THE QUEEN'S CADET

  And other Tales


  BY JAMES GRANT

  AUTHOR OF
  "THE ROMANCE OF WAR," "FIRST LOVE AND LAST LOVE,"
  "THE WHITE COCKADE," ETC., ETC.



  LONDON
  GEORGE ROUTLEDGE AND SONS
  THE BROADWAY, LUDGATE
  NEW YORK: 416 BROOME STREET
  1874




CONTENTS.


THE QUEEN'S CADET

THE SPECTRE HAND

THE BOMBARDIER'S STORY

KOTAH: A TALE OF THE INDIAN MUTINY

THE STORY OF RAPHAEL VELDA

LA BELLE TURQUE: THE STORY OF THE PRINCESS CECILE

THE MARQUIS DE FRATTEAUX, CAPTAIN OF FRENCH HORSE

SOCIVISCA: THE STORY OF A GREEK OUTLAW

PAQUETTE: AN EPISODE OF THE FRANCO-PRUSSIAN WAR

APPARITIONS AND WONDERS:

  LEAVES FROM OLD LONDON LIFE; 1664-1705

  THE WILD BEAST OF GÉVAUDAN

  "THERE WERE GIANTS IN THOSE DAYS"

  BURIED HEARTS

  PHANTASMAGORIA

  A STRING OF GHOST STORIES




THE QUEEN'S CADET.

"I have been forced to believe in the existence and influence of an
unseen world, of something which is described in that line of
Dryden's,

  "'With silent steps I follow you all day.'


"I have felt the influence of the spiritual and invisible on the
senses, though I know nothing of the complications, the deceptions
and alleged perils, forming a portion of that which is now termed
spiritualism; and which affirms that the unseen world cannot become
manifest, save in obedience to certain occult laws which regulate the
phenomena of nature."

What rigmarole was this?

Could the speaker--this man with the melancholy tone and saddened
eye--actually be the same handsome Jack Arkley, my old college chum
at Sandhurst, who was always rather sceptical even in religious
matters, who was one of the merriest fellows there, who had been once
nearly rusticated for breaking the lamps and dismounting the guns to
spite the adjutant, but who, as a Queen's cadet, had more marks of
excellence than any of us; who was afterwards the beau-ideal of a
fine young English officer--a prime bat and bowler, who pulled a good
stroke oar, had such a firm seat in his saddle, and who was the best
hand for organizing a picnic, a ball, or a scratch company, for
amateur theatricals; and who in the late expedition against the
Looshais, had won the reputation of being a regular fire-eater--a
fellow who would face the devil in his shirt sleeves!

Could the champagne of "the Rag" have affected him, thought I, as he
continued earnestly and sadly, and while manipulating a cigar
selected from the silver stand on the table:

"I have somewhere read that very few persons in this world have been
unfortunate enough to have seen those things that are invisible to
others."

"By Jove!  Do you mean a--ghost?"

"Not exactly the vulgar ghost of the nursery," said he, his pale face
colouring slightly.

"But we have all met with those who knew some one else who had seen
something weird, unearthly, unexplainable."

"Precisely; but I shall speak from personal experience--so now for a
little narrative of my own."

We had dined that evening at the club, where D---- of the Greys had
given a few fellows a dinner, in honour of being gazetted to his
troop, and to "wet" the new commission; and though it seemed to me
that, like the rest of us, Jack Arkley had done justice to all the
good things set before him, from the soup to the coffee and curaçao,
he had been, during dinner, remarkably _triste_ or abstracted, and
took but little interest in the subjects discussed by the guests, who
were mostly all upon short leave from Aldershot, and, the Spring
drills being over, were thankful to exchange the white dust of the
Long Valley, for the Row or Regent Street.

We were alone now, and lingering over some iced brandy-pawnee (as we
called it in India) in the cool bay-window of his room in Piccadilly,
where it overlooked the pleasant Green Park and where the clock of
Westminster was shining above the trees, like a red harvest moon.  So
I prepared to listen to him with more curiosity than belief, while he
related the following singular story, which he would never have
ventured to relate to the circle of heedless fellows whom we had just
left.

"My parents died when I was little more than an infant, leaving me to
the care of two uncles, a maternal one, named Beverley, a man of
considerable wealth, who in consequence of a quarrel with my father,
whose marriage with his sister he resented, totally ignored my
existence, and was ever a kind of myth to me; the other a paternal
one, a bachelor curate in North Wales, poor old Morgan Apreece
Arkley, than whom there was no better or more kind-hearted man in all
the principality.

"His means were most limited; but to share the little he possessed he
made me freely and tenderly welcome, all the more so that to two
appeals he had made to the generosity of my Uncle Beverley, no
response was ever returned--a cutting coldness and rudeness, bitterly
resented by my hot-tempered but warm-hearted old Welsh kinsman.

"A career was necessarily chosen for me.

"The death of my father on duty at Benares, enabled me to be borne on
the strength of the Military College at Sandhurst as one of the
twenty Queen's cadets; and to that seminary I repaired, a few months
after you did, when in my sixteenth year, leaving with sincere sorrow
the lonely white-haired man who had been as a parent to me, and whose
secluded parsonage by the margin of Llyn Ogwen, and under the shadow
of Carneydd Davydd, had been the only home I could remember.  There
for years he had been my earnest and anxious tutor, mingling with the
classics a store of quaint old Welsh legends and ancient songs, for
he was an excellent and enthusiastic harper, and had come of a long
line of harpers.

"Prior to this change in my life, I encountered an adventure which
has had considerable influence in my after career.

"From childhood I had been familiar with the mountains that overhang
Llyn Ogwen.  I knew every track and rock and fissure of Carneydd
Davydd, of 'the Black Ladders' of Carneydd Llewellyn, and the brows
of the greater giant of the three, cloud-capped Snowdon.  For miles
upon miles among them I had been wont to wander with my gun, and at
times to aid the shepherds in tracking out lost sheep or goats, by
places where we looked down upon the gray mist and vapour that
floated below us, and where the mountain peaks seemed to start out of
it like isles amid a sea.  In the heart of such solitudes as these I
found food for much reflective thought, and was wont to give full
swing to my boyish fancies.

"Under every variety of season and weather I was wont to wander among
these mountains; sometimes when their sides seemed to vibrate under
the hot rays of a cloudless summer sun; at others when the glistening
snow lay deep in the passes and valleys, or when height and hollow
were alike shrouded in thick and impenetrable mist; but my favourite
spot was ever Llyn Idwal, the wildest and most savage of all our
Welsh lakes.  It fills the crater of an ancient volcano, and is the
traditional scene of the murder of Idwal, a prince of Wales, who was
flung over its precipice--a place which for gloomy grandeur has no
equal, as the bare rocks that start out of it, sheer as a wall,
darken by their shadows its depth to the most intense blackness; and
the peasants aver that no fish can swim in it, and no bird fly over
it and live.

"Lying upon the mountain tops, amid the purple heather or the scented
thyme-grass, I was wont to watch the distant waters of the Channel,
stretching far away beyond the Puffin Isle and Great Orme's Head,
ever changing in hue as the masses of cloud skimmed over them; and
from thence I followed, with eager eyes, the white sails of the
ships, or the long smoky pennants of the steamers that were bound
for--ah! where were they bound for?--and so, far from the solitary
parsonage of the good old man who loved me so well, I was ungrateful
enough to follow to distant isles and shores these vanishing specks,
in the spirit.

"I see that you are impatient to know what all this preamble has to
do with Sandhurst and the melancholy which now oppresses me; but
nevertheless, I am fast coming to the matter--to 'that keystone of
the soul which must exist in every nature.'

"One day I was up a wild part of the mountains, far above Llyn Ogwen,
a long and narrow sheet of water which occupies the whole pass
between Braich-ddu and the shoulder of Carneydd Davydd.  My sole
companion was my dog Cidwm--in English, 'Wolf'--which lay beside me
on the sunny grass, when from one of my day-dreams I was suddenly
roused by voices, and found three persons close beside me.

"Mounted on sturdy Welsh ponies, two of these were a gentleman in the
prime of life, and a very young lady, apparently his daughter,
attended by David Lloyd, one of the guides for the district, who knew
me well.  He led the bridle of the girl's pony with one hand, and
grasped his alpenstock with the other.  This group paused near me,
and some conversation ensued.  Lloyd had evidently mistaken the path,
and was loath to admit the fact, or to suggest that they should
retrace their steps, and yet he knew enough of the mountains to be
well aware that to advance would be to court danger.  During the
colloquy that ensued between him and his employer, a haughty and
imperious-looking man, I was earnestly gazing in the half-averted
face of the girl, who was watching an eagle in full flight.

"She was marvellously beautiful.  Her features--save in profile--were
perhaps far from correct, yet there was a divine delicacy, a charming
purity of complexion, and brightness of expression over them all; and
her minute face seemed to nestle amid the masses of her fair rippling
hair.  She turned towards me, and her eyes met mine.  They were dark
violet blue, and shaded by brown lashes, so long that they imparted
much of softness to their dove-like expression, and she smiled, for
no doubt the little maid saw that there was something of unequivocal
admiration to be read in my ardent gaze; and so absorbed was I, that,
for a few seconds, I was not aware that the guide was addressing me,
and inquiring how far the path was traversable in this particular
direction.  Ere I could reply,

"'How should this mere lad know, if you don't?' asked the male
tourist, haughtily and sharply.

"'Few here can know better, sir,' replied Lloyd.  'I have seen him
climb where the eagles alone can go.'

"'Shall we proceed, then?' he asked me, sharply.

"'I think not, sir,' said I; 'Moel Hebog was covered with mist this
morning, and----'

"'But Moel Hebog is clear enough now,' said David Lloyd, with
irritation--the mountain so named being deemed an unerring barometer,
as regards the chances of mist upon its greater brethren--'so I think
we may proceed,' he added, touching his hat to his employer.  'I
don't require, sir, to be taught my trade by a mere lad, a gentleman
tho you be, Master Arkley.'

"'_Arkley!_' repeated the stranger, starting and eyeing me keenly,
and yet with a lowering expression of face.

"I warned them of the danger of farther progression, but the
avaricious guide derided me; and I heard his employer, as they passed
on, asking him some questions, amid which--but it might be fancy--I
thought my own name occurred.  I gazed after them with interest, and
with much of anxiety, for their path was perilous, and the sweet soft
beauty of the girl had impressed me deeply; and, as she disappeared,
with all her wealth of golden hair, the brightness seemed to have
departed from the mountain side.

"What was the magic this creature, whom I had only seen for a few
minutes, possessed for me?  She was scarcely a woman, yet past
childhood; and her features remained as distinctly impressed upon my
memory as if they were before me still.  Do not infer from this
strange interest that 'love at first sight,' as the novels used to
have it, was an ingredient of this emotion.  No; it was something
deeper--a subtle magnetism--something that I know not how to define
or to express; and with a repining sigh, I thought of my lonely life,
and longed to go forth on the career that awaited me beyond those
green mountains that were bounded by the sea.

"Had I ever seen that fair little face before, or dreamed of it by
night or by day, that already it seemed to haunt me so?

"The little group had not disappeared above five minutes, when a
sound like a cry was borne past me on the mountain breeze.  I started
up, my heart beating wildly; and with undefined apprehension,
hastened in the direction of the sound, while Wolf careered in front
of me.  There now came the sound of hoofs, and with bridle trailing,
saddle reversed, and nostrils distended, the pony on which I had so
recently seen the young girl, came tearing over the crest of the
hill, and galloped madly past me towards Llyn Idwal.

"Quicker beat my heart, and my breath came thick and fast.  Something
dreadful had taken place!  True to his instincts as ever was the
faithful Gelert of the Welsh tradition, Wolf sped in haste to the
edge of what I knew to be a frightful ravine.  There the hoof marks
were fresh in the turf, the edge of which was broken; the grass too,
was crushed and torn, as if something had fallen over it.  The dog
now paused, lifted up his nose, and howled ominously.  I peered over;
and far down below, on a ledge of green turf, but perilously
overhanging a chasm in the mountain side, lay that which appeared at
first to be a mere bundle of clothes, but which I knew to be the
little maiden dead-- doubtlessly dead--and a wail of sorrow escaped
me.

"Her father and the guide had disappeared.

"Partly sliding, partly descending as if by a natural ladder, finding
footing and grasp where many might have found neither, mechanically,
and as one in a dream, I reached her in about ten minutes; and, as I
had a naturally boyish dread of facing death, with joy I saw her
move, and then took her in my arms tenderly and caressingly; while
she opened her eyes and sighed deeply, for the fall had stunned and
shaken her severely.  Otherwise she was, happily, uninjured; but I
had reached her just in time, for, if left to herself, she must have
tottered and fallen into the terrible profundity below.

"'Papa! oh, where is my papa?  I was thrown suddenly from my pony--a
bird scared it--and remember no more;' then a passion of tears and
terror came over her, with the consciousness of the peril she had
escaped and that which still menaced her, for to ascend was quite
impracticable, and to descend seemed nearly equally so.  Above us the
mountain side seemed to rise like a wall of rock; on the other hand,
at the bottom of the ravine, where the shadows of evening were dark
and blue, though sunset still tipped Snowdon's peaks with fire, and
clouds of crimson and gold were floating above us, I could see a
rivulet, a tributary of the Ogwen, glittering like a silver thread
far down, perhaps a thousand feet below.

"'Courage,' said I, while for a time my heart died within me; 'I
shall soon conduct you to a place of safety.'

"'But papa, he will die of fright.  Where is my papa?' she exclaimed,
piteously.

"'Gone round some other way,' I suggested.  And subsequently this
proved to be the case.  Placing an arm round her for aid, we now
began to descend, but slowly, the face of the hill, which was there
so steep and shelved so abruptly, that to lose one step might have
precipitated us to the bottom with a speed that would have insured
destruction.  From rock to rock, from bush to bush, and from cleft to
cleft, I guided and often lifted her, sometimes with her eyes closed;
and gazed the while with boyish rapture on the beautiful girl, as her
head drooped upon my shoulder.  She had lost her hat, and the unbound
masses of her golden hair, blown by the wind, came in silken ripples
across my face; and delight, mingled with alarm, bewildered me.

"Till that hour no sorrow could have affected a spirit so pure as
hers; and certainly love could not have agitated it--she was so
young.  But when we drew nearer the base of the hill, and reached a
place of perfect safety, the soft colour came back to her face, and
the enchantment of her smile was as indescribable as the clear violet
blue of her eye, which filled with wonder and terror as she gazed
upward to the giddy verge from which she had partly fallen; and then
a little shudder came over her.

"With a boy's ready ardour, I was already beginning to dream of being
beloved by her, when excited voices came on the wind; and round an
angle of the ravine into which we had descended came Lloyd, the
guide, several peasants, and her father, who had partially witnessed
our progress, and whose joy in finding her alive and well, when he
might have found her dashed perhaps out of the very semblance of
humanity, was too great for words.  The poor man wept like a very
woman, as he embraced her again and again, and muttered in broken
accents his gratitude to me, and praise of my courage.  Suddenly he
exclaimed to the guide,

"'You said his name was--Arkley, I think?'

"'Yes, sir,' replied Lloyd.

"'John Beverley Arkley, nephew of the curate at the foot of the
mountain yonder?' he added, turning to me.

"'The same, sir.'

"'Good heavens!  I am your Uncle Beverley!' said he, colouring
deeply, and taking my hand again in his.  'The girl you have saved is
your own cousin--my darling Eve.  I owe you some reparation for past
neglect, so come with me to the parsonage at once.'

"Here was a discovery that quite took away my breath.  So this
dazzling little Hebe was my cousin!  How fondly I cherished and
thought over this mysterious tie of blood--near almost as a sister,
and yet no sister.  It was very sweet to ponder over and to nurse the
thoughts of affection, and all that yet might be.

"What a happy, happy night was that in the ancient parsonage!  The
good old curate forgave Uncle Beverley all the short-comings in the
years that were past, and seemed never to weary of caressing the
wonderful hair and the tiny hands of Evelyn Beverley, for such was
her name, though familiarly known as Eve.

"'It is quite a romance, this,' said kind Uncle Arkley to his
brother-in-law; 'the young folks will be falling in love!'

"Eve grew quite pale, and cast down her eyes; while I blushed
furiously.

"'Stuff!' said Uncle Beverley, somewhat sharply.  'She has barely cut
her primers and pinafores, and Jack has Sandhurst before him yet.'

"He presented me with his gold repeater, and departed by the first
convenient train, taking my newly-discovered relation with him.  I
had a warm invitation to visit them for a few weeks before entering
at Sandhurst; and, to add to my joy and impatience, I found that
Beverley Lodge was in Berkshire, and within a mile of the College:
and so, but for the presence of the golden gift, and the memory of a
kind and grateful kiss from a beautiful lip--a kiss that made every
nerve thrill--I might have imagined that the whole adventure on the
slopes of Carneydd Davydd was but a dream.

"Naturally avaricious, cold, and hard in heart, Mr. Beverley had
warmed to me for a time, but a time only; yet I revered and almost
loved him.  He was the only brother of my dead mother, whom I had
never known.  _She_--this golden-haired girl--was of her blood, and
had her name; so my whole soul clung to her with an amount of
youthful ardour, such as I cannot portray to you--for I was always
much of an enthusiast--and I was again alone, to indulge in the old
tenor of my ways amid the voiceless mountain solitudes.

"Again and again in my lonely wanderings had my mind been full of
vague longings and boyish aspirations after glory, pleasure, and
love: and now the memory of Eve's minute and perfect face--so pure
and English in its beauty--by its reality filled up all that had been
a blank before; and I was ever in fancied communion with her, while
lying on the hill-slopes and looking to the sea that sparkled at the
far horizon, into the black ravines through which the mountain brooks
went foaming to the rocky shore, or where our deep Welsh _llyns_ were
gleaming in the sunshine like gold and turquoise blue--amid the
monotony of the silent woods; and so the time passed on, and the day
came when I was to start for Beverley Lodge, and thence to Sandhurst;
while love and ambition rendered me selfishly oblivious of poor old
Uncle Morgan, and the fervent wishes and blessings with which he
followed my departing steps.

"A month's visit to Beverley Lodge, amid the fertility of Berkshire,
many a ride and ramble in the Vale of the White Horse, many an hour
spent by us together in the shady woods, the luxurious garden, in the
beautiful conservatory, and in the deep leafy lanes where we wandered
at will, confirmed the love my cousin and I bore each other.  A boy
and a girl, it came easily about; while many were our regrets and
much was our marvelling that we had not known each other earlier.

"No two men make a declaration of love, perhaps, in precisely the
same way, though it all comes to the same thing in the end; but it
might be interesting to know in what precise terms, and having so
little choice, Father Adam declared his passion for Mother Eve, and
in what fashion she responded.

"I know not now how my love for _my_ little Eve was expressed; but
told it was, and I departed for college the happiest student there,
every hour I could spare from study and drill being spent in or about
Beverley Lodge.

"With an income of forty pounds per annum till gazetted, I almost
thought myself rich; and I had three years before me--it seemed an
eternity of joy--to look forward to.  At Sandhurst I was, as you
know, entered as a Queen's cadet _free_, and a candidate for the
infantry.  I had thus to master algebra, the three first books of
Euclid, French, German, and 'Higher Fortification;' but in the pages
of Straith, amid the ravelins of Vauban and the casemates of Coehorn,
I seemed to see only the name and the tender eyes of Eve.  The daily
drills, in which I was at first an enthusiast, became dull and
prosaic, and hourly I made terrible mistakes, for Eve's voice was
ever in my ear, and her delicate beauty haunted me; for wondrously
delicate it became, as consumption--which she fatally inherited from
her mother--shed over it a medium that was alike soft and alluring.

"Since then I have met girls of all kinds everywhere.  Though only a
sub, I have been dressed for, played for, sung for; but never have I
had the delight of those remembered days that were passed with Eve
Beverley in our dream of cousinly love; however, a rude waking was at
hand!

"When she was eighteen, and I a year older, she told me one day that
her father had been insisting upon her marrying an old friend of his,
a retired Sudder judge, who had proposed in form; but she had laughed
at the idea.

"'Absurd!  It is so funny of papa to have a husband ready cut and dry
for me; is it not, Jack?' said she.

"I did not think so; but my heart beat painfully as I leaned
caressingly over her, and played with her beautiful hair.

"'I don't thank him for selecting a husband for me, Jack, dear,' she
continued, pouting; 'do you?'"

"'Certainly not, Eve.'

"'But I must prepare my mind for the awful event,' said she, looking
up at me with a bright, waggish smile.

"The time was fast approaching, however, when neither of us could see
anything 'funny' in the prospect; for 'the awful event' became
alarmingly palpable, when one day she met me with tears, and threw
herself on my breast, saying:

"'Save me, dearest Jack--save me!'

"'From whom?"

"'Papa and his odious old Sudder judge, Jack, love.  You know that I
must marry you, and you only!'

"'The devil he does!' said a voice, sharply; and there, grim as Ajax,
stood Uncle Beverley, with hands clenched and brows knit.  'My sister
married his father, a beggar, with only his pay; and now, minx, you
dare to love their son, by heavens, with no pay at all!  Leave this
house, sir--begone instantly!' he added, furiously, to me.  'I would
rather that she had broken her neck on the mountains than treated me
to a scene like this.'

"The gates of Beverley Lodge closed behind me, and our dream was over.

"Half my life seemed to have left me.  After three years of such
delightful intercourse I could not adopt the conviction that I should
never see her again; and in a very unenviable state of mind I entered
the college, where you may remember meeting me under the Doric
portico, and saying:

"'What's up, Jack?  But let me congratulate you.'

"'On what?' I asked sulkily.

"'Your appointment to the Buffs.  The _Gazette_ has just come from
town.  They are stationed at Jubbulpore.'

"And so it proved that the very day I lost her saw me in the service,
with India, and a far and final separation before us.  Necessity
compelled us to prepare for an almost instant departure; short leave
was given me by the adjutant-general; and I had to join the Candahar
transport going with drafts from Chatham for the East, on a certain
day.

"Rumours reached me of Eve being seriously ill.  She was secluded
from me, and there was every chance that I should see her no more.  A
letter came from her imploring me to meet her for the last time at a
spot known to us both--a green lane that led to a churchyard
stile--the scene of many a tender tryst and blissful hour, as it was
a place where overhanging trees, with the golden apple, the purple
damson, and the plum, formed a very bower, and where few or none ever
came, save on Sunday; and there we met for the last time!

"There once again her head lay on my shoulder, my circling arm was
round her, and her hot, tremulous hand was clasped in mine.  I was
shocked by the change I perceived in her.  Painful was her pallor to
look upon; there were circles dark as her lashes under her sad,
melancholy eyes; her nostrils and lips were unnaturally pink; she had
a short, dry cough; and blood appeared more than once upon her
handkerchief.

"Consumption on one hand, and parental tyranny on the other, were
fast doing their fatal work.

