The rapid motion gratified my restlessness, and, together with the
noise, soothed me homoeopathically. I slept a great deal. The
midsummer day was far shorter than I feared it would be; and I found
myself rather refreshed than fatigued when the conductor roused me
finally by shouting names more and more familiar, as we stopped at
way-stations. I sat upright, and strained my _cinderful_ eyes, long
surfeited with undiluted green, for the first far blue and silver
glimpses of my precious sea. Then well-known rocks and cedars came
hurrying forward, as if to meet me half-way.
As the cars stopped for the last time with me, I caught sight of a horse
and chaise approaching at a rapid rate down the main street of the town.
The driver sprang out and threw the reins to a boy. He turned his
face--a grave face--up, and looked searchingly along the row of
car-windows. It was Dr. Physick. I darted out at the nearest door. He
saw me, smiled, and was at it in an instant, catching both my hands in
his to shake them and help me down by them at the same time.
"Little Katy!"--he always would call me so, though, as I sometimes took
the liberty to tell him, I was very sure I had long left off being
_that_, even if I was not yet quite the size of some giants I had
seen,--"Little Katy! How jolly! 'Fanny?' O, Fanny's pretty
comfortable,--looking out for you and putting her head out of the
window, I dare say, the minute my back's turned. I look to you now to
keep her in order. Baggage? Only bag? Give it to me. Foot,--now
hand,--there you are!"
And there I was,--where I was most glad to be once more,--in his gig,
and driving, in the cool, moist twilight, down the dear old street,
shaded with dear old elms, with the golden and amber sunset still
glowing between their dark boughs; where every quiet, snug, old wooden
house, with its gables and old-fashioned green or white front-door with
a brass or bronze knocker, and almost every shop and sign even, seemed
an old friend.
The lingering glow still lay full on the front of our old home, which
now had "Philemon Physick, M. D." on the corner. As we stopped before
it, I thought I spied a sweet little watching face, for one moment,
behind a pane of one of the second-story windows. But if I did, it was
gone before I was sure.
"Here she is!" called out the Doctor. "Julia!--Wait a minute, Kate, my
dear,--no hurry. Julia!" Up he ran, while "Julia" ran down, said
something, in passing, to him on the stairs, kissed me at the foot three
times over,--affectionately, but as if to gain time, I thought,--led me
into the parlor to take off my bonnet, and told me Fanny was not quite
ready to see me just then, but would be, most likely, in two or three
minutes. The Doctor had gone up to see about it, and would let me know.
"O, didn't I see her at the window?"
"Yes, dear, you did; and that was just the trouble. She saw you were
there; and she was so pleased, it made her a little faint. The Doctor
will give her something to take; and as soon as she is a little used to
your being here, of course you can be with her all the time."
The Doctor came down, speaking cheerily. "She is all right now. Run up,
as fast as you like, and kiss her, Kate, my child; but tell her I forbid
your talking till to-morrow. In five minutes, by my watch, I shall call
you down to tea; and when you are called, you come. That will give her
time to think about it and compose herself. Julia's _help_ shall stay
with her in the mean while. Afterwards, you shall share your own old
chamber with her. Julia has it, as usual, all ready for you."
Fanny had sunk back on her white pillows, upon the little couch before
the window from which she watched for me. How inspired and beautiful she
looked!--she who was never thought of as beautiful before,--the very
transfigured likeness of herself, as I hope one day to behold her in
glory,--and so like our mother, too! She lay still, as she had been
ordered, lest she should faint again; but by the cheerful lamp that
stood on the stand beside her, I saw her smile as she had never used to
smile. The eyes, that I left swollen and downcast, were raised large and
bright. But as she slowly opened her arms and clasped me to her, I felt
tears on my cheek; and her voice was broken as she said, "Katy, Katy! O,
thank God! I was afraid I never should see you again. Now I have
everything that I want in the world!"
It was hard to leave her when I was called so soon; but she knew that it
was right, and made me go; and when I was allowed to return to her, she
lay in obedient but most happy silence for all the rest of the evening,
with those new splendid eyes fixed on my face, her dim complexion
glowing, and her hands clasping mine. After I had put her to bed, and
laid myself down in my own beside her, I felt her reach out of hers and
touch me with a little pat two or three times, as a child will a new
doll, to make sure that it has not been merely dreaming of it. At first,
I asked her if she wanted anything; but she said, "Only to feel that you
are really there"; and when, after a very sound and long rest, I awoke,
there was her solemn, peaceful gaze still watching me, like that of an
unsleeping guardian angel. She had slept too, however, remarkably long
and well, whether for joy, as she thought, or from the opium which I had
been startled to see given her the night before. She said she had had
many scruples about taking it; but the Doctor insisted; and she did not
think it her duty on the whole to make him any trouble by opposing his
prescriptions, when we owed him so much. Poor Fanny! How hard it was for
her to owe any one "anything, but to love one another."
The Doctor's bulletin that morning was, "Remarkably comfortable." But in
the forenoon, while Fanny after breakfast took a nap, I snatched an
opportunity to cross-question Mrs. Physick, from whom I knew I could
sooner or later obtain all she knew,--the _sooner_ it would be, if she
had anything good to tell; as, in my inexperience, I was almost sure she
must have.
Fanny's "influenza," I now discovered, dated back to May. She kept her
room a few days, did not seem so ill as many fellow-patients who were
now quite well again, and soon resumed her usual habits, but was never
quite rid of her cough. Two or three weeks after, there was a
Sunday-school festival in the parish to which we belonged. She was
called upon to sing and assist in various ways, over-tasked her
strength, was caught in a shower, looked very sick, and being, on the
strength of Mrs. Physick's representations, formally escorted into the
office, was found to have a quick pulse and sharp pain in one side. This
led to a careful examination of the chest, and the discovery not only of
"acute pleurisy," but of "some mischief probably of longer standing in
the lungs," yet "no more," the Doctor said, "than many people carried
about with them all their lives without knowing it, nor than others, if
circumstances brought it to light, recovered from by means of good care
and good spirits, and lived to a good old age."
"How long ago was that?"
"The pleurisy? About the beginning of June. The Doctor said last week he
'could scarcely discover a vestige of it.' And now, Katy," continued
kind, cheery Mrs. Physick, "you see, your coming back has put her in the
best of spirits; and you and the Doctor and I are all going to take the
best of care of her; and so we may all hope the best."
"The best of care"? Ah, there was little doubt of that! But even "_good_
spirits"! who could hope to see Fanny enjoying them for any length of
time, till she had done with time? Good, uncomplaining, patient, I had
always seen her,--happy, how seldom!--when, indeed, till now? There was
not enough of earth about her for her to thrive and bloom.
My mother, I believe, used to attribute in part to Fanny's early
training her early joylessness. In her early days,--so at least I have
understood,--it was thought right even by some good people of our
"persuasion," to lose no opportunity of treating the little natural
waywardnesses of children with a severity which would now be called
ferocity. Mamma could never have practised this herself; but perhaps she
suffered it to be practised to a greater extent than she would have
consented to endure, had she foreseen the consequences. My poor father
must have been inexperienced, too; and I suppose his nerves, between
sickness and poverty, might at times be in such a state that he scarcely
knew what he did.
I was four years younger than Fanny, and know nothing about it, except a
very little at second-hand. But at any rate I have often heard my mother
say, with a glance at her, and a gravity as if some sad association
enforced the lesson on her mind, that it was one of the first duties of
those who undertook the charge of children to watch over their
cheerfulness, and a most important rule, never, if it was possible to
put it off, so much as to reprimand them when one's own balance was at
all disturbed. This was a rule that she never to my knowledge broke;
though she was naturally rather a high-strung person, as I think the
pleasantest and most generous people one meets with generally are.
