"FOR ENGLAND!"
Through the whole night the battle still raged furiously. The enemy
fought on with reckless, unparalleled daring. Chasseurs and Zouaves,
Cuirassiers, Dragoons, and infantry from the Loire and the Rhone
struggled desperately, contesting every step, and confident of ultimate
victory.
But the enemy had at last, by the splendid tactics of the defenders,
been forced into a gradually contracting square, bounded by Dorking and
Guildford in the north, and Horsham and Billinghurst in the south, and
soon after midnight, with a concentric movement from each of the four
corners, British Regulars and Volunteers advanced steadily upon the foe,
surrounding and slaughtering them.
The horrors of that night were frightful; the loss of life on every hand
enormous. Britannia had husbanded her full strength until this critical
moment; for now, when the fate of her Empire hung upon a single thread,
she sent forth her valiant sons, who fell upon those who had desecrated
and destroyed their homes, and wreaked a terrible vengeance.
Through the dark, sultry hours this awful destruction of life continued
with unabated fury, and many a Briton closed with his foe in death
embrace, or fell forward mortally wounded. Of British heroes there were
many that night, for true pluck showed itself everywhere, and Englishmen
performed many deeds worthy their traditions as the most courageous
and undaunted among nations.
[Illustration: BRITISH BLUEJACKETS MARCHING THROUGH THE STRAND AFTER THE
VICTORY.]
Although the French Commander-in-chief had been killed, yet the enemy
still fought on tenaciously, holding their ground on Leith Hill and
through Pasture Wood to Wotton and Abinger, until at length, when the
saffron streak in the sky heralded another blazing day, the straggling,
exhausted remnant of the once-powerful legions of France and Russia,
perspiring, dust-covered, and bloodstained, finding they stood alone,
and that the whole of Sussex and Surrey had been swept and their
comrades slaughtered, laid down their arms and eventually surrendered.
After these three breathless days of butchery and bloodshed England was
at last victorious!
In this final struggle for Britain's freedom the invader had been
crushed and his power broken; for, thanks to our gallant citizen
soldiers, the enemy that had for weeks overrun our smiling land like
packs of hungry wolves, wantonly burning our homes and massacring the
innocent and unprotected, had at length met with their well-merited
deserts, and now lay spread over the miles of pastures, cornfields, and
forests, stark, cold, and dead.
Britain had at last vanquished the two powerful nations that had sought
by ingenious conspiracy to accomplish her downfall.
Thousands of her brave sons had, alas! fallen while fighting under the
British flag. Many of the principal streets of her gigantic capital were
only parallel lines of gaunt, blackened ruins, and many of her finest
cities lay wrecked, shattered, and desolate; yet this terrible ordeal
had happily not weakened her power one iota, nor had she been ousted
from her proud position as chief among the mighty Empires of the world.
Three days after the great and decisive battle of Caterham, the British
troops, with their compatriots from the Cape, Australia, Canada, and
India, entered London triumphantly, bringing with them some thousands of
French and Russian prisoners. In the streets, as, ragged and dusty,
Britain's defenders passed through on their way to a great Open-Air
Thanksgiving Service in Hyde Park, there were scenes of the wildest
enthusiasm. With heartfelt gratitude, the people, scrambling over the
debris heaped each side of the streets, cheered themselves hoarse; the
men grasping the hands of Volunteers and veterans, and the women,
weeping for joy, raising the soldiers' hands to their lips. The glad
tidings of victory caused rejoicings everywhere. England, feeling
herself free, breathed again. In every church and chapel through the
United Kingdom special Services of Thanksgiving for deliverance from the
invaders' thrall were held, while in every town popular fetes were
organised, and delighted Britons gaily celebrated their magnificent and
overwhelming triumph.
In this disastrous struggle between nations France had suffered
frightfully. Paris, bombarded and burning, capitulated on the day
following the battle of Caterham, and the legions of the Kaiser marched
up the Boulevards with their brilliant cavalry uniforms flashing in the
sun. Over the Hotel de Ville, the Government buildings on the Quai
d'Orsay, and the Ministries of War and Marine, the German flag was
hoisted, and waved lazily in the autumn breeze, while the Emperor
William himself had an interview with the French President at the
Elysee.
That evening all France knew that Paris had fallen. In a few days
England was already shipping back to Dieppe and Riga her prisoners of
war, and negotiations for peace had commenced. As security against any
further attempts on England, Italian troops were occupying the whole of
Southern France from Grenoble to Bordeaux; and the Germans, in addition
to occupying Paris, had established their headquarters in Moghilev, and
driven back the Army of the Tsar far beyond the Dnieper.
From both France and Russia, Germany demanded huge indemnities, as well
as a large tract of territory in Poland, and the whole of the vast
Champagne country from Givet, on the Belgian frontier, down to the
Saone.
Ten days later France was forced to accept the preliminaries of a treaty
which we proposed. This included the cession to us of Algiers, with its
docks and harbour, so that we might establish another naval station in
the Mediterranean, and the payment of an indemnity of L250,000,000. Our
demands upon Russia at the same time were that she should withdraw all
her troops from Bokhara, and should cede to us the whole of that portion
of the Trans-Caspian territory lying between the mouths of the Oxus and
Kizil Arvat, thence along the Persian frontier to Zulfikai, along the
Afghan frontier to Karki, and from there up the bank of the Oxus to the
Aral Sea. This vast area of land included the cities of Khiva and Merv,
the many towns around Kara Khum, the country of the Kara Turkomans, the
Tekeh and the Yomuts, and the annexation of it by Britain would
effectually prevent the Russians ever advancing upon India.
Upon these huge demands, in addition to the smaller ones by Italy and
Austria, a Peace Conference was opened at Brussels without delay, and at
length France and her Muscovite ally, both vanquished and ruined, were
compelled to accept the proposals of Britain and Germany.
Hence, on November 16th, 1897, the Treaty of Peace was signed, and eight
days later was ratified. Then the huge forces of the Kaiser gradually
withdrew into Germany, and the soldiers of King Humbert recrossed the
Alps, while we shipped back the remainder of our prisoners, reopened our
trade routes, and commenced rebuilding our shattered cities.