TRUE STORIES OF GIRL HEROINES
[Illustration: The brave young wife rode forth at the head of her whole
garrison.
_Page 109. Frontispiece._]
TRUE STORIES OF GIRL HEROINES
BY
E. EVERETT-GREEN
AUTHOR OF "GOLDEN GWENDOLYN," "THE SILVER AXE," "OLIVIA'S EXPERIMENT,"
ETC.
WITH SIXTEEN ILLUSTRATIONS BY
E. F. SHERIE
[Illustration]
NEW YORK
E. P. DUTTON & CO.
LONDON
HUTCHINSON & CO.
CONTENTS
PAGE
INEZ ARROYA 1
CATHARINE THE ROSE 17
ELSJE VAN HOUWENING 35
GRIZEL COCHRANE 55
EVA VON GROSS 73
EMMA FITZ-OSBORN 93
ELIZABETH STUART 111
CHARLOTTE HONEYMAN 131
MARY BRIDGES 149
THERESA DUROC 167
JANE LANE 185
HELEN KOTTENNER 205
MAID LILLYARD 223
MARGARET WILSON 241
AGOSTINA OF ZARAGOZA 259
AGNES BEAUMONT 277
HANNAH HEWLING 297
MONA DRUMMOND 317
JESSY VARCOE 337
URSULA PENDRILL 355
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
The brave young wife rode forth at the head of her whole
garrison _Frontispiece_
The first great stone leapt from her hand and went
bounding and crashing upon the head of the foremost
Moor _ To face p._ 8
The Commandant pulled her down beside him before it
was too late " " 30
"Is the chest to be examined before it goes on board?" " " 48
With a beating heart Grizel tore open this bundle and
looked at its contents " " 66
He stopped short on seeing the Countess " " 125
Suddenly, close above her, the steps came to a dead stop " " 145
Theresa forgot everything in the sight of the child's peril. " " 183
"Well, now, I did hear as young Charles Stuart himself
was taken," answered the smith " " 193
The men plunged down into the vault " " 218
She set herself in their ranks, and went charging down
the hill " " 237
A wounded man half rose from the ground at their feet " " 270
Bunyan looked down at her with rather a grim smile upon
his face " " 283
The Judge plucked his robe out of her detaining hand. " " 310
"Dare to come one step nearer, and I fire" " " 335
"The first man that touches him I'll kill!" cried Jessy " " 351
True Stories of Girl Heroines
INEZ ARROYA
"Mistress! my mistress! the Moriscos are upon us!"
Inez sprang to her feet, the rich southern blood receding for a moment
from her cheek, as those words fell upon her ears--words of such fearful
significance to the Christian inhabitants of the Moorish territory along
the Sierra Nevada.
"Juana, what mean you? Speak, girl! What have you heard? What have you
seen?"
Juana's face had been white when she came bursting in upon her young
mistress; she held her hand to her side; her breath came and went in
great gasps; yet already she was recovering the power of speech, and she
seized Inez by the arm.
"Mistress, they are below already; they are robbing the house. Can you
not hear them? When they have taken the wine and the oil they will come
hither and murder us!"
Inez held her breath to listen. Yes, there were sounds from
below--sounds of voices--loud, threatening voices, and the laughter of
men assured of victory.
Juana, the maid, spoke in a fierce whisper. Fear was receding. The high
courage which comes to weak women in the hour of extremest need
possessed the hearts alike of mistress and maid.
"The master went forth not an hour ago. Five minutes since little Aluch
ran up to tell me that, as the master was taking the air, there suddenly
appeared a band of rebel Moriscos from Orgiba, who set upon him, and
chased him, and would have killed him, but he took refuge in his
father's house; and he will hide him, and get him safe away. But all
Istan will join the rebels, and already they are crying that every
Christian shall be slain!"
"Every Christian!" cried Inez, with a flash in her dark eyes. "And how
many Christians are there in Istan? Two weak women, Juana, you and I,
and my uncle, whom they have already set upon and chased to the
mountains. Pray Heaven and our Lady that he may reach them safely, and
send us help from Marbella, else there will be but short work with the
Christian population of Istan."
There was scorn in the girl's voice, scorn in the flashing eyes. Istan
was a Moorish village, where one Christian priest had been placed to
work amongst the Moslems, and seek to convert them to the true faith.
Success in this missionary work had been small; but the good man had
hitherto lived in peace with his alien flock. The wise and kindly
traditions of Ferdinand and Isabella, and Hermando de Talavera, had for
long kept under the natural hatred of Moor towards Christian in Southern
Spain. But a monarch had arisen who hated the word toleration. To keep
faith with the Moslem was to break it with the Almighty. The edict of
1567 was now a year or more old, and its pernicious effects were already
made abundantly evident in fierce Moorish risings here, there, and
everywhere.
Inez had heard stories as to the fate of Christian prisoners who had
fallen into the hands of the Moors. Before she followed Juana she had
caught up a shining dagger which hung against the wall; and she thrust
it into her girdle as she ran down the broken steps of the tower.
"At least, they shall not take us alive!" she breathed to herself; and
Juana seemed to hear, for she flashed back a glance at her young
mistress, and for a moment showed the gleam of a long stiletto which she
carried in the bosom of her tunic.
