sorrows of childhood arising from parental folly, one feels that the
task is endless. There are parents who will not suffer their children to
go to the little feasts which children occasionally have, either on that
wicked principle that all enjoyment is sinful, or because the children
have recently committed some small offence, which is to be thus
punished. There are parents who take pleasure in informing strangers, in
their children's presence, about their children's faults, to the extreme
bitterness of the children's hearts. There are parents who will not
allow their children to be taught dancing, regarding dancing as sinful.
The result is, that the children are awkward and unlike other children;
and when they are suffered to spend an evening among a number of
companions who have all learned dancing, they suffer a keen
mortification which older people ought to be able to understand. Then
you will find parents, possessing ample means, who will not dress their
children like others, but send them out in very shabby garments. Few
things cause a more painful sense of humiliation to a child. It is a sad
sight to see a little fellow hiding round the corner when some one
passes who is likely to recognize him, afraid to go through the decent
streets, and creeping out of sight by back-ways. We have all seen
_that_. We have all sympathized heartily with the reduced widow who
has it not in her power to dress her boy better; and we have all felt
lively indignation at the parents who had the power to attire their
children becomingly, but whose heartless parsimony made the little
things go about under a constant sense of painful degradation.
An extremely wicked way of punishing children is by shutting them up in
a dark place. Darkness is naturally fearful to human beings, and the
stupid ghost-stories of many nurses make it especially fearful to a
child. It is a stupid and wicked thing to send a child on an errand in a
dark night. I do not remember passing through a greater trial in my
youth than once walking three miles alone (it was not going on an
errand) in the dark, along a road thickly shaded with trees. I was a
little fellow; but I got over the distance in half an hour. Part of the
way was along the wall of a church-yard, one of those ghastly, weedy,
neglected, accursed-looking spots where stupidity has done what it can
to add circumstances of disgust and horror to the Christian's long
sleep. Nobody ever supposed that this walk was a trial to a boy of
twelve years old: so little are the thoughts of children understood. And
children are reticent: I am telling now about that dismal walk for the
very first time. And in the illnesses of childhood, children sometimes
get very close and real views of death. I remember, when I was nine
years old, how every evening, when I lay down to sleep, I used for about
a year to picture myself lying dead, till I felt as though the coffin
were closing round me. I used to read at that period, with a curious
feeling of fascination, Blair's poem, "The Grave." But I never dreamed
of telling anybody about these thoughts. I believe that thoughtful
children keep most of their thoughts to themselves, and in respect of
the things of which they think most are as profoundly alone as the
Ancient Mariner in the Pacific. I have heard of a parent, an important
member of a very strait sect of the Pharisees, whose child, when dying,
begged to be buried not in a certain foul old hideous church-yard, but
in a certain cheerful cemetery. This request the poor little creature
made with all the energy of terror and despair. But the strait Pharisee
refused the dying request, and pointed out with polemical bitterness to
the child that he must be very wicked indeed to care at such a time
where he was to be buried, or what might be done with his body after
death. How I should enjoy the spectacle of that unnatural, heartless,
stupid wretch tarred and feathered! The dying child was caring for a
thing about which Shakspeare cared; and it was not in mere human
weakness, but "by faith," that "Joseph, when he was a-dying, gave
commandment concerning his bones."
I believe that real depression of spirits, usually the sad heritage of
after-years, is often felt in very early youth. It sometimes comes of
the child's belief that he must be very bad, because he is so frequently
told that he is so. It sometimes comes of the child's fears, early felt,
as to what is to become of him. His parents, possibly, with the good
sense and kind feeling which distinguish various parents, have taken
pains to drive it into the child, that, if his father should die, he
will certainly starve, and may very probably have to become a wandering
beggar. And these sayings have sunk deep into the little heart. I
remember how a friend told me that his constant wonder, when he was
twelve or thirteen years old, was _this_: If life was such a burden
already, and so miserable to look back upon, how could he ever bear it
when be had grown older?
* * * * *
But now, my reader, I am going to stop. I have a great deal more marked
down to say; but the subject is growing so thoroughly distressing to me,
as I go on, that I shall go on no farther. It would make me sour and
wretched for the next week, if I were to state and illustrate the varied
sorrows of childhood of which I intended yet to speak: and if I were to
talk out my heart to you about the people who cause these, I fear my
character for good-nature would be gone with you forever. "This genial
writer," as the newspapers call me, would show but little geniality: I
am aware, indeed, that I have already been writing in a style which, to
say the least, is snappish. So I shall say nothing of the first death
that comes in the family in our childish days,--its hurry, its
confusion, its awe-struck mystery, its wonderfully vivid recalling of
the words and looks of the dead; nor of the terrible trial to a little
child of being sent away from home to school,--the heart-sickness, and
the weary counting of the weeks and days before the time of returning
home again. But let me say to every reader who has it in his power
directly or indirectly to do so, Oh, do what you can to make children
happy! oh, seek to give that great enduring blessing of a happy youth!
Whatever after-life may prove, let there be something bright to look
back upon in the horizon of their early time! You may sour the human
spirit forever, by cruelty and injustice in youth. There is a past
suffering which exalts and purifies; but _this_ leaves only an evil
result: it darkens all the world, and all our views of it. Let us try to
make every little child happy. The most selfish parent might try to
please a little child, if it were only to see the fresh expression of
unblunted feeling, and a liveliness of pleasurable emotion which in
after-years we shall never know, I do not believe a great English
barrister is so happy when he has the Great Seal committed to him as two
little and rather ragged urchins whom I saw this very afternoon. I was
walking along a country-road, and overtook them. They were about five
years old. I walked slower, and talked to them for a few minutes, and
found that they were good boys, and went to school every day. Then I
produced two coins of the copper coinage of Britain: one a large penny
of ancient days, another a small penny of the present age. "There is a
penny for each of you," I said, with some solemnity: "one is large, you
see, and the other small; but they are each worth exactly the same. Go
and get something good." I wish you had seen them go off! It is a cheap
and easy thing to make a little heart happy. May this hand never write
another essay, if it ever wilfully miss the chance of doing so! It is
all quite right in after-years to be careworn and sad. We understand
these matters ourselves. Let others bear the burden which we ourselves
bear, and which is doubtless good for us. But the poor little things! I
can enter into the feeling of a kind-hearted man who told me that he
never could look at a number of little children but the tears came into
his eyes. How much these young creatures have to bear yet! I think you
can, as you look at them, in some degree understand and sympathize with
the Redeemer, who, when he "saw a great multitude, was moved with
compassion toward them"! Ah, you smooth little face, (you may think,) I
know what years will make of you, if they find you in this world! And
you, light little heart, will know your weight of care!
And I remember, as I write these concluding lines, who they were that
the Best and Kindest this world ever saw liked to have near him; and
what the reason was he gave why he felt most in his element when they
were by his side. He wished to have little children round him, and would
not have them chidden away; and this because there was something about
them that reminded him of the Place from which he came. He liked the
little faces and the little voices,--he to whom the wisest are in
understanding as children. And oftentimes, I believe, these little ones
still do his work. Oftentimes, I believe, when the worn man is led to
him in childlike confidence, it is by the hand of a little child.
* * * * *
THE REHABILITATION OF SPAIN.
Three hundred and fifty years ago, a Spanish gentleman sailed on a
cruise that may be considered remarkable even in the history of the
wonderful adventures of the age of Columbus and Da Gama. Juan Ponce de
Leon, having lost the government of Porto Rico, resolved to discover a
world for himself, and so become as renowned as "The Admiral." With the
strong fanaticism of his time and his race, he believed that there was a
third world to be found, and that it "had been saved up" for him, a
gentleman of Leon, and a loyal subject of their Catholic Majesties, who
had done good service for his sovereigns and the faith in Granada, and
later in the Indies. While he was thinking of the course in which he
should sail, he was told that to the North there lay a land which not
only contained unlimited gold, and many other material good things, but
also a fountain of such marvellous nature that to bathe in it was to
secure the return of youth. This revival of an old classic story[A]
fired the imagination of the adventurous cavalier, and he sailed
forthwith (March 3, 1512) in search of a land so rich in things that all
men, from philosophers to politicians, desire to have,--perfect health
and boundless wealth. We need not say that Ponce de Leon failed as
completely as if he had sailed in search of the Northwest Passage, for
he died in less than ten years, a worn-out old man, aged beyond his
years, leaving little gold behind him, and presenting at his parting
hour anything but the appearance of youth. He was a type of the
Spaniards of those days, who believed everything, and whose valor was as
great as their credulity; and his cruise in search of the _Fontaine de
Jouvence_ was quite worthy of a native of a country which seems to be
allowed the privilege of an occasional "dip" into that fountain, though
at long intervals, but is denied the power of constantly bathing in it.
[Footnote A: The belief in the existence of the Fountain of
Youth belongs to many countries and to all times. Not to mention
other instances, Herodotus, in his third book, (23,) tells of a
fountain of the kind which was possessed by "the long-lived
Ethiopians," and which caused the bather's flesh to become sleek
and glossy, and sent forth an odor like that of violets. Peter
Martyr, to whom we owe so many lively pictures of the effect on
the European mind of the discovery of America and its
consequences, wrote to Leo X. of the marvellous fountain which
was sought by Ponce de Leon, and in terms that leave no doubt
that he was well inclined to place considerable faith in the
truth of the common story. The clever Pope probably believed as
much of it as he did of the New Testament. Peter Martyr does
not, we think, mention the Ethiopian fountain, of which, as he
was a good scholar, and that was the age of the revival of
classic learning, he must have read.]
Spain, unlike most other countries, rises and falls, and apparently is
never so near to degradation as when she is most strong, and never so
near to power as when she is at the weakest point to which a nation can
sink and still remain a nation. All states have had both good and evil
fortune, but no other great European kingdom has known the extreme and
extraordinary changes that have been experienced by Spain. France has
met with heavy reverses, but she has been a great and powerful country
ever since the days of Philip Augustus, whose body was turned up the
other day, after a repose of more than six centuries. Even the victories
of the English Plantagenets could but temporarily check her growth; and
notwithstanding the successes of Eugène and Marlborough, Louis XIV. left
France a greater country than he found it. England's lowest point was
reached during the reigns of her first four Stuart monarchs, but her
weakness was exhibited only on the side of foreign politics: it being
absurd to suppose that the country which could produce Hampden and
Cromwell, Strafford and Falkland, and the men who formed the Cavalier
and Roundhead armies, was then in a state of decay. At the worst, she
was but depressed, and the removal of such dead weights from her as
Charles I. and James II. was all that was necessary to enable her to
vindicate her claim to a first-rate place in the European family. In
1783, at the close of the American War, men said that all was over with
England; but so mistaken were they, that at that very time were growing
up the men who were to lead her fleets and armies with success in
contests compared with which the combats of Gates and Burgoyne, of
Cornwallis and Washington, were but as skirmishes. No other nation,
perhaps, ever had so sudden and so great a fall as that which France met
with in 1814-15. It was the most perfect specimen of the "grand smash"
order of things that history mentions, if we consider both what was
lost, and how quickly it was lost. But it was humiliating merely, and
was attended with no loss of true strength. There was taken from France
that which she had no right to hold, any more than England has at this
moment to hold Gibraltar and Aden and India. France remained much as she
had been under the old monarchy, and there were some millions more of
Frenchmen than had ever lived under a Bourbon of former days, and they
were of a better breed than the political slaves, and in some instances
the personal serfs, who had existed under kings that misruled at
Versailles and Marly. How rapidly France rose above the effects of her
fall we have seen, as her recovery belongs to contemporary history. Her
various mind was never more vigorous than it has been since 1815. As to
her political and military greatness, millions of men who were living on
Waterloo's day, and who read of that "dishonest victory" as "news,"
lived to read the details of Solferino, and of the redemption of Italy.
