The winter of 1642-43 was one of uneasy uncertainty to us at
Netherby. The whole world seemed to lie dim and hazy, as if wrapped
in the heavy folds of a November fog. The next villages seemed to
become far-off and foreign, in the unsettled state of the country.
There was no knowing the faces and voices of friends from those of
foes, in the rapid shifting of parties. The comrade of yesterday was
the opponent of to-day. Who could say what the comrade of to-day
might be to-morrow? Mr. Capel, the Member for Hertfordshire, who had
been the first in Parliament to complain of grievances, had become
Lord Capel, and was threatening the seven associated counties with
his plunderers.
Lord Essex (many thought) seemed as frightened at success as at
failure. Victories lulled him into fruitless negotiations; and the
only thing that roused him to action was imminent ruin. Some
murmured that "professional soldiers love long wars as physicians
love long diseases." Some whispered of treachery, and others of
Divine displeasure. The explosion of battle had come; but the only
consequence seemed to be the loosening of the whole ground around,
the crumbling away of the nation in all directions.
Partly, no doubt, this sense of vagueness and dimness was caused by
the absence from most homes and communities of the most capable and
manly men in each,--in the garrisons, on the field, taking counsel
with the King at Oxford, or taking counsel for the nation at
Westminster. Thus events were left to be guessed and debated by old
men despondent with the decay of many hopes; or women, draining in
anxious imaginations the dregs of every peril they could not share in
fact; or boys delighting in magnifying the dangers they hoped soon to
encounter, therewith to magnify themselves in the eyes of mothers and
maids.
Rachel Forster, on whose gentle strength the whole village was wont
to lean, was away; and Aunt Dorothy, the manliest heart left among
us, had a belief in the general wickedness of men, and the general
going wrong of things in this evil world, which was anything but
reassuring to those whose fears were quickened with the life-blood of
more vivid hopes than hers.
Thus we were ripe for all kinds of credulities that winter at
Netherby.
I can remember nothing rising prominently out of the general hum and
fog except two convictions, which enlarged before us steadily,
becoming more solid instead of more shadowy as they came nearer. The
first was the impossibility of trusting the King. The second was
that everything went right where Colonel Cromwell was; for by this
time he was Colonel Cromwell, at the head of his regiment, which he
was slowly sifting and compressing into the firm invincible kernel of
his invincible army.
A dim, dreary time it was for us from the Edgehill Fight, in October,
1642, to the beginning of February, 1643. Roger in prison at Oxford
with Job; my Father at Reading or in London with Lord Essex and the
army.
But in the beginning of February a new time dawned on us. My Father
came home to us for a few days, to make the old house as tight as he
could against any assaults from Lord Capel, or any straggling party
of Prince Rupert's plunderers, who were always making dashing forays
into the counties favourable to the Parliament, and appearing where
they were least expected. The old moat, which in front of the house
had long been the peaceful retreat of many generations of ducks, and
elsewhere had been partially blocked up with fallen stones and trees,
was carefully cleared out and filled with water. The terraces which
led to it on the steep side of the house were scarped, all but the
uppermost, which was palisadoed, and had two great guns planted on
it. The drawbridge was repaired, and ordered to be always drawn up
at night. We were provided with a garrison of four of the
farm-servants, drilled as best might be for the occasion, and placed
under the command of Bob, which virtually placed the whole fortress
under the command of Tib, whose orders were the only ones Bob was
never known not to disregard. Meantime my aunts and I, with the
serving-maids, were instructed how to make cartridges, and prepare
matches for the match-locks; and Aunt Gretel gave us the benefit of
her experience in pulling lint, preparing bandages, and other
hospital work.
If an attack, however, were ever made, the general belief in the
household was that Aunt Dorothy would take her place as commandant,
her courage being of the active rather than the passive kind.
Indeed, I think the sense of danger to ourselves was a kind of relief
to most of us. It seemed to make us sharers in the great struggle,
which we believed to be for God, and truth, and righteousness. It
took us out of the position of uneasy listeners for rumours into that
of sentinels on the alert for an attack. And the whole spirit of the
household rose from dreamy disquiet into cheery watchfulness and
activity.
My Father brought us the story of the king's attempt to surprise
London. "It was a treacherous, unkingly deed," my Father said,
"enough to quench in the heart of the people every spark of trust
left in His Majesty."
He said it happened on this wise. On Thursday, the 11th of November,
1642 (my father told us), the king received messengers from the
Commons with proposals of peace, declared his readiness to negotiate,
and his intention to remain peaceably in the same neighborhood till
all was amicably settled. The Parliament, trusting him, ceased
hostilities. Nevertheless, instantly after despatching this message,
he set off in full march for London. On Saturday he sent forces
under Prince Rupert to surprise Brentford under cover of a November
fog, and of his own too loyally trusted word. But Denzil Hollis,
with part of his regiment, made a noble stand, and stopped the
Prince's progress.
Hampden came up first, and Lord Brook, to the succour of Hollis'
imperilled regiment; they tried to fight through the royal troops,
which had surrounded Hollis and his men in the streets of Brentford.
This they could not effect. But Hollis' little band themselves
fought to their last bullet, and then threw themselves into the
river, those who were not drowned swimming past Prince Rupert's
troops to Hampden and his Greencoats. Lord Essex, hearing the sound
of guns in the Parliament House, where he was at the time, took horse
and galloped across the parks and through Knightsbridge to the scene
of action. After this, all through the Saturday night, soldiers came
pouring out from the roused city, until, on Sunday morning, four and
twenty thousand men were gathered on Turnham Green.
Then the tables were turned, and Hampden fell on the king's rear.
"And then?" asked Aunt Dorothy.
"And then," replied my Father, drily, "Lord Essex recalled him, and
so nothing further came of it; but things have gone on simmering ever
since; always getting ready, and discussing how things should be
done, and never doing them."
"How do Mr. Hampden and Mr. Pym brook these delays?" said Aunt
Dorothy.
"Mr. Hampden would have had my Lord Essex invest Oxford," said my
Father, "but he is a subordinate, and Lord Essex a veteran; and Mr.
Hampden, I trow, deems military obedience the best example he can
give an army scarce six months recruited from the shop or the plough."
"And meantime," said Aunt Dorothy, "I warrant Prince Rupert is active
enough. There is no end to the tales of his devastations, seizing
whole teams from the plough, setting fire to quiet villages at
midnight, with I know not what iniquities besides, and carrying home
the spoil from twenty miles around to the king's quarters at Oxford.
If Lord Essex does not want to fight the king, why does not he submit
to him? Keeping twenty-four thousand men armed and fed at the public
expense, and doing nothing, is neither peace nor war to my mind!"
"True, sister Dorothy," said my Father, "I know of no method by which
war can be carried on in a friendly way. And when Lord Essex has
come to the same conclusion, perhaps things will go a little faster."