The priest of Istan dwelt in a strange house. It was, properly speaking,
no house at all, but a Moorish fortalice, dismantled and ruinous, which
he had partially repaired soon after his arrival there, and which, since
the arrival of his orphan niece to live with him, he had desired to make
more habitable still.
The place was, in fact, a sort of tower. The lowest floor was their
storehouse for supplies of wheat, oil, and so forth; and from this level
came up the sound of rough voices, as the Moors leisurely removed the
spoil before proceeding upwards. There was only one door from the
fortalice into the world without, and this it was impossible to reach,
for the Moors were swarming in the lowest part, effectually preventing
their egress. They knew perfectly that the two girls were as helplessly
caught as a rat in a trap; they did not even hasten the work in which
they were engaged. Inez, standing at the top of the long flight of stone
steps which led downwards to the basement, heard what they were saying
one to another, and into her olive cheek there crept a deep glow of red,
whilst her lips set themselves, her teeth clenched, and her black eyes
gleamed with a light like that of fire.
"Our Lady and the blessed saints protect us!" whispered Juana, with a
furtive glance into the beautiful face of her young mistress; and Inez
looked back at her without a quiver as she replied:
"The Christian's God helps those who help themselves, Juana. We are not
here to wring our hands and look for a miracle to save us. We fight for
our lives, and Christ and our Lady will help us. See, we are not quite
defenceless, Heaven be thanked for that! Collect those stones, quickly,
quietly. Keep out of sight. Do not let them observe us. Get together a
number, then you shall see!"
It was as Inez had said. The repairs of the fortalice, which had been
already commenced, had put the means of defence into their hands. Large
quantities of great stones had been collected at first in the basement,
but only the previous week had been laboriously carried up the steep,
narrow stairs which led upwards to the dwelling rooms; and these large
stones the two brave girls were now quietly collecting in a great heap
at the top of the flight.
They were in deep shadow, and below the brown-skinned men, in their
picturesque Arab dress, were far too busy examining their spoil, and
making away with it, to heed the slight sounds from above. They talked
together as they worked; they told of the attack they had made upon
Orgiba, and of that fearful massacre of Christian men, women, and
children at Uxixar. Inez held her breath to listen to the confirmation
of certain vague rumours which had reached them before this, but had
scarcely been believed. Peaceful Istan, with its terraced gardens
overhanging the lovely gorge of the Verde, had seemed so far removed
from the storm and strife; and its people were peaceable and kindly
disposed, even though they were Moriscos. But these men were rebels and
freebooters, with the fierce lust of blood upon them, their hands red
from the butchery of innocent, helpless women and children; men who
laughed aloud at tales of hideous deeds done in cold blood; men mad with
hatred to the conquering race, knowing themselves doomed to final
defeat, yet resolved to revenge themselves in every possible way upon
those of the hated faith ere their own turn came.
Upon such a band of men did Inez look down, with the fire of courageous
despair in her eyes. What could they do? what hope was there for them?
two slight girls against a score of trained warriors.
The Moriscos of Istan would probably not join in the attack upon them;
but they would not interfere with what their brethren of the faith might
do. Help from without there would be none, unless the priest himself
could find means of escape, and could get to Marbella and bring it. Inez
knew that he would strain every nerve in this effort. But what chance
had they of holding out for perhaps six hours or more? Could it be done?
Oh, could it be done? She looked at the heap of stones. She looked at
the flitting forms below in the gloom. And then she held her breath once
again, listening to stories of how in other places Christians had taken
refuge in towers and churches, whilst their Moorish foes piled faggots
soaked in pitch, and such-like inflammable material against and around
the walls, and reduced the building to one mass of flames.
If they kept the men from laying immediate hands upon them, would that
fiery doom be theirs?
"Better that than to fall into their hands," said Inez, between her shut
teeth; and Juana, looking at her mistress, with a world of faithful love
in her eyes, exclaimed softly:
"Our Lady will surely send us help, mistress. You are too beautiful to
die such a death!"
Inez put her hands upon the shoulders of the faithful girl, and said in
a low voice:
"You would come with me from Granada, Juana, where you would have been
safe; and there were those who warned us that we might not long be safe
out here. But my duty seemed to my uncle; and you--you would not leave
me. And what if I have brought you hither to your death?"
"We must all die once," answered Juana, her eyes full of love and
courage; "and I would sooner die with you, mistress, than live without
you. If I had stayed behind, and had heard this story of you, I should
have killed myself, or died for grief and shame that I was not with
you."
Then Inez put her arms about the faithful girl's neck, and kissed her
thrice upon the lips.
"We will do battle for our lives, Juana; and then, if needs be, we will
die together," she said.
Suddenly there was a cry from below. Some one had looked up, and had
seen the two girlish figures clinging together. Perhaps the very action
had been misunderstood, and instantly there was a rush towards the
steep, broken, narrow steps of some dozen swarthy Moors.
Instantly the girls were at their post at the head of the flight. Inez,
quiet and composed, gave the word.
"Welcome to the Moriscos!" she cried, in a clear and ringing voice, as
the first great stone leapt from her hand and went bounding and crashing
upon the head of the foremost Moor.