"Her father was pitiless and inexorable--wonderfully, infamously so,
as he was so rich that mere money was no object, and as she was his
only child, and one so tender, and so fragile.  His studied system of
deliberate 'worry' had wrung a consent from her; she was to marry the
old judge; and in more ways than one I felt that too surely I was
losing her for ever.  She could not go out with me.  I felt
desperate, and in silence folded her again and again to my breast.
At last the ting-tong of the old church clock announced the hour when
we must part, never to meet again, and the fatal sound struck us like
a shock of electricity.

"'Jack, my dearest--my dearest,' she whispered wildly; 'I don't think
I shall live very long now.  I may--nay, I must, die very soon; but
the spirit is imperishable, and I shall always be with you, wherever
you may be, wherever you may go, hovering near you, I hope, _like a
guardian angel_!'

"Her words struck me as strange and wild; I did not attach much
importance to them then, but they have had a strange and terrible
significance since.

"'Would you welcome me?' she asked, with a mournful smile.

"'Dead or living shall I welcome you!' I replied, with mournful
ardour.

"'Then kiss me once again, dear Jack; and now we part--in this world,
at least!'

"Another wild, passionate embrace, and all was over.  In a minute
later I was galloping far from the villa to reach the railway.  I saw
her beloved face no more; but voice and face, eye and kiss, were all
with me still.  Would a time ever come when I might forgot them?

"Adverse winds detained us long in the Channel, but we cleared it at
last; and the last _Times_ that came on board announced the marriage
of this unhappy girl.

"Six months subsequent found me in cantonments at Neemuch, with a
small detachment of ours, and in hourly expectation of the mutiny
which had broken out at Meerut and Delhi, with such horrors, being
imitated there, though we had sworn the sepoys to be 'true to their
salt,' the Mahometans on the Koran, the Hindoos on the waters of the
Ganges, and the other darkies on whatever was most sacred to them;
and if they revolted, all Europeans were to seek instant shelter in
the fort.

"It was the night of _the 3rd June_--one of the loveliest I ever saw
in India--the moonlight was radiant as midday, and not a cloud was
visible throughout the blue expanse of heaven.  I was lying in my
bungalow, with sword and revolver beside me, as we could not count
upon the events of an hour, for all Hindostan seemed to be going to
chaos in blood and outrage.

"The cantonment ghurries had clanged midnight; my eyes were closing
heavily; and when just about to sleep I thought that my name was
uttered by some one near me, very softly, very tenderly, and with an
accent that thrilled my heart's core.  Starting, I looked up, and
there--oh, my God!--there, in the slanting light of the moon, like a
glorified spirit, with a brightness all about her, was the figure of
Eve Beverley bending over me, with all her golden hair unbound, and a
garment like a shroud or robe about her.

"Entranced, enchained by love as much as by mortal terror, I could
not move or speak, while nearer she bent to kiss my brow; but I felt
not the pressure of her lips, though reading in her starry, violet
eyes a divine intensity of expression--a mournful, unspeakable
tenderness, when, pointing in the direction of _the fort_, she
disappeared.

"'It is a dread--a dreadful dream!' said I, starting to my feet
preternaturally awake, to hear the sound of artillery, the rattle of
musketry, the yells of 'Deen! deen!' and the shrieks of those who
were perishing; for the mutineers had risen, and the 1st Cavalry, the
72nd N. I., and Walker's artillery, had commenced the work of
massacre.  I rushed forth, and at the moment I left my bungalow on
one side it was set in flames and fired through from the other.  I
fled to the fort, which, thanks to my dream--for such I supposed it
to be--I reached in safety, while many perished, for all the station
was sheeted now with flame.

"Once again I had that dream, so wild and strange, when a deadly
peril threatened me.  I was hiding in the jungle, alone and in great
misery, near Jehaz-ghur, a fugitive.  The time was noon, and I had
dropped asleep under the deep, cool shadow of a thicket, when that
weird vision of Eve came before me, soft and sad, tender and intense,
with her loving eyes and flowing hair, as, with hands outstretched,
she beckoned me to follow her.  A cry escaped me, and I awoke.

"'Was my Eve indeed dead?' I asked of myself; 'and was it her
intellectual spirit, her pure essence, that imperishable something
engendered in us all from a higher source, that followed me as a
guardian angel?'  I remembered her parting words.  The idea suggested
was sadly sweet and terrible; and so, as a sense of her perpetual
presence as a _spirit-wife_ hovered at all times about me,
controlling all my actions, rendered me unfit for society, till at
Calcutta, a crisis was put to all this.

"With some of the 72nd, and other Europeans who had escaped from
Neemuch, or had 'distinguished themselves,' as the 'Hurkaru' had it,
I once went to be photographed at the famous studio near the corner
of the Strand.  I sat, in succession, alone and in a group, after
being posed in the usual fashion, with an iron hoop at the nape of my
neck.  On examining the first negative, an expression of perplexity
and astonishment came over the face of the artist.

"'Strange, sir,' said he; 'most unaccountable!'

"'What is strange; what is unaccountable?' asked several.

"'Another figure that is _not_ in the room appears at Captain
Arkley's back--a woman, by Jove!' he replied, placing the glass over
a piece of black velvet; and there--there--oh, there could be no
doubt of it--was faintly indicated the outline of one whose face and
form had been but too vividly impressed on my heart and brain,
bending sorrowfully over me, with her soft, bright eyes and wealth of
long bright hair.

"From my hand the glass fell on the floor, and was shivered to atoms.
A similar figure hovering near me, was visible among the pictured
group of officers, but faded out.  I refused to sit again, and
quitted the studio in utter confusion, and with nerves dreadfully
shaken, though my comrades averred that a trick had been played upon
me.  If so, how was the figure that of my dream--that of my lost
love--who, a letter soon after informed me, had burst a blood-vessel,
and expired on _the night of the 3rd June_, with my name on her lips?"


Such was the story of Jack Arkley.  Whether it was false or true, in
this age of spiritualism and many other _isms_ of mediums with the
world unseen, and in which Enemoser has ventilated his theory of
polarity, I pretend not to say, and leave others to determine.  He
became a moody monomaniac.  I rejoined my regiment, and from that
time never saw my old chum again.  The last that I heard of him was,
that he had quitted the service, and died a Passionist Father, in one
of the many new monastic institutions that exist in the great
metropolis.




THE SPECTRE HAND.

Do the dead ever revisit this earth?

On this subject even the ponderous and unsentimental Dr. Johnson was
of opinion that to maintain they did not was to oppose the concurrent
and unvarying testimony of all ages and nations, as there was no
people so barbarous, and none so civilized, but among whom
apparitions of the dead were related and believed in.  "That which is
doubted by single cavillers," he adds, "can very little weaken the
general evidence, and some who deny it with their tongues confess it
by their _fears_."

In the August of last year I found myself with three friends, when on
a northern tour, at the Hôtel de Scandinavie, in the long and
handsome Carl Johan Gade of Christiania.  A single day, or little
more, had sufficed us to "do" all the lions of the little Norwegian
capital--the royal palace, a stately white building, guarded by
slouching Norski riflemen in long coats, with wide-awakes and green
plumes; the great brick edifice wherein the Storthing is held, and
where the red lion appears on everything, from the king's throne to
the hall-porter's coal-scuttle; the castle of Aggerhuis and its petty
armoury, with a single suit of mail, and the long muskets of the
Scots who fell at Rhomsdhal; after which there is nothing more to be
seen; and when the little Tivoli gardens close at ten, all
Christiania goes to sleep till dawn next morning.

English carriages being perfectly useless in Norway, we had ordered
four of the native carrioles for our departure, as we were resolved
to start for the wild mountainous district named the Dovrefeld, when
a delay in the arrival of certain letters compelled me to remain two
days behind my companions, who promised to await me at Rodnaes, near
the head of the magnificent Ransfiord; and this partial separation,
with the subsequent circumstance of having to travel alone through
districts that were totally strange to me, with but a very slight
knowledge of the language, were the means of bringing to my knowledge
the story I am about to relate.

The table d'hôte is over by two o'clock in the fashionable hotels of
Christiania, so about four in the afternoon I quitted the city, the
streets and architecture of which resemble portions of Tottenham
Court Road, with stray bits of old Chester.  In my carriole, a
comfortable kind of gig, were my portmanteau and gun-case; these,
with my whole person, and indeed the body of the vehicle itself,
being covered by one of those huge tarpaulin cloaks furnished by the
carriole company in the Store Standgade.

Though the rain was beginning to fall with a force and density
peculiarly Norse when I left behind me the red-tiled city with all
its green coppered spires, I could not but be struck by the bold
beauty of the scenery, as the strong little horse at a rasping pace
tore the light carriole along the rough mountain road, which was
bordered by natural forests of dark and solemn-looking pines,
interspersed with graceful silver birches, the greenness of the
foliage contrasting powerfully with the blue of the narrow fiords
that opened on every hand, and with the colours in which the toy-like
country houses were painted, their timber walls being always snowy
white, and their shingle roofs a flaming red.  Even some of the
village spires wore the same sanguinary hue, presenting thus a
singular feature in the landscape.

The rain increased to an unpleasant degree; the afternoon seemed to
darken into evening, and the evening into night sooner than usual,
while dense masses of vapour came rolling down the steep sides of the
wooded hills, over which the sombre firs spread everywhere and up
every vista that opened, like a sea of cones; and as the houses
became fewer and farther apart, and not a single wanderer was abroad,
and I had but the pocket-map of my "John Murray" to guide me, I soon
became convinced that instead of pursuing the route to Rodnaes I was
somewhere on the banks of the Tyri-fiord, at least three Norwegian
miles (_i.e._ twenty-one English) in the opposite direction, my
little horse worn out, the rain still falling in a continual torrent,
night already at hand, and mountain scenery of the most tremendous
character everywhere around me.  I was in an almost circular valley
(encompassed by a chain of hills), which opened before me, after
leaving a deep chasm that the road enters, near a place which I
afterwards learned bears the name of Krogkleven.

Owing to the steepness of the road, and some decay in the harness of
my hired carriole, the traces parted, and then I found myself, with
the now useless horse and vehicle, far from any house, homestead, or
village where I could have the damage repaired or procure shelter,
the rain still pouring like a sheet of water, the thick, shaggy, and
impenetrable woods of Norwegian pine towering all about me, their
shadows rendered all the darker by the unusual gloom of the night.

To remain quietly in the carriole was unsuitable to a temperament so
impatient as mine; I drew it aside from the road, spread the
tarpaulin over my small stock of baggage and the gun-case, haltered
the pony to it, and set forth on foot, stiff, sore, and weary, in
search of succour; and, though armed only with a Norwegian tolknife,
having no fear of thieves or of molestation.

Following the road on foot in the face of the blinding rain, a Scotch
plaid and oilskin my sole protection now, I perceived ere long a side
gate and little avenue, which indicated my vicinity to some place of
abode.  After proceeding about three hundred yards or so, the wood
became more open, a light appeared before me, and I found it to
proceed from a window on the ground floor of a little two-storeyed
mansion, built entirely of wood.  The sash, which was divided in the
middle, was unbolted, and stood partially and most invitingly open;
and knowing how hospitable the Norwegians are, without troubling
myself to look for the entrance door, I stepped over the low sill
into the room (which was tenantless), and looked about for a
bell-pull, forgetting that in that country, where there are no
mantelpieces, it is generally to be found behind the door.

The floor was, of course, bare, and painted brown; a high German
stove, like a black iron pillar, stood in one corner on a stone
block; the door, which evidently communicated with some other
apartment, was constructed to open in the middle, with one of the
quaint lever handles peculiar to the country.  The furniture was all
of plain Norwegian pine, highly varnished; a reindeer skin spread on
the floor, and another over an easy-chair, were the only luxuries;
and on the table lay the _Illustret Tidende_, the _Aftonblat_, and
other papers of that morning, with a meerschaum and pouch of tobacco,
all serving to show that some one had recently quitted the room.

I had just taken in all these details by a glance, when there entered
a tall thin man of gentlemanly appearance, clad in a rough tweed
suit, with a scarlet shirt, open at the throat, a simple but _dégagé_
style of costume, which he seemed to wear with a natural grace, for
it is not every man who can dress thus and still retain an air of
distinction.  Pausing, he looked at me with some surprise and
inquiringly, as I began my apologies and explanation in German.

"Taler de Dansk-Norsk," said he, curtly.

"I cannot speak either with fluency, but----"

"You are welcome, however, and I shall assist you in the prosecution
of your journey.  Meantime, here is cognac.  I am an old soldier, and
know the comforts of a full canteen, and of the Indian weed too, in a
wet bivouac.  There is a pipe at your service."

I thanked him, and (while he gave directions to his servants to go
after the carriole and horse) proceeded to observe him more closely,
for something in his voice and eye interested me deeply.

There was much of broken-hearted melancholy--something that indicated
a hidden sorrow--in his features, which were handsome, and very
slightly aquiline.  His face was pale and care-worn; his hair and
moustache, though plentiful, were perfectly white-blanched, yet he
did not seem over forty years of age.  His eyes were blue, but
without softness, being strangely keen and sad in expression, and
times there were when a startled look, that savoured of fright, or
pain, or insanity, or of all mingled, came suddenly into them.  This
unpleasant expression tended greatly to neutralize the symmetry of a
face that otherwise was evidently a fine one.  Suddenly a light
seemed to spread over it, as I threw off some of my sodden mufflings,
and he exclaimed--

"You speak Danskija, and English too, I know!  Have you quite
forgotten me, Herr Kaptain?" he added, grasping my hand with kindly
energy.  "Don't you remember Carl Holberg of the Danish Guards?"

The voice was the same as that of the once happy, lively, and jolly
young Danish officer, whose gaiety of temper and exuberance of spirit
made him seem a species of madcap, who was wont to give champagne
suppers at the Klampenborg Gardens to great ladies of the court and
to ballet girls of the Hof Theatre with equal liberality; to whom
many a fair Danish girl had lost her heart, and who, it was said, had
once the effrontery to commence a flirtation with one of the royal
princesses when he was on guard at the Amalienborg Palace.  But how
was I to reconcile this change, the appearance of many years of
premature age, that had come upon him?

"I remember you perfectly, Carl," said I, while we shook hands; "yet
it is so long since we met; moreover--excuse me--but I knew not
whether you were in the land of the living."

The strange expression, which I cannot define, came over his face as
he said, with a low, sad tone--

"Times there are when I know not whether I am of the living or the
dead.  It is twenty years since our happy days--twenty years since I
was wounded at the battle of Idstedt--and it seems as if 'twere
twenty ages."

"Old friend, I am indeed glad to meet you again."

"Yes, old you may call me with truth," said he, with a sad weary
smile as he passed his hand tremulously over his whitened locks,
which I could remember being a rich auburn.

All reserve was at an end now, and we speedily recalled a score and
more of past scenes of merriment and pleasure, enjoyed
together--prior to the campaign of Holstein--in Copenhagen, that most
delightful and gay of all the northern cities; and, under the
influence of memory, his now withered face seemed to brighten, and
some of its former expression stole back again.

"Is this your fishing or shooting quarters, Carl?" I asked.

"Neither.  It is my permanent abode."

"In this place, so rural--so solitary?  Ah! you have become a
Benedick--taken to love in a cottage, and so forth--yet I don't see
any signs of----"

"Hush! for God's sake!  You know not _who_ hears us," he exclaimed,
as terror came over his face; and he withdrew his hand from the table
on which it was resting, with a nervous suddenness of action that was
unaccountable, or as if hot iron had touched it.

"Why?--Can we not talk of such things?" asked I.

"Scarcely here--or anywhere to me," he said, incoherently.  Then,
fortifying himself with a stiff glass of cognac and foaming seltzer,
he added: "You know that my engagement with my cousin Marie Louise
Viborg was broken off--beautiful though she was, perhaps _is_ still,
for even twenty years could not destroy her loveliness of feature and
brilliance of expression--but you never knew _why_?"

"I thought you behaved ill to her,--were mad, in fact."

A spasm came over his face.  Again he twitched his hand away as if a
wasp had stung, or something unseen had touched it, as he said--

"She was very proud, imperious, and jealous."

"She resented, of course, your openly wearing the opal ring which was
thrown to you from the palace window by the princess----"

"The ring--the ring!  Oh, do not speak of _that_!" said he, in a
hollow tone.  "Mad?--Yes, I was mad--and yet I am not, though I have
undergone, and even _now_ am undergoing, that which would break the
heart of a Holger Danske!  But you shall hear, if I can tell it with
coherence and without interruption, the reason why I fled from
society and the world--and for all these twenty miserable years have
buried myself in this mountain solitude, where the forest overhangs
the fiord, and where no woman's face shall ever smile on mine!"

In short, after some reflection and many involuntary sighs--and being
urged, when the determination to unbosom himself wavered--Carl
Holberg related to me a little narrative so singular and wild, that
but for the sad gravity--or intense solemnity of his manner--and the
air of perfect conviction that his manner bore with it, I should have
deemed him utterly--mad!

"Marie Louise and I were to be married, as you remember, to cure me
of all my frolics and expensive habits--the very day was fixed; you
were to be the groomsman, and had selected a suite of jewels for the
bride in the Kongens Nytorre; but the war that broke out in
Schleswig-Holstein drew my battalion of the guards to the field,
whither I went without much regret so far as my _fiancée_ was
concerned; for, sooth to say, both of us were somewhat weary of our
engagement, and were unsuited to each other: so we had not been
without piques, coldnesses, and even quarrels, till keeping up
appearances partook of boredom.

"I was with General Krogh when that decisive battle was fought at
Idstedt between our troops and the Germanizing Holsteiners under
General Willisen.  My battalion of the guards was detached from the
right wing with orders to advance from Salbro on the Holstein rear,
while the centre was to be attacked, pierced, and the batteries
beyond it carried at the point of the bayonet, all of which was
brilliantly done.  But prior to that I was sent, with directions to
extend my company in skirmishing order, among some thickets that
covered a knoll which is crowned by a ruined edifice, part of an old
monastery with a secluded burial-ground.

"Just prior to our opening fire the funeral of a lady of rank,
apparently, passed us, and I drew my men aside, to make way for the
open catafalque, on which lay the coffin covered with white flowers
and silver coronets, while behind it were her female attendants, clad
in black cloaks in the usual fashion, and carrying wreaths of white
flowers and immortelles to lay upon the grave.  Desiring these
mourners to make all speed lest they might find themselves under a
fire of cannon and musketry, my company opened, at six hundred yards,
on the Holsteiners, who were coming on with great spirit.  We
skirmished with them for more than an hour, in the long clear
twilight of the July evening, and gradually, but with considerable
loss, were driving them through the thicket and over the knoll on
which the ruins stand, when a half-spent bullet whistled through an
opening in the mouldering wall and struck me on the back part of the
head, just below my bearskin cap.  A thousand stars seemed to flash
around me, then darkness succeeded.  I staggered and fell, believing
myself mortally wounded; a pious invocation trembled on my lips, the
roar of the red and distant battle passed away, and I became
completely insensible.

"How long I lay thus I know not, but when I imagined myself coming
back to life and to the world I was in a handsome, but rather
old-fashioned apartment, hung, one portion of it with tapestry and
the other with rich drapery.  A subdued light that came, I could not
discover from where, filled it.  On a buffet lay my sword and my
brown bearskin cap of the Danish Guards.  I had been borne from the
field evidently, but when and to where?  I was extended on a soft
fauteuil or couch, and my uniform coat was open.  Some one was kindly
supporting my head--a woman dressed in white, like a bride; young and
so lovely, that to attempt any description of her seems futile!

"She was like the fancy portraits one occasionally sees of beautiful
girls, for she was divine, perfectly so, as some enthusiast's dream,
or painter's happiest conception.  A long respiration, induced by
admiration, delight, and the pain of my wound escaped me.  She was so
exquisitely fair, delicate and pale, middle-sized and slight, yet
charmingly round, with hands that were perfect, and marvellous golden
hair that curled in rippling masses about her forehead and shoulders,
and from amid which her _piquante_ little face peeped forth as from a
silken nest.  Never have I forgotten that face, nor shall I be
_permitted_ to do so, while life lasts at least," he added, with a
strange contortion of feature, expressive of terror rather than
ardour; "it is ever before my eyes, sleeping or waking, photographed
in my heart and on my brain!  I strove to rise, but she stilled, or
stayed me, by a caressing gesture, as a mother would her child, while
softly her bright beaming eyes smiled into mine, with more of
tenderness, perhaps, than love; while in her whole air there was much
of dignity and self-reliance.

"'Where am I?' was my first question.

"'With me,' she answered naïvely; 'is it not enough?'

"I kissed her hand, and said--

"'The bullet, I remember, struck me down in a place of burial on the
Salbro Road--strange!'

"'Why strange?'

"'As I am fond of rambling among graves when in my thoughtful moods.'

"'Among graves--why?' she asked.

"'They look so peaceful and quiet.'

"Was she laughing at my unwonted gravity, that so strange a light
seemed to glitter in her eyes, on her teeth, and over all her lovely
face?  I kissed her hands again, and she left them in mine.
Adoration began to fill my heart and eyes, and be faintly murmured on
my lips; for the great beauty of the girl bewildered and intoxicated
me; and, perhaps, I was emboldened by past success in more than one
love affair.  She sought to withdraw her hand, saying--

"'Look not thus; I know how lightly you hold the love of one
elsewhere.'

"'Of my cousin Marie Louise?  Oh! what of that!  I never, never loved
till now!' and, drawing a ring from her finger, I slipped my
beautiful opal in its place.

"'And you love me?' she whispered.

"'Yes; a thousand times, yes!'

"'But you are a soldier--wounded, too.  Ah! if you should die before
we meet again!'

"'Or, if you should die ere then?' said I, laughingly.

"'Die--I am already dead to the world--in loving you; but, living or
dead, our souls are as one, and----'

"'Neither heaven nor the powers beneath shall separate us now!' I
exclaimed, as something of melodrama began to mingle with the
genuineness of the sudden passion with which she had inspired me.
She was so impulsive, so full of brightness and ardour, as compared
to the cold, proud, and calm Marie Louise.  I boldly encircled her
with my arms; then her glorious eyes seemed to fill with the subtle
light of love, while there was a strange magnetic thrill in her
touch, and, more than all, in her kiss.

"'Carl, Carl!' she sighed.

"'What!  You know my name?--  And yours?'

"'Thyra.  But ask no more."

"There are but three words to express the emotion that possessed
me--bewilderment, intoxication, madness.  I showered kisses on her
beautiful eyes, on her soft tresses, on her lips that met mine half
way; but this excess of joy, together with the pain of my wound,
began to overpower me; a sleep, a growing and drowsy torpor, against
which I struggled in vain, stole over me.  I remember clasping her
firm little hand in mine, as if to save myself from sinking into
oblivion, and then--no more--no more!