From whatever cause or causes,--to return to Fanny,--she grew up, not
fierce, sullen, nor yet hypocritical, but timid and distrustful,
miserably sensitive and anxious, and morbidly conscientious.
There was another pleasure in store for her, however; for, the afternoon
following that of my return, Mrs. Julia, looking out as usual for her
husband,--with messages from four different alarmingly or alarmed sick
persons, requesting him to proceed without delay in four different
directions,--saw him at length driving down the road with such
unprofessional slowness that she feared some accident to himself or his
harness. When he came before the door, the cause appeared. It was a
handsome Bath chair, with a basket of strawberries on the floor and a
large nosegay on the seat, fastened to the back of his gig, and safely
towed by it.
"What is that for?" cried I from Fanny's window.
"Fanny's coach," said he, looking up. "Miss Dudley has sent it to be
taken care of for her. She does not want it herself for the present; and
you can draw your dolly out in it every fine day."
"O," cried Fanny, sitting upright on the couch by the window,--where she
spent the greater part of the day,--to see for herself, with the tears
in her eyes. "O, how lovely! That is the very kindest thing she has done
yet;--and you don't know how she keeps sending me everything, Katy!"
"Miss Dudley? Who is she?"
"O, don't you know? The great naturalist's sister. He lives in that
beautiful place, on the shore, in the large stone cottage. The ground
was broken for it before you went to Greenville. She is very sick, I am
afraid,--very kind, I am sure. I never saw her. She has heard about me.
I am afraid the Doctor told her. I hope she does not think I meant he
should."
"Of course, dear, she does not."
"Do you really think so?"
"Certainly."
"Why?"
"Why,--I know I should not like being begged of in that underhand way
myself; and if I did not like it, I might send something once, but after
that I should never keep on sending."
"I am very glad you think so; for I like her kindness, though I scarcely
like to have her show it in this way, because I am afraid I can never do
anything for her. But I hope she does like to send; for Dr. Physick says
she always asks after me, almost before he can after her, and looks very
much pleased if she hears that I have been so. I suppose the Doctor will
think it is too late to take me down to-night. Katy, don't you want to
go and see the wagon, and tell me about it, and pour the strawberries
into a great dish on the tea-table, and all of you have some, and bring
up the flowers when you come back after tea?"
When I came back with the flowers, Fanny smiled rather pensively, and
did not ask me about the chair.
"Fanny," said I, "the Doctor says you may go out to-morrow forenoon, and
stay as long as you like, if it is fair; and the sun is going down as
red as a Baldwin apple. The chair is contrived so, with springs and the
cushions, that you can lie down in it, as flat as you do on your sofa,
when you are tired of sitting up."
"O Katy," cried she, with a little quiver in her voice, for she was too
weak to bear anything, "I have been seeing how inconsiderate I was! To
think of letting you exert and strain yourself in that way!"
In came the Doctor, looking saucy. "Fanny won't go, I suppose? I thought
so. I said so to De Quincey [his horse], as I drove him down the street
at a creep, sawing his mouth to keep him from running away, till he
foamed at it epileptically, while all the sick people were sending
north, south, east, and west after all the other doctors. I hope you
won't mention it, said I to the horse; but Fanny is always getting up
some kind of a row. But there is Katy now,--Katy is a meek person, and
always does as she is bid. She has been cooped up too much, and bleached
her own roses with teaching the Greenville misses to sickly o'er with
the pale cast of thought. Katy needs gentle exercise. So does Deacon
Lardner." Deacon Lardner was the fat inhabitant of the town, and ill of
the dropsy. "I will send Katy out a-walking, with Deacon Lardner in Miss
Dudley's chair."
I laughed. Fanny smiled. The Doctor saw his advantage, and followed it
up. "Julia, my dear, get my apothecary's scales out of the office. Put
an ounce weight into one, and Fanny into the other. Then put the ounce
weight into the chair. If Katy can draw that, she can draw Fanny."
This time, it was poor Fanny who had the laugh to herself.
The next day, the Doctor carried her down stairs, as soon as she could
bear it after her breakfast, and left her on a sofa, in the little
parlor, to rest. About ten o'clock, he came back from his early rounds.
I was dressed and waiting for him, with Fanny's bonnet and shawl ready.
I put them on her, while he drew out the chair from its safe stable in
the hall. Once again he took her up; and thus by easy stages we got her
into "her coach." I pulled, and he pushed it, "to give me a start." How
easy and light and strong it was! How delighted were both she and I!
Fanny was too easily alarmed to enjoy driving much, even when she was
well; and she had not walked out for weeks. During that time, the slow,
late spring had turned into midsummer; and the mere change from a
sick-room to the fresh, outer world is always so very great! For me, it
was the first going abroad since my return to Beverly. We went in the
sun till my charge's little snowdrop hands were warm, and then drew up
under the shade of an elm, on a little airy knoll that commanded a
distant view of the sea, and was fanned by a soft air, which helped poor
Fanny's breathing. She now insisted on my resting myself; and I turned
the springs back and arranged the cushions so that she could lie down,
took a new handkerchief of my guardian's from my pocket, and hemmed it,
as I sat at her side on a stone, while she mused and dozed. When she
awoke, I gave her her luncheon from a convenient little box in the
chair, and drew her home by dinner-time.
In this way we spent much of the month of July--shall I say
it?--agreeably. Nobody will believe it, who has not felt or seen the
marvellous relief afforded by an entire change of scene and occupation
to a person tried as I had been. If I had but "one idea," that idea was
now Fanny. Instinctively in part, and partly of set purpose, I postponed
to her every other consideration and thought. It was delightful to me to
be able, in my turn, to take her to one after another of the dear old
haunts, in wood or on beach, where she had often led me, when a child,
to play. I always did love to have something to take care of; and the
care of Fanny wore upon me little. She was the most considerate of
invalids.
Besides, she was better, or at any rate I thought so, after she began to
go out in Miss Dudley's chair. Her appetite improved; her nerves grew
more firm; and her cough was sometimes so quiet at night that her
laudanum would stand on her little table in the morning, just as it was
dropped for her the evening before.
Not only were my spirits amended by the fresh air in which, by Dr.
Physick's strict orders, I lived with her through the twenty-four hours,
but my health too. He had declared her illness to be "probably owing in
great part to the foul atmosphere in which," he found, "she slept"; and
now she added that, since she had known the comfort of fresh air at
night, she should be very sorry ever to give it up. In windy weather she
had a large folding-screen, and in raw, more blankets and a little fire.
Besides the chair, another thing came in our way which gave pleasure to
both of us, though it was not very pleasantly ushered in, as its pioneer
was a long visit from Fanny's old "Sabbath school-ma'am," Miss Mehitable
Truman, who _would_ come up stairs. Towards the close of this visit her
errand came out. It was to inquire whether "Fanny wouldn't esteem it a
privilege to knit one or two of her sets of toilet napkins for Miss
Mehitable's table at the Orphans' Fair, jest by little and little, as
she could gether up her failin' strength." Fanny could not promise the
napkins, since, luckily for her, she was past speech from exhaustion, as
I was with indignation; and Miss Truman, hearing the Doctor's boots
creak below, showed the better part of valor, and departed.
The next day, it rained. We were kept in-doors; and Fanny could not be
easy till I had looked up her cotton and knitting-needles. She could not
be easy afterwards, either; for they made her side ache; and when Dr.
Physick paid his morning visit, he took them away.