"Welcome to the Moriscos!" echoed Juana, dislodging another, which
sprang from stair to stair, and then, bounding sideways, went crashing
upon the bent back of a man in the basement beneath, who fell like a log
from the blow, his spine fractured.
Crash, crash, crash! Down hurtled the huge stones, flinging the
unprepared Moriscos from the steep stairs, where they fell in a confused
mass, one upon the top of the other, pinned down by the great boulders
which came rolling down upon them from above, cursing, raging, crushed
and maimed, utterly taken aback by such a reception; and now only eager
and anxious to get out of a place that seemed to rain nether mill-stones
upon them.
[Illustration: The first great stone leapt from her hand and went
bounding and crashing: upon the head of the foremost Moor.
_Page 8._]
Three of their number lay stretched dead upon the ground. A number more
were badly hurt; and all were flying from the stairs, which threatened
to become a veritable death-trap for all who tried to mount.
There was a rush for the outer door. The wounded were dragged away
groaning by their comrades; those who were sound carried the dead. They
turned and shook threatening fists at the two girls standing behind
their heap of stones at the top of the stairs; they promised them that
they were coming back. They breathed out threats which might well make
the stoutest hearts quail. But Inez stood up tall and straight, with a
great stone poised in her hand; and the strength and accuracy with which
those formidable weapons had been launched against them before, caused
the men to jostle each other through the doorway in their haste to
escape from possible hurt from the same source.
Scarcely had the last man disappeared before Juana was down the stairs
like a flash, had slammed-to the heavy oaken door, and had drawn the
great iron bolts and the heavy iron bar across it.
"The master left it open when he went out this morning," she said to
Inez, "and I never thought to shut it. Why should I? That is how they
got in so easily; but they will not get in again so fast!"
This was true enough; for the door had been made to withstand attack,
as, indeed, had the tower itself, and though it had fallen into a
ruinous state inside, it was built in a very solid fashion, the walls
being exceedingly thick, and light being admitted mainly by loopholes.
The top, also, was protected by a low battlement, from which a view of
the surrounding country could be obtained. This battlement had fallen a
good deal into disrepair, like the tower itself, and material for
repairing it had been brought in; so that not only had the girls the
remainder of the stones they had already used with such effect, but
there was a large quantity of such material that had been laboriously
carried up to the very top only three days earlier; and some of these
stones were very large and heavy, as they had been designed to form the
coping of the battlement.
"See there!" cried Inez, as the two girls ran up the stairs to the top,
to watch the retreat of the temporarily baffled foe. "Juana, how long,
think you, would such artillery last us? We could slay a score of our
foes, as the woman in the tower slew Abimelech the king. Did not mine
uncle tell us that tale the other night? and how little we thought----"
Juana's eyes were shining. The thrill of victory was upon her. The peril
was not over. Nay, they might have worse to encounter than they had
done already. But at least they had driven forth the foe from the
tower. Their citadel was their own. They had weapons of defence under
their hands. If help would only come at last, they could hold out for
awhile.
"See, see!" cried Inez, as she leaned over the wall to watch the baffled
Moriscos wending their way downwards, sometimes turning to shake
threatening fists at the tower and its defenders. "There is little Aluch
hiding below in the orange grove, and making signals to us. Run, Juana,
to that loophole below, and he will tell you what he has come to say!"
Juana disappeared down the stairs, and returned quickly with a face in
which anxiety and satisfaction were strangely blended.
"The master has got safely off to the mountains. He will be at Marbella
very soon, and then they will start out to help us; but Aluch said he
heard the Moriscos vowing vengeance upon us as they went away. They will
quickly be back; and he thinks if they cannot batter in the door and
take us alive, that they will burn the tower down over our heads."
"They will if they can," said Inez, looking out over the fair, wild
valley, with the expression of one who knows she may be looking almost
her last upon a familiar scene; "but we have a welcome ready for them!"
They leaned over the battlements, those two brave-hearted girls, and
they watched the little village at their feet, almost wishing that the
Moriscos would show themselves; for suspense was harder to bear than
action.
"Let us say our prayers," said Inez, suddenly kneeling in the hot
sunshine upon the hard stone floor; and Juana instantly knelt beside her
and took her rosary in her hands.
When they rose from their knees a few minutes later, suspense was at an
end. The attack was approaching.
"They have weapons now!" cried Juana. "Mistress, have a care. Those bows
and arrows are deadly weapons in the hands of a good marksman. And
look--they are bringing faggots; and that mule has a barrel of tar upon
his back! And see that great ram of wood! They will seek to batter down
the door with that. If they do----"
Yes, if they did that, the girls' position would be desperate indeed.
Before, the men had only been armed with daggers and scimitars, which
were useless save at close quarters. Now they had the deadly bow and
arrow, and if they once obtained entrance, it would be useless for the
girls to repeat the defensive manoeuvre of the earlier hours. They
would be shot down instantly, and fall an easy prey. Inez realised that
in a moment, as she watched the approach of the Moors; and scarcely had
her head appeared above the battlement, before a shower of arrows fell
clattering about them.
"This side!" she said to Juana, between shut teeth. "They will try the
door first; we will be ready for them!"