Not so has it been with Spain. Unlike all other nations in all other
respects, she could not allow herself to resemble them even in the
matter of making sacrifices to Mutability. Had Juan Ponce de Leon been
so unlucky as to find the Fountain of Youth, and had he been so unwise
as to reserve its waters for his own private washing and drinking, and
so have lived from the age of American discovery to the age of American
secession, he would, as a Spaniard, have been forced to undergo many
mortifications in the course of the dozen generations that he would then
have survived beyond his originally appointed time. Spain has been a
greater country than any other in Europe, but she has experienced
greater changes than any other European country. She has never known
such a catastrophe as that which befell France in the early part of our
century, but her losses have been far beyond those which France has ever
met with. It was the lot of France to fall at once, to pass from the
highest place in the world to the lowest at one step, to abdicate her
hegemony with something of that rapidity which is common in dreams, but
which is of rare occurrence in real life. It has been the lot of Spain
to perish by the dry rot, and to lose imperial positions through the
operation of internal causes. So situated as to be almost beyond the
reach of effective foreign attack, Spain has had to contend against the
processes of domestic decay more than any other leading nation of modern
times. To these she has often had to succumb, but she has never failed
in due time to redeem herself, and, after having been a by-word for
imbecility, to rise again to a commanding place. Three times in less
than three centuries have the Spaniards fallen so low as to become of
less account in the European system than the feeblest of the Northern
peoples; and on each occasion has the native, inherent vigor of the race
enabled it to astonish mankind by entering again upon the career of
greatness, not always, it must be allowed, after the wisest fashion, but
so as to testify to the continued existence of those high qualities
which made the Castilian the Roman of the sixteenth century.
Spain was of considerable importance in Europe from a very early period
of modern history; but the want of union among her communities, and the
presence of Mussulman power in the Peninsula, prevented her from
exercising more influence in the Old World than would fall to our share
in the New, should the principles of the Secession party prevail. It was
not until a union had been effected through the marriage of Ferdinand
and Isabella, that the power of Christian Spain was brought to bear upon
the remnant of the Mussulmans of that country, and rounded and completed
the work of redeeming it from the dominion of the followers of the
Prophet, who had, on the whole, ruled their possessions better than the
Christian states had been ruled. The fall of Granada, in 1492, was
hailed throughout Christendom as a great triumph for the Cross, as in
one sense it was; but there was not a Christian country which would not
have been the gainer, if the Mussulmans of Spain had risen victorious
from the last game which they played with the adversaries of their
religion in a duel that had endured for more than seven hundred years.
Many a Pagan country, too, which had never heard either of Jesus or of
Mahomet, was interested in the event of the War of Granada. Montezuma
and Atahuallpa, who never had so much as dreamed of Europe, had their
fate determined by the decision of the long struggle between the rival
religions and peoples of the Peninsula; and Boabdil was not the only
monarch, by many, who then and there had his lot decided. Much of
America, and not a little of Europe, were conquered on the Plains of
Granada; and "the Last Sigh of the Moor" may have been given, not so
much to his own sad fate, as over the evil that was to come, and which
was to affect popes and princes and peoples alike. There was not a
country in the world but might have served itself well, if it had sent
aid to the struggling Moors. Instead of rejoicing over the victory of
the Spanish Christians, the world might have sent forth a wail in
consequence of it, as best expressing the sense that should have existed
of the woes which that victory was to be the means of bringing upon
mankind. The issue of that Peninsular contest was in every way bad, and
no good has ever come from it, but evil in abundance. The fountain that
was then unsealed was one of bitter waters only. The sympathies of men
should be with the Moors, who were the more enlightened, the more
liberal, and the wiser of the two races that then grappled for a final
encounter. Being the weaker party, they fell, but they were destined to
have grand funeral games.
Freed from the presence of any Mussulman states, Spain was enabled to
begin a grand European career in the latter years of the fifteenth
century, the conquest of Granada and the discovery of America having
given her a degree of power that gained for her the world's profoundest
respect. Partly by success in war, and partly through a series of
fortunate marriages, she became the first member of the European
commonwealth in a quarter of a century after the overthrow of the Moors.
The first of her Austro-Burgundian kings was made Emperor of Germany,
and by birth he was lord of the Netherlands. In a few years, and after
the conquest of Mexico, he had a French king among his captives, and the
Pope was shut up by one of his armies in the Castle of St. Angelo. Yet a
few years more, and Peru was added to the dominions of Spain. The
position and principles of the Emperor-King made him the champion of the
old order of things in Europe as against the Reformation, which added
immensely to his power. Spain was then, as she is now, and as probably
she ever will be, intensely Catholic, and as Papal as any country
valuing its independence well could be. How she regarded Protestantism,
and all other forms of "heresy," we know from the fiery energy--it was
literally of a fiery character--with which she disposed of all the
Reformers, of every degree, upon whom her iron hand could be laid. Had
Charles V. been inclined to favor the Reformation, from his position as
Emperor of Germany, he would soon have been diverted from any such
thought by considerations drawn from his position as King of the Spains.
A Mussulman, or a Hebrew, or an avowed atheist would have had a better
chance of being a powerful and popular sovereign at Valladolid than a
pious man who should have been inclined to look with favor upon Dr.
Luther. It may be doubted if even a king could have been safe from the
inquiries of the Inquisition. Thus Spain was not only at the head of
Europe because of her military superiority and the extent of her home
territory and foreign dominion, but, as the champion of the Church, she
had a moral power such as no other country has ever possessed, her
championship of the Pope being something very different from Napoleon
III.'s championship of the Pope of to-day. The German aristocracy might
be after the loaves and fishes of the Church, when they professed
readiness to aid in warfare against the Reformers; but no one could
doubt the zeal of the Spanish patricians, when _they_ dedicated
their swords and lances to the work of extirpating all enemies of the
faith. An Englishman of 1857 could not have been more hostile to a Sepoy
than a Spaniard of 1557 was to a Protestant. Religious power, political
power, military power, and long-continued success in the cabinet and in
the field, all combined to place Spain in a position such as no other
nation had ever known, such as no other nation ever will know. Even the
failures of Charles V.--his flight before Maurice of Saxony, and his
defeat at Metz--did not sensibly abate the power of Spain, for they
concerned Germany more than they did the Peninsular subjects of the
disappointed monarch.
When Philip II. succeeded to most of his father's abdicated thrones,
there was no diminution of Spanish pretensions, and he became the
mightiest sovereign that Europe had known since Charlemagne. Philip's
failure to obtain the Imperial throne was a personal disappointment to
both father and son, but it was no loss of real power to the elder
branch of the House of Austria. The death of Mary of England, though it
prevented Philip from availing himself of the men and money of his
wife's kingdom, was rather beneficial to him, as chief of the Spanish
dominion, than otherwise. What could he have done with the haughty,
arrogant, self-sufficient islanders, who were as proud as the Castilians
themselves, without any of the imperial pretensions of the Castilians to
justify their pride, had Mary lived and reigned, while he alone should
have ruled? There would have been civil war in England but for Mary's
death, which occurred at a happy time both for her and for her subjects.
Philip also lost a portion of his Northern hereditary dominions, because
he would have a tyranny established in the Netherlands. But all that he
lost in Germany, in the Netherlands, and in Britain was compensated by
his easy conquest of Portugal after the extinction of the House of Avis.
The Portugal of those times was a very different country from the
Portugal of these times. It was not only Portugal and the Algarves that
Philip added to the dominions of Spain,--and that alone would have been
a great thing, for it would have perfected the Spanish rule of the
Peninsula, always a most desirable event in the eyes of Castilians,--but
the enormous and wide-spread possessions of Portugal in Africa, in
America, and in Asia became subject to the conqueror. Portugal alone was
of far more value to Spain than England could have been; but Portugal
and her colonies together made a greater prize than England, Holland,
and Germany could have made, recollecting how full of "heretics" those
countries were, and that the more heretical subjects Philip should have
had, the less powerful he would have been. Portugal was as "Faithful" as
Spain was "Catholic," and both titles now belonged to Philip. At that
time, Philip's power, to outward seeming, was at its height. It was not
certain that he would lose Holland, and it was certain that he had
gained Portugal and all her dependencies. He was absolute master of the
Spanish Peninsula, and his will was law over nearly all the Italian
Peninsula except that portion of it which was ruled by Venice. He alone
of European sovereigns had vast possessions in both Indies, the East and
the West. He was monarch of no insignificant part of Africa, and in
America he was the Great King, his dominion there being almost as little
disputed as was that of Selkirk in his island. He was still master of
the best part of the Low Countries, and the Hollanders were regarded as
nothing more than his rebellious subjects. He was the sole Western
potentate who had lieutenants in the East, who ruled over Indian
territories that never had been reached even by the Macedonian
Alexander. From his cabinet in Madrid, he fixed the fate of many
millions of the first peoples in the world, members of the races most
advanced in all the arts of war and of peace. His least whisper could
affect the every-day life of men in the principal cities of both
hemispheres. He who was sovereign at Madrid and Lisbon, at Naples and
Milan, at Brussels and Antwerp, was sovereign also at Mexico and Lima,
at Goa and Ormuz.
Philip's power was by no means to be measured solely by the extent and
various character of his dominions. His position, as a great monarch,
and as the chief champion of the Catholic cause, made him, at times,
master of many European countries over which he could exercise no direct
rule. England trembled before him even after the "Armada's pride" had
been rebuked, and Elizabeth came much nearer being vanquished by him
than is generally supposed. Nothing but the blockade of Parma's forces
by the Dutch, and the occurrence of storms, saved England from
experiencing that sad fate which she has ever been so ready, with cause
and without cause, to visit upon other countries. In Ireland the Spanish
monarch was more respected than Elizabeth, its nominal ruler, and he was
regarded by the Irish not only with reverence as the first of Catholic
princes, but also with that affection which men ever feel for the
enemies of their enemies. Whoso hates England is sure of Irish
affection, and as it is today so was it three hundred years ago, and so
will it ever be, unless the very human heart itself shall undergo a
complete change. Scotland furnished a Spanish party that might have
become formidable to England, had events taken a slightly different
turn; and the old Caledonian hatred of Southrons had not been
extinguished by the success of the Reform party in both countries. The
Scotch Catholics called Philip "the pillar of the Christian
commonwealth," (_Totius reipublicæ Christianæ columen_,) and sought
his assistance to restore the old religion to their country. France was
for several years more at the command of Philip than at that of any of
its own sovereigns, the weak dregs of the line of Valois. The League
would willingly have transferred the French crown to any person whom he
might have named to wear it; and perhaps nothing but the sensible
decision of Henry IV., that Paris was worth a mass, prevented that crown
from passing to some member of the Spanish branch of the House of
Austria. In Germany Philip had an influence corresponding to his power,
which was all the greater because he was the head of a Germanic house
that under him seemed destined to develop an old idea that it should
become ruler of the world. If anything marred his strength in that
quarter, it was the fact that the junior branch of the Austrian family
was at that time inclined to liberalism in politics,--an offence against
the purposes and traditions of the whole family of which few members of
it have ever been guilty, before or since.
