the village. It must have once been a most enchanting little home to
an unambitious mind; for even at the time I saw it, ruin as it was,
its garden trodden down, its trees broken and torn up, its fences
destroyed, and its walks disfigured—a charm lingered over it that
caught every passenger's attention. The scenery around gave it a
peculiar beauty: the blue mountains, the dark valleys, the luxuriance
of foliage, the deep green dell, the falling water, and the clear sky
still remained;—these the soldiers of France could not destroy, and
from such scenery did the wreck of the widow's cottage derive its rural
halo. It reminded me of the fair Ophelia in her ruin,—so beautiful,
so scathed and sorrowful! If a picture of the spot were painted by a
Salvator Rosa, it would afford a melancholy pleasure to every beholder;
but the reality—the poor widow and her breaking heart, gave too much
pain to render a visit to her cheerless home at all enviable.
To have seen her sitting in the only tenantable apartment of her once
comfortable cottage, thinly but cleanly clad—a white apron and kerchief
covering the half worn out black stuff gown; two broken chairs, a
crazy table, a straw pallet, and a few earthen panella's,[9] forming
all her furniture; to have contemplated the fixed melancholy of
her thin, worn, but once handsome countenance, her gentle manners,
and her patient submission to the will of Heaven, under the deepest
affliction—and yet to have been unable to alleviate her distress, could
give no pleasure to the heart, unless to those who love to sympathise
with grief and drop a tear with the unfortunate. Yet even such would
have involuntarily said, on quitting the melancholy scene, “I wish I
had not heard the poor old widow's story.”
Her son Diego the muleteer, when the French first entered Spain,
under the orders of Buonaparte, was about twenty-two years of age,
and had the reputation of being an exemplary young man, obedient, and
affectionate to his mother—his only relation, except an uncle, who also
resided in Ernani, and whose farm the young muleteer no doubt would
have inherited, after his death, had he survived him.
Under the uncle's auspices, Diego had courted a young girl, nearly
related to a respectable family, at the head of which was a clergyman
residing in the convent of St. Ignatio de Loyola, but a few leagues
from Ernani. The girl's father lived within a hundred yards of Diego
and his mother, and from infancy the young couple became attached to
each other.
Although the employment of a muleteer is, in general, considered
beneath the class to which Diego's sweetheart belonged, yet there was
no objection to her marriage, on account of the excellent character the
young man bore, and the expectations which he had of future success in
life. The marriage would have taken place as soon as a house, which the
muleteer's uncle was building, might be completed. In this house the
young couple were to have resided, and to it was attached an excellent
farm, to be managed by him for the uncle. These happy arrangements,
alas! were broken by the columns of the French army. Like mountain
torrents they poured over the Pyrenees, sweeping the rustic comforts
of the peaceful Spaniards before them. Requisitions for cattle and
carriages were enforced, and Diego, amongst many, was obliged to march
with his mules along with the invading army, wherever his directors
thought fit.
Short was the time allowed for the sad yet endearing farewell of
the lovers, and the interchange of blessings between the mother and
the son. The uncle and the widow accompanied him a league beyond
the village; but the poor girl, who now for the first time felt the
bitterness of life, remained weeping at home, almost dead with grief;
which was not alleviated by the return of Diego's mother and uncle,
whose first care, after parting with the youth, was to go to her he
loved so well. The house—the whole village was a place of mourning; for
every family, in some way or other, had but too much cause for sorrow.
Poor old woman! when she told me of the last moment she passed with her
lost son, she sobbed as if her heart would have burst. “Oh!” said she,
“I was giving my dear child a prayer-book and a silk handkerchief, for
the sake of remembrance, when one of the dragoons struck him with the
flat of his sword, and ordered him to go on; he could only say, ‘God
bless you, mother!’... I never saw him again.”
For six months after this separation, the family of Diego heard no
tidings of him; for, no doubt, his letters, as well as theirs, were
opened and destroyed by the invaders; however, at the end of that
time, a muleteer, who had been pressed along with Diego, returned, by
permission, to die from ill health, and he brought letters from him to
the almost despairing friends. It appeared by these, that he was along
with the army in the south of Spain, and had but little hopes of being
able to return to his beloved Joanna, his relatives, and his projected
farm-house, for at least another half-year; but he did not even at that
period return—nor for upwards of a year after.
