THE TRUMPET CALL.
Willie, fold your little hands;[1]
Let it drop--that "soldier" toy;
Look where father's picture stands--
Father, that here kissed his boy
Not a month since--father kind,
Who this night may--(never mind
Mother's sob, my Willie dear)
Cry out loud that He may hear
Who is God of battles--cry,
"God keep father safe this day
By the Alma River!"
Ask no more, child. Never heed
Either Russ, or Frank, or Turk;
Right of nations, trampled creed,
Chance-poised victory's bloody work;
Any flag i' the wind may roll
On thy heights, Sevastopol!
Willie, all to you and me
Is that spot, whate'er it be,
Where he stands--no other word--
_Stands_--God sure the child's prayers heard--
Near the Alma River.
Willie, listen to the bells
Ringing in the town to-day;
That's for victory. No knell swells
For the many swept away--
Hundreds, thousands. Let us weep,
We, who need not--just to keep
Reason clear in thought and brain
Till the morning comes again;
Till the third dread morning tell
Who they were that fought and--_fell_
By the Alma River.
Come, we'll lay us down, my child;
Poor the bed is--poor and hard;
But thy father, far exiled,
Sleeps upon the open sward,
Dreaming of us two at home;
Or, beneath the starry dome,
Digs out trenches in the dark,
Where he buries--Willie, mark!
Where _he buries_ those who died
Fighting--fighting at his side--
By the Alma River.
Willie, Willie, go to sleep;
God will help us, O my boy!
He will make the dull hours creep
Faster, and send news of joy;
When I need not shrink to meet
Those great placards in the street,
That for weeks will ghastly stare
In some eyes--child, say that prayer
Once again--a different one--
Say "O God! Thy will be done,
By the Alma River."
Open your atlas at the map of Russia. Look down toward the bottom, at
that part of the great empire which borders on the Euxine or Black Sea;
there you will find a small peninsula--it is really almost an island,
being surrounded on three sides by water--labeled "_Crimea_." It is only
a part of one of the smallest of Russia's forty-odd provinces, the
province of Taurida; yet it is one of the famous places of history, for
here, in the years 1854 and 1855, was fought the Crimean War, one of the
greatest wars of modern times.
Russia and Turkey have never been good neighbors. They have always been
jealous of each other, always quarreling about this or that, the fact
being that each is afraid of the other's getting too much land and too
much power. In these disputes the other countries of Europe have
generally sympathized with Turkey, feeling that Russia had quite enough
power, and that if she had more it might be dangerous for all of them.
Some day you will read in history about the Eastern Question and the
Balance of Power, and will find out just what these meant in the
Fifties; but this is all that you need know now, in order to understand
what I am going to tell you.
In 1854 Turkey, feeling that Russia was pressing too hard upon her,
called upon the other European powers to help her. The result was that
England, France, Sardinia (now a part of Italy, but then a separate
kingdom), and Turkey made an agreement with one another, and all
together declared war upon Russia.
England had been at peace with all the world for forty years, ever since
the wars of Napoleon, which were closed by the great victory of
Waterloo. The English are a brave race; they had forgotten the horrors
of war, and remembered only its glories and its victories; and they
sprang to arms as joyously as boys run to a football game. "Sharpen your
cutlasses, and the day is ours!" said Sir Charles Napier to his men,
just before the British fleet sailed; and this was the feeling all
through the country.
The fleets of the allied powers gathered in the Black Sea, forming one
great armada; surrounded the peninsula of the Crimea, and landed their
armies. In September, 1854, was fought the first great battle, by the
Alma River. The allies were victorious, and a great shout of joy went up
all over England. "Victory! victory!" cried old and young. There were
bells and bonfires and illuminations; the whole country went mad with
joy, and for a short time no one thought of anything except glory,
waving banners and sounding trumpets. But banners and trumpets, though a
real part of war, are only a very small part. After a little time,
through the shouting and rejoicing a different sound was heard; the
sound of weeping and lamentation, not only for the hundreds of brave men
who were lying dead beside the fatal river, but for the other hundreds
of sick and wounded soldiers, dying for want of care.
There had been gross neglect and terrible mismanagement in the carrying
on of the war. Nobody knew just whose fault it was, but everything
seemed to be lacking that was most needed on that desolate shore of the
Crimea. The English troops were in an enemy's country, and a poor
country at that; whatever supplies there were had been taken by the
Russian armies for their own needs. Food and clothing had been sent out
from England in great quantities, but somehow, no one could find them.
Some supplies had been stowed in the hold of vessels, and other things
piled on top so that they could not be got at; some were stored in
warehouses which no one had authority to open; some were actually
rotting at the wharves, for want of precise orders as to their disposal.
The surgeons had no bandages, the doctors no medicines; it was a state
of things that to-day we can hardly imagine. Indeed, it seemed as if the
need were so great and terrible that it paralyzed those who saw it.