But this mighty Spanish power came to an end with the monarch in whom it
was represented. The sources of Spanish strength had been drying up for
a century, but the personal character of the successive monarchs, and
vast foreign acquisitions, had disguised the fact from the world. Philip
died in 1598, and in reality left his empire but a skeleton to his son,
a youth of feeble mind, but under whose rule a change of policy was
effected, not, as has been sometimes supposed, from any deep views on
the part of the Count-Duke Lerma, but because it was impossible for
Spain to maintain the place she had held under Philip II. Even had
Philip III. been as able a man as his father, or his grandfather, he
could not have preserved the ascendency of Spain,--that country having
changed much, and Europe more. Every European nation, with the exception
of Turkey,--and the Turks were only encamped in Europe,--had advanced
during the sixteenth century, except Spain, which had declined. Thus had
she become weak, positively and relatively. Rest was necessary to her,
and under the rule of Lerma she obtained it. He supported the peace
policy of that old aristocratical party of which Ruy Gomez had been the
chief, but which had been hardly heard of in the last twenty years of
Philip II.'s reign. That monarch, on his death-bed, regretted that "to
his grace in bestowing on him so great a realm, God had not been pleased
to add the grace of granting him a successor capable of continuing to
rule it"; but had his son been all that the most unreasonable parent
could have desired, he could not have pursued his father's policy. Lerma
did but act as he was forced to act. The circumstance that the Catholic
Reaction had triumphed was alone sufficient to make a change necessary.
Spanish greatness was no longer the leading political interest of the
Church, and Rome was at liberty to have some regard to the new powers
that were growing up in Europe. Pacific ideas prevailed. Spain ceased to
make war in every direction, and husbanded her resources, and began to
renew her native strength. The skeleton bequeathed by Philip II. became
clothed with flesh, and sinewy. Could this policy have been continued
for a generation, Spanish history might have been made to read
differently from the melancholy text it now presents. But the process of
rehabilitation was not allowed to go on. There had always been a strong
party opposed to Lerma, and that statesman's friendliness to the English
and the Dutch made him liable to the charge of favoring heresy,--a
charge that was the heaviest that could be brought against any one in
the estimation of Philip III., who was as bigoted as his father. The
Catholic and warlike policy of Idiaquez, Granvella, and Moura was
revived. The two branches of the Austrian family were again brought into
the closest alliance, and at a time when the German branch had become
even more Catholic than the elder branch. Spain stepped once more into
the European arena, and her generals and armies by their abilities and
exploits revived recollections of what had been done by Parma and his
hosts. Spinola, who was scarcely inferior to Farnese, conquered the
Palatinate, and so began the Thirty Years' War favorably to the Catholic
cause. The great victory of Nordlingen, won by the Catholics in 1635,
was due to the valor of the Spanish troops in the Imperial army. Spain
appeared to be as powerful as at any former period, and the revival of
her ascendency might have been expected by those who judged only from
external indications of strength. Yet a few years, however, and it was
clear to all politicians at least that Spain was far gone into a
decline, and that the course of Olivarez had been fatal to her
greatness; and the mass of mankind, who judge only from glaring actions,
could not fail to appreciate the nature of such events as the defeat of
Rocroi and the loss of Portugal, the latter including the loss of all
the dependencies of the Portuguese in Africa, America, and India. No
historical transaction of the seventeenth century testifies so strongly
to the weakness of a first-class power as the Revolution of Portugal.
Though Portugal lay at the very door of Spain, that country slipped from
her feeble hands, and she never could recover it. Having resumed her
encroaching, domineering course before she had fairly recovered her
strength, she broke down in less than a quarter of a century, though
even then the full extent of her weakness was not generally understood.
It is an amusement to read works that were written in the reigns of
Philip IV. and Charles II., in which Spain is spoken of as a great
power, and to compare the words of their writers with the actual facts
of the case. If we were to fix upon any one date as indicating the final
breaking down of Austrian Spain, it would be the year 1659, when the
treaty of the Pyrenees was made, and when the old rival of France became
virtually her vassal. From that time we must date the beginning of that
strange interference in Spanish affairs which has formed so much of the
public business of France, whereby one of the proudest of peoples have
become, as it were, provincials to one of the vainest of peoples. It is
true that there were more wars between Austrian Spain and France, but
they served only to show that the former had lost the power to contend
with her rival, who might look forward to the day when the empire of
Philip II. should fall to pieces, and furnish spoil to those strong
nations that watch over the beds of sick men in purple.
The state of decay in which the first Bourbon king of Spain found his
inheritance, in 1701, is well known. The War of the Succession soon
followed, and Spain was shorn of some of her most magnificent foreign
possessions. All that she had held in Flanders was lost,--and so were
Naples, and Sicily, and Sardinia, and the Milanese, and other lands that
had been ruled, and wellnigh ruined, by the Austro-Burgundian kings. The
English had Gibraltar, and were holding Minorca also. Bourbon Spain was
not to be Austrian Spain,--that was clear. But this trimming and pruning
of the Peninsular monarchy were very useful to it; and Spain, having
been ploughed up by the sword for twelve successive years, was in
condition to yield something beyond what it had produced since the death
of Philip II. Accordingly, under the ascendency of the Italian Alberoni,
Spain became rapidly powerful; and could that remarkable statesman have
confined his labors to affairs purely Spanish in their character and
purpose, that country might have taken, and have continued to hold, the
first place in Europe. He, however, with all his talents, was
intellectually deficient in some important respects, and so all his
schemes came to nought, and he fell. He tried to effect too much, and
though fully sensible of the necessity of peace to Spain, he plunged
into war. He did, in fact, what the rulers of Spain are doing to-day: he
sought to restore the old Castilian influence by engaging the country in
wars that would have been foolish, even if they had not been unjust,
when he should have continued to direct all his attention to its
internal affairs. Had he been at the head of any other than a Spanish
ministry, Alberoni would probably have borne himself rationally; but
there is something in the politics of Spain that affects even the wisest
of heads, often turning them, as it were, and rendering their owners the
strangest of caricatures. It is sometimes said that the most Irish of
the people of Ireland are those who have come latest into the green
island, there being something in its air and soil that soon converts the
stranger into a true Hibernian in all moral respects; but the remark is
more applicable to Spain than to Ireland, as in the former country
foreign statesmen have more than once made Spanish policy ridiculous by
taking that one step which separates that quality from the sublime. What
in the person of a Castilian is at the worst but Quixotic becomes in the
foreigner, or man of foreign descent, the merest burlesque upon
statesmanship.
Alberoni's fall did not imply the fall of Spain. The renewal of vigor
that she had gained under his direction was sufficiently great to carry
her well through more than seventy years, during which she stood on an
equal footing with France, the Empire, and Great Britain, and for most
of the time was the superior of Russia and Prussia, whose European
greatness did not begin until the second half of the eighteenth century
had become somewhat advanced. It is difficult for the men of to-day to
understand that Spain was really a great power under the Bourbon kings,
down to the first years of the French Revolution. We have seen her,
until very recently, a country of little more European account than
Portugal; and that she should, but eighty years since, have treated with
England as equal with equal, after having assisted at the work of
England's humiliation, it is hard to comprehend. But such was the fact.
Several of the Spanish statesmen of the last Century were very superior
men, the kingdom itself was strong, and the Indies did not experience
any disturbances calculated seriously to embarrass the mother-country.
Then the close union that was brought about between France and Spain, in
the early days of Charles III. and the last days of Louis XV., had no
unimportant effect on the fortunes of Spain. The _Pacte de Famille_
was one of the greatest political transactions of those days. It was
effected just a hundred years ago, and but for the occurrence of the
French Revolution it would have proved most fruitful of remarkable
events. Had it never been made, it may well be doubted if the American
Revolution could have been a successful movement. That Revolution France
was bound to support, both by interest and by sentiment; and the
Family-Compact enabled her to take Spain on to the side of America,
where it is evident that her interests scarcely could have taken her;
and Spain's aid, which was liberally afforded, was necessary to the
success of our ancestors. That it was possible thus to place Spain was
owing to one of those displays of English insolence that have made the
islanders abhorred by the rulers and the ruled of almost every land.
"Charles III. of Spain," says Macaulay, "had early conceived a deadly
hatred of England. Twenty years before, when he was King of the Two
Sicilies, he had been eager to join the coalition against Maria Theresa.
But an English fleet had suddenly appeared in the Bay of Naples. An
English captain had landed, had proceeded to the palace, had laid a
watch on the table, and had told his Majesty that within an hour a
treaty of neutrality must be signed, or a bombardment would commence.
The treaty was signed; the squadron sailed out of the bay twenty-four
hours after it had sailed in; and from that day the ruling passion of
the humbled prince was aversion to the English name. He was at length in
a situation in which he might hope to gratify that passion. He had
recently become King of Spain and the Indies. He saw, with envy and
apprehension, the triumphs of our navy, and the rapid extension of our
colonial empire. He was a Bourbon, and sympathized with the distress of
the house from which he sprang. He was a Spaniard; and no Spaniard could
bear to see Gibraltar and Minorca in the possession of a foreign power.
Impelled by such feelings, Charles concluded a secret treaty with
France. By this treaty, known as the Family-Compact, the two powers
bound themselves, not in express words, but by the clearest implication,
to make war on England in common." Such was the origin of an alliance
that changed the fate of America, and which might have done as much for
Europe but for the fall of the French Bourbons. The statesmen of
England, with that short-sightedness which is the badge of all their
tribe, were nursing the power of Russia, at an enormous expense, in
order that, at a still greater expense, their grandsons might attempt
the bridling of that power, in which they succeeded about as well as did
Doria in bridling the horses of St. Mark. The partition of Poland showed
what Europe had most to fear, and French statesmen were preparing for
the Northern blast, while those of England, according to one of their
own number, who was a Secretary of State, spoke of it as something
indeed inconsistent with national equity and public honor, and therefore
engaging their master's disapprobation, but as not so immediately
interesting as to deserve his interposition. Time, however, would have
brought England right, from regard to her own safety, and she would have
united herself with France, Spain, and Naples to resist Russian
encroachments; and Austria, it may be assumed, would have gone with the
West and the South against the North, for her statesmen had the sagacity
to see that the partition of Poland was adverse to their country's
interests, and the part they had in that most iniquitous of modern
transactions was taken rather from fear than from ambition. They could
not prevent a robbery, and so they aided in it, and shared in the spoil.
