THE COUNT’S LETTER.
O’Shaughnessy’s wound, like my own, was happily only formidable from the
loss of blood. The sabre or the lance are rarely, indeed, so death-dealing
as the musket or the bayonet; and the murderous fire from a square of
infantry is far more terrific in its consequences than the heaviest charge
of a cavalry column. In a few weeks, therefore, we were once more about and
fit for duty; but for the present the campaign was ended. The rainy season
with its attendant train of sickness and sorrow set in. The troops were
cantoned along the line of the frontier,--the infantry occupying the
villages, and the cavalry being stationed wherever forage could be
obtained.
The Fourteenth were posted at Avintas, but I saw little of them. I was
continually employed upon the staff; and as General Crawfurd’s activity
suffered no diminution from the interruption of the campaign, rarely passed
a day without eight or nine hours on horseback.
The preparations for the siege of Ciudad Rodrigo occupied our undivided
attention. To the reduction of this fortress and of Badajos, Lord
Wellington looked as the most important objects, and prosecuted his plans
with unremitting zeal. To my staff appointment I owed the opportunity of
witnessing that stupendous feature of war, a siege; and as many of my
friends formed part of the blockading force, I spent more than one night in
the trenches. Indeed, except for this, the tiresome monotony of life was
most irksome at this period. Day after day the incessant rain poured down.
The supplies were bad, scanty, and irregular; the hospitals crowded with
sick; field-sports impracticable; books there were none; and a dulness and
spiritless depression prevailed on every side. Those who were actively
engaged around Ciudad Rodrigo had, of course, the excitement and interest
which the enterprise involved: but even there the works made slow progress.
The breaching artillery was defective in every way: the rain undermined the
faces of the bastions; the clayey soil sank beneath the weight of the heavy
guns; and the storms of one night frequently destroyed more than a whole
week’s labor had effected.
Thus passed the dreary months along; the cheeriest and gayest among us
broken in spirit, and subdued in heart by the tedium of our life. The very
news which reached us partook of the gloomy features of our prospects. We
heard only of strong reinforcements marching to the support of the French
in Estramadura. We were told that the Emperor, whose successes in Germany
enabled him to turn his entire attention to the Spanish campaign, would
himself be present in the coming spring, with overwhelming odds and a firm
determination to drive us from the Peninsula.
In that frame of mind which such gloomy and depressing prospects are well
calculated to suggest, I was returning one night to my quarters at Mucia,
when suddenly I beheld Mike galloping towards me with a large packet in his
hand, which he held aloft to catch my attention. “Letters from England,
sir,” said he, “just arrived with the general’s despatches.” I broke the
envelope at once, which bore the war-office seal, and as I did so, a
perfect avalanche of letters fell at my feet. The first which caught my eye
was an official intimation from the Horse Guards that the Prince Regent had
been graciously pleased to confirm my promotion to the troop, my commission
to bear date from the appointment, etc., etc. I could not help feeling
struck, as my eye ran rapidly across the lines, that although the letter
came from Sir George Dashwood’s office, it contained not a word of
congratulation nor remembrance on his part, but was couched in the usual
cold and formal language of an official document. Impatient, however, to
look over my other letters, I thought but little of this; so, throwing them
hurriedly into my sabretasche, I cantered on to my quarters without delay.
Once more alone in silence, I sat down to commune with my far-off friends,
and yet with all my anxiety to hear of home, passed several minutes in
turning over the letters, guessing from whom they might have come, and
picturing to myself their probable contents. “Ah, Frank Webber, I recognize
your slap-dash, bold hand without the aid of the initials in the corner;
and this--what can this be?--this queer, misshapen thing, representing
nothing save the forty-seventh proposition of Euclid, and the address
seemingly put on with a cat’s-tail dipped in lampblack? Yes, true enough,
it is from Mister Free himself. And what have we here? This queer, quaint
hand is no new acquaintance; how many a time have I looked upon it as the
_ne plus ultra_ of caligraphy! But here is one I’m not so sure of. Who
could have written this bolt-upright, old-fashioned superscription, not
a letter of which seems on speaking terms with its neighbor? The very O
absolutely turns its back upon the M in O’Malley, and the final Y wags his
tail with a kind of independent shake, as if he did not care a curse for
his predecessors! And the seal, too,--surely I know that griffin’s head,
and that stern motto, _Non rogo sed capio_. To be sure, it is Billy
Considine’s, the count himself. The very paper, yellow and time-stained,
looks coeval with his youth; and I could even venture to wager that his
sturdy pen was nibbed half a century since. I’ll not look farther among
this confused mass of three-cornered billets, and long, treacherous-looking
epistles, the very folding of which denote the dun. Here goes for the
count!” So saying to myself, I drew closer to the fire, and began the
following epistle:--
O’MALLEY CASTLE, November 3.