"Will they ever, under Lord Essex?" said she.
"Time will show," said he. "We have scarcely found our Great
Gustavus yet."
"Colonel Cromwell has been doing something better than dreaming what
to do, at Cambridge, since he saved the magazine there and £2,000 of
plate for the Parliament last June," said Aunt Dorothy. "Troops are
pouring up to him from Essex and Suffolk, and all around, they say;
and Cambridge is being fortified; and they say it is owing to Colonel
Cromwell we are so quiet in these seven counties."
"Colonel Cromwell has a rare gift of sifting the chaff from the
wheat; finding out who can do the work and setting them to do it,"
said my Father, thoughtfully.
"So strict with his soldiers too," said Aunt Dorothy. "They say the
men are fined twelve pence if they swear a profane oath."
"Then," said my Father, "he is doing what he told his cousin Mr.
Hampden must be done, if ever the Parliament army is to match the
king's."
"What is that?" said she.
"Getting men of religion," my Father replied, "to fight the men of
birth. You will never do it," said Colonel Cromwell, "with tapsters
and 'prentice lads. Match the enthusiasm of loyalty with the
enthusiasm of piety!"
"It is strange," rejoined Aunt Dorothy, "that Mr. Cromwell never
discovered his right profession before. A farmer till forty-three,
and then all at once to find out he was made for a soldier!"
"What can make or find out soldiers but wars, sister Dorothy?" said
my Father. "Moreover, I warrant Colonel Cromwell has known what it
is to wage other kinds of war before this. It is only taking up new
weapons. It is only the same conflict for the oppressed against the
oppressor, in which he contended for those of the Fen country against
Royal assumption, and for the poor men of Somersham against the
courtiers who would have ousted them from their ancient
common-rights; or for the gospel lecturers whom Archbishop Laud
silenced. The same war, only a new field and new weapons. At any
rate, I am glad the lad Roger is to serve under him; and so you may
tell him when he gets his liberty and comes home, as I trust he will
in a fortnight."
This was said as my Father was taking an early breakfast alone with
us in the Hall, with his horse saddled at the door, ready to take him
back to the Lord General's quarters.
Rachel and Job Forster came home before Roger, in Sir Walter
Davenant's wagon, stored with provisions and cordials, and soft
pillows, by Lady Lucy.
I believe every one in Netherby slept with a greater feeling of
security on the night after their return. Poor Margery, Dickon's
young wife, said it was like the Ark coming back from the
Philistines, regardless of the slur she thereby cast on the Royalist
army, in which Dickon fought. And yet there was nothing very
reassuring in Job's appearance. He looked like a gaunt ghost, and
stumbled into the cottage like a tottering infant, and rather fell on
the bed, which had been made up for him in the kitchen, than lay down
on it, so broken was his strength. When the neighbours came in after
a while, however, he had a good word to hearten each of them. As to
Rachel, she settled in at once, without more ado, to her old ways and
plans, doing everything with the purpose-like quietness which so
calms the sick.
Cheered by Job's greetings to the neighbours, she told me it was not
until the place was still, and she was making up the fire for the
night, that she knew how low his strength was. As she took the wood
from the pile he had made for her close to the fire, she was
startled, she told me, by a sound like a stifled sob from where he
lay.
"Art laid uneasy?" said she, at his side in an instant. "Does aught
ail thee? Is the bed ill-made?"
"Naught," said he. "It's better than the bed of Solomon to me, with
the pillars of silver and the bottom of gold. But I am like to them
that dream, laughing and crying all in one. For I used to think
before thee come to the gaol, how I should never see thee kindle a
fire in the old place again, and how every stick thee had to take
from where I laid it for thee would go to thy heart like a stab. And
it shamed me not to have made a better shot at the Lord's meaning for
thee and me."
"How could thee tell His meaning," said Rachel, "before He told thee?
He gave thee no promise to bring thee out of prison, nor me."
"Nay," said Job, "but it's making very bold with Him, and making
fools of ourselves, to guess at His words when they're half spoken,
instead of waiting to hear them out. And it grieves me I should have
suspected Him when He was moaning us so well. Read me what the
Scripture saith about the forgiveness of sins."
"But, Mistress? Olive," concluded Rachel, when she told me this
little history, "when Elijah, worn out with trouble, misunderstood
the Lord, the angel comforted him, not with a text, but with a cake
baken on the coals; so, when Job took to misunderstanding the
Almighty like that, thinking He would be angered with what would not
have fretted one of the likes of us poor hasty creatures, instead of
the Bible I gave him a good cup of strong broth. I knew it was the
body, poor soul, and not the spirit that was to blame, and that all
those brave words he spoke to the neighbours had cost more than they
were worth; and, of course, I was not going to profane the Holy Word
by using it like the spell in a witch's charm."
So for several days she kept every creature out of the cottage, which
deprived me of her counsel in a moment of difficulty, which happened
the week of their return.
Lord Capel's troops continued to hover round, and to keep the
district in a state of suspense and alarm, ripe for any marvellous
stories of horror, or for any acts of terrified revenge. For in
stormy times there are sure to be some cowardly spirits ready to
throw any helpless victim as an expiatory sacrifice to the powers of
evil.
One Saturday evening, late in February, I was returning home through
the village from Gammer Grindle's cottage, which I had very often
visited since poor Tim's death. The old woman had seemed gentler in
her way of speaking of her neighbours, and once or twice had betrayed
her pleasure in seeing me by speaking sharply to me if I stayed away
longer than usual, as if I had been one of her own lost grandchildren.
I had made rather a long circuit in returning, not liking to try the
high road again, because, in going, I had encountered a dozen or so
of the king's troopers, and as I was hurrying past them, they
complimented me in a way I did not like, and came after me. I
recognized Sir Launcelot Trevor's voice among them, and then I turned
round and spoke to him, and begged him to call his men away. Which,
when he recognized me, he did; but not without some more idle
Cavalier jesting, which set my heart beating, and made me resolve to
come back by a quiet path through the Davenant woods, which led round
through the village by Job Forster's.
Poor old Gammer was very friendly. I suppose I was trembling a
little, though I did not tell her why, for she declared I was
chattering with cold, and would have me drink a hot cup of peppermint
water, and kindled up the fire, and took off my shoes, which were
wet, and dried them, wrapping up my feet, meanwhile, in her own best
woolsey whimple. Indeed, she was so gracious and approachable, that
I ventured to say something about the benefit of coming to church,
and mingling a little more with her neighbours.
"Too late, too late for that!" said she, firing up. "This twenty
year, come Lammas, my Joan, Cicely's mother, was buried, she and her
man, Cicely's father, in one grave. And the parson would do nothing
without his fee. So I sold the cover from my bed to pay him. And I
vowed I'd never darken his church-door again."
