looked comically for a few seconds at my\nworthy progenitor, as if not sure how he would take it.\n\n\"Well, sir?\"\n\n\"You're a pleasant sight too _honest_, Sergeant.\"\n\n\"But I draw them all the same.\"\n\n\"You would draw more if you told a white lie now and then.  And,\nSergeant----\"\n\n\"And what, Major Drake?\"\n\n\"All lies told for the benefit of your King and country are white\nlies.\"\n\n\"The regiment is soon to go abroad again, I suppose, sir?\"\n\n\"That's so, I think.\"\n\n\"I'm glad to hear it.\"\n\n\"And why?\"\n\n\"Because I think cutting throats for your King and country is far\nmore honest and honourable than telling lies, however white they may\nbe.\"\n\nDrake laughed heartily.\n\n\"O, Robertson, Robertson, you'd make a capital captain of a company,\nbut you'd never do for a general.\"\n\n\"By the way,\" he added, \"there is something I ought to have told you\nyears ago.  Although we have been separated often enough, you having\nbeen so ubiquitous, I had plenty of opportunities.  Before he left\nthe Rock, the Duke informed me in conversation that he never had an\norderly or staff-sergeant under him that pleased him better than you.\"\n\n\"Did he really?\"\n\nGrand-dad's eyes were sparkling with pleasure.\n\n\"Yes, but he told me more.  There is to be a Highland battalion of\nthe Royal Scots,* if his Royal Highness can manage it.\"\n\n\n* This was on the tapis before Waterloo.\n\n\n\"So he has hinted to me himself, sir.\"\n\n\"Did he tell you anything else?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Well, he assured me that you would be one of the first appointed to\nit as ensign, and I'll be happy, Sergeant Robertson, when that day\ncomes, to welcome you as a brother officer.\"\n\nHe extended his hand, and my grandfather shook it warmly.\n\nNow although, innocently enough, I asked him if he had cried when he\nreceived that awful slash across the shoulder, and although not even\nthe \"pand\u00e9s\" of Dominie Freeschal could make my grandfather cry,\nthere had been tears in his eyes when his officer spoke thus kindly.\nThey came up with a gush and a rush, and it was a wonder they didn't\noverflow.\n\n\"Major Drake,\" he said, \"you've been always a friend to me on sea and\nland, and we have fought shoulder to shoulder many a time, and I\ndeclare to you honestly, I've always felt happy when I saw your sword\nwaving through the smoke of battle.  But now you've made me the\nhappiest man in all the regiment.  I've always tried to do my duty,\nand henceforward, wherever I am, be the danger what it may, I shall\never remember what the dear Duke said, and that ensign's sword will\nseem to guide me on.\"\n\n\"Bravely spoken, Robertson.  Now off you go and get ready for\nDundalk.\"\n\n\"I'm off, sir.  O, by the way,\" he said, turning back, \"my old friend\nTonal is on furlough, and will be here to-morrow.  He'll have his\nbagpipes.  Shall I take him with me?\"\n\n\"Most certainly.\"\n\n* * * * *\n\nIt was not \"to-morrow,\" however, but that very afternoon that Tonal\nand my grand-dad met.  The latter was walking across the bridge with\nthe ribbons fluttering gaily from his hat, as he swung his dainty\ncane, and looked as gay as a goldfinch, when a voice said behind him,\n\"I want to enlist,\" at the same time he received a slap on the back\nthat made him jump.\n\n\"Take that, you spalpeen,\" roared grandfather, rounding briskly on\nhis assailant with uplifted cane.\n\nBut the blow never fell.\n\nFor there was Tonal himself as large as life, and laughing all down\nboth sides, apparently.\n\n\"Well, I am glad.\"\n\n\"And so am I.\"\n\n\"But, Tonal, man, what a terribly hard fist you have!\"\n\nThey adjourned together to a quiet inn at which my grandfather was\nwont to treat the men whom he hoped to enlist.\n\nThere was no recruiting in his head now, however, and it was two\nwhole hours before those two friends and cronies made their exit, so\nmuch had they to speak about and tell each other.\n\nA day or two after this happy meeting, both were off and _en voyage_\nfor Dundalk.\n\nAnd now I have to tell you how my grandfather won his wife.\n\nHow my hero won my grandmother.  Is that a better way of putting it?\nI'm sure I don't know.  You see she couldn't have been my grandmother\nthen, because I wasn't born.  I was dead then, as the children say.\nBesides, a girl of seventeen isn't very often a grandmother, is she?\nHeigho!  I always did get ravelled in reckoning or counting kith and\nkin.\n\nBut one day, a week or two before this momentous visit to Dundalk, he\nwas returning to Dublin from Booterstown.  He was admiring the quiet\nvillas, that even at that distant date were springing up, here and\nthere, not far from the water's edge.\n\nThe bay was very blue and beautiful, and afar off were the bonnie\ngreen hills and the rocks that, together, seemed to float in the\ngloaming haze.\n\nSomehow or other, grandfather's thoughts, just then, were reverting\nto the braes where his father and mother lived, and to his old\nschooldays, when little innocent Rachel Freeschal was his boyhood's\nidol.  He had sunk into a kind of reverie, which, though just tinged\nwith a little sadness, was far indeed from being unpleasant, when he\nheard the rattle of wheels some distance behind him.\n\nHe looked quickly round, and noticed a pony and trap rapidly\nadvancing, the occupants of which--an elderly lady and a young--had\nevidently lost all control over the steed.\n\nThis was a moment for action, and grand-dad was ready for it.  Though\nnot tall, he was very powerfully built, an athlete to all intents and\npurposes.\n\nThis catching of a runaway horse is by no means so easy as it seems.\nAnd it is, moreover, attended with considerable danger.\n\nIn pictures we sometimes see the action represented as if the hero\nthereof had caught the nag, and forced him on his haunches.  It never\nwas like this.  Donald Dinnie himself could not do it.\n\nThe man is invariably dragged some little way unless he can keep his\nfeet.\n\nOn the present occasion my gallant grandfather was most successful,\nand Mrs. Stapleton and her daughter were most grateful.\n\nThe frightened pony had taken them some distance past their cottage,\nand grandfather led him back.\n\nHe would have taken his leave then.\n\n\"Sergeant,\" said the elder lady, \"we are presently going to dine; you\nmust come and join us.\"\n\n\"Ladies,\" was the reply, \"I am but a simple soldier.\"\n\n\"And we're but simple people.  Peter, take the pony.  Scold him a\nlittle, but don't beat him.  This is the gate, Sergeant.  Come.\"\n\nAnd as the girl's eyes said \"Come\" also, what could he do?\n\nBut those eyes, ay, and the beautiful face as well, reminded him so\nof Rachel that non-compliance was out of the question.\n\n\"Obedience to orders,\" he said, smiling, \"is the first duty of a\nsoldier.  I follow.\"\n\nHe unpinned the ribbons from his hat, however, and placed them in his\npocket.\n\nThe ladies lived here all alone, with a single servant ind the boy\nPeter.\n\nMrs. Stapleton* was the widow of a doctor once well known in Dublin,\nand although comfortably off, they were by no means wealthy.  She was\nby no means averse to talking about her past life, nor Eleanor about\nher dead-and-gone father, but all in such a quiet way that my\ngrandfather felt perfectly at home.  He was a simple-minded and\ntruthful man, and although those were the days of effusive\ncompliments, strange to say, he never paid even a lady one.\n\n\n* Mrs. Stapleton and Eleanor are real, not fictitious names.\n\n\nBut he told them much of his strange, romantic life, and especially\nhis early adventures, which made both ladies laugh.\n\nEleanor played prettily on the harp, and sang sweetly too.\n\nGrandfather, in the course of the evening, blurted out the following\nremark:\n\n\"How like your daughter's eyes and looks are to--to one I knew.\"\n\n\"Aha! a sweetheart.  O, you soldiers!\" said Mrs. Stapleton.\n\n\"Yes, a--sweetheart.  It is long, long ago.  She is dead.  I was\nthirteen, she was twelve.\"\n\nSome impulse made him show the ladies his amulet, Rachel's letter,\nand the sadly-faded four-bladed clover.\n\nEleanor smiled when she read it.  But her bonnie blue eyes were\nswimming in tears.\n\n* * * * *\n\n\"If ever I marry,\" said my grandfather to himself as he walked\nhomewards, \"that sweet girl shall be my bride.  But, heigho!  I'm\nonly a soldier, and--they did not even say, 'Come back and see us.'\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI.\n\n  AN IRISH FAIR AT DUNDALK--GREAT FUN AND NO END\n  OF FIGHTING--THE BOMBARDMENT OF\n  COPENHAGEN--GRANDFATHER GETS MARRIED.\n\nThat little cruise round to Dundalk and back was to be big with my\ngrandfather's fate, though he did not know this at the time he\nstarted.\n\nHe voyaged, with his friend Tonal, in a small but comfortable trading\nschooner, the _St. Patrick_.  She was well decked, and though her\ncabin or cuddy was small, it and everything else were beautifully\nclean.\n\nThe skipper was likewise the owner of the craft, and as soon as the\nvessel had cleared the bay, and established a good offing--for the\nwind, though light, was dead on to the rocky shore, a shore on which\nmany a good ship has left her ribs--all three got talking.\n\nThe skipper told his passengers that he made many a journey to\nLiverpool, and even Glasgow, and that being his own master he could\ngo wherever he pleased.\n\n\"My little ship is almost like a yacht, you see,\" he said, looking\nround the deck with pardonable pride.  \"If she weren't my own,\nperhaps I wouldn't take so much pains with her.\"\n\n\"I don't know who it can be,\" said my grandfather presently, \"but you\nare very like someone I know.\"\n\n\"I am said to be very like my elder sister at Booterstown, Sergeant;\nbut you would hardly know Mrs. Stapleton.  She and her daughter have\na cottage there, and, as I always tell them, are buried alive among\nthe trees.\"\n\n\"But, sir, I do know them.  What a strange meeting, to be sure!\"\n\nThen he told the skipper the story of the runaway pony, and the\npleasant evening he had spent at the cottage.\n\n\"The first and the last,\" he added with half a sigh.\n\n\"Don't be too sure, young Sergeant,\" said the skipper; \"for troth,\nthen, I took Eleanor to Dundalk with me only a week ago, to see\nanother uncle, and it is back with me she'll be coming same time as\nyourself.\n\n\"If you've no objection, Sergeant.\"\n\nThis was said with a sly and merry twinkle of the eyes.\n\n\"Ah!\" he added, \"you needn't be looking at the seagulls, Sergeant.\nSure it is myself that can see as far into a stone as a mason\nhimself.  Or _free_-mason.\"\n\nHe held out his hand.\n\n\"Shake, brother, shake.\"\n\n* * * * * *\n\nThat was a merry fair indeed.  And when Tonal blew up the\nbagpipes--he was dressed in full Highland costume--the two of them\nhad a very pretty following, I assure you.\n\nI really cannot say whether my grandfather was guilty of overpraising\nhis Majesty's service or not.  Perhaps he was.\n\nHe and Tonal were very lordly, however, and tossed coins upon the\ncounters in a way that struck awe into the hearts of the simple lads\nthey treated.\n\n\"Faix!\" said one fellow.  \"Faix, Sergeant agra, you must know where\nthem things is dug.\"\n\nGrand-dad took him aside for a few moments, and talked to him.  In\nthat brief time he had gained a recruit.\n\nA fine, strapping, fair-haired lad he was, and when he had got a few\nribbons attached to his cap he was proud indeed, and, marching off\nbehind Tonal, became a kind of nucleus to draw other recruits.  That\nfirst day the haul was seven.\n\nMore ribbons were bought, and more recruits were got next forenoon.\n\nWhy, Tonal really seemed the \"pied piper,\" whom the rats all followed.\n\nAnyhow, it was recruits, not rats, that were wanted, and by the end\nof the third day they had scored nineteen good men and true.\n\nThere was great fun at the fair, and no end of fighting.\n\nHis recruits begged my grandfather, late on the last day, just to let\nthem have a little scrimmage, and he hadn't the heart to refuse.\n\nAnd, with their shillalahs, those nineteen recruits quickly cleared\nthe market-place.  There were many constables there, and they alleged\nthat, \"on their honour, they couldn't have done it more nately\nthemselves.\"\n\nOn the evening of the fourth day, my grandfather marched proudly down\nto the harbour at the head of his men, Tonal on the other side,\nplaying a right lively pibroch.\n\nHere there was much sad leave-taking, sisters, sweethearts, and aged\nmothers crying and wringing their hands, as if broken-hearted,\nbecause their boys were going off to the wars.\n\nBut they were all safely shipped at last, and then the schooner set\nsail.\n\nMy grandfather felt strangely sad, for he saw no signs of Eleanor\nthere.  She could not have come, then; but his sadness disappeared\nlike dark clouds at daybreak when the skipper went down below, and\npresently returned leading Ellen by the hand.\n\n\"Is this the young lady?\" said that sly and wicked old skipper.  \"She\nwas baptized Eleanor as certain as sunrise, but she's called\nEleanora, Leonora, Ellen, or Nora, according to taste, and answers to\nany or all of them together.  I'll leave the two of you together till\ndinner time.  Sure, sodgers never need prompting to talk.\"\n\n* * * * *\n\nI'm sorry, for my reader's sake, that no wild storm arose during the\nvoyage of the St. Patrick back to Dublin, or that the ship didn't\nfounder, leaving them all to escape in the boats, or float for days\non a stormy sea, or that they weren't attacked by a French\nbrig--sorry, in a word, that nothing happened to give my grand-dad\nand Tonal a chance of showing off their gallantry and bravery.\n\nBut nothing did.  That is the worst of writing a true story.  Had\nthis been fiction, I should easily have known how to dispose of the\nSergeant and Nora, if I had had to sink the ship and drown everybody\nelse.\n\nWell, nothing did happen _just then_, but I'll tell you what did\nhappen a few months after this, if you'll wait a few minutes.\n\nWe are in the officers' mess again, then, and listening to the\nconversation of an animated little group who are sitting by\nthemselves near a window, through which are peeping the red rays of\nthe setting sun.\n\n\"You may say what you like, Drake, but I don't think it's altogether\na fair action on the part of the British Government.\"\n\n\"I can't say it is, either,\" said big McLeod, \"but it serves Boney\n(Bonaparte) right, though I pity the poor Danes that were killed.\nThe women and the bairns.  Yet how!  Seems to me that Boney is the\ndevil incarnate, and that he is not only unscrupulous and sinful\nhimself, but manages to stir up evil in every nation he enters or\nplaces his black foot upon.\"\n\n\"Well, perhaps you're right, Doctor.\"\n\n\"O, I'm sure I am.\"\n\n\"Just like a medico.  Anyhow, I'd believe any evil you like to tell\nme about Boney.  Why he has been let loose on earth, goodness only\nknows.\"\n\n\"When taken to be well shaken.\"\n\n\"Yes, till the life is out of him.  But here is, or was, Doctor, the\nstate of the case.  Russia has proved about as much a rogue as\nFrance.  For we find the Bear and the Eagle hugging each other for\ntheir mutual benefit.\n\n\"Says the Eagle: 'If you'll be on my side, we'll play fair.  You\nshall have the rich and splendid provinces of Finland and the Danube.'\n\n\"'Yes, yes,' says the Bear, 'and what am I to do for all these fine\nthings?'\n\n\"'O, hardly anything, only in case of Britain refusing the terms of\npeace that I offer, you, Mr. Bruin, and I, Mr. Eagle, will bring\nmatters to a head.  It will be fine fun.  Denmark and Portugal are\nneutral, but we'll force them to join us against England.  See?'\n\n\"'Yes,' grunted the Bear; 'but suppose the Sultan cuts up rusty and\nsays----'\n\n\"'O, bother! what does the Sultan signify?  I can take him by the\nnose and force him to give up every bit of European territory he\nholds, bar Roumelia and Constantinople, and this we would divide\nbetween us.'\n\n\"Says the Bear: 'Couldn't I have Constantinople?  It would----'\n\n\"'No, no, no; that is, not at present.  But won't we laugh to see the\nfall of prideful, boasting, blessed Britain?'\n\n\"'Ha, ha, ha!' roared Bruin.\n\n\"'And I can then have a castle in Spain,' says the Eagle.