The girls dared not show themselves openly; but the battlements were
built with a view to defence, and they were able to look cautiously over
without being seen. The Moors were approaching the door; they were
almost directly underneath.
"Now!" cried Inez, setting her hand to a huge stone. Juana put all her
strength into the task, the great coping stone was hoisted between them,
and pushed bodily over.
A fearful yell and a thundering crash told that it had done its work
well; a storm of furious execration went up, and in the midst of it down
came another stone which dashed out the brains of a fellow in the crowd
below.
Juana peered over and then drew back, a fierce triumph on her girlish
face; for she had seen that there were two enemies the less.
"We have plenty of stones, the saints be praised!" she exclaimed. "They
are closing in again, Mistress. Let us give them another!"
The Moors were always careless of life in battle; and again and again
they advanced to fix their battering ram; whilst again and again the
huge stones came thundering down, and, besides these large ones, were
many smaller, which the girls aimed with such precision and coolness,
that not only could the assailants not fix their ram against the door to
batter it down, but the men approaching the walls with faggots and
combustibles were picked off one by one, and dropped wounded or crushed
beneath the hail of stones from above.
Inez looked over once again, drawing herself up to her full height, and
straining her eyes towards Marbella in the hope of seeing the
long-looked-for relief.
"Have a care, Mistress, have a care!" cried Juana anxiously, and sprang
forward; but she was just too late. The arrow had buried itself in the
shoulder of Inez; she gave a start and an exclamation of pain; but,
taking hold of it firmly, she instantly plucked it out.
"Pray heaven it be not poisoned!" cried Juana, as she stanched the flow
of blood with quick, skilful fingers. And Inez smiled bravely through
her pain.
"Hark! They are at the door again; we must show them that the garrison
is not disabled yet. That stone there, Juana; now both together! down it
goes! Hark! what a yell that was. I am revenged for my sore shoulder!"
But the brave resistance of the girls seemed rather to stimulate than to
baffle the assailants. The air was rent with frightful threats and
curses; and Inez, looking rather white, though there was no fear in her
heart, said quietly:
"There is no hope of mercy, Juana. If we are not relieved; if help comes
not, we must sell our lives as dearly as we can; and plunge our daggers
into our own hearts sooner than fall alive into their hands."
"We will, Mistress," said Juana firmly. "But surely our Lady will send
us aid ere that!"
"Look! look! look!" cried Inez suddenly. "The banner of the cross! Oh,
Juana, do my eyes deceive me? Is it a vision that I see?"
And indeed for a moment both the girls thought that it must be; for the
light fell sparkling upon mailed headpieces and flashing swords; and a
banner with the cross flaunting in the golden light of the southern
afternoon was borne aloft, and waved as though in signal that help
indeed was at hand.
"What can it be? Whence come they?" cried Inez, with breathless
agitation. "That is not the road from Marbella! Our Lady herself must
have sent them to our aid! Pray heaven it be not a vision!"
"See, see!" cried Juana in ungovernable excitement, running to the
battlement and showing herself fearlessly. "The Moriscos--they run! They
fly Mistress, we are saved! We are saved! It is our brave Spanish
soldiers come to our rescue!"
Inez looked over in turn, and though the mists seemed to rise before her
eyes in the revulsion of her feeling, she could see the flying figures
of the Moriscos dashing down helter-skelter into the deep ravine below,
to escape the Christian swords, and she saw the lifted headpiece of the
officer in charge of the band, as he looked up and marked the two girls
leaning over the low rampart.
The next minute Juana had dashed down and opened the door, while little
Aluch, flushed with triumph, was telling Inez how this band had come in
pursuit of the rebels of Orgiba; how he had met them and told them of
the predicament of the Christian maidens, and had brought them by the
nearest route to the rescue.
So Istan was saved--saved from Spanish vengeance through little Aluch's
act, as the Christian population of three souls was saved by the heroism
of the two brave girls. Inez rode into Marbella that evening beside the
officer of the band, to find her uncle there, beseeching help, which the
citizens could not believe was wanted in such a peaceful spot, till the
young officer rode into the great square, still holding Inez by the
hand, and told the tale of how she and Juana had held the tower against
the rebel Moriscos.
CATHARINE THE ROSE
He held her hands and looked steadfastly into her eyes.
"You would not hold me back, Kate?"
The eyes which looked bravely at him were full of tears; but the girl
shook the drops from her long lashes as she threw back her head, and
spoke with unfaltering lips.
"I would hold no man back from his duty; least of all the man I love."
In a moment his arm was about her. The troth plight, spoken amid the
clang of arms and the rattle of musketry, was but three days old; and
the strange sweetness of it had penetrated the life of the English
Captain in a fashion which he had no skill to analyse. But in these
stern days there was little scope for the sweetness of spoken love; and
even the minutes snatched from the pressing needs of garrison life were
few and far between.
But Hart had volunteered the second time for a service of extra peril,
and he had come to speak a farewell to his love--a farewell which both
knew might be final.
"I went and returned in safety last time, sweetheart," he said, "and
wherefore not again? I shall have your prayers to Heaven on my side this
time."
"You had them before," said Kate, lifting her head from his shoulder and
looking straight into his eyes; and he kissed away the last of the
raindrops from her lashes.