I knew she would be sorry to have nothing to give to that fair. It was
one of the few rules of life which my mother had recommended us to
follow, never from false shame either to give or to withhold. "If you
are asked to give," she would say, "to any object, and are not satisfied
that it is a good one, but give to it for fear that somebody will think
you stingy, that is not being faithful stewards. But when you do meet
with a worthy object, always give, if you honestly can. Even if you have
no more than a cent to give, then give a cent; and do not care if the
Pharisees see you. That is more than the poor widow in the Gospels
gave";--how fond she always was of that story!--"and you remember who,
besides the Pharisees, saw her, and what he said? His objects would not
have to go begging so long as they do now, if every one would follow her
example." From pride often, and sometimes from indolence, I am afraid I
had broken that rule; but Fanny, I rather think, never had; and now I
would try to help her to keep it.
My mother's paint-box was on a shelf in our closet, with three sheets of
her drawing-paper still in it. Painting flowers was one of her chief
opiates to lull the cares of her careful life. I think a person can
scarcely have too many such, provided they are kept in their proper
place, I have often seen her, when sadly tired or tried, sit down, with
a moisture that was more like rain than dew in her eyes, and paint it
all away, till she seemed to be looking sunshine over her lifelike
blossoms. Then she would pin them up against the wall, for a week or
two, for us to enjoy them with her; and, afterwards, she would give them
away to any one who had done her any favor. Her spirit was in that like
Fanny's,--she shrank so painfully from the weight of any obligation! She
wished to teach me to paint, when I was a child. I wished to learn; and
many of her directions were still fresh in my memory. But the
inexperienced eye and uncertain hand of thirteen disheartened me. I
thought I had no _talent_. My mother was not accustomed to force any
task upon me in my play-hours. The undertaking was given up.
But I suppose many persons, like me not precocious in the nursery or the
school-room, but naturally fond, as I was passionately, of beautiful
forms and colors, would be surprised, if they would try their baffled
skill again in aftertimes, to find how much the years had been
unwittingly preparing for them, in the way of facility and accuracy of
outline and tint, while they supposed themselves to be exclusively
occupied with other matters. What the physiologists call "unconscious
cerebration" has been at work. Scatter the seeds of any accomplishment
in the mind of a little man or woman, and, even if you leave them quite
untended, you may in some after summer or autumn find the fruit growing
wild. Accordingly, when, within the last twelvemonth, I had been called
upon to teach the elements of drawing in my school, it astonished me to
discover the ease with which I could either sketch or copy. And now it
occurred to me that perhaps, if I would take enough time and pains, I
could paint something worthy of a place on Miss Mehitable's table.
Fanny's gladness at the plan, and interest in watching the work, in her
own enforced inaction, were at once reward and stimulus. I succeeded,
better than we either of us expected, in copying the frontispiece of a
"picture-book," as Dr. Physick called it, which he had brought up from
his office to amuse her. It was a scientific volume, sent him by the
author,--an old fellow-student,--from the other side of the world.
Lovely ferns, flowers, shells, birds, butterflies, and insects, that
surrounded him there, were treated further on separately, in rigid
sequence; but as if to make himself amends by a little play for so much
work, he had not been able to resist the temptation of grouping them all
together on one glowing and fascinating page. I framed my copy as
tastefully as I could, in a simple but harmonious _passe-partout_, and
sent it to Miss Mehitable, with Fanny's love. Fanny's gratitude was
touching; and as for me, I felt quite as if I had found a free ticket to
an indefinitely long private picture-gallery.
Fanny's satisfaction was still more complete after the fair, when Miss
Mehitable reported that the painting had brought in what we both thought
quite a handsome sum. "It was a dreadful shame," she added, "you hadn't
sent two of 'em; for at noon, while I was home, jest takin' a bite, my
niece, Letishy, from Noo York, had another grand nibble for that one
after 'twas purchased. Letishy said a kind o' poor, pale-lookin',
queer-lookin' lady, who she never saw before, in an elegint
camel's-hair,"--("Poor-lookin', in a camel's-hair shawl!" was my inward
ejaculation; "don't I wish, ma'am, I could catch you and 'Letishy' in
my composition class, once!")--"she come up to the table an' saw that,
an' seemed to feel quite taken aback to find she'd lost her chance at
it. Letishy showed her some elegint shell-vases with artificial roses;
but that wouldn't do. I told Letishy," continued Miss Mehitable, "that
she'd ought to ha' been smart an' taken down the lady's name; an' then I
could ha' got Kathryne to paint her another. But you mu't do it now,
Kathryne, an' put it up in the bookseller's winder; an' then, if she's
anybody that belongs hereabouts, she'll be likely to snap at it, an' the
money can go right into the orphans' fund all the same."
"Much obliged," thought I, "for the hint as to the bookseller's
shop-window; but I rather think that, if the money comes, the orphan's
fund that it ought to 'go right into' this time is Fanny's."
For my orphan's fund from my months of school-keeping, not ample when I
first came back, was smaller now. Fanny's illness was necessarily, in
some respects, an expensive one. I believed, indeed, and do believe,
that it was a gratification to Dr. Physick to lavish upon her, to the
utmost of his ability, everything that could do her good, as freely as
if she had been his own child or sister. But it could not be agreeable
to her, while we had a brother, to be a burden to a man unconnected with
us by blood, young in his profession, though rising, and still probably
earning not very much more than his wife's and his own daily bread from
day to day, and owing us nothing but a debt of gratitude for another's
kindnesses, which another man in his place would probably have said that
"he paid as he went."
In plain English, the tie between us arose simply from the fact that he
boarded with my mother, when he was a poor and unformed medical student.
He always said that she was the best friend he had in his solitary
youth, and that no one could tell how different all his after-life might
have been but for her. She was naturally generous; yet she was a just
woman; and I know that, while we were unprovided for, she could not have
given, as the world appraises giving, much to him. Still "she did what
she could." He paid her his board; but she gave him a home. After she
found that his lodgings were unwarmed, she invited him to share her
fireside of a winter evening; and, though she would not deprive us of
our chat with one another and with her, she taught us to speak in low
tones, and never to him, when we saw him at his studies. When they were
over, and he was tired and in want of some amusement, she afforded him
one at once cheap, innocent, and inexhaustible, and sang to him as she
still toiled on at her unresting needle, night after night, ballad after
ballad, in her wild, sweet, rich voice. He was very fond of music,
though, as he said, he "could only whistle for it." It was the custom
then among our neighbors to keep Saturday evening strictly as a part of
"the Sabbath." It was her half-holiday, however, for works of charity
and mercy; and she would often bid him bring her any failing articles of
his scanty wardrobe then, and say that she would mend them for him if he
would read to her. Her taste was naturally fine, and trained by regular
and well-chosen Sunday reading; and she had the tact to select for these
occasions books that won the mind of the intellectual though
uncultivated youth by their eloquence, until they won his heart by their
holiness. Moreover, she had been gently bred, and could give good
advice, in manners as well as morals, when it was asked for, and
withhold it when it was not.
The upshot of it all was, that he loved her like a mother; and now the
sentiment was deepened by a shade of filial remorse, which I could never
quite dispel, though, as often as he gave me any chance, I tried. The
last year of my mother's life was the first of his married life. His
father-in-law hired, at the end of the town opposite to ours, a
furnished house for him and his wife. My mother called upon her by the
Doctor's particular invitation. The visit was sweetly received, and
promptly returned by the bride; but she was pretty and popular, and had
many other visits to pay, especially when she could catch her husband at
leisure to help her. He was seldom at leisure at all, but, as he
self-reproachfully said, "too busy to think except of his patients and
his wife"; and poor mamma, with all her real dignity, had caught
something of the shy, retiring ways of a reduced gentlewoman, and was,
besides, too literally straining every nerve to pay off the mortgage on
her half-earned house, so that, if anything happened, she might "not
leave her girls without a home." Therefore he saw her seldom.