During this absence Mina and his intrepid Guerillas were incessant in
their annoyance of the French, throughout the province in which the
widow lived; frequently surprising strong parties of the enemy, even in
the town of Ernani. So desperate were these warriors, that they would
often appear on the high and broken hill, close under which the city
of Tolase stands; and when the French regiments were on parade beneath
them in the square, would open an unexpected volley of musketry on
them, which never failed in taking good effect; and before they could
be subject to retaliation they were generally off. It was an attack of
this description, headed by Mina, which afforded a pretence for the
destruction of Ernani.
The Guerillas had halted there for half a day, and furnished themselves
with provisions. A French regiment, hot from Bayonne, and eager for
plunder, marched in, as Mina's men marched out; and at an ambuscade
upon the road, received a most annoying fire from the Guerillas,
without being able to pursue them. The regiment immediately commenced
the work of destruction in the village:—the houses were sacked and set
on fire; the inhabitants murdered; and, amongst the general ruin, was
the widow's cottage. Diego's uncle was sabred in his own house, and the
innocent girl, who was all to the absent muleteer, still more cruelly
treated. Her poor father, in protecting her from the brutal violence
of the soldiers, was shot through the head, and the unhappy girl
herself died in three weeks after at Escotia, a village in the Basque
mountains, whither she and the mother of Diego fled. Her eyes were
closed by the widow's hand, and her last words were her “_dear, dear
Diego!_”
Shortly after the sacking of the village the Muleteer returned. He had
deserted with great difficulty from the southern army, taking with him
his favourite mule; and was pacing in the highest possible spirits,
singing along the road from Tolosa, when the tops of the houses,
amongst which his early and happy days were passed, met his eye. It was
in the evening. The sight of his own Joanna's home, and of his beloved
mother's cottage, made him urge on his mule. Light was his heart and
light his song; he was then about to enjoy, as he thought, the happiest
hours of his existence. It was quite dark when he arrived;—he rode up
to the house of his Joanna; there was no light—no sound: he entered
trembling, for there was no door, and his brain reeled as he beheld in
the twilight the ruins of the house. He ran to his mother's cottage,
this was no better; distracted then he entered the village;—all was
desolate,—no living creature but a wild dog crossed his way. He entered
his uncle's house, and there upon the floor lay the murdered body,
naked and bruised; he lifted it up, and by the grey light from a
sashless window recognized the features of his uncle. The truth now
flashed on him: this scene of horror was only one of those which he was
forced to witness while with the army from which he had deserted. For
a few moments he was senseless, but this only preceded the tempest of
his mind;—he ran back to his mule, mounted, and galloped to Rinteria,
about a league distant. Here the first persons he met outside the
town were two French soldiers; in a moment he was off his mule, and
before time for a thought had passed, they both lay bleeding at his
feet: he killed them with his cochilio; there was but little noise,
for they never spoke. Breathless and raging, he remounted, and rode
on to the house of one he had known—a former companion; there he
learned the fate of his Joanna,—that both she and his mother were dead.
Diego's hands were covered with blood; and as he cursed the authors of
Ernani's destruction, he exultingly showed to his friend the red drops
of retribution, and told him that he had already struck down two of
the invaders to the earth. The young man, to whom he confessed this
circumstance, was the person who afterwards informed his mother of
it. He declared that such was the state of Diego's mind, when he came
to him at Renteria, that he would have destroyed himself, but for the
satisfaction he felt in having killed the Frenchmen. I conversed with
this young man at Renteria afterwards, for he returned to his home when
the British arrived at Passages.
The alarm was now beginning to spread. Diego's friend was not less
the enemy of the French than himself. Mina was in the mountains. Two
excellent horses were in the stable of Diego's friend, belonging to a
French colonel: these, with a brace of pistols and two swords, they
seized during the absence of the servants; and, together with Diego's
mule, forded the river, and took a by-way across the hill, towards the
Tolosa road; the favourite mule was turned loose in a fertile valley,
and the next day both the travellers came up with Mina's party, which
they joined with a shout of “Viva Espagna!”