But the revolutionary storm came, and broke up the old European system.
Passional politics took the place of diplomacy, and party-spirit usurped
that of patriotism. It was the age of the Reformation repeated, and men
could hail the defeats of their own country with joy, because their
country and their party were on opposite sides in the grand struggle
which opinions were making for supremacy.
In that storm Spain broke down, but not until she had exhibited
considerable power in war, first with France, and then as the ally of
France. Her navy was honorably distinguished, though unfortunate, at St.
Vincent and Trafalgar, and elsewhere, showing that Spanish valor was not
extinct. Napoleon I., unequal to bearing well the good-fortune that had
been made complete at Tilsit, and maddened by the success of England in
her piratical attack on Denmark, resolved to add Spain to his empire,
virtually, if not in terms. He was not content with having her as one of
his most useful and submissive dependencies, whose resources were at his
command as thoroughly as were those of Belgium and Lombardy, but must
needs insist upon having her throne at his disposal. Human folly never
perpetrated a grosser blunder than this, and he established that
"Spanish ulcer" which undermined the strength of the most magnificent
empire that the world had seen for ten centuries; for, if his empire was
in some respects inferior to that of Philip II., in others it was
superior to the Castilian dominion. Out of his action in the Peninsula
grew the Peninsular War, which was to the Spain of our age what the
Succession War had been to the Spain of a century earlier. That country
was prepared by it for another revival, which came at last, but which
also came slowly. Had Ferdinand VII. been a wise and truthful man, or
had there been Spanish statesmen capable of governing both monarch and
monarchy, the days of Alberoni would have been repeated before 1820. But
there was neither an honest monarch nor a great statesman in the
kingdom, and Spain daily became weaker and more contemptible. Her
colonial empire disappeared, with a few exceptions, such as Cuba and the
Philippines. The sun ceased to shine constantly on that empire which had
been warmed by his beams through three centuries, and transferred that
honor to England. Spanish politics became the world's scorn; and a
French army, acting as the police of the Holy Alliance, crossed the
Pyrenees, and made Ferdinand VII. once more an absolute king. After his
death, a civil war raged for a long time between the Christinos and the
Carlists, parties which took their names from the Queen-Mother and from
Don Carlos, who claimed to be the legitimate King of the Spains. At
length that war was brought to an end, and the throne of Isabella II.
appears to be as well established as was that of Isabella I.
During all those unhappy years, Spain had, to use the common phrase,
been making progress. Foreign war and civil war, and political
convulsions of every kind, had been eminently useful to her. The Arachne
webs and dust of ages had been blown away by the cannon of France and
England. Old ideas were exploded. Young Spain had displaced Old Spain. A
generation had grown up who had no sympathy with the antique world. In
spite of repeated invasions, and almost unbroken bad government, and
colonial losses such as no other country ever had experienced, the
material power of Spain had vastly advanced between 1808 and 1850. Since
1850 the Spaniards have been prosperous people, and every year has seen
their power increased; and they are now demanding for their country
admission into the list of the Great Powers of Europe. They have formed
a numerous army, and a navy that is more than respectable. They are
constructing railways, and encouraging business in all its forms. The
public revenue is equal to about ninety millions of our money, which
would liberally provide for every expenditure that the Government ought
to make, but which cannot meet the wants of that Government, because the
Spanish statesmen of 1862 are as unwise as were any of their
predecessors, most of whom treated the dollar as if it contained twelve
dimes. "To spend half a crown out of sixpence a day" requires the
possession of as much ingenuity as would, if rationally employed, serve
to convert the sixpence into a crown; but Spain rarely permits common
sense to govern her action, and prefers debt to prosperity, when she can
fairly make her choice between the two. As to her public morality, a
very little observation proves that she is not an iota more merciful or
consistent now than she was when she banished the Moriscos. At the very
time when she is engaged in making war on Mexico because of alleged
wrongs received at the hands of that country, she refuses to pay her own
debts, thus placing herself on the level of Mississippi, which can raise
money to aid in warring against the Union, and yet will not liquidate
its bonds, which are held by the English allies of American rebels. This
does not promise much for the future of Spain, and she may find her
armies brought to a stand in Mexico from the want of money; and thus
will be repeated the blunder of the sixteenth century, when the
victories of the Spaniards in the Low Countries were made fruitless
because their sovereign was unable to pay his soldiers, and so they
became mutineers at the very time when it was most requisite that their
loyalty should be perfect, in order that the Castilian ascendency might
be entirely restored. Spain walks in a circle, and she repeats the
follies of her past with a pertinacity that would seem to indicate,
that, while she has forgotten everything, she has learned nothing.
This third revival of Spain has been attended with a liberal exhibition
of the same follies which we know it was her custom to display after
preceding revivals. Instead of attending to her internal affairs, which
demanded all her attention and the use of all her means, she has plunged
into the great sea of foreign politics, with the view, it should seem,
of being admitted formally into the list of leading European Powers.
That she should desire a first place is by no means discreditable to
her; but her manner of seeking it is to the last degree childish, and
unworthy of a country that has had so much experience. That place which
she seeks can never long be denied to any European nation which is
really strong, and modern strength does not consist merely in great
fleets and armies, to be employed in attacking the weak, and in
promoting a system of intervention in the affairs of foreign countries.
Such, however, is not the opinion of Spanish statesmen, if they are to
be judged by their actions. No sooner did Spain begin to feel her
strength, than she determined to make other countries feel it, in a very
disagreeable fashion. She directed her attention to Italy, and nothing
but a salutary dread of Napoleon III prevented her from becoming the
champion of all the tyrants and abuses of that country. It was at one
time supposed that she meant to revive her pretensions to territorial
rule in the Italian Peninsula, and to contend for the restoration of the
state of things which there ended with the ending of the
Austro-Burgundian rule of the Spanish Empire in 1700; and though it
would have been preposterous to have thought such pretensions possible
in the case of any other country,--as preposterous as it would be to
suppose England capable of thinking of the restoration of her power over
the United States,--yet it was perfectly reasonable to believe that
Spain would revive claims that were barred by the lapse of one hundred
and fifty years. No statute of limitations is known to her, and what she
has held once she thinks herself entitled to reclaim on any day through
all time. Weakness may prevent her from enforcing her title, but that
title never becomes weak. What is ridiculous in the eyes of the
statesmen of Paris and London is eminently commonplace in those of the
statesmen of Madrid, who are the most industrious of builders,
_Châteaux en Espagne_ employing their energies. Although it is more
than two centuries since Portugal threw off the Spanish yoke, they have
never yet given up the hope in Spain of adding that spirited little
kingdom to the Peninsular monarchy. They would absorb it, as so many
other kingdoms have been absorbed by the power that has issued its
decrees from Madrid and Valladolid. The attack made by Spain on Morocco
was a silly affair, and was resolved upon only to convince the world
that Spain could make war abroad, a point in which the world felt but
small interest, as at that time it was not thought that the Spaniards
would seriously endeavor to regain their old American possessions. That
what had been lost through one class of errors would be sought through
resort to another class of errors, it entered not the minds of men to
conceive. They would as soon have thought of Spain making a demand on
Holland, with the view of restoring in that country the rule that was
lost there in the days of Alva and Parma, as of her entering upon a war
for a second conquest of Mexico. Nor would they have been astonished by
the breaking out of such a war, had it not been for the breaking down of
the American Republic. America's calamity was Spain's opportunity. She
had been successful in her crusade against the modern Moors, because bad
government had unfitted those Mussulmans to make effectual resistance to
her well-led and well-appointed armies, which were supported by
well-equipped ships. Then, flushed with victory, and beholding America
in convulsions, she resolved to direct her energies against Mexico,
where, unfortunately, bad government had done its work even more
perfectly than it had been done in Morocco. The Spaniards are a brave
and a spirited people, but their conduct in St. Domingo and their attack
on Mexico cannot be cited as evidence of their bravery and spirit. They
never would have dared to move against the Mexicans, if our condition
had remained what it was but eighteen months ago; and yet they had just
as good cause to assail them in the summer of 1860 as they now have in
the winter of 1862. All the grounds of complaint that they have against
Mexico were in existence then,--but we heard of no modern Spanish Armada
at that time, and might then as rationally have expected to see a French
fleet in the St. Lawrence as a Spanish fleet in the Mexican Gulf. The
American sword was then sharp, and the American shield broad, and so
Spain stayed her chivalrous hand. Her conduct is as bad as was our own,
when we "picked a quarrel" with Mexico, and bestowed upon her weak back
the blows we should have visited on the stout shoulders of England. Our
Mexican contest was the effect of our fear of a stronger adversary. We
had brought the Oregon question to such a point that it was difficult to
avoid war with Great Britain. The West had been cheated by the cry for
"the whole of Oregon," and the men who had got up that cry were afraid
to face the people whom they had deceived by the light of common day;
and so we had the Mexican War improvised, to distract public attention
from the lame and impotent manner in which we had settled the Oregon
question. Having kissed the Briton's boot, it became necessary to soothe
our exasperated feelings by applying our own boot to the person of the
Aztec. The man having been too much for us, we were bound to give the
boy a sound beating, and that beating he received. True, we had cause of
quarrel with Mexico, which we had long overlooked, and which had seldom
moved us to anger, and never to the point of falling foul, until we had
become excessively angry both with the English and ourselves; and
equally true is it that Spain has some reason to make Mexico feel the
weight of her arm, now that it has become strong again,--but, imitating
our prudence, she has chosen her own time for calling Mexico to account.
All chivalrous nations are partial to this form of shabbiness; and
though we are told that honor is the distinction of a monarchy, we see
that under the Spanish monarchy its requirements can be dispensed with
when a gain can be secured by walking in the path of dishonor.