After he heard she was ill, he was with her daily, and often three or
four times a day; and his wife came too, and made the nicest broths and
gruels with her own hands, and begged Fanny not to cry, and cried
herself. He promised my mother that we should never want, if he could
help it, and that he would be a brother to us both, and my guardian. She
told him that, if she died, this promise would be the greatest earthly
comfort to her in her death; and he answered, "So it will to me!"
Then after she was gone, when the lease of his house was up, as no other
tenant offered for ours, he hired it, furniture and all, and offered
Fanny and me both a home in it for an indefinite time; but our affairs
were all unsettled. We knew the rent, as rents were then, would not pay
our expenses and leave us anything to put by for the future, which my
mother had taught us always to think of. Therefore I thought I had
better take care of myself, as I was much the strongest, and perfectly
able to do so. "And a very pretty business you made of it, didn't you,
miss?" reflected and queried I, parenthetically, as I afterwards
reviewed these circumstances in my own mind.
The best we had to hope from my older and our only brother George was,
that he should join us in paying the interest on the mortgage till real
estate should rise,--as everybody said it soon must,--and then the rise
in rents should enable us to let the house on better terms, and thus, by
degrees, clear it of all encumbrances, and have it quite for our own, to
let, sell, or live in. The worst we had to fear was, that he would
insist on forcing it at once into the market, at what would be a great
loss to us, and leave us almost destitute. He was going to be married,
and getting into business, and wanted beyond anything else a little
ready money.
He scarcely knew us even by sight. He had been a sprightly, pretty boy;
and my mother's aunt's husband, having no children of his own, offered
to adopt him. Poor mamma's heart was almost broken; but I suppose
George's noise must have been very trying to my father's nerves; and
then he had no way to provide for him. After she objected, I have always
understood that my father appeared to take a morbid aversion to the
child, and could scarcely bear him in his sight. So George seemed likely
to be still more unhappy, and ruined beside, if she kept him at home. He
was a little fellow then, not more than five years old; but he cried for
her so long that my great-uncle-in-law was very careful how he let him
have anything to do with her again, till he had forgotten her; and
little things taken so early must be expected to fall, sooner or later,
more or less under the influence of those who have them in charge.
Poor mamma died without making a regular will. It was not the custom at
that time for women to be taught so much about business even as they are
now. She thought, if she did make a will before she could pay off the
debt on the house, she should have to make another afterwards, and that
then there would be double lawyers' fees to deduct from the little she
would have to leave us. After she found out that she was dangerously
sick, she was very anxious to make her will, whenever she was in her
right mind; but that went and came so, that the Doctor, and a lawyer
whom he brought to see her, said that no disposition she might make
could stand in court, if any effort were made to break it. All that
could be done was to take down, as she was able to dictate it, an
affectionate and touching letter to George.
In this she begged him to remember how much greater his advantages, and
his opportunities of making a living, were than ours, and besought him
to do his best to keep and increase for us the pittance she had toiled
so hard to earn, and to take nothing from it unless a time should come
when he was as helpless as we.
Two copies of this letter were made, signed, sealed, and witnessed. One
I sent to George, enclosed with an earnest entreaty from Fanny and
myself, that he would come and let mamma see him once again, before she
died, if, as we feared, she must die. We had asked him to come before.
He answered our letter--not our mother's--rather kindly, but very
vaguely, putting off his visit, and saying, that he could not for a
moment suffer himself to believe that she would not do perfectly well,
if we did not alarm her about herself, nor worry her with business when
she was not in a state for it. His reply was handed me before her,
unluckily. She wished to hear it read, and seemed to lose heart and grow
worse from that time.
Thus then matters stood with us that July. The sale of our house was
pending--over our kind host's head too! It was plain to me that George
would not, and that Dr. Physick should not, bear the charge of Fanny's
maintenance. So far and so long as I could, I would.
In the mean time, no further examination was made of her lungs. The
Doctor's report was often "Remarkably comfortable," and never anything
worse than, "Well, on the whole, taking one time with another, I don't
see but she's about as comfortable as she has been." I was, of course,
inexperienced. I was afraid that, if she improved no faster, I should be
obliged to leave her, when I went away to work for her again at the end
of the summer vacation, still very feeble, a care to others, and pining
for my care. That was my nearest and clearest fear.
But what did Fanny think? I hope, the truth; and on one incident, in
chief, I ground my hope. One beautiful day--the last one in July--she
asked me if I should be willing to draw her to our mother's grave. There
could be but one answer; though I had not seen the spot since the
funeral. Fanny looked at it with more than calmness,--with the solemn
irradiation of countenance which had during her illness become her most
characteristic expression. She desired me to help her from her chair.
She lay at her length upon the turf, still and observant, as if
calculating. Then she spoke.
"Katy, dear," said she, very tenderly and softly, as if she feared to
give me pain, "I have been thinking sometimes lately, that, if anything
should ever happen to either of us, the other might be glad to know what
would be exactly the wishes of the one that was gone--about our graves.
Suppose we choose them now, while we are here together. Here, by mamma,
is where I should like to lie. See, I will lay two red clovers for the
head, and a white one for the foot. And there, on her other side, is
just such a place for you. Should you like it?--and--shall you
remember?"
I found voice to say "Yes," and said it firmly.
"And then," added she, after a short, deliberating pause, during which
she, with my assistance, raised herself to sit on the side of the chair
with her feet still resting on the turf, "while we are upon the
subject,--one thing more. If I should be the first to go,--nobody knows
whose turn may come the first,--then I should like to have you do--just
what would make you happiest; but I _don't_ like mourning. I shouldn't
_wish_ to have it worn for me. My feelings about it have all changed
since we made it for mamma. It seemed as if we were only working at a
great black wall, for our minds to have to break through, every time
they yearned to go back into the past and sit with her. It was as if the
things she chose for us, and loved to see us in, were part of her and of
her life with us,--as if she would be able still to think of us in them,
and know just how we looked. And it seemed so strange and unsympathizing
in us, that, when we loved her so, we should go about all muffled up in
darkness, because our God was clothing her in light!"
I answered,--rather slowly and tremulously this time, I fear,--that I
had felt so too.
"Then, Katy," resumed she, pleadingly, as she leaned back in her usual
attitude in the chair, and made a sign that I might draw her home, "we
will not either of us wear it for the other,--without nor within either,
will we?--any more than we can help. Don't you remember what dear mamma
said once, when you had made two mistakes in your lessons at school, and
lost a prize, and took it hard, and somebody was teasing you, with
making very light of it, and telling you to think no more about it? You
were very sorry and a little offended, and said, you always chose not to
be hoodwinked, but to look at things on all sides and in the face. Mamma
smiled, and said, 'It is good and brave to look all trials in the face;
but among the sides, never forget the bright side, little Katy.' If I
had my life to live over again, I would try to mind her more in that.
She always said, there lay my greatest fault. I hope and think God has
forgiven me, because he makes it so easy for me to be cheerful now."
"Fanny," said I, as we drew near the house, "things in this world are
strangely jumbled. Here are you, with your character, to wit, that of a
little saint, if you will have the goodness to overlook my saying so,
and somebody else's conscience. I have no doubt that, while you are
reproaching yourself first for this, then for that and the other, the
said somebody else is sinning away merrily, somewhere among the
antipodes or nearer, without so much as a single twinge."
Smiling, she shook her head at me; and that was all that passed. She was
as cheerful as I tried to be. With regard to the other world, she seemed
to have attained unto the perfect love that casteth out fear; and I
believe her only regret in leaving this lower one for it was that she
could not take me with her. In fact, throughout her illness, her freedom
from anxiety about its symptoms--not absolute, but still in strong
contrast with her previous tendencies--appeared to her physician, as he
acknowledged to me afterwards, even when he considered the frequent
flattering illusions of the disease, a most discouraging indication as
to the case. But to her it was an infinite mercy; and to me, to have
such glimpses to remember of her already in possession of so much of
that peace which remaineth unto the people of God.