\n\n\"'And I, you said (didn't you?), would have the city of Constanti----'\n\n\"'No.  You're joking, Bruin.'\n\n\"Well, this was the secret arrangement between the two nations that\nwere pretending to wish for peace with us.  Were we going to permit\nthem to walk away with that splendid fleet of Denmark's, that should\nhelp them to come thundering to our gates?  Perish the thought!  We\nshould have it, and not they.\"\n\n\"And yet,\" said O'Reilly, \"you say England isn't a grasping nation.\nFaith, it's myself that differs from you entirely.  I say that\nEngland would rather smash an egg than let any other old hen sit on\nit.\"\n\n\"Anyhow, the thing's done,\" said Drake.  \"We sent a fine fleet and a\nfine army out, and it got there in the middle of August.\n\n\"'Hand over these ships,' said the British Lion, 'else the Eagle will\nfloat them.'\n\n\"'We won't,' was the reply.\n\n\"'They'll only be in pawn till peace is proclaimed, you know, and we\ncan protect you from the wrath of France----'\"\n\n\"Yes, indeed,\" sneered O'Reilly, \"and what did brave Denmark reply?\nShe told them (didn't she?) that she wasn't sure the wrath of the\nEagle wasn't less to be dreaded than the friendship of England.\n'Why,' says the Dane, 'there is more honour to be expected from the\npirates of Barbary than from you British.'\"\n\n\"And a very insolent remark it was,\" said Drake, \"and I don't wonder\nthat the Lion growled.\"\n\n\"'If you don't shut up, and hand over your ships,' cried the Lion,\n'I'll blow you sky-high off the face of the earth.'\n\n\"'Then I shan't,' cried Denmark.\n\n\"So, men, the bombardment of Copenhagen commenced.\"\n\n\"Ay,\" said Dr. McLeod, \"and a terrible one it must have been.  A _feu\nd'infer_ that lasted three days and nights.  Eighteen hundred houses\nlevelled to the ground.  The city on fire, here, there, and\neverywhere; even the women and children perishing in the flames, and\nnot knowing where to turn or run to.  Awful!\"\n\n\"But,\" said Drake, \"not only was the fleet then handed over to us,\nbut all the stores in the arsenal as well.\"\n\n\"To be kept in pawn?  Eh?\"\n\n\"No, no, not now.  What we've got we mean to hold.\"\n\nO'Reilly jumped up, and walked away laughing, but ha turned in the\ndoorway, and said--\n\n\"English fair-play?  Eh?  O, sure, it's a beautiful thing entirely.\nEnglish fair----ha, ha, ha!\"\n\nAnd off went O'Reilly.\n\n\"I beg your pardon, Sergeant Robertson,\" he said, as he nearly\ntumbled over my grandfather in the passage.\n\n\"It was to see Major Drake I came,\" said my grand-dad.\n\n\"Knock and go right in, my boy; you'll find him by the window,\ntalking--nonsense.\"\n\nMy grandfather told me he felt very shy.  But he broke the ice at\nlast.\n\nHe wanted to get married, and wanted the commanding officer's leave;\nand would Major Drake----\n\nOf course he would.\n\n\"Of course he will,\" added McLeod also.  \"We'll be proud to have your\nwife join the Royals.\"\n\n* * * * *\n\nSo grandfather got married.\n\nOr, in more poetical language, grandfather made this sweet young\ngirl--my grandmother--his bride, which was very good of him.\n\nThe marriage was a very quiet one--Presbyterian, of course, my\ngallant grand-dad being a Scot as well as a Royal Scot.\n\nHoneymoons were not in those days considered an indispensable\nappendix to a wedding.  Nevertheless, my grand-dad got a fortnight's\nfurlough, to say nothing of a lot of old shoes and handfuls of rice\nas he drove off in a carriage and pair, _en route_ for the Lakes of\nKillarney.\n\nBy the way, I am not much of an antiquarian, else I would pause here\nto wonder what is the reason annexed to throwing old shoes--not\nhob-nailed ones--after a happy pair, plus handfuls of rice.\n\nI suppose--but I don't know--that the old shoes mean: \"May you never\ngo barefooted.\"\n\nAnd the rice: \"May you never go hungry!\"\n\nI think that fortnight's furlough must have been spent most\nblissfully, because one of the few snatches of song that ever I heard\nthe old man sing, was this:\n\n  \"Did e'er you hear tell of Kate Kearney?\n  She lives by the banks of Killarney.\n      From the glance of her eye\n      Shun danger, and fly,\n  For fatal's the glance of Kate Kearney.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII.\n\n  THE FRENCH IN SPAIN AND PORTUGAL--BRITISH TO THE\n  RESCUE--SIR ARTHUR--SIR JOHN MOORE--SPLENDID\n  GENERALSHIP OF NAPOLEON.\n\nBold Bonaparte--for bold as well as wicked he was--commanded Portugal\nto declare war against England, and to confiscate all British\nproperty she could lay her hands on.  The first part of this order\nPortugal did not mind obeying, but the last she would not comply\nwith.  Perhaps she feared reprisals.\n\nNow this refusal was just what Napoleon had wished for.  Fact is, he\nwanted to add Portugal to his own territory.\n\nSo now he recalled his ambassador from Lisbon, and marched Junot\nright away down at the head of a large army.\n\nThe Royal Family fled when this army drew near, all their valuables\nbeing already on board ship.  This was what the Scourge of Europe\ncalled a reprisal for our having taken the Danish fleet.\n\nIf Bonaparte's real aims were not at first suspected by Spain, they\nvery soon became apparent enough.  He had established himself at the\nhead of the Portuguese Government, but Spain, after all, was the big\ntarget he was aiming at.\n\nThe Queen of Spain and her head minister expected that Napoleon would\nclear out of Spain, having taken Portugal.  Napoleon had no such\nintention.  Now the Queen had a husband, King Charles IV., but he was\na mere noodle, and did not count.  She also had a son, Ferdinand, who\nwas, for various reasons, at enmity with her.  It was put into this\nnoodle-king's head that his son wanted to usurp his throne, and he\nwrote a simple letter to Bonaparte, telling him that Ferdinand and\nhis accomplices had been put under arrest, and would be tried and\nexcluded from the succession.\n\nThis was really playing into Napoleon's hand, who seized the pretext\nof throwing a great army on the border, nominally to protect the\nroyal rights of Ferdinand, the Crown Prince.  This army entered Spain\nin the end of December, 1807, and the Spaniards welcomed it with joy.\nAt last they would be delivered from the thraldom of the hated\nminister and the Queen.\n\nMeanwhile Ferdinand and his father became friendly.\n\nThe French army continued to march south and south, and one way or\nanother got hold of the frontier fortresses.  Then they marched\ntowards Madrid itself, and the terrified King abdicated in favour of\nhis son Ferdinand.\n\nTo make a long story short, the Spaniards at length discovered--when\ntoo late--what sort of a man they had to deal with.  Riots broke out\nin Madrid, and Frenchmen to the number of about a hundred were killed.\n\nMurat, who commanded the army of occupation, exacted a terrible\nvengeance on the unfortunate insurgents.  They were driven into the\nsquare, and, while they tried to defend themselves as brave men will,\nthey were slain by repeated charges of Murat's horse.  When they laid\ndown their arms they were shot in cold blood.\n\nThe wolf Napoleon now threw off the sheepskin, and it ended in both\nthe King and his son being exiled.\n\nBut the wolf had still to deal with the patriotic and brave\npeople--patriotic to a degree.  This people rose _en masse_, and a\nwar of independence was proclaimed by the Spaniards against the\ninvader, from end to end of their ancient and heroic land.\n\n* * * * *\n\nThe noble struggle of Spain and Portugal for freedom forms one of the\nromantic dramas in the history of this nineteenth century.\n\nI wish it were mine to tell my readers the whole sad and glorious\nstory, not in the ponderous English that historians deem it the\ncorrect thing to use, but in language---simple, terse, and plain, yet\npleasant--that even a boy might read.\n\nI do not wonder at my grandfather saying to me so often, \"O laddie,\nwar is a terrible, terrible thing.\"  I was but a child then, and\ncould only see the glory-side of war.\n\nWhat a fiend in human form the French General Loison must have been!\nAt Evora, we are told,* \"he acted like the lowest bandit.  He robbed\nthe convents with his own hands.  He ransacked the bishop's library,\nwith some of his officers, to discover concealed valuables behind the\nbooks, tore off the gold and silver clasps, and, on finding but\nlittle treasure, destroyed piles of valuable manuscripts.  They took\naway gold and silver coins out of the cabinet of medals, and the\njewels that adorned statues and relics, and Loison even filched the\narchbishop's ring from his table.\n\n\n* CASSELL'S _History of England_.\n\n\n\"Never was there a nation, calling itself civilized, which so\nuniversally carried robbery and licentiousness into the countries\nwhich they wantonly invaded.\"\n\nBut while Loison was carrying on thus at Evora, another officer,\ncalled Margaron, was butchering the inhabitants of Leiria.\n\nThere they not only killed all they could find--men, women, and\nchildren--but even tore open the graves in search of pillage.\n\nIn fact, wherever the French appeared, they appeared as agents of\nlust, rapine, and destruction; and the peasantry, roused by their\nconduct to a fury of vengeance, fell on them wherever they could find\nthem, and massacred them without mercy.\n\nBut the hour of retribution was at hand.\n\nProbably, reader, being more used to fighting, the people of these\nislands were more courageous then than they are now.\n\nIn these days, we can hear the screams and wails of men, women, and\nchildren, as they are murdered wholesale in Christian Armenia,\nwithout even dreaming of going to assist them.  Their heart-rending\nappeals arouse in us not half the sympathy that the pitiful squeals\nof a pig being slaughtered do.\n\nBut in those sad days the people of these islands responded to the\ncry of Spaniards and Portuguese at once.\n\nThey would make no more war in either country, but do their best by\nsea and land to extinguish the terrible fire-brand Napoleon, who had\nset the whole of Europe in a blaze.\n\nSir Arthur Wellesley, who became afterwards the great and famous Duke\nof Wellington, arrived at Corunna, and concerning his doings and\nsuccesses there against the French I must refer you to history.\n\nBut Sir Arthur was a soldier born, if ever there was one.  It was not\nsimply that he was brave, which he was.  A savage may be brave, and\ngenerally is.  This general possessed tact and the genius of\npainstaking.  Had we been as careful with our commissariat during the\nCrimean war as Wellesley was with his, our poor troops would not have\ndied like rotten sheep, succumbing to cold and hunger and disease.\n\n* * * * *\n\nThe happy life that my grandfather had led for many months had all\ntoo soon to come to an end.  Leonora and he must bid each other\nfarewell--a long and eternal farewell, it might be.  He was going to\ntake part in the great Peninsular war, and do his duty as no one\ndoubted for a moment that he would.\n\nSo Leonora once more took up her abode with her mother in the cosy\nlittle cottage at Booterstown, and John, her hero, went away to fight\nthe French.\n\nFrom his great intimacy with Wellesley's private as From his great\nintimacy with Wellesley's private as well as public character, I\nthink my grandfather must have served for a time under him.  Never\ncould there have been a stricter officer than this general.  Yet for\nall that he was trusted and beloved by his men, whom he so often led\nto battle and to victory.\n\nIt is with Sir John Moore's expedition, however, we have at present\nmost to do.\n\nThis brave general had been ordered to advance with his 20,000 men\ninto Spain as far as Burgos, and there assist the armies to expel the\nFrench.  They were, he was given to understand, to receive, later on,\na reinforcement of 10,000 men, then sailing from England to take part\nin this unhappy war.\n\nThis was in October, 1808.\n\nIn the following mouth Napoleon himself crossed the Pyrenees.  The\nSpaniards had been so far victorious during the previous summer that\nthey had compelled the enemy to fall back upon and cross the river\nEbro.\n\nNapoleon considered that he himself alone was equal to a whole army,\nand there is no doubt this was true enough.\n\nThe beaten forces that he would now join lay between the Pyrenees and\nthe Ebro.  He would soon change the tune of the haughty Spaniards,\npenetrate the centre of their army and defences, hurl it to right and\nto left of him, then advance in a bee-line to Burgos and Madrid\nitself.\n\nAs an example of what the great game of war is, I may instance\nNapoleon's advance upon Burgos.  No doubt he had spies everywhere,\nand knew where the Spanish armies lay as well as they did themselves.\nAs in the simple game of draughts, so in the game of war, you must\nthink ahead.  You must think, as it were, with your opponent's mind.\n\"If I move there,\" you will say, \"what will my opponent do, and what\nwill be the consequence?\"\n\nNapoleon said to himself, \"As soon as I reach Vittoria, General\nBlake, with the left wing of the Spanish army, will move from the\nEbro, and try to outflank me and cut me off from the Pyrenees.  I\nhope he will.\"\n\nBlake did, and marched eastwards.\n\nHad he gone far enough, or so far as to lose his line of retreat, he\nwould have been surrounded by the French, and his army massacred to a\nman.\n\nLuckily for him, the French themselves attacked too soon, and\nalthough Blake was badly beaten at Espinosa, on the upper waters of\nthe Ebro, he was able to retreat with his sadly beaten forces into\nthe mountains of Asturias.\n\nMarshal Soult, the great French general, now charged the centre of\nthe Spanish lines.  The battle was bloody while it lasted, but\nvictory fell to Soult, and Burgos was captured.\n\nGeneral Ney was next despatched to attack the remainder of the\nSpanish forces that, like a new broom, were to have swept the enemy\nclean out of Spain.\n\nOn the 4th of December Napoleon captured Madrid itself.\n\nThe Emperor of the French had therefore carried out his little\nprogramme with beautiful tact and precision and completely destroyed\nthe great Spanish line of defence long before it could be reinforced\nby British troops.\n\nHaving read so far, you will easily understand the why and the\nwherefore of Sir John Moore's unfortunate campaign.\n\nTo begin with, this expedition of Moore's was at least a month too\nlate in starting, and it had difficulties to contend with from the\nvery first, that were almost insurmountable.\n\nProbably Sir Arthur Wellesley might have made a quicker and more\ndashing march, and a better-conducted one.  As it was, when Sir John\nstarted from Lisbon he found that he could not procure sufficient\nconveyances for his baggage and impedimenta, so that these had to be\ncut down to the lowest figure.\n\nMany of the women and children were left behind.  It was the custom\nin those days to permit the most deserving soldiers' wives to\naccompany their husbands, a custom that we nowadays cannot but marvel\nat.  Women on the war-path make the worst of all species of baggage.\n\nThe army was ordered to pay the utmost respect to the people, and to\ntreat none of their ways and customs with anything like disdain.\n\nThe next difficulty was that of provisions.  This caused much trouble\nand delay, because the French had harried the country through which\nthey must pass.\n\nThe army then had to advance in divisions and by different routes.\n\nThe weather was rainy--wet and bad.  The roads were in a fearful\ncondition to drag artillery over, or even for men to march through.\n\nIt was not until the 11th of November that Sir John managed to drag\nhis army across the frontier and reach Ciudad Rodrigo.  Two days\nafter this he entered Salamanca.\n\nAt Salamanca Sir John Moore had to make a halt, for two reasons.\nFirst, owing to the abominable condition of the roads, he had been\nobliged to send the most of his artillery round by Elvas, and he must\nhere wait till they joined.  Secondly, he had to wait for the\nreinforcements which, after innumerable delays, had been permitted to\nland at Corunna.  These were the 10,000 men under Baird, including\nthose of the Royals my grandfather was attached to, and which also\nincluded the 42nd--the \"gallant Forty-twa.