IN WHICH CHARLES COMES TO LIFE AGAIN.
Ha! This was a life again. Better this than dawdling about at the heels
of a dandy, or sitting on a wheelbarrow in a mews! There is a scent here
sweeter than that of the dunghill, or the dandy's essences--what is it?
The smell of tar, and bilge water, and red herrings. There is a fresh
whiff of air up this narrow street, which moves your hair, and makes
your pulse quicken. It is the free wind of the sea. At the end of the
street are ships, from which comes the clinking of cranes; pleasanter
music sometimes than the song of nightingales.
Down the narrow street towards the wharf come the hussars. Charles is
among them. On the wharf, in the confusion, foremost, as far as he dare,
to assist. He was known as the best horseman in the troop, and, as such,
was put into dangerous places. He had attracted great attention among
the officers by his fearlessness and dexterity. The captain had openly
praised him; and, when the last horse had been slung in, and the last
cheer given, and the great ship was away down the river, on her message
of wrath, and woe, and glory, Charles was looking back at Southampton
spires, a new man with a new career before him.
The few months of degradation, of brooding misery, of listlessness and
helplessness he had gone through, made this short episode in his life
appear the most happy and most beautiful of all. The merest clod of a
recruit in the regiment felt in some way ennobled and exalted: but as
for Charles, with his intensely, sensitive, romantic nature, he was
quite, as the French say, _tête montée_. The lowest menial drudgery was
exalted and glorified. Groom his horse and help clean the deck? Why not?
That horse must carry him in the day of the merry meeting of heroes.
Hard living, hard work, bad weather, disease, death: what were they,
with his youth, health, strength, and nerve? Not to be thought of save
with a smile. Yes! this expedition of his to the Crimea was the noblest,
and possibly the happiest in his life. To use a borrowed simile, it was
like the mournful, beautiful autumn sunset, before the dark night closes
in. He felt like a boy at midsummer, exploring some wood, or distant
valley, watched from a distance long, and at last attained; or as one
feels when, a stranger in a new land, one first rides forth alone into
the forest on some distant expedition, and sees the new world, dreamt of
and longed for all one's life, realised in all its beauty and wonder at
last; and expanding leaf by leaf before one. In a romantic state of
mind. I can express it no better.
And really it is no wonder that a man, not sea-sick, should have been in
a state of wonder, eager curiosity, kindliness, and, above all, high
excitement--which four states of mind, I take it, make up together the
state of mind called romantic, quixotic, or chivalrous; which is a very
pleasant state of mind indeed. For curiosity, there was enough to make
the dullest man curious. Where were they going? Where would the blow be
struck? Where would the dogs of war first fix their teeth? Would it be a
campaign in the field, or a siege, or what? For kindliness: were not his
comrades a good set of brave, free-hearted lads, and was not he the
favourite among them? As for wonder and excitement, there was plenty of
that, and it promised to last. Why, the ship herself was a wonder. The
biggest in the world, carrying 500 men and horses; and every man in the
ship knew, before she had been five hours at sea, that that
quiet-looking commander of hers was going to race her out under steam
the whole way. Who could tire of wondering at the glimpse one got down
the iron-railed well into the machinery, at the busy cranks and leaping
pistons, or, when tired of that, at the strange dim vista of swinging
horses between decks? Wonder and excitement enough here to keep twenty
Don Quixotes going! Her very name too was romantic--HIMALAYA.
A north-east wind and a mountain of rustling white canvas over head.
Blue water that seethed and creamed, and roared past to leeward. A calm,
and the Lizard to the north, a dim grey cape. A south-west wind, and
above a mighty cobweb of sailless rigging. Top-gallant masts sent down
and yards close hauled. Still, through it all, the busy clack and rattle
of the untiring engine.
A dim wild sunset, and scudding prophet clouds that hurried from the
west across the crimson zenith, like witches towards a sabbath. A wind
that rose and grew as the sun went down, and hummed loud in the rigging
as the bows of the ship dipped into the trough of the waves, and failed
almost into silence as she raised them. A night of storm and terror: in
the morning, the tumbling broken seas of Biscay. A few fruit brigs
scudding wildly here and there; and a cape on a new land. A high round
down, showing a gleam of green among the flying mists.