"Help we must have if Sluys is to be saved," he said. "I swim forth
to-night, under cover of the darkness, with letters for England's Queen.
The devil take that pestilent peace-party, who would beguile her into
dallying with Spain and her tyrant King and treacherous Princes!" broke
out the young Captain suddenly, in a gust of hot anger. "Can she not see
that her only safety lies in joining heart and soul with the Netherlands
in their struggle for life and liberty? Let Philip of Spain once get
these lands beneath his iron heel, and then England will have cause to
tremble for her very existence!"
"But the Queen has sent us help already," said Kate; "surely she will do
more, when she knows our dire extremity!"
"Eight hundred men," answered the young officer, with a tone of scorn,
"eight hundred English soldiers with eight hundred Dutch, to hold a
place like Sluys! How is it possible the thing should be done? It has
come to this, that if help comes not, Sluys must fall. Alexander Farnese
and his Spanish host will score another triumph for tyranny and the
Inquisition!"
A shudder ran through the girlish frame at the sound of that word, more
hateful and terrible to the party of freedom than any other which could
be spoken. Then her eyes flashed with a spark as of fire, and, flinging
back her head, she cried:
"And what would the men do if they came, Harold? What work would you set
them first to do?"
"There is work and to spare, both in attack and defence," answered Hart,
with something of grimness in his tone. "We are in dire need of at least
four redoubts between the citadel and the ramparts. The burghers have
banded themselves together to build us one. We are sending every man
that can be spared from garrison duty and the actual fighting to throw
up the second; but how the others are to be constructed with our present
force it is impossible to see. Help we must have at all cost, and I
trust these dispatches which you have been so carefully sewing in my
clothing, will bring it to us, ere it be too late."
He could not linger. The shadows of the coming evening were beginning to
fall, although the summer day lingered long. He put his hands upon the
shoulders of the girl, and looked into her face with a long wistful
gaze. His own face was very thin and brown, and though he was still
quite young, there were a few grey hairs to be seen about his temples.
Hard living, hard fighting, days and nights of anxious toil had left
their impress upon him, as upon many another compatriot at that season
of bitter struggle. And the bitterness was greater rather than less for
the knowledge that if England's Queen and her counsellors would but show
a little more firmness of purpose and readiness of dispatch, many of the
horrors of this protracted struggle might even now be saved to the
courageous and devoted Dutch.
Even upon the fair young face of Catharine Rose, the perils in which she
had been reared had traced their lines. That look of firm determination,
of high-souled courage, of resolute devotion to duty, be the cost what
it might, could not have been so clearly written there had she not lived
her young life amidst scenes and tales of stress and storm.
Men and women, youths and maidens, had to face from week to week, and
even from day to day, the possibility of having to yield up life and
liberty, home and friends, for their fidelity to their country and their
faith. Catharine's father had died a martyr at the stake. Her brother
had been slain in the memorable defence of Antwerp, two years since; and
the loss of her only son had broken the mother's heart, so that she
faded away and died a few months later.
But these troubles and losses had broken neither the heart nor the
spirit of Catharine. She had the mixed blood in her veins of an English
father and a Dutch mother; the courage and devotion of two warlike
nations seemed to combine in her youthful frame.
Her quarrel with Fate was that she had been born a woman, and not a man.
Her longing was to gird on sword and buckler, and go forth to fight the
hated Spaniard--the tool of the bloody tyrant whose very name was not
heard without curses both loud and deep.
"Oh, if I were but a man!" had for long been the cry of her heart; and
if in the sweetness of feeling herself beloved by one of the heroes of
Sluys she no longer breathed this aspiration, it was not because her
heart was less filled with an ardent longing to do and to dare.
"Farewell, sweetheart," spoke the Captain, looking deep into her eyes,
and knowing, as she too knew, that perhaps he was looking his last. But
the consciousness of ever-present peril was one of the elements of daily
life in the beleaguered city; and although this mission upon which Hart
set forth was one of more than ordinary peril, a soldier never went
forth upon his daily duty with any certainty of seeing home or friend
again.
"Farewell; God be with you, and bring you safely back to us," she
answered steadfastly; and their lips met once before he dropped her
hands, and hurried away without trusting himself to look behind again.
Catharine looked after him from the window as he walked rapidly away in
the gathering twilight. Her accustomed ears scarcely heeded the sullen
booming of the great guns, or the dropping shots of muskets from the
ramparts. The life of the town went on with a curious quietude in the
midst of warlike strife; notwithstanding the fact that it became daily
more and more evident that without substantial succour in men, and
munitions, and food, Sluys could not hold out against such overmastering
odds.
Suddenly the girl turned from the window, and, with fleet steps, crossed
the room, descended a dim stairway, and entered the chamber beneath,
where, by the light of a solitary lamp, a girl, a few years her senior,
was setting out a frugal meal with the aid of a youthful servant-maid.
"Has he gone, Kate?" she asked, as she saw that Catharine was alone; "I
had hoped he would have had something to eat ere he sallied forth into
the night. The rations of the soldiers are meagre enough now, and he has
a hard task before him. God in His mercy give him safe transit through
those sullen waters, and blind the eyes of sentries and soldiers!"