\"\n\nIll-luck seemed to cloud, then, this expedition from the very first.\nSir John had expected that he would speedily join the already\nvictorious armies of Spain, and assist in sweeping the French back\nacross the Pyrenees.  Where were those armies?  With what or whom was\nhe to co-operate?\n\nBut he could get no correct information.  The Spanish Junta were\ntaking it easy.  They vainly imagined that they hardly now required\nthe assistance of the British.  Were their own victorious troops not\nlying defensively on the frontiers?  Were not these able to overthrow\nthe French?\n\nHow little they knew the French, or rather Napoleon.\n\nAt Salamanca Sir John Moore seemed to be completely befogged, and the\nstate of his mind at this time was certainly not an enviable one.\nJust think of it for a moment, reader.  The French were within twenty\nleagues of him, having captured--so he was told--Valladolid.\n\nMr. John Hookham Frere at this time--worse luck--was ambassador at\nMadrid.  From him poor Sir John Moore could get no information.  Sir\nDavid Baird had not got away from Corunna, and Sir John Hope had not\nyet got past Madrid with the guns.  In fact Moore was isolated.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII.\n\n  TREACHERY AND FOOLERY--A RACE FOR LIFE AND A RUN\n  FOR THE SEA--TOM GRAHAME'S BABY--SORROW, SUFFERING,\n  AND DANGER--IT MUST BE DEATH OR VICTORY.\n\nIt was the want of proper information as to what was really going on\nthat caused the ruin of the unfortunate Sir John Moore.  That\ninformation ought to have come to him from Frere, the British\nambassador at Madrid.  Not only did this fellow not trouble himself\nto communicate with Moore, but he scarcely bothered to find out the\nreal state of matters himself.  He was led by the nose by the\nplausible traitor, Morla, who was in communication with the French.\n\nHad a fellow like Frere belonged to the French army, he would have\nbeen shot--or hanged, for shooting was really too good for him.\n\nFrom the little he did know, more by chance than anything else, he\nconcluded he must retreat into Portugal.\n\nBoth Sir David Baird and his corps, as well as Sir John Hope with the\nartillery, were still at a distance.  Moore sent messengers to both.\nBaird was to fall back on Corunna, and sail with his army to Lisbon;\nHope was to meet him at Ciudad Rodrigo.\n\nPity indeed these arrangements were not carried out.  And why were\nthey not?  Simply because Moore was out-generalled by means of the\ntreachery of Morla, and the blank idiocy of the ambassador, Frere.\n\nThe latter wrote to Sir John from Avanjuez, on November 30th, and\nearnestly protested against his proposed retreat.  Nothing, he said,\ncould beat the splendid valour of the Spaniards.  Moore, if he\nmarched to Madrid, could save Spain by repulsing the French before\nthey received reinforcements!\n\nThis letter, as we know, was written just as Napoleon was dashing\ndown upon Madrid, after scattering the Spanish frontier lines into\nmist.  At the very time that Moore received the communication, the\nFrench were lying in wait for the general, and a day or two after\nFrere himself was fleeing for his life to Badajoz.\n\nFrere took no trouble even now to send to warn Moore.  But he did\nworse, for the scoundrel Morla--instigated by the French--also wrote\nto Sir John Moore urging him to come on.  He even sent a messenger\nafter Frere, and this letter was endorsed by the British minister.\n\nThe desire of Morla was, of course, to make our hero, Moore, believe\nthat Madrid would fight to the last if he would hurry up to their\nassistance.  But at this very time Napoleon was in possession of\nMadrid!  And instead of fighting, the nobles had fled, thinking more\nabout saving their lives and their jewellery than of becoming\npatriots.\n\nIt was all clearly a plot to lead Moore into a disaster that would\nhave been infinitely more terrible than that which did take place.\n\nMoore, however, still thought he could beat the French general,\nSoult, before Napoleon could come up.  He was finally reinforced by\nBaird and Hope, and had now altogether about 25,000 men, with more\nregiments coming on.\n\nHe was obliged, however, to halt at Sahagan, to wait for his baggage\nand supplies, and Soult was only a day's march distant.\n\nIt was now that for the first time, and that too by the merest\nchance, Moore learnt that Napoleon himself, with 40,000 picked men,\nwas on his trail, having crossed a ridge of mountains by forced\nmarches through sleet and snow.\n\nEverything depended now on whether Napoleon's vanguard or Moore's\narmy should reach the bridge at Benavente, that spans the river Esla.\n\nMoore won this, and blew it up immediately after he got his army over.\n\nWhat was the odds, as regards numbers, between Moore's force and that\nof the enemy?  Why, the French numbered altogether 100,000 men.\n\nThere was nothing for it now but a retreat upon Corunna, but Napoleon\nfelt certain that Moore and all his men would speedily fall into his\nhands.\n\nThe Emperor, after following Moore for a day or two, left the rest\nfor his marshals to do.  It was easy work, of this he was confident.\n\nBut Soult, with his great army of three to one of the British, still\nfollowed on.\n\nOn the very last day of December, 1808, Napoleon was close to the\nrear of the flying army of Britain.\n\nOn the 1st of January, 1809, he was at Astorga, and this ambitious\nman, who seemed neither to fear God nor regard the sufferings and\ntorture he was causing to writhing millions, must needs climb an\nadjacent hill to see the last of Moore and his men, to feast his\neyes, as it were, upon the sight of the already tired and weary\nrear-guard, that dragged on after the main body.\n\nHe was required elsewhere.\n\n\"Soult,\" he said to himself, \"will settle with them.  My guiding star\nleads me back to fair France, which is all my own.  Ay, and my own it\nmust be, despite the news that these despatches bring me.\"\n\nThe news he referred to was that Austria had gone on the war-path.\n\nSo next day he hurried away from Spain, back again over the Pyrenees,\nwith far greater speed than he had come.\n\nEverything depended on his presence in Paris, and at the seat of this\nnew war.\n\nLet us follow Moore, then.\n\nWords, of course, are useless to describe the retreat of this general\nand his now disorganised army.\n\nA beaten or retreating army is ever a demoralised one, and the\nBritish, in this case, was no exception.\n\nThe retreat was indeed a race for life on a gigantic scale.\n\nA race for life, a run for the sea.\n\nFor the first few days the retreat was conducted in as orderly a\nmanner as possible.  Some of the French, however, had crossed the\nstream, and, making a dash for Moore's rear, succeeded in capturing\nmany hundreds of the sick and stragglers.  These they despatched with\nscant ceremony.\n\nIt was pitiful indeed that the sick should be thus ruthlessly\nmurdered; but as for the other stragglers, I fear they had only\nthemselves to blame, for these men had weakened their constitutions\nwith wine.  Some, indeed, were found by Soult's men drunk on the\nhills or in the woods, and subjected to unheard-of atrocities.\n\nBut the torrents of rain, that left off only to change to pelting\nsnow, and the terrible condition of the roads they had to traverse,\nsoon began to tell upon the very best and bravest of the men, and\nthey became gloomy, hopeless, and, in not a few instances, reckless.\n\nThe women and children--more of whom had been taken along with the\narmy than Sir John Moore had sanctioned--were, perhaps, in a more\nterrible plight than even the men, being, of course, more feeble and\nless able to bear hardships and exposure to the elements.\n\nThese, with the sick, which every day increased in numbers, were kept\nas well in front as possible, but it is not going too far to say that\nthe very helplessness of these poor creatures often inspired our\nfellows with courage, even when themselves sinking with fatigue.\n\nMoore was making all haste, but so was Soult, and ever, as he pressed\ntoo closely in the rear, Sir John would single out his best regiments\nand companies, and while the main portion of his retreating army,\nwith baggage and women, hurried on, he turned like a very lion in the\nface of Soult's men.\n\nDid they fight despairingly?\n\nNo, Britons never despair when fighting.\n\nHad you, reader, but heard the wild cheers of the English at such\ntimes, the terrible slogan of the Highlanders, and the inspiriting\nnotes of the bagpipes, you would have been proud of your country.\nNothing could have satisfied you but drawing your sword, taking up\nthe battle-cry, and dashing on with our troops to face the French.\n\nAnd not only was my grandfather's great friend, Tonal, in this\nretreat, but Sergeant Tom Grahame also.\n\nIn the dusk, one evening, my grand-dad met Tom carrying something in\nthe folds of his plaid.\n\nThe honest fellow was bending down over it, and singing--_mirabile\ndictu!_\n\n\"Why, Tom,\" cried my grandfather, \"what have you got there?\"\n\n\"A poor wee lassie, John.  She belonged to Jack Burns, of ours.\"\n\n\"And what are you going to do with her?\"\n\n\"Why, Lord love the bairn; I dare say I'll have to adopt her.\"\n\n\"But her mother and father, Sergeant?\" said Major Drake, who came up\nat this moment.\n\n\"Hush, sir, hush.\"\n\nThen in a whisper: \"I found the bairn beneath a bush out yonder,\nbeside her dead mother.  The father fell to-day in the rush back\nagainst Soult.  She's an orphan.  Sleep, dearie, sleep.\"\n\nAnd he swung her back and forwards.\n\n\"A pretty child, indeed,\" said Drake.\n\nThe wee thing looked up into his face, and smiled.\n\n\"I'se dot (got) some suga' candy,\" she said, \"and I'se going to keep\na big, big piece for dear daddy and ma.\"\n\n\"Tom,\" said Major Drake, \"however are you going to fight with a child\nin your arms?\"\n\n\"O, I'll find a way,\" said Tom gaily; \"but anyhow I'll stick to her\ntill we get to Corunna.\"\n\n\"If ever we do get, lad,\" said grand-dad.\n\n\"Don't you go despairing next, John.\"\n\n\"O, I never despair.\"\n\nDrake walked on.  The halt had been called, and soon some food was\nbrought--the sort it was.\n\n\"Why here comes Tonal, bagpipes and all.\"\n\n\"Well, it isn't me, John, that's going to play to-night.  Man, I\nwouldn't play to wake the childer' (children) and the poor women for\nanything.\"\n\n\"Sit down, Tonal.  Sentries are set, and I'm off duty, in a way of\nspeaking.  We'll spend the night together.  Raise a fire, Tonal.\"\n\n\"I will with pleasure.  And glad I am to be with you, och! and och!\nthe scenes, on in front yonder, where Dr. McLeod is labouring, like\nthe big, good-hearted giant he is, are just too awful for anything.\nAnd is it a little child you've got, Tom?\"\n\nTom laughed.\n\n\"It's my little daughter,\" he said, and then told the sad story.\n\nThe fire was soon lighted, and the wee one was fed and dried.  Then\nTom rolled her in his plaid again, and she went to sleep in his arms.\n\n\"I think,\" said Tonal, thoughtfully gazing at the fire, \"that it's\nmyself can find you a nurse for the wee thing.\"\n\n\"Yes, Tonal?\"\n\n\"O, it is just a little Spanish lassie of sixteen, but an angel for\nall that; so brave, too, though you wouldn't think it to look at her.\nAnd so bonnie, I--I--I think, man, I've sort of lost my heart to the\ngirl.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said my grandfather, \"I thank Heaven, Tonal, that my heart is\nfar away, near Dublin Bay.  And my wife, too, was sick to come with\nme.  Maybe, Tonal, she is praying for us now.\"\n\nTonal simply said:\n\n\"Well, John, and we'll pray for her and for the dear souls on the\npeaceful Braes of R----.  It's well they don't know to-night of our\nsorrows, or sufferings, or dangers.\"\n\nThen they got talking together of far-off homes and times long gone\nby, till, wearied at last, they fell sound asleep.\n\nThe dark day had not yet broken, however, before the retreat was once\nmore commenced.\n\nAs long as the marching continued, Tom Grahame stuck to his\nprize--the little orphan.\n\nBut things grew worse and worse, and the waysides or hills were\nlittered with the weary and dying or dead.  Especially did the women\nand children suffer.  Alas! these were only too often left to be\nmutilated and torn to pieces by Soult's savage soldiers.\n\nBut on the day when Colbert, the French general, was killed by our\nmaddened though flying forces, and seven squadrons of cavalry that he\nled cut to pieces, Tom Grahame entrusted Annie, as he called the\nchild, to the care of the girl who had so captivated poor Tonal.\n\nPoor Tonal, I well may say; for that day, while leading a stirring\ncharge, or cheering the men, at all events, with the sound of the\nsweet Highland bagpipe, he was struck down with a bullet, that not\nonly went through his shoulder, but through the bagpipes as well.\n\nI really think Tonal was more vexed at the accident to his pipes than\nthat to himself.\n\nMy grandfather helped to carry Tonal off the field, and to place him\nunder the care of McLeod.  Nor did he leave him until assured by the\ndoctor that his friend's wound was not mortal.\n\n\"Och!\" said Tonal, \"but the wound to my poor pipes is mortal, Dr.\nMcLeod, and it isn't you yourself that can mend that same.\"\n\nThe girl had now to nurse both the orphan and her lover, Tonal.  As\noften as not the child and she were borne in the same litter.\n\nAlmost daily the fighting continued, and Soult soon came to the\nconclusion that in the British, despite the fact that they were a\nretreating or flying army, he had no mean foe to deal with.\n\nI am sorry to add, so demoralized did many of our troops become, that\nthey frequently broke the ranks, and rushed pell-mell to seize food\nand wine from the Spanish villages, or wherever else it could be\nfound.  Many thus lost their lives who might otherwise have been\nspared.\n\nThe night of the eighth was a memorable one.  On the previous day, so\nfearful was the onslaught of the British on the advancing foe, that\nabout five hundred French lay dead on the field, and so disheartened\nwas Soult, that he refused battle.\n\nThis night there was no rest for the wounded and weary, except the\neternal rest, into which many sank.  For after a hurried supper the\nmarch was resumed.\n\nAfar off they could see the camp-fires of the French, and their own\nthe British left burning to deceive the foe.\n\nWhen, on the 13th day of January, they came near to Corunna at last,\ntheir spirits rose to a joy almost akin to deliverance at the sight\nof the sea.  But, alas! they sank again almost as speedily, for here\nwas no British fleet to receive them.\n\nNow at last it must be death or victory.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX.\n\n  FIGHTING AGAINST FEARFUL ODDS--DEATH OF MOORE--THE\n  EMBARKATION--A WIFE AND A NEW SET OF BAGPIPES.\n\nAt Corunna Sir John Moore quickly established his troops.  He found\nplenty of ammunition here that the careless, stupid Spanish\nauthorities had not troubled themselves to send on.\n\nAt Corunna he determined to defend himself till the transports came\nup; they really had been detained at Vigo by stress of weather.\n\nHowever, on the very next day after their arrival, the ships did\narrive, and no time was lost in getting the wounded, the sick, the\nwomen and children, and even the horses, on board, for Sir John was a\nhumane man.\n\nBut already Soult was close to the town, and skirmishing had\ncommenced.\n\nSir John had blown up a magazine only the day before, that was built\non a hill overlooking the town.  It is said that in this magazine\nwere about 4000 barrels of gunpowder that had been sent from England.\nIn this very spot Soult had some of his guns planted, and, in seizing\nthese, brave Colonel McKenzie and many of his men were killed by the\nFrench.\n\nOur troops occupied the village of Elima, and to command this Soult\nhad erected a formidable battery.  Opposite this battery, and not far\noff, were Sir David Baird and his men.\n\nAbout twelve o'clock on the 15th of January, the terrible but\nglorious battle began in earnest.\n\nI am not going to describe it in detail.  It was a fight that every\nBritish schoolboy should know as much about as any novelist can tell\nhim.\n\nWe fought a desperate battle, though not a despairing one.