Many a Frenchman fell by the hand of Diego—he had lost all; he only
lived to avenge the destruction of his home and his happiness. No
Guerilla was before him in the attack,—he was the first in, and the
last out of the battle: and if gratified revenge could compensate for
the ruin of tender affections, Diego was amply satisfied. But no,
nothing could appease him,—the thought of his misery burned like Ætna's
fires within his breast,—no blood could extinguish it. With only seven
or eight others, he has been known to have surprised a party of French
soldiers three times that number. Often has he watched their movements
dressed as a simple muleteer, and when any favourable opportunity has
occurred, he would hasten back to his companions, buckle on his sword,
and return, thus reinforced, to attack any straggling band of the enemy
drinking in a wine house, perhaps, or otherwise off their guard. To set
fire to the house, and then dash in upon their victims and slaughter
them, before they were aware of their danger, was a very usual mode
of proceeding with Diego and his associates; after which exploits the
Guerillas would disappear as rapidly as they had come.
At one of these attacks the Muleteer met his death. His friend was
beside him when he fell, and from him I heard the fight described.
The Guerillas consisted of between fifty and sixty prisoners, and
had received information that some mules loaded with valuables, and
escorted by a company of French infantry, were on their way from Bilboa
to Bayonne, and had not yet passed a defile in the mountains about
two leagues and a half from the former city. Through this defile runs
a narrow river close to the high road. On one side of this road and
river rises a rugged mountain, whose steep sides are abruptly broken in
several parts, and at others hang out over the depth below. In various
shelves of the height are to be seen full-grown trees, the roots of
which stretch out from the broken earth, and serve for the support
of creeping and climbing underwood. This bold mountain continues
unintersected for at least half a mile; and as the opposite side of the
road beneath is equally flanked by rocks, the invaders, in forcing this
passage, were wholly at the mercy of the enemy above: and before they
took the precaution of securing the heights, whole divisions were often
cut off by a handful of men, who would deliberately march on with the
French column, firing upon it as often as they could load, doing the
greatest execution.
To this pass, then, hastened the Guerilla party, and arrived about an
hour before the mules and escort appeared in sight. As soon as the
French had advanced well into the defile, the Guerillas appeared above
on the heights, dismounted, and opened fifteen muskets upon them. The
fire was returned, but with no effect; for one step backwards brought
the Guerillas under cover of the craggy verge of the height. The French
increased their speed to double quick time, but the Guerillas kept
up such a fire upon them, that twenty men out of about seventy, were
strewed along the road, dead or wounded. The Guerillas now laid down
their muskets, mounted, and fell in with the remainder of their own
men, in order to get before the French, and thus finish the business by
a charge. They trotted on, and headed the escort very soon. They now
descended to the road, and lay in ambush about a quarter of a mile from
the enemy. A projecting arm of a rock, covered with trees, concealed
them from the French, whose column was now passing, and in a moment, a
most desperate charge from the Guerillas broke them up. The mules took
fright and increased the confusion, while the sabres of the Spaniards
finished in a very short time the bloody affair. Diego's horse was in
the midst of the French, and there fell with him, wounded. He fought
on foot with both dagger and sabre, and had just brought to his feet a
French sergeant, when one of the men who lay near him, wounded from his
sabre, levelled his piece at Diego, and shot him through the breast.
He was the only one his brave party lost, while every single Frenchman
was either killed by them or the peasants, who gladly finished what the
Guerillas began.
This was the fate of the unhappy Diego. He did not die for an hour
after he fell. His comrades carried him into the mountains, and there
he breathed his last. But before he died, he took from his pocket the
prayer-book and the silk handkerchief which his mother gave him the day
he parted from her, and consigned them, as his last gift of friendship,
to his companion, with a request that he would offer a mass for his
poor mother's soul, and never cease to pursue the French with vengeance
while they had a foot in Spain. Then kissing the lock of hair, which
he held, he said “Do not take this out of my hand when I am dead, but
bury it with me: it is the hair of my own dear Joanna.”
His wish was obeyed, and he was buried just as he lay, under a wild
chestnut-tree, where a Frenchman had never trod. Peaceful be the bed
of the Guerilla for ever! May the invader never disturb the grass that
waves over his dust!
When the poor widow had told me the short history of her hapless son,
she went to a little box, and with the tears streaming down her pale
cheeks, brought me the handkerchief and the prayer-book;—“There,” says
she, “is all I have left of my poor son!” She staggered with grief and
debility as she walked across the room with the treasure of her heart.