Sail set again before a northerly wind, and the ship rolling before it
like a jolly drunkard. Then a dim cloud of smoke before them. Then the
great steamer _Bussorah_, thundering forward against the wind, tearing
furiously at the leaping seas with her iron teeth. A hurried glimpse of
fluttering signals, and bare wet empty decks; and, before you had time
to say what a noble ship she was, and what good weather she was making
of it, only a cloud of smoke miles astern.
Now, a dark line, too faint for landsmen's eyes, far ahead, which
changed into a loom of land, which changed into a cloud, which changed
into a dim peak towering above the sea mists, which changed into a tall
crag, with a town, and endless tiers of white fortification--Gibraltar.
Then a strong west wind for three days, carrying the ship flying before
it with all plain sail set. And each day, at noon, a great excitement on
the quarter-deck, among the officers. On the third day much cheering and
laughter, and shaking of hands with the commander. Charles, catching an
opportunity, took leave to ask his little friend the cornet, what it
meant. The _Himalaya_ had run a thousand miles in sixty-three hours.[8]
And now at sunrise an island is in sight, flat, bald, blazing yellow in
the morning sun, with a solitary, flat-topped mass of buildings just in
the centre, which the sailors say is Civita Vecchia; and, as they sweep
round the southern point of it, a smooth bay opens, and there is a
flat-roofed town rising in tiers from the green water--above heavier
fortifications than those of Gibralter, Charles thinks, but wrongly.
Right and left, two great forts, St. Elmo and St. Angelo, say the
sailors; and that flight of stone steps, winding up into the town, is
the Nix Mangare stairs. A flood of historical recollections comes over
Charles, and he recognises the place as one long known and very dear to
him. On those very stairs, Mr. Midshipman Easy stood and resolved that
he would take a boat and sail to Gozo. What followed on his resolution
is a matter of history. Other events have taken place at Malta, about
which Charles was as well informed as the majority, but Charles did not
think of them; not even of St. Paul and the viper, or the old windy
dispute, in Greek Testament lecture, at Oxford, between this Melita and
the other one off the coast of Illyricum. He thought of Midshipman Easy,
and felt as if he had seen the place before.
I suppose that, if I knew my business properly, I should at this point
represent Charles as falling down the companion-ladder and spraining his
ankle, or as having over-eaten himself, or something of that sort, and
so pass over the rest of the voyage by saying that he was confined to
his bunk, and saw no more of it. But I am going to do nothing of the
sort, for two reasons. In the first place, because he did not do
anything of the kind; and in the next, because he saw somebody at
Constantinople, of whom I am sure you will be glad to hear again.
Charles had seen Tenedos golden in the east, and Lemnos purple in the
west, as the sun went down; then, after having steamed at half-speed
through the Dardanelles, was looking the next evening at Constantinople,
and at the sun going down behind the minarets, and at all that sort of
thing, which is no doubt very beautiful, but of which one seems to have
heard once or twice before. The ship was lying at anchor, with fires
banked, and it was understood that they were waiting for a Queen's
messenger.
They could see their own boat, which they had sent to wait for him at
Seraglio Point. One of the sailors had lent Charles a telescope--a
regular old brute of a telescope, with a crack across the object-glass.
Charles was looking at the boat with it, and suddenly said, "There he
is."
He saw a small grey-headed man, with moustaches, come quickly down and
get into the boat, followed by some Turks with his luggage. This was
Colonel Oldhoss, the Queen's messenger; but there was another man with
him, whom Charles recognised at once. He handed the telescope to the man
next him, and walked up and down the deck rapidly.
"I _should_ like to speak to him," he thought, "if it were only one
word. Dear old fellow. But then he will betray me, and they will begin
persecuting me at home, dear souls. I suppose I had better not. No. If I
am wounded and dying I will send for him. I will not speak to him now."
The Queen's messenger and his companion came on board, and the ship got
under way and steamed through the Bosphorus out into the wild seething
waves of the "Fena Kara degniz," and Charles turned in without having
come near either of them. But in the chill morning, when the ship's head
was north-west, and the dawn was flushing up on the distant Thracian
sierra, Charles was on deck, and, while pausing for an instant in his
duties, to look westward, and try to remember what country and what
mountains lay to the north-west of Constantinople, a voice behind him
said quietly, "Go, find me Captain Croker, my man." He turned, and was
face to face with General Mainwaring.
