That branch of the military profession to which I was destined (the
Royal Engineers) requires an early dedication to its peculiar studies.
We are put under military discipline while we are yet boys, and are
in many respects good soldiers before we come to be men. Hence a
consequence is derived to this service which I think is favourably
felt by its members in after life; and this is, that their companions
in arms and in the labours and dangers of war are, for the most part,
those with whom they have shared the yoke of education, and the more
than redeeming pleasures of youthful fellowship. Much doubt, therefore,
in the selection of friends, and much of the disappointment and injury
which so often accrue from a bad choice, are hereby spared, since at a
period when Nature seldom permits any sustained disguise, each young
mind has furnished itself with friends, chosen, as it were, in the
castle of truth. Here it has obtained the knowledge of which to seek
and which to shun. Thus, when at the age of seventeen or eighteen I
assumed the sword of a British officer, the branch of service into
which I entered contained numbers of my chosen friends, whose hearts I
knew to the bottom, and who knew mine. A character on both sides was
already established which we would have died rather than sully, and
certainly the advantages of this emulous friendship did not terminate
with the individual, but extended to the service in which they were
employed. Of all my early friends, I never knew one who was not eager
and importunate to be placed in the front of danger and of enterprise,
or who thought even for a moment of sparing any extent of labour,
peril, loss of liberty, or life itself in the service of his country;
and most of these, in the flower of youth and dawn of military glory,
have fallen in battle.
After about a year spent on a home station, in compliance with my
earnest request, I was nominated, early in 1805, to proceed with a
foreign expedition, going, no one knew whither, under the command of
Sir James Craig.
This order plunged me immediately into a new state of existence,
wherein every sort of agitation, activity, and conflicting emotion
succeeded to the monotony of routine duty. I exulted that I was so
early to taste of foreign service, and the note of preparation and
outfit was well suited to the stirring propensity of youth; but in the
midst of all my satisfaction and ardent hope there did lurk a fear and
a dread at the bottom of my heart of something I had first to encounter.
My father and mother had accustomed the hearts of their children to
such unbounded tenderness and love as is sure to draw a proportionate
return; and in spite of the commonness of such separation, I knew
better than any one else could that the thoughts of my departure would
make that home unhappy whose happiness and peace I prized above all
other things.
I knew that my incomparable father, whatever he might feel, had no
wish to make a home soldier of his son. I knew he would both mourn and
approve my departure. But it was a thing which lay in my way and hung
at my heart, and my first object on arriving in London was to seek my
new commanding officer, and gain his consent to my making a hurried
journey to take leave of my friends.
The name of my new chief I had long known, for his fine person and dark
flashing eye had been pointed out to me when a boy as belonging to the
finest officer in the service, and his manner and conversation were all
that a raw boy could hope to find in a young man, of kindness, genius,
and experience. My heart beat with the thoughts of serving under such
a master, of being trained to actual service under his eye, and
(youthful vanity perhaps added) of being made by him as fine and clever
a fellow as himself.
He entered at once into the feelings which made me so desirous to make
a journey home, and the moment he could ascertain that the time would
serve, “Be off then, Boothby,” he said, “but make all the haste you
can back; and if I have left London, lose not a moment in getting to
Portsmouth.”
Away I went. The parting scene was more trying even than I anticipated,
but “Time and the hour run through the roughest day,” and I was soon on
my way back to London. I had seen my father’s venerable form and manly
features shaken with childish weeping as he held me to his breast, and
though long the pang of that sight dwelt in my mind--for I have ever
since cherished that sacred picture as one of the holiest my memory
can retain--I never shall forget the relief and lightness I felt from
having got through this sad passage of tears and lamentations. On
arriving in London I feared that my Chief had left it, so I hastened
to that second mother who had spent the short interval of my absence
in collecting all the various articles desirable for an officer in the
Mediterranean, to which we were supposed to be destined.
I found her in her drawing-room, where every sofa, cabinet, chair,
and table was covered with my clothes and linen, which hers and other
kind hands were marking. The perpetual consciousness of doing kind and
useful acts had made an angelic smile the inseparable companion of her
face, and with that loved, that dearly-remembered smile did she now
receive me.
To all the stores she had so laboured to procure for me she had added
as her own present a complete writing-box and dressing-case combined--a
luxury of peculiar value to me, which my own funds would have found
it difficult to compass; but finding me uneasy lest I should be left
behind or be thought tardy by my commander, “Go,” she said, “you shan’t
wait for your baggage; we will have it all packed up, and I will send
my butler with it to Portsmouth, that I may be sure of its reaching
you.”
Down to Portsmouth then I went on the outside of the Mail, in the
highest health and the ardent spirits of youth--spirits that made, I
suppose, even my body buoyant and elastic, for the Mail overturned
in the night and threw me on the road without giving me so much as a
scratch or a bruise. It was about twenty miles from London when we
met a team of horses standing in a slant direction on the road, the
night very foggy with misting rain, and the lamps not penetrating
farther into the mist than the rumps of the wheelers. The coachman, to
avoid the waggon, turned suddenly out of the way and ran up the bank.