\n\nDefeat would have meant for us utter annihilation.  Yet we fought\nagainst fearful odds.\n\nI--a Scot--would naturally like to claim the greatest honours for my\nown countrymen, notably the gallant Forty-twa, and my grand-dad's\nregiment.  O, it is only natural.  But, my brave English lads and\nlasses who do me the honour of reading my books, I am going to do\nnothing of the sort.  Let us say honours were divided 'twixt Scotch,\nEnglish, and Irish.\n\nJust a word about the numerical strength of the opposing hosts.\n\nSoult, then, had fully twenty thousand men, and Sir John but little\nover fourteen thousand.  Moreover, our general had shipped all his\nartillery with the exception of a few small cannons.\n\nMany a gallant charge was made that day, and again and again was the\nvillage taken and lost.  Many a brave man and officer fell too.  But\nwe were not to be denied, not to be beaten.\n\nPoor Sir John Moore! his last heroic words, his last wild shout, were\naddressed to the 42nd.\n\nThis was a critical time, for Sir David Baird's arm was broken by a\ncannon-ball.  Major Stanhope was killed, and the well-known Sir\nCharles Napier, at this time a major, was wounded, and Paget was\nborne back on the right wing.\n\nIt was then that, seeing the critical state of affairs, Sir John\nMoore, who, you will remember, led the Highlanders at Alexandria,\ngalloped up to the 42nd.\n\n\"Hurrah! my lads,\" he shouted; \"remember Egypt!  Down with the foe!\"\n\nSurely a wilder slogan had never been heard before in any\nbattle-field than that which answered Sir John.\n\n\"That we will!\" roared Tom Grahame.  \"Forward!\"\n\nThen the cheer and the slogan, and those sturdy mountaineers seemed\nto carry everything before them.  The Highlanders were bravely\nsupported by men brought up by Hardinge.\n\nBut, alas! it was then that, while waiting for this officer, brave\nSir John Moore was struck.  He fell from his horse.\n\nBut, with his terrible wound bleeding, he sat up once more and gazed\nafter the 42nd, who were driving the enemy before them.\n\nOf two things the hero now felt certain.  First, that the victory was\nours, and secondly, that he himself had received his death-wound.\n\nLike the immortal Nelson--\n\n  \"In honour's cause his life had passed,\n  In honour's cause he fell at last\n      For England, Home, and Beauty.\"\n\n\nSergeant Tom Grahame, with two other soldiers, making a hammock of a\nHighland plaid, carried the poor bleeding general to the rear, though\nmore than once, so great was his anxiety to see how things were going\non, he caused them to halt, that he might catch one more glimpse of\nthe battle-field.\n\nSir John Moore's wounds were mortal, and by sunset he was dead.\n\nBut our troops were victorious all along the line and in every line.\n\nThere was no coffin to lay the remains of the hero in.  He was just\nburied at midnight, in the uniform he had worn when shot down,\nwrapped in martial cloak, as Wolfe in his poem describes it, and\nwithout either pomp or ceremony.  He had endeared himself, however,\nto his soldiery, and had it been daylight, many a tear might have\nbeen seen glistening in the eyes of the rough and weather-beaten\nsoldiers, who placed him in his narrow bed.\n\n  \"Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,\n    As his corse to the rampart we hurried;\n  Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot\n  O'er the grave where our hero we buried\n\n  \"We buried him darkly at dead of night,\n    The sods with our bayonets turning;\n  By the struggling moonbeam's misty light,\n    And the lantern dimly burning.\n\n  \"No useless coffin enclosed his breast,\n    Not in sheet nor in shroud we wound him;\n  But he lay like a warrior taking his rest,\n    With his martial cloak around him.\n\n  \"Few and short were the prayers we said,\n    And we spoke not a word of sorrow;\n  But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead,\n    And we bitterly thought of the morrow.\n\n  \"We thought as we hollowed his narrow bed,\n    And smoothed down his lonely pillow,\n  That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head,\n    And we far away on the billow!\n\n  \"Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone,\n    And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him;\n  But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep on\n    In the grave where a Briton has laid him.\n\n  \"But half our heavy task was done,\n    When the clock struck the hour for retiring;\n  And we heard the distant and random gun\n    That the foe was sullenly firing.\n\n  \"Slowly and sadly we laid him down,\n    From the field of his fame fresh and gory;\n  We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone--\n    But we left him alone with his glory.\"\n\n\nIt was not without danger and difficulty, to say nothing of accident,\nthat the troops were finally embarked.\n\nGeneral Soult may have imagined we were going to keep the lines we\nhad so gallantly won, and remain for a time at Corunna.  When,\ntherefore, he found next morning that these were deserted, and our\nships making off to sea, he caused great guns to be dragged to the\ntops of the hills, and endeavoured to sink the vessels.\n\nThree or four of these got on shore, but although they had to be\nabandoned, those on hoard were saved by the boats; and so ended this\nill-fated expedition.\n\n* * * * *\n\nOnce fairly at sea, there was time for our brave fellows to think and\ntalk of all the fearful sufferings they had come through.  Not that\nthese were quite all over yet.  The transports were but small, and\nwere painfully over-crowded.\n\nMoreover, in the hurry of embarkation, women got separated from their\nchildren, and knew not whether they were dead or alive.  Nor could\nwives tell the fate of their husbands.\n\nMany mourned as dead those they joyfully met again on shore, and,\nalas! not a few felt certain their husbands were safe on board some\nother transport, though they were lying stark and stiff on the\nbattle-field where they had so gallantly fought and fallen.\n\nNeither O'Reilly nor Drake, though bravely indeed had they led their\nmen on, had received a scratch, nor had my grandfather.  These two\nofficers, however, were on board another ship; while once again, as\nfate would have it, Tom Grahame, Tonal, and my grand-dad found\nthemselves together--thanks to careful nursing, for the Spanish girl\nhad embarked with the others, bringing Tom's baby, as little Annie\nwas called, along with her.  The child had taken a very great fancy\nfor the burly sergeant, and screamed with delight when she saw him\nagain.\n\n\"What are you going to do with her, Tom?\" asked my grand-dad again.\n\n\"Well, Preen Mhor,\" was the reply, \"I haven't just made up my mind\nyet.  If I can get a furlough, I'll just take her home to my mother\non the braes.  If not, she must follow a soldier's fortunes.\"\n\n\"Well, Tom, you have a great big heart of your own, to be sure.  But\nas for Tonal, it is very evident what he means to do.\"\n\n\"To be sure, to be sure, Tonal has a soft heart of his own, and now\nthat he has lost his bagpipes, nothing but a wife can take their\nplace.\"\n\n\"A good exchange, Tom; and when he comes to have a few bairns, faix!\nhe won't miss the pipes.\"\n\nTom laughed.\n\nBut it turned out much as was predicted.  Tonal did get married.  At\nDover, I believe, the happy event took place.  And Tonal was doubly\ndelighted, because on that same day the officers and non-commissioned\nofficers presented the honest fellow with a splendid stand of\nbagpipes, brent new from Inverness.\n\nNo wonder Tonal was happy.  Many a man gets a wife, but probably not\none in ten thousand gets a wife and a stand of bagpipes both in the\nsame day.  That was where the laugh came in.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X.\n\n  \"I'M A SOLDIER'S WIFE, I'LL SHARE A SOLDIER'S TOILS\"--GIRL\n  HEROINES--STORMING OF BERGEN-OP-ZOOM--STRANGE\n  ADVENTURES--BORN ON A BATTLE-FIELD.\n\nI need scarcely tell you that, as soon as he could get a furlough,\nnay grandfather hurried off to Dublin.\n\nWhat a pleasure, and what a change from the terrible toils of battle\nand retreat, was the seat by the fireside of Mrs. Stapleton's cottage!\n\n\"Ellen,\" my grandfather said, \"looked prettier than ever.\"  Had his\nname been William instead of Ian or John, I dare say the following\nlines would have been appropriate to their meeting:\n\n  \"She gazed, she reddened like a rose,\n    Then pale as any lily;\n  Then sank into his arms and cried,\n    'Are ye my ain dear Willie?'\"\n\n\n\"O John, John,\" she told him when they were alone that first evening,\n\"what a sad and weary time it has been to me, and never, never, did I\nexpect to see you more!  But, John----\"\n\n\"Yes, dear.\"\n\n\"You shall not leave me again.  I shall go with you.\"\n\n\"Child, child, you little know what a terrible thing war is.  O, had\nyou but seen how some of those poor women, the soldiers' wives,\nsuffered in that awful retreat, dragging on, on, on, day after day,\nthrough slush and mud, in rain and cold, and sleeping by the\ncamp-fires at night, with scarce even a plaid to cover them, and\nnever knowing the moment the enemy would attack!  Then the weariness,\nthe cold, the hunger.  O, don't think of it, Ellen, agra'.\"\n\n\"But, John, your Ellen has already thought about it.\"\n\nShe stood up as she spoke, and with one loving hand upon his shoulder\nand her eyes looking straight into his:\n\n\"John, listen to me.  English women and Scottish followed their\nhusbands through all the horrors, and toils, and terrors of that sad\nretreat.  What a Scotch or English lass can do an Irish lass can do\nas well!  Besides,\" she added, with a smile, \"the motto of the\nBritish army is 'Advance!' and not 'Retreat!'\"\n\nThen, more seriously, but with pretty determination:\n\n\"John, mavourneen, I'm a soldier's wife.  I'll share a soldier's\ntoils.\"\n\nWhat could grand-dad say or do?\n\nEllen had her own way, and all was arranged.\n\n* * * * *\n\nI dare say my girl readers will think that last line of asterisks\nrepresents kisses.  They may if they choose.  But it really is only\nmy way of dividing periods and paragraphs.\n\nNever, then, during the next six years, in which she followed his\nfortunes, did my grandfather repent having taken his wife with him.\nBut those were indeed stirring days!\n\nStirring days for Europe, stirring days for Britain from Land's End\nto John O' Groats.  For our country was being drained of its best and\nbravest men to fight the French in far-off foreign lands, or upon the\nocean itself.\n\nSome women are cut out for soldiers' wives, and are heroines noble,\nfaithful, and true.  The times in which they live and the scenes they\nsee around them in war times make heroines of even girls, or, let us\nsay, bring to the fore all of the heroic that had hitherto lain\nlatent in their natures.\n\nRemember, for instance, the story of Joan of Arc, and that of the\nMaid of Saragossa.  Was she a beautiful lunatic?  Some have dared to\nsay so, just as those who are \"stirks\" and asses themselves tell you\nthat genius is akin to madness.\n\nAh! we need the example of such lunatics, even in Britain, to stir\nour blood and clear it.  But when the French, under Napoleon himself,\nwere besieging Saragossa--when, at a certain place, the fire of\nmortars, howitzers, and cannon was so terrible that nothing could\nstand before it; when, as fast as the sand-bag batteries could be\nbuilt, they were scattered to the winds, and the soldiers torn in\npieces; when the citizens at last refused to re-man the guns--this\ngirl seized a match from a dead artilleryman, sprang over the bodies\nof the slain who lay in heaps, and fired a cannon at the foe.  She\nthen leapt upon the gun-carriage and, waving her arms aloft, vowed\nshe would never leave it till the men resumed their duties.  Her\ncourage fired the soldiers; they answered her with a cheer, and never\nwere more noble deeds done than those at this terrible siege.\n\nSo numerous were my grand-dad's adventures during the Napoleonic wars\nthat I cannot relate a tithe of them.\n\nNot in all his marches did my grandmother accompany him.  But she was\nnever far away.  She was not far off when her gallant husband took\npart in that wonderful fight, the storming of Bergen-op-Zoom.\n\nWhile in a town once by herself, and living not far from the harbour,\nwhen a powder-ship blew up that seemed to shake the city to its very\nfoundations, the windows in the rooms where she then was were\nshattered almost into dust.\n\nStrange to say, a cat belonging to this ship had that very morning\nrun aloft and found its way to the main truck--that is the highest\npoint, as a landsman would call it, or tip of the main-topgallant\nmast.  There this prescient pussy sat, to the astonishment of all,\ntill, with the ship and all on board, she was blown to pieces.\n\nBut about Bergen-op-Zoom.  At the time of our extraordinary action\nthere the whole of Austrian Flanders, except this stronghold, with\nAntwerp and three other places, was in the hands of the British and\ntheir allies.\n\n\"Bergen-op-Zoom,\" Alison tells us, \"was in every respect the worthy\nantagonist of Antwerp, to which it was directly opposite at a\ndistance of only fifteen miles.  On its works the celebrated Cohern\nhad exhausted all the resources of his art....  And the works were so\nextensive that they could only be adequately manned by twelve\nthousand men.  In addition to this, an immense system of mines and\nsubterranean works rendered all approach by an enemy hazardous in the\nextreme.\"\n\nThere are three gates to the place.  The garrison was about five\nthousand strong.\n\nIt was in the winter of 1814 that, some of the ditches being frozen\nover and some of the scarps out of repair, General Lord Proby\ndetermined to take the place by assault, with a little over three\nthousand troops that he divided into four columns.\n\nIt was a most daring undertaking; and I mention it only to show the\nintrepidity and valour of our soldiers of the days of yore.\n\nBergen-op-Zoom was stormed at every gate, though at one the attack\nwas a mere feint.\n\nThe place was considered impregnable, and, had the guard shown as\nmuch tact as daring courage, the end might have been far different.\n\nThe place, wonderful to say, was carried by escalade, or considered\nto be carried.\n\nEven the force that had made the false attack retired to their\ncantonments, and a brigade of Germans, that had advanced on hearing\nthe firing, returned.\n\nThe French troops retired to the centre of the town, making sure that\nthey would be made prisoners at break of day.\n\nBut, before then, the British soldiers, considering themselves\nvictorious, broke into the gin-shops and drank to excess.  There was\neven a ball got up among the sergeants, and they were still dancing\nwhen, at break of day, they were called to arms.\n\nThen the fight was, indeed, a furious one.  Our forces were divided,\nand one portion was all but annihilated.  My grandfather fought on\nthe summit of the Antwerp bastions, and long and bloody was the\ncontest, as may be understood from the fact that we lost in killed\nand wounded nearly one thousand men.\n\n[Illustration: The contest on the summit of the Antwerp bastions was\nlong and bloody.]\n\nThe rest of our troops were taken prisoners.\n\nMy grand-dad, with several hundred men, were marched into a church,\nand there confined for, I believe, over four-and-twenty hours without\nfood or water.\n\nThen, it is said by historians, they were exchanged.  But the\nsoldiers themselves believed that no exchange would have been made\nhad the French been able to feed their prisoners.\n\nMy grand-dad's uniform was so soiled with blood and mud, that on\nbeing freed he stripped off his outer garments and washed them at a\npump.\n\nAs his name was entered on the list of the dead, my grandmother's\ngrief may be better imagined than described.  Major Drake himself\ncame to break the news to her.\n\nShe seemed to know by his face what he had come for.\n\n\"O, John, John!\" she cried, in an agony of grief.  \"He is dead!  He\nis dead!\"\n\nMajor Drake could only shake his head in sad confirmation.\n\nBut that evening John himself turned up, and her grief was changed to\njoy.