It was only for an instant, but their eyes met; the general started, but
he did not recognise him. Charles's moustache had altered him so much
that it was no great wonder. He was afraid that the general would seek
him out again, but he did not. These were busy times. They were at Varna
that night.
Men were looking sourly at one another. The French expedition had just
come in from Kustendji in a lamentable state, and the army was rotting
in its inactivity. You know all about that as well as I can tell you;
what is of more importance to us is, that Lieutenant Hornby had been
down with typhus, and was recovering very slowly, so that Charles's
chances of meeting him were very small.
What am I to do with this three weeks or more at Varna to which I have
reduced Charles, you, and myself? Say as little about it as need be, I
should say. Charles and his company were, of course, moved up at once to
the cavalry camp at Devna, eighteen miles off, among the pleasant hills
and woodlands. Once, his little friend, the young cornet, who had taken
a fancy for him, made him come out shooting with him to carry his bag.
And they scrambled and clambered, and they tore themselves with thorns,
and they fell down steep places, and utterly forgot their social
positions towards one another. And they tried to carry home every object
which was new to them, including a live turtle and a basaltic column.
And they saw a green lizard, who arched his tail and galloped away like
a racehorse, and a grey lizard, who let down a bag under his chin and
barked at them like a dog. And the cornet shot a quail, and a hare, and
a long-tailed francolin, like a pheasant, and a wood-pigeon. And,
lastly, they found out that, if you turned over the stones, there were
scorpions under them, who tucked their claws under their armpits, as a
man folds his arms, and sparred at them with their tails, drawing their
sting in and out, as an experienced boxer moves his left hand when
waiting for an attack. Altogether, they had a glorious day in a new
country, and did not remember in what relation they were to one another
till they topped the hill above Devna by moonlight, and saw the two long
lakes, stretching towards the sea, broken here and there into silver
ripples by the oars of the commissariat boats. A happy innocent
schoolboy day--the sort of day which never comes if we prepare for it
and anticipate it, but which comes without warning, and is never
forgotten.
Another day the cornet had business in Varna, and he managed that
Charles should come with him as orderly; and with him, as another
orderly, went the young lad who spoke about his sister in the pot-house
of Windsor; for this lad was another favourite of the cornet's, being a
quiet, gentlemanly lad, in fact a favourite with everybody. A very
handsome lad, too. And the three went branking bravely down the
hill-side, through the woodlands, over the streaming plain, into the
white dirty town. And the cornet must stay and dine with the mess of the
42nd, and so Charles and the other lad might go where they would. And
they went and bathed, and then, when they had dressed, they stood
together under the burning white wall, looking over the wicked Black
Sea, smoking. And Charles told his comrade about Ravenshoe, about the
deer, and the pheasants, and the blackcock, and about the big trout that
lay nosing up into the swift places, in the cool clear water. And
suddenly the lad turned on him, with his handsome face livid with agony
and horror, and clutched him convulsively by both arms, and prayed him,
for God Almighty's sake----
There, that will do. We need not go on. The poor lad was dead in four
hours. The cholera was very prevalent at Varna that month, and those who
dawdled about in the hot sun, at the mouth of the filthy drains of that
accursed hole, found it unto their cost. We were fighting, you see, to
preserve the town to those worthless dirty Turks, against the valiant,
noble, but, I fear, equally dirty Russians. The provoking part of the
Russian war was, that all through we respected and liked our gallant
enemies far more than we did the useless rogues for whom we were
fighting. Moreover, our good friends the French seem to have been more
struck by this absurdity than ourselves.
I only mentioned this sad little incident to show that this Devna life
among the pleasant woodlands was not all sunshine; that now and then
Charles was reminded, by some tragedy like this, that vast masses of men
were being removed from ordinary occupations and duties into an unusual
and abnormal mode of life; and that Nature was revenging herself for the
violation of her laws.
You see that we have got through this three weeks more pleasantly than
they did at Varna. Charles was sorry when the time came for breaking up
the camp among the mountain woodlands. The more so, as it had got about
among the men that they were only to take Sebastopol by a sudden attack
in the rear, and spend the winter there. There would be no work for the
cavalry, every one said.