Dear Charley,--Here we sit in the little parlor with your last
letter, the “Times,” and a big map before us, drinking your health,
and wishing you a long career of the same glorious success you have
hitherto enjoyed. Old as I am--eighty-two or eighty-three (I forget
which) in June--I envy you with all my heart. Luck has stood
to you, my boy; and if a French sabre or a bayonet finish you now,
you’ve at least had a splendid burst of it. I was right in my opinion
of you, and Godfrey himself owns it now,--a lawyer, indeed! Bad
luck to them! we’ve had enough of lawyers. There’s old Hennesy,--honest
Jack, as they used to call him,--that your uncle trusted
for the last forty years, has raised eighteen thousand pounds on the
title-deeds, and gone off to America. The old scoundrel! But it’s
no use talking; the blow is a sore one to Godfrey, and the gout
more troublesome than ever. Drumgold is making a motion in
Chancery about it, to break the sale, and the tenants are in open
rebellion and swear they’ll murther a receiver, if one is sent down
among them. Indeed, they came in such force into Galway during
the assizes, and did so much mischief, that the cases for trial were
adjourned, and the judges left with a military escort to protect them.
This, of course, is gratifying to our feelings; for, thank Providence,
there is some good in the world yet. Kilmurry was sold last week
for twelve thousand. Andy Blake would foreclose the mortgage,
although we offered him every kind of satisfaction. This has done
Godfrey a deal of harm; and some pitiful economy--taking only
two bottles of claret after his dinner--has driven the gout to his
head. They’ve been telling him he’d lengthen his days by this, and
I tried it myself, and, faith, it was the longest day I ever spent in
my life. I hope and trust you take your liquor like a gentleman and
an Irish gentleman.
Kinshela, we hear, has issued an execution against the house and
furniture; but the attempt to sell the demesne nearly killed your
uncle. It was advertised in a London paper, and an offer made for it
by an old general whom you may remember when down here. Indeed,
if I mistake not, he was rather kind to you in the beginning. It
would appear he did not wish to have his name known, but we found
him out, and such a letter as we sent him! It’s little liking he’ll
have to buy a Galway gentleman’s estate over his head, that same Sir
George Dashwood! Godfrey offered to meet him anywhere he
pleased, and if the doctor thought he could bear the sea voyage,
he’d even go over to Holyhead; but the sneaking fellow sent an
apologetic kind of a letter, with some humbug excuse about very
different motives, etc. But we’ve done with him, and I think he
with us.
When I had read thus far, I laid down the letter, unable to go on; the
accumulated misfortunes of one I loved best in the world, following so fast
one upon another, the insult--unprovoked, gratuitous insult--to him upon
whom my hopes of future happiness so much depended, completely overwhelmed
me. I tried to continue. Alas, the catalogue of evils went on; each line
bore testimony to some farther wreck of fortune, some clearer evidence of a
ruined house.
All that my gloomiest and darkest forebodings had pictured was come to
pass; sickness, poverty, harassing unfeeling creditors, treachery, and
ingratitude were goading to madness and despair a spirit whose kindliness
of nature was unequalled. The shock of blasted fortunes was falling upon
the dying heart; the convictions which a long life had never brought
home--that men were false and their words a lie--were stealing over the
man upon the brink of the grave; and he who had loved his neighbor like a
brother was to be taught, at the eleventh hour, that the beings he trusted
were perjured and forsworn.
A more unsuitable adviser than Considine, in difficulties like these, there
could not be; his very contempt for all the forms of law and justice was
sufficient to embroil my poor uncle still farther; so that I resolved at
once to apply for leave, and if refused, and no other alternative offered,
to leave the service. It was not without a sense of sorrow bordering on
despair, that I came to this determination. My soldier’s life had become
a passion with me. I loved it for its bold and chivalrous enthusiasm, its
hour of battle and strife, its days of endurance and hardship, its trials,
its triumphs; its very reverses were endeared by those they were shared
with; and the spirit of adventure and the love of danger--that most
exciting of all gambling--had now entwined themselves in my very nature. To
surrender all these at once, and to exchange the daily, hourly enthusiasm
of a campaign for the prospects now before me, was almost maddening. But
still a sustaining sense of duty of what I owed to him, who, in his love,
had sacrificed all for me, overpowered every other consideration. My mind
was made up.
Father Rush’s letter was little more than a recapitulation of the count’s.
Debt, distress, sickness, and the heart-burnings of altered fortunes filled
it; and when I closed it, I felt like one over all whose views in life a
dark and ill-omened cloud was closing forever. Webber’s I could not read;
the light and cheerful raillery of a friend would have seemed, at such a
time, like the cold, unfeeling sarcasm of an enemy. I sat down at last to
write to the general, enclosing my application for leave, and begging of
him to forward it, with a favorable recommendation, to headquarters.
This done, I lay down upon my bed, and overcome by fatigue and fretting,
fell asleep to dream of my home and those I had left there; which,
strangely too, were presented to my mind with all the happy features that
made them so dear to my infancy.