"On again coming back to consciousness, I was alone.  The sun was
rising, but had not yet risen.  The scenery, the thickets through
which we had skirmished, rose dark as the deepest indigo against the
amber-tinted eastern sky; and the last light of the waning moon yet
silvered the pools and marshes around the borders of the Langsö Lake,
where now eight thousand men, the slain of yesterday's battle, were
lying stark and stiff.  Moist with dew and blood, I propped myself on
one elbow and looked around me, with such wonder that a sickness came
over my heart.  I was _again_ in the cemetery where the bullet had
struck me down; a little gray owl was whooping and blinking in a
recess of the crumbling wall.  Was the drapery of the chamber but the
ivy that rustled thereon?--for where the lighted buffet stood there
was an old square tomb, whereon lay my sword and bearskin cap!

"The last rays of the waning moonlight stole through the ruins on a
new-made grave--the fancied _fauteuil_ on which I lay--strewn with
the flowers of yesterday, and at its head stood a temporary cross,
hung with white garlands and wreaths of immortelles.  Another ring
was on my finger how; but where was she, the donor?  Oh, what
opium-dream, or what insanity was this?

"For a time I remained utterly bewildered by the vividness of my
recent dream, for such I believed it to be.  But if a dream, how came
this strange ring, with a square emerald stone, upon my finger?  And
_where_ was mine?  Perplexed by these thoughts, and filled with
wonder and regret that the beauty I had seen had no reality, I picked
my way over the ghostly _débris_ of the battle-field, faint,
feverish, and thirsty, till at the end of a long avenue of lindens I
found shelter in a stately brick mansion, which I learned belonged to
the Count of Idstedt, a noble, on whose hospitality--as he favoured
the Holsteiners--I meant to intrude as little as possible.

"He received me, however, courteously and kindly.  I found him in
deep mourning: and on discovering, by chance, that I was the officer
who had halted the line of skirmishers when the funeral _cortège_
passed on the previous day, he thanked me with earnestness, adding,
with a deep sigh, that it was the burial of his only daughter.

"'Half my life seems to have gone with her--my lost darling!  She was
so sweet, Herr Kaptain--so gentle, and so surpassingly beautiful--my
poor Thyra!'

"'_Who_ did you say?' I exclaimed, in a voice that sounded strange
and unnatural, while half-starting from the sofa on which I had cast
myself, sick at heart and faint from loss of blood.

"'Thyra, my daughter, Herr Kaptain,' replied the Count, too full of
sorrow to remark my excitement, for this had been the quaint old
Danish name uttered in my dream.  'See, what a child I have lost!' he
added, as he drew back a curtain which covered a full-length
portrait, and, to my growing horror and astonishment, I beheld,
arrayed in white even as I had seen her in my vision, the fair girl
with the masses of golden hair, the beautiful eyes, and the
_piquante_ smile lighting up her features even on the canvas, and I
was rooted to the spot.

"'This ring, Herr Count?' I gasped.

"He let the curtain fall from his hand, and now a terrible emotion
seized him, as he almost tore the jewel from my finger.

"'My daughter's ring!' he exclaimed.  'It was buried with her
yesterday--her grave has been violated--violated by your infamous
troops.'

"As he spoke, a mist seemed to come over my sight; a giddiness made
my senses reel, then a hand--the soft little hand of last night, with
my opal ring on its third finger--came stealing into mine, unseen!
More than that, a kiss from tremulous lips I could not see, was
pressed on mine, as I sank backward and fainted!  The remainder of my
story must be briefly told.

"My soldiering was over; my nervous system was too much shattered for
further military service.  On my homeward way to join and be wedded
to Marie Louise--a union with whom was intensely repugnant to me
now--I pondered deeply over the strange subversion of the laws of
nature presented by my adventure; or the madness, it might be, that
had come upon me.

"On the day I presented myself to my intended bride, and approached
to salute her, I felt a hand--the _same hand_--laid softly on mine.
Starting and trembling I looked around me; but saw nothing.  The
grasp was firm.  I passed my other hand over it, and felt the slender
fingers and the shapely wrist; yet still I saw nothing, and Marie
Louise gazed at my motions, my pallor, doubt, and terror, with calm
but cool indignation.

"I was about to speak--to explain--to say I know not what, when a
kiss from lips I could not see sealed mine, and with a cry like a
scream I broke away from my friends and fled.

"All deemed me mad, and spoke with commiseration of my wounded head;
and when I went abroad in the streets men eyed me with curiosity, as
one over whom some evil destiny hung--as one to whom something
terrible had happened, and gloomy thoughts were wasting me to a
shadow.  My narrative may seem incredible; but this attendant, unseen
yet palpable, is ever by my side, and if under any impulse, such even
as sudden pleasure in meeting you, I for a moment forget it, the soft
and gentle touch of a female hand reminds me of the past, and haunts
me, for a guardian demon--if I may use such a term--rules my destiny:
one lovely, perhaps, as an angel.

"Life has no pleasures, but only terrors for me now.  Sorrow, doubt,
horror, and perpetual dread have sapped the roots of existence; for a
wild and clamorous fear of what the next moment may bring forth is
ever in my heart, and when the touch comes my soul seems to die
within me.

"You know what haunts me now--God help me!  God help me!  You do not
understand all this, you would say.  Still less do I; but in all the
idle or extravagant stories I have read of ghosts--stories once my
sport and ridicule, as the result of vulgar superstition or
ignorance--the so-called supernatural visitor was visible to the eye,
or heard by the ear; but the ghost, the fiend, the invisible Thing
that is ever by the side of Carl Holberg, is only sensible to the
touch--it is the unseen but tangible substance of an apparition!"

He had got thus far when he gasped, grew livid, and, passing his
right hand over the left, about an inch above it, with trembling
fingers, he said--

"It is here--here now--even with you present, I feel her hand on
mine; the clasp is tight and tender, and she will never leave me, but
with life!"

And then this once gay, strong, and gallant fellow, now the wreck of
himself in body and in spirit, sank forward with his head between his
knees, sobbing and faint.

Four months afterwards, when with my friends, I was shooting bears at
Hammerfest, I read in tell Norwegian _Aftenposten_, that Carl Holberg
had shot himself in bed, on Christmas Eve.




THE BOMBARDIER'S STORY.

  "Some feel by instinct swift as light
    The presence of the foe,
  Whom God ordains in future time
    To strike the fatal blow."  AYTOUN.


Very few persons in this world are unlucky enough to see, or to have
seen, a ghost; but we nearly have all met with some one else who had
seen something weird or unearthly.  And now for a little story of my
own, by which you will find that, in my time, I have more than once
encountered a ghost, or that which, perhaps, was _worse_ than any
ghost could be.

In the Christmas before the battle of the Alma, I, Bob Twyford, was a
young bombardier of the Royal Artillery, a "G.C.R." (good conduct
ring) man, mighty proud of that, and of my uniform, with its yellow
lace and rows of brass buttons, with the motto "_Ubique quo fas et
gloria ducunt_," and so forth, when I went home on a month's
furlough, to see old mother and all my friends at our little village
in the Weald of Kent.

I was proud too, to show them that, by the single chevron of
bombardier, my foot was firmly planted on the first step of the long
ladder of promotion; happy, too, that there was one in particular to
show it to--my cousin, little Bessie Leybourne--though she was a big
Bessie now--my sweetheart, and my wife that was to be, if good
promotion came, or if I bought my discharge, and took to business
with some money we expected--money that was long, long in coming.

More than once, in the beautiful season of autumn, had Bessie
Leybourne been the queen of the hop-pickers, and then I thought that
she looked bright and beautiful as a fairy, when the crown of flowers
was placed on her sunny brown hair, and her deep blue eyes were
beaming with pleasure and gratified vanity.

I had a dream about Bessie on the night before--a dream that made me
uncomfortable and gave me much cause for thought; and so a vague
presentiment of coming evil clouded the joy of my returning home.

I had seen Bessy in her beauty and her bravery as the hop queen; but
she was calling on me to protect her--for she was struggling to free
herself from the embraces and the blandishments of a handsome and
blasé-looking man, whose costume and bearing were alike fashionable
and distinguished.  Close by them, looking on evidently with
amusement, was his friend, a hook-nosed, grim, and sombre-looking
fellow, with a black moustache, and malevolent eyes, who held me back
as with a grasp of iron, while uttering a strange, chuckling laugh,
the sound of which awoke me.  But the faces of those men made a vivid
and painful impression upon me; for the whole vision seemed so
distinct and real, that I believed I should recognize them anywhere.

I spoke to Tom Inches, our Scotch pay-sergeant, about it, and he,
being a great believer in dreams, assured me that it was ominous of
some evil that would certainly happen to Bessie or to me, or to us
both.

"For you must know, Bob," he continued, "that in sleep the soul seems
to issue from the body, and to attain the power of looking into the
future; for time or place, distance or space, form no obstruction
then; so the untrammelled spirit of the dreamer may see the future as
well as the past, and know that which is to happen as well as that
which has happened."

The Scotchman's words had a solemnity about them that rendered me
still more uneasy; but I strove to shake off care, and already saw in
anticipation my mother's cottage among the woodlands of the Weald.

Every pace drew me nearer home, and I trod gaily on, with my knapsack
on my back, and only a crown piece in my pocket.  My purse was light;
but, save for that ugly dream, my heart was lighter still, as I
thought of Bessie Leybourne.

I had left the railway station some miles behind.  It was Christmas
Eve.  The Weald of Kent spread before me; not as I had seen it last
in its summer greenness, but covered deep with snow, over which the
sun, as he set, shed a purple flush, that deepened in the shade to
blue, and made the icicles on every hedge and tree glitter with a
thousand prismatic colours.

Red lights were beginning to twinkle through the leafless copses from
cottage windows, and heavily the dun winter smoke was curling in the
clear mid air, from many a house and homestead, and from the
clustered chimney stalks of the quaint and stately old rectory.

An emotion of bitterness came over me, on passing this edifice, with
all its gables and lighted oriel windows.

I had no great love for the rector.  When a boy I had found in our
garden a pheasant, which he, the Rev. Dr. Raikes, had wounded by a
shot.  Pleased with the beauty of the bird, I made a household pet of
it, till his keeper, hearing of the circumstance, had me arrested and
stigmatized as a little poacher, the rector, as a magistrate, being
the exponent of the law in the matter.  So I quitted the parish and
its petty tyrant, to become a gunner and driver in the artillery,
where my good education soon proved of service to me.

For the sake of a miserable bird, the sporting rector had driven into
the world a widow's only son.  But how fared he in his own household?

Valentine Raikes, his only son, was breaking his proud and pampered
heart by mad dissipation, by gambling, and every species of
debauchery; by horse-racing, and by debts of honour, which had been
paid thrice over, to save his commission in the hussars.

At last I stood by mother's cottage door.

The little dwelling was smothered among hops and ivy, and with these
were blended roses and honeysuckle in summer.  Now the icicles hung
in rows under the thatched eaves, but a red and cheerful glow came
through the lozenged panes of the deep-set little windows on the
waste of snow without.

A moment I lingered by the gate, and in the garden plot, for my heart
was very full, and it well-nigh failed me; but there was a listener
within who heard my step and knew it.  And the next moment saw me in
my mother's arms, and I felt like a boy again, as my happy tears
mingled with hers, and it seemed as if this Christmas Eve was to be
the Christmas Eve of past and jollier times.

"A merry Christmas, Bob, and a happy new year!"

The dear old woman's face was bright with joy; yet I could detect
many a wrinkle now where dimples once had been, and see that her hair
was thinner and whiter, perhaps, as she passed her tremulous hand
caressingly over my bronzed face as if to assure herself of my
identity, and that I was really her "own boy Bob."  Then she helped
me off with my knapsack, and sat me in father's old leathern chair,
by the side of the glowing hearth, and pottered about, getting me a
hot cake, and a mug of spiced ale, muttering and laughing, and
hovering about me the while.

"But, mother, dear," said I, looking round, "where is Bessie all this
time?  She got my letter, of course?"

"Bessie is across the meadows at the church, Bob?"

"On this cold night, mother!"

"Yes; helping Miss Raikes to decorate it for the service to-morrow."

"Miss Raikes!" said I, and a cloud came over me.

I had left head-quarters with only four crowns in my pocket.  We
soldiers are seldom over-burdened with cash--for though England
expects every man to do his duty, England likes it done cheap--and I
had well-nigh starved myself on the road home that I might bring
something with me for those I loved--some gay ribbons for Bessie, and
a lace cap for my mother, who was so proud of her "Bombardier Bob,"
for so she always called me, heaven bless her!

"I hope she won't be long away, mother, for I've had such a dream----"

"Lor' bless me, Bob," said she, pausing as she bustled about
preparing supper, "a dream, have you--about what, or whom?"

"Bessie," said I, with a sigh, as I took the ribbons from my knapsack.

"Was it good or evil, Bob?"

"I can't say, mother," said I, with a sickly smile, as the solemn
words of the Scotch pay-sergeant came back to my memory; "for an evil
dream, say we, portends good, and a pleasant dream portends evil;
they seem to go by contraries.  Yet somehow, by the impression this
dream made upon me, it seems almost prophetic."

"Don't 'ee say so, Bob, for though in the Old Testament we find many
instances of prophetic dreaming, I don't believe in such things
nowadays."

The darkness had set completely in now, and I saw that, although
mother affected to make light of Bessie's protracted absence, she
glanced uneasily, from time to time, through the window, and at the
old Dutch clock that ticked in its corner, just as it used to tick
when I was a boy, and rode on father's knee; for nothing here seemed
changed, save that mother was older, and stooped a trifle more.

"Mother, dear," said I, starting up at last, "I can't stand this
delay, and Bessie must not come through the lanes alone; so I shall
just step down to the church and escort her home."

In another moment I was out in the snow.  A few thick flakes were
falling athwart the gloom.  The decoration of the rectory church for
the solemn services of the morrow was, I knew of old, always
considered an important matter in our village, yet I could not help
thinking that, as I had written to announce the very time of my
return, Bessie might have been at home to welcome me.  Instead of
that, I had now to go in search of her; and this was the Christmas
meeting--the home-coming of which I had drawn so many happy and
joyous pictures when alone, and in the silence of the night when far
away, a sentinel on a lonely post, or when tossing sleeplessly on the
hard wooden guard-bed.

Mother was kind, loving, affectionate as ever, but Bessie, my
betrothed, why was she absent at such a time?

The sad presentiment of coming evil grew strong within me, and I
thought, with bitterness, of how far I had marched afoot for days,
and starved myself to buy her gewgaws, for I knew that pretty Bessie
was not without vanity.

"Pshaw!" said I.  "Be a man, Bob Twyford--be a man!" and, leaping the
churchyard stile, I slowly crossed the burial ground.

There were lights in the church; and I heard the sound of merry
voices, and even of laughter, ringing in its hollow, stony space.

Snow covered all the graves, and the headstones, which stood in close
rows; a heavy mantle of snow loaded the roof of the church, and,
tipping the carvings of its buttresses, brought them out from the
mass of the building in strong white relief.  Great icicles depended
from the gurgoyles of its tower and battlements, and the wind
whistled drearily past, rustling the masses of ivy that grew over the
old Saxon apse.  The tracery of the windows, the sturdy old mullions
and some heraldic blazons, with quaint and ghastly spiritual subjects
in stained glass, could be discerned by the lights that were within.

I lifted my forage-cap in mute reverence as I passed one grave, for I
knew my father lay there under a winding-sheet of snow, and a pace or
two more brought me to the quaint little porch of the church, where I
remained for a time looking in, and irresolute whether to advance or
retire.

When my eyes became accustomed to the partial gloom within, I could
see that the zigzag Saxon mouldings and ornaments of the little
chancel arch, the capitals of the shafts, the stairs of the pulpit,
and the oaken canopy thereof, were all decorated with ivy sprigs and
holly leaves, combined with artificial flowers, all with some meaning
and taste, so as to bring out the architectural features of the
quaint old edifice.

A portable flight of steps stood in the centre of the aisle, just
under the chancel arch, which was low, broad, massive, of no great
height, and formed a species of frame for a picture that sorely
disconcerted me.

On the summit of that flight stood a lovely, laughing young lady,
whose delicate white hands, a little reddened by the winter's frost,
were wreathing scarlet holy-berries among the green leaves.

A little lower down was seated Bessie--my own Bessie--her blue eyes
radiant with pleasure, her thick hair--half flaxen, half
auburn--shining like golden threads in the light of the altar lamps,
that fell on her beaming English face, so fresh, so fair, so
charming.  Her lap was full of ivy and holly twigs, which a gentleman
who hovered near, cigar in mouth, was cutting and tossing into that
receptacle, amid much banter and badinage, that savoured strongly of
familiarity, if not of flirtation.

Near them in the background loitered another, who was simply leaning
against the pillar of the chancel arch, looking on with a strange
smile, and sucking the ivory handle of his cane.

He laughed as he regarded them.

That laugh--where had I heard it before?

In my dream.  And now the antitypes--the men of my dream--stood
before me!

As yet unnoticed, I remained apart, and observed them; but not
unseen, for the eyes of the dark man were instantly upon me, and the
peculiarity of their expression rendered me uneasy.

He who hovered about Bessie was a fair-faced, blasé-looking young
man, with sleepy blue eyes, a large jaw, a receding chin, and thick,
red, sensual lips.  He had long, thin, flyaway whiskers, and a slight
moustache, with an unmistakably good air about him.

His companion had that peculiar cast of features which we sometimes
see in the Polish Jew--keen and hawk-like, with sharp, glittering
black eyes, hair of a raven hue, and a general pallor of complexion
that seemed bilious, sickly, and unhealthy.

I felt instinctively that I hated one and solemnly feared the other.
Why was this?

Was it the result of my dream?--of that "instinct which, like
imagination, is a word everybody uses, and nobody understands?"

Perhaps we shall see.

Suddenly the eye of the fair-haired stranger fell on me.  He adjusted
his glass, surveyed me leisurely, and, pausing in the act of
playfully holding a sprig of mistletoe over Bessie's head, said, in
the lisping drawl peculiar to men of his style--

"A soldier, by Jove!  Now, my good man--ah, ah!--what do you want
here at this time of night?"

"I came to escort my cousin home, sir."

"Your cousin, eh--haw?"

"Bessie Leybourne, sir; but," I added, reddening with vexation and
annoyance, "I see she is still busy."

"Cousin, eh?  What do you say to this, Bessie?"

Bessie, who started from the steps on which she had been seated, came
towards me, also blushing, confused, and letting fall all the
contents of her lap as she held out her hands to me, and said--

"Welcome home, dear Bob.  A merry Christmas and a happy new year!
Captain Raikes, this is my Cousin Bob, who is a soldier like
yourself--an artilleryman," she added, with increasing confusion, as
if she felt ashamed of my blue jacket among those fine folks; while
the captain, after glancing at me coolly again, merely said,
"Oh--ah--haw--indeed!" and proceeded to assist his sister in
descending the steps, as their labours were done, and the decorations
of the church complete; but a heavier cloud came over me now.

Captain Raikes was the son of the rector, and squire of the parish,
in right of his mother, who was an heiress; and he, perhaps the
wildest and most systematic profligate in all England, had made the
acquaintance of Bessie Leybourne!

A little time they lingered ere Bessie curtseyed, and bade the young
lady good-night.  Captain Raikes whispered something which made
Bessie blush, and glance nervously at me, while his friend with the
hook nose gave a mocking cough, and then we separated.  They took the
path to the gaily-lighted rectory, while Bessie and I trod silently
back through the snow to my mother's little cottage.

I pressed Bessie's hand and arm from time to time, and though the
pressure was returned, I never ventured to touch her cheek, or even
to speak to her, for I felt somehow, intuitively, that all was over
between us; and we walked in silence through the lanes where we had
been wont to ramble when children.

It seemed to be always summer in the green lanes then; but it was
biting winter now.  I asked for no explanation, and none was offered
me; but I felt that Bessie, once so loving and playful, was now cold,
reserved, and shy.

Next day was Christmas.  Our fireplace was decked with green boughs,
and holly-leaves, and huge sprigs of mistletoe.  I heard the chimes
ringing merrily in the old tower of the rectory church.

It was a clear, cold, snowy, and frosty, but hearty old English
Christmas; and faces shone bright, hands were shaken, and warm wishes
expressed among friends and neighbours, as we trod through the holly
lanes, and over the crisp, frosty grass, to church--mother, Bessie,
and I; and again, as in boyhood, I heard our rubicund rector preach
against worldly pride and luxury, both of which, throughout a long
life, he had enjoyed to the full.

The dark stranger--the squire's constant companion, chum, and Mentor,
whose strange bearing and wicked ways gained him the sobriquets of
Pluto and Hooknose in the village--was not with the rector's family
on this day; and I learned that he resided at the village inn.  It
was evident, though we read off the same book, that Bessie's thoughts
were neither with heaven nor me, for I caught many a glance that was
exchanged between Captain Raikes and her, and these showed a secret
intelligence.

I sat out the rector's sermon in silent misery, and in misery
returned home--a moody and discontented fellow, wishing myself back
at head-quarters, or anywhere but in the Weald of Kent.

Bessie didn't seem to care much about my ribbons.  Why should she?  I
was only a poor devil of a bombardier, and couldn't give her such
rich presents as those pearl drops which I now discovered in her ears.

"A present from Captain Raikes, Bob," said mother, good, simple soul;
"but I don't think she should ha' shown 'em till her wedding-day."

I had a mouthful of mother's Christmas dumpling in my throat at that
moment, and it well-nigh choked me.

The mistletoe hung over our heads; but I never claimed the playful
privilege it accorded.  Was there not some terrible change, when I
dared not--or scorned--to kiss Bessie, even in jest?  Others' kisses
had been upon her lips, and so they had no longer a charm for me!

Day and night dread and doubt haunted me, while hope, with her
hundred shapes and many hues, returned no more.  Brooding, silent,
and melancholy thoughts seemed to consume me; yet the time passed
slowly and heavily, for Bessie's falsehood and fickleness formed the
first recollection in the morning, the last at night, and the source
of many a tantalizing dream between.  All the ebbs and flows of
feeling or emotion which torment the lover I endured.  My sufferings
were very great; and from being as jolly, hardy, and expert a gunner
as ever levelled a Lancaster or an Armstrong, I was becoming a very
noodle--a moonstruck creature--"a thoroughbred donkey," as Tom Inches
would have called me--and all for the love of Bessie Leybourne.

Short though my time at home would be, Bessie could give me but
little of her society.  My jealousy would no longer be concealed, and
that she had secret meetings with our squire I could no more doubt.
Then came tears, upbraidings, and bitterness, with promises that she
would meet him no more; and in the strongest language I could
command, I told her of the perils she ran, of the desperate character
of Valentine Raikes, of his mad orgies and debaucheries, of the
gambling, drinking, singing, swearing, and whooping that accompanied
the suppers he and Hooknose had almost every night in a lonely lodge
of the rectory grounds.

"Oh, Bob, don't bother," she would say, imploringly, through her
smiles and tears.  "It is terrible to be told constantly that one
must marry one particular young man."

"Meaning, Bessie, that mother reminds you of being engaged to me?"

"Well, yes."

"You are fickle, Bessie."

"My poor Bob, you are not rich, neither am I."