"But that parson is dead, Gammer," said I, "and it was not his church
after all."
"That may be," said she. "But a vow is a vow. Besides, I could
never bear the folks' eyes speiring at me. I'm ugly, and lone, and
poor, and they make mouths at me, and call me an old hag and a witch.
But it's only natural. All the brood will peck at the lame chick.
All the herd will leave the stricken deer. Didn't all the village
hoot and jeer at my poor, tender, innocent Tim?"
And then she poured forth the story of her life of sorrow as I had
never heard it before. A heart trained to distrust and suspect
through a childhood of bondage under the petty tyrannies of a
stepmother and her children. One year of happy married life, ending
in a sudden widowhood, which widowed her heart also of all its
remnant of hope in God, and left her to struggle prayerless and alone
with a hard world, for bread for herself and her orphan babe. The
growing up of this child to be a stay and comfort, and, for three
years, a second home with her when she married. This second home
broken up as suddenly as the first, by the death of the daughter and
her husband in one month, from a catching sickness, leaving the
grandmother once more alone to toil with enfeebled strength for two
orphan babes; the boy, poor, faithful Tim, half-witted and sickly;
the girl, Cicely, wilful and high-spirited, and the beauty of the
village. Then the terrible morning when Cicely was gone, and no
account could be got of her beyond Tim's confused and exulting
statement, that Cicely had cried, and laughed, and kissed him, and
told him to wish grandmother good-bye for her, and she would come
back a lady and bring Tim a gun like Master Roger's; to Gammer
Grindle tidings worse than bereavement or all the misery she had
known, for she came of a truly honourable yeoman's house that had
never known shame. Tim, however, could never be brought to look on
his sister's disappearance in any but the most cheerful light, and
would watch for hours at the corner of the path leading to the
village for Cicely and the "gun like Master Roger's," until, as time
passed on, the expectation seemed to fade away, only to be awakened
once again by the mysterious touch of death. And since then not a
word of the poor lost girl. Tim in the grave, and the vain longing
that Cicely were there too. And all the little world around her, as
she believed, leagued against her crushed but unconquered heart. She
ended with,--
"But it's but natural. When the lightnings have rent the trunk the
winds soon snap the boughs. They say the devil stands by me. If he
did no one need wish him for a friend. They say the Almighty is
against me. And most times I think belike He is."
Then Aunt Gretel's words came back to me, "_Anywhere but there. Put
the darkness anywhere but there_;" and I said,--
"Never, Gammer, never. The devil said that thousands of years ago;
but the Lord Christ came to show what a lie it was. He stood by the
stricken and wounded always. The lame and the blind came to Him in
the temple, and he healed them."
She listened as if she half believed, and then, after a silence, she
said,--
"The devil is no easy enemy to deal with, mistress, but if I could be
sure it was only him, maybe I might look up and try again."
At last she was persuaded so far as to let me say I might call for
her the next Sunday on my way to church. "It was as like as not she
would not go, but at any rate it would do her no harm to see me."
And as I left I heard something like a blessing follow me, and I saw
the poor, bent old figure leaning out of the door and watching me.
But when I came back to Netherby I found the whole village at the
doors in a ferment of eager talk.
I thought at once of Sir Launcelot and the troopers, and asked if
there had been another battle.
"Nay, nay," said the woman I spoke to, "it's naught but folks going
to reap their deserts at last."
Then came a chorus of grievances.
"Three of Farmer White's finest milch kine gone in one night!"
"Goodwife Joyce's best black hen killed, and not a feather touched;
no mortal fox's work it was too plain to see!" "The dogs yelling as
if they were possessed, as belike they were, on Saturday evening,
seeing no doubt more than they could tell, poor beasts, of what was
going on in the air!" "Lord Essex and his army lying spellbound,
able to do nothing, while the Prince Robber was plundering the land
far and wide!" "Job and Master Roger, the best in the village, the
first stricken; too clear where the blows came from!" "And to-day
the squire's own cattle driven off the meadow, with Mistress
Nicholl's, by a troop of plunderers, who came no one knew whence, and
had gone no one knew whither!" "And finally, Tony Tomkin had been
pursued by a headless hound through the Davenant woods, where he had
only gone to take a rabbit or two he had snared, and thought no harm,
the family being away and fighting against the country!" "And," but
this was muttered under the breath, "there were those who said they
had seen something that was not smoke come out of Gammer Grindle's
chimney--something that flew away over the fens faster than any bird.
And this was only on last Saturday night, and every one knew that
Saturday was the day of the witches' Sabbath ever since the Jews had
brought the innocent blood on their heads!"
Then suddenly it flashed on me what it all meant. They were going to
execute some dreadful vengeance on Gammer Grindle, believing her to
be one of the witches who were causing all the mischief in the land.
It was no use to set myself against the torrent of fear and rage, so
I said as quietly as I could,--
"What are they going to do, and when?"
"First," was the reply, "they're going to duck her in the Mere before
her own door. If she sinks they will pull her out if they can, as it
mayn't be her doings after all. If she swims she's a witch, clear
and plain."
"And what then?" I said.
"Nothing too bad, Mistress Olive, for the like of them. But the
lads'll see when it comes to the point. It isn't often their master
helps the wretches out at last, they say. And if she don't sink
natural, as a Christian ought, belike the lads'll make her."
"When did they go to do this?" I asked.
"They're but just off," was the answer. "But they'll make short work
of it, never fear. It's time a stop could be put to such things, if
ever it was."
"If Rachel and Job had been among you this would never have been," I
thought. I longed to have consulted Rachel, had it been possible.
But there was no time to hesitate.
My first impulse was to rush after the cruel boys; but I felt that in
the maddened state of terror in which the village was, they would
most probably keep me back. So, without saying a word or visibly
quickening my pace, I walked quietly on towards home.
In the porch I found Aunt Gretel. She was watching for me.
I took her arm, not violently, I was so afraid of frightening her
from doing what I had determined must be done. And I said quite
quietly,--
"Aunt Gretel, we must go together this instant to Gammer Grindle's."
"What is the matter?" she said.
"I will tell you as we go," I said. "There is no time to be lost."
She came with me. I turned into the path by the meadows.
"Not this way, Olive," she said. "The plunderers have been there
to-day. Your Father's best cattle are taken, and Placidia's."
"If the cattle are gone, then belike so are the plunderers," I said.
"But if the king's whole army were there we must take the shortest
way."
And I told her the whole story.
She said nothing but,--
"Then the good God guard us, sweetheart, and don't waste your breath
in words."
We went quickly on.
Only once I thought I heard shouts, and I said,--
"Aunt Gretel, what do they do with witches at the worst?"
"They have roasted them alive," she said, under her breath. And we
said no more.