I took them with reverence, and concealed my tears by examining them;
for I will not deny it, I could not help weeping. The poor woman sat
down, and rocked herself to and fro in silent grief, while I turned
over the leaves of the prayer-book without knowing why I did so. At
this moment my servant entered the room to prepare supper, and I left
the house to indulge in my thoughts for half an hour alone amongst the
ruins of Ernani.
FOOTNOTES:
[8] These verses are adapted to a Spanish glee, usually sung by the
muleteers, and set for four voices. Those who have been in Spain during
the British war there, will recollect the air by the following popular
gingle, sung mostly by the muleteers while travelling.
“General Morillo
E su division,
Rumpe la cabeçà
De Napoleon.”
Tre lo ri, tri lo, &c.
[9] Cooking-pots.
RATIONS, OR ELSE!
General Picton, like Otway's _Pierre_, was a “bold rough soldier,” that
stopped at nothing; he was a man whose decisions were as immutable,
as his conceptions were quick and effective, in all things relative
to the command which he held. While in the Peninsula, an assistant
commissary, (commonly called assistant-commissary _General_, the rank
of which appointment is equal to a Captain's,) through very culpable
carelessness, once failed in supplying with rations the third division
under General Picton's command; and on being remonstrated with by
one of the principal officers of the division, on account of the
deficiency, declared, with an affected consequence unbecoming the
subject, “that he should not be able to supply the necessary demand for
some days.” This was reported to the General, who instantly sent for
the Commissary, and laconically accosted him with:—
“Do you see that tree, Sir?”
“Yes, General, I do.”
“Well, if my division be not provided with rations to-morrow, by twelve
o'clock, I'll _hang_ you on that very tree.”
The confounded Commissary muttered, and retired. The threat was
alarming: so he lost not a moment in proceeding at a full gallop to
head quarters, where he presented himself to the Duke of Wellington,
complaining most emphatically of the threat which General Picton had
held out to him.
“Did the General say he would _hang_ you, Sir?” demanded his Grace.
“Yes, my Lord—he did,” answered the complainant.
“Well, Sir,” returned the Duke, “if he said so, believe me he _means_
to do it, and you have no remedy but to provide the rations!”
The spur of necessity becomes a marvellous useful instrument in
sharpening a man to activity: and the Commissary found it so; for the
rations were all up, and ready for delivery, at twelve o'clock the next
day.
INFERNAL DUTY.
“Down, down to hell, and say I sent thee thither.”
_Shakspeare._
Captain Thompson, of the artillery, while serving in the Peninsula, had
the luck to lose, in the space of one campaign, every man of the heavy
brigade which he commanded, some by sickness, but most by the enemy;
and he found himself at last, not only the _captain_ of the brigade,
but, in his own person, the _brigade itself_. Finding, however, that
a commanding officer, without men to command, was neither useful nor
ornamental, he applied personally to the Adjutant-general, for advice
under the circumstances, observing, that he wished to be appointed to
some other duty. The Adjutant-general, at the moment the application
was made to him, happened to be proceeding across the village in which
they were quartered, to Lord Wellington; and said he would speak to
his Lordship, requesting Thompson to call on him, for the purpose of
knowing the Commander of the forces' will on the subject. When the
Adjutant-general mentioned the matter to Lord Wellington, his Lordship
was very busy with a map of the Peninsula, and did not give any answer
regarding the captain and his _brigade_; but continued to attend to the
subject he was then engaged with.
At length the Adjutant-general got up to retire, and amongst other
things, asked his Lordship again, where he should send Captain
Thompson; “Oh, send him to h——ll,” was the reply, and the interview
ended.
When the last man of the brigade called upon the Adjutant-general, to
know the result of his application, he was accosted by that officer in
a grave and official manner:—
“Captain Thompson,” said he, “I am sorry we are going to lose you; and
still more sorry to learn the sort of duty which the Commander of the
forces has assigned to so deserving an officer.”
The Captain, who was a most gallant and deserving, but hot-tempered and
impetuous man, interrupted the Adjutant-general thus: “God bless me! I
hope his Lordship is not going to send me home.”
“I don't know that,” was the answer.
“I'm sure I have done my duty since I have joined his Lordship's army,”
continued the Captain, “and I trust I shall not be so far negatively
disgraced.”
“My dear Captain,” replied the Adjutant-general, “it is not a very
disgraceful duty to which you are appointed, considering the very
respectable men who have preceded you upon it. The fact is, that the
Commander of the forces, knowing you to be a _devil of a fire-eater_,
has directed us to send you to _h——ll_, and here is your route,”
handing him an official direction of the marches by which he was to
arrive at his destination.