"Hence your fickleness; but, oh, Bessie, don't think I want to make a
soldier's wife of you.  I hope for better days, and to settle down at
home.  Oh, Bessie, my own Bessie, listen to me, and hear me."

And so she would listen to me, and hear me, and then slip away to
keep a tryst with my rival.

Once or twice Bessie became angry with me, and ventured to defend the
squire, laying the blame of all his evil actions on his friend, or
Mentor--the dark Mephistopheles, who was always by his side.  Her
defence of him maddened me.  From tears she took to taunts, and I
replied by scorn.

We separated in hot anger, and with my mind a perfect chaos--a
whirl--and already repenting my violence, or precipitation, I strode
moodily through the holly lanes, till a sudden turn brought me face
to face with Captain Raikes and his dark friend, in close and earnest
conversation.

The idea of honest and manly remonstrance seized me; and touching my
cap respectfully, as became me to an officer, I said--

"Captain Raikes, may I crave a word with you?"

"Certainly--haw!" he drawled, while his friend drew back, surveying
me with his strange, malevolent, but terrible smile.  "In what can
I--haw--serve you?"

"In a matter, sir, that lies very near my heart."

He surveyed me with a quiet but puzzled air, through his glass, and
replied--

"Haw--have seen you before.  How is your pretty cousin, Bessie
Leybourne, this morning--well, I hope?"

"It is about Bessie I wish to speak, sir," said I, with a gravity
that made him start and colour a little--but only a little, as he was
one of those solemn, self-conceited, unimpressionable "snobs," who
disdain to exhibit the slightest emotion.  He did, however, become
uneasy ultimately, and pulled his long whiskers when I said--

"Captain Raikes, my cousin Bessie is my betrothed wife; and, though I
am but a poor private soldier (or little more), I must urge, sir--ay,
request--that you cease to follow, molest, or meet her, as I have
good reason to know you do; for though Bessie is a true-hearted girl,
no good can come of it.  So I put it to you, sir, as a gentleman--as
my comrade, though our ranks are far apart--whether your intentions
can be honourable in the matter?"

"By Jove! the idea!  I'll tell you what it is, my good fellah," said
he, twirling his riding whip; "I have listened to your impertinent
advice--your demmed interference with my movements--so far without
laying this across your shoulders; but beware--haw--how you address
me on this subject again."

Passion and jealousy blinded me, and shaking my hand in his face, I
said--

"Captain Raikes, on your life I charge you not to trifle with her or
with me!"

He never lost his self-possession, but said, with a smile--

"Very good; but rather daring in a private soldier--a poacher--a
vagabond!"

I heard the strange laugh of Hooknose at these words, and, while it
was ringing in my ears, I struck the squire to the earth, and he lay
as still as if a twelve-pound shot had finished him.  Then I walked
deliberately away.

I had vague alarms now.  He might have me arrested on a charge of
assault or might report me to head-quarters for the blow, although he
was not in uniform; but he did neither, as he left the Weald that
night for London; and mother and I sat gazing at each other in alarm
and grief--our Bessie had disappeared!

By some of our neighbours she had been seen near the branch station
of the South-Eastern line, with Valentine Raikes and his mysterious
friend, the Hooknose: and from that hour all trace of her was--lost!

* * * * *

She had left me coldly and heartlessly, and old mother, too, who had
always been more than a mother to her.

So passed the last Christmas I was to spend in old England.

I got over it in time.  I was not without hope that I might discover
Bessie, and befriend her yet--ay, even yet.  But I couldn't do much,
being only a poor fellow with two shillings per diem, and an extra
penny for beer and pipeclay.  But even that hope was crushed when, in
the following August, I was ordered with the siege train to
Sebastopol, and sailed from Southampton aboard the "Balmoral," of
Hull, a transport ship, which had on board a whole battery of
artillery, with one hundred and ten fine horses.

Captain Raikes was, I knew, with the Light Cavalry Brigade, under
Lord Cardigan; and I only prayed that heaven and the chances of war
would keep us apart, and not put the terrible temptation before me of
seeing him under fire.

Our voyage was prosperous till we entered the Black Sea, when we
experienced heavy gales of wind, and lost our topmasts; and as the
gales increased in fury and steadiness, they were blowing a perfect
hurricane on the night when, in this crippled condition, we hauled up
for the harbour of Balaclava.

Were I to live a thousand years, I should never forget the horrors
and certain events of that night; and though the perils that our
transport encountered were ably described by more than one newspaper
correspondent, I shall venture to recall them here.

Wearied with hard stable duty, I had fallen asleep in my birth, when
I was suddenly roused by a voice--the voice of Bessie,

"Bob, Bob, dearest Bob--save me! save me!  I am drowning!"

It rang distinctly in my ears, and then I seemed to hear the gurgling
of water, as I sprang from bed in terror and bewilderment, and from
no dream that I was at all conscious of; but I had little time to
think of the matter, for now the bugle sounded down the hatchway to
change the watch on deck.

The night was pitchy dark; all our compasses had suddenly become
useless--no two needles pointed the same way--and the rudder bands
were rent by the force of the sea, which tore in vast volume over the
deck, sweeping everything that was loose away.  The watch were all
lashed to belaying pins, or the lower rattlins; but three of ours and
two seamen were swept overboard and drowned.

To add to our dangers, as we lifted towards the harbour mouth, the
"Balmoral" heeled over so much that the ballast broke loose in the
hold, and uprooted the stable deck.  The centre of gravity was thus
lost, and the transport lay almost over on her beam-ends, with the
wild sea breaking over her, as she went, like a helpless log, on some
rocks within the harbour entrance.

The captain commanding the artillery ordered Tom Inches and a party,
of whom I was one, into the hold or stables, to see how the horses
fared; and I shall never forget that terrific scene, for it nearly
rendered me oblivious of the cry that yet lingered in my ears.

The time was exactly midnight, and I almost fear to be considered a
visionary by relating all that followed.  The vessel lay nearly on
her beam-ends to starboard; the whole of the stalls on the port side
had given way, and the horses were lying over each other in piles,
many of them half or wholly strangled in their halters; and there, in
the dark, they were biting and tearing each other with their teeth,
neighing, snorting, and even screaming (a dreadful sound is a horse's
scream), and kicking each other to death.

The atmosphere was stifling.  The wounds they gave each other were
bloody and frightful.  Many had their legs and ribs broken, and
others their eyes dashed out by ironed hoofs.  Above were the
bellowing of the wind, and the roaring of the Black Sea on the rocks
of Balaclava.  There were even thunder-peals at times, to add to the
terrors of the occasion, and the rain was falling on the deck like a
vast sheet of water.

Many of our men were severely wounded by kicks; for the horses that
survived were wild with fear--maddened, in fact--and, in their
present condition, proved quite unmanageable.

Carrying a lantern, I was making my way into the hold, and through
this frightful scene, when suddenly, amid it all, and through the
gloom, I saw a face that terrified--that fascinated--me, but which
none of my comrades could see.

Was I mad, or about to become so?

Within six inches of my own face was the keen, dark, and swarthy--the
almost black--visage of Hooknose glaring at me, mocking and
jibbering; his eyes shining like two carbuncles, his sharp teeth
glistening with his old malevolent smile; and, as I shrank back, I
heard his mocking laugh--the same laugh that had tingled in my ears
on that fatal Christmas time at home.

I fell over a horse, the hoof of another struck me on the chest.  I
became insensible, and, on recovering, found myself on deck, in the
hands of Tom Inches and the surgeon.

I was soon fit for duty, luckily, as that ship was no place for a
sick man.  With sunrise the storm abated; with slings the horses were
hoisted out as fast as we could bring them; and of the hundred and
ten we had on board, we found that ninety-five had been kicked to
death, smothered, or so bruised that we were compelled to shoot them
with our carbines.

Their carcasses lay long in Balaclava harbour, where they were used
as stepping stones by the sailors and boatmen, till their corruption
filled the air, adding to the cholera and fever in the town and camp.

All that haunted me must have been fancy, thought I, for my thoughts
were always running on Bessie--lost to me and to the world--fevered
fancy, especially the cry, and the horrid gurgling as of a drowning
person that followed it.  The sound of the sea must have produced or
suggested the cry in my sleeping ear, and the subsequent vision in
the hold--those gleaming eyes and that fierce hooked nose; and yet,
as an author has remarked, the whole world of nature is but one vast
book of symbols, which we cannot decipher because we have lost the
key.

It was ungrateful of me to be always thinking of Bessie, who had
scorned, flouted, and deserted me--thinking more of her than of poor
old mother in the Weald of Kent, who loved me with all her soul, as
only a mother could love a son who was amid the trenches of
Sebastopol; but I couldn't help it, for the terrible mystery that
involved the fate of Bessie made me brood over it at all times.

As for the trifle of money I had expected, it never came, and now I
didn't want it.

It was Christmas Eve before Sebastopol, as it was all over God's
Christian world; but I hope never again to see such a ghastly
festival.  I was not at the breaching batteries that night, having
been sent with two horses and four men to bring in a twelve pound
gun, which had been left by the Russians in the valley of Inkermann,
after the battle of the 5th of November.  Tom Inches and many a brave
fellow of ours had gone to their long home in that valley of death,
and I was a battery-sergeant now.

The cold was awful, and we were rendered very feeble by hunger, toil,
and half-healed wounds; so, like men in a dream, we traced the horses
to the gun, and limbered up the tumbril, both of which lay among some
ruins in rear of the British right attack, and not far from the
frozen Tchernay.

Three miles distant rose Sebastopol, and the sky seemed all on fire
in and around it, for they were keeping Christmas night, amid shot
from our Lancaster guns, and whistling Dicks of all sorts and sizes,
from hand-grenades to eighteen-inch bombs, chokeful of nails, broken
bottles, and grapeshot.

Yet I couldn't help thinking of home, and how merrily the village
chimes would be ringing in the old tower of the rectory church, amid
the hop-gardens and the cherry-groves of Kent.  And then I saw in
fancy the old fireside, where father's leathern chair was empty now,
and where one at least would say her prayers that night for me--that
happy night at home, when every church and hearth would be gay with
ivy leaves and holly-berries, and the lads and the lasses would be
dancing under the mistletoe; and with all these came thoughts of
Christmas geese and plum-puddings, and I drew my sword-belt in a hole
or two, for I was starving--light-headed and giddy with want; and as
we rode silently on, the swinging chains of the gun seemed to me like
the jangle of our village chimes! but they rung over the snowy waste
that lay between Khutor Mackenzie and the Highland camp--a white
waste, dotted by many a dead man and horse.

As we rode silently on, man after man of our little party of four
gave in, dropped from the gun, to which I had no means of securing
them, overcome by cold, fatigue, and death.  At last I was riding
alone in the saddle, with the gun rattling behind me.

Ghastly sights were around me on that Christmas night, and the
glinting of the moon at times made them more ghastly still.

On French mule litters, and on horses, many wounded and dying men
were being borne from the redoubts down to Balaclava; and as my
progress was very slow, with two worn-out, half-starved nags, a
terrible procession passed before me.  Many of the poor fellows were
nearly over their troubles and sorrows.  With closed eyes, relaxed
jaws, and hollow visages, they were carried down the snowy path by
the Ambulance Corps, and the pale steam that curled in the frosty air
from the lips of each alone indicated that they breathed.

Two dismounted hussars--for amid their rags, I discovered them to be
such--were carrying one who seemed like a veritable corpse, strapped
upright on a seat; the legs dangled, the eyes were staring open and
glassy, and the head nodded to and fro.

"Comrades," said I, "that poor fellow is surely out of pain now?"

"Not yet," said one.  "He is an officer of ours, badly wounded and
frost-bitten."

"An officer!"

"Captain Raikes.  He won't last till morning, I fear."

"Raikes," said I through my clenched teeth; "Valentine Raikes--and
here!"

"Ay, here, sure enough," said the hussar.

My heart bounded, and then stood still for a moment.  At last I said--

"Place him on the gun, comrades, and I will take him on to Balaclava;
but first, here I've some raki in my canteen.  Give him a mouthful,
if he can swallow."

Raikes was placed on the seat of the gun-carriage, buckled thereto
with straps, and muffled up as well as we could devise, to protect
him from the cold.  The two hussars left me, and then we were alone,
he and I--Valentine Raikes and Bob Twyford--in the solitary valley,
through which the road wound that led to Balaclava.

Though coarse and fiery, the raki partially revived the sinking man,
and, leaving my saddle, I asked him, in a voice husky with cold and
emotion, if he knew me.

But he shook his head sadly and listlessly.  And bearded as I was
then, it was no wonder that his dimmed vision failed to recognize me.

"I am Robert Twyford, the bombardier, whose plighted wife you stole,
Valentine Raikes!  God judge between you and me; but I feel that I
must forgive you now."

"My winding sheet is woven in the loom of hell!" he moaned, in a low
and almost inarticulate voice.  "Oh!  Twyford, I have wronged
you--and her--and--many, many more."

"But Bessie!" said I, drawing near, and propping him in my arms;
"what came of Bessie Leybourne?  Speak--tell me for mercy's sake,
while you have the power!"

"Ask the waters--the waters----"

"Where--where?"

"Under Blackfriars-bridge.  She perished there on the 27th of last
September."

The 27th was the night of the storm--the night of the mysterious
drowning cry, which startled me from sleep!

"I am sinking fast, Twyford!" he resumed, in a hollow and broken
voice.  "Pray for me--pray for me.  There is but one way to
heaven----"

"But many to perdition!" added a strange, deep voice.

And a dark, indistinct, and muffled figure, having two gleaming eyes,
stood by the wheel of the gun-carriage, just as a cloud overspread
the moon.

"Here--he here!  Do not let him touch me--do not let him--touch me!"
cried Raikes, in a voice that rose into a scream of despair, as he
threw up his arms and fell back.

There was a gurgle in his throat, and all was over!

A fiendish, chuckling laugh seemed to pass me on the skirt of the
frosty wind; but I saw no one; nor had I time to observe, or to
remember, much more, for now a madness seemed to seize the horses.

They dashed away with frightful speed, the field-piece swinging like
a toy at their hoofs.  It swept over me breaking one of my legs, and
inflicting also a terrible wound on the head, I sank among the snow,
and remember no more of that night, for, after weeks of delirium and
fever, I found myself a poor, weak, and emaciated inmate of the
hospital at Scutari, and so far on my way home to dear old England.

But such was the Christmas night I spent before Sebastopol, and such
were those mysteries in the "Book of Nature," to which I can find as
yet no key.




KOTAH.

A TALE OF THE INDIAN MUTINY.

It was on a soft and warm night in April that we were encamped not
far from the margin of Lake Erie, in expectation of the Fenian
raiders, who were having armed picnics, and threatening a plundering
invasion of Upper Canada.  We were simply an advanced post,
consisting of my company of the Royal Canadian Rifle Regiment, and
some two hundred volunteers, farmers and their sons.  For some time
past there had been considerable alarm along the Canadian frontier.
General Mead, of the United States army, was at Eastport with his
staff, and the Federal gun-boat Winooske was cruising off that place,
on the look-out for an alleged Fenian vessel.

Numerous armed meetings had taken place in the State of Maine, and a
great embarkation of the brotherhood in green was expected to take
place at Ogdensburg, the capital of St. Lawrence, which has a safe
and commodious harbour; but luckily the whole affair ended in bluster
and rumour.  The only fire we saw was that of our bivouac, and the
only smoke that of the soothing weed, while we sat by "the
wolf-scaring faggot," and drank from our canteens of rum-and-water,
singing songs, and telling stories to wile the night away.

The picturesque was not wanting in the group around that blazing fire
of pine wood.  The Royal Canadians, in their dark green tunics, faced
with scarlet; the volunteers, in orthodox red coats or fringed
hunting-shirts, with white belts worn over them, were all bronzed,
rough, and bearded fellows, hardy by nature and resolute in bearing,
led, in most instances, by old Queen's officers, who had commuted
their commissions, and turned their swords into ploughshares on farms
by the banks of the New Niagara, or the shores of the vast Erie,
whose waters stretched in darkness far away towards the hills of
Pennsylvania.

"Come, captain, tell us a story of other lands and sharper work than
this," said one of the Canadian volunteers, as he proffered me his
tobacco-pouch, which was prettily embroidered with wampum; "tell us
something about the mutiny in India.  You served there, as we all
know."

"Yes," said I, as the memory of other times and other faces--faces I
should never look upon in this world again--came over me, "I served
there in the --th Dragoons, and can relate a strange story indeed--of
discipline overdone--of that which we hear little about in our
service, thank heaven--tyranny; and of a young hero, who, without a
crime, was sentenced to die the death of a felon!"

"We know," said one of my subs, "that the mutiny is always a bitter
subject with you."

"I lost much by the destruction of Indian property, and so had to
begin the sliding-scale."

"What kind of scale is that?"

"Sloping from the cavalry to the line."

"But the story, captain!" urged the volunteers.

"Well, here goes," said I; and after a pause and a sip at the
canteen, began thus:--

"The narrative I am about to tell you was not one in which I figured
much personally, save as member of a court-martial; but it details
suffering with which I was familiar--the miserable fate of Sergeant
Anthony Ernslie, a fine old soldier, and his son Philip, a brave
young fellow--a mere lad--both of whom were in my troop during the
Crimean war, and afterwards in the memorable mutiny, the horrors of
which are so fresh in the minds of all.

"I had not been long with the regiment before I discovered that a
deeply-rooted enmity existed between our sergeant-major, Matthew
Pivett, and my troop-sergeant, Ernslie, and that it had been one of
long standing, having originated in jealousy when both were privates
quartered at Canterbury, and both were rivals for the affection of a
pretty milliner girl.  She, however, preferred Ernslie, then a horse
artilleryman; but when our corps was under orders to join the army of
the East, Ernslie volunteered for general service in the cavalry,
and, by the chance of fate, was placed in my troop of the --th
Dragoons, where his steady conduct, fine appearance, and strict
attention to duty, soon caused me to recommend him for promotion, and
he gained his third stripe with a rapidity that did not fail to
excite the remark of the envious.

"Yet his life was rendered miserable by the sergeant-major--a stern,
wiry, sharp-eyed, loud-voiced, and vindictive man; and more than
once, when I interposed my authority to keep peace between them, has
Ernslie told me, with tears in his eyes, that 'he cursed the day on
which he left the ranks of the Horse Artillery to become a dragoon!'

"A senior, when perpetually on the watch to worry a junior, may
easily find opportunities enough for doing so.  Thus Ernslie's belts
were never pipe-clayed quite to the taste of Pivett, and at the staff
inspection before parade, faults were ever found with his horse,
harness, and everything.  He was put on duty at times out of his
turn, and not in accordance with the roster.  A complaint to the
adjutant or myself always altered these errors; but the sting of
annoyance remained.  At drill a hundred petty faults were found with
him, and he was perpetually accused of taking up wrong dressings,
distances, and alignments, till, in his anger and bewilderment, the
poor man sometimes really did so, and then great was the delight of
Pivett!

"'For what,' said he one day, bitterly, 'for what did I ever leave my
old regiment?'

"'No good, most likely,' sneered Pivett.

"'Sir, I won my three good-conduct rings there.'

"'By a fluke, of course,' replied Pivett; adding, in a loud voice,
'Silence!' to check the rising retort of the other.

"As Shakespeare has it--

  "'That in the captain's but a choleric word
  Which in the soldier is rank blasphemy.'

And so it came to pass that whenever Ernslie ventured to remonstrate,
his oppressor invariably sent him to his room under arrest, and
twice--a great insult to a sergeant--to the guard-house; but though
the charges of mutiny and insubordination were always 'quashed' by
the colonel, poor Ernslie felt, as he told me, 'that he was a doomed
man, and safe to come to grief some day, for the sergeant-major had
sworn an oath to smash him!'

"His son Philip, a private in the troop, saw and felt all this.  The
lad's smothered hatred and fear of the sergeant-major were great; but
he did his duty well and steadily, and contrived to elude notice.
Ernslie was proud of his handsome boy, and thanked heaven in the
inmost recesses of his heart when the war was over in the Crimea, for
there father and son had ridden side by side in the famous charge of
the Heavy Brigade, and both had escaped almost scatheless; but when
we were ordered to India, to stem with our swords the great tide of
the terrible mutiny, the father's anxieties were revived again.

"When our transport was off the Cape de Verd Islands, Ernslie came to
my cabin in great distress, to announce that his wife had just died.
I knew that the poor woman had been ailing for some time past, and
the sickness incident to the rough weather we encountered put an end
to her sufferings, and she died in the arms of her son, for her
husband was with his watch on deck, and the sergeant-major would not
permit him to go below.

"She had died at daybreak, and by noon that day the body, swathed in
her bedding, and lashed round with spun-yarn, lay on a grating to
leeward, with a twenty-pound shot at the feet, and a Union Jack
spread over it.  By sound of trumpet, our men fell into their ranks,
and, like the sailors, all stood bare-headed, silent, and grave, for
a funeral at sea is the most sad and solemn of all.  There was a
heavy breeze at the time, and the ship was flying before it with her
courses and head-sails only, and the bitter spray swept over us in
drenching showers.

"The adjutant read the burial service.  At a given signal the grating
was lifted, and the body vanished with a splash under the ship's
counter.  Close by me stood Sergeant Ernslie and his son.  Clutching
the mizen shrouds with one hand, and Philip by the other, he bent his
pale face over the quarter, as if to give a farewell glance at the
corpse; but it was gone--gone for ever!

"Ernslie was barely forty; but now he looked quite old and haggard,
and his hair was streaked with gray.  He saw Pivett standing near
him, as the men were dismissed, and passing forward or below; and as
if he felt and knew that the original cause of enmity had passed
away, he held forth his hand, and said, in a choking voice, for grief
had softened his heart--

"'You'll shake hands with me now, sergeant-major, won't you?'

"But Matthew Pivett answered only by a scowl, and crossed to the
windward side of the deck.  So even by the side of that vast and
uncouth grave their hatred was not quenched; and I had twice to
interfere for Ernslie's protection before our transport ran up the
Hooghly, and landed us at Calcutta, from whence the river steamers
took us up country to Allahabad, where our remount awaited us, and we
took the field at once, under Brigadier-General R----.

"If Ernslie's tormentor spared his son, it must have been through
some lingering regard for the dead mother, or some soft memory of the
love he once bore her, and Ernslie was thankful that Philip escaped,
for the lad was passionate and resentful, and had vowed to his father
in secret that he would 'yet serve out the sergeant-major.'

"One morning, long before daybreak, we were on the march towards the
province of Ajmir, where a noted rebel, Hossein Ali, was at the head
of a great force.  We had endured the most unparalleled heat; for
days the sky had been as a sheet of heated brass above our heads, and
the cracked and baked earth as molten iron under foot.  Cases of
sunstroke had been incessant, and many of our horses perished on the
march.

"On this morning our thirst was excessive, for the tanks of a temple
on which we had relied for water had become dry in the night, and the
_bheesties_, or water-carriers, attached to the regiment, had
deserted to Hossein Ali, and most of us were without liquid of any
kind in our canteens.