As we came to the creek of the Mere, on the opposite side of which
the cottage was, we heard yells and shouts too plainly borne across
the water in the stillness of the evening, unbroken by the lowing of
the stolen cattle which had been feeding there that morning. And in
another moment we saw the reflection of torches gleaming in the
water, as wo stumbled along in the dusk among the reeds. I listened
eagerly for poor old Gammer's voice. But I heard nothing. Indeed,
my own heart began to beat so fast, I could hear little but that.
Until, just as we reached the cottage, there was a dull splash, and
then a silence. It was followed by a low moan, but by no cry. They
were drowning the poor old woman, and the brave broken heart would
vouchsafe them the triumph of no entreaty for mercy and no cry of
distress! I knew it as if I saw it. And the next moment I had flown
along the shore and was in the midst of the crowd on the brink of the
water, clinging with one hand round the stem of an alder, and
stretching out the other till it grasped the poor shrivelled hands
which had caught at the branches which drooped over the water.
"Cling to me, Gammer!--to me, Olive Drayton! I am holding
fast--cling to me!"
I was scarcely prepared for the desperate tenacity of the grasp which
returned mine. I never felt till that moment what it means to cling
to Life. My other arm held firm, but the bank was oozy and slippery,
and I felt as if I were losing my power, when at that instant Aunt
Gretel came and knelt beside me, and clutching Gammer Grindle's
dress, between us we dragged her to land.
Then the second part of the work of rescue began, and the hardest.
The men, or rather lads (for they were few of them more), who formed
the crowd, had been startled into inaction by our sudden appearance
among them; but now they began to mutter angrily, and would have
pushed us rudely away, saying "it was no matter for women to meddle
in. They had not come there for nothing, and they would have it out.
The whole country-side should not be laid waste to save one wicked
old witch, that no one had a good word to say for."
By this time Gammer Grindle had recovered so far as to rise out of
that mere instinct of self-preservation with which she had
desperately clung to me. And disengaging herself from me, she said,
standing erect and facing her assailants,--
"Let me alone, Mistress Olive. They say right. They are all gone
who would have said a good word for me. Let me go to them."
Two of the men seized her again.
"Confess!" said one of them, shaking her rudely; "confess, and we'll
leave you to the justices. If not you shall try the water once more
to sink or swim."
And they dragged her again to the brink. The touch of the cold
oozing water made the horror and weakness come over her again. Her
courage forsook her, and she cried like the feeble old woman she
was,--
"Have pity on me, neighbours. I'll confess anything, if you'll leave
me alone--anything I can. I've been a sinful old woman, and the
Lord's against me; the Lord's against me!"
"Hear her, mistress," said the men with a cry of triumph; "she'll
confess anything. She says the Almighty's against her. It isn't fit
such should live."
They were forcing her on; her poor, patched, thin garments tore in my
hands as I clung to them. Aunt Gretel, driven to the end of her
English, as usual with her in strong emotion, was pouring forth
entreaties and prayers in German, when I caught sight of a Netherby
lad well known as the pest of the village, and the ringleader in all
mischief. He was carrying a torch. I caught his arm and looked in
his face.
"Tony Tomkin," I said, "Squire Drayton shall know of this, and it
shall not be unpunished. It is your wickedness, and such as yours,
that brings the trouble on us all, and not Gammer Grindle's. God is
angry with you, Tony, for breaking your little brother's head, and
idling away your time, while your poor mother toils her life away to
get you bread. You will not give up your hearts to be good like
brave men, which is the only sacrifice God will have; and instead,
like a pack of cowards, you are sacrificing a poor helpless old woman
to the devil. Isn't there one man here with the heart of a man in
him? What harm can the devil do you, much less a witch, if you
please God? And which of you thinks God will be pleased by a troop
of you slinking here in the dark to murder a helpless old woman at
her own door? Can none of you lads of Netherby remember poor Tim,
and how he died for Master Roger, and how good she was to him? Or
can't you trust Squire Drayton to do justice, and leave her to him?"
Tony let his torch fall and slunk back. Then two Netherby men came
forward and said,--
"She's right; Mistress Olive is right! Squire Drayton'll see justice
done."
Two or three others joined them. The cry arose, "No one shall touch
the old woman to-night, as long as there's any Netherby lads to
hinder it."
A scuffle ensued, during which Aunt Gretel and I got hold of Gammer
Grindle once more, and led her back into the cottage.
Once there, we barricaded the door with the logs and fagots which
formed Gammer's store of firewood, and felt safe.
But it was not until the angry voices had quite died away in the
distance, and we heard again the quiet plashing of the water among
the rushes, that we could quiet the poor old woman so that she would
let go her clasp of our hands. Then she let us kindle a fire, and
wrap her in warm dry things.
We wanted to lay her in a clean comfortable bed which was made in the
corner of the hut. But this she would not suffer. "It is Cicely's,"
she said. "It's not for me." So we had to pack her up as
comfortably as we could upon the heap of straw and rags laid on an
old chest, which was her bed.
There she lay quite still for a long time, while Aunt Gretel and I
sat silent by the fire, hoping she would sleep.
But in about an hour she said, in a quiet voice--
"Take away those logs from the door."
I went to her bedside.
"In the morning, Gammer," I said, "when it is quite safe."
"This moment!" said she, starting up any trying to walk. But the
terrors of the night had made her so faint and feeble, that she fell
helplessly back.
"This moment, Mistress Olive!" she repeated, in a faint querulous
voice, very unlike her usual sharp firm tones--"this moment! The
poor maid might come and try the door, and go away, and never come
again. I've been sharp with her, I know, and she might be afraid,
not knowing, poor lamb, how I watch for her."
Aunt Gretel went to the door and began to unpile the logs.
"God will care for us, Olive," said she with a faltering voice. "He
will know and care; He who never closes the door against us."
And gently we withdrew the logs which formed our protection.
"Set the light in the window," Gammer said.
By the window she meant a rough crevice in the wall, with a canvas
curtain hung before it.
Aunt Gretel ventured a little remonstrance.
"Hardly that to-night," said she. "It might guide any evil-disposed
people here."
"It will guide her, and what does it matter for anything else?" said
Gammer Grindle, almost fiercely. "She knew there was always a light
burning, and if she saw none, she might think I was dead, and turn
away."
And the lamp was placed in the window.
Then another long silence, broken again by Gammer.
"What'll they think's come to you, my mistresses? What a selfish old
woman I've been. Why didn't I let them do for me, and be quiet. I
never knew before what fear was. I've wished to die scores of times;
but when death came near, I clung to life like a drowning dog or cat,
and never cared who I pulled in to save myself. I never thought I
should live to be such a pitiful old coward. But the Lord's against
me," she cried, going back to her old wail--"the Lord's against me.
Everybody says so, and it must be true. He not only leaves me to be
drowned; He leaves me also to be as selfish and wicked as I will.