\n\nThis puts one in mind of the lines in the old stage doggerel song,\n\"Jack Robertson \":\n\n  \"O, someone to me said,\n  In a paper he had read,\n  That Jack Robertson was dead.\n  'I was never dead at all,'\n      Cried Jack Robertson!\"\n\n* * * * * *\n\nMy grand-dad fought side by side with the Russians against the\nFrench.  And with the Austrians, too.\n\nOnce, when crossing the ice on the Danube, the ice gave way, and many\nwomen and children were drowned before their husbands' eyes.  This\nwaggon was supposed to have on board not only my grandmother, but her\nchild Robert.  It was her turn to be reported dead.  Luckily,\nhowever, she had been changed into another conveyance that got safely\nover.\n\nThis Robert Robertson was, of course, my baby uncle.  If ever anyone\nwas a soldier born, it was he.  For, after an engagement that our\nfellows had gallantly won, they encamped on the very ground on which\nthey fought.  That night he made his first appearance on the stage of\nlife.\n\nBorn on a battle-field, he died on a battle-field--died, sword in\nhand, fighting by a gun in India.\n\nStrange indeed were the adventures of the wives who elected to follow\ntheir husbands to the seat of war in those days.\n\nI have one more to tell of my grandmother, who was undoubtedly one of\nthe most courageous girls that ever went upon the war-path.\n\nIt was after an action--a skirmish my bold grand-dad called it--with\nthe French, which had been fought on a braeside sparsely covered with\nbush.  If skirmish it was, it was a long and bloody one, but we had\nsucceeded in beating the foe from the field, and retired some\ndistance to bivouac for the night.\n\nGrand-dad did not return with his company.  The wounded were brought\nin, the dead left on the brae to be buried next morning, in which sad\nceremony the French, under flag of truce, would also take part.\n\nThe Irish are, or were in those days, somewhat superstitious, and\ndreamers of dreams.\n\nAnyhow, my dear, brave young granny had cried herself to sleep by the\ncamp-fire.  It was about midnight when, she assured me herself, she\nheard her name called distinctly enough three times.\n\n\"Ellen, mavourneen!  Ellen!  Ellen!\"\n\nThe voice was that of her husband.\n\nIt was but a dream, perhaps, but she sprang from her pallet, and\npassing the sentries, who tried to dissuade her, went straight to the\nbattle-field to look for her husband.\n\n\"Take this with you, anyhow,\" said one young sentry, handing her a\npistol.\n\nThis she placed in the belt she wore, and, muffling her head and\nshoulders in a little Highland plaid, set out upon her ghastly\nmission.\n\nDead, dead, all seemed dead here under the moonlight, which made\ntheir faces uncanny to look at.\n\n\"O,\" she said to herself, \"if I can but find him, I'll lie down and\ndie by his side.\"\n\nDead?  Yes, but not all, for yonder from behind a bush appears the\nfigure of a woman.\n\nSome poor creature, perhaps, come like herself--to search for a\nhusband among the slain.\n\nBut O, horror! she sees this fiend in woman's shape swirl something\nquickly round her head, and then she hears a groan, as the harpy\nbends down to rifle the pockets of a man she has murdered.\n\nThe sight makes my grandmother almost sick, and a terrible fear gets\nhold of her heart, and for a moment she feels ready to faint.\n\nShe quickly hides behind a bush.\n\nShe sees the harpy finish off another poor fellow in whom some spark\nof life remained.\n\n\"Ellen!  Ellen!\"\n\nIt is--it is her husband's voice, coming from near the bush behind\nwhich she hides.\n\nBut the harpy has heard it too.\n\n\"Coming, John! coming, mavourneen!\"\n\nShe rushes out now from the place of concealment, just as the\nshe-fiend approaches from the other side, and both meet almost at the\nspot where my grandfather lies, so terribly wounded that he had been\nleft for dead.\n\nThere is no more fear in the heart of that soldier's wife now.  She\nstands face to face with the murderess--a peasant woman belonging to\nthe district.\n\n\"You would kill my husband as you killed the others?\"\n\nThe pistol rings out clearly on the still air.  They hear it even in\ncamp, and soldiers are despatched to the battle-field to find out the\ncause.\n\nThey find my grandmother kneeling by the side of her husband.\n\nAnd just a little way off lies the murderess--dead.\n\nIn her pocket were found both silver and gold, and many watches and\nrings.\n\nThe weapon she had been using to complete her awful work was a\nstrange one--a cannon-ball in a stocking.\n\nMy grandfather's wound was not so dangerous as first anticipated,\nand, with careful nursing, and the kind attention of stalwart Dr.\nMcLeod, in a month's time he was able once more to take the field.\n\nThe dream my grandmother dreamt is the strangest part of this story;\nbut is it not true that\n\n  \"There are more things in heaven and earth\n  Than we dream of in our philosophy\"?\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI.\n\n  ACROSS THE WIDE ATLANTIC--A STRANGE PARADE--THE\n  BAREFOOT SQUAD--SHIPWRECK--A FEARFUL FIGHT.\n\nIt is quite early on the morning of a bright and lovely summer's day.\n\nOn board the brave old transport _Salamanca_ seven bells have only\njust been struck.  The officers are briskly walking about the\nquarter-deck, up and down, up and down, in that eager and hungry\nexpectancy with which Britons, be they soldiers or sailors, await a\nsummons to breakfast.\n\nThe sea is almost calm now.  Only a gentle breeze ruffles its waters,\nand the sunshine is sparkling on every wave.\n\nBut only yesterday, and down to yester eve, it blew so fiercely that\nthe good ship was scudding along almost under bare poles, and rolling\nand plunging enough--the seamen said--to drag the masts out of her\nand haul them overboard.  There was one consolation, however, even\nwhen the gale was at its worst.  The _Salamanca_ had plenty of\nsea-room, for she is crossing the wide Atlantic with troops to assist\nin the American war, in Canada.\n\nFar too much elated at the success of the first great War of\nIndependence, the Americans had gone to war with us again, and would\nnot be content, so they vowed, until they had captured Canada, and\nthus \"cabbaged,\" as they termed it, \"the whole boundless continent.\"\n\nPity indeed that two nations such as America and Britain, speaking\nthe same language, holding fast by the same religion, brothers in\nevery sense of the beautiful word, should ever long to imbrue their\nhands in each others blood.\n\nThe _Salamanca_ is under easy sail this morning, for she is a fast\nship of her kind, and the captain judged, rightly too, that she must\nbe far ahead of the other transports, and of the line-of-battle ship\nthe _Warrior_, which was acting as their convoy.\n\nBut hark! there is a hail from the main-top-mast cross-trees.\n\n\"Sail in sight!\"\n\n\"Can you make her out?\"\n\nThere is a long pause, while the out-look scans her.  And there is\nanxiety visible enough on every countenance; for the vessel is\nthree-quarters of the way across, and this sail may be a Yankee\ncruiser.\n\n\"_Can't_ you make her out?\" was shouted a second time.\n\nOne moment.\n\n\"Yes, sir; it is the _Warrior_.\"\n\nA cheer rises from the deck fore and aft, then the steward's bell\nrings, and the officers go tumbling down to breakfast.\n\nA little child, three years of age--a sailor's pet she is, if ever\nsailors had a pet--is perched high up on the shoulders of sturdy,\ngiant McLeod.  In fact, she has a little leg, with well-bronzed knee,\nover each shoulder, as if she were a kind of top-gallant bulwark to\nthe bold doctor.\n\nThe doctor has been her horse for the last half-hour, and she has\nbeen riding him up and down the deck.\n\nBut now her excitement knows no bounds, and she clutches the doctor\nby the hair with one hand, while with the other she waves on high a\nlittle flag that one of the men made for her.\n\n\"Hillo! the _Walliol_,\" she cries.\n\nBut now Dr. McLeod lowers her from her perch, for she, too, is ready\nfor breakfast.\n\n\"Good-morning, Sergeant,\" he says, as he meets my grandfather.  \"Here\nis your little daughter.  We have been having such glorious fun, but\nif it continues like this every morning, I won't have a hair on my\nhead!  How do you get on with the women, Sergeant?\" continued the\ndoctor.  \"Better, I trust.  Have you got them to wash their faces\nevery morning yet?\"\n\nHe referred to the soldiers' wives.\n\n\"Just hold on half a minute,\" said grandfather, laughing, \"and you'll\nsee the strangest parade, perhaps, you ever clapped eyes on.  You\nsee,\" he explained, \"I have ordered every woman on board to appear on\ndeck for inspection, bareheaded, with bare necks and naked feet.\"\n\nThe latter would be called \"Trilbies\" nowadays.\n\n\"And to show there is no unfairness,\" he continued, \"I have put my\nown wife at the head of them.\"\n\nNext minute about thirty soldiers' wives appeared on deck just as my\ngrand-dad described, and at their head, in the same strange\n_deshabille_, my grandmother.\n\nThey were drawn up like so many Amazons, their own husbands laughing\nand chaffing a little.\n\n\"Chin up, Maria!\" cried one soldier.\n\n\"Attention!  Jeannie, my lass!\" came from another.\n\n\"Dress, Betsy,\" said a third.\n\n\"Dress, indeed!\" answered Betsy with a saucy toss of her head.  \"I\nwish we could.\"\n\n\"Silence!  Attention!\"\n\nThat was my grand-dad's voice.\n\n\"Now, Mrs. Robertson,\" he said, \"do your duty!\"\n\nArmed with a sergeant's pike, my grandmother commenced the\ninspection, and, stopping for a few seconds in front of every woman,\ncarefully scrutinised her, literally from top to toe.\n\nHad any one of them appeared even with unclean hands, either she\nherself would have been punished by being kept below, or punished by\nproxy--namely, by the stopping of her husband's grog.\n\nWhen Dr. McLeod went below and reported what he had seen, there was a\ngood deal of laughing.\n\nThe adjutant, however, approved of the plan, and complimented\ngrandfather on his originality.\n\nIt certainly was successful, for the women after this took much more\ninterest in their personal appearance.  But the \"barefoot squad,\" as\nJack Tar called them, was drilled just the same all throughout the\nvoyage.\n\n* * * * *\n\nIn those days there were no ocean greyhounds, as our fleetest\nAtlantic liners are now called.  The voyage across the sea was\ntherefore a long and a weary one.\n\nThe _Salamanca_, however, did not get out without adventure, for in\nthe gulf of the St. Lawrence she was separated from the other\ntransports in a dense fog, and for many a week saw no more of the\n_Warrior_ or any other ship.\n\nFinally, in the darkness of a wild and stormy night, they ran on the\nrocks off the island of Anticosti.\n\nDaylight revealed the peril of their situation, for both wind and\nwaves were high, and there was every sign that the vessel would soon\nbreak up.  It was a terrible time and a trying.\n\nAt last a boat was lowered and manned by bold British bluejackets,\nwho pulled shorewards and round a little cape to seek for a\nlanding-place.\n\nHow long the time seemed!  Hours and hours passed by, and yet there\nwere no signs of their return.  The soldiers and their wives were\nhuddled together under the lee of the bulwarks forward, and the\nchildren crouched beneath their shawls and plaids.\n\nAt long last there was a cheer.  The boat could be seen coming round\nthe point.\n\nLuckily their report was a good one.  They had found a spot where a\nlanding could be effected.\n\nThe women and children were sent off first, then the soldiers, then\nstores, and last of all, just as the vessel was slipping off the\nrock, the sailors left her.\n\nFar over the wooded western shore the sun was setting and daylight\nwould soon be at an end.\n\nThe last boat was not sixty yards away from the vessel when she\nslipped back.  For a moment or two her jib-boom was stretched high in\nthe air like the naked arm of a drowning man extended in agony, then\nshe went down with a sullen boom like the roar of a distant gun.\n\n  \"How, brothers, row; the stream runs fast,\n  The rapids are near, and the daylight is past.\"\n\n\nThe stream did run high, or rather the tide, and although there were\nno rapids, there were rushing waves, and breakers too.\n\nThe last boat rounded the point safely, however, and presently they\ncould see the lights waving on shore to guide them on.\n\nAnd never, perhaps, were tired sailors more glad to get on shore, and\nseat themselves around a cheerful campfire.\n\nI cannot remember how many days or weeks these shipwrecked men and\nwomen remained here, but it was a dismal time, for the fogs closed\naround them again and buried all the distant shores.\n\nMoreover, the bears were in scores, and the poor children were nearly\nfrightened to death; for so bold did the brutes become that they made\ndashes at night, and carried away provisions in the very glare of the\ncampfires.\n\nThey were rescued at last, however, and taken on board another\ntransport.\n\nThen they were hurried on up into the interior, where fighting was\ngoing on, and where their services were very much needed indeed.\n\n* * * * * *\n\nAlthough geography ought to be studied from globes, still maps are\nvery useful, although at times puzzling, as they very often give\nwrong impressions of the lay of the land and the bearings of one\ncountry to another.  I should always take the part of that boy or\ngirl who hated geography or history, for this reason: it is\ntaught--if teaching one can call it--from a wrong basis at our\nschools and seminaries.  It is rendered neither pleasant nor\ninteresting, but, on the contrary, hateful.  I should just as soon\nexpect a youngster to get by heart the first chapter of the Book of\nNumbers, and feel interested in that, as in the geography and history\nas taught in schools.\n\nI will tell you, however, where a map becomes a comfort and a\nnecessity, and that is when a war is on.  Indeed, I believe that war\nteaches most people about all they know about any place.\n\nI have mentioned the river St. Lawrence.  Now although some little\nboys may imagine that the St. Lawrence is somewhere down in Surrey or\nup Yorkshire way, I can assure them it is in no such place.\n\nJust for once in a way take a glance at your map.  What a mighty\nocean that is which stretches right away, without bounds or limits or\neven an island to break its monotony, from the south of England to\nNewfoundland.  Some idiots call it the herring-pond, in an off-hand\nkind of way as if such an ocean were a mere mill-dam compared to the\nseas they have crossed.  Such people have probably never been a mile\nfrom a cow's tail in all their low little lives.\n\nThe Atlantic is a mighty and wonderful expanse of water, and although\ncrossed by thousands of ships, I have sailed in a bee-line on this\ngreat world of waters for a whole week without seeing a craft of\nanything.\n\nOnly the dark heaving waves, only the boundless horizon, only the\nsky.  Its very lonesomeness has made me feel eerie.\n\nO, if that ocean had a voice other than that of its booming billows,\nwhat a story it could tell!  What sufferings it has seen, what\nfounderings, what battles, what agonies!  And what strange mysteries!\nSo pray do not talk of it slightingly, if you wish to lay claim to\nhaving more brains than could be held in a walnut-shell.  But when\ngoing to the St. Lawrence you sail on and on till at long last you\nround the great Bank of Newfoundland, then bear north and west, till\nyou skirt the huge island itself, which is as large as the whole of\nIreland itself.\n\nWhen past this you are in the Gulf, and so you sail on and past\nAnticosti, where my grandfather, grandmother, and my three-year-old\nmammy were wrecked.  You are in the river now, but still a mighty\nlong way from Quebec itself.  But, if you clap your eagle eye on the\nmap, you may be surprised to know that the distance from Toronto to\nthe mouth of the St. Lawrence is nearly as far as from Cork to the\nmiddle of the Atlantic, and Lake Erie farther still.  You will note\nalso that New York itself is far nearer to Toronto than Quebec itself.\n\nWell, the United States had been casting sheep's-eyes at our big\nsister Canada.  But Canada is our love, not theirs.  