SERGEANT DRUMBIRREL.
The regiment which I had joined was entirely composed of Scotsmen,
with a very few exceptions, being one of the old national corps which
had existed before the union of the countries; but, as twenty men
were required to complete the strength before embarkation, the
lieutenant-colonel, the Earl of Kildonan, had obtained a
beating-order, and sent out parties from his head-quarters, to obtain
recruits in England, and hence my meeting with Sergeant Drumbirrel in
the little market town of Compton Kennel.
The regiment had been raised in 1678, by Charles, fifth Earl of Mar,
for the service of Charles II.; it was then armed with light muskets,
and hence the name of _Fusiliers_, which it still retains, even in
these our days of breechloaders, Whitworth and Lancaster rifles. Its
first baptism in blood was at the battle of Bothwellbrig, and after
serving in all the useless and wanton wars of Orange William, of
Queen Anne, down to the campaigns of Marlborough, Peterborough, and
Cornwallis, it was now about to commence a new career of glory, under
Sir Charles Grey, in the conquest of the West Indian Isles.
As we marched along the dusty highway, all this was told me by
Sergeant Drumbirrel, who, with all his recruiting tricks, was a droll
and intelligent fellow from Ayrshire; and a veritable record of all
the past history of the Scots Fusiliers, which, with the true _esprit
de corps_ of a British soldier, he declared and believed to be the
_first_ regiment in the civilized world.
An irritated father having followed us, with the intention of giving
a farewell horse-whipping to his son, who had enlisted, overtook our
party, when halted at the first wayside inn, about ten miles from
Compton Kennel; but our halberdier was ready for any emergency, being
a man of endless resource. To save the youth's bacon, he tied him up
in a sack, and placed him among twenty others, which were filled with
potatoes, in a room, into which the astonished farmer had traced his
son, without being able to discover him; and this trifling incident
furnished the party with a subject for merriment and jokes, until we
reached our halting-place for the night. The lad's name was Tom
Telfer, of whom, more anon.
Perceiving that I was very much cast down in spirit, and also that I
kept somewhat aloof from my companions, Sergeant Drumbirrel pressed
me to drink.
"You made me take too much last night," said I, reproachfully.
"Too much! why, we drank the best of brandy, so that is impossible."
"My mother----"
"Come! don't be a Molly and quote your mother, now when you are a
soldier; but what did _she_ say?"
I sighed bitterly and replied,--
"She ever taught me that liquor was an enemy."
"Then you should do as I do."
"How is that?"
"Make it a _friend_. Here, boy, the smallest drop in life won't do
you the least harm; a hair of the dog--you know the rest."
Thus urged, I took a draught of brandy-and-water from the sergeant's
canteen, and thereafter became considerably invigorated and more
communicative.
"Did you know Captain Ellis, of the Fusiliers," I asked.
"Ellis--Ellis, who served with Burgoyne, and was killed on the banks
of the Hudson?"
"Yes."
"Know him--odd's life, lad, and that I did! A kind good friend he
was to me, and saved me once from the halberts, when found asleep on
my post on a cold and wintry American night. A better officer or a
braver one never wore a red coat! I was by his side when the
death-shot struck him, and I was one of those who buried him at the
foot of a tree before we retired, and just as night was coming on,
for we all loved the captain too well to leave him without a
soldier's grave. Was he a relation of yours, my lad?"
Touched by what the sergeant said in his blunt honest way, my eyes
filled with tears, and I replied,--
"I am his only son."
"You!"
"I."
"You, little Oliver, whom I carried on my back on the march to
Skenesborough, when the baggage-waggons broke down and were lost in
the woods!" exclaimed the sergeant, grasping both my hands with
friendly warmth; "well, well, what queer things do come about in this
world! You have grown so much, I could never have known you; and ten
years in America and Jamaica have made some change in me. I have no
need for hair powder _now_, Master Oliver; time is powdering me fast
enough. You must tell me how this came to pass; and the good lady
your mother----"
"I have been most ungrateful in leaving her; though the act was
somewhat involuntary."