The Lord's against me. Why did you try to save me? I must fall into
His hands at last!"
This was exactly what Aunt Gretel never could hear with patience.
"You are a little better than those bad men, my dear woman," said
she. "You, none of you, can see the difference between the good God
and the devil. You talk of falling into His hands, as if His arms
were hell. And all the while He is stretching out His arms that you
may fall on His heart. You slander, grandmother, you slander God!"
she added.
"He is not against you; you are against Him."
"Much the same in the end," moaned poor Gammer, "if we're going
against each other."
"It is not the same," said Aunt Gretel. "You can turn and go with
Him, and He will not have to drive you home. You can bow under his
yoke, and you will not feel it heavy. You can bow under His rod, and
you will find it comfort you as much as His staff."
"Not so easy, mistress," said Gammer, after a pause. "I have turned
from Him so long, how can I know if I should have a welcome?"
"That is what Cicely is waiting for, Gammer," I whispered, kneeling
down beside. "But the door is open and the light is burning for her.
If she could only know! if she could only have a glimpse _inside_!"
"If she could only know!" murmured the poor old woman, her eyes
moistening as she turned from the thought of her own sorrows to those
of her lost child.
And she said no more. But there was something in the quiet of her
face which made me hope that she herself had got a "glimpse inside."
And soon afterwards she fell asleep.
Aunt Gretel and I were left to our watch. Then, for the first time,
when we ceased to watch for sleep to come over the poor exhausted
aged frame, I began to watch the noises outside, and feel a creeping
horror as I listened to the slow cold plashing of the water among the
rushes, and the soughing, and wailing, and whistling of the wind
among the leafless boughs of the wood behind us. There was one
gnarled old oak especially, just outside the house, whose dry boughs
creaked in the wind as if they had been dead beams instead of living
branches.
Often I thought I heard long sighs and wailings as of human voices,
and with difficulty persuaded myself that it was fancy. But at last
there came sounds which could not be mistaken--low whistles, and
short, peculiar cries, responded to by others, until we became sure
that a number of men must be moving about in the darkness around us.
At first Aunt Gretel and I thought it must be the witch-finders come
again for Gammer Grindle, and very softly we replaced the logs to
barricade the door.
But other sounds began to mingle with those of human voices, like the
lowings of cattle forcibly driven. Suddenly I remembered my
encounter that very morning with the royal troopers, which, with all
that happened since, seemed weeks distant.
"It is Sir Launcelot and the plunderers!" I exclaimed.
"That accounts for their not sending after us," said Aunt Gretel.
"They have tried to reach us, no doubt, and cannot."
And we listened again.
Then came something like a soft knock and a low cry, which seemed
close to the door, and a heavy thud as of something falling. But,
though we listened breathlessly, no second sound came; and the old
stories of supernatural horrors haunting the place crept back to us,
and kept us motionless.
By this time the dawn was slowly creeping in, and making the lamp in
the window red and dim.
We sat crouching close together by the embers of the dying fire, and
took each others' hands, and listened.
The voices came nearer, till we could plainly distinguish them, and
with them the sound of trampling: feet of men and horses, and then of
men springing from the saddle and approaching the hut.
"It's the old witch's den," a gruff voice said; "she's burning a
candle to the devil. No one ever got good by going near her."
Then a laugh, and Sir Launcelot Trevor's mocking voice,--
"One would think you were a Roundhead, from the respect with which
you mention the old enemy's name. At all events, witches don't live,
like saints, on air and prayers. We'll get some warmth and comfort
this bitter night out of the old hag's stores. Some sack or malmsey,
perchance, and a fat capon or two bewitched from good men's cellars
and larders. Stay here, if you are afraid. And I will storm this
witch's castle for you," And his long heavy stride approached the
door. We sat with beating hearts, expecting the rickety door to be
shaken or forced in by a strong hand. But instead, the steps
suddenly ceased, and the intruder seemed to start back as if struck
by an invisible hand on the threshold.
Then there was an exclamation of amazement and horror, ending in a
fearful oath in a low deep tone, very different from Sir Launcelot's
usual bravado. Afterwards a few hasty retreating steps, and as he
rejoined his men, some words in the old light tone, but hurried and
wild as of one overacting his part.
"Belike you are right, lads. Black art or white, better keep to beer
of mortal brewing than seize anything from a witch's caldron, or
touch anything of a witch's brood. Besides, the country will be
awake, and it's as well we were in safe quarters with the booty.
Steady, and look out tor pitfalls in this cursed place."
After which there was a splashing of horses' feet on the reedy margin
of the Mere. Then a heavy trampling as they reached firmer ground,
succeeded by a sharp gallop across the meadow, until every sound was
lost in the distance, and we were left in the silence to listen once
more to the cold plashing of the water among the rushes, and to the
breathing of poor old Gammer in her heavy sleep, as we watched the
slow breaking of the morning.
We had not sat half an hour after the last tramp of the horsemen had
died away, when we heard a faint sound as of something stirring on
the threshold.
Aunt Gretel laid her hand on mine.
"What made Sir Launcelot turn back, Olive?" she whispered. "He is
scarcely a man likely to dream dreams or see visions."
By one impulse we softly removed the logs with which we had
barricaded the door, and opened it.
There was a rude porch outside to keep off the beat of the weather,
and under it a low seat where Gammer used to sit in summer and carry
on any work that needed more light than could be had in the hut.
Across this lay stretched, in a death-like swoon, the form of a
woman. She was half kneeling, half prostrate, her head towards the
door, resting on the seat, one arm beneath it, the other fallen
helpless by her side, half hidden in a heavy mass of long hair. A
puny little child lay cuddled up close to her, clasping the
unconscious form with both arms, asleep.
The features were sharp as with age, and pallid as with the touch of
death, and the long soft hair was gray, but it was still easy to
recognise in the sharp and altered face what memories it had brought
back to Sir Launcelot, and why that poor faded form had guarded her
threshold from him better than an army of fiends.
It was the flaming sword of conscience which had guarded us that
night.
Poor pallid wasted face, so terrible in its mute reproach!
We took her up between us. It was easy. She was light enough to
carry. We laid her on the old bed which her grandmother had kept
always ready for her. Aunt Gretel loosened her dress and chafed her
hands, while I took the poor puny child to the fire to keep it quiet
while I made some warm drink to revive the mother.
But the poor sickly little one was not easily to be quieted. In
spite of all my soothing it awoke, and began wailing for mammy.
Perhaps, after all, the best restorative! The sharp fretful cry
aroused the mother from her swoon, and the grandmother from her heavy
sleep.