It is just worthy of notice how, when one once begins a vagabond life,
one gets attached to a place where one may chance to rest even for a
week. When one gets accustomed to a change of locality every day for a
long while, a week's pause gives one more familiarity with a place than
a month's residence in a strange house would give if one were habitually
stationary. This remark is almost a platitude, but just worth writing
down. Charles liked Devna, and had got used to it, and parted from it as
he would from a home.
This brings us up to the point where, after his death and burial, I have
described him as riding along the shore of the Bay of Eupatoria,
watching the fleet. The 140th had very little to do. They were on the
extreme left; on the seventeenth they thought they were going to have
some work, for they saw 150 of the lancers coming in, driving a lot of
cattle before them, and about 1,000 Cossacks hanging on their rear. But,
when some light dragoons rode leisurely out to support them, the
Cossacks rode off, and the 140th were still condemned to inactivity.
Hornby had recovered, and was with the regiment. He had not recognised
Charles, of course. Even if he had come face to face with him, it was
almost unlikely that he would have recognised him in his moustache. They
were not to meet as yet.
In the evening of the nineteenth there was a rumble of artillery over
the hill in front of them, which died away in half an hour. Most of the
rest of the cavalry were further to the front of the extreme left, and
were "at it," so it was understood, with the Cossacks. But the 140th
were still idle.
On the morning of the twentieth, Charles and the rest of them, sitting
in their saddles, heard the guns booming in front and on the right. It
became understood among the men that the fleet was attacking some
batteries. Also, it was whispered that the Russians were going to stand
and fight. Charles was sixth man from the right of the rear rank of the
third troop. He could see the tails of the horses immediately before
him, and could remark that his front-rank man had a great patch of oil
on the right shoulder of his uniform. He could also see Hornby in the
troop before him.
These guns went moaning on in the distance till half-past one; but still
they sat there idle. About that time there was a new sound in the air,
close on their right, which made them prick up their ears and look at
one another. Even the head of the column could have seen nothing, for
they were behind the hill. But all could hear, and guess. We all know
that sound well enough now. You hear it now, thank God, on every village
green in England when the cricket is over. Crack, crack! Crack, crack!
The noise of advancing skirmishers.
And so it grew from the right towards the front, towards the left, till
the air was filled with the shrill treble of musketry. Then, as the
French skirmished within reach of the artillery, the deep bass roared
up, and the men, who dared not whisper before, could shout at one
another without rebuke.
Louder again, as our artillery came into range. All the air was tortured
with concussion. Charles would have given ten years of his life to know
what was going on on the other side of the hill. But no. There they sat,
and he had to look at the back of the man before him; and at this time
he came to the conclusion that the patch of grease on his right shoulder
was of the same shape as the map of Sweden.
A long weary two hours or more was spent like this. Charles, by looking
forward and to the right, between the two right-hand men of the troop
before him, could see the ridge of the hill, and see the smoke rising
from beyond it, and drifting away to the left before the sea-breeze. He
saw an aide-de-camp come over that ridge and dismount beside the captain
of Hornby's troop, loosening his girths. They laughed together; then the
captain shouted to Hornby, and he laughed and waved his sword over his
head. After this, he was reduced to watching the back of the man before
him, and studying the map of Sweden. It was becoming evident that the
map of North America, if it existed, must be on his left shoulder, under
his hussar jacket, and that the Pacific Islands must be round in front,
about his left breast, when the word was given to go forward.
They advanced to the top of the hill, and wheeled. Charles, for one
instant, had a glimpse of the valley below, seething and roaring like a
volcano. Everywhere bright flashes of flame, single, or running along in
lines, or blazing out in volleys. The smoke, driven to the left by the
wind, hung across the valley like a curtain. On the opposite hill a ring
of smoke and fire, and in front of it a thin scarlet line disappearing.
That was all. The next moment they wheeled to the right, and Charles saw
only the back of the man before him, and the patch of grease on his
shoulder.
But that night was a night of spurs for them. Hard riding for them far
into the night. The field of the Alma had been won, and they were
ordered forward to harass the Cossacks, who were covering the rear of
the Russian army. They never got near them. But ever after, when the
battle of the Alma was mentioned before him, Charles at once used to
begin thinking of the map of Sweden.