"He could not stay," answered Kate, "and he said he had eaten well.
May," she broke out suddenly, clasping her hands together, the colour
coming and going in her cheeks, "May, I have a plan, and you must help
me. I have learned what the sons and daughters of the city can do for
Sluys. I am going to toil for her, and you will help me!"
"What mean you, Kate? What have you heard? What can be done for the city
by weak women like ourselves?"
"I am not a weak woman!" answered Kate, throwing back her head in her
favourite gesture, "I am a strong woman, and so are you, May, and so are
dozens, ay, and scores of the daughters and the wives of the burghers.
Listen, May. You know of the need for redoubts, and how your husband is
toiling almost day and night to construct one on yonder side of the
citadel. But they need more; Harold himself told me so. They need more
than soldiers or burghers can build. I am going to organise a band of
women and girls. You and I, May Hart, will be the leaders. I have not
watched the building of forts and defences for nothing all these weeks.
You and I with the women of the city, will build them a redoubt, and it
shall be the work of the girls of Sluys!"
The young wife fired instantly at the suggestion. All over the city it
was known of the dire want of men to construct these defensive works.
Boys and men of the burgher class had gone forth willingly in defence
of their town, and were working night and day at the unaccustomed toil.
But Sluys was to see another sight ere long: a great band of women, many
of them mere girls, and even little children, armed with the needful
tools led by Mary Hart and Catharine Rose, going forth morning by
morning from their homes, delving, building, toiling through the long
hot summer's day, in rivalry of the brothers and fathers on the
corresponding side of the citadel; the new redoubt rising bit by bit
before their strenuous efforts, the work as accurate and solid as that
of the men, though every detail was the work of women and girls.
"Impossible!" had been the first cry of the burghers when they heard of
the proposed scheme. Proud though they were of the spirit that inspired
their women-kind, they shook their heads at the thought of their ever
being able to carry out such a plan. But Catharine was a power amongst
the girls of Sluys. She came of a race who had laid down their lives for
the country of their adoption. Her mother had been a townswoman; and the
girl had been born and bred amongst them. "Catharine the Rose" she had
been called in affectionate parlance, a play upon her patronymic, and a
compliment to her brilliant colouring which even the privations and
anxieties of the siege had not dimmed.
Mary Hart was also a girl of Sluys, lately wedded to Roger Hart, the
elder brother of the gallant English Captain, who had been sent with the
small band of troops into the city a short time previously, and had
already so distinguished himself by personal courage, that any specially
perilous errand was readily entrusted to him.
Roger was not a soldier by profession. The Harts' father had settled in
the Netherlands during a time of Tudor intolerance and persecution in
England, little foreseeing how soon the land of their adoption would
become the arena of a struggle to the death against a tyranny of which
England in her worst and darkest hour had never dreamed. He had,
however, thriven and prospered in the country he had chosen as his home,
and had not been driven away by the troubles which speedily befell it.
His sons, like Catharine Rose, combined in their veins the blood of
England's sons and that of the Netherlands; and it was with the Harts
that the girl had found a home, when her mother's death had left her
alone in the world. Perhaps it was not strange when Harold Hart came to
Sluys and spent his few spare hours at his brother's house, that he and
the girl he had played with in childhood should draw together as they
had done, animated by a common love, a common hatred, and a common
steadfast resolve to do and dare all in the cause which was nearest
their heart.
But how would the amazons of Sluys face the fire from the guns of the
enemy when their earthworks grew to the height that would make them
increasingly a target for the Spanish guns?
"Leave it to us now," said some of the burghers, who came as a
deputation to the spot where the women and girls were at work. "Commence
the fort if you will, brave maidens, but leave this part to men. It is
too stern work for delicate girls when the storm of lead whistles about
those who work."
It was to Catharine the Rose they spoke, and she turned upon them with a
flash in her eyes, as she made answer:
"Think you that we have not counted the cost? Think you that we are
afraid? Have we not seen? do we not know? Are we of different nature
from yourselves? I answer for the maidens of Sluys. That which we have
begun we will carry through. Have not you men your work cut out? Are you
not toiling--ay, and dying--daily for our defence and that of our homes?
Do you think we are afraid to toil, and, if need be, to die in the same
cause? It was like you to offer thus to relieve us in the time of
chiefest peril; but I give you the answer of the girls of Sluys--go to
Captain May for the answer of the wives!"
Captain Catharine and Captain May were the titles by which the two
leaders were known to their own squads; but the men called them
"Catharine the Rose" and "May in the Heart"--a sort of graceful parody
upon their names.
Mary Hart had the same answer to give on behalf of the wives of the
burghers. And, indeed, it was abundantly evident that the men had their
hands full with what they themselves had undertaken, and that unless the
brave work were carried out by those who had commenced it, it must
perforce be abandoned; whilst more and more needful for the safety of
the city did these redoubts become.
The temper of the besiegers was known to be sorely tried, and scant was
the chance that even if they heeded the sex of the workers upon the
growing redoubt, they would on that account permit it to grow without
opposition. Again and again in the history of those bloody wars women
had fought side by side with men in the defence of their homes and
liberties, and the Spanish soldier had as ruthlessly cut down the one as
the other.