"Among others situated thus was Sergeant Ernslie, who had been on
patrol duty until the last moment.  His son Philip was the orderly of
the colonel, and while that officer's horse was getting a drink, he
had contrived to fill his canteen from the bucket, and held it
invitingly to Ernslie, just as the corps filed past, for the colonel
had not yet mounted.  Agonized as he was with thirst, to resist the
temptation was impossible; so Ernslie galloped to where his son
stood, a hundred yards distant or so, near the hut of palm-leaves
which had formed the colonel's quarters.

"'To your troop, Sergeant Ernslie! back to your troop, sir!' cried
the sergeant-major, in a voice of thunder.

"Ernslie heard the voice of his enemy, but still rode towards his
son, and took a long draught from his canteen before turning his
horse and galloping back to his troop.

"'How dare you leave the ranks when on the line of march?' resumed
Pivett, heedless in his fury that this was interfering with _me_.
'Fall in with the quarter guard!' he added, in his most bullying
tone; 'and consider yourself under arrest!'

"'I shall do neither one nor the other,' replied Ernslie, trembling
with passion.  'I am under the orders of the captain of the
troop--not yours.  Keep your own place, or, by heaven, I shall make
you!'

"And in his just anger, Ernslie was rash enough to shake his sword
with the point towards Pivett--an unmistakable threat.  So the
colonel was compelled to place him under arrest, in the face of the
whole regiment.

"'At last you have fixed me, sergeant-major!' said he, calmly, but
bitterly, as he sheathed his sword, and turned to the rear; 'but if
you look for your true character, you will find it in the "Military
Dictionary."'

"'Likely enough; but under what head?  Discipline?'

"'No.  Tyrant!  See how that is defined!'

"The sergeant-major did look, and saw that Colonel James therein
defines, 'Petty tyrants--a low, grovelling set of beings, who,
without one spark of real courage within themselves, execute the
orders of usurped or strained authority with brutal rigour;' and as
he read on Pivett grew pale with rage.

"At the first halt of the brigade, a general court-martial, of which
I was the junior member, sat, by order of General R----.  An example
was wanted; so Ernslie was reduced to the ranks.

"Our parade next morning was a gloomy one, as we formed a hollow
square of close columns of regiments, near the ruins of a great
Hindoo temple.  The sun was yet below the horizon, and in the dim,
cold light, the face of Ernslie looked pale and ghastly as he was
marched into the square, a prisoner, between two armed troopers, one
of whom, with execrable taste, the sergeant-major had contrived
should be his own son, Philip.

"The sergeant was nervous in bearing and restless in eye; but his
mind seemed to be turned inward.  He was thinking, perhaps, of the
terrors of the day at Balaclava, of the dead wife he had committed to
the deep, or of the boy who stood scheming revenge by his side; but
it was not until he felt the penknife of the trumpet-major ripping
the worthily-won chevrons from his sleeve that a groan escaped his
lips, a flush crossed his haggard face, and his soul seemed to die
within him.

"Then he slunk to the rear of his troop, a broken and degraded man.
Philip's dark eyes were full of fire, and, if a glance could have
slain, the career of Matthew Pivett had ended there.

"We all felt for the sergeant, and knew that in the vindication of
discipline he had been made a victim; but that night the Queen lost a
good soldier, for Ernslie was absent from roll-call--he had
disappeared without a trace, and the sergeant-major openly declared
his belief that he had deserted to the rebel Sepoys, under Hossein
Ali.

"The truth was, though we knew it not at the time, that Ernslie, when
wandering alone and unarmed near our camp, communing with himself in
a storm of grief and misery, had actually been waylaid and carried
off by some of Hossein's scouting Sepoys, who by that time were tired
of slaughtering and torturing the white Feringhees.  They spared him,
and discovering somehow that he had once been a _golandazee_, or
gunner, they chained him naked to a field-piece, and kept him to
assist in working their cannon against us in Kotah, the place which
we were on the march to besiege and storm.

"So poor Anthony Ernslie's name was further disgraced by being scored
down as a deserter in the regimental books.

"The forces which we accompanied, under General R----, consisted of
the 8th Royal Irish Hussars, H.M. 72nd Highlanders, 83rd and 95th
Regiments, together with the 13th Bengal Native Infantry, a corps
which had not yet revolted, but was sorely mistrusted.

"The enemy in Kotah consisted entirely of mutineers, but chiefly
those of the 72nd Bengal Infantry, whose scarlet coats were faced
with yellow, exactly like those of the 72nd Highlanders, now
advancing against them; and we considered it a curious coincidence
that two regiments bearing the same number should meet in mortal
conflict.

"Our march was a severe one; each of our horses had not less than
twenty stone weight to carry, irrespective of forage, and yet there
was not a sore back or a broken girth either in our ranks or in those
of the 8th Hussars, when, after traversing a mountainous but fertile
and well-watered district, we came in sight of Kotah (which had been
the seat of a Rajpoot-rajah), on the east bank of the Chumbul.  It is
a large town, girt by massive walls, defended by bastions and deep
ditches cut out of the solid rock.  Its entrances were all protected
by double gateways.

"Both strong and stately looked the fortified town, when, under the
scorching blaze of an Indian sun, and a hot, red sky, amid which the
hungry vultures floated, we saw it and the palace of the rajah, with
all its lofty white turrets, the roofs of bazaars and temples,
crowning a steep slope that was covered by teak, tamarind, and date
palm trees, all of lovely green.  In the foreground lay a vast lake,
with the superb temple of Jugmandul, a mass of snow-white marble,
rising in its centre, its peristyles and domes reflected downward in
the deep and dark-blue water.

"The rajah had fled.  In his palace Hossein Ali, an
ex-_kote-havildar_, or pay-sergeant of the revolted 72nd B.N.I.,
reigned supreme; and its marble courts and chambers were yet stained
by the blood of our women, children, and other defenceless people,
who had been slain therein, after enduring indignities and torments
that maddened those who came, like us, to avenge them; and, full of
the memories of those deeds, with the other horrors of Cawnpore and
Delhi to inflame us, we pushed the siege with relentless vigour,
though Hossein's men, with seventy pieces of cannon, gave us quite
enough to do, and our sappers worked in vain to undermine the
enormous walls.

"Night and day, amid slaughter, wounds, sunstroke, and cholera, we
pounded away at each other with the big guns.  Officers and men
worked side by side at them and in the trenches, aiding or covering
the sappers in their scheme of a mine, till we were all as black as
the Pandies with gunpowder, dust, and grime, and till the once gay
uniform of ours had given place to flannel jerseys and rags; our
helmets to linen puggerees, or solar-hats; our pantaloons to cotton
knickerbockers and Cawnpore boots; and even those who had been the
greatest dandies among us were seldom seen without a scrubby beard, a
shovel, a revolver, and Chinshura cheroot.  In short, we were more
like diggers or desperadoes than her Britannic Majesty's dragoons.

"With a working party composed of men of various corps, one morning,
before daybreak, I was assisting the sappers at the mine, while the
enemy, with shot, shell, and rockets, did all they could to retard or
dislodge us.  It was a horrid place, I remember, encumbered by dead
camels and horses--yea, and men, too, in every stage of
decomposition, where the gorged vultures hovered lazily among fallen
ruins and whitening bones.

"'Jack Sepoy thinks it no sin now to bite the greased cartridge--the
scoundrel!' said one of my men, as a bullet broke the shovel in his
hand.

"'Sin--as little as to cut the throats of our wives and children in
cold blood!' added another, with a fierce oath.

"'Fighting for glory is a fine thing,' said young Philip Ernslie,
resting on his pickaxe; 'but fighting for a shilling per day, with a
penny extra for beer, is a different affair.'

"'But we are fighting for revenge, Phil,' said a soldier, whose wife
and children had perished at Meerut.

"'True,' replied Ernslie, through his clenched teeth; 'and times
there are, by Jove! when even revenge may be just and holy!'

"'Silence!' growled Sergeant-Major Pivett, still in pursuance of his
feud.

"'Down, men--down!' cried I, 'for here comes a shell.'

"Humming through the air, but, oddly enough, _not_ whistling, a
ten-inch shell fell near me, and, with a thud, half sunk into the
soil.  Strange to say, it was without a fuze; the touch-hole was
simply plugged by a common cork, in which a half-scorched quill-pen
was stuck.  After lying flat on our faces, and watching it uneasily
for some time, and all fearing a snare, or the explosion of some
poisonous stuff, I ventured to roll it over with a shovel, and found
that it was empty, or quite unloaded.  Pivett, who certainly did not
lack courage, sprang forward, and, extracting the cork from the
fuze-hole, found a scrap of paper attached to it, and on the scrap
was written, with ink that seemed to have been composed of gunpowder
and water, these words:--

"'_I am a prisoner in Kotah.  The work of the sappers is useless, for
where they are mining the rock is solid.  There are seventy guns in
this place, and I am chained to one of the seventeen in the right
bastion.  If the front gate is blown up, the place may be carried at
the point of the bayonet, as the way beyond is quite open._

"'A. ERNSLIE, _private, H.M. --th Dragoons_.'

"'I knew that fellow had deserted to the enemy!' growled the
sergeant-major.

"'Silence,' said I, 'and do not be unjust in your hatred.'

"'It's a message-shell, sir, a message-shell, and fired by my father,
poor man.  Heaven help him!--he is in the hands of the Sepoys!'
exclaimed young Ernslie, whom, with the shell and note, I took at
once to the general, whose tent was by the margin of the lake.

"This information caused the staff at once to abandon the idea of a
mine, and all our energies were now bent against the great gate.

"Though the junior regiment of the division, the 72nd, or Duke of
Albany's Own Highlanders, were ordered to furnish three hundred men
for a storming party, and at two o'clock on the morning of the 30th
of March the grand assault was to be made, while we--the
cavalry--were in our saddles, to cover, and if possible assist in the
attack, when the great gate was forced.

"'My brave lads, rouse!' I heard the adjutant of the Highlanders cry
in the dark; 'quit your dog's sleep--half-dozing and half-waking--and
fall in.  Fall in, stormers!'

"And while the warning pipes blew loud and shrill, cheerfully they
formed by companies, those brave Albany Highlanders; and stately,
indeed, looked their grenadiers, with their tall plumed bonnets and
royal Stuart tartan; for the highland regiments during the mutiny had
not time to adopt Indian clothing, and went at the Pandies in their
kilts and ostrich feathers, just as their forefathers did at Madras
and Assaye.

"Silently they crossed the river in the dark, where the graceful date
palms and the luxuriant mango topes cast a deeper shadow than the
starry night upon the water.  Then, quitting their boats, they crept
close to the great outer wall of Kotah; but so great was the delay in
blowing up the gate, that day broke, the Highlanders were seen, and
for hours we sat in our saddles helplessly, and saw the enemy pouring
shot and shell upon them from the same bastion where we knew poor
Tony Ernslie was chained to a gun.

"Suddenly there was a dreadful shock; the wall of the city seemed to
open, as it rent and gaped, a blinding cloud of dust and stones
ascended into the air, and a shower of wooden splinters, the
fragments of the great gate, flew far and wide, as our mine blew the
barrier up.

"A mingled shout of 'Scotland for ever!' the old Waterloo war-cry of
the Black Watch and the Greys, broke from the Highlanders* again and
again, as they rushed in with fixed bayonets, driving back the
terrified Sepoys, storming bastion after bastion, and capturing two
standards.  The other regiments broke in at different points, and
after much hard fighting Kotah was ours, and then we rode through the
streets cutting down the fugitive rebels on right and left.


* See _Scotsman_ of 28th of May, 1858.


"Philip Ernslie and a few of his comrades made straight for the
bastion indicated in his father's note.  It was deserted by all save
a few dead or dying Sepoys; but a more terrible spectacle awaited the
searchers.

"Stripped nude, and nailed to the wall of the bastion by the hands
and feet, hung the body of Anthony Ernslie, minus nose and ears, and
otherwise horribly mutilated!

"Even this appalling spectacle failed to excite the pity or soothe
the hate of the malevolent Matthew Pivett (but we were well used to
scenes of horror and barbarity during the mutiny), for he audibly
expressed a conviction 'that Ernslie had met his just reward for
deserting to the enemy.'

"'I shall make you eat your words before the going down of the sun,
by the God who made us, I shall!' said Philip Ernslie, in a low,
husky voice, heard only by the sergeant-major, who shrunk back, so
impressed was he by the fierce and resolute aspect of the lad, by the
deep concentrated loathing that glared in his eyes, making his lips
ashy pale, and causing every muscle to quiver; but this emotion was
unseen by others, and his threat was unheard, luckily, for if Pivett
could have found a witness, he would at once have made young Ernslie
prisoner on a charge of insubordination, as he really dreaded his
vengeance.

"About dark that evening the sergeant-major was returning from the
bungalow of the colonel, where, with the adjutant, he had been
preparing lists of casualties and for our march on the morrow, when
we and the 8th Hussars were to surround a village that was full of
fugitive mutineers.  The day had been one of toil, of strife, and
heat; now the atmosphere was steamy and moist, and Pivett was
enjoying by anticipation the comforts of a hearty supper and a cool
sleep in his tent, the sides of which his _tatty-wetter_ had, no
doubt, soused well with cold water.

"To reach the cavalry camp he had to pass through a ravine, not far
from the town wall--a narrow place, full of prickly and thorny
shrubs, where the beautiful silky jungle grass grew in such wild
luxuriance that, in some instances, it was almost breast-high, and
where the perfume of the many aromatic plants came floating on the
puffs of warm air.

"Traversing the narrow path on foot, with his sword under his arm, he
was suddenly confronted in the dusk by Philip Ernslie, who resolutely
barred the way.  He, too, had his sword by his side, but in each hand
he had a holster pistol.  His features were pale as those of a
corpse, and might have passed for such, but for the nervous twitching
of his lips as he spoke.

"'You know, Matthew Pivett, for what purpose I am here?'

"'Mutiny and murder, likely enough,' replied Pivett, who was a stern
and resolute man.  'Give up those pistols--fall back, and return to
your quarters, or I shall cut you down.'

"'Draw your sword but one inch from its sheath, and I shall send a
bullet through your brain!' replied Philip, cocking one of the
pistols.  'You maddened my poor father by your systematic tyranny for
years; you had him reduced and degraded, and driven desperate from
among us.  You wronged his memory this morning, and taunted even his
mutilated remains----'

"'Scoundrel! what then?  Would you dare to murder me?' exclaimed the
undaunted sergeant-major.

"'No, you shall have a chance for your life.  Oh, Matthew Pivett, I
have long looked for an opportunity like this, when I might meet you
face to face; so take your choice of these pistols, for, by the
heaven that hears us, you or I must lie dead here to-night!'

"As Philip spoke solemnly and sternly, with clenched teeth and
flashing eyes, he thrust a pistol into Pivett's hand.

"'Quarter guard!' shouted Pivett, as he made a resolute attempt to
grasp the throat of Ernslie, who thrust him back with the barrel of
the other pistol, crying--

"'Stand back, sergeant-major, and keep your distance, or I shall
shoot you down like the dog you are!'

"Pivett, who now saw there was no resource but to fight, withdrew a
pace or two, and fired straight at Ernslie's head.  The ball whistled
through the white puggeree, or cap, and slightly grazed his left ear.
He gave a ghastly smile, and said--

"'You were rather quick, sergeant-major, but now it is my turn!'

"He levelled his pistol, with a deadly, triumphant, and vindictive
aim, straight at the glaring eyes of the agitated Pivett; but the
percussion cap must have been defective--it snapped and hung fire.

"'Seize this mutinous rascal!' cried the sergeant-major to a patrol
who, on hearing the explosion of the first pistol, came galloping up;
and Philip was instantly made prisoner by a party of the 8th Hussars,
who had seen the whole situation.

"Another court-martial sat by break of day, in the palace of the
Rajah of Kotah, and, wan and haggard, after a sleepless night,
fettered by handcuffs, and looking the picture of misery, Philip
Ernslie stood before it, charged with violating the forty-first
clause of the second section of the Articles of War, which ordain
that 'any officer or soldier who shall strike a superior, or use any
violence against him, shall, if an officer, suffer death, and if a
soldier, death, transportation, or such other punishment as by a
general court-martial shall be awarded.'

"The majority of the members of the court were strangers to the lad
and his story, and the father's alleged spirit of insubordination,
manifested when on the march to Kotah, was now brought forward in the
prosecution of the son.  The court was but an epitome of the greater
world, where accusation is condemnation.  Nothing is so fallible as
human judgment, but nothing so pitiless.

"As captain of Philip's troop, I gave evidence of all I knew, and of
the good characters borne by father and son; but, after the brief
proceedings terminated, and the court was cleared for the
consideration of the verdict and sentence, I knew too well what they
would of necessity be.

"That evening the chaplain visited the prisoner, who was confined in
one of the vaults of the palace, to announce that on the following
morning he was to--DIE!

"He spent nearly the whole night with the poor lad, who was quite
resigned, and so calm and prepared for his fate that he begged to be
left alone for a little sleep before the appointed time; and when the
provost-marshal came at gun-fire, he found Philip Ernslie in a
profound slumber, with a horse-cloak spread over him, and his head
resting on a bundle of straw.

"Never did we parade with more reluctance than on that 31st of March
at dawn, and all the corps in and about Kotah, with some others that
had marched in during the night, got under arms to witness the
execution.  It was a lovely Indian morning.  The beams of the sun
shone redly on the white marble domes and carved minarets of Kotah,
and on the turrets of the rajah's stately palace.

"The place where we paraded was a hollow between two hills that were
covered with beautiful groves of the peepul-palm and teakwood, and
flocks of wild peacocks and green paroquets flew hither and thither
as we were massed in columns round the spot, where an open grave was
yawning, and where the guard of the provost-marshal--twelve men and a
sergeant--stood with their rifles loaded.

"Every face was expressive of intense anxiety to have the whole
affair over, and many were very pale.

"Accompanied by the chaplain of the cavalry brigade, who wore a
surplice over his black uniform surtout, and praying very devoutly
with his fettered hands clasped before him, Philip Ernslie, guarded
by an escort, came slowly into the square of regiments, and stopped
midway between the firing party and that premature grave that was so
soon to receive him.  His face was frightfully pale; he looked at
that black hole, which yawned so horribly amid the green turf, calmly
and steadily, and something of a smile--but not of bravado or
derision--stole over his features.

"My heart bled for the poor lad; but I was immensely relieved when
our colonel said, in a whisper, as he passed me--

"'The adjutant-general has a reprieve from General R---- in his
pocket, so there will be no execution.'

"'Thank heaven!' I exclaimed, fervently.

"'We are but acting out a solemn farce.'

"'For the sake of effect and discipline?'

"'Exactly.'

"'And the sentence, colonel----'

"'Will be commuted to transportation for life.'

"It was a human existence blighted for ever, any way; but now I could
look on with more composure.

"The fetters were removed from Philip's hands.  He was ordered to
take off his cap and listen respectfully to the sentence of the
court; and he seemed to do so mechanically, as one in a dream.

"The proceedings of the tribunal were briefly noted, the enormity of
the crime forcibly adverted to, and then came the doom--that he was
to be shot to death!

"The young man's usually haughty and handsome face was wistful and
sad in expression now.  He merely bowed his head in meek assent, and
in a weak voice asked leave to shake hands with me and some of his
comrades.  They came forth from the ranks as he named them, and wrung
his cold and clammy fingers in silence, and I could see that the eyes
of these men were moist with tears; yet they were brave fellows all,
and had charged by my side at Inkermann and Balaclava.

"Philip next asked for the sergeant-major, that he might shake hands
even with him, and so die at peace with all mankind.  But Pivett was
absent from parade that morning, and lay seriously ill in his tent,
for Asiatic cholera had fastened upon him.

"Philip then turned to the chaplain to signify that he was ready,
and, kneeling near his grave, had his eyes covered by a handkerchief.

"The whole scene was now worked up to its utmost intensity, and many
officers, who knew not of the reprieve, had taken off their caps to
utter a silent prayer for the spirit that was so soon to appear
before its Maker.

"The silence was profound, and we heard only the Chumbal rushing on
its course to meet the Jumna, till the voice of the provost-marshal
rang in the air--

"'Firing-party--ready!' and softly the rifles were cocked.

"'As you were!' cried the adjutant-general, with a bright expression
of face; 'half-cock, and order arms!  Prisoner, stand up! you are, I
rejoice to say, mercifully reprieved.'

"Philip Ernslie did not hear the words apparently, for his head sank
forward on his breast.

"The provost-marshal took his hand to assist him to rise; but the
poor lad fell forward on his face, dead--stone dead--without a wound.
The sudden revulsion of feeling had killed him.

"So he was actually buried in that unconsecrated ground, beneath the
shadow of the walls of Kotah; but, ere we marched next day, another
grave was formed beside him.

"It contained the remains of Sergeant-Major Pivett; and, during a
long career of service, I have met with few events which created so
profound a sensation among the troops as this little tragedy."




THE STORY OF RAPHAEL VELDA.

On an evening in the September of 1860, some excitement was caused
among the inhabitants of the secluded town of Oppido in Calabria
Ultra, when the gleam of arms announced the approach of regular
troops.  The dealers in pottery and silk, in wine and oil, and the
manufacturers of gloves and stockings from the delicate filaments of
the shell-fish named the _pinna marina_, and the water-carrier by the
well, conferred together on this unusual circumstance; the wandering
_pifferari_ paused in their strains before the shrine of the Madonna;
and the rustics of a more doubtful character--to wit, the armed and
lawless _carbonari_ and mountaineers, the brigands, with their
sugar-loaf hats, velveteen jackets, and sandalled feet--looked forth
from the dense forests and coverts wherein they lurked, defying alike
the anathemas of the Archbishop of Reggio and the powers of the High
Court there, and thought the time was near to inspect their guns and
stilettoes, and set their wives to abandon the distaff for the
bullet-mould, as none knew on what errand those troops had come, or
what might ensue ere long, and strange things were expected, for
Mazzini and "The Liberator" had been busy with their manifestoes;
even the Fata Morgana had been showing strange optical delusions of
late in the Bay of Reggio and the Straits of Messina.

The battle of Aspromonte had been fought in their vicinity during the
preceding month.

Garibaldi, as all the world knows, intent on raising an insurrection
in Hungary, had placed himself at the head of a body of Sicilian
volunteers, in the forest district of Ficuzza, twenty miles from
Palermo, and, by a hasty and ill-advised movement, he landed these
men from two steamers on the Calabrian shore, where, on the mountain
plateau of Aspromonte--one of the highest of the Calabrian hills,
rising immediately behind the town of Oppido--he was attacked by the
Royal Italian troops, under Colonel Pallavacino.  He fell, wounded by
a musket-shot in the ankle, while all his people were surrounded and
made prisoners.

Military executions followed on many, though "The Liberator," for his
great services in the cause of Italian independence, was never
brought to trial; and now the young grass was sprouting above the
earthy mounds, and round the rude little crosses that marked where
the dead lay in their lonely graves on the slope of the Apennines.