In another instant the old woman was kneeling by the poor girl's
bedside, clasping and fondling her, and calling her by tender,
endearing, childish names, such as no one at Netherby would have
dreamed could have poured forth from Gammer Grindle's lips. The
first words Cicely spoke when she fully recovered consciousness and
sate up (her beautiful large gray eyes gleaming from her faded hollow
cheeks like living souls among a pale troop of ghosts), were,--
"Gammer, I heard him--I heard his voice. Where is he? I thought I
saw his face. But it was dusk, and faces change. But voices will be
the same, I think, even in heaven or in hell. And I heard his voice,
the same as when he called me darling and wife."
"Wife!" said the old woman, starting and standing erect. "Say that
again, Cicely."
"All in vain, Gammer!" she said, with a slow hopeless tone. "With
the priest and the ring! But it was all false. He told me so when
it was too late. He said I must have known. But how was I to know,
Gammer? I trusted him; I trusted him. Yet, perhaps, I ought to have
known better, Gammer? I suppose it must have been wicked of me.
Every one seems to think it was."
"Not me, sweetheart!" the old woman cried; "never me! Thank God, my
lamb comes back to me as pure as she went. Thank God, Cicely my
darling, thank God, sweetheart, and take courage. If all the cruel
world hunted my lamb to death and cried shame on her, there's one in
the world who knows she's as pure as the sweetest lady that ever trod
the church floor in her bride's white, with her path strewn with
roses." Then, taking the child in her arms, and cuddling it to her,
she added, "And thy child's as much a crown of joy to thee and me,
Cicely, as to any lady in the land. Take courage, sweetheart. What
does all the world matter, if grandmother knows; and Him that's
above, darling," she added, in a voice faltering again into
feebleness. "For He is above, Cicely, and He's not against us, for
He's brought thee home."
All this time the old woman and Cicely had seemed quite unconscious
of our presence, as we sat in a shadowed corner of the dark old hut,
keeping as quiet as sobs would let us. But when the poor girl was
calmed by the long-forgotten relief of a burst of tears on a heart
that trusted her, she looked up and around with a quieter glance, and
began to ask again how it could be that she had heard the voice.
Then I stepped forward to explain.
She started, and covered her face with her hands, as if she would
have hidden herself.
"It's only me, Cicely, Olive Drayton," I said, as plainly as I could
for weeping. "You've come back among those that know you and trust
you, Cicely."
Then, after giving her such explanation as I could of the events of
the night, and after Aunt Gretel had made up the fire, we bade them
farewell, and left the three together to go over the mournful history
that lay between their meetings; while we hastened away to assure
those at home of our safety.
"What a night, Aunt Gretel!" I said, as we went. "It seems like a
life-time."
"Things come often thus in life," said she, "as far as I have seen;
the fruits ripened through the long silent year, reaped in a day." I
scarcely understood her then, but since, I have often thought she was
right. Sowing-times and growing-times, long, silent, underground;
and then bursts of flowering days, reapings and gatherings; a
life-time in a day; a thousand long-prepared events bursting into
flower in a moment. A thousand ghosts of forgotten deeds gathered
together and confronting us at one point. The probation thousands of
years; the Judgment a day.
Aunt Dorothy was a little doubtful as to our having too much commerce
with Gammer Grindle or Cicely. "If Gammer was not a witch," said
she, "which God forbid--though that there are witches who ill-wish
cattle, and ride on broom-sticks, is as certain as there are
wandering stars and sea-serpents; at all events it is a solemn
warning to every one on the danger of not going to church like your
neighbours. And if Cicely was not as bad as had been feared--for
which God be praised--she was nevertheless an awful example of the
danger of dancing round May-poles, and wearing bits of ribbons and
roses on your head."
But when Job heard of it, his anger was greatly kindled.
"One would think," said he, "the Book of Job had been put into the
Apocrypha, that men who profess themselves Christians should go
worrying the afflicted like Zophar, Bildad, and Eliphaz, heaping
coals on the devil's furnace. Witches there were, no doubt, poor
wretches, or they could not have been hanged and burned, although for
the most part he believed the devil was too good a general to let his
soldiers waste their time in cavalcading about on broom-sticks. But,
be that as it might, it was ill work piling wood on fires that were
hot enough already, especially when you could not be sure who had
kindled the flames. The only comfort was, that after all the devil
was nothing more than the Almighty's furnace-heater. All his toil
only went to heating it to the right point to fuse the silver. The
Master would see that none of the true metal was lost."
At the end of February, Roger came to us. He was pale with
prison-air and meagre from prison-fare, and the hair had grown on his
upper lip. In my eyes he had gained far more than he had lost. His
eyes had a look of purpose and command in them, pleasant to yield to;
though little enough of command had he exercised during the last four
months, except, indeed, that command of himself which is true
obedience, and lies at the root of all true command.
He was even less given than of old to long narratives or orations of
any kind.
The history of what he had seen and heard dropped from him in broken
sentences, as he went about seeing to various little plans for
strengthening the defences of the house, or as he repaired or cleaned
his arms in the evening. Of what he had suffered he said nothing,
except to make light of it in answer to any questioning of mine.
More than once he mentioned, in a few brief words, Lady Lucy's
kindness. But he did not speak at all of Lettice except once, when
we were all sitting together round the Hall fire--Aunt Dorothy, Aunt
Gretel, and I--when he said carelessly, as if he had just remembered
it by accident,--
"Mistress Lettice told me she had read the sermons you gave her, Aunt
Dorothy. And she sent you her love, Olive."
"There are gracious dispositions in the child," said Aunt Dorothy.
"I have been sure of it for a long time."
And I ventured after a little while to say,--
"She sent me her love, Roger, and was that all?"
"Her dear love, I think it was," said he dryly, as if the adjective
made little difference in the value of the substantive.
"And she said no more, Roger? Not one message?"
"I only saw her for ten minutes, Olive," said he, a little
impatiently, "and most of the time she was talking to a little French
poodle, a little wretch with wool like a sheep and eyes like
glass-beads."
"You are hard on the poor child, Roger," said Aunt Dorothy; "consider
her bringing up. I warrant she never spun a web, or learned a
chapter in Proverbs through in her life. What can you expect from a
mother who is a friend of the Popish queen, and, I am only too sure,
wears false hair and paint?"
"Aunt Dorothy," said he, firing up, "the Lady Lucy is as near a
ministering angel as any creature I ever wish to see. And if it were
not so, it's not for me, who have lived on her bread and on her kind
looks for months, to hear a word against her."
And Roger arose, and strode out of the hall and across the court,
whistling for Lion; leaving Aunt Dorothy in perplexity as to whether
he were more aggrieved with her for defending Lettice or for
assailing Lady Lucy, and me in equal perplexity as to how I could
ever venture to introduce Lettice's name again, longing as I did to
hear more of her.
"You never saw Lettice after she gave you that message?" I ventured
at last to say one day when we were walking alone together.