"Girls, are you afraid?" asked Kate, as she led forth her band upon the
morrow. "You have heard the balls hissing overhead these many days; but
to-day, perchance, we shall feel the sting of the hot bullet, or the
splinter of some shell tearing its way into our flesh. Are you afraid to
face such experience?"
"We are not afraid; where you lead us, we will go!" was the almost
universal rejoinder, spoken with a quiet gravity and resolve which
attested its sincerity. These girls were not undertaking the task in
ignorance of its perils. They had seen enough of wounds and death. They
knew what they were facing; but there were only a few waverers who, on
Kate's invitation, went back; and even they could not tear themselves
away from the scene of their labours; they came to look on beneath the
shelter of the rampart, to give help should help be needed; and before
long the stern excitement of the hour possessed them also, and scarce
one but was soon working with the rest, only shrinking and perhaps
uttering a little cry as some bullet might whizz close to her ear.
Under fire!--a rain of bullets falling round!--a comrade beside you
sometimes falling silent and helpless, or with a cry and a struggle. It
is so easy to speak of such things, but how many of us realise what they
mean to those who have passed through such experience?
Catharine in the foremost post of danger worked on directing and
encouraging. She had insisted that her squad of girls should take the
side most exposed to the enemy's fire, leaving the less perilous place
for the married women. There had been a generous rivalry for this
position of peril and honour; but Catharine's word and determination had
prevailed.
"You who have husbands and perhaps children to think of, and to miss you
if you are taken, must give this post to us," she said; and she thought
of the man she loved, of whom no tidings had yet come; who had ventured
his life so many times; and in her heart she prayed that if he were
taken, she might join him on the other side of the narrow stream of
death, the stream which seemed so small and narrow when so many were
crossing it day by day.
So the work progressed rapidly, though many a brave young life paid
forfeit, and the tears would well up sometimes in Kate's eyes, as she
saw a comrade carried off dead, or bent over a dying girl, to hear her
last brave message for home and friends; or, when in the silence of the
night, she thought upon these things, and cried in her heart, "How long,
O Lord, how long?"
But there was never a quiver of fear in her face or in her heart as she
stood to her post day by day; and the walls grew, and the Commandant of
the garrison came and gave warm praise and thanks, and timely cautions
and instructions to the heroic girls who toiled through the hot summer
days without one selfish thought of fear.
Once, as he stood beside the leader of these brave young amazons, a
shell came screaming through the air, and he shouted a word of command.
"Down on your faces!" he cried, and himself set the example, to show
them what to do. The shell was from a new battery, and it had been
directed with a view to stopping the work on this very redoubt. The
girls dropped their tools and fell flat, but Catharine was a thought too
late. She had been so interested in the work of that battery that she
forgot for a moment the peril in which she stood. Luckily the Commandant
pulled her down beside him before it was too late; but a portion of the
explosive struck her, tearing a ghastly wound from wrist to elbow. The
stones and rubble seemed to fly up around them; a fragment dashed itself
against Catharine's head; a blood-red mist seemed to swirl before her
eyes, and blank darkness swallowed her up.
When she opened her eyes next it was to find herself at home, lying upon
the wide couch beneath her favourite window which looked down the
street. The light showed that the evening was advancing; May was in the
room setting the table for supper, and--but was not that part and parcel
of the dream which still seemed to enwrap her faculties?--Harold, her
bronzed-faced soldier, was seated beside her, his eyes hungrily bent
upon her face.
She smiled, half afraid to move lest the dream should vanish, and the
next moment he had her fingers close in his grasp.
"Kate, my Kate!" he cried; and she smiled back, and sat up.
[Illustration: The Commandant pulled her down beside him before it was
too late.
_Page 30._]
"Harold! you have done it again! and have come back safe."
"Yes, I have come back, and to find--what? That my Kate has set an
example to the women of the Netherlands, that----"
But she put her hand upon his mouth and stopped him.
"It was not I more than others; and there are some who have laid down
their lives for the cause. You must not praise me; why should not women
do their duty to the cause of freedom as well as men? You do not praise
your men for standing to their guns."
"But we will praise you!" cried Harold hotly. "Know you not that all the
city is ringing with the news that the women's redoubt is all but
finished, and that in spite of the deadly fire from the new battery? And
Kate, to-night the soldiers will get the guns mounted, and to-morrow
Fort Venus will give her answer back. Oh, my Kate, will you be able to
come and see?"
"Fort Venus?" she queried, with a smile in her eyes.
"That is what the Commandant has christened it, and the soldiers
received the name with ringing cheers. The names of Catharine the Rose
and May in the Heart are in all men's mouths. Surely, surely you must be
there to see!"
And she was; for the wound, although severe, was not crippling, and the
dauntless spirit of the girl carried her through the triumph and
gladness of the next day, as it had carried her through the previous
perils and hardships.
A spectator would have thought that Sluys was _en fête_ that day instead
of a sorely pressed beleaguered city, wanting food, help, everything.
Citizens and soldiers marched in squadrons to the new fort, which had
been the scene of arduous toil all the night, and from whose loopholes
the mouths of guns could now be seen protruding.