The stages mentioned in the route were whimsical in the extreme, and
there were several good points made; the last-mentioned place on the
road was _London_.
When Thompson read the paper, his weather-beaten jaws relaxed into a
smile; and putting the document into his pocket, he drily remarked,
that Lord Wellington had always been in the habit of giving him _hot
work_. “It is not the first time,” said he, “that I was sent to _clear
the way_ for him; however, when I arrive, I'll look out for _warm
quarters_ for his Lordship and _staff_. But there is a mistake in the
route, I suspect; you see ‘_London_’ is the last stage mentioned.”
“Yes,” replied the Adjutant-general, “and depend upon it that is the
nearest way to the infernal regions.”
“Excuse me,” rejoined Thompson, “there is a much better.”
“What is that?” asked the other.
“Why,” said the Captain, “_Wellington_, to be sure.”
The joke was soon carried to the Commander of the forces, and his
Lordship, with the best humour in the world, changed Thompson's route,
and took him off the _infernal_ duty to which he had previously ordered
him.
NIGHTS IN THE GUARD-HOUSE.
No. II.
“Hoo' comes it, that ye ha' got an' extra guard the naight,
Mulligan—Eh?”
“Musha 'pon my sowl, Sargeant M'Fadgen, it's becaise the Captain
ordthered it.”
“Poh! mun, I ken that weel; but the Captain wonna gi' ye a guard for
naething, wad he?”
“No, faith! it's _something_ to me; for I've had three this week
before; that is, three nights out o' bed in my reglar juty; so isn't it
something to be ordthered another night by way o' recreation?”
“Aweel, but what ha' ye been doin, lad?”
“Faith! I was doin' nothing at all; an' it was for that I got my
guard.”
“Hoo's that?”
“I was ordthered to put out the light in my barrack-room every night at
nine o'clock, an' I did not do it last night—that 's all.”
“But you were doin' a wee bit o' something, I'll warrant, Pat. Ye war a
liften yer han' to your muzzle—eh?”
“O! that's nothing at all at all. We had a dthrop to be sure. That
fellow over there on the stool—(_you_, mister Jack Andrews, I
mane)—kept a tellin' us such stories, that I forgot the time entirely.
Hooh! the divil may care—Jack is here now, and Corporal O'Callaghan
to boot; so what signifies a guard, if they'll only tip us a bit of a
song: what do you say, Sargeant—eh?”
“Why, Pat, I've no objection to that, if there be no muckle noise aboot
it.”
Thus spoke the Sergeant, and his worthy private, Mulligan: the latter,
by way of punishment, was ordered to an extra guard, for being a little
out of rule, as above-mentioned; but his punishment was given him by
an Officer who had fought and bled with him, and who regarded him with
kindly feelings. Pat's delinquency was reported to the Captain by the
Orderly Officer, and he could do no less. However, there was not a
better nor a more respected man in the corps, than Patrick Mulligan,
of the grenadier company. Like many other good soldiers, he was fond
of society and the all-powerful potyeen. So when the Orderly Officer
was going round at nine o'clock, he put the light under a wooden pale,
and when all was, as he thought, safe, he returned to the convivial
glass with his comrades; but the officer was one of those pipe-clay
martinets, just joined from the half-pay of a militia regiment, and
although he had never seen in his life as much actual service as poor
Pat had done in one month of his existence, (and perhaps knew much
less in reality about the duties of a soldier,) he stole back to the
barracks, and surprised the party of carousing Peninsulars. His report
was made, and the men were punished.
The practice of keeping lights in the barrack rooms, after the
proper hour for extinguishing them, cannot be justified; but there
are infractions of general rules in the army, which, if not to be
tolerated, should not be sought after with too scrutinizing an eye. A
good officer knows when to pry and when to keep his eyes shut; but
that was not the case with Pat Mulligan's Orderly Officer.
“Weel Jock,” said the Corporal, “ye maun gi' us a lilt—you or the
Corporal.”
“With all my heart,” replied Jack Andrews, “if Corporal O'Callaghan is
willing to join in with his second.”
“Faith! I've no objection in the world to conthribute to the harmony of
the guard, if my voice doesn't frighten you, lads.”