"How could I, Olive?" said he, "I went away instantly; except
indeed," he added, "when I happened to look back, as I was leaving
the court, I saw her standing at the window with that poodle in her
arms. But I did not look again, for at the same moment Sir Launcelot
Trevor came out of another door, looking as if he were, as no doubt
he is, quite at home in the place with them all."
"O Roger," I said, "some of us ought to write to Lady Lucy at once to
say how wicked he is!"
"What is the use, Olive?" said he, sadly. "It is not from us, rebels
and traitors, she will believe evil of a good Cavalier. Least of all
from me or mine about Sir Launcelot!" he added, in a lower voice.
"But he may be deceiving them all," I said, passionately. "It is a
sin to let him. Can nothing be done? Have you never thought of it?"
"You had better ask me could I think of nothing else, Olive?" said
he. "For I had to ask myself that many times as I paced up and down
in prison, and knew about it all. And the more I thought, the more
helpless I saw we were about it."
"And what did you decide on at last?" I asked.
"I decided that _this was what the Civil War cost_," he replied; "not
battles and loss of limb or life only, but misunderstandings and loss
of friends. To have all we say and do reported to those we love best
through those who think the worst of us, and to have no power of
saying a word in justification or explanation. To be identified with
the worst men and the most violent acts on our side, and, in loyalty
to the principles of our party, not to be able to disown them. To
see often the people we love best estranged more and more from the
principles we hold dearest; and to watch a great gulf widening
between us which no voice of man can reach across."
"I feel sure nothing and no one could make Lettice think harshly of
us, Roger," I exclaimed; "I feel as sure as if I had been speaking to
her yesterday."
"How can it be otherwise, Olive?" said he, "especially when I am
under Colonel Cromwell. You should have seen the little start and
scornful look she gave when I mentioned his name. 'Colonel!' said
she, almost under her breath, as if she were talking only to that
poodle. But I heard her There is no one the Cavaliers hate like him."
"It seems almost a pity you must be with him!" I said, thinking only
of Roger and Lettice.
"A pity, Olive!" said he, flashing up. "The Cavaliers hate Colonel
Cromwell, because wherever he is there is doing instead of debating.
And for what better reason can we hold to him? If we fight at all,
it is because we believe there is something worth fighting for to be
lost or won; and where Colonel Cromwell is, it is won. The country
he defends is defended; the city he holds is held; the men he trains
fight; and, thank God, my lot is with him, to defend the old
liberties under him, Olive, or, if he fails, to find new liberty in
the New England across the seas."
The next day Roger went off to join his regiment at Cambridge, where
Colonel Cromwell was.
How silent and languid the old house seemed when he left us, without
his firm, soldier-like tread clearing the stairs at a few bounds, and
his whistle to the dogs, and his voice singing with a firm precision,
like the tramp of a regiment, snatches of the grave, grand old psalm
tunes which the Ironsides loved to march to!
A fortnight afterwards, Job Forster followed him. And then came
again months of listening and waiting, and of contradictory rumours,
ending too often in ill-tidings worse than the worst we had feared.
For that whole year brought little but disaster to the Parliament
troops. Day after day in that yellow old Diary of mine is marked
with black tidings of defeat and death.
First comes--
"_June_ 18.--Mr. Hampden wounded in trying to keep off Prince
Rupert's plunderers, until Lord Essex came. Lord Essex did not come
in time, and Mr. Hampden went off the field sorely wounded. They say
he felt himself death-stricken, and turned his horse towards the
house of his first wife, whom he loved so dearly, that he might die
there. But his strength failed. It was as much as he could do to
make one last effort, and spurring his horse over a little brook
which bounded the field, to find his way to the nearest village, and
home.
"_June_ 24.--Mr. Hampden died, thinking to the last more of his
country than himself. In the midst of terrible pain he wrote (my
Father tells us) to entreat Lord Essex to act with more vigour, and
to collect his forces round London. He received the sacrament, and
spoke with affection of the services of the Church of England,
although not altogether so of her bishops. He received the Lord's
Supper, and for himself looked humbly and peacefully to God. But for
England his heart looked sorrowfully onward. And his last words
were, 'Lord, have mercy on my bleeding country;' and then another
prayer, the end not heard by mortal ears. My Father writes: 'His
love for his country will scarce fail in the better country whither
he is gone. But his counsel and all his slowly garnered treasures of
wisdom are lost to us for ever.'"
The next death marked is--
"_September_ 20.--A battle at Newbury, in Gloucestershire. Lord
Falkland killed. Once Hampden's friend, and now (must it not be?)
his friend again. A good man, and gentle, and wise, they say. I
wonder how it all looks and sounds there where they are gone."
And the next--
"_November_.--Mr. Pym is dead. They have buried him among the kings
in Westminster Abbey. I wonder how many of the people who began the
war will be fighting at the end of it, and whether they will be
fighting for the same things as when they began."
Then, mixed up with these notices of the dead, are long accounts of
skirmishes and fights, which every one thought all-important then,
but which no one thinks of now, save those who have their beloved
dead lying beneath the fields where they were fought.
And through it all a steady going downward and downward of the
Parliament cause, from that fatal June, 1643, when Hampden died, to
near the close of the following year.
"_June_ 30, 1643.--The Fairfaxes defeated at Atherton Moor.
"_July 13_.--Sir William Waller (once vainly boasted of as William
the Conqueror) defeated, and his army scattered, in Lansdowne.
"_July_ 22.--Prince Rupert took Bristol."
And so the war surged away to the Royalist West and Royalist North,
until in all the West Country not a city was left to the Parliament
but Gloucester; and in the North Country, not a city but Hull, which
the Hothams had been baffled in an attempt to betray to the king;
whilst in the counties between, Prince Rupert and the plunderers were
having it much their own way. Very evil times we thought them. And
many different reasons were assigned for the failure of the good
cause. Aunt Dorothy feared it was a punishment for a licentious
spirit of toleration to zealots and sectaries, and the sins of the
Independents. The zealous preacher who came from Suffolk
occasionally to expound at Job Forster's meeting, was sure it was
carnal compromise lording it over God's heritage, and the sins of the
Presbyterians. And Rachel believed it was the sins of us all, and of
herself in particular, who had, she considered, been too much like
Ananias and Sapphira, in that she had professed to give the whole
price to God and then would fain have kept back the half, having
indulged the deceitful hope that Job was so wounded as never to be
able to go to the wars again.
Placidia and Mr. Nicholls were much "exercised." Especially since
the loss of the three parsonage cows, which were (by what Aunt
Dorothy considered a very solemn warning to Placidia) swept off with
my Father's by the plunderers from the meadow by the Mere. "There
were two texts," said Placidia, "which had always seemed to her
exceedingly hard to reconcile. One was, 'Godliness hath promise of
the life which now is as well as of that which is to come.' And the
other, 'Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth.' What could be done with
texts so exceedingly difficult to reconcile as these?"