"Too late to think of that now. Your health again, Master Oliver. I
hope to see you a captain yet, like your father (as to _me_, I've got
to the top of my profession). You will find your name a password to
every heart in the Fusileers."
The sergeant took a long draught from his canteen and resumed,--
"In the hard winter of '75, when Quebec was besieged by the Yankees,
we suffered horribly, though _I told_ the general how it would be.
It made one melancholy to see the poor, pale, wasted soldiers full of
spirit, though their canteens and haversacks were empty, patient
though suffering, sick at heart in soul and body, wolf-eyed by
famine, toil, and battle, standing on their dreary posts, at Quebec,
among the frozen snow, through which the bare skeletons of men and
horses were everywhere visible. One night I must have died of cold
(for my watchcoat was frozen like a deal board, and the flesh of my
fingers stuck to the barrel of my firelock), but for your father,
Master Oliver. He gave me his blanket to wrap round me, and shared
with me the contents of a canteen, as I to-day am proud to do with
you. God bless him, he had the heart to feel for a poor comrade. I
remember the storming of Skenesborough, when he got that ugly knock
on the head. We were in brigade with the old '9th and 20th.' I
volunteered for the forlorn hope; for being a bit of a devil, I
always went for anything desperate; and I remember, as if 'twere
yesterday, the night of the 5th of July and the preparations, we
stormers made for the event of the next day."
"Preparations--you would be reading your Bibles, I suppose?" said I
simply.
"Bibles!" reiterated the sergeant, bursting into a loud fit of
laughter.
"How, then, did you prepare?"
"By changing every rag we possessed into ready money at the sutler's
tent--by eating and drinking and fun; for if we survived, a dead
man's kit would always come handy, and if we were knocked on the
head, what the devil was the use of letting ours come to the
drumhead, or be buried in the trenches with us? So a jolly night we
had of it, cleaning our firelocks, snapping the flints, drinking and
singing,
'Why, soldiers, why
Should we be melancholy boys,
Whose business 'tis to die?'
Well, at three o'clock in the morning of the 6th, we landed--formed
in the water, and rushing up the mountain, assailed the stockades,
while the general, by my advice--for, as I said before, General
Burgoyne always took _my_ advice--sent the 20th in rear of the fort
to cut off the retreat of the Yankees; but they all escaped save a
few prisoners. My eyes, Master Oliver, I remember well the first
time the good captain and I were under fire together. It was on that
8th of July, when we were detached towards Fort Ann to support His
Majesty's 9th foot, which was attacked by hordes of Yankees, French,
and wild Indians, who are worse than incarnate fiends. A terrible
march we had of it, cutting down trees to clear a way where men never
trod before; fording weedy creeks, and floundering through reedy
marshes in heavy marching order, with knapsacks and blankets,
campkettles, and sixty rounds per man, till the 30th of July, when we
crossed the Hudson by a bridge of boats. And there it was that
General Sir John Burgoyne came galloping up to me and said,--
"'Duncan, what do you think of the position of these rascally
Yankees?'
"'Send forward the 20th and the 62nd, general,' said I, 'and if they
fail, the 21st will be sure to settle the business.'
"'You're right, sergeant--you always are right.'
"'Thank you kindly, general,' said I, saluting him, for I was always
very respectful. So on went the old Kingsleys, as we always called
the 20th, and next the 62nd; but deuce a thing they did but blaze
away their powder and lose their men in heaps, till we--that is, the
Fusiliers, Master Oliver--came up, shoulder to shoulder in line, with
colours flying, and the drums and fifes playing 'Britons, Strike
Home!' and _home_ we did strike with the charged bayonet; for, as Sir
John says in his despatch (though ungrateful enough, never to mention
_me_), 'just as night closed in, the enemy gave ground on all sides,
and left us completely masters of the field.'"
The sergeant and I became sworn comrades; we had now a thousand
things to talk of. He was kind, attentive, consolatory, and said
everything he could think of to fire my energy and keep my spirit up.
Under his influence, it rose superior to the thoughts that had
crushed it; and I now resolved to become, if possible, the arbiter of
my own destiny, agreeing with Musæus, that "an _active_ man is not
content with being what he is; but strives to _become_ what he _can
be_."