Finding the coach swaggering, I got up, with my face to the horses,
hardly daring to suppose it possible that the Mail could overturn, when
the unwieldy monster was on one wheel, and then down it came with a
terminal bang. During my descent I had just time to hope that I might
escape with the fracture of one or two legs, and then found myself on
my two shoulders, very much pleased with the novelty and ease of the
journey. I got me up, and spied the monster with his two free wheels
whirling with great velocity, but quite compact and still in the body,
and as soon as I had shaken my feathers and opened my senses I began to
think of the one female and three males in the inside, whom I supposed
to be either dead or asleep. I ran to open the door, when the guard,
having thought of the same thing, did it for me, and we then took out
the folks one by one, like pickled ghirkins, or anything else preserved
in a jar, by putting our hands to the bottom. We found that the inmates
were only stupefied, though all had bruises of some kind, and one
little gentleman complained that he was nipped in the loins by the
mighty pressure of his neighbour, who had sat upon him some time after
the door was opened, to recollect himself or to give thanks for his
escape.
[Illustration: THE START.
“Down to Portsmouth then I went on the outside of the Mail.”]
The lady told me “she was terribly hurt indeed,” and so, when we got to
the supper place, I gave her a kipperkin of boiled port wine with much
spice. She agreed it was very nice, and looked more cheery, but the
rest of the inside passengers seemed to think that it would not look
well to eat after being overturned.
Not one on the outside was hurt in the least degree, and I, being on
the top of the coach, had the farthest fly.
I had not been without my fears that on arriving at Portsmouth I should
have to hasten on board, and perhaps sail without my baggage; but the
wind had changed, all the troops were not yet embarked, and nobody
seemed to be thinking of anything but gaiety and amusement, or the not
unpleasant business of laying in comforts for the voyage.
Sir James Craig and Lefebure were lodging together, and kindly took
me in till I could provide myself better. With Lefebure I had early
acquaintance, and since entering the Army we had been employed in
neighbouring stations, and I knew that under Sir James Craig’s command
he had come to be reckoned perhaps the best officer of his early
standing. He, I found, was to be of our company, as well as Hoste and
Lewis, two more of my earlier friends.
Our second in command was Sir John Stuart, whom I saw for the first
time. The best and bravest could not have chosen fitter company than
every one of these. Sir James Craig and Sir John Stuart were of great
experience and superior rank. Sir John Stuart had served long at
Gibraltar; Sir James Craig everywhere. The rest might be called equals,
for in youth, inexperience, and rank they were about equal, but of the
whole party I was the junior officer.
Two excellent vessels, a ship and a brig, were appointed for our
accommodation, and some of us were allotted to the ship and some to the
brig.
Each party now addressed itself to the important task of laying in a
comfortable sea stock, and the two ships agreed, as opportunity should
occur, that they would interchange fresh meat on the voyage.
For our part we provided several sheep and pigs, a milch goat, and a
great many ducks and fowls, with hay and grain for their provender, a
prodigious quantity of eggs and potatoes, butter, cheese, and lard,
of pickles, sauces, spices, portable soup, white and brown maccaroni,
vermicelli, and celery seed, with a variety of other stores, but
particularly a great stock of bottled porter, a barrel of ale, and a
pretty allowance of wine and spirits.
The procuring and embarking of all these various things, animate and
inanimate, fell in equal portions to Lewis and myself. It was no light
task, but neither was it bad fun. Lewis was a pleasant, lively, and
most efficient colleague; many a voyage did we make to Spithead; many
an hour did we spend on board to see proper accommodation prepared for
our live stock, and to place our stores out of the reach of damage or
of breakage.
The general obligation of such provisioning makes the streets of
Portsmouth like a rabbit-warren, the scarlet purchasers popping in and
out of the shop doors incessantly in long succession.
Between two and three weeks passed over not unpleasantly, for letters
and various accidents had extended my acquaintance amongst the staff of
the army, and tended to wear off any feeling of strangeness.
The general impression was that Malta was our destination in the first
instance, as indeed it was known that we were charged with despatches
for that island.
On the 18th of April 1805 we set sail--a numerous fleet of transports
under the convoy of the _Queen_, a three-decker, having the Commander
of the Forces on board and his staff, and the _Dragon_, a seventy-four,
carrying Sir John Stuart, the second in command, and his staff.
The army was supposed to be from 8000 to 10,000 strong, accompanied
as well by four companies of artillery, and a prodigal supply of all
warlike stores.
PORTSMOUTH, _April 17, 1805_.
MY DEAREST FATHER--I can only say we are all going on board, and
expect to sail to-morrow, certainly for the Mediterranean. Don’t
write any more to this place. I am perfectly happy and comfortable.
God bless you, and my mother, and Louisa.--Ever yours, my dearest
Dad,