But though the policy of Spain is base toward Mexico, it has the merit
of being perfectly intelligible, which is generally the case with things
of the kind. Much fault has been found with Spain by our Unionists
because she has exhibited some partiality for the Secessionists, and
apparently is ready to go as far as England means to go in helping them
to the full enjoyment of independence and national life. It has been
pointed out, that it was the South, not the North, which favored the
"acquisition" of Cuba by force, fraud, or falsehood, according to
circumstances; that the men who met at Ostend, and proclaimed that Cuba
must be ours, were Democrats, not Republicans; and that the buccaneers
who used to fit out expeditions for the redemption of the "faithful"
island from Spanish rule were Southrons, while other Southrons refused
to convict those buccaneers who were tried at New Orleans, and elsewhere
in Secessia, of being guilty of crimes against the laws of America and
of nations. And it is asked, with looks of wonder, "How can Spain be so
blind to her interests, and so regardless of insults that ordinarily
disturb even the mildest of nations, as to sympathize with and aid her
enemies, men who, if successful in their present purpose, would be sure
to attack Cuba, to help themselves to Mexico, and to become masters of
all the Spanish-American countries on this continent?" Pertinent to the
matter as this question is, Spain has an answer to give that would be
very much to the point. "True," she might say, "it was the South that
sent land pirates to Cuba, and it was a Federal Government that was
dominated by Southrons that used to insult us semiannually by insisting
that we should part with Cuba, though we should as soon have thought of
selling Cadiz. But it was the American Government, which spoke in the
name of the whole American nation, that made the demand for Cuba, and
which protected the pirates. Had you made war on us to obtain possession
of Cuba, as you would have done but for the occurrence of your civil
troubles, that war would have been waged by the United States, and not
by the South and by the Democratic party. It would have been the work of
you all, of Republicans as well as Democrats, of Yankees as well as
Southrons, of Abolitionists as well as Slaveholders. There would have
come soldiers from your Southern States, to tear from the Spanish
monarchy its most valuable foreign possession; but whence would have
come the men who would have manned your fleets, that would have acted
with your armies, protecting their landing, and thus alone making Cuba's
conquest possible? They would have been Northern men, New-Englanders and
New-Yorkers, perhaps descendants of some of the very men who helped to
conquer a portion of the island a century ago. It was _American_
strength that we feared, not the strength of the _North_ or that of
the _South_, for neither of which do we care. Who would have
furnished the capital to pay the expenses of the war? Who but the rich
men of the North? Money is the sinew of all war, foreign and civil, and
not a little of that Northern capital which we have seen so lavishly
poured out in aid of the Union would have been subscribed in aid of a
project to bring the curse of disunion upon our country. You know this
to be the fact, and we challenge you as truthful men to deny it, that
for many years it has been a favorite idea with some of your statesmen,
and not of leaders of the Democratic party only, to stave off the
troubles that were rapidly growing out of the slavery question, by
having recourse to a 'distraction' based on the acquisition of Cuba. You
know, or ought to know, that the very man who is now at the head of the
Southern Confederacy was advised, at the North, in 1853, to pursue such
a course with regard to Cuba, he being then the most influential member
of the Pierce administration, as should 'distract' American attention
from slavery as a local matter; and that he thought this Northern advice
good, and would have given the administration's support to the project
it involved, and probably with success, and to our great loss and
disgrace, when a new turn was given to your strange politics by the
movement in behalf of the repeal of the Missouri compromise, a movement
that has brought safety to us, and loss and disgrace upon yourselves. We
admit that your cause is the cause of law, of order, and of
constitutional freedom; but why should we desire the triumph of the
cause of law, of order, and of constitutional freedom in the United
States, when that triumph would be but preliminary to a triumph over our
own country? Had your internal peace been continued for ten years
longer, your free population would have reached to forty millions, and
your wealth would have grown at a greater rate than your population. You
would have been able to give law to America, and you would, under one
plausible pretext or another, have taken possession of all the European
colonies of the Occident. Nothing short of a European alliance could
have prevented your becoming supreme from the region of eternal snows to
the regions of eternal bloom; and such an alliance it would have been
difficult to form, as there are nations in Europe that would have been
as ready to back you in your day of strength as they are now both ready
and anxious to back your enemy in this your hour of weakness. In plain
words, it is for our interest that you should fall; and as your fall can
be best promoted through the success of the Secessionists, therefore do
we give them our moral support, and sympathize with them in their
struggle to establish their national freedom on the basis of everlasting
slavery. Why should we not sympathize with them, and even aid, at an
early day, in raising the blockade of their ports? Are they not doing
our work? As to their seizure of Spanish-American countries, it would be
long before they could attempt an extension of their dominion; and by
reëstablishing our rule over Mexico we shall be in condition to bridle
them for fifty years to come, even if they should remain united. But it
is not at all probable that they would continue united. What Mexico has
been, that the Southern Confederacy would be. The revolutions, the
_pronunciamientos_, the murders, and the robberies which it is our
intention to banish from Mexico, would take up their abode in the
Southern Confederacy, in which Secession would do its perfect work. Such
things are the natural fruits of the Secession tree, which is as
poisonous as the upas and as productive as the palm. _You_ we shall
have no occasion to fear, as, once cut down, Europe would never again
permit you to endanger the integrity of the possessions of any of her
countries in the West."
Such might be the language of Spain in reply to the remonstrances of our
Unionists, and although it embodies nothing but the intensest
selfishness, it would not be the worse diplomatic expression on that
account. When was diplomacy otherwise than sordid in its nature? When
was it the custom with nations to "spare the humble and subdue the
proud"? Never. The Romans said that such was their practice, but every
page of their bloody history gives the lie to the poetical boast. It is
the humble who are subdued, and the proud who are spared. Good
Samaritans are rare characters among men, but who ever heard of a Good
Samaritan among nations? The custom of nations is far worse than was the
conduct of those persons who would not relieve the man who had fallen
among thieves. They simply abstained from doing good, while nations
unite their powers to annoy and annihilate the distressed. There is, it
is probable, an understanding existing between France, England, and
Spain to aid the Southern Confederacy at an early day, and when we shall
have become sufficiently reduced to admit of their giving such aid
without hazard to themselves, they being little inclined to engage in
hazardous wars.
In one respect the reconquest of Mexico by Spain would prove beneficial
to us. If the Southern Confederacy should be established through the
action of foreign powers, it would be for our interest that Mexico
should have a strong government ruling over a united people. If the
anarchical condition of Mexico should be continued, that country would
afford a fine field for the energy and enterprise of all the lawless
spirits of the South, who could be precipitated upon it to the great
gain of their countrymen; and England, in pursuance of her great
Christian principle of creating markets for cotton and cottons, would
encourage the Confederates to enter Mexico. But if Mexico should be
converted into an orderly country, and have an army capable of treating
buccaneers as the Spanish army treated Lopez and his followers, it would
be no place for the discharged soldiers of Davis and Stephens. They
would have to stay at home, and they would make of that home a hell. The
welfare of the North would be promoted by the misery of the Southrons,
who ought to be made to pay the full penalty of their extraordinary
crime. Without provocation, and making of that want of provocation an
absolute boast, they have brought war upon their country, and are
endeavoring to spread its flames over the world. The misery they have
wrought is incalculable, and no narrative of it, let it be as minute and
as detailed as it could be made, will ever furnish a full picture of it.
It would be but the merest justice, that men who make war in the spirit
of wantonness be compelled to drink off the red cup they have filled, to
the very lees. Such would probably be their doom, should they prevail.
The least successful thing to them would be success.
It is not certain, however, that the revival of Spanish power is to be
lasting in its nature; and if Spain should fall as suddenly as she has
risen, the way to Mexico would be open to the Southrons, who might then
and there add so tremendously to the dominions of King Cotton as to make
him even more powerful than ever he has been in the imagination of his
votaries,--and they have ranked him only one step below the Devil.
Spanish revivals are so much like certain other revivals, that they are
apt to be followed by reaction, leaving the unduly excited subject in a
worse condition than ever. European affairs, too, may demand Spain's
attention, and require her to leave Mexico to take care of herself.
Europe is full of causes of war, occasion for waging which must soon
arise. The American war has tended to the promotion of peace in Europe,
but that cannot be much longer maintained. Let war break out in Europe,
and Spain would probably feel herself called upon to assume a principal
part in it, and then the Southern Confederacy would be at liberty to
spread slavery over the finest cotton country on earth, under the
patronage of England, which hates slavery, but worships its results. The
future of Mexico it lies in the power of the American Union to decide,
and our armies are contending as much for Mexican freedom as they are
for American nationality.
* * * * *
A RAFT THAT NO MAN MADE.
I am a soldier: but my tale, this time, is not of war.
The man of whom the Muse talked to the blind bard of old had grown wise
in wayfaring. He had seen such men and cities as the sun shines on, and
the great wonders of land and sea; and he had visited the farther
countries, whose indwellers, having been once at home in the green
fields and under the sky and roofs of the cheery earth, were now gone
forth and forward into a dim and shadowed land, from which they found no
backward path to these old haunts, and their old loves:--
[Greek: Êéri kaì nephélê kekalumménoi oudé pot' autoùs
Êélios phaéuôn katadérketai aktinessin.]
_Od._ XI.
At the Charter-House I learned the story of the King of Ithaca, and read
it for something better than a task; and since, though I have never seen
so many cities as the much-wandering man, nor grown so wise, yet have
heard and seen and remembered, for myself, words and things from crowded
streets and fairs and shows and wave-washed quays and murmurous
market-places, in many lands; and for his [Greek: Kimmeríon undrôn
dêmos],--his people wrapt in cloud and vapor, whom "no glad sun finds
with his beams,"--have been borne along a perilous path through thick
mists, among the crashing ice of the Upper Atlantic, as well as
sweltered upon a Southern sea, and have learned something of men and
something of God.
I was in Newfoundland, a lieutenant of Royal Engineers, in Major Gore's
time, and went about a good deal among the people, in surveying for
Government. One of my old friends there was Skipper Benjie Westham, of
Brigus, a shortish, stout, bald man, with a cheerful, honest face and a
kind voice; and he, mending a caplin-seine one day, told me this story,
which I will try to tell after him.
We were upon the high ground, beyond where the church stands now, and
Prudence, the fisherman's daughter, and Ralph Barrows, her husband, were
with Skipper Benjie when he began; and I had an hour by the watch to
spend. The neighborhood, all about, was still; the only men who were in
sight were so far off that we heard nothing from them; no wind was
stirring near us, and a slow sail could be seen outside. Everything was
right for listening and telling.
"I can tell 'ee what I sid[A] myself, Sir," said Skipper Benjie. "It
isn' like a story that's put down in books: it's on'y like what we
planters[B] tells of a winter's night or sech: but it's _feelun_,
mubbe, an' 'ee won't expect much off a man as couldn' never read,--not
so much as Bible or Prayer-Book, even."
[Footnote A: Saw.]
[Footnote B: Fishermen.]
Skipper Benjie looked just like what he was thought: a true-hearted,
healthy man, a good fisherman, and a good seaman. There was no need of
any one's saying it. So I only waited till he went on speaking.
"'T was one time I goed to th' Ice, Sir. I never goed but once, an' 't was
a'most the first v'yage ever was, ef 't wasn' the _very_ first; an'
't was the last for me, an' worse agen for the rest-part o' that crew,
that never goed no more! 'T was tarrible sad douns wi' they!"
This preface was accompanied by some preliminary handling of the
caplin-seine, also, to find out the broken places and get them about
him. Ralph and Prudence deftly helped him. Then, making his story wait,
after this opening, he took one hole to begin at in mending, chose his
seat, and drew the seine up to his knee. At the same time I got nearer
to the fellowship of the family by persuading the planter (who yielded
with a pleasant smile) to let me try my hand at the netting. Prudence
quietly took to herself a share of the work, and Ralph alone was
unbusied.
"They calls th' Ice a wicked place,--Sundays an' weekin days all alike;
an' to my seemun it's a cruel, bloody place, jes' so well,--but not all
thinks alike, surely.--Rafe, lad, mubbe 'ee'd ruther go down cove-ways,
an' overhaul the punt a bit."