For two noted brigands who had accompanied him, named Agostino Velda
and Giuseppe Rivarola, rewards were offered at that time in vain.

The excitement in Oppido was in no way lessened when the sound of
bugles came on the evening wind, and ere long the 3rd regiment of
Bersaglieri, or Italian Rifles, in the service of Victor Emanuel,
with their plumed hats and quaint uniforms, marched into the town,
and halted before the _Albergo del Leon d'Oro_, where the colours
were lodged, and the lieutenant-colonel commanding took up his
quarters.

The soldiers were placed in an empty monastery; a guard was mounted
there, and also at the _albergo_; and then it began to be whispered
about in the market-place and _cafés_ that the Bersaglieri were to
remain there until a captain arrived from Reggio with some special
instructions for the colonel, Vincenzo il Conte Manfredi, of whom we
shall hear more anon.

These rumours were unpleasantly connected with a Bersagliere named
Agostino Velda--the same Velda who had followed General Garibaldi,
and who had been brought in with the quarter-guard as a prisoner, and
was now in a cell of the monastery, heavily ironed, and under the
strictest surveillance.

Among the Bersaglieri of Colonel Manfredi were two soldiers of the
name of Velda--the prisoner Agostino, and his son Raphael, a youth of
little more than twenty years, who bore a character as high and
unblemished as that of his father was degraded and low, dissipated
and vile.  Yet the father and son were both eminently handsome men,
and both had fought bravely--the former on the fields of Goïto and
Novara, and the latter at Montebello and Solferino; but latterly to
many crimes and breaches of military law, Agostino had added that of
desertion and consorting with brigands, among whom he narrowly
escaped an assassination in which he became involved; and a notice of
this event found its way even into the _Times_.

He had thrown aside his uniform, adopted the well-known costume of
the brigands--a gaily-embroidered jacket, a high hat, with broad,
flaunting ribbon, and long leathern gaiters--and, armed with a rifle
and six-barrelled revolver, made his lurking-place among the
mountains near Naples.

Not far from Acerra--an episcopal city in the province of Lavoro--for
a year prior to the affair of Aspromonte, he had taken up his
residence with a formidable bandit and his wife, with whom he lived,
concealed in a vault, the fragment of some ruined castle or villa of
the old days of Roman Naples.

There they might have resided long enough together, and made perilous
the road to Rome, but for the sum of two thousand ducats which had
been put upon the head of Agostino Velda after Garibaldi's defeat,
and which proved too much for a friendship such as theirs.

One day, after a close pursuit, his _padrona_ assured him that he
might safely issue forth, as the police had disappeared; but
immediately on Velda raising the trap-door, which was covered with
turf and branches to conceal their den, he was struck to the earth by
a blow from an axe, dealt full on his head by a most unsparing hand.

Assisted by his wife, the _padrona_ dragged the body to a ditch close
by, and then, stabbing her to death, he departed at once to Naples,
where he claimed the reward offered for Agostino Velda, whom he
accused of killing the woman.  But Velda was not dead--such men are
hard to kill; he was simply stunned, grievously wounded, and made
hideous by the blood that covered him.

He managed to crawl to the nearest house of the National Guard, to
whom he told his story, denouncing, as his accomplice, the _padrona_,
who was seized and shot, as the reward of his crimes; while he
(Velda) was sent back under escort to the 3rd Bersaglieri, then on
their march to Calabria, to overawe the brigands in that mountain
region, and he was now under sentence and waiting the result of his
trial, the papers connected with which had been forwarded for
approval to General Enrico Cialdini, who, in the subsequent year, was
appointed leader of the entire Italian army, and "Viceroy of Naples,
with full power to repress brigandage."

The proceedings of the court-martial by which the father had been
tried were actually engrossed by the hand of his son, who was the
clerk to the regiment, and he knew all the papers contained, save the
sentence, which was known to the sworn members of the court alone;
but he could not doubt the tenor of it.

Shame and gloom clouded the dark and handsome face of the young man,
and this dejection was held sacred by his comrades, though it has
been said that Colonel Manfredi--a man of weak and vicious character,
one, moreover, who was fierce, reckless, and dissipated--was cruel
enough, on more than one occasion, to taunt the innocent son with the
errors of the guilty father.

The sun was verging towards the watery horizon of the gulf of Gioja,
and the shadows of the Apennines were falling far athwart the deep
and wooded valleys that lie eastward of Oppido, when, full of sad,
terrible, and bitter thoughts, the younger Velda left the little
city, and, after pausing once or twice to cross himself before the
little lamp-lighted Madonnas at the street corners, hurried towards a
spot which was familiar to him, for he was by birth a Calabrian, and
like his father before him had first seen light among those very
mountains where Aspromonte had been fought.

Under the circumstances in which he was placed, the young soldier
gazed sadly on the scenes of his infancy--on the forest paths and
secluded places where he had been led by the hand of his mother, who
had perished of fever and fright after the battle of Novara.

Raphael Velda walked rapidly onward for a few miles through a
district that was rich in fruit trees, where the lemon and citron,
the fig, the vine, and the orange were growing, till he reached a
region that was rocky and wild, and where the majestic oaks and pines
of that extensive tract known as the Forest of La Sila, celebrated
even by Virgil in the twelfth book of the "Æneid," cast a deepening
shadow over the way he pursued, and where the goat, the buffalo, and
the wild black swine appeared at times amid the solitude.

Brightly streamed the evening sun through the openings in the forest
while Raphael, with unerring steps, trod a path that had been
familiar to him in boyhood, and at last reached the place he sought.

It was a cavern in the gray basaltic rocks; but the entrance, known
only to the initiated, was carefully concealed by the hand of nature,
for the wild fig-trees, the vines, and other luxuriant creepers
completely screened it from the casual eye.

"Oh, Francesca, my love! my love! what an abode for _you_!" muttered
the soldier as he saw it.  But the place was silent as the grave; the
hum of insect life, and the gurgle of a mountain rivulet, whose
course was hidden by the verdure, alone met his ear.  "Francesca, my
betrothed! the wife of my heart!"

Passing through the screen of leaves, Raphael Velda came to a barrier
of wood, wedged between the walls of rock, and on this he knocked
with a resolute hand, though his heart was throbbing with anxiety.

After a pause, a sound most unpleasantly like the click of a gunlock
met his quickened ear, and he hastily knocked again.

"_Chi è la?_ (Who is there?)" demanded a stern voice.

"'Tis I, good Giuseppe--a friend."

The wooden barrier sharply revolved on its centre, and within the
cavern, half seen in ruddy sunlight, and half sunk in dark brown
shadow, appeared the picturesque figure of a man whose attire and
bearing proclaimed him to be a Calabrian brigand.  Strong and
athletic in form, erect and dignified in carriage, the lines of his
dark face and his keen, wild eyes declared him to possess an ardent
and fiery spirit; but his garments were tattered and miserable, his
beard was long, and its natural raven blackness was becoming silvered
by time.

His sash contained a brace of pistols and a horn-hafted knife, and in
his hands was a long double-barrelled rifle, which was cocked and
held menacingly, for the naturally ferocious expression of his face
deepened when he saw the hostile attire of his visitor.

"A friend!" he exclaimed scornfully.  "Do the friends of Giuseppe
Rivarola wear the uniform of the king's Bersaglieri?"

"True, I am a soldier, Giuseppe--a soldier of the king; yet am I not
the less your friend," replied Velda gently.

"Back, I say!  I seek not your friendship, boy, and I want not your
blood!  Yet," continued the robber, wrathfully, "how am I to save my
own if I permit you to return alive after having dared to track me to
my hiding-place?"

As Rivarola spoke he involuntarily raised the musket to his right
shoulder.

"Hold, Giuseppe Rivarola!" cried his visitor.  "Have you quite
forgotten me?  I am Raphael, the son of Agostino Velda."

The brigand uttered a cry, threw down his musket, and springing
forward, with all that volubility of gesture and violent declamation
which proclaims the Calabrian a genuine child of nature--a rough and
impetuous mountaineer--he embraced the young man, took him in his
arms and led him into his hiding-place.

It was indeed a squalid den, and lighted only by a few dim rays of
the fading sunshine which stole in through fissures in the basalt.
In a recess a little Madonna of coarse clay was fixed to the wall of
rock, and the flame of a brass oil-lamp was flickering before it.
Beneath lay a bed or rather a pallet, the neat arrangements of which
indicated the presence of a female hand.

Outside this lay a couch of leaves and deer-skins whereon doubtless
old Rivarola snatched his few hours of repose.  Some vessels of
coarse pottery, an iron pot, a bullet-mould, a powder-flask, and
other similar _et cetera_, made up the furniture; and Raphael looked
round him with a saddened and anxious eye.

"Francesca?" said he, inquiringly.

"She has gone to vespers, and to market at Oppido.  The poor child
requires other comforts than my gun can procure her on these bleak
mountain sides, or even on the highway, for few men travel now
without an escort of the Carabinieri.  I am in hopes that she may be
employed as a _zitella_--(a girl who will make herself useful)--by
the good sisters of the Benedictine convent--God and His Mother bless
them!" continued the brigand, lifting off his old battered hat with
reverence.  "The sisters pity her for her own sake, though they
execrate me as one of the godless Garibaldini.  Once that our
Francesca is safe within their walls, I shall go farther west, among
the mountains, where some of the men of Aspromonte are still lurking,
though heaven knows that to leave this place for that may be only
_noi cadiamo da Scilli in Cariddi_," he added, using the old classic
proverb.  "But while talking of my own affairs I forget yours.  What
of your father, my boy?"

"He has been taken by the National Guard, and is now with us in
Oppido; but under sentence of death, as I too justly fear it must
be," replied Raphael, in a broken voice.

"Rebellion, desertion, treason, and robbery!  What else could be the
penalty of these but death!  He will be shot, of course, by the
Bersaglieri."

"Alas!"

"Yet you will continue to wear their uniform?" said the old brigand,
his moustaches quivering with anger.

"I follow the dictates of my conscience."

"Conscience!" replied the other, grimly.  "I had such a thing about
me once; but now----  Well! well!"

"Are they safe for Francesca, or safe for you, these evening errands
into Oppido?"

"She goes in as the twilight falls, and always returns after dark,
when none can see the way she takes.  But our perils will be
increased now that your precious Bersaglieri are so close at hand."

"They are increased, Giuseppe.  A list of persons to be captured, and
shot if found with arms in their hands, or who prove unable to give a
satisfactory account of themselves, has been given by Cialdini to the
Conte Manfredi, and your name is the _first_ on that fatal roll, of
which I made a copy no later than yesterday, by the Conte's order."

The outlaw only laughed at this, and his white teeth glistened under
his dark moustache.

"They will never discover my retreat," said he.

"Oh, be not too sure of that."

"It has served me ever since that fatal day at Aspromonte."

"You are wrong.  Either Francesca has been watched or some one has
betrayed you."

"None could betray me.  My secret is known to Francesca and myself
alone," replied the outlaw, confidently.

"A clue to your hiding-place is in the hands of the Conte Manfredi,
and ere to-morrow--yea, to-night, perhaps--a cordon of riflemen will
be around it.  _Povero amico_!  I swear to you that this is the
truth!"

"And my Francesca!" exclaimed Rivarola, mournfully, as he clasped his
brown hands.

"She is here--here at last!" cried the young man, as a girl sprang
into the cavern; but on beholding his uniform she uttered a low cry
of terror, and shrank behind her father.

Her figure was slender and _petite_, yet she was full-bosomed and
beautifully rounded.  Her eyes were dark, but bright and sparkling,
and softened in expression by their wonderfully long lashes, which,
like her hair, were black as jet.  Her attire was poor, but plain and
neat, even to being piquante and pretty.  Her scarlet bodice was
handsomely embroidered, and her habit-shirt, like the square fold of
linen that shaded her face, was white as snow, and contrasted well
with the almost olive hue of her complexion.

"_O padre mio_!  I have been pursued!" she exclaimed.

"By whom?" asked Rivarola, starting to his musket.

"An officer of the Bersaglieri; but I escaped him in the forest.  Oh,
my father! my father! and a Bersagliere is here before me!"

"Raphael Velda, your betrothed!" said the young man, taking off his
plumed hat, and coming forward from the shade which had partly
concealed him.

Uttering a soft exclamation of joy, mingled with astonishment, the
girl rushed into his arms, and he covered her face with kisses,
showering them on her brow, her lips and eyes, even on her neck,
where hung her only ornament, a little crucifix of brass.

"_Ne sono estatico!_ (I am in ecstasies!)" the young soldier
continued to murmur, as he gazed upon the upturned face that lay upon
his fringe epaulette, and so near his own flushed cheek.

"Oh, what happiness!" responded the girl.  "I am beside myself with
joy!  Raphael, Raphael, speak to me!"

"Thou art loved by every one, my child," said the old brigand, who
made no attempt to check the free emotions of the lovers, but turned
away sadly, and leaned upon his long musket.

"Oh, Francesca, many may--nay, must have loved you; but none as poor
Raphael Velda does," said the lover.

"If ever we are parted, judging by what I have suffered already, the
_wrench_ will be terrible!  Francesca will die!" murmured the girl.

"No female society ever afforded me the delight that yours does, and
were we to be together for days and days, instead of a few short
stolen hours, I would never weary of looking into your sweet eyes.
How often in camp and on the march, when weary and listless, I have
longed for your beloved shoulder to lay my head upon and go to sleep,
though I fear your presence would put all sleep to flight."

"Oh, Raphael, when absent from you I seem only to endure existence.
All time seems lost that is not spent with you."

"And one of our officers pursued you, Francesca?" asked Raphael,
after a pause.

"Yes, my beloved--from the gate of Oppido, along the highway, and
close up to the forest, where I eluded him by lurking behind an ilex
tree, while he passed on."

"Is he old or young?"

"A man of some fifty years, with long gray moustaches curled up to
his ears."

"_Dio!_ 'tis the colonel--the Conte Manfredi! the greatest _roué_, in
all Naples!"

"Never mind--soldiers are used to run after pretty girls.  You have
escaped him, and if he comes hither my gun will do the rest--there
will be promotion for the major," said Rivarola, calmly.

But the handsome face of Velda became troubled and clouded.

His love for Francesca was deep and passionate; yet as a soldier
could he marry and make her a camp-follower--the jest, perhaps, of
his comrades, the prey, perchance, of such a man as the conte?--she,
with all her purity and beauty.  A soldier, could he with safety wed
the daughter of a brigand--an outlaw--one of the Garibaldini?  She
had been seen and pursued by his _roué_ colonel also, to complicate
and make matters more dubious, perilous, and difficult.

"Be one of us--throw your allegiance to the winds, and take to the
mountains," the brigand would have suggested; but Raphael was loyal
and good, and mourned the lost lives of Rivarola and his doomed
father.

But now the sun was set, and he knew that he must soon return to
quarters, as he had only leave till midnight, and, taking his gun,
Rivarola prepared to accompany him a little distance on the way.

The lovers separated, with an arrangement for their meeting on the
morrow, and from the screen of leaves that hid her wretched home the
poor girl, with eyes half-blinded by tears, watched their figures
retiring through the forest; but scarcely had they been gone ten
minutes when both came rushing back to her.  The face of Raphael was
deadly pale; that of Rivarola inflamed by passion, and in his eyes
there sparkled a dangerous light.

"Conceal yourself, my child.  A party of the Bersaglieri are in the
forest, searching, doubtless, for _me_, so I must fly; but I shall
leave your betrothed with you.  Surely," continued Rivarola, "he will
be able to protect you from his own comrades, at least.  I will fire
a shot to lure these men after me, and away from this vicinity; so,
if you hear it, my children, be not alarmed.  To heaven and your love
I trust her, Raphael.  Adieu!"

He pressed the terrified girl almost convulsively to his breast,
sprang up the rocks with his musket slung behind him, and
disappeared, while Raphael led Francesca into the cavern and closed
the door.

The task of soothing her was a delightful one; but then came the
reflection--what was he to do?  To remain there with her was
impossible, as, ere midnight, he would have to report himself to the
quarter-guard, and could he leave her alone--alone in the wild forest?

No!  She should return with him to Oppido, and seek at the
Benedictine convent that shelter which would not be denied her.  This
was soon resolved on, and, though about to leave the cavern, perhaps
for ever, she reverentially trimmed anew the votive lamp before the
little Madonna, while Raphael stole for half a mile or so into the
forest, to assure himself that his comrades were gone.  This proved
to be the case, as they had heard the distant random shot of
Rivarola, and, following it, had disappeared.

"Heaven be praised!" said Raphael, aloud; "the road is clear for her
and me."

He was returning to the hiding-place, when a shrill cry--almost a
shriek--from Francesca made him spring forward with all the speed he
could exert; and he saw with dismay that the barrier of wood and
screen of leaves were alike thrown down, and that an armed man stood
within them.

All that his heart had foreboded of evil--the climax of every vague
apprehension to which the soul of Raphael Velda had been a prey--was
reached when he beheld his beautiful little Francesca struggling to
free herself from the grasp of her visitor--his colonel, the Conte
Manfredi!

Of all men in Italy, the man from whom he had most cause to fear--the
man who held in his hands, perhaps, the life of his father, Agostino
Velda, and his own life as a consorter with outlaws--had now tracked
out Francesca as a new prey!  This was but an example probably, of
"how oft the power to do ill deeds makes ill deeds done."

Raphael knew that the conte was a man without scruple or conscience,
possessed of vast wealth, of high rank, and a position which enabled
him always to _crush_ with success all who opposed his wishes,
however vile or cruel those wishes might be; and Raphael was but a
poor Bersagliere, whose father was a convicted brigand.

All this foreknowledge rushed upon the mind of Raphael, and for a
moment he was paralyzed with dismay; but a moment only.

The next saw him tear Francesca from the grasp of the conte, whom he
thrust without much ceremony aside.

In an instant the blade of the colonel's sword glittered in his hand.

"_In guardia, signore! in guardia!_" cried he, in a voice that was
tremulous with rage; while Raphael, who had no other weapon than the
short sword-bayonet of the Bersagliere, promptly drew it to defend
himself, and therewith he parried one or two thrusts that were aimed
at his breast.  As yet the colonel had not recognized him, for the
cavern was dark, or only lit by the tiny votive lamp that flickered
above the humble couch of Francesca.  "Ha, Signore Spadaccino!" said
Manfredi, mockingly, "I'll be through your body this time."

But, by a rapid circular parry and great strength of wrist, Raphael
twisted the sword from the hand of the conte, who then drew a pistol.
All this passed in a few seconds; while Francesca, crouching behind
Raphael, looked upward with her face blanched by terror.  And now, as
he levelled the pistol, the conte for the first time discovered that
his antagonist was a soldier.

"_Como vi chiamente_ (what is your name)?" he asked, in a voice of
thunder.

"Raphael Velda, signore."

"_Ehi!_ one of my own men, too!"

"_Illustrissimo--si--_I have the honour," replied Raphael, with a
profound salute, but keeping his sword drawn, nevertheless.

"Oh, Raphael! my love! my love! you are lost!  Spare him, Signore
Colonello! spare him!" cried Francesca.  "He is too young to die!"

"Leave this place, Raphael Velda," said the conte, in a low, hoarse
voice.

"Never!"

"Indeed!  When are you due at Oppido?"

"I have my captain's leave till midnight, signore."

"_Mezzanotte_?  Good.  It wants but two hours of that time now," said
the mocking conte, looking at his watch.  "You know, I presume, the
penalty of drawing upon a superior officer?"

"No--not when in defence of my own life, and of one who is dearer to
me than life."

"_Veramente_--indeed!" drawled the other, curling up his enormous
moustache, which he wore in imitation of King Victor Emanuel.  "This
girl--the daughter of a brigand--of a Garibaldino--is beyond the pale
of all protection."

"She is my betrothed wife, signore," said Raphael, with a deep burst
of emotion.

"Your life is in my hands, Velda, as a consorter with outlaws."

"Not more a consorter than yourself, signore, if the mere fact of
being here makes me one."

"Insolent!  Yet I will spare your life on one condition."

"Name it, signore."

"That you will never mention what has transpired here to-night--our
combat, and my disarmament.  Swear it by the God that hears you, and
the soul of the girl you love!"

Raphael felt astonished at a punishment so unlike Manfredi, but swore
as he was requested.

"Good," said the colonel, picking up and sheathing his sword.  "I
give you life for silence, but my vengeance will come on the morrow!"

And with these ominous words, which the unfortunate Raphael connected
in some way with his imprisoned father, the colonel quitted the
dreary abode of the Rivarolas, and disappeared in the forest.

The moment he was gone, Raphael raised Francesca, and strove by his
caresses to reassure her.  He affected to make light of the threats
of Manfredi, expatiated on the promises he had given as a reward for
silence, expressed joy that her father had escaped; and, as soon as
she had regained her composure, he led her from the cavern, and
together, hand in hand, with their minds mutually oppressed by fear
for the future, they pursued the highway almost in silence till they
reached the little city of Oppido.

"Adieu, Raphael," said the girl, weeping on his breast.

"Oh, Francesca! my dearest Francesca!  I cannot tell you how I love
you!  And this love continues, if possible, to grow every day.  My
whole soul is yours, Francesca!"

"And I shall yearn long and wearily for you till we meet again.
Separate from you, the most sunny days are gloomy to me, and I seem
to shiver as if chilled by the _tramontana_!"

And now, after a long and passionate kiss--a _last_ one, as it
proved--they separated at the gate of the Convent of Santo Benedetto;
and, fortunately for Raphael, he was in quarters before the time
necessary, and amid their dull monotony the voice of Francesca ever
lingered in his ear.

Some valets or emissaries of the conte were at the cavern betimes
before daybreak.  The cage was empty, and its pretty bird flown, they
knew not whither; and this only served to inflame him the more
against the elder Velda.

Next morning the shrill brass bugles of the Bersaglieri were blown at
an unusually early hour, while the mountain summits were yet red with
the first rays of the morning sun, and the whole battalion paraded
under the orders of the conte; for the expected captain had arrived
overnight from Reggio with his final instructions, and, rumour said,
with the death-warrant of Agostino Velda.  The latter seemed to be
fully verified by the fact that the regimental chaplain--a Franciscan
friar--had spent the greater portion of the night in his cell.

It was a lovely Italian morning, and never did the towering Apennines
look more beautiful in their verdure and fertility, while the red
rising sun cast their purple shadows, and those of the great pines
and oaks which clothed their sides far to the westward.  To the east,
dotted by many a white sail, the blue Mediterranean spread away
towards the Lipari Isles; and the smoke of many a steamer towered
high into the deep azure of the dome above the Straits of Messina and
the Bay of Gioja.

The plain where the Bersaglieri (who derive their name from
_bersaglio_, a mark, or shooting-butt) were paraded was a solitary
spot about a mile distant from Oppido, in a rugged ravine, overhung
on all side by masses of rock, which had been rent into fantastic
shapes seventy-seven years before by the dreadful earthquake of 1783.

The troops were unpopular among the Calabrese; so none of the
inhabitants were present to witness the morning parade, which, on the
part of the Conte Manfredi, embraced a scheme for vengeance such as
an Italian heart of a certain calibre alone could conceive.