And foremost in that procession, cheered to the echo by burghers and
soldiers alike marched the brave women and girls, who had done such work
for their country and their city, headed by Mary Hart and Kate Rose.
Then, at a given signal, "Fort Venus" opened her mouth and roared forth
her message of defiance and resolve.
"Hear the voice of the women of the Netherlands!" cried Arnold de
Groenevelt, the grave Commandant, as the guns belched forth fire and
smoke, and the welkin rang with the shouts of the citizens and soldiers.
And so true was the aim of the gunners, that the new battery was
speedily silenced; and cheer after cheer went up as the destruction
wrought became more and more visible; and the youths of the city bore
aloft upon their shoulders through the streets to their homes,
Catharine the Rose and May in the Heart, crying aloud as they took their
triumphal way: "Hear the voice of Fort Venus! Hear the voice of the
women of the Netherlands! Death to the tyrant! Life and immortality to
the liberties of the people, and freedom of faith. The voice of the
girls is the voice of the nation."
ELSJE VAN HOUWENING
For two years she had lived within the walls of a grim fortress; a
prison had been her home. Thirteen massive doors, secured by iron bolts
and bars and huge locks, stood between her and the outer world; and yet
this maiden of nineteen summers was no prisoner; she was here in this
gloomy place of her own freewill.
And for what cause was she here? Was it to guard and tend one who was
very near and dear to her,--a father, a mother, a brother? No; it was
none of her own kindred who were thus shut up, but her master, Hugo de
Groot, or Grotius, as he is more generally known to history.
With the causes for the unjust captivity of this great and learned man,
we need not deal here. They belong to the page of history, where they
can be read in full. Suffice it to say, that Grotius was condemned by
the States-General of the Netherlands to a life-long captivity in the
great fortress of Loevenstein, under the spiteful tyranny of its
governor, Lieutenant Deventer, who had an especial grudge against him,
and seemed resolved to make his captivity as bitter as it was possible
to do.
The one grace allowed to the unhappy prisoner was that his wife and
family might share his captivity; might live within the fortress in the
quarters allotted to him, although not suffering all the rigours of
imprisonment. And with Madame de Groot and her family of children had
come Elsje van Houwening, their young maid-servant, who had stoutly
refused to leave them in their hour of trial and trouble, and had
already spent two years of her young life within the walls of the
prison.
The tie that binds master and servant together was stronger in those
days than it is now. The race of devoted servants seems well-nigh
extinct in these degenerate days; our mothers and grandmothers had
experience of a fidelity which is seldom met with now. But even in their
times an instance of such courage and devotion must needs be rare. Yet
to Elsje it seemed perfectly natural to cleave to the family that had
befriended her in a lonely childhood, and she loved her master and
mistress and their children with a love which only grew stronger and
stronger during the long, monotonous days of this captivity. Small
wonder was it that Madame de Groot should sit for hours over their
scanty fire, her children asleep, her husband poring over the books
which came to him from time to time in a great chest from friends in
Gorcum, talking with Elsje as though to a friend, talking over the
difficulties of keeping house upon the pittance allowed them from the
Government after the sequestration of their family property; the
mournful future that seemed to stretch indefinitely before them, and now
and again of that ever recurrent dream of hapless prisoners--the chances
of escape!
And yet what was the possibility of this? How could it be even dreamed
of that a closely guarded prisoner should pass through those thirteen
iron-bound doors which lay between him and liberty? And if the sad-eyed
wife or eager maid looked down from their windows, what did they see,
save the rushing, tumultuous flow of a deep turbid river?
Nature and art had combined, as it seemed, to make this fortress
impregnable alike from without and within. It stood in the very narrow
and acute angle, where the strong and turbid Waal joins its rushing
waters with those of the Meuse; and on the land side immensely strong
walls with a double moat guarded it from attack, and held in helpless
captivity all those upon whom the great doors had closed.
True Madame de Groot with her children, or Elsje with her market basket,
were permitted to sally forth at will by day, or, at least, under
modified restrictions; to cross by the boat to Gorcum, which lay exactly
opposite on the farther bank of the Waal. They made their purchases
here, and saw their friends from time to time; but how did this help
the prisoner? Madame de Groot was very stout and somewhat short, whilst
Grotius himself was tall and slight, possessed of singular personal
beauty, and an air and bearing that would be most difficult to disguise.
The idea of dressing him up in their clothes, and smuggling him out in
that fashion, had been talked of a hundred times, but only in a sort of
despair. Hugo himself had shaken his head over the plan. It was doomed
to ignominious failure, as he saw from the first. No one was permitted
to leave the prison save in broad daylight, and all had to pass
innumerable guards and sentries on the way. If the prisoner were to be
detected seeking to escape in such fashion, it would only lead to a more
rigorous and harsh captivity, and, probably, to his entire separation
from his family.
The wife had sorrowfully agreed that it was too great a risk to run;
yet, nevertheless, she and Elsje were ceaselessly racking their brains
to think out some plan whereby the prisoner might escape the dreadful
doom of life-long captivity.
It was evening. Madame de Groot was bending over the stove, cooking her
husband's frugal supper. Elsje went in search of the children, to put
such of them to bed as were not already there.