Ralph, who perhaps had stood waiting for the very dismissal that he now
got, assented and left us three. Prudence, to be sure, looked after him
as if she would a good deal rather go with him than stay; but she
stayed, nevertheless, and worked at the seine. I interpreted to myself
Skipper Benjie's sending away of one of his hearers by supposing that
his son-in-law had often heard his tales; but the planter explained
himself:--
"'Ee sees, Sir, I knocked off goun to th' Ice becase 't was sech a
tarrible cruel place, to my seemun. They swiles[C] be so knowun
like,--as knowun as a dog, in a manner, an' lovun to their own, like
Christens, a'most, more than bastes; an' they'm got red blood, for all
they lives most-partly in water; an' then I found 'em so friendly, when
I was wantun friends badly. But I s'pose the swile-fishery's needful;
an' I knows, in course, that even Christens' blood's got to be taken
sometimes, when it's bad blood, an' I wouldn' be childish about they
things: on'y,--ef it's me,--when I can live by fishun, I don' want to go
an' club an' shoot an' cut an' slash among poor harmless things that
'ould never harm man or 'oman, an' 'ould cry great tears down for
pity-sake, an' got a sound like a Christen: I 'ouldn' like to go
a-swilun for gain,--not after beun among 'em, way I was, anyways."
[Footnote C: Seals.]
This apology made it plain that Skipper Benjie was large-hearted enough,
or indulgent enough, not to seek to strain others, even his own family,
up to his own way in everything; and it might easily be thought that the
young fisherman had different feelings about sealing from those that the
planter's story was meant to bring out. All being ready, he began his
tale again:--
"I shipped wi' Skipper Isra'l Gooden, from Carbonear: the schooner was
the Baccaloue, wi' forty men, all told. 'T was of a Sunday morn'n 'e
'ould sail, twel'th day o' March, wi' another schooner in company,--the
Sparrow. There was a many of us wasn' too good, but we thowt wrong of
'e's takun the Lord's Day to 'e'sself.--Wull, Sir, afore I comed 'ome, I
was in a great desert country, an' floated on sea wi' a monstrous great
raft that no man never made, creakun an' crashun an' groanun an' tumblun
an' wastun an' goun to pieces, an' no man on her but me, an' full o'
livun things,--dreadful!
"About a five hours out, 't was, we first sid the blink,[D] an' comed up
wi' th' Ice about off Cape Bonavis'. We fell in wi' it south, an' worked
up nothe along: but we didn' see swiles for two or three days yet; on'y
we was workun along; pokun the cakes of ice away, an' haulun through wi'
main strength sometimes, holdun on wi' bights o' ropes out o' the bow;
an' more times, agen, in clear water: sometimes mist all round us, 'ee
couldn' see the ship's len'th, sca'ce; an' more times snow, jes' so
thick; an' then a gale o' wind, mubbe, would a'most blow all the spars
out of her, seemunly.
[Footnote D: A dull glare on the horizon, from the immense
masses of ice.]
"We kep' sight o' th' other schooner, most-partly; an' when we didn'
keep it, we'd get it agen. So one night 't was a beautiful moonlight
night: I think I never sid a moon so bright as that moon was; an' such
lovely sights a body 'ouldn' think could be! Little islands, an' bigger,
agen, there was, on every hand, shinun so bright, wi' great,
awful-lookun shadows! an' then the sea all black, between! They did look
so beautiful as ef a body could go an' bide on 'em, in a manner; an' the
sky was jes' so blue, an' the stars all shinun out, an' the moon all so
bright! I never looked upon the like. An' so I stood in the bows; an' I
don' know ef I thowt o' God first, but I was thinkun o' my girl that I
was troth-plight wi' then, an' a many things, when all of a sudden we
comed upon the hardest ice we'd a-had; an' into it; an' then, wi' pokun
an' haulun, workun along. An' there was a cry goed up,--like the cry of
a babby, 't was, an' I thowt mubbe 't was a somethun had got upon one o'
they islands; but I said, agen, 'How could it?' an' one John Harris said
'e thowt 't was a bird. Then another man (Moffis 'e's name was) started
off wi' what they calls a gaff, ('t is somethun like a short boat-hook,)
over the bows, an' run; an' we sid un strike, an' strike, an' we hard it
go wump! wump! an' the cry goun up so tarrible feelun, seemed as ef 'e
was murderun some poor wild Inden child 'e'd a-found, (on'y mubbe 'e
wouldn' do so bad as that: but there've a-been tarrible bloody, cruel
work wi' Indens in my time,) an' then 'e comed back wi' a white-coat[E]
over 'e's shoulder; an' the poor thing wasn' dead, but cried an' soughed
like any poor little babby."
[Footnote E: A young seal.]
The young wife was very restless at this point, and, though she did not
look up, I saw her tears. The stout fisherman smoothed out the net a
little upon his knee, and drew it in closer, and heaved a great sigh: he
did not look at his hearers.
"When 'e throwed it down, it walloped, an' cried, an' soughed,--an' its
poor eyes blinded wi' blood! ('Ee sees, Sir," said the planter, by way
of excusing his tenderness, "they swiles were friends to I, after.)
Dear, oh, dear! I couldn' stand it; for 'e _might_ ha' killed un',
an' so 'e goes for a quart o' rum, for fetchun first swile, an' I went
an' put the poor thing out o' pain. I didn' want to look at they
beautiful islands no more, somehow. Bumby it comed on thick, an' then
snow.
"Nex' day swiles bawlun[F] every way, poor things! (I knowed their
voice, now,) but 't was blowun a gale o' wind, an' we under bare poles,
an' snow comun agen, so fast as ever it could come: but out the men
'ould go, all mad like, an' my watch goed, an' so I mus' go. (I didn'
think what I was goun to!) The skipper never said no; but to keep near
the schooner, an' fetch in first we could, close by; an' keep near the
schooner.
[Footnote F: Technical word for the crying of the seals.]
"So we got abroad, an' the men that was wi' me jes' began to knock right
an' left: 't was heartless to see an' hear it. They laved two old uns
an' a young whelp to me, as they runned by. The mother did cry like a
Christen, in a manner, an' the big tears 'ould run down, an' they 'ould
both be so brave for the poor whelp that 'ould cuddle up an' cry; an the
mother looked this way an' that way, wi' big, pooty, black eyes, to see
what was the manun of it, when they'd never doned any harm in God's
world that 'E made, an' would n', even ef you killed 'em: on'y the poor
mother baste ketched my gaff, that I was goun to strike wi', betwixt her
teeth, an' I could n' get it away. 'T was n' like fishun! (I was
weak-hearted like: I s'pose 't was wi' what was comun that I did n'
know.) Then comed a hail, all of a sudden, from the schooner; (we had n'
been gone more 'n a five minutes, ef't was so much,--no, not more 'n a
three;) but I was glad to hear it come then, however: an' so every man
ran, one afore t' other. There the schooner was, tearun through all, an'
we runnun for dear life. I failed among the slob,[G] and got out agen.
'T was another man pushun agen me doned it. I could n' 'elp myself from
goun in, an' when I got out I was astarn of all, an' there was the
schooner carryun on, right through to clear water! So, hold of a bight
o' line, or anything! an' they swung up in over bows an' sides! an'
swash! she struck the water, an' was out o' sight in a minute, an' the
snow drivun as ef't would bury her, an' a man laved behind on a pan of
ice, an' the great black say two fathom ahead, an' the storm-wind blowun
'im into it!"
[Footnote G: Broken ice, between large cakes, or against the
shore.]
The planter stopped speaking. We had all gone along so with the story,
that the stout seafarer, as he wrought the whole scene up about us,
seemed instinctively to lean back and brace his feet against the ground,
and clutch his net. The young woman looked up, this time; and the cold
snow-blast seemed to howl through that still summer's noon, and the
terrific ice-fields and hills to be crashing against the solid earth
that we sat upon, and all things round changed to the far-off stormy
ocean and boundless frozen wastes.
The planter began to speak again:--
"So I failed right down upon th' ice, sayun, 'Lard, help me! Lard, help
me!' an' crawlun away, wi' the snow in my face, (I was afeard, a'most,
to stand,) 'Lard, help me! Lard, help me!'
"'T was n' all hard ice, but many places lolly;[H] an once I goed right
down wi' my hand-wristès an' my armes in cold water, part-ways to the
bottom o' th' ocean; and a'most head-first into un, as I'd a-been in wi'
my legs afore: but, thanks be to God! 'E helped me out of un, but colder
an' wetter agen.
[Footnote H: Snow in water, not yet frozen, but looking like
the white ice.]
"In course I wanted to folly the schooner; so I runned up along, a
little ways from the edge, an' then I runned down along: but 't was all
great black ocean outside, an' she gone miles an' miles away; an' by two
hours' time, even ef she'd come to, itself, an' all clear weather, I
could n' never see her; an' ef she could come back, she could n' never
find me, more'n I could find any one o' they flakes o' snow. The
schooner was gone, an' I was laved out o' the world!
"Bumby, when I got on the big field agen, I stood up on my feet, an' I
sid that was my ship! She had n' e'er a sail, an' she had n' e'er a
spar, an' she had n' e'er a compass, an' she had n' e'er a helm, an' she
had n' no hold, an' she had n' no cabin. I could n' sail her, nor I
could n' steer her, nor I could n' anchor her, nor bring her to, but she
would go, wind or calm, an' she'd never come to port, but out in th'
ocean she'd go to pieces! I sid 't was so, an' I must take it, an' do my
best wi' it. 'T was jest a great, white, frozen raft, driftun bodily
away, wi' storm blowun over, an' current runnun under, an' snow comun
down so thick, an' a poor Christen laved all alone wi' it. 'T would
drift as long as anything was of it, an' 't was n' likely there'd be any
life in the poor man by time th' ice goed to nawthun; an' the swiles
'ould swim back agen up to the Nothe!
"I was th' only one, seemunly, to be cast out alive, an' wi' the dearest
maid in the world (so I thought) waitun for me. I s'pose 'ee might ha'
knowed somethun better, Sir; but I was n' larned, an' I ran so fast as
ever I could up the way I thowt home was, an' I groaned, an' groaned,
an' shook my handès, an' then I thowt, 'Mubbe I may be goun wrong way.'
So I groaned to the Lard to stop the snow. Then I on'y ran this way an'
that way, an' groaned for snow to knock off.[I] I knowed we was driftun
mubbe a twenty leagues a day, and anyways I wanted to be doun what I
could, keepun up over th' Ice so well as I could, Noofundland-ways, an'
I might come to somethun,--to a schooner or somethun; anyways I'd get up
so near as I could. So I looked for a lee. I s'pose 'ee'd ha' knowed
better what to do, Sir," said the planter, here again appealing to me,
and showing by his question that he understood me, in spite of my
pea-jacket.
[Footnote I: To stop.]