"It is now pouring rain," wrote William Howard Russell to the London
_Times_, "the skies are black as ink, the wind is howling over the
staggering tents, the trenches are turned into dykes; in the tents the
water is sometimes a foot deep; our men have not either warm or
waterproof clothing; they are out for twelve hours at a time in the
trenches; they are plunged into the inevitable miseries of a winter
campaign--and not a soul seems to care for their comfort, or even for
their lives. These are hard truths, but the people of England must hear
them. They must know that the wretched beggar who wanders about the
streets of London in the rain, leads the life of a prince compared with
the British soldiers who are fighting out here for their country.
* * * * *
"The commonest accessories of a hospital are wanting; there is not the
least attention paid to decency or clean linen; the stench is appalling;
the fetid air can hardly struggle out to taint the atmosphere, save
through the chinks in the walls and roofs; and for all I can observe,
these men die without the least effort being made to save them. There
they lie, just as they were let gently down on the ground by the poor
fellows, their comrades, who brought them on their backs from the camp
with the greatest tenderness, but who are not allowed to remain with
them. The sick appear to be tended by the sick, and the dying by the
dying."
He added that the snow was three feet deep on a level, and the cold so
intense that many soldiers were frozen in their tents.
No one meant to be cruel or neglectful; but there were not half enough
doctors, and--think of it, children! there were _no nurses_.
How did this happen? Well, when the war broke out the military
authorities did not want female nurses. The matter was talked over, and
it was decided that things would go better without them. This was put on
the ground that the class of nurses, as I have told you, was at that
time in England a very poor one. They were often drunken, generally
unfeeling, and always ignorant. The War Department decided that this
kind of nurse would do more harm than good; they did not realize that
"The old order changeth, yielding place to new," and that the time was
come when the new nurse must replace the old.
But now the need was come, immediate and terrible, and there was no one
to meet it. When the people of England realized this; when they learned
that the hospital at Scutari was filled with sick and wounded and dying
men, and no one to care for them save a few male orderlies, wholly
untrained for the task; when they heard that in the hospitals of the
French army the Sisters of Mercy were doing their blessed work, tending
the wounded, healing the sick and comforting the dying, and realized
that the English soldiers, their own sons, brothers and husbands, had no
such help and no such comfort, the sound of bell and trumpet was lost in
a great cry of anger and sorrow that went up from the whole country.
And matters grew worse and worse, as one great battle after another sent
its dreadful fruits to the already overflowing hospital at Scutari. On
October 25th came Balaklava; on November 5th, Inkerman.
You have all read "The Charge of the Light Brigade"; yet I ask you to
read it again here, so that it may fit into its place in the story of
this terrible war. Remember, it is only one incident of that great
battle of Balaklava, in which both sides claimed the victory, while
neither gained any signal advantage.
Half a league, half a league,[2]
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
"Forward, the Light Brigade!
Charge for the guns!" he said;
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
"Forward, the Light Brigade!"
Was there a man dismayed?
Not though the soldier knew
Someone had blundered;
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volleyed and thundered.
Stormed at with shot and shell,
Boldly they rode and well;
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell,
Rode the six hundred.
Flashed all their sabres bare,
Flashed as they turned in air,
Sabring the gunners there,
Charging an army, while
All the world wondered;
Plunged in the battery-smoke,
Right through the line they broke.
Cossack and Russian
Reeled from the sabre-stroke,
Shattered and sundered.
Then they rode back, but not--
Not the six hundred.
Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon behind them
Volleyed and thundered:
Stormed at with shot and shell,
While horse and hero fell,
They that had fought so well
Came through the jaws of Death
Back from the mouth of Hell--
All that was left of them,
Left of six hundred.
When can their glory fade?
O the wild charge they made!
All the world wondered.
Honor the charge they made!
Honor the Light Brigade,
Noble six hundred!
I have already spoken of William Howard Russell. He was the war
correspondent of the _Times_, the great English newspaper, and a man of
intelligence, heart and feeling. He was on the spot, and saw the horrors
of the war at first-hand. His heart was filled with sorrow and pity for
the suffering around him, and with indignation that so little was done
to relieve it; and he wrote day after day home to England, telling what
he saw and what was needed. Soon after Balaklava he wrote:
"Are there no devoted women amongst us, able and willing to go forth to
minister to the sick and suffering soldiers of the East in the hospitals
at Scutari? Are there none of the daughters of England, at this extreme
hour of need, ready for such a work of mercy? France has sent forth her
Sisters of Mercy unsparingly, and they are even now by the bedsides of
the wounded and the dying, giving what woman's hand alone can give of
comfort and relief. Must we fall so far below the French in
self-sacrifice and devotedness, in a work which Christ so signally
blesses as done unto Himself? 'I was sick and ye visited me.'"
This was the trumpet call that rang in the ears of the women of England,
sounding a clearer note than all the clarions of victory. We shall see
how it was answered.