As the dog-days drew on, a change came, though at first a very gentle
one to her, if not to me. She slept more, ate less, grew so thin that
she could no more bear the motion of her little wagon, and begged that
it might be returned, because it tired her so to think of it.
Then word came that our house was advertised to be sold,
unconditionally, at an early day. To move her in that state,--how
dreadful it would be! I did not mean to let her know anything about it
until I must; but Miss Mehitable, always less remarkable for tact than
for good-will, blurted it out before her.
Her brows contracted with a moment's look of pain. "O Katy," she
whispered, "I am sorry! That must make you very anxious";--and then she
went to sleep.
Evidently it did not make her very anxious, as I knew that it would have
done as lately even as two or three months before. What was the remedy?
Approaching death. Well, death was approaching me also, as steadily, if
not so nearly; and, after her example, my thoughts took such a foretaste
of that anodyne that, as I sat and gazed on her unconscious, placid
face, all terrors left me, and I was strengthened to pray, and to
determine to look to the morrow with only so much thought as should
enable me to bring up all my resources of body and mind to meet it as I
ought, and to leave the result, unquestioned, quite in God's hand.
The result was an entire relief to her last earthly care. The appointed
day came. The matter took wind. None of our townspeople appeared, to bid
against my guardian; but enough of them were on the spot "to see fair
play," or, in other words, to advance for him whatever sum he might
stand in need of; and the house was knocked down to him at a price even
below its market value. He paid the mortgagee and George their due by
the next mail, but left my title and Fanny's as it was, not to be
settled till I came of age.
These details would only have worried and wearied her; but the
auctioneer's loud voice had hardly died away, or the gathered footsteps
scattered from the door, when the Doctor came to her chamber, flushed
with triumph, to tell us that "Nobody now could turn us out; and
everything was arranged for us to stay." Fanny looked brightly up to
him, and answered: "Now I shall scarcely know what more to pray for, but
God's reward for you." And most of all I thank Him for that news,
because her last day on this earth was such a happy one.
The next morning, just at dawn, she waked me, saying, "O Katy, tell the
Doctor I can't breathe!"
I sprang up, raised her on her pillows, and called him instantly.
She stretched out her hand to him, and gasped, "O Doctor, I can't
breathe! Can't you do anything to help me?"
He felt her pulse quickly, looking at her, and said, very tenderly,
"Have some ether, Fanny. I will run and bring it." Throwing wider open
every window that he passed, he hurried down to the office and back with
the ether.
Eagerly, though with difficulty, she inhaled it; and it relieved her. I
sat and watched her, silent, with her hand in mine.
Presently the door behind me opened softly, as if somebody was looking
in. "My dear," said the Doctor, turning his head, and speaking very
earnestly, though in a low voice, "I _wouldn't_ come here. You can do no
good." But presently his wife came in, in her dressing-gown, very pale,
and sat by me and held the hand that was not holding Fanny's.
And next I knew they thought she would not wake; and then the short
breath stopped. And now it was my turn to stretch out my hands to him
for help; but, looking at me, he burst into tears, as he had not when he
looked at Fanny; and I knew there was no breath more for her, nor any
ether for me. I did not want to go to sleep, because _I_ should have to
wake again; but his wife was sobbing aloud. I knew how dreadful such
excitement was for her; and so I had to do just as they wished me to,
and let them lead me out and lock the door, and lay down on a bed and
shut my eyes.
PROTONEIRON.
DECEMBER 9, 1864.
"And in that sleep of death what dreams may come."
The unresting lines, where oceans end,
Are traced by shifting surf and sand;
As pallid, moonlit fingers blend
The dreamlight of the ghostly land.
No eye can tell where Love's last ray
Fades to the sky of colder light;
No ear, when sounds that vexed the day
Cease mingling with the holier night.
As bells, which long have failed to swing
In lonely towers of crumbling stone,
Through far eternal spaces ring,
With semblance of their ancient tone.
The lightning, quivering through the cloud,
Weaves warp and woof from sky to earth,
In mist that seems a mortal's shroud,
In light that hails an angel's birth.
Thought vainly strives, with life's dull load,
To mount through ether rare and thin;
Fond eyes pursue the spirit's road
To heaven, and dimly gaze therein.
In battle's travail-hour, a host
Writhes in the throes of deadly strife.
One flash! One groan! A startled ghost
Is born into the eternal life.
Dear wife and children! Now I fly
Forth from my soldier camp to you!
Blue ridge and river hurry by
My weary eyes, in quick review.
Long have I waited. How and when
My furlough came is mystery.
I dreamed of charging with my men,--
A dream of glorious history!
To you I fly on Love's strong wing;
My courser needs no armed heel:
And yet anew the bugles ring,
And wake me to the crash of steel.
In fiercer rush of hosts again
My dripping sabre seeks the front.
Spur your mad horses! Forward, men!
Meet with your hearts the battle's brunt.
Tricolor, flaunt! And trumpet-blare,
Scream louder than the bursting shell,
And thundering hoofs, that shake the air,
Trembling above that surging hell!
In carbine smoke and cannon flash,
Like avalanches twain, we meet;
One gasp! we spur; one stab! we crash
And trample with the iron feet.
I _dream_! My tiercepoint smote them through,
My sabre buried to my hand!
And yet unchecked those horsemen flew,
And still I grasp my phantom brand!
Our chargers, which like whirlwinds bore
Us onward, lie all stiff and stark!
Black Midnight's feet wait on the shore,
To bear me--where? Where all is dark.
And still I hear the faint recall!
My senses,--have they dropped asleep?
I see a soldier's funeral pall,
And there _my_ wife and children weep!
Sobs break the air, below the cloud;
And one pure soul, of love and truth,
Is folding in a mortal shroud
Her quivering wings of Hope and Youth.
Ye of the sacred red right hand,
Who count, around our camp-fire light,
Dear names within the shadowy land,
Why do ye whisper _mine_ to-night?
Where am I? _Am_ I? Trumpet notes
Still mingle with a dreamy doubt
Of Where? and Whither? Music floats,
As when camp-lights are going out.
Like saintly eyes resigned to Death,
Like spirit whispers from afar,
The sighing bugle yields its breath,
As if it wooed a dying star.
Draped in dark shadows, widowed Night
Weeps, on new graves, with chilly tears;
Beyond strange mountain-tops, the light
Is breaking from the immortal years.
A rhythm, from the unfathomed deep
Of God's eternal stillness, sings
My wondering, trembling soul to sleep,
While angels lift it on their wings.
THE PROGRESS OF PRUSSIA.