She belongs to\nthis other boy--to John, and not to Jonathan--and if John catches\nJonathan making love to his sister Canada, O my! won't Jonathan catch\nit, that is all!  The boundary-line of the United States is a\nperfectly straight one from the shores of the Pacific to the Lake of\nthe Woods in Upper Canada.  Well, all Jonathan wanted was to extend\nthat line on the straight to the Atlantic Ocean.\n\nBut Sister Canada wouldn't have it.\n\n\"If you come a step nearer, Mr. Jonathan,\" she says, \"I'll scream,\nand wild cats won't be in it.\"\n\nYou see, reader, it is not a very difficult thing to make a map on\npaper with pen and ink.  But when the same job is attempted on _terra\nfirma_, with a sword for a pen and blood instead of ink, why the case\nis considerably altered.\n\nSuch a map, however, the Americans determined to make, a year before\nmy grandfather's battalion crossed the ocean.\n\nAt this time, instead of having ships on the great lakes and soldiers\non shore, we had neither to speak of.\n\nSo, in the early part of 1813, General Dearborn, who commanded the\nAmerican forces, had set the ball in motion.  He advanced upon\nYork--a town and stronghold on Lake Ontario.\n\nWe had barely a thousand men there, and, as the Yankee was supported\nby a flotilla of gunboats, the Canadians decamped, leaving their\nmilitary stores for Dearborn.\n\n\"That is a good beginning,\" he said to himself.  So, in his flotilla,\nhe loaded up those stores, and with artillery, cavalry, and\ninfantry--about seven thousand all told--he set sail for Niagara,\nand, after some hard fighting, captured Fort George.  General\nVincent, of the British or Canadian side, had only a handful of\ntroops, so could not well oppose Dearborn.  But Vincent, after\nclearing out of Fort George, collected all the troops he could find,\nto the number of about eighteen hundred, and determined to make a\nstand fifty miles up the strait at Burlington Bay.\n\nThis was another chance for Dearborn to annihilate a few more\nBritishers; so he marched to attack brave Vincent with nine guns and\nthree thousand men.  But Vincent himself did the attacking this time;\nand Colonel Harvey, of ours, was chosen to lead a midnight bayonet\ncharge on Dearborn's camp.  It was an awful fight, but it did not\nlast long.  Harvey was victorious; though he had only seven hundred\nmen, he scattered the enemy in all directions, littered the ground\nwith their dead and wounded, and took four guns and over one hundred\nprisoners.\n\nThis, then, was the beginning of this new American war; and, though\nit must be admitted the Yankees fought bravely at times and met with\nmany successes, they really had reckoned without their host.  That\nhost was Canada; and so pluckily did she fight that they were utterly\nbeaten.\n\nThey had run up a heavy bill which it would take a long time for\ntheir country to clear; they had lost in all over fifty thousand men,\nand last, but not least, they had earned for themselves the hatred of\nevery man and woman in Canada, and that hatred, I fear, is a fire\nthat is smouldering till this very day, as the extraordinary activity\nof the Canadians and their splendid rush to arms during the-war scare\nin January, 1896, fully prove.\n\nThe word \"never\" is a long one, for neither men nor nations know what\nmay be in store for them in the future, or how near to them the\nfuture that shall work such changes may be; but it is the general\nopinion, both here and in Canada, that America will never be able to\nconquer Canada.  She will never be a great naval Power either.  She\ncertainly will not be if she crosses arms with Britain.  It will add\nto her wealth, as well as her power, to keep the peace with her old\nmother, Britain.\n\nAnd now, my intelligent reader, I consider that there has been blood\nenough spilt in these pages of mine to satisfy any gore-loving lad\nthat ever sat by a cosy fire on a winter's evening.\n\nBut I must give you a sketch of just one fight that occurred on the\nCanadian frontier, and, after you have read it, I wish you to ask\nyourself the question: Ought two nations, who can fight so terribly\nas this, to be other than friendly?\n\nThe fight was about a battery that the British had erected on a\ncommanding hill at the battle of Chippewa.  \"The action,\" says\nAlison, quoting from General Drummond's official account, \"began\nabout six in the evening, and the whole line was soon warmly engaged,\nbut the weight of the conflict fell upon the British centre and left.\"\n\nNotwithstanding the utmost efforts, the latter was forced back, and\nour General Riell was severely wounded and made prisoner.  The 89th,\nRoyals, and King's regiments opposed a determined resistance, and the\nguns on the hill, which were worked with prodigious rapidity,\noccasioned so great a loss to the attacking columns, that General\nBrown (American) soon saw that there was no chance of success until\nthat battery was carried; and a desperate effort was resolved on to\nobtain the mastery of it.\n\nThe Americans, under General Millar, advanced with the utmost\nresolution, and with such vigour that five of the British cannon at\nfirst fell into their hands.\n\nSo desperate was the onset, so strenuous the resistance, that the\nBritish artillerymen were bayoneted by the enemy in the act of\nloading, and the muzzles of their guns were advanced to within a few\nyards of the English battery.\n\nThis dreadful conflict continued till after dark, with alternate\nsuccess, in the course of which the combatants fought hand to hand,\nby the light of the discharges of the guns, and the artillery on both\nsides was repeatedly taken and retaken.\n\nAt length the combatants sank to rest, from pure mutual exhaustion,\nwithin a few yards of each other, and so intermingled that two of the\nAmerican guns were finally mastered by the British, and one of the\nBritish by the Americans.\n\nDuring the period of repose the loud roar of the battle was succeeded\nby a silence so profound, that the dull roar of the Falls of Niagara,\ninterrupted at intervals by the groans of the wounded, was distinctly\nheard.\n\nOver the scene of this desperate strife the moon threw an uncertain\nlight, which yielded occasionally to the bright flashes of musketry\nand cannon when the combat was partially renewed.\n\nBut British Drummond took advantage of the lull in the awful storm to\nbring up his right, so as to support the centre.\n\nThe American general now saw that all his efforts were in vain, and\nat midnight the bugles sounded the retreat; the blood-red hill and\ntheir guns were left to the British who had so manfully defended them.\n\nI think you will agree with me that the answer to the question I\nrequested you to put to yourself must be: \"No--_No_--No.\"\n\n\"I re-echo,\" said a well-known man on January 25th, 1896 (Burns'\nbirthday), \"I re-echo and I reciprocate, from the bottom of my heart,\nthe noble words which were spoken by the American Senator Walcott,\namidst uwonted applause, in the hall of the Capitol at Washington,\nwhen he said: 'Blood is thicker than water, and until a just quarrel\ndivides us, which Heaven forbid, may these two great nations, of the\nsame speech, lineage, and traditions, stand as brothers shoulder to\nshoulder in the interests of humanity by a union compelling peace.'\nThat always has been, that always will be, the wish of every Briton.\nThe two nations are allied, and more closely allied in sentiment and\nin interest than any other two nations on the earth.  While I should\nlook with horror upon, anything in the nature of a fratricidal\nstrife, I should look forward with pleasure to the possibility of the\nStars and Stripes and the Union Jack floating together in defence of\na common cause sanctioned by humanity and by justice.\"\n\nIn God's name, then, let us have peace with our brother Jonathan, and\nheartily shake\n\n  HANDS ACROSS THE WATER.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII.\n\n  RED-EYE, THE INDIAN CHIEF--A TERRIBLE ADVENTURE\n  WITH A BEAR--BAD NEWS!--STOLEN OR KILLED BY\n  INDIANS.\n\nThe war in Upper Canada may be said to have ended before the winter\nof 1814-15.  Ended indeed in General Drummond's terrible but abortive\nattack or assault on Fort Erie, in which he lost about five hundred\nin killed and wounded.\n\nThe general, although reinforced, dared not attack again, \"but,\" as\nAlison says, \"contented himself with drawing closer the investment,\nand cooping the large American army up in a corner of British\nterritory, where they were rendered perfectly useless during the\nremainder of the campaign.\"\n\nMeanwhile, however, ships were being built, and gunboats too, both\nfor the British and Americans to float and fight on the great inland\nseas and lakes, and this with the intention on the American side to\nmake one more effort to conquer Canada in the ensuing spring.\n\nIf, however, I were to tell you of the battles, by land and sea,\nwhich took place this year between Britain and America, further south\nthan Canada, although I might succeed in interesting some of my\nreaders on this side of the Atlantic, I might irritate my good\nfriends on the other.\n\nWhile the good weather lasted, and the bright and beautiful Indian\nsummer, life in camp, in log huts, or in houses was delightful enough\nto my grandfather and his wife, with my little mother, Mary\nRobertson, to say nothing of Tonal's Spanish wife herself.\n\nThe woods and forests, the lakes and streams, and the rugged hills\nwere clad in all the glory and colour of a late autumn.\n\nMy mother was a true _fille du regiment_, and continued to be as much\na favourite and as much beloved by officers and men on shore as she\nhad been at sea.\n\nThe Indians in those times were far more numerous in the forests and\nhills, in the great lake districts, than they are now.  Neither\nBritish nor Americans have ever meted out to them any very great\nmeasure of justice.  In fact it has been very much the reverse.  We\nhave driven them back, back, back, before us; we have taken their\nterritories over and over again; we have cheated and robbed them, and\nwhen they have retaliated and taken the revenge that red men always\nwill, we have declared against them a war of extermination, or\nalmost; we seemed to forget that they were human beings, and shot\nthem down like wolves.\n\nThese poor, brave creatures assisted us greatly in the war against\nAmerica.  But they fought in a savage way, and mutilated even the\nwounded in a shocking and fearful manner.  For the braves must have\nscalps to hang on poles, far away where their wigwams stood in forest\nglade, or by the peaceful streams that meandered through their\nterritory.\n\nThese Indians, now that comparative peace had come, still lingered\naround our camps.  They were, alas! too often led into excesses by\nthe fire-water of the pale-faces.\n\nStrangely enough, the child Mary exhibited not the slightest trace of\nfear in the company of these dusky warriors.  She would even toddle\noff at times to their camp, and not be seen again for hours, when\nsome of the Royal Scots, being sent in search of her, were sure to\nfind her chatting gaily to squaws or braves, in their tents or by the\nlog-fires.\n\nBut there were Indians also who hated the British, and hated also\nthose tribes who had fought for the pale-faces, such as the\nChippawas, the Wyandottes, and Minsees.  With these, I believe, we\nwere friendly on the whole, but far away in the west and north, was a\ntribe or branch of the Micmacs, whose hand appeared to be turned\nagainst everyone, and who were constantly on the war-path.  They\nlived chiefly by their bows and arrows or spears, but of late years\nhad made use of guns also, so that they were now considered still\nmore dangerous and deadly.\n\nTheir wigwams stood on the shores of a beautiful, lonesome sheet of\nwater, embosomed by woods, and to which they had given the euphonic\nname Eeowreeva, or Yewreeva, the Great Pike Lake.  Here these red men\nhad lived for many generations, more than Red-Eye, a friendly Micmac,\nwho often visited the camp, could count on his fingers.  They loved\ntheir home in the wild west, Red-Eye said, because no pale-face had\never yet come to see and seek their land.\n\nThis land, and all the hills and forests around it, was no\nreservation.  It was simply a country into which the pale-face had\nnot as yet penetrated.\n\nBut Red-Eye, or Led-Eye, as Mary called him, was no beauty to gaze\nupon.  On the contrary, it was believed that, although he prided\nhimself on the distance he could throw a spear, or his skill with a\ntomahawk, his chief pride lay in his stern and dreadful face, and in\nthe number of scars he had on his body, many of which, he assured my\ngrandmother, whom he often visited, had been received in fights and\nencounters with wild beasts, with bears and panthers, that he had\nfollowed, even to their very dens, and killed.  In his own country he\nhad been a chief.\n\nLittle Mary, my mother, used to listen with rapt attention to this\nsemi-civilised savage's account of his adventures, as he squatted\nnear the fire, wrapped in his great striped blanket.\n\nBut she must have been too young to understand much of what was said.\n\nA strange sort of friendship, however, sprang up between the two.\n\nTheir love-making, if so it could be called, was droll in the extreme.\n\n\"Po' Led-Eye,\" she said one day, as she stood beside him, nursing one\nof his hands, on which were the marks left by a panther's teeth.\n\"Po' Led-Eye.  And the nasty wild beast cut you so!  Did you kill the\nbig cat, Led-Eye?\"\n\n\"Ugh! child, yes, I kill he quick.  With my spear I kill he.  Hold my\nspear so.\"\n\n\"Ah!  Ah! wild cat was all toveled (covered) wi' blood, wasn't he,\nLed-Eye?\"\n\n\"Blood in streams!\" said Red-Eye.\n\n\"O, how nice!  Anazle (another) big tut (cut) on 'oo blow (your\nbrow), po' Led-Eye, what make that tut?\"\n\n\"The spear of a chief, child of my heart.\"\n\nHe smoothed her long fair hair as he spoke, and glanced lovingly into\nher blue eyes.\n\n\"Child of my heart!  Hair like sunset clouds.  Eyes and cheeks like\nstars and flowers.  Child of my love!\"\n\n\"'Oo iss, of tourse.  Child of oor love.  But 'oo kill the tief\n(chief) that troo the spear and cuttit oo blow.  You kill him, quick,\nquick?\"\n\n\"I kill him, plenty quick.\"\n\n\"And he bleeded all over?\"\n\n\"Ugh!  I wash my hands in his blood.\"\n\nMy little mother jumped for joy.\n\n\"How nice! how nice!\" she cried, clapping her hands.  \"Tell the chile\nof oo love mo' stolies.\"\n\n\"Mary, Mary,\" cried my grandmother, \"come here this instant, till I\nget you ready for bed.\"\n\n\"I think,\" said Tonal to my grandfather, as they lay on their\nblankets by the fire, \"I think that Mary would grow up a splendid\nsavage.  Come here, Mary, and sit on my knee.  Your mother won't put\nyou to bed for just a little while, I'm sure.\"\n\n\"Not if she's good.\"\n\n\"I sit on oo knee bymeby, when po' Led-Eye does (goes) away to feep\n(sleep).\"\n\n\"You like Red-Eye best, then?\"\n\n\"Of tourse.  Led-Eye mo' ugly as you.\n\n\"Nevah mind,\" she continued, patting the savage's cheek, \"when I\ndlows (grows) up, I lun (run) away to the woods and be oo queen.\"\n\n\"It's all settled then, John,\" said Tonal.\n\n\"It would seem so, Tonal.\"\n\nBut Red-Eye's love-making did not end in mere words.  Words are only\nfroth, acts alone are solid, and he used to bring the \"child of his\nlove\" many beautiful things from the forest--flowers, skins of\nbeasts, and feathers of birds.\n\nOnce he brought her a live humming-bird, or one of an allied species.\nIt soon died, however.  Then he took much pains to cure it for her.\nHe opened it slightly, and stuffed it with strange spices and musk.\nThen he rolled it in leaves, and laid it on a stone near the fire,\nand behold! in an hour it was embalmed and cured.\n\nThat little bird, in a tiny glass case, is on my table as I write.  I\nwould not part with it for all the world.  All the world would be\nnothing to me, as I should not know what to do with it, but this\nlittle case, ah! what gladsome memories it brings me back.\n\nTonal and my grandfather used often to accompany Major Drake or Dr.\nMcLeod in long rambles into the forests.\n\nThey would be away for two or even three days sometimes, and never\nreturn without the spoils of the chase, to the great delight of my\nlittle mother, Mary.