To which Aunt Dorothy replied,--
"Give up trying to reconcile them at all, my dear. Let them fight,
as frost and heat do, fire and water, sunshine and storm; and out of
the strife come the flower and the fruit, spring-time and harvest,
which shall never cease. Not that I see any difficulty in it. The
promise is not meadows or cows, but grace and peace. The perplexity
is over when you make up your mind that what you want is not to feel
warm for a day or two, but to have things grow; not a few sunny
hours, but the harvest."
Perhaps among us all, the person least perplexed by these continued
disasters was Aunt Gretel; because, leaving the whole field of
politics as altogether too complicated for her to comprehend, she
continued to see only the links which bind every day to the Eternal
Day, and every event to the hand of the merciful Father; and thus her
chief wonders ever were the pity which forgave so many sins, and the
love which provided so many mercies. Overlooking all the battles and
skirmishes around us, she saw but one Battle and one Battle-field,
and but two Captains. Overlooking all the subordinate divisions of
nations and parties, she saw only a flock and a Shepherd, and the
Shepherd calling each one by one, from the Great Gustavus to little
Cicely and poor Tim; folded, one, in the heavenly fold of which he
knew nothing till he was in it, and the other in the poor earthly
house which she and her child and her grateful love had made, once
more, a home and a refuge for poor old Gammer. For since Cicely's
return, Gammer's broken links with her fellow-creatures began to be
knit again; and more than one at Netherby took Job's words to heart.
The broad shield of her love and welcome which she threw around the
wanderer had shielded herself.
But side by side with the doleful records in my Diary run two series
of letters full of victory and hope.
One was to my Father from Dr. Antony, who spent most of that period
in London. And there, throughout all these disasters, the courage of
the citizens seemed never to fail.
When Lord Essex returned from Edgehill with very doubtful success,
which he had entirely failed to convert into lasting gain by his
hesitations and delays, London, of as brave and generous a heart as
old Rome, voted him £5,000.
When Bristol fell before Prince Rupert, and every city in the west
save Gloucester fell into the hands of the king, and Lord Essex
timidly recommended accommodation with His Majesty, and the Lords
would have petitioned him, the Commons, the Preachers, and the
citizens (knowing that no accommodation with the king could be relied
on unless secured by victory) rejected all such wavering thoughts.
The shops were all shut for some days, not to make holiday, but for
solemn fasting. These days were spent in the churches, and the
people came forth from them ready for any sacrifice for the eternal
truth and the ancient liberty. It was determined to surround London
with entrenchments. Knights and dames went forth, spade in hand, to
the beat of drum, to share in the digging of the trenches, and to
hearten others to the work. And in a few days twelve miles of
entrenchment were dug. Whereof we heard His Majesty took notice, and
lost heart thereby.
Throughout all those adverse times London never lost heart. Plate
and jewels kept pouring into the Parliament's treasury at Guildhall.
Time spent by the 'prentices in the Parliament army was ruled to
count as time served in their trades. And jests against the courage
of men bred in streets and trained behind counters lost their point.
Dr. Antony's letters through all that dreary time had the cheer and
stir of a triumphal march in them, although he had no triumphs to
relate, but only defeats borne with the courage which repairs them,
and although he himself went to the battle-field not to wound but to
bind up wounds.
The other series of letters was from Roger. And these cheered us,
because they always told of victory. They were brief, and mostly
written from the battle-field, to assure us at once of victory and
safety. They crossed the dark shadows of my Diary like sunbeams. In
June, when we were mourning over the death of Hampden, and over the
slow debates of the Lord-General what to do first for the bleeding
country, wounded in every part by the stabs of plunderers and
reckless Cavaliers, came Roger's first letter, delayed on its way,
dated, "Grantham, 18th May, 1643." It spoke of a glorious victory
won that day against marvellous odds of number, the enemy running
away for three miles, four colours taken, and forty-five prisoners,
and many prisoners rescued. Again in July, when we were bewailing
the Fairfaxes defeated at Atherton Moor in the north, Sir William
Waller's army routed at Lansdowne Heath in the west, and Bristol
lost, Roger was writing us, on the 31st, news from Gainsborough of a
"notable victory with a chase of six miles."
Mingled with these good tidings were sayings which Roger had heard of
Colonel Cromwell's. Some of these sayings were like proverbs, so
closely did the word fit the thought. Others had in them the ring of
a war-song, as when he wrote to the Commissioners at Cambridge. "You
see by this enclosed how sadly your affairs stand. It's no longer
disputing, but out instantly all you can. Raise all your bands; send
them to Huntingdon; get up what volunteers you can; hasten your
horses. Send these letters to Norfolk, Suffolk, and Essex without
delay. I beseech you, spare not. You must act lively; do it without
distraction. Neglect no means." Yet often it seemed, when you
listened to Colonel Cromwell, as if it were by some marvellous
accident his thoughts did ever tumble into their right clothes, so
strangely did they come lumbering out. But every now and then, if
you had patience, amidst the rattling of the rough stones and
pebbles, flashed a sentence, sharp cut and brilliant as a diamond,
although, apparently, as unconscious of its polish and sharpness as
the rest of their uncouth ness. "Subtilty may deceive you, integrity
never will;" "Truly, God follows us with encouragements, who is the
God of blessings; and I beseech you, let him not lose his blessing
upon us! They come in season, and with all the advantages of
heartening, as if God should say, 'Up and be doing, and I will stand
by you and help you!' There is nothing to be feared but our own sin
and sloth." "If I could speak words to pierce your hearts with the
sense of our and your condition, I would. It may be difficult to
raise so many men in so short time; but let me assure you it's
necessary, and, therefore, to be done." "God hath given reputation
to our handful (the Ironsides), let us endeavour to keep it. I had
rather have a plain, russet-coated captain that knows what he fights
for, and loves what he knows, than that which you call 'a gentleman'
and nothing else. I honour a gentleman that is so indeed."
"Yet," said Roger in one of his letters, "it gives you little
knowledge of what the Colonel is to extract these bits of his
sayings, and make them emphatic, as if he meant them for epigrams,
when the force is that they are said without force; the thought and
purpose in him, which always go to the point in deeds, from time to
time flashing straight to the point in words, which are then as
strong as other men's deeds. But this I know, when he says of us,
'We never find our men so cheerful as when there is work to do,' or,
'God hath given reputation to our handful,' we all feel as if we were
dubbed knights, and were moving about glorious with Royal Orders."
So, slowly as the year passed on, some of us began dimly to feel that
a kingly being had arisen among us, such a king as David was before
he was crowned, when he ruled in the hearts of the thousands of
Israel by right of the slain giant and the secret anointing of the
seer; a mighty man, who felt nothing impossible which he believed
right, with whom, if a thing was "necessary," it was "to be done."