THE JESUIT.
Retaining ten thousand men under his own command, Count Tilly
immediately despatched the Counts of Carlstein and Merodé, with the
remainder of his force, along the banks of the Elbe, with orders to
turn the flank of all King Christian's outposts; after which they
were all to reunite, and advance again to the conquest of the Danish
isles.
Devereaux's Irish regiment occupied Lauenburg, where the German
pioneers buried the dead in great trenches, and many were quite warm,
with the blood still oozing from their wounds when flung in. The
vast depth to which they dug these pits excited my surprise, and I
was informed by Count Kœningheim that it was "to prevent any
vampires who might be among the slain ascending to upper earth;" for
I found that, from the frightful atrocities of the Imperial troops,
they had the most implicit belief in these imaginary monsters, and
supposed that many were in their ranks.
Several prisoners, who had incurred Tilly's displeasure for various
reasons, were now selected by the sergeant of the quarter-guard, and
put aside for hanging at sunset. To my horror, I found _myself_
placed among these doomed men! I remonstrated with the sergeant with
all the earnestness of one whose life depended upon his own
exertions, assuring him that I had done nothing worthy of a death so
detestable.
"Very well," said he coolly; "make some interest with an officer, and
we may shoot you instead--forward, escort!" and we were marched to a
small open shed, which stood under some large trees that grew near
the river. Against one of these trees stood a ladder, and Bandolo,
who on this occasion had constituted himself assistant to the
provost-marshal, superintended the arrangement of certain cords,
having ugly loops thereon, from the branches of the trees. My fellow
prisoners were six Croats and two Germans. They were all tied with
cords; the Croats sat on the ground in sullen silence, glaring at
their guards from under their fur caps and savage elf-locks; the two
Germans had smoked themselves into a state of dreamy indifference,
and sat with their lack-lustre eyes fixed on the flowing river.
Around us, the soldiers of the escort were quietly cleaning their
arms, rubbing down their horses, and cooking their rations on a large
fire (composed of tables, chairs, &c., taken from a neighbouring
house), previous to marching.
Though I could face death in any form when encountering him in the
ranks, with the colours above and my comrades beside me, to die thus
was a very different thing. To be left hanging like a dog or a thief
from the branch of a tree (though the sergeant assured me "it was a
most respectable gibbet")--I, a gentleman and soldier, in the manly
garb of my native country--to die thus--and to die without a crime!
The reflection was intolerable!
But there was not one to whom I could apply for mercy or for succour.
Count Carlstein had marched, and Kœningheim, had gone, no one knew
whither.
Devereux's Irishmen cared nothing for me. I was not their
countryman; besides, I had not the means of communicating with them.
As the day wore on, with an agony which cannot now be written, I
watched the summer sun verging to the westward, and shedding along,
the whole bosom of the Elbe its bright evening beams, throwing far
across the river and its bordering meadows the lengthening shadows of
every spire, and house, and tree; for as still, as glassy, and
waveless as ever, the stream flowed on towards the German Sea--the
same sea that washed the Scottish shore. The sun sank lower and
lower; the days were then long, and the landscape was flat; yet it
was within an hour of setting.
Only an hour! .......
I sprang up, and walked to and fro with an air of perturbation which
I could not conceal; but which my phlegmatic German guard, viewed
with the most perfect indifference. A torrent of bitter thoughts
poured through my heart; I had quitted a home where none regretted
me, with the hope that all I left behind should one day be proud of
my actions, and might boast of my glorious death if I fell in battle
or siege--but now the noose was waving over my head! I felt that it
was impossible for me to meet such a death, and so unmerited, with
resolution or with resignation, and without a struggle--a desperate
struggle--if not for liberty at least for revenge. It was better, a
thousand times better, to die sword in hand, and be hewed to pieces,
than to be hung like a pitiful marauder.
A weapon! I saw none save in the hands of the strong guard which
surrounded us, laughing and jesting through their bushy mustaches
just as if nothing unusual was to happen, and nine poor devils were
not to be hanged at all.
While full of these bitter thoughts, I perceived a man whom I knew by
his attire to be a priest of the order of Jesus--one of the many who
followed the army of Tilly--walking slowly towards the trees whereon
the fatal nooses were dangling, and at the foot of which the Croats
and Germans were seated in sullen and listless apathy.
He stooped down and addressed them all in succession; but they
cursed, and bade him begone "to the devil." Then he paused, with the
air of one who conferred with himself whether it were worth while to
continue so ungrateful a task; and, after some hesitation, he
approached and gazed at me from head to foot.
His thin, tall figure is yet before me. Worn evidently by asceticism
and conventual severity, he stooped a little forward; his forehead
was broad and impending; his features were harsh, while a prominence
of mouth and chin indicated more firmness of purpose than mildness
and benignity--yet, in many respects, his face belied the good man's
disposition. His eyes--keen, penetrating and hard in
expression--inspired awe, and commanded respect from all on whom he
bent them; but their decided expression belied the humility with
which he crossed his bony hands upon his bosom, and humbly bowed his
head even unto the most humble.