\n\nPart of these excursions was by boat, the other on shore.\n\nTheir guide was invariably Red-Eye.\n\nHe was a fearless fellow, and often led them into adventures that it\nwould have been as well for them had they avoided.\n\nOn one of these occasions McLeod fired upon a great bear on a\nhillside.  The brute was but grazed, and came rushing down upon him\nwith a roar that seemed to rend the very rocks.  Both man and bear\nwent rolling down the brae, and powerful though the doctor was, he\nnever could have come out of the adventure alive, had not Red-Eye\nbeen there.  The Indian buried his tomahawk in the monster's neck.\nWith a yell the bear now sprang at him, and had not O'Reilly, who was\nnear, placed the muzzle of his gun close to the bear's ear and fired,\npoor Red-Eye would have told my little mother no more terrible\nstories.\n\nThough badly bruised,\n\n  \"Unwounded from the dreadful close\n  But breathless all McLeod arose.\"\n\n\nRed-Eye appeared none the worse.  He just shook himself and said,\npointing to O'Reilly's gun:\n\n\"Ugh!  Much good fire-stick.\"\n\nBut the spoils of the chase did not invariably consist of bears, or\nany other of the _fer\u00e6_, but game and pigeons.  The latter were seen\nsometimes, not in flocks only, but in clouds, so that it was no\nuncommon thing for our heroes to bring them down with bullets.\n\nI do not mean to say that the very bird that was aimed at always\nfell---though with a good modern rifle and a good modern marksman\nthis might have been the case--but so numerous were they that it was\nalmost impossible to fire without hitting.\n\nSome of the streams, away in the backwoods, teemed with fish.  In\nfact, so numerous were these that one could scarcely call it sport to\ncatch them.\n\nOne day, while my grandfather and Drake were in the woods, they got\ntalking together about home, and the old scenes they had passed\nthrough, and the battles in which they had fought shoulder to\nshoulder.\n\nBoth had received letters only the day before.\n\n\"O, by the way, Sergeant,\" said Major Drake suddenly, \"I have\nsomething to tell you.\n\n\"I had a letter from H----.  You know he is a friend of the Duke--our\nparticular Duke.\"\n\n\"The Duke of Kent?\"\n\n\"Yes; and it seems H---- was telling his Royal Highness how your wife\nshot that terrible harpy on the battle-field, and saved your life.\n\n\"The Duke,\" continued Drake, \"was enthusiastic, and he does not take\nwine to make him so, either.\n\n\"'Robertson,' he said, 'was one of the best non-commissioned officers\nI ever had on my staff, and right bravely but coolly he could do his\nduty in his regiment also.\n\n\"'And, H----,' he continued, 'the Highland battalion.  of the Royal\nScots will soon be _au fait accompli_, and I shan't forget my promise\nto Robertson.'\"\n\n\"Thank Heaven,\" said my grandfather, \"for that news!  It has been my\ndream for years.  Could I afterwards gain a captaincy in my company,\nand once lead it into action against the French, I would die happy.\nAnd you know, sir, I am no mere romancist.\n\n\"But, sir,\" he added, \"with the fall of Napoleon and the restoration\nof the Bourbons, don't you think wars will cease all over the world,\nand that there won't be anymore use for Highland battalions?\"\n\nDrake laughed.\n\n\"Listen, Sergeant John,\" he said.  \"Mind, I'm no prophet, and never\nwas, but--Napoleon is scotched, not killed.\"\n\n\"And pray, sir--who--or where----\"\n\n\"Where did I get my information?\"\n\n\"I fear I'm rude, sir, but that is what I was about to ask.\"\n\n\"Well, my good follow, a wee birdie told me.\"\n\nThat was a happy day all through for my grandfather.\n\nHappy, that is, until eventide.\n\nBut as he was going singing up to his own log hut, with a bundle of\nbirds over his left shoulder, he was surprised to find the men\nstanding here and there in little groups.  And he could not help\nimagining that they were looking at him in a kind of pitying way.\n\nI have said little about Tonal's Spanish wife for the simple reason\nthat there was little to tell; yet she had followed his fortunes all\nthrough the war, and proved a very great boon to the pipe-major, as\nhe was now called.\n\nShe was here in camp.\n\nInstead of little Mary running as usual to meet her father, it was\npoor Mrs. Tonal that came.\n\nHer large, dark eyes were swimming in tears.\n\n\"O, Sergeant Robertson,\" she began, but the grief seemed to choke her\nutterance.\n\n\"Good heavens, girl, speak!\" cried my grandfather.  \"Speak, I entreat\nof you!  Has anything happened to my dear wife?\"\n\n\"No, no,\" gasped the girl, for girl she was to all appearance.  \"She\nis gone to the Indian camp, but my husband has gone.\"\n\n\"Tonal gone?--dead?\"\n\n\"Oh!\" she cried, \"we do not know, Mr. Robertson, but Mary, little\nMary, too, has gone.\"\n\nFor a moment, forest, lake, and hill seemed to spin round, and my\ngrandfather had almost fainted.\n\nHis daughter, whom he adored, lost, gone!  It was too awful to think\nabout.\n\nHe threw down his gun, threw down his game, and next moment was\nhurrying off to the Indian camp.\n\nHe would now, at all events, hear the very worst.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII.\n\n  \"WHERE IS RED-EYE?  I WILL KILL HIM!\"--A SOLEMN\n  SCENE--THE MOONLIT FOREST.\n\nOn his way to the wigwam camp, as that of the Indians was called, he\nmet stalwart McLeod.\n\n\"Ah!\" said the soldier-surgeon, \"I see you have heard the bad news.\"\n\nMy grandfather's face was set and stern, but very pale.\n\n\"No, Doctor,\" he replied.  \"Tonal's wife could tell me nothing, only\nthat her husband and my child have disappeared.\"\n\n\"Yes, and--but can you bear the evil news, my good fellow?\"\n\n\"I can bear anything--anything except suspense.\"\n\n\"Well, the facts, as far as we know them, are these.  Our friendly\nIndians had arranged to-day to hold a feast far away in the forest.\nThey went off in their war-paint.  The pipe-major, with one\nman--Roberts, of your company--went with them, and poor wee Mary\nwould not be left behind.  You know your wife will trust her anywhere\nwith Tonal.\"\n\n\"Yes, yes.  O Doctor, pardon my impatience, but go on--go on.\"\n\n\"The Indians went off with great rejoicing, Tonal good-naturedly\nplaying in front of them.\n\n\"At three o'clock the scattered remains of our Indians came into the\ncamp by twos and threes, some sadly wounded, but no Tonal, no Mary,\nand no Roberts.\"\n\n\"Killed?\"\n\n\"Roberts was killed at the first volley.  For the Micmacs are on the\nwar-path, and have come from afar to take revenge on our Indians.\nThey seem to have known the very day they would hold this feast.\"\n\n\"Dr. McLeod, there is treason in the camp.\n\n\"Where is Red-Eye?  I will kill him!\"\n\n\"Stay, stay,\" cried the doctor; \"do not be rash.  I believe Red-Eye\nto be as faithful as he is simple and brave.\"\n\n\"Where is he, I say?\"\n\n\"He has gone alone into the forest to seek for your child.  If there\nis any man in our camp who can pick up a trail, it is he.\"\n\n\"Dr. McLeod, sir, he will never return; and I here make a vow--and\nlet it be registered in heaven--I will follow him to the wilds of the\nfarther west, and, when I find him, will slay him in his tracks.\"\n\n\"Robertson, my boy,\" said the kind-hearted doctor--\"for you are but a\nboy to me--Red-Eye may be a savage, but he is also a Christian, and\nto the lake-side, after sunset, he has gone every night to pray.  I\nhappened to be there but two nights ago, when he stalked silently\ndown, and knelt with his face to the west.  Me he could not see,\nRobertson.  I have heard eloquent prayers from many a pulpit, and at\nmany a humble fireside far away in bonnie Scotland, but I never\nlistened to so simple yet heart-o'erflowing prayer before.  And you\nand your little daughter were prayed for in words of such passionate\ntenderness that I shall ne'er forget them.\"\n\nThere was a reaction now.\n\n\"God forgive me, Doctor, if I wrong the man.\"\n\nThen he covered his face with his hands.\n\n\"Come, come, Robertson, do not take on so.  There yet is hope, you\nknow.  Come, I shall have your wife and yourself on my hands as\npatients, if you break down thus.\"\n\n* * * * *\n\nA party, that had gone out to bury the dead and bring in more of the\nwounded, now came in.  They bore, on a litter of branches, the\nlifeless body of Roberts, a young fair-haired lad, who had joined in\nCanada.\n\nHis terrible wounds were all in front, showing how well he had fought.\n\nHe, like all the other dead, and some of the wounded had been scalped.\n\nThe assault by the Micmacs, it seems, had been terribly sudden.\n\nIt was a wild _m\u00eal\u00e9e_, and terrible tulzie, but soon over.\n\nAs neither Tonal nor the child was found in the forest, it was\nevident that they had been taken prisoners.\n\nTonal would doubtless be tortured at the stake, but how about Mary?\nShe would either be flung into the river or over the cliff, or\nstripped and dressed as a papoose, then handed over to the tender\nmercies of some horrid squaw, to be reared as a little savage.\n\nPoor wee wonder! she had often expressed her wish to become a savage,\nand roam through the woods and wilds with the braves.  Little did she\nknow then what was about to befall her.\n\nThere would be no sleep for grandfather to-night, and little for\nanyone else.\n\nPreparations were being hastily made, however, for an expedition\nagainst the Micmacs.  It was hoped that, secure in the depth of the\nforests, and in their mountain fastnesses, they would not hurry\nhomewards, but follow the chase for a time.  But this was only\nconjecture.  If they went directly towards their own country, there\nwas but little chance of our people being able to overtake them.\n\nBesides, there were no good guides.  The knowledge of even the\nfriendly Indians, concerning this hostile tribe, was but small, but\nthey would do all they could.\n\nThe expedition would not start until daybreak; so it was at first\narranged.  Without proper guides, rashness would only mean disaster.\n\nMy grandfather lay down for a time, but sleep was, for once, banished\nfrom his eyes.\n\nHe was restless, wildly restless.  So he got up and left the hut.  He\nleft his wife asleep, for sorrow, in some, often causes drowsiness.\n\nHe would have bent down and kissed her, had he not feared it would\nwake her, for her cheeks were even now wet with tears.\n\nGrandfather passed the sentry, and went on towards the lake.  The\nsight of a placid sea or lake seems to have a soothing effect upon\nthe nerves.\n\nWhat a beautiful night it was!  Not a breath of wind!\n\nThe great round moon was struggling up through a ghostly fog, and her\nred beams turned the waves to a yellow-pinkish hue.  The forest all\naround looked like rolling clouds of vapour, and the ground itself\nwas so white, that at a little distance it seemed covered with snow.\nIt was a solemn scene!\n\nNothing was heard, except now and then the mournful cry of a\nnight-bird, and the shout of a watchful sentry.  But the drone of the\ndistant waterfall filled all the air, and the very trees appeared to\nvibrate to its rhythm.\n\nNo life was visible anywhere.\n\nGrandfather was alone.  Alone with his grief.  Alone with God.\n\nYes, He could see him.  He loved him still.\n\nA very bright star shone high up in the east, and appeared to look\ndown on the sorrowing father with kind and pitying eye.\n\nHe knelt near the lake to pray.  It was no presumptuous prayer.\n\n\"If it be Thy will, O  Father, who have always been my Guide and\nFriend----\"\n\nThat was the first of it.\n\n\"If it be Thy will.\"\n\nAnd prayer should never go further than this.\n\nAs he still knelt there, and the waters of the lake grew more and\nmore silvery every minute, as the moon rose higher and higher, a tall\nfigure came gliding from the forest, walking in its moccasins as\nsilently as, they tell me, ghosts walk.\n\n\"Ugh!\"\n\nGrandfather started to his feet.\n\nThe moon shone full now in the face of the Indian, Red-Eye.\n\n\"Red-Eye, it is you.  What is it you carry?\"\n\nRed-Eye held his burden by the hair aloft.\n\nAn Indian head, with half-open eyes and drooping jaw.\n\n\"Red-Eye, how came you by that ghastly trophy?\"\n\nThe Indian only pointed to the west, threw the head down carelessly,\nand sat down.\n\n\"I tire, much tire,\" he said, as he leant on one arm and commenced to\nfill his wooden pipe.\n\nGrandfather sat down beside him and waited.  He knew the habits of\nIndian warriors.\n\nHe felt sure the man would speak anon.\n\nThe moon was in full silver flood now, and grandfather could watch\nRed-Eye, and note every expression on his wild uncouth face.\n\n\"Red-Eye's heart is heavy,\" he said at last.\n\n\"And my heart is heavy, Red-Eye.\"\n\n\"Indian can love more--much more than pale-face.  I loved your lost\nchild.\"\n\nGrandfather drew nearer to him.  He felt he could trust this strange\nman.  He felt that now, for the first time.\n\n\"Long ago--long before the pale-face was sent by your great white\nchief to fight bad 'Merican man--I live in the sunset west.  Soon\nquarrels rise.  I love one Indian.  Grat Pike love her too.  We\nfight.  All braves fight--but I kill my chief.  Then I fly and live\nin the forest.  Every man want to kill Red-Eye then.  For years I\nlive so.  Meemee come too, but one night she die.\"\n\nHe paused for a minute, as if the memory of his grief had made him\ndumb.\n\n\"Then when pale-faces come, I come to your camp-fire.  You not trust\nme.  You think poor Red-Eye traitor and thief.  You think I steal the\nchild for my tribe.\"\n\n\"No, no, no, Red-Eye!  I did doubt you, but now I think my eyes have\nbeen opened.\"\n\nRed-Eye pointed with his pipe to the ghastly head.\n\n\"He one scout.  One spy.  Yes, he belong to my tribe.  Ugh!  He not\ntell more tale.\"\n\n\"And whither, think you, have they taken my child and my friend?\"\n\n\"When I kill he, I go after my tribe.  Your child I cannot see.  Your\nfriend play in my tribe's camp.\"\n\n\"Tonal playing!  He must be mad!\"\n\n\"No.  Suppose not play, then----\"\n\nRed-Eye touched his neck with the point of his finger.\n\nThis was significant enough.\n\nThen up sprang Red-Eye, tall, defiant, determined.\n\n\"Your men ready?\"\n\n\"They will start to-morrow morning early.\"\n\n\"Too late!  They start now!\"\n\nHe pulled out his knife and quickly scalped the hideous head.\n\nThe scalp he hung to his girdle.\n\n\"Come,\" he said.\n\nAnd grandfather followed mechanically, as it were.\n\nHis head was bent downwards.  He walked as soldiers walk at the\nfuneral of a well-beloved friend.\n\nBut he was hopeless.  He would never see his little Mary-again.  Of\nthis he felt certain.\n\nThe Indian led the way to the hut occupied by Major Drake, and\nquickly that gallant officer responded to the summons.\n\nDr. McLeod came out with him.  Both started when they saw the tall\nIndian with scalp and tomahawk in his girdle.\n\n\"Red-Eye, I am happy to see you,\" said the doctor.\n\n\"Come _now_,\" said Red-Eye, pointing to the moon.  \"I will guide you\nto the camp of the Micmacs.  Come quick.\"\n\nIn less than half an hour O'Reilly, Drake, and McLeod, with fully\nhalf of my grandfather's company, had fallen in.\n\nThey were silent and grave, but the look of sternness on each face\ntold that they meant business.\n\nMy grandfather ran in to say good-bye, and bid his wife and Tonal's\nbe of good cheer and--just _pray_!\n\nThen, in double file, and still in silence, men and officers marched\naway, guided by Red-Eye, and soon were lost to view, swallowed up, as\nit were, in the depths of that great white, moonlit forest.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV.\n\n  THE FIGHT WITH SAVAGES--A LONE GRAVE IN THE\n  FOREST--RETURN OF SPRING--NAPOLEON AT ST. HELENA.\n\nAt first the half-frozen leaves rustled crisp beneath the men's feet,\nbut Red-Eye led them through the darkness of the great forest, into\nwhich hardly a ray of moonlight could find its way, and here the\nground was soft, and the leaves made no noise.\n\nRed-Eye believed he had the scalp of the only spy hanging at his\ngirdle; but he might be mistaken, so every precaution was taken to\nmaintain an unbroken silence.\n\nTen of the friendly Indians, by Red-Eye's desire, had accompanied the\nexpedition, and these he spread out on both flanks and ahead, so that\nif an enemy appeared they could give timely warning, and our fellows\nwould be ready to fight.