The changes that have taken place in Europe in the last twenty years are
of a most comprehensive character, and as strange as comprehensive; and
their consequences are likely to be as remarkable as the changes
themselves. In 1846 Russia was the first power of Europe, and at a great
distance ahead of all other members of the Pentarchy. She retained the
hegemony which she had acquired by the events of 1812-1814, and by the
great display of military force she had made in 1815, when 160,000 of
her troops were reviewed near Paris by the sovereigns and other leaders
of the Grand Alliance there assembled after the second and final fall of
the first Napoleon. Had Alexander I. reigned long, it is probable that
his eccentricities--to call them by no harder name--would have operated
to deprive Russia of her supremacy; but Nicholas, though he might never
have raised his country so high as it was carried by his brother, was
exactly the man to keep the power he had inherited,--and to keep it in
the only way in which it was to be kept, namely, by increasing it. This
he had done, and great success had waited on most of his undertakings,
while in none had he encountered failure calculated to attract the
world's attention. England had in some sense shared men's notice with
Russia immediately after the settlement of Europe. The "crowning
carnage, Waterloo," was considered her work; and, as the most decisive
battle since Philippi, it gave to the victor in it an amount of
consideration that was equal to that which Napoleon himself had
possessed in 1812. But this consideration rapidly passed away, as
England did nothing to maintain her influence on the Continent, while
Russia was constantly busy there, and really governed it down to the
French Revolution of 1830; and her power was not much weakened even by
the fall of the elder Bourbons, with whom the Czar had entered into a
treaty that had for one of its ends the cession to France of those very
Rhenish provinces of which so much has been said in the course of the
present year. Russia was victorious in her conflicts with the Persians
and the Turks, and the battle of Navarino really had been fought in her
interest,--blindly by the English, but intelligently by the French, who
were willing that she should plant the double-headed eagle on the
Bosporus, provided the lilies should be planted on the Rhine. If the
fall of the Bourbons in France, and the fall of the Tories in England,
weakened Russia's influence in Western Europe, those events had the
effect of drawing Austria and Prussia nearer to her, and of reviving
something of the spirit of the Holy Alliance, which had lost much of its
strength from the early death of Alexander. Russia had her own way in
almost every respect; and in 1846 Nicholas was almost as powerful a
ruler as Napoleon had been a generation earlier, with the additional
advantage of being a legitimate sovereign, who could not be destroyed
through the efforts of any coalition. Three years later he saved Austria
from destruction by his invasion of Hungary,--an act of hard insolence,
which quite reconciles one to the humiliation that overtook him five
years later. He was then so powerful that the reactionists of the West
cried for Russian cannon, to be used against the Reds. There was no
nation to dispute the palm with Russia. England was supposed to be
devoted to the conversion of cotton into calico, and to be ruled in the
spirit of the Manchester school. She had retired into her shell, and
could not be got out of it. Austria was thinking chiefly of Italy, and
of becoming a naval power by incorporating that Peninsula into her
empire. Prussia was looked upon as nothing but a Russian outpost to the
west, and waiting only to be used by her master. France had not
recovered from her humiliation of 1814-15, and never would recover from
it so long as she warred only at barricades or in Barbary. Russia was
supreme, and most men thought that supreme she would remain.
Thus stood matters down to 1853. Early in that year the Czar entered on
his last quarrel with the Turks, whose cause was espoused by England,
partly for the reason that Russian aggrandizement in the East would be
dangerous to her interests, but more on the ground that she had become
weary of submission to that arrogant sovereign who was in the habit of
giving law to the Old World. Russia's ascendency, though chiefly the
work of England, was more distasteful to the English than it was to any
other European people,--more than it was to the French, at whose expense
it had been founded; and had Nicholas made overtures to the latter,
instead of making them to England, it is very probable he would have
accomplished his purpose. But he detested Napoleon III., and he was at
no pains to conceal his sentiments. This was the one great error of his
life. The French Emperor had two great ends in view: first, to get into
respectable company; and, secondly, to make himself powerful at home, by
obtaining power and influence for France abroad. Unaided, he could
accomplish neither end; and Nicholas and Victoria were the only two
sovereigns who could be of much use to him in accomplishing one or both.
Had Nicholas been gracious to him, had he, in particular, made overtures
to him, he might have had the Emperor almost on his own terms; for the
French disliked the English, and they did not dislike the Russians.
Everything pointed to renewal of that "cordial understanding" between
Russia and France which had existed twenty-five years earlier, when
Charles X. was king of France, and which, had there been no Revolution
of July, would have given to Russia possession of Constantinople, and to
the French that roc's egg of theirs, the left bank of the Rhine. But
prosperity had been fatal to the Czar. He could not see what was
palpable to everybody else. He allowed his feelings to get the better of
his judgment. He treated Napoleon III. with less consideration than he
treated the Turkish Sultan; and Napoleon actually was forced to teach
him that a French ruler was a powerful personage, and that the days of
Louis Philippe were over forever. If not good enough to help Russia
spoil Turkey, the Czar must be taught he was good enough to help England
prevent the spoliating scheme. France and England united their forces to
those of Turkey, and were joined by Sardinia. Russia was beaten in the
war, on almost all its scenes. The world ascribed the result to Napoleon
III. France carried off the honors of the war, and of spoil there was
none. The Peace of Paris, which terminated the contest, was the work of
Napoleon. He dictated its terms, forcing them less on his enemy than on
his allies.
As Russia's leadership of Europe had come from success in war, and had
been maintained by subsequent successes of the Russian armies,--in
Persia, in Turkey, in Poland, and elsewhere,--it followed that that
leadership was lost when the fortune of war changed, and those armies
were beaten on every occasion where they met the Allies. No military
country could stand up erect under such crushing blows as had been
delivered at the Alma, at Inkermann, at the Tchernaya, and at
Sebastopol, not to name lesser Allied successes, or to count the
victories of the Turks. Nicholas died in the course of the war, falling
only before the universal conqueror. His successor submitted to the
decision of the sword, and in fact performed an act of abdication
inferior only to that executed by Napoleon. France stepped into the
vacant leadership, and held it for ten years. Subsequent events
confirmed and strengthened the French hegemony. The Italian war, waged
by the Emperor in person, had lasted only about as many months as the
Russian war did years, and yet it had proved far more damaging to
Austria than the other had proved to Russia. The mere loss of territory
experienced by Austria, though not small, was the least of the adverse
results to her. Her whole Italian scheme was cut through and utterly
ruined; and it was well understood that the days of her rule over
Venetia were destined to be as few as they were evil. For what she then
did, France received Savoy and Nice, which formed by no means a great
price for her all but inestimable services,--services by no means to be
ascertained, if we would know their true value, by what was done in
1859. France created the Kingdom of Italy. After making the amplest
allowance for what was effected by Cavour, by Garibaldi, by Victor
Emanuel, and by the Italian people, it must be clear to every one that
nothing could have been effected toward the overthrow of Austrian
domination in Italy but for the action of French armies in that country.
That the Emperor meant what he wrought is very unlikely; but after the
events of 1859 it was impossible to prevent the construction of the
kingdom of Italy; and the Frenchman had to consent to the completion of
his own work, though he did so on some occasions with extreme
reluctance,--not so much from the dictation of his own feelings, as from
the aversion which the French feel for the Italian cause, and which is
so strong, and so deeply shared by the military, that it was with
difficulty the soldiers in the camp of Châlons were prevented getting up
an illumination when news reached them of the battle of Custozza, the
event of which was so disastrous to Italy, and would have been fatal to
her cause, had not that been vindicated and established by Prussian
genius and valor on the remote fields of Germany and Bohemia. The
descendants of men who fought under Arminius saved the descendants of
the countrymen of Varus. Those persons who have condemned the
Frenchman's apparently singular course toward Italy on some occasions,
have not made sufficient allowance for the dislike of almost all classes
of his subjects for the Italians. The Italian war was unpopular, and the
Russian war was not popular. While the French have been pleased by the
military occurrences that make up the histories of those wars, they were
by no means pleased by the wars themselves, and they do not approve them
even at this day; and the extraordinary events of the current year are
not at all calculated to make them popular in France: for it is not
difficult to see that there is a close connection between the
establishment of the Kingdom of Italy and the elevation of Prussia to
the first place in Europe; and Prussia is the power most abhorred by the
French. So intense is French hatred of Prussia, that it is not too much
to say that, last summer, the French would almost as lief have seen the
Russians in Paris as the Prussians in Vienna.