I had been so carried along with his story that I had felt as if I were
the man on the Ice, myself, and assured him, that, though I could get
along pretty well on land, _and could even do something at
netting_, I should have been very awkward in his place.
"Wull, Sir, I looked for a lee. ('T wouldn' ha' been so cold, to say
cold, ef it hadn' a-blowed so tarrible hard.) First step, I stumbled
upon somethun in the snow, seemed soft, like a body! Then I comed all
together, hopun an' fearun an' all together. Down I goed upon my knees
to un, an' I smoothed away the snow, all tremblun, an' there was a moan,
as ef 't was a-livun.
"'O Lard!' I said, 'who's this? Be this one of our men?'
"But how could it? So I scraped the snow away, but 't was easy to see 't
was smaller than a man. There wasn' no man on that dreadful place but
me! Wull, Sir, 't was a poor swile, wi' blood runnun all under; an' I
got my cuffs[J] an' sleeves all red wi' it. It looked like a
fellow-creatur's blood, a'most, an' I was a lost man, left to die away
out there in th' Ice, an' I said, 'Poor thing! poor thing!' an' I didn'
mind about the wind, or th' ice, or the schooner goun away from me afore
a gale, (I _wouldn'_ mind about 'em,) an' a poor lost Christen may
show a good turn to a hurt thing, ef 't was on'y a baste. So I smoothed
away the snow wi' my cuffs, an' I sid 't was a poor thing wi' her whelp
close by her, an' her tongue out, as ef she'd a-died fondlun an' lickun
it; an' a great puddle o' blood,--it looked tarrible heartless, when I
was so nigh to death, an' wasn' hungry. An' then I feeled a stick, an' I
thowt, 'It may be a help to me,' an' so I pulled un, an' it wouldn'
come, an' I found she was lyun on it; so I hauled agen, an', when it
comed, 't was my gaff the poor baste had got away from me, an' got it
under her, an' she was a-lyun on it. Some o' the men, when they was
runnun for dear life, must ha' struck 'em, out o' madness like, an'
laved 'em to die where they was. 'T was the whelp wasn' quite dead.
'Ee'll think 't was foolish, Sir, but it seemed as though they was
somethun to me, an' I'd a-lost the last friendly thing there was.
[Footnote J: Mittens.]
"I found a big hummock an' sheltered under it, standun on my feet, wi
nawthun to do but think, an' think, an' pray to God; an' so I doned. I
couldn' help feelun to God then, surely. Nawthun to do, an' no place to
go, tull snow cleared away; but jes' drift wi' the great Ice down from
the Nothe, away down over the say, a sixty mile a day, mubbe. I wasn' a
good Christen, an' I couldn' help a-thinkun o' home an' she I was
troth-plight wi', an' I doubled over myself an' groaned,--I couldn' help
it: but bumby it comed into me to say my prayers, an' it seemed as thof
she was askun me to pray, (an' she _was_ good, Sir, al'ays,) an' I
seemed all opened, somehow, an' I knowed how to pray."
While the words were coming tenderly from the weather-beaten fisherman,
I could not help being moved, and glanced over toward the daughter's
seat; but she was gone, and, turning round, I saw her going quietly,
almost stealthily, and very quickly, _toward the cove_.
The father gave no heed to her leaving, but went on with his tale:--
"Then the wind began to fall down, an' the snow knocked off altogether,
an' the sun comed out; an' I sid th' Ice, field-ice an' icebargs, an'
every one of 'em flashun up as ef they'd kendled up a bonfire, but no
sign of a schooner! no sign of a schooner! nor no sign o' man's douns,
but on'y ice, every way, high an' low, an' some places black water,
in-among; an' on'y the poor swiles bawlun all over, an' I standun
amongst 'em.
"While I was lookun out, I sid a great icebarg (they calls 'em) a
quarter of a mile away, or thereabouts, standun up,--one end a twenty
fathom out o' water, an' about a forty fathom across, wi' hills like,
an' houses,--an' then, jest as ef 'e was alive an' had tooked a notion
in 'e'sself, seemunly, all of a sudden 'e rared up, an' turned over an'
over, wi' a tarrible thunderun noise, an' comed right on, breakun
everything an' throwun up great seas: 't was frightsome for a lone body
away out among 'em! I stood an' looked at un, but then agen I thowt I
may jes' so well be goun to thick ice an' over Noofundland-ways a piece,
so well as I could. So I said my bit of a prayer, an' told Un I could n'
help myself; an' I made my confession how bad I'd been, an' I was sorry,
an' ef 'E'd be so pitiful an' forgive me; an' ef I mus' loss my life, ef
'E'd be so good as make me a good Christen first,--an' make _they_
happy, in course.
"So then I started; an' first I goed to where my gaff was, by the
mother-swile an' her whelp. There was swiles every two or three yards
a'most, old uns an' young uns, all round, everywhere; an' I feeled
shamed in a manner: but I got my gaff, an' cleaned un, an' then, in
God's name, I took the big swile, that was dead by its dead whelp, an'
hauled it away, where the t' other poor things could n' si' me, an' I
sculped[K] it, an' took the pelt;--for I thowt I'd wear un, now the poor
dead thing did n' want to make oose of un no more,--an' partly becase't
was sech a lovun thing. An' so I set out, walkun this way, for a spurt,
an' then t' other way, keepun up mostly a Nor-norwest, so well as I
could: sometimes away round th' open, an' more times round a lump of
ice, an' more times, agen, off from one an' on to another, every minute.
I did n' feel hungry, for I drinked fresh water off th' ice. No
schooner! no schooner!
[Footnote K: Skinned.]
"Bumby the sun was goun down:'t was slow work feelun my way along, an' I
did n' want to look about: but then agen I thowt God 'ad made it to be
sid; an' so I come to, an' turned all round, an' looked; an' surely it
seemed like another world, someway,'t was so beautiful,--yellow, an'
different sorts o' red, like the sky itself in a manner, an' flashun
like glass. So then it comed night: an' I thowt I should n' go to bed,
an' I may forget my prayers, an' so I'd, mubbe, best say 'em right away;
an' so I doned: 'Lighten our darkness,' and others we was oosed to say:
an' it comed into my mind the Lard said to Saint Peter, 'Why did n' 'ee
have faith?' when there was nawthun on the water for un to go on; an' I
had ice under foot,--'t was but frozen water, but't was frozen,--an' I
thanked Un.
"I could n' help thinkun o' Brigus an' them I'd laved in it, an' then I
prayed for 'em; an' I could n' help cryun, a'most: but then I give over
agen, an' would n' think, ef I could help it; on'y tryun to say an odd
psalm, all through singun-psalms an' other, for I knowed a many of 'em
by singun wi' Patience, on'y now I cared more about 'em: I said that
one,--
'Sech as in ships an' brickle barks
Into the seas descend,
Their merchantun, through fearful floods,
To compass an' to end:
They men are force-put to behold
The Lard's works, what they be;
An' in the dreadful deep the same
Most marvellous they see.'
An' I said a many more, (I can't be accountable how many I said,) an'
same uns many times over: for I would keep on; an' 'ould sometimes sing
'em very loud in my poor way.
"A poor baste (a silver fox 'e was) comed an' looked at me; an' when I
turned round, he walked away a piece, an' then 'e comed back, an'
looked.
"So I found a high piece, wi' a wall of ice atop for shelter, ef it
comed on to blow; an' so I stood, an' said, an' sung, I knowed well I
was on'y driftun away.
"It was tarrible lonely in the night, when night comed: it's no use! 'T
was tarrible lonely: but I 'ouldn' think, ef I could help it; an' I
prayed a bit, an' kep' up my psalms, an' varses out o' the Bible, I'd
a-larned. I had n' a-prayed for sleep, but for wakun all night, an'
there I was, standun.
"The moon was out agen, so bright; an' all the hills of ice shinun up to
her; an' stars twinklun, so busy, all over; an' No'ther' Lights goun up
wi' a faint blaze, seemunly, from th' ice, an' meetun up aloft; an'
sometimes a great groanun, an' more times tarrible loud shriekun! There
was great white fields, an' great white hills, like countries, comun
down to be destroyed; an' some great bargs a-goun faster, an' tearun
through, breakun others to pieces; an' the groanun an' screechun,--ef
all the dead that ever was, wi' their white clothès---But no!" said the
stout fisherman, recalling himself from gazing, as he seemed to be, on
the far-off ghastly scene, in memory.
"No!--an' thank 'E's marcy, I'm sittun by my own room. 'E tooked me off:
but 't was a dreadful sight,--it's no use,--ef a body'd let 'e'sself
think! I sid a great black bear, an' hard un growl; an' 't was feelun,
like, to hear un so bold an' so stout, among all they dreadful things,
an' bumby the time 'ould come when 'e couldn' save 'e'sself, do what 'e
woul'.
"An' more times 't was all still: on'y swiles bawlun, all over. Ef it
hadn' a-been for they poor swiles, how could I stan' it? Many's the one
I'd a-ketched, day-time, an' talked to un, an' patted un on the head, as
ef they'd a-been dogs by the door, like; an' they'd oose to shut their
eyes, an' draw their poor foolish faces together. It seemed
neighbor-like to have some live thing.
"So I kep' awake, sayun an' singun, an' it wasn' very cold; an'
so--first thing I knowed, I started, an' there I was lyun in a heap; an'
I must have been asleep, an' didn' know how 't was, nor how long I'd
a-been so: an' some sort o' baste started away, an' 'e must have waked
me up; I couldn' rightly see what 't was, wi' sleepiness: an' then I
hard a sound, sounded like breakers; an' that waked me fairly. 'T was
like a lee-shore; an' 't was a comfort to think o' land, ef 't was on'y
to be wrecked on itself: but I didn' go, an' I stood an' listened to un;
an' now an' agen I'd walk a piece, back an' forth, an' back an' forth;
an' so I passed a many, many longsome hours, seemunly, tull night goed
down tarrible slowly, an' it comed up day o' t' other side: an' there
wasn' no land; nawthun but great mountains meltun an' breakun up, an'
fields wastun away. I sid 't was a rollun barg made the noise like
breakers, throwun up great seas o' both sides of un; no sight nor sign
o' shore, nor ship, but dazun white,--enough to blind a body,--an' I
knowed 't was all floatun away, over the say. Then I said my prayers,
an' tooked a drink o' water, an' set out agen for Nor-norwest: 't was
all I could do. Sometimes snow, an' more times fair agen; but no sign o'
man's things, an' no sign o' land, on'y white ice an' black water; an'
ef a schooner wasn' into un a'ready, 't wasn' likely they woul', for we
was gettun furder an' furder away. Tired I was wi' goun, though I hadn'
walked more 'n a twenty or thirty mile, mubbe, an' it all comun down so
fast as I could go up, an' faster, an' never stoppun! 'T was a tarrible
long journey up over the driftun ice, at sea! So, then I went on a high
bit to wait tull all was done: I thowt 't would be last to melt, an'
mubbe, I thowt, 'e may capsize wi' me, when I didn' know (for I don' say
I was stout-hearted): an' I prayed Un to take care o' them I loved; an'
the tears comed. Then I felt somethun tryun to turn me round like, an'
it seemed as ef _she_ was doun it, somehow, an' she seemed to be
very nigh, somehow, an' I didn' look.