Educated a Presbyterian, and being the soldier of a Protestant king,
I gazed with some distrust at this brother of that order whose name
excites so many jealous feelings, and which has been so obnoxious to
the princes of Europe generally; for in my own time I have seen the
Jesuits, as the result of their intrigues, expelled forcibly from
Venice and Prague, from Naples and Flanders.
He halted before me, crossed his hands upon his breast, and slightly
bent his lofty figure.
"Your servant, reverend sir," said I, in my own language.
"God be with you, my son," he answered in the same. I had used it
inadvertently, but now my attention was excited, and I gazed at him
inquiringly. "I am sorry," he continued, "to see a Scottish
gentleman in this sad predicament."
"I fear me, good sir, your regrets will not mend the matter much," I
replied sourly, for the most intense hatred of the Imperialists was
swelling in my breast; "you cannot do any thing for me, I presume."
"Perhaps not--I am only poor father Ignatius."
"The confessor of Count Tilly!" I exclaimed, thunderstruck; "pardon
me, sir--I have often heard of you."
"For little that is good--if in the Danish camp."
"Nay, sir--even there I have heard you spoken of with respect, as the
possessor of a thousand virtues."
"Though a Jesuit--'tis wonderful! Though I am known as Ignatius in
the Order of Jesus, at home, in poor old Scotland, I was kent but as
David Daidle, the neer-do-weel o' the parish schule, and son o' auld
Davie o' the Daidleysheugh, at the Rollo's Craig. Ye see, gude sir,
I've no forgotten our auld Scottish whilk my puir mither taucht me."
"How!" I exclaimed, clasping both his hands in mine; "are you the
brother of my old Dominie Daidle, at home in dear Cromartie?"
"The same--the same!" he sighed, with a flushing cheek and a kindling
eye; "my brother did become a dominie; but I, with James of
Jerusalem, and Father Leslie, now superior of the Scottish college at
Douay, became followers of Ignatius Loyola. But my puir
brother--when saw ye him last?"
"But a few months ago; the poor dominie plays the fiddle as well as
ever, and still leads the choir of our parish kirk. I promised to
bring him from Germany the object of his greatest ambition--a metal
horologue, which he is not likely to receive, however," I added,
glancing at the setting sun, and the noose which dangled over my head.
"Young gentleman, it seems to me as if your face was familiar to me,
and your voice, too; yet I must have left old Scotland, years before
you were born. You are a son of our father's laird and patron, Rollo
of Craigrollo?"
"Compelled to become a soldier of fortune, because of a certain
unlucky heirloom----"
"The Rollo spoon," replied the Jesuit, a broad smile spreading over
his usually grave features; "I remember well that quaint heirloom of
old Sir Ringan; I remember too, with gratitude, the many favours your
family have for ages bestowed on mine, the hereditary vassals of your
house. Oh! I would gladly repay but one of these, if in my
power----"
"You can more than repay them all, sir, for indeed you owe us
nothing. If we did service to the dominie's family, they did good
service to ours. Whose sword hewed a farther passage into Huntly's
pikemen at Glenlivat, than old Davie Daidle's? I am to be hanged in
ten minutes--hanged like a dog, because I have done my devoir as a
soldier against these rascally Imperialists, and would not betray to
them my kinsmen, the M'Farquhars. If you can save me----"
"Save you!--I can and will----"
"There is but little time, then; for, by my soul, yonder come Bandolo
the bravo, and the provost-marshal with his guard and assistants,
carrying the fatal ladder, by which they mean to accommodate us in
mounting the branches of these high trees."
"Follow me, Mr. Rollo, and let me see who will dare to interrupt you."
The soldiers fell back and presented arms to this well-known and
formidable priest, who was as familiar to the armies of Tilly as the
terrible Father du Tremblay was then known in those of France, but in
a very different way--for every good, and not for every evil. Like
his master's, the will and command of Ignatius d'Eydel (for so had
they rendered his homely name) were as much law to the soldiers as if
the cruel thin lips of Tilly had expressed them.
As we passed the provost, he respectfully saluted the priest who
stood by my side, in his long flowing garments. Bandolo scowled at
me with rage and disappointment, but was compelled to pass on,
leaving me untouched. I remembered the cruel murder of poor Dandy
Dreghorn, and could scarcely keep my hands from his throat; but hoped
that an hour of retribution was coming.
After walking in silence along the road for some hundred yards, on
looking back I saw the convulsed bodies of my eight recent companions
dangling from the trees, while the provost and his guard retired
leisurely towards their quarters in the town of Lauenburg.