At the middle of last June the leadership of Europe--Frenchmen said of
the world--was in the hands of France; and that such was France's place
was the work of Napoleon III. The Emperor had been successful in all his
undertakings, with one exception. His Mexican business had proved a
total failure; but this had not injured him. Americans thought
differently, some of us going so far as to suppose the fall of
Maximilian's shaky throne would involve that of the solid throne of
Napoleon. No such thing. The great majority of Frenchmen know little and
care less about the Mexican business. Intelligent Frenchmen regret the
Emperor's having taken it up; but they do so because of the expenditure
it has involved, and because they have learnt from their country's
history that it is best for her to keep out of that colonizing pursuit
which has so many charms for the Emperor,--perhaps because of his Dutch
origin. There is something eminently ridiculous about French
colonization, which contrasts strangely with the robust action of the
English. The Emperor seems to believe in it,--an instance of weakness
that places him, on one point at least, below common men, most of whom
laugh at his doings in regard to Mexico. If report does him no
injustice, he thinks his Mexican undertaking the greatest thing of his
reign. What, then, is the smallest thing of that reign? It is somewhat
strange that this immense undertaking should not have been practicable
till some time after the United States had become involved in civil war,
that tasked all American energies, and did not permit any attention to
be paid to Napoleon's action in Mexico.
Whether wise or foolish, Napoleon's interference in Mexican affairs had
not weakened his power or lessened his influence in the estimation of
Europe. Five months ago he was at the head of the European world. His
position was quite equal to that which Nicholas held thirteen years
earlier. If any change in his condition was looked for, it was sought in
the advance of his greatness, not in the chance of his fall. The
general, the all but universal sentiment was, that during Napoleon
III.'s life France's lead must be accepted; and that, if that life
should be much extended, France's power would be greatly increased, and
that Belgium and the Rhine country might become hers at no distant day.
It is true that, long before the middle of June, the course of events
indicated the near approach of war; but it was commonly supposed that
the chief result of such war would be to add to the greatness and glory
of France. _That_ was about the only point on which men were agreed with
respect to the threatened conflict. Prussia and Italy might overthrow
the Austrian empire; but most probably Austria, aided by most of
Germany, would defeat them both, her armies rendezvousing at Berlin and
Milan; and then would Napoleon III., bearing "the sword of Brennus,"
come in, and save the Allies from destruction, who would gratefully
reward him,--the one by ceding the Rhenish provinces, and the other the
island of Sardinia, to France. Such was the programme laid out by most
persons in Europe and America, and probably not one person in a hundred
thought it possible for Prussia to succeed. Even most of those persons
who were not overcrowed by Austria's partisans and admirers did not
dream that she would be conquered in a week, but thought it would be a
more difficult matter for General Benedek to march from Prague to Berlin
than was generally supposed, and that such march would not exactly be of
the nature of a military promenade. That the French Emperor shared the
popular belief, is evident from his conduct. He never would have allowed
war to break out, if he had supposed it would lead to the elevation of
Prussia to the first place in Europe,--a position held by himself, and
which he had no desire to vacate. It was in his power to prevent the
occurrence of war down almost to the very hour when the Diet of the
Germanic Confederation afforded to Prussia so plausible a ground for
setting her armies in motion, by adopting a course that bore some
resemblance to the old process of putting a disobedient member under the
ban of the Empire. Prussia would not have gone to war with Austria, had
she not been assured of the Italian alliance,--an alliance that would
not only be useful in keeping a large portion of Austria's force in the
south, but would prevent that power from purchasing Italian aid by the
cession of Venetia; for so angry were the Austrians with Prussia, that
it was quite on the cards that they might become the friends of Italy,
if she would but help them against that nation whose exertions in 1859
had prevented Venetia from following the fate of Lombardy.
As Prussia would not have made war in 1866 without having secured the
assistance of Italy, so was it impossible for Italy to form an alliance
with Prussia without the consent of France being first had and obtained.
Napoleon III. possessed an absolute veto on the action of the Italian
government, and had he signified to that government that an alliance
with Prussia could not meet with his countenance and approval, no such
alliance ever would have been formed, or even the proposition to form it
have been taken into serious consideration by the Cabinet of Florence.
Victor Emanuel II. would have dared no more to attack Francis Joseph,
without the consent of Napoleon III., than Carthage durst have attacked
Masinissa without the consent of Rome. Prussia was not under the
supervision of France, and was and is the only great European nation
which had not then, as she has not since, been made to feel the weight
of his power; but it may be doubted, without the slightest intention to
impeach her courage, if she would have resolved upon war had she been
convinced that France was utterly opposed to such resolution, and was
prepared to show that the Empire was for peace by making war to preserve
it. The opinion was quite common, as matters became more and more
warlike with each succeeding day, that the course of Prussia had been
fixed upon and mapped out by Count Bismark and Napoleon III., and that
the former had received positive assurances that his country should not
undergo any reduction of territory should the fortune of war go against
her; in return for which he had agreed to such a "rectification of the
French frontier" as should be highly pleasing to the pride of Frenchmen,
and add greatly to the glory and the dignity of their Emperor. When news
came that Napoleon III., after peace had been resolved upon, had asked
for the cession of certain Rhenish territory,[45] the demand was
supposed to have been made in consequence of an understanding entered
into before the war by the courts of Paris and Berlin. There was nothing
unreasonable in this supposition; for Napoleon III. was so bent upon
extending the boundaries of France, and was so entirely master of the
situation, and his friendship was so necessary to Prussia, that it was
reasonable to suppose he had made a good bargain with that power.
Probably, when the secret history of the war shall be published, it will
be seen that an understanding did exist between Prussia and France, and
that Napoleon III., in August, asked for no more than it had been agreed
he should have, in June, or May, or even earlier. Why, then, did Prussia
give so firm but civil a negative in answer to his demand? and how was
it that he submitted with so much of meekness to her refusal, even
attributing his demand to the pressure of French public opinion, which
is no more strongly expressed in 1866 in favor of the acquisition of the
Rhine country, than it has been in almost any year since that country
was lost, more than half a century since? The answer is easy. Prussia,
no matter what her arrangement with France before the war, durst not
pass over to the latter a solitary league of German territory. Her
victories had so exalted German sentiment that she could not have her
own way in all things. She was, on one side, paralyzed by the unexpected
completeness of her military successes, which had brought very near all
Germany under her eagles; for all Germans saw at once that she had
obtained that commanding position from which the dictation of the unity
of their country was not only a possibility, but something that could be
accomplished without much difficulty. What Victor Emanuel II. and Count
Cavour had been to Italy, William I. and Count Bismark could be to
Austria, with this vast difference in favor of the Prussian sovereign
and statesman,--that their policy could not be dictated, nor their
action hampered, by a great foreign sovereign, who ruled a people
hostile to the unity of every European race but themselves. It was
impossible even to take into consideration any project that looked to
the dismemberment of Germany, at a time when even Southern Germans were
ready to unite with Prussia, because she was the champion of German
unity, and was in condition to make her championship effectual. Napoleon
III. saw how matters were, and, being a statesman, he did not hesitate,
at the risk of much loss of influence, to admit a fact the existence of
which could not be denied, and which operated with overwhelming force
against his interests both as an emperor and as a man. That he may have
only deferred a rupture with Prussia is probable enough, for it is not
to be assumed that he is ready to cede the first place in Europe to the
country most disliked by his subjects, and which refuses to cede
anything to him. But he must have time in which to rearm his infantry,
and to place in their hands a weapon that shall be to the needle-gun
what the needle-gun[46] is to the Austrian muzzle-loader. He has
postponed action; but that he has definitely abandoned the French claim
to the left bank of the Rhine it would be hazardous to assert. There are
reports that a conference of the chief European powers will be held
soon, and that by that body something will be done with respect to the
French claim that will prove satisfactory to all parties. It would be a
marvellous body, should it accomplish so miraculous a piece of business.
The matter is in fair way to disturb the peace of Europe before Sadowa
shall have become as old a battle as we now rate Solferino.