The well-trained Bersaglieri stood silent and firm in their ranks;
the only motion there being the fluttering of their dark-green
plumes, which were caught by the passing breeze.  Their
sword-bayonets were fixed on their rifles, as the regiment formed
three sides of a hollow square, and the broad blades of these
reflected gayly the sheen of the morning sun.

On the vacant side of the square stood an upright post, firmly placed
in the earth, with a stout rope dangling from it.  At this object the
eyes of the soldiers looked grimly but sternly from time to time.
The officers leaned on their swords, and yawned wearily in the early
morning air.  Since the field of Aspromonte they had grown tired of
the perilous work of brigand-hunting, and looked forward with
something of dismay to the rustication of dull quarters in the
mountain city of Oppido, while knowing that at Reggio there were the
great cathedral, with its aisles of paintings, where people may flirt
if they do not pray, the theatre, the opera, and the promenade of the
Porto Nuovo, where girls handle their fans as girls only do in Spain
and Italy.  Even the yearly fair would be lost to the Bersaglieri.
It was all a profound bore!

While such empty regrets occupied the minds of many, the heart of
Raphael Velda was a prey to a grief and horror all its own.  He and
all the regiment thought that he should have been spared a scene so
horrible as the execution of his own father!  He had proffered this
request personally, and through the captain of his company, but in
vain.  The conte was inexorable.  He only gave one of his sinister
smiles, and shrugged his shoulders in token of refusal.  So, pale as
a spectre, and trembling in every fibre, Raphael stood under arms in
his usual place.

Agostino Velda, though an old soldier of the corps, who had, as we
have said, fought loyally on the field of Goïto, in Lombardy, and
that of Novara, in Piedmont, was viewed now only as a disgrace, a
brigand and Garibaldino; so, although all sympathized with his son,
and deprecated his presence on an occasion so awful, they cared
little otherwise about the impending execution.  But how little could
they foresee the terrible _triple_ tragedy which was to ensue on that
bright and sunny morning parade!

From the lower end of the ravine was seen the gleam of approaching
bayonets, and the prisoner appeared with fetters on his hands,
walking slowly between a file of Bersaglieri, and by the side of the
chaplain--a very reverend-looking old man, who wore the garb of a
Franciscan--and who had been praying with him all night in the vault
of the old castle, which served as a dungeon.  And now poor Raphael
felt an icy shudder pass over his whole frame as his father drew near.

He had already that day at dawn taken a passionate and affectionate
farewell of him, and they were to meet no more on earth; but yet the
dark and haggard eyes of Agostino Velda wandered restlessly and
yearningly along the ranks, as if in search of a beloved face.

He was a splendid-looking man, in the prime of life.  His stature was
great, and his bearing lofty and commanding.  The pallor of his face
contrasted strangely with the raven blackness of his voluminous beard
and hair; the latter seemed to start up in sprouts from his forehead
and temples, and fell backward like the mane of a lion.  His eyes
were dark--dark as the doom that awaited him; and their usual
expression was fierce, defiant, and lowering.

He was bareheaded, and muffled in an old regimental great-coat, which
was intended to be his shroud.

"I have repented of all my faults and crimes," said he, in a firm
voice, and with a collected manner.  "I see now, old comrades, the
folly, the wickedness, of my past life, and am ready to die for it!"

The proceedings of the court-martial were then read over by the
adjutant, and they closed with the sentence--

"_That he--the said Agostino Velda, lately a Bersagliere of the 3rd
Regiment, and now a brigand--was to be tied to a post and shot to
death by any three soldiers whose doubtful character might lead the
colonel to select them for that duty as a species of punishment!_"

The hand of Manfredi seemed to tighten on his bridle-rein as he heard
this, and there passed a grim smile over his face as he handed a
pencilled memorandum to the sergeant-major, who changed colour as he
read it, and in his utter confusion actually forgot to salute his
officer, under whose glance most of the Bersaglieri cowered, for he
was supposed to possess that terror of the Italians, an evil-eye.  He
paused for a moment irresolutely, and then turned to obey, for
discipline and obedience become a second nature to a soldier.

While the pioneers bound the passive prisoner to the stake, the
perplexed sergeant-major summoned from the ranks two soldiers who had
been punished repeatedly for breaches of discipline, and twice for
robbery, as their names had been given to him by the colonel.  Then,
pausing slowly before the company in the ranks of which Raphael Velda
stood, pale as a sheet, and supporting himself on his rifle, he
summoned him to step forth, as the _third_ fire, to complete the
firing-party.

A thrill of horror and dismay seemed to pervade the whole regiment on
witnessing this, and now Raphael rushed to the front.

"_Signore Illustrissimo--oh, colonello mio!_" he exclaimed, in a
piercing voice, while gesticulating with all the fervour of a true
Calabrian; "_Dio buono!_ you cannot mean this!  It is too cruel--too
terrible.  The king will resent it--General Cialdini will never
permit it," he added, wildly and incoherently, while his tongue
seemed to cleave to the roof of his mouth.

In a paroxysm of grief he knelt before the conte, entreating him to
alter the terrible selection--to forego this subtle scheme for
vengeance, while the pale prisoner, who saw and understood the whole
situation, uttered a cry of grief, and, dropping the crucifix which
the chaplain had placed in his hands, covered his face with them.

"What can be the meaning of this?" was whispered round the ranks.

Raphael alone could have told; but he was sworn to secrecy--secrecy
by God's name and the soul of Francesca.

In vain did the major--a gallant old soldier, who possessed great
influence in the corps--urge the conte to change his plan; in vain
did the venerable chaplain supplicate on one hand and threaten on the
other; and in vain also did Raphael Velda, whose voice had now left
him, stretch his hands towards the conte in mute entreaty.

Vincenzo Manfredi was inexorable!

"I do not command the son to shoot the father, but the loyal
Bersagliere to slay the convicted felon," said he; and then, with a
voice and bearing that forbade all hope of his revoking an order
which filled the regiment with indignation and bewilderment--for the
character of Raphael was unimpeachable, and even were it not so, the
selection was alike cruel and unnatural--he ordered the firing-party
to fall in at fifty yards' distance from the criminal, and to load
and cap their rifles.  Then the remainder of the obnoxious task was
to be performed by the sergeant-major.

"_Sono allo desperazione!_--I am in despair--oh, Francesca!--oh, my
father!" moaned Raphael, as he loaded mechanically, and knew that
even if he fired in the air he would throughout all his future life
be branded as a parricide--as the executioner of his own father!

A blindness--a horror, like a great darkness--seemed to come over
him, and for a few moments he was beside himself with excess of
emotion.  For a second or so the idea of shooting Manfredi at the
head of the regiment occurred to him, but only to be dismissed, for
that officer was so placed that he could not have been hit without
the risk of killing another; and now, like an automaton, he found
himself kneeling--one of three executioners--before his father, at
fifty yards' distance.

Though horror blanched his face, Agostino looked proudly and steadily
at the three dark tubes from whence his doom was to come; for at the
word "three" the executioners were to fire.

"_Uno!_" cried the sergeant-major, in a voice that was quite unlike
his own; "_due!_  TRE!"

Reverberating with a hundred echoes among the rocks as the sounds
were tossed from peak to peak, _four_ rifles rang sharply in the
clear morning air, and three men fell dead.

They were Agostino Velda, pierced by two bullets in his head, which
sank heavily forward on his breast; Raphael, who, by an expert use of
his bayonet as a lever, after uttering a prayer to heaven and for
Francesca, had shot himself through the heart; and, lastly, the Conte
Manfredi, who, pierced by a bullet fired from the rocks above, threw
up his hands with a wild scream, and fell lifeless from his horse!

His fall and the suicide of Raphael Velda were so totally unexpected,
that the Bersaglieri were utterly bewildered and confounded.  The
double catastrophe was almost terrifying even to old soldiers; but
the major was the first to recover his presence of mind, and at the
head of a company proceeded to surround and scale those rocks from
whence the mysterious bullet had come.

No trace of the assassin could be found, save a long and
double-barrelled rifle, which had been recently discharged, and on
the stock of which was carved the name of the noted brigand,
"Giuseppe Rivarola;" so not a doubt remained that by his hand the
conte had perished.

In vain were the mountains searched, and princely rewards for his
apprehension offered by General Cialdini and the king; for Giuseppe
was never seen afterwards, though he is supposed to be still lurking
among the wilds of the Abruzzi--the Promised Land of the Italian
brigands.

As a suicide, the hapless Raphael Velda was buried in a solitary
place, and in unconsecrated ground; but yearly, on the anniversary of
his death--the festival of St. Michael and All Angels--there comes a
Benedictine nun, who kneels by the green sod that covers him, and
with beads in hand and head bent low and reverently, says a prayer
for the repose of his soul.

She then hangs a wreath of fresh flowers on the little cross that
marks his grave, and glides slowly and sadly away.




LA BELLE TURQUE.

THE STORY OF THE PRINCESS CÉCILE.

Of all the wandering claimants to royalty, scions of kings "retired
from business," _soi-disant_ regal pretenders, false or real--whether
like Perkin Warbeck, or the six Demetriuses of Russia, some more
recent pseudo-heirs of the house of Stuart who figured in Austria
after the "Quarterly" drove them out of Scotland, "the Duke of
Normandy" in London, and so forth, who have appeared from time to
time, none have had so marvellous a story to tell as the Princess
Cécile, "La Belle Turque," as she was named, who, announcing herself,
in two volumes octavo, to be a daughter of the deposed sultan Achmet
III., took the heedless world of Paris by surprise, about a hundred
years ago, and whose narrative has frequently been classed with
romances, though it came forth as a veritable history, and with a
title more clearly avowed than that of "Ascanius, or the Adventurer
in Scotland."

The editor, who guaranteed its truth, was a man of veracity and
credit in his day; and he urged upon the public, that however
extraordinary and romantic her adventures might appear, they were,
nevertheless, strictly fact; and in a letter addressed to the editor
of the "Journal de Paris," in 1787, he added, that in that year the
lady was still alive in the French capital, "and, notwithstanding her
advanced age, in the enjoyment of good health."

It is singular that her narrative, whether false or true, as given by
herself and "M. Buisson, Littéraire, Hôtel de Mesgrigny, Rue des
Poitevins,"--as it would furnish ample materials for the largest
three-volume novel--escaped the eyes of Alexandre Dumas, or Viscount
d'Arlincourt, as it is full of adventures of the most stirring kind,
and, told briefly, runs thus:--

The introductory part of her story, in which the names of persons of
rank are concealed, contains, necessarily the adventures of her
governess, or nurse, by whom she was first abducted from her home,
and brought to France.  It would appear that about the year 1700, a
Mademoiselle Emilia (_sic_), daughter of a surgeon in the French
seaport town of Génes, was, with her lover, a young Genoese, named
Salmoni, in a pleasure-boat upon the Mediterranean, a little way from
the coast, when, notwithstanding "la terreur du nom de Louis XIV.,"
they were pounced upon by some Turkish corsairs--a common enough
event in those days, and one not unfrequent, even after Lord Exmouth
demolished Algiers.

This occurred in the dusk; and the voice of Salmoni, who had been
singing, is supposed to have first attracted them.  Being armed, the
Italian defended his love and his life with courage, but fell
severely wounded, and was left for dead in the bottom of his boat,
which floated away, the sport of the waves, while Emilia was carried
off, and, in consequence of her great beauty, was ultimately sold, at
Constantinople, under the name of Fatima, for the service and
amusement of Achmet III., who, in consequence of her accomplishments,
made her a species of governess to his children, instead of retaining
her among the odalisques in the seraglio.  This must have been
subsequent to 1703, when Achmet began his troublesome reign.

She was in this situation of trust, when Salmoni, who had never
forgotten her, after a long and unsuccessful search through many
seaport towns in the Levant--a veritable pilgrim of
love--accidentally discovered, by a casual conversation with a
Turkish seaman, where she was, and how occupied; for this man had
been one of the corsair's crew.

Disguised as a Turk, and giving out that "he was the father of
Fatima, the trusted slave," Salmoni found means to communicate with
her through an _itchcoglan_, one of the slaves or pages attached to
the seraglio, and they were thus enabled to see each other and
converse, their hasty meetings being but stolen moments of tenderness
and joy.

Emilia was now in attendance upon a little daughter of Achmet III.,
born in 1710, and then six months old.  Her mother was the Sultana
Aski, formerly a Georgian slave, and then one of the kadines or wives
of the Sultan, ladies whose number rarely exceeds seven.  Emilia was
high in favour with both Achmet and this sultana, as she had been
particularly serviceable to the latter at the birth of the child,
through some little skill she had acquired from her father, the
surgeon; thus the confidence they reposed in her, and the authority
she possessed over all the people in and about the seraglio,
facilitated the execution of those plans for an escape, suggested and
urged by Salmoni.

With a view to this end, she desired the _bastonghi_, or
head-gardener, to make a see-saw, which was in the gardens, so high
that she--and her pupils, probably--might see the whole city from the
lofty wall that girds this place, where still the trees planted are
always green, that the inhabitants of Galata and other places may not
see the ladies at their lonely promenades.  Aided by this see-saw,
she dropped over the wall a billet to Salmoni, desiring him to
procure a ladder, "a steel-yard" to fix it to the masonry, to make
arrangements with a ship captain, and, when all was prepared, to wait
her beneath the wall of that terrible Serai Bournous, which no
slave-woman had ever yet left alive.

Salmoni promptly obeyed her instructions; he discovered a ship for
the Levant, and, by a note tossed over the wall, informed her of the
night, and the very hour of their departure.

She was in the act of reading this note--probably not for the first
time--when the Sultan Achmet suddenly entered her apartment; and she
had barely time to toss it, unseen, into a porphyry vase; for this
billet, if discovered, might have consigned her to the bowstring of
the _capidgi-bashi_, or the sack of the black _channatoraga_, and its
concealment forms an important feature in the story of the fugitives.

The hour--almost the moment--for flight had arrived, and Salmoni, she
knew, awaited her below the garden wall; yet, amid all the terror and
anxiety of the time, so strong was Emilia's love for the little
baby-girl of whom she had the chief care, that she resolved to convey
the child away with her, and hoped eventually to rear it as a
Christian.  Collecting all her jewels, and those which Achmet had
already lavished on the infant, she took with them the silken
_fetfa_, or record of its birth; and, to be brief, escaped unseen by
means of the steel-yard and ladder.

As she descended, the latter was held for her by a person in a gray
cloak, whom she believed to be Salmoni, and into whose arms she was,
consequently, about to throw herself, when another man started
forward, and plunged a sword into his breast.  He fled, and a cry
escaped Emilia, who fell to the ground; but at that moment the
captain of the vessel, by which Salmoni had arranged they should
escape, rushed up, and, tearing off the mufflings of the fallen man,
merely exclaimed, "It is _not_ he!" and bore her off to the seashore.

An alarm had been given.  There was no time to wait for the absent
Salmoni; she was placed at once on board the vessel, which
immediately sailed and made all speed to leave the Golden Horn
behind.  She proved to be a small craft belonging to Bayonne,
commanded by a young captain from Dieppe; who ultimately landed
Emilia and her charge at Génes, where her first care was to have the
little _Turque_ baptized according to the rites of the Catholic
church.

This, it is recorded, was done by the _curé_ of St. Eulalie de Génes,
who named her Marie Cécile; and in honour of an event so remarkable,
a salute was fired by the cannon of the château and those of the
ramparts of the fort; and three _religeuses_, named respectively, La
Mère St. Agnes, La Mère St. Modeste, and La Mère de l'Humilité, are
mentioned as having taken a deep interest in the escaped fugitive and
her charge, who was kept in ignorance of her origin till her
fifteenth year.

We know not how many daughters Achmet III. is said to have had; but
in a letter of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, dated from Adrianople, she
writes of his eldest being betrothed in marriage to Behram Bassa,
then the reigning court favourite, and translates a copy of verses he
had addressed to her.

Cécile was now taken to several European courts, "at
which"--according to the narrative--"she was received with all the
honours due to her illustrious rank."  In Russia, she was presented
to the Czar, Peter I., (who died in that year); but in England, she
would seem to have contented herself with a short residence at a
coffee-house (_café_), in Covent Garden!  Among other sovereigns, she
was presented to Pope Clement XI., at Rome, where her beauty, which
she inherited from her Georgian mother, especially the profusion of
her exquisite hair, began to surround her with snares and perils.

In Rome, her guardian, Emilia, had the joy of once more meeting
Salmoni!  The man who had been stabbed beneath the seraglio wall had
not been he, but the Turkish corsair, through whom he had first
traced her there, and who had hoped to make profit out of the
intended escape by treacherously revealing it to the sultan; and for
this purpose he had plotted with a female slave attached to the
palace.  This woman, through whose hands the important billet passed,
had artfully erased the hour of twelve, fixed by Salmoni, and
substituted _eleven_.  Hence, though the sailor had full time to make
the attempt, he failed in the execution of his purpose; so now, after
all their perils, Salmoni and Emilia were married in the Eternal
City, where the love affairs of "La Belle Turque" speedily began to
attract notice.

First, we are told, that a duke fell in love with her; but she made
him her friend, assuring him that he could never be more to her, as
she had already become inspired by a passion for a handsome young
Knight of Malta, who hoped soon to be absolved from his vow of
celibacy.  While waiting for this, the knight's father, old Prince
----, as mischance would have it, became enamoured of her, reckless
that he was a rival of his son; and, to avoid his importunities, she
and the Salmonis set out suddenly for Paris, where, by the knavery of
a banker, she lost much of the proceeds of the jewels brought from
Constantinople; so that her fortune was reduced from sixty thousand
livres yearly, to about ten thousand.

In a coffee-house at Paris, Cécile chanced to see in the "Gazette de
France," an account of the misfortunes that had overtaken her father,
Achmet III.  This was in 1730, when that weak and imbecile
voluptuary, who had viewed with indifference the Hungarian troubles
and the wars of the north, after being involved in a contest with
Russia, by which he lost in succession the cities of Asoph and
Belgrade, and the provinces of Temesvar, Servia and Wallachia, on the
discomfiture of his arms by Persia, had an insurrection among his own
subjects, and was compelled by the Janissaries to abdicate in favour
of his nephew, Mustapha III., who threw him into a prison, where he
passed a life of mortification and shame, "after he had," as Voltaire
has it, "sacrificed his vizier and his principal officers, in vain,
to the resentment of the nation."

On reading of all these things, Cécile registered a vow that she
would visit Turkey, seek out her father, and endeavour to console him
in his misfortunes; and the death of her guardian, Emilia, about this
time, together with the annoyance she experienced from the old
Prince, who, presuming on her friendless, dubious, and false
position, daily "became more urgent and less respectful," hastened
her departure.

Alone she set out for Fontainebleau to solicit a passport as a French
subject, and to return thanks for the protection afforded her by the
court of Louis XIV; but in returning to Paris, her carriage was
stopped at night in the forest, which then covered thirty thousand
acres of hill and valley, and there ensued an episode, which, by its
_coincidences_, seems too evidently romance, though truth at times is
stranger than fiction.

A handsomely-attired chevalier--who proved to be the
Prince--requested her to alight and enter a voiture, which stood
there with six horses, pleading that she would do so, "without
compelling him to use violence."

On this, she uttered a cry for help; and ere long another _voiture_
dashed up, and there leaped out a gentleman sword in hand.  He proved
to be the young Duke de ----, her Roman admirer, and he had barely
time to recognize Cécile, when her betrothed, the Knight of Malta,
also appeared on the scene, which thus becomes so melo-dramatic as to
throw ridicule on the story.

"The Duke is about to deprive you of your mistress," said the cunning
old Prince to his son; "let us jointly use our swords against him in
defence of your dearest interests."

So thereupon the cavalier of Malta ran the poor Duke through the body
in the most approved fashion; bore off the fainting Cécile to Paris,
and placed her in the hotel of his father.  There the renewed, but
secret, addresses of the latter so greatly alarmed her, that on one
occasion she had to protect herself by an exhibition of pistols,
after which she escaped with Salmoni and the Knight, who urged that
she should, in fulfilment of her vow, visit her captive father, while
he once more strove, at the feet of Pope Clement's successor, to get
the oath of celibacy absolved.

In Turkey, some unruly Janissaries slew Salmoni, and were about to
offer some violence to Cécile, despite her French passport, when she
displayed before them the _fetfa_!  This, we are told, was a piece of
yellow silk on which was embroidered, in golden letters, the names of
the Sultan, of her mother Aski, and herself, with the day and hour of
her birth, together with certain passages from the Koran: "The
children of the Sultans are bound with the _fetfa_ immediately after
birth; and this document is deemed a sacred proof of their royal
descent; and at the sight of it every Mohammedan must bow himself to
the ground, and defend with his life the wearer of it."

By this time her cousin Mustapha III. was dead, and his successor,
her kinsman, Mohammed V., on hearing of her story, and, more than
all, of her beauty, conceived a passion for her, and sent his chief
friend and confident, the Beglerbeg of Natolia, to inform her of the
honour that awaited her.  Being informed that it was the fame of her
wonderful hair that had first excited the curiosity and admiration of
the Sultan, she cut it entirely off, and, tossing it to the
messenger--

"Go," said she, "and give your master this--the object of his
love--and tell him, that a woman capable of such a sacrifice, knows
no master but Heaven and her own heart!"

Had chignons been then in fashion, much trouble might have been saved
the fair Cécile; who, finding that a hasty departure from Turkey
alone could save her, demanded, but in vain, a passport from the
Bashaw of Smyrna or Izmir.  Urged by her father Achmet, she quitted
secretly by sea, and was landed by a French frigate at Toulon, where
she learned from the lieutenant of a Maltese galley that her lover
had perished in a duel.

Her journey to Turkey had greatly impoverished her, and now she found
herself in France almost without a friend, with only five hundred
ducats and a diamond, the gift of her father Achmet III.  Choosing to
conceal her fallen fortune from every eye, she selected an humble
dwelling in an obscure part of the city, where, long years after, her
editor first discovered her, and where, at a distance from royal
thrones, from human wealth and grandeur, she had sought to pass the
evening of her days in peace and obscurity.  "God has blessed my
fortitude," she concludes.  "Born in 1710, I have lived to see the
1st of January, 1786, and must now serenely and tranquilly await that
peace by which death must make amends for all the surprising and
afflicting changes of fortune which I experienced in my passage
through life."

Cécile--if ever she existed at all--must have been then in her 76th
year.  Her narrative is certainly mentioned in the "Journal de
Paris;" but in the tide of events that so rapidly followed the year
in which the financial troubles of France began, the meeting of the
States-General, and the crash of the first Revolution following, we
hear no more of "La belle Turque," the _soi-disant_ daughter of the
dethroned Achmet III.




THE MARQUIS DE FRATTEAUX,

CAPTAIN OF FRENCH HORSE.