\n\nOn and on they marched, for many weary hours; then at last, when near\ndaybreak, Red-Eye ordered a halt.  The camp of the enemy was not far\ndistant.\n\nLeaving the scouts well spread out, the guide now went on by himself.\n\nHe would soon return, he told the officers.\n\n\"I dare say it is safe enough, O'Reilly,\" said Major Drake, \"but\nprecaution is part of a soldier's duty.  We will keep our fellows\nwell together, and post sentries.  This may be an ambuscade, you\nknow.\"\n\nDaybreak was already spreading up in the east-by-south, when Red-Eye\nonce more glided into the camp.\n\n\"No good news,\" he said.  \"Red man's camp-fires are cold.  But I find\nthe trail.\"\n\nHe now rolled himself in his blanket, and was soon fast asleep.\n\nThe wearied men, by Major Drake's advice, did the same, and the\nneedful rest was taken that should prove of so much importance when\nthey got, at last, hand to hand with the Indian foe.\n\nWeary men sleep soundly, and three hours' slumber to a soldier on the\nwar-path will make him as fresh and strong as ten hours taken in a\nstuffy room.\n\nOn again; on and on all that day, through woods and wilds, sometimes\nclimbing wooded hills, in the sides of which many huge bears had\ntheir caves, and into which they retreated, growling and threatening,\nas our men walked past.\n\nGreat was the temptation to Drake and O'Reilly to try conclusions\nwith some of the monsters.  But the sound of a gun in these forests,\nwhere, as Red-Eye expressed it, the very trees have ears and tongues,\nmight have given an alarm that would have rendered the expedition all\nin vain.\n\nRed-Eye himself said but little.  He was too busily engaged, sticking\nto the trail as a pointer follows the scent of game.  This trail was\nat times so much in evidence that even a white man could make it out;\nat others difficult even for the red man himself to descry.\nSometimes it was divided and subdivided, seeming to go in a hundred\ndifferent directions, and it required the utmost skill then to\ndiscover which was the right one.\n\nThere were rivers to be forded, also deep morasses to be crossed,\nwhile at times a lake caused a long detour to be made.\n\nSometimes a strange Indian was met with, and was invariably made\nprisoner.\n\nAt nightfall a halt was again called, and rest and food taken.\n\nBut Red-Eye seemed to need neither rest nor food.  He left his party\nonce more, telling Major Drake he would return at moonrise.\n\nHow he could find his way through the dark of the forest, with\nnothing save the stars to guide him, it is impossible to say.\n\nThe men lay down by their arms.  No one was inclined to talk.  They\nwere tired, and sleep alone could do them good.\n\nIt was midnight before Red-Eye once more glided into camp.\n\nMy grandfather, who had slept but for a very short time, was up and\nwatching for him.\n\nHis report was this:\n\n\"I travel many, many miles.  Then I come to big, big hill.  This I\nclimb and look far to the west.  Ugh!  I can see plenty camp-fires\nlight the sky, and my heart rejoices.  I go nearer and nearer.  Then\ncat-music fall upon my ear, and I rejoice more.\"\n\n\"Cat-music, Red-Eye?\"\n\n\"Cat-music--the wild music of your people.\"\n\n\"You mean the great Highland bagpipes.\"\n\n\"It is that.  It is that.  Your Tonal play to the chief, and they\nmuch rejoice.\"\n\n\"With God's help,\" said my grandfather, \"we'll change their tune.\"\n\nThe whole camp was speedily astir now.  According to Red-Eye, they\nwould have only about seven miles to traverse, but, at the slow and\ncreeping pace they needs must travel, it would take them about three\nhours at least to do the journey, for they would have to be as silent\nand cautious as panthers.\n\nIt was midnight when they started, and the moon shone bright in every\nclearing.  But they still had to keep well into the darkling of the\nwoods, for it was unlikely that a savage tribe of Indians like the\nMicmacs would squat around their tent-fires without posting sentries\nand scouts.\n\nThis made one of the chief difficulties in the way of effecting a\nrescue.\n\nAnother difficulty was even more formidable.  So, at all events, it\nappeared to grandfather.  It lay in the fact that, if the enemy's\ncamp was not captured by very sudden surprise, the savages would,\ndoubtless, spear poor Tonal, while they who had possession of little\nMary would strangle her.\n\nThis last thought was a horror of horrors that made my grandfather\nalmost delirious.\n\nIf anything happened to his child, he determined that he would never\nreturn.  He would follow the savages alone.  Without doubt, he would\npay the penalty of such rashness with his life: but he would sell\nthis dearly.\n\nWithout adventures of any sort, though often startled by the growling\nof some bear, or the mournful cry of the great brown owl, they crept\nstealthily on.  After a time, however--and how very long that time\nhad seemed to my poor grandfather it need scarcely be told--a sound\nof another sort fell on the listening ears of the Royal Scots.  It\nwas the wail of the bagpipe playing a coronach, or lament.\n\nHow solemn and sad it was, rising thus from the depths of the\nmidnight forest!\n\nIt stopped suddenly; and once more the little army marched onwards.\n\nThey could not be far off now, so double caution must be exercised.\n\nRed-Eye soon lifted his hand as a signal for the halt.  Then he\ntouched Major Drake and my grandfather on the shoulder, and beckoned\nto them to follow.\n\nWhen about seventy yards off, Red-Eye lay down for a moment with one\near close to the ground.\n\nThis is the savages' telephone, and it is wonderful what sounds they\ncan thus hear.\n\nThe very earth seems to talk to them, and confess its secrets.\n\nHe crept forward now on hands and knees, the others following his\nexample.\n\nSuddenly a glimmer of light could be seen rising high up on the\npine-trees beyond, and next moment they were looking down over a rock\ninto the camp of the red men.\n\nIf the Indians have more acute hearing than we pale-faces, they have\nalso better eyesight.  Neither Drake nor my grandfather could\ndistinguish anything very well in the uncertain light of the\ncamp-fires, that darted up through the rolling clouds of smoke, and\nstruggled confusingly with the moonbeams.\n\nThere were but two tents in the camp, which was pitched low down in\nan open glade, near to a little lake or pool.  Both were made of\ngreen pine-boughs.  The larger, near to which lay poor Tonal, now\nbound hand and foot, no doubt belonged to the chief and his squaw.\nThe other, it was equally certain, contained Mary and her attendant.\n\nRed-Eye and his companions now drew back a little, and held a\nwhispered conversation--a council of war.\n\nMy grandfather wished to make a sudden dash on the foe, but Red-Eye\nshook his head.\n\n\"No, no, no,\" he said: \"Indian too quick--kill Tonal, kill child of\nmy heart too.\"\n\nThen he proposed his own plan.\n\nHe would creep snake-like towards the camp, cut the cords that bound\npoor Tonal, then dash straight to the smaller tent, and seize the\nchild.\n\nBy this time the camp would be roused, and the soldiers must come to\nthe rescue.\n\nThis plan was adopted, and away glided Red-Eye on his truly dangerous\nmission.\n\nThe men were brought as close to the camp of the enemy as safety\nwould admit of, and my grandfather and Major Drake once more took up\ntheir position on the rock from which they could see the camp-fires.\n\nFor the present, all they could do was to wait and watch.\n\nAt no period of his life, my grandfather has told me, did he ever\nexperience such terrible anxiety as that which he now felt.\n\nHow very, very long the time seemed!\n\nAt last his head sank on the moss.  He could bear to look no longer.\n\nWhat a blessing it is that God is near us wherever we go, and that we\ncan always pray.\n\nBut hark!\n\nThere is the sound of a musket far down beneath.\n\nThen a yell.\n\n  \"Like the wild scream of the curlew,\n  From crag to crag the signal flew.\"\n\n\nThe whole camp down yonder is in motion, the savages are rushing\nhither and thither like a nest of hornets.  The fires are being\nrapidly extinguished--this is the work of the squaws.  But as yet no\nsavage knows whence the danger will come.  They are already armed,\nhowever, with bow and spear and musket.\n\nSee! see!\n\nThe retreating figure of an Indian can be distinguished by them,\nmaking his way eastwards, and bearing something in his arms.\n\nTwang go the bows, muskets are discharged, but still he hurries on.\n\nBut now, high above the ear-splitting yells of the savage foe, rises\nthe war-cry of our men, as they dash down to the charge with bayonets\nfixed.\n\nThat was an ugly fight while it lasted.\n\nA battle bloody but brief.\n\nOur fellows spared none, their bayonets doing the work until the\nsavages broke and fled.  Then volley after volley was fired, until\nall had disappeared in the depths of the forest.\n\nDr. McLeod had fought his way to the chief's tent, and near it he\nfound Tonal, still bound, for Red-Eye had been discovered before he\nhad had time to cut his bonds.\n\n\"God bless you!  God bless you, Dr. Mac!\" he cried, as the giant\nlifted him on his back as deftly as one might lift a child.\n\n\"But man! man! the pipes!  I'll no go a single inch without my\nbagpipes.\"\n\nHastily Dr. McLeod picked up the bagpipes, then speedily rushed back\nin the direction Red-Eye had taken.\n\nLittle Mary was running to meet him.  Safe and sound she was, but\ncrying bitterly.\n\n\"Po' Led-Eye!  O, po' Led-Eye!  He is all blooded and dead.\"\n\nDr. McLeod now cut Tonal's cords, then hurried to the spot where the\npoor faithful fellow lay.  It was evident that life was fast ebbing\naway, but the doctor did what he could to stanch the bleeding.\n\nHe administered a little brandy, and Red-Eye seemed to revive.  It\nwas but as the glimpse of sunshine that precedes the summer storm,\nand of this Red-Eye appeared to be fully aware.\n\nWhen my grandfather and the others ran up after the savages had fled,\nthey found Tonal supporting Red-Eye on his breast, and the child\nsitting near, quietly weeping.  She rushed into her father's arms.\n\n\"But O, daddy,\" she entreated, \"tan oo save po' Led-Eye, 'fore he\ndies, and does (goes) away to a dark hole?\"\n\n\"He is sinking fast,\" said Dr. McLeod, as my grandfather knelt beside\nthe dying man.\n\n\"I will take little Mary away.\"\n\n\"No, no, no,\" cried the child; \"I sit by po' Led-Eye all the time.\"\nAnd down she sat.\n\nRed-Eye tried to lift his hand towards Mary.  She took the poor\nscarred hand that she had often nursed before, and the faithful\nfellow seemed more peaceful now.\n\n\"Lead me--through--the darkness,\" he murmured--\"to the land of the\nGreat White Spirit.\"\n\nThese were the last words he spoke.  His own spirit fled.\n\nGrandfather closed his eyes.\n\nHis bitterest thought at that moment was that he had ever doubted\nthis poor Indian, who had given his life to save the child.\n\n* * * * *\n\nSo sudden had been the attack upon the savages that few of our\nfellows were wounded--none dangerously--and no one was killed.\n\nThe nearest route was now taken towards the camp.  So a litter of\nboughs was made, and the corpse of Red-Eye, covered with leaves, was\nborne along with them.  They would not bury him at a place where\nthere was the slightest chance of the savages desecrating his grave.\n\nBut when they got once more within sight of the Fort, and not far\nfrom the camp, a grave was dug, and the Indian hero laid to rest.\n\nAccompanied by Tonal, every morning, as long as a wild flower was to\nbe had, my wee mother visited the grave, to place on the green mound\nsome little floral tribute to the memory of her never-to-be-forgotten\nplaymate and friend.\n\nBut winter came at last, and covered all the land in robes of white.\nAs severe a winter, probably, as ever had been experienced in Canada.\n\nBut British soldiers are capable of roughing it in any climate, and\nfew, if any, fell victims to the terrible frost.\n\nWinter wore away, and one day Mary, the daughter of the regiment,\nrushed to tell her mother that flowers were growing in the woods, and\nthat once more Red-Eye's grave was green.\n\n* * * * *\n\n* * * * *\n\nIf I happened to come across a village school anywhere, during my\nsummer rambles in my caravan, in which there were boys who had never\nheard of Quatre Bras, of Napoleon's return from the beautiful and\nromantic island of Elba, and of the memorable battle of Waterloo, I\nshould borrow the teacher's tawse or cane, and lay it on\nunmercifully.  Not on the boys--pray do not mistake me--but on the\nteacher himself, unless he happened to be a much bigger and more\nactive man than myself, in which case I--I--well, discretion, you\nknow, is the better part of valour!\n\nIt was a lasting sorrow with my dear grandfather that the transport\nin which he and the rest of his company recrossed the Atlantic did\nnot get home in time to give them a chance of sharing in the glories\nof Waterloo.  This was partly owing to stress of weather, but mostly\nto the fact that she got her fore-foot on a sand-bank, and there lay\nfor a week.  This one single week made all the difference 'twixt\nglory and the loss of it.\n\nPeace was proclaimed at last, and a lasting peace it proved.\n\nThe Highland battalion was no more thought of, and shortly after the\nwar was over, not only my grandfather, but his two friends, Tom\nGrahame and Tonal, left the army and returned to their own country.\nFor many years they lived within easy hail of each other, and met\ntogether, to talk of old times and of the future, almost every night.\n\nTonal's bonnie black-eyed bairns, and \"Tom Grahame's baby,\" as Annie\ncontinued to be called, were brought up at the same school, and\nalthough changes came and separation too, they were friends as long\nas they lived.\n\nBoth O'Reilly and Major Drake retired shortly before my grandfather\nleft the Service, and brave, sturdy Dr. McLeod took up a practice in\nGlasgow.  His name had been mentioned in many a despatch; that was\nall, for in those days there were no Victoria Crosses.\n\nOne day--how well I remember it, though but a child--a hale, hearty\nold man came to see my grandfather, at his cottage, and a right merry\nafternoon and evening they spent.\n\n  \"They fought their battles o'er again,\n  And thrice they slew the slain.\"\n\n* * * * * *\n\nNapoleon Bonaparte was sent, as you all know, to spend the remainder\nof his days and chafe his life away on a sea-girt rock, called St.\nHelena.\n\nIt is really one of the most charming islands in the tropical ocean.\n\nIt is a long time now since his grave, down in a cool, green hollow,\nin a grove of trees, was vacated, for the French were permitted at\nlast to take their dead hero home.\n\nThe house, a far from pretentious one, stood and stands on a bold,\nbare bluff, out-looking as blue a sea as anyone ever beheld.  To the\nleft, as you approach the house, far down beneath, is the green glen\nwhere the grave was dug; but behind you, if you turn your gaze, the\nscenery is well-wooded and mountainous.\n\nTruly a lovely island, but this end of it is lonesome in the extreme,\nand surely in such a place as this, watched night and day by ships\nand soldiers, this eagle-hearted genius of war must have found his\npunishment almost greater than he could bear.\n\nBefore visiting the house, I went to the grave, and was permitted to\ncull some large pink flowers, which were afterwards stolen from my\ncabin on board H.M.S. _Valorous_.\n\nThe interior of the house itself, and its rooms, reminded me of\nhospital wards.\n\nHung up near to a bed was a placard, worded somewhat as follows:\n\n\"If these walls could speak, and tell the story of the great man's\nsufferings in this room, it would melt the hardest heart to tears.\"\n\nAnd this, then, was the end of a life of cruelty and ambition.\n\nHeigho!\n\n  \"So sinks the pride of former days,\n    When glory's thrill is o'er,\n  And hearts that then beat high with praise\n    Now feel that pulse no more.\"\n\n\n\nTHE END","title":"Shoulder to shoulder : $b A story of the stirring times of old","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":83266}