We do not assert that there was an understanding between France and
Prussia last spring, and that Prussia went to war because that
arrangement assured her against loss; but we think there is nothing
irrational in the popular belief in the existence of such an
understanding, and that nothing has occurred since the middle of June
that renders that belief absurd. The contrary belief makes a fool of
Napoleon III.,--a character which not even the Emperor's enemies have
attributed to him since he became a successful man.
War began on the 15th of June, the day after that on which that bungling
body, the Bund, under Austrian influence, had resort to overt measures
against Prussia, which had suffered for some time from its covert
measures. The Germanic Confederation ceased to exist on the 14th of
June, having completed its half-century, with a little time to spare.
The declarations of war that appeared on the 18th of June,--the
anniversary of Fehrbellin, Kolin, and Waterloo, all great and decisive
Prussian battles, and two of them Prussian victories, or victories which
Prussians aided in winning,--the declarations of war, we say, were mere
formalities, and as such they were regarded. Prussia's first open
operation was taken three days before, when she invaded Saxony,--a
country in which the Austrians, had they been wise, would have had at
least a hundred thousand men within twenty-four hours after the action
of the Diet. Prussia had been prepared for war for some weeks, perhaps
months, while we are assured that Austria's preparations were far from
complete; from which, supposing the statement correct, the inference is
drawn that she did not expect Prussia to push matters to extremity. It
is more likely that she fell into the usual error of all proud
egotists,--that of estimating the capacity of a foe by her own. We
cannot think so poorly of Austrian statesmen and generals as to conclude
that they did not see war was inevitable in the latter part of May,
which gave them three weeks to mass their troops so near the Saxon
frontier as would have enabled them to cross it in a few hours after the
Diet had given itself up to their direction, before the world. As the
Diet never durst have acted thus without Austria's direct sanction,
Austria must have known that war was at hand, and she should have
prepared for its coming. Probably she did make all the preparation she
thought necessary, she supposing that Prussia would be as slow as
herself, because believing that her best was the best thing in the
world. This error was the source of all her misfortunes. She applied to
the military art, in this age of railways and electric telegraphs,
principles and practices that were not even of the first merit in much
earlier and very different times. She was not aware that the world had
changed. Prussia was thoroughly aware of it, and acted accordingly. She
was all vivacity and alertness, and hence her success. In nineteen days,
counting from the morning of June 15th, she had accomplished that which
almost all men in other countries had deemed impossible. While
foreigners were speculating as to the number of days Benedek would
require to reach Berlin, and wondering whether he would proceed by the
Silesian or the Saxon route, the Prussians were routing him, taking
Prague, and marching swiftly toward Vienna. The contending armies first
"felt" one another on the 26th of June, in a small affair at Liebenau,
in which the Prussians were victorious. The next day there was another
"affair," of larger proportions, at Podal, with the same result; and two
more actions, one at Nachod and at Skalitz, in which Fortune was
consistent, adhering to the single-headed eagle, and the other at
Trautenau, which was of the nature of a drawn battle. On the 28th there
was another fight at Trautenau, the Prussians remaining masters of the
field; while the Austrians were beaten at other points, and fell back to
Gitschin, once the capital of Wallenstein's Duchy of Friedland, and
where the Friedlander was to receive ample vengeance just seven
generations after his assassination by contrivance and order of the head
of the German branch of the house of Austria, Ferdinand II. Could
Wallenstein have "revisited the glimpses of the moon" on the night of
the 28th of last June, he might have cast terror into the soul of
Francis Joseph, as the Bodach Glas did into that of Vich-Ian-Vohr, by
appearing to him, and bidding him beware of the morrow; for it was at
Gitschin, on the 29th of June, and not at Sadowa, on the 3d of July,
that the event of the war was decided. Had the battle then and there
fought been fortunate for the Austrians, the name of Sadowa would have
remained unknown to the world; for then the battle of the 3d of July
could not have been fought, or it would have had a different scene, and
most probably a different result. Austrian defeat at Gitschin made the
battle of Sadowa a necessity, and made it so under conditions highly
favorable to the Prussians. The ghost of Wallenstein might have returned
to its rest with entire complacency, and with the firm resolution to
trouble this sublunary world no more, had it witnessed the flight of the
Austrians through Gitschin. By a "curious coincidence," it happens that
a large number of the vanquished were Saxons, descendants, it may be, of
men who had acted with Gustavus Adolphus against Wallenstein in 1632.
The battle of Sadowa was fought on the 3d of July, the third anniversary
of the decisive day of our battle of Gettysburg. At a moderate estimate,
four hundred and twenty thousand men took part in it, of whom one
hundred and ninety-five thousand were Austrians and Saxons, and two
hundred and twenty-five thousand Prussians. This makes the action rank
almost with the battle of Leipzig, the greatest of all battles.[47] It
is satisfactory evidence of the real greatness of Prussian generalship,
that it had succeeded in massing much the larger force on the final
field, though at a distance from the Prussian frontier and far within
the enemy's territory; and also that while the invaders of Austria were
opposed by equal forces on the left and centre of the Austrian line,
they were in excessive strength on that line's right, the very point at
which their presence was most required. Yet further: these great masses
of men were all employed, and admirably handled, while almost a fourth
part of the Austrian army remained idle, or was not employed till the
issue of the battle had been decided. The Austrian position was strong,
or it would have been so in the hands of an able commander; but Benedek
was unequal to his work, and totally unfit to command a larger army than
even Napoleon I. ever led in any battle. There seldom has lived a
general capable of handling an army two hundred thousand strong. The
Prussians, to be sure, were stronger, and they were splendidly handled;
but it must be observed that they were divided into two armies, and that
those armies, though having a common object, operated apart. In this
respect, though in no other, Sadowa bears a resemblance to Waterloo, the
armies of the Crown Prince and of Prince Frederick Charles answering to
those of Blücher and Wellington. The Prussian force engaged far exceeded
that of all the armies that fought at Waterloo, and the Austrian army
exceeded them by some five or six thousand men. War has very rarely
been conducted on the scale that is known in 1866. Even the greatest of
the engagements in our civil contest seem to shrink to small proportions
when compared with what took place last summer in Bohemia. The armies of
Grant and Lee, in May, 1864, probably were not larger than the Prussian
army at Sadowa. At the same time, Austria had a great force in Venetia,
and large bodies of men in other parts of her empire, and some in the
territory of the Germanic Confederation; and the Prussians were carrying
on vigorous warfare in various parts of Germany.
After their grand victory, the Prussians pushed rapidly forward toward
Vienna; and names that are common in the history of Napoleon's Austrian
campaigns began to appear in the daily journals,--Olmütz, Brünn, Znaym,
Austerlitz, and others. Nothing occurred to stay their march, and they
were in the very act of winning another battle which would have cut the
Austrians off from Hungary, when an armistice was agreed upon. It was so
in 1809, when the officers had to separate the soldiers to announce the
armistice of Znaym. It came out soon after that the cessation of warlike
operations took place not a day too soon for the Austrians, whose army
was in a fearfully demoralized condition. Vienna would have been
occupied in a week by the Prussians, had they been disposed to push
matters to extremities, and that without a battle; or, if a battle had
been fought, the Austrian force must have been destroyed, or would have
been literally cut off from any safe line of retreat. Probably the house
of Austria would have been struck out of the list of ruling families,
had the Austrians not submitted to the invaders. Count Bismark is a man
who would have had no hesitation in reviving the Bohemian and Hungarian
monarchies, had further resistance been made to his will. The armistice
was quickly followed by negotiations, and those were completed on the
23d of August, exactly seventy days after the Diet, at the dictation of
Austria, had given up Prussia to punishment, to be inflicted by the
Austrian sword.