"After a bit, I got up to look out where most swiles was, for company,
while I was livun: an' the first look struck me a'most like a bullet!
There I sid a sail! _'T was_ a sail, an' 't was like heaven openun,
an' God settun her down there. About three mile away she was, to
nothe'ard, in th' Ice.
"I could ha' sid, at first look, what schooner't was; but I did n' want
to look hard at her. I kep' my peace, a spurt, an' then I runned an'
bawled out, 'Glory be to God!' an' then I stopped, an' made proper
thanks to Un. An' there she was, same as ef I'd a-walked off from her an
hour ago! It felt so long as ef I'd been livun years, an' they would n'
know me, sca'ce. Somehow I did n' think I could come up wi' her.
"I started, in the name o' God, wi' all my might, an' went, an'
went,--'t was a five mile, wi' goun round,--an' got her, thank God! 'T
was n' the Baccaloue, (I sid that long before,) 't was t' other
schooner, the Sparrow, repairun damages they 'd got day before. So that
kep' 'em there, an' I'd a-been took from one an' brought to t' other.
"I could n' do a hand's turn tull we got into the Bay agen,--I was so
clear beat out. The Sparrow kep' her men, an' fotch home about
thirty-eight hundred swiles, an' a poor man off th' Ice: but they, poor
fellows, that I went out wi', never comed no more; an' I never went
agen.
"I kep' the skin o' the poor baste, Sir: that's 'e on my cap."
When the planter had fairly finished his tale, it was a little while
before I could teach my eyes to see the things about me in their places.
The slow-going sail, outside, I at first saw as the schooner that
brought away the lost man from the Ice; the green of the earth would
not, at first, show itself through the white with which the fancy
covered it; and at first I could not quite feel that the ground was fast
under my feet. I even mistook one of my own men (the sight of whom was
to warn me that I was wanted elsewhere) for one of the crew of the
schooner Sparrow of a generation ago.
I got the tale and its scene gathered away, presently, inside my mind,
and shook myself into a present association with surrounding things, and
took my leave. I went away the more gratified that I had a chance of
lifting my cap to a matron, dark-haired and comely, (who, I was sure, at
a glance, had once been the maiden of Benjie Westham's "troth-plight,")
and receiving a handsome curtsy in return.
* * * * *
FREMONT'S HUNDRED DAYS IN MISSOURI.
III.
THE FORCED MARCH TO SPRINGFIELD.
_Bolivar, October 26th_. Zagonyi's success has roused the
enthusiasm of the army. The old stagers took it coolly, but the green
hands revealed their excitement by preparing for instant battle. Pistols
were oiled and reloaded, and swords sharpened. We did all this a month
ago, before leaving St. Louis. We then expected a battle, and went forth
with the shadow and the sunshine of that expectation upon our hearts;
but up to this time we have not seen a shot fired in earnest. Now the
blast of war blows in our ears, and we instinctively "stiffen the sinews
and summon up the blood."
Captain H., the young chevalier of the staff, whom we have named _Le
Beau Capitaine_, went this morning to St. Louis with intelligence of
the victory. He has ninety miles to ride before midnight, to catch
to-morrow's train.
Under the influence of the excitement which prevailed, we were on
horseback this morning long before it was necessary, when the General
sent us word that the staff might go forward, and he would overtake us.
The gay and brilliant cavalcade which marched out of Jefferson City is
destroyed,--the maimed and bleeding Guard is reposing a few miles south
of Bolivar,--the detachment which was left at head-quarters has gone on
to join the main body,--and the staff, broken into small parties,
straggles along the road. A more beautiful day never delighted the
earth. The atmosphere is warm, the sky cloudless, and the distance is
filled with a soft dreamy haze, which veils, but does not conceal, the
purple hills and golden forests.
A few miles south of our last night's camp we came out upon a large
prairie, called the Twenty-Five Mile Prairie. It is an undulating plain,
seven miles wide and twenty-five long. It was the intention to
concentrate the army here. A more favorable position for reviewing and
manoeuvring a large force cannot be found. But the plan has been
changed. We must hasten to Springfield, lest the Rebels seize the
place, capture White and our wounded, and throw a cloud over Zagonyi's
brilliant victory.
Passing from the prairie, we entered a broad belt of timber, and soon
reached a fine stream. We drew rein at a farmhouse on the top of the
river-bank, where we found a pleasant Union family. The farmer came out,
and, thinking Colonel Eaton was the General, offered him two superb
apples, large enough for foot-balls. He was disappointed to find his
mistake, and to be compelled to withdraw the proffered gift. Sigel
encamped here last night;, and the _débris_ of his camp-fires
checker the hill-side and the flats along the margin of the creek. After
waiting an hour, the General not coming up, Colonel Eaton and myself set
out alone over a road which was crowded with Sigel's wagons. Everything
bears witness to the extraordinary energy and efficiency of that
officer. This morning he started before day, and he will be in
Springfield by noon to-morrow. His train is made up of materials which
would drive most generals to despair. There are mule-teams, and
ox-teams, and in some cases horses, mules, and oxen hitched together.
There are army-wagons, box-wagons, lumber-wagons, hay-racks, buggies,
carriages,--in fact, every kind of animal and every description of
vehicle which could be found in the country. Most of our
division-commanders would have refused to leave camp with such a train;
but Sigel has made it answer his purpose, and here he is, fifty miles in
advance of any other officer, tearing after Price.
We were jogging painfully over the incumbered road, and through clouds
of dust, when an officer rode up in great haste, and asked for Dr. C.,
who was needed at the camp of the Guards. By reason of the broken order
in which the staff rode to-day, he could not be found. For two mortal
hours unlucky aides-de-camp dashed to the front and the rear, and
scoured the country for five miles upon the flanks, visiting the
farm-houses in search of the missing surgeon. At last he was found, and
hurried on to the relief of the Guard. At this moment the General came
up, and, to our astonishment, Zagonyi was riding beside him, bearing
upon his trim person no mark of yesterday's fatigue and danger. The
Major fell behind, and rode into Bolivar with me. On the way we met
Lieutenant Maythenyi of the Guard.
Our camp is on the farm of a member of the State legislature who is now
serving under Price. His white cottage and well-ordered farm-buildings
are surrounded by rich meadows, bearing frequent groups of noble trees;
the fences are in good condition, and the whole place wears an air of
thrift and prosperity which must be foreign to Missouri even in her best
estate.
_Springfield, October 28th_. Few of those who endured the labor of
yesterday will forget the march into Springfield. At midnight of
Saturday, the Sharp-shooters were sent on in wagons, and at two in the
morning the Benton Cadets started, with orders to march that day to
Springfield, thirty miles. Their departure broke the repose of the camp.
To add to the confusion, a report was spread that the General intended
to start at daybreak, and that we must have breakfast at four o'clock
and be ready for the saddle at six. This programme was carried out. Long
before day our servants called us; fires were lighted, and breakfast
eaten by starlight. Before dawn the wagons were packed and horses
saddled. But the General had no intention of going so early; the report
had its origin in the uneasy brain of some officer who probably thought
the General ought to leave at daybreak. Some of the old heads paid no
attention to the report, or did not hear it, and they were deep in the
pleasures of the morning nap while we poor fellows were shivering over
our breakfast.
Colonel Wyman reported himself at Bolivar, having marched from Rolla and
beaten the Rebels in three engagements. The General set out at nine
o'clock for our thirty-mile ride. The black horse fell into his usual
scrambling gait, and we pounded along uneasily after him. As we passed
through Bolivar, the inhabitants came into the streets and greeted us
with cheers and the waving of handkerchiefs,--a degree of interest which
is not often exhibited. Fording a small stream, we came into Wyman's
camp, and thence upon a long, rolling prairie. An hour's ride brought us
to the place where the Guard encamped the night before. The troops had
left, but the wounded officers were still in a neighboring house,
waiting for our ambulances. Those who were able to walk came out to see
the General. He received them with marked kindness. At times like this,
he has a simple grace and poetry of expression and a tenderness of
manner which are very winning. He spoke a few words to each of the brave
fellows, which brought smiles to their faces and tears into their eyes.
Next came our turn, and we were soon listening to the incidents of the
fearful fray. None of them are severely wounded, except Kennedy, and he
will probably lose an arm. We saw them all placed in the ambulances, and
then fell in behind the black pacer.
A short distance farther on, a very amusing scene occurred. The road in
front was nearly filled by a middle-aged woman, fat enough to have been
the original of some of the pictures which are displayed over the booths
at a county fair.
"Are you Gin'ral Freemount?" she shouted, her loud voice husky with
rage.
"Yes," replied the General in a low tone, somewhat abashed at the
formidable obstruction in his path, and occupied in restraining the
black pacer, who was as much frightened at the huge woman as he could
have been at a park of artillery.
"Waal, you're the man I want to see. I'm a widder. I wus born in Old
Kentuck, and am a Union, and allers wus a Union, and will be a Union to
the eend, clear grit."
She said this with startling earnestness and velocity of utterance, and
paused, the veins in her face swollen almost to bursting. The black
pacer bounded from one side of the road to the other, throwing the whole
party into confusion.
The General raised his cap and asked,--
"What is the matter, my good woman?"
"Matter, Gin'ral! Ther's enough the matter. I've allers gi'n the sogers
all they wanted. I gi'n 'em turkeys and chickens and eggs and butter and
bread. And I never charged 'em anything for it. They tuk all my corn,
and I never said nuthing. I allers treated 'em well, for I'm Union, and
so wus my man, who died more nor six yeah ago."
She again paused, evidently for no reason except to escape a stroke of
apoplexy.
"But tell me what you want now. I will see to it that you have justice,"
interrupted the General.
"You see, Gin'ral, last night some sogers come and tuk my
ox-chains,--two on 'em,--all I've got,--and I can't buy no more in these
war-times. I can't do any work without them chains; they'd 'a' better uv
tuk my teams with 'em, too."
"How much were your ox-chains worth," said the General, laughing.
"Waal now," answered the fat one, moderating her tone, "they're wuth a
good deal jes' now. The war has made such things dreffle deah. The big
one wus the best I ever see; bought it last yeah, up at Hinman's store
in Bolivar; that chain was wuth--waal now--Ho, Jim! ho, Dick! come
y'ere! Gin'ral Freemount wants to know how much them ox-chains wus
wath."
A lazy negro and a lazier white man, the latter whittling a piece of
cedar, walked slowly from the house to the road, and, leaning against
the fence, began in drawling tones to discuss the value of the
ox-chains, how much they cost, how much it would take to buy new ones in
these times. One thought "may-be four dollars wud do," but the other was
sure they could not be bought for less than five. There was no promise
of a decision, and the black pacer was floundering about in a perfect
agony of fear. At last the General drew out a gold eagle and gave it to
the woman, asking,--
"Is that enough?"