Few events made a greater sensation in England generally, and more
particularly in London, in March, 1752, than the mysterious
disappearance or abduction--it was called for a time the murder--of
the unfortunate Marquis de Fratteaux, who was actually dragged by
force from the heart of the English metropolis, and immured in the
Bastile, to gratify the strange and unnatural hatred of his own
father.

This noble, whose name was Louis Mathieu Bertin, Marquis de
Fratteaux, Chevalier of the Order of St. Louis, and a distinguished
young captain of French cavalry, was the eldest son of M. Jean Bertin
de St. Geyran (Honorary Master of Requests and Counsellor to the
Parliament of Bordeaux) and of his wife Lucretia de St. Chamant, both
of whose families were deemed, by character and descent, most
honourable among the Bordelais.  In the Blazon ou Art Héraldique,*
Bertin is represented as bearing an escutcheon argent, charged with a
saltire (simple) dentelé.


* French Encyclopaedie, 1789.


From his birth, the Marquis Louis Mathieu was an object of aversion
to his father, who, on the other hand, doted even to absurdity on his
youngest son, on whom he lavished all his love and his livres, and on
whom he bestowed the estate of Bourdeille.  M. Bertin would seem,
almost, from the birth of his second boy, to have determined, by
every scheme he could devise, to deprive the eldest of his
birthright; and this object he followed with singular rancour nearly
to the end of his life.

It has never been hinted that M. Bertin suspected the paternity of
his heir.  Through life the conduct of Madame Bertin was
irreproachable and above all suspicion.

In the infancy and boyhood of Louis, his father strove by systematic
oppression, and by cutting neglect, to degrade, mortify, and break
the spirit of the poor little fellow: on all occasions giving the
place of honour, and the whole of his affection, to his second son.
As his manhood approached, his father proposed to him the profession
of the law, but as he, weary of his unhappy home, displayed an
inclination for the army, open war was at once declared by his father
against him.  To more than one abbé did the young man in his misery
appeal for intercession with his tyrannical parent; but such appeals
only made matters worse, and the Counsellor became so furious in his
wrath, that he made preparations to seclude Louis in some strong
vault or cellar of his mansion.

The Marquis having discovered the residence of a young woman who was
the mistress of his father, paid her a secret visit, told her the
story of his unhappy life and domestic persecution; and, as his own
mother seemed powerless in the matter, on his knees sought _her_
interest in his behalf.  She would seem to have been touched by the
appeal; and rated the Counsellor soundly for his unnatural conduct,
threatening him with the loss of her affection "if M. Louis were not
left to his own inclination in the choice of a profession."

In the hope, perhaps, that some English or Prussian bullet might rid
him of a son whom he hated so cordially, Bertin permitted the Marquis
to join the Regiment de Noailles (or 54th Cavalry of the Line,
commanded by the Comte d'Ayen, nephew of Marshal Noailles) as a cadet
or volunteer; but, according to the system then pursued in the French
service, he could receive no pay or emolument, even while campaigning
in Flanders and Germany.  After fourteen months of this probation,
however, he was gazetted to a cornetcy in the Regiment de Maine, and
at sixteen years of age became captain of a troop in the 40th
Cavalry, or Dragoons of St. Jal, commanded by Brigadier the Comte de
St. Jal;* his boyish spirit and bravery (not to mention his rank)
having even then attracted the attention of Comte d'Argenson, who was
prime minister of France from 1743 to 1757.  The Count prevailed upon
Louis the Fifteenth to make the Marquis a Chevalier of the Royal
Order, and bestow upon him a special pension, in lieu of the wretched
pittance allowed him by his father.


* Liste Historique de toutes les troupe au Service de France.


This early success in camp and at court seemed to inflame the
resentment of the Counsellor, who now began to affirm that the
Marquis was not his son, but a changeling, or impostor, substituted
by the nurse for his first child, who, he declared, had died while
under her charge; but, as this story could be in no way sustained, M.
Bertin changed his tactics, and resolved to get rid of his eldest son
by--poison!

A fever with which Fratteaux was seized about this time, favoured the
infamous idea; and his father, who visited him with an air of
concern, contrived to give him, in his medicine, a dose of some
deadly drug which he called an infusion of bark.  It nearly proved
fatal, and would inevitably have done so, but for the prompt arrival
of the apothecary who had furnished it, and who, suspecting foul play
when summoned by the Marquis, brought with him a powerful antidote.

The Counsellor, who was immensely rich, now suborned some worthless
fellows, among whom was an Italian (name unknown), to swear that
Fratteaux meditated a parricidal design against _his_ life; "that the
Marquis, having a quarrel with his father, drew his sword, and would
have killed him but for the interposition of the father of the
Italian, who received the thrust, and died of it."

This deposition enabled Bertin to purchase a lettre de cachet, by
virtue of which he had his son arrested, and thrust into a monastery
near Bordeaux, where he was treated as a prisoner.  Though for the
crime of attempted parricide he might have been broken alive on the
wheel by the then existing laws of France.

Through the great influence of Bertin as a Counsellor of Parliament,
all his son's entreaties for release, or for a public trial, were
rendered vain, and he lost his commission in the Regiment of St. Jal.
Some of his friends, however, having discovered where he was
confined, and fearing that he might be secretly put to death, broke
into the monastery one night, and assisted him to escape.  Through
Gascony and Bearn he fled to Spain, where, without so much as a
change of clothes, without money or letters of introduction, he
arrived, in a famished and destitute condition, at the house of the
Comte de Marcillac (a relation of his mother), who derived his title
from the little town of that name, nine miles north of Bordeaux.

The Counsellor soon discovered the place of his son's retreat, and,
assisted by a liberal donation of gold, soon procured from the French
ambassador at Madrid a warrant for the arrest of the fugitive, based
upon the powers afforded by that infamous instrument of tyranny, the
lettre de cachet.  Once more the unhappy son had to fly; the Comte de
Marcillac supplied him with money; and, embarking at the nearest
port, he sailed for London, where he arrived in 1749.  There, under
the name of Monsieur de St. Etienne, he took a humble lodging in
Paddington, then a country village with green fields all round it,
from Marybone Farm to Kensington.  His landlord was a market gardener.

His friends in France and Spain sent him remittances and letters of
introduction to several persons of rank in London.  To these, the
pleasant manners, gentle bearing, and handsome person of the young
Marquis speedily recommended him, and ere long he was enabled to
remove nearer town, where he boarded with a Mrs. Giles, in
Marybone--or, as another account has it, "with one Mrs. Bacon, a
widow gentlewoman of much good nature and understanding."  But even
in this "land of liberty" he was not safe from the rancour of the
indefatigable Counsellor, with his lettre de cachet.

The English friends of the Marquis having urged that he should lay
the story of his wrongs before Louis the Fifteenth in the form of a
memorial, the preparation of it was confided to an amanuensis, a
Frenchman named Dages de Souchard.  This fellow (though only the son
of an obscure lawyer at Libourne, then a very small town of Provence)
assumed, in London, the title of Baron.  A deep-witted, crafty, and
insinuating rascal, he contrived to propitiate many unsuspecting
persons, and claimed to be a strict French Protestant, though he had,
in early life, been a Franciscan monk, or friar minor, in a monastery
at Nerac, in the west of France, and came of a family of rigid
Catholics.  Nay, while in the monastery, he seduced a young girl
named Du Taux, whose mother was the lavandière of the establishment,
and they had come together to London, where they gave themselves out
as persecuted French Protestants.  Having been born within twenty
miles of Bordeaux, this Souchard knew the story of the Marquis de
Fratteaux, and conceived the idea of turning it to his own profit
before it should reach the ears of Louis the Fifteenth.  For this
purpose, delaying the preparation of the memorial, he wrote secretly
to the Counsellor, stating that he knew where his son was, and
offering to make terms to secure and deliver him up!  The Counsellor
entered cordially into the scheme, and, after remitting him some
money on account, agreed to settle upon him for life a pension of six
hundred livres, and to pay him two thousand English guineas down,
with two hundred more, for the reward of any assistants or
accomplices he might deem necessary.

Dages de Souchard immediately set about his treachery, and employed a
man of most unscrupulous character, one Alexander Blasdale, a
Marshal's Court officer who resided in St. Martin's Lane, and whose
follower or colleague, by a strange coincidence, was the very Italian
who had been accessory to the incarceration of the Marquis in the
monastery near Bordeaux.

On the night of the 25th of March, 1752, they repaired to the
lodgings of the Marquis: who immediately became deadly pale on seeing
the Italian, and exclaimed, in alarm and distress:

"I am a dead man!"

Blasdale summoned him to surrender in the king's name.  Knowing that
he owed no man anything, Fratteaux was disposed to resist.  His
landlady sent for M. Robart, French clergyman, to whom Blasdale, with
cool effrontery, showed a writ to arrest the Marquis for a pretended
debt.  The latter was persuaded to yield and to accompany the officer
to his house in St. Martin's Lane, whither he was immediately driven
in a hackney-coach, and there placed in a secure chamber.

Five gentlemen, "one of them a person of the first fashion," on
hearing of the arrest, repaired to the bailiff, and in strong
language warned him to beware of using the least violence towards his
prisoner, lest he should be called to a severe account; and they
added, that sufficient bail would be found for him in the morning.
One gentleman, named M. Dubois, remained with the Marquis as his
friend, resolved to see the end of the affair, and to protect him;
but about midnight the Italian came in, saying that some one wished
to speak with this gentleman below.  On descending to the street,
Dubois found only the bailiff Blasdale, who roughly told him "to be
gone," and thrusting him out of the house, shut him out, and secured
the door.  On this gentleman returning with the French clergyman and
others next morning, they were told by a servant-girl "that the
Marquis was gone, in company with several gentlemen."  They then
demanded to see her master, but were curtly told that "he was out of
town."  In short, neither he nor his victim was ever beheld in
England again!

Fears of foul play being immediately excited, the whole party
repaired to Justice Fielding, by whom a warrant to apprehend Blasdale
was issued, on suspicion of murder.  Application was made to the Lord
Chief Justice, and also to the secretary of state, Robert Earl of
Holderness, for a habeas corpus to prevent the Marquis from being
taken out of the kingdom dead or alive; but all was of no avail, and
the fate of Fratteaux remained for some time a dark mystery.

It would appear that on finding himself alone, after the rough
expulsion of his friend Dubois, the Marquis became furious with rage;
on which Blasdale swore that as he made so much noise in the house he
would convey him at once to jail.  Fratteaux, who feared he might be
assassinated where he was, readily consented to go to jail, and a
hackney-coach was called.  In it, he, the bailiff, and the nameless
Italian, drove through various obscure streets and by-lanes.  It was
now about five in the morning.

The marquis again and again implored aid from the coach window in
broken English, but received none; to the watch his keepers said that
he was "only a French fellow they had arrested for debt;" to others
they said he had been made furious by the bite of a mad dog, and they
were going to dip him in salt water at Gravesend.  Thus his
entreaties were abortive, and at about sunrise he found himself at a
lonely place by the side of the river Thames.  A cocked pistol was
put to his ear, and resistance was vain; he was thrust on board a
small vessel, which had been waiting for him in the river, and which,
after he was secured below, dropped down with the ebb tide.  So well
did Souchard, Blasdale, and the Italian take all their measures, that
on the night of the 29th the two last-named worthies landed the
Marquis at Calais, the gates of which town were opened to admit them
long after the usual hour of closing.  He was then delivered over as
a prisoner of state to the town authorities, who had all been duly
communicated with, and probably well fee'd, and by whom he was sent,
chained by the neck, in a post-chaise, to his father's house in
Paris.  The Counsellor, in virtue of his lettre de cachet, now sent
his son the Marquis to be immured in the Bastile for life.

"This is the first narrative of the kind which has stained the annals
of England," says a print of the time; "and if it be not the last,
highly as we boast of giving laws to all Europe, we shall be little
better, in fact, than a pitiful colony exposed to the mercy of every
insolent neighbour."  Great indignation was excited in London, where
a subscription was raised for the purpose of punishing all concerned
in this flagrant violation of British law; but nothing was achieved
in the end,* though in January, 1754--one year and eight months after
the outrage at St. Martin's Lane--our ambassador at the court of
Versailles, General the Earl of Albemarle, demanded that both the
Marquis and his infamous trepanner, Alexander Blasdale, at that time
in Paris, should be delivered up and sent back to London.  His
request was never complied with, and for fourteen years the luckless
Marquis was allowed to languish in the Bastile.


* "We are told that a foreign nobleman is already in custody of a
messenger for this offence, and no person is permitted to have access
to him, neither is he allowed the use of pen, ink, or
paper."--_Gentleman's Magazine_, 1752.  Very probably this "foreign
nobleman" was the _Baron_ Dages de Souchard.


He and his story were soon forgotten, and nothing more was heard of
him, until some of the London papers of July 14, 1764, contained the
following paragraph: "The Marquis de Fratteaux, that French gentleman
who was some years ago forcibly carried off from England to France
and confined in the Bastile, is now at liberty on his estate at
Fratteaux; for when his brother, M. Bertin de Bourdeille, was made
Intendant of Lyons, he obtained his liberty, on giving his word of
honour to remain on his estate at Fratteaux, and never to go above
six miles from it without leave from his father, with whom he had
been at great variance, which was the occasion of his leaving France.
Two months after his arrival at Fratteaux his father went to see him,
and he had permission to return the visit at Bourdeille.  He has kept
his word of honour strictly, and lives at present in cordiality with
the whole family."

Broken in health and spirit by all he had undergone, this unfortunate
victim of a family feud and an unnatural hatred, died soon
afterwards, and thus the wishes of his father were accomplished.




SOCIVISCA:

THE STORY OF A GREEK OUTLAW.

In the year 1688, that district of Western Turkey named
Montenegro--the ancient Illyria--placed itself under the protection
of the Venetian republic, which was then governed by the doge
Francisco Morosini, a famous soldier, who took the castle of the
Dardanelles from the Turks, together with Lepanto and several other
places.

For a time after this, its inhabitants, those half-Greek and
half-Slavonian mountaineers, with the people of Bosnia, enjoyed
comparative peace; but by the treaty concluded at Passarowitz in
July, 1718, between Charles VI. (last Count of Hapsburg) and the
Porte, they were surrendered to the tender mercies of the Turks, and
became subject to all the exactions of those grasping, ignorant, and
impracticable conquerors.

However, the hardy warriors of the mountains were scarcely content,
like their countrymen in the eastern portions of Greece, to live on
despised and unmolested for the payment of tribute; the worst and
most humiliating feature of which was the number of children they
were compelled to present yearly to the sultan for service in the
seraglio, or in the ranks of the janissaries, where their identity
soon became lost; and where in the end they realized what Voltaire
termed "a great proof of the force of education and of the strange
constitution of human affairs, that the most of those proud
oppressors of Christianity should thus be born of _Christian
parents_."

Socivisca, the subject of the following sketch, was born at Simiova
in 1725, of Grecian parents, who reared and educated him in the
profession and faith of the Greek church.  He was strong, hardy, and
athletic in form, and of a haughty and resentful spirit, that would
ill brook the circumstances in which he found himself as he grew to
manhood.

His father occupied a small sheep farm on the slope of those
mountains whose forests of dark pine give a name to the people and
the province.  But the proprietors were Turks, who treated the
family, which consisted of the old man and his four sons, with great
severity, subjecting them to constant exactions, insults, and
oppressions.

They were thus reduced to such extreme poverty that Socivisca, with
all his industry, aided by that of his three brothers, Nicholas,
Giurgius, and Adrian, found himself quite unable to marry a beautiful
Greek girl, of whom he became enamoured in youth.  His father, being
of a peaceful and gentle nature, and being perhaps aware of the
hopelessness of resistance, on perceiving that his sons writhed under
their afflictions, besought them to submit with patience to the will
of God; but the four young men, being alike of a fiery and haughty
spirit, and, moreover, being trained to the use of those arms which
the Montenegrin shepherds constantly wear (like the Scots Highlanders
in the last century), they received his advice in reluctant silence,
and not the less resolved to have a trial of strength some day with
their Mahommedan oppressors.

Native hardihood and warlike spirit were in this instance added to
national animosity and religious rancour; thus Socivisca, like Rob
Roy, vowed that ere long those should tremble "on hearing of his
vengeance, that would not listen to the story of his wrongs."

The Montenegrins, like most other mountaineers, are eminently
patriotic, and the solemn and melancholy aspect of those dark hills
of Illyria that look down on the Adriatic, to their eyes must seem
well to harmonize with the fallen state of Greece:--

  "And yet how lovely in thine age of woe,
    Land of lost gods and god-like men, art thou!
  Thy vales of evergreen, thy hills of snow,
    Proclaim thee nature's varied favourite now."

Though not pure Greeks, but Zernagorzii, of half-Slavonian blood, the
Montenegrins have the most extravagant ideas of independence and the
past glories of their country.  Inspired by its scenery, by the real
and imaginary stories of its departed greatness and present
degradation, Socivisca and his brothers registered at the altar a vow
of vengeance on their oppressive Overlords! and as if _fatality_ had
a hand in the matter, it chanced soon after that the haughty Turk,
the proprietor of their sheep farm, accompanied by two of his
brothers, came, either by choice or necessity, to lodge at the farm.
This was in 1744, when Socivisca was in his nineteenth year.

"We are four to three," said he, "so look to your pistols and
yataghans, after these dogs have had their food and coffee."

Notwithstanding their vow, it is said that he wavered for a time
before performing the terrible deed; but when he saw his father's
face, sharpened more by want and privation than by age--when he
looked on the rags and sheepskins that clad them all--they the true
lords of the soil--and saw in contrast the rich flowing garments of
fine silk and velvet, laced with gold, and the jewelled weapons of
the three Mahommedans, in whose presence every wooden crucifix or
gaudy little picture of a Greek saint had to be hidden--and perhaps
when the youth thought of his bride, and all that might be if the
land they trod on was indeed their own, every scruple gave way, and,
inciting his brothers to the deadly work, they fell on the three
Turks, as they lounged over their long pipes, and slew them by their
pistols and yataghans, after a very brief resistance.

In their mails were found eighteen thousand sequins--an unexpected
but most seasonable accession of fortune.  The brothers quickly
buried the bodies and all their habiliments.  Save the gold, which
was carefully concealed, there remained no trace of the terrible
deed, and as it occurred unknown to all save themselves, in that
solitary little farm amid the savage mountain solitude, no suspicion
of the circumstance fell on them.

Thus, instead of taking to flight, the Greeks remained quietly where
they were.  The Pacha of Bosnia made every inquiry after the three
missing Turks, who were his friends.  Suspicions somehow fell on
other parties, who were dragged to Traunick, and executed with great
barbarity, while Socivisca wedded the girl he loved, and lived with
his father and brothers in comparative ease and comfort.

About a year after the triple assassination, some imprudence of
Socivisca, in displaying the latent pride and ferocity of his
character, together with the unusual amount of money the family were
enabled to spend, excited the surprise and then the ready suspicions
of the pastoral people around them.

Some whisper of these suspicions reached Socivisca; so by his advice
the whole family abandoned the farm in the night, and, taking with
them only their gold and their arms, departed from the mountains
towards the Venetian territory.

The weather was severe, the roads were rough, and the elder
Socivisca, unable to sustain privations so unwonted at his time of
life, expired of toil by the wayside, and was hastily buried by his
four sons in a wild and solitary place.

Entering the territories of the republic, where they were in safety,
in the year 1745, they took up their habitation in the town of
Imoski, which is now in what is termed Austrian Dalmatia, and on the
borders of Bosnia; but in those days the old fortress on the
hill--the site of the ancient Novanium--bore the flag of Venice.

Here they gave themselves out to be traders, and opened a bazaar,
which they stored with rich merchandise; they built a large house,
and soon became almost wealthy; but the easy life of a merchant by no
means suited the temperament of Socivisca and his brethren,--for the
warrior shepherds pined for their mountain home and the forests of
the Illyrian shore.

They sold their house, the bazaar, and its goods, and attended by
stout fellows, whose spirit was something like their own, they
returned again to Montenegro, and commenced a series of those forays
and surprises (against the pacha) in which the Black Mountaineers
delight, and in the conduct of which they peculiarly excel; and
during the ensuing summer they contrived to massacre, in various
ways, about forty Turks, as it was against them, and them only, that
all the hatred of Socivisca was directed.

The habits to which he had been accustomed from infancy pre-eminently
fitted him for the life of a wandering guerrilla.  "A Montenegrin,"
says Broniewski, a Russian traveller, "is always armed, and carries
about, during his most peaceful occupation, a rifle, pistols, a
yataghan, and cartouch-box.  They spend their leisure from boyhood in
firing at a target.  Inured to hardships and privations, they
perform, without fatigue, long and forced marches, climb the steepest
rocks with facility, and bear with patience hunger, thirst, and every
kind of privation.  They cut off the heads of those enemies whom they
take with arms in their hands, and spare only those who surrender
_before_ battle."

Seeking no mercy, they yielded none; and if one of their number was
wounded severely, his comrades cut off his head; and when not tending
their flocks, like the Circassians, they spent their whole time in
forays against the invaders of the Black Mountains.  But after a time
Socivisca grew weary of slaughtering and beheading the Turks, and
returned once more to his wife and children at Imoski, where he
remained till 1754, engaged in trade, though now and then he slung
his long rifle on his shoulder, stuck his dagger and pistols in his
girdle, and crossed the Bosnian frontier to indulge in his favourite
pastime of slaying the Turks.

In all his dealings and adventures, whether as a merchant or
guerrilla robber, it could never be discovered that he wronged in the
least degree any subjects either of the Austrian empire or of the
Venetian republic.

Meantime, two of his brothers married, and Adrian, the youngest,
joined the Aiducos, a band of Morlachians, who had leagued themselves
together for the express but hazardous purpose of preventing the
Turks from crossing what they considered the frontier of their own
country; in short to defend the wooded passes of the Black Mountains.
Brave, rash, cunning, treacherous, and cruel, these Morlachians are a
mixture of Hungarian, Greek, and Venetian blood, and their religion
is a mere mass of superstition, partly Christian and partly Oriental.

The youth became the comrade of a Morlachian of the Greek church, and
chose him for his _probatim_.  This choice of friendship was always
consecrated by a solemn ceremony at the altar of the nearest church,
before which they knelt, each holding a lighted taper, whilst the
priest sprinkled them with holy water and blessed the compact.

United thus, the _probatims_ are bound for life to assist each other
in war or peace, in danger or adversity, against all men whatsoever.
The young mountaineer, however, made an unfortunate choice of a
friend, for the probatim lured him to his own house, gave him drugged
wine, and for a sum of money delivered him over, bound hand and foot,
to the Pacha of Traunick, which is one of the six military pachalics
into which Bosnia is divided.

After exposing the poor youth, who was a model of manly beauty,
stripped and nude before the people, the pacha put him to death, amid
the most exquisite tortures that the Oriental mind can suggest.

On hearing of this atrocity Socivisca was filled with rage and grief;
but dissembling, he armed himself fully, and travelled without
stopping until he reached the residence of the false probatim, whose
father, a subtle old Morlachian, received him with an air of such
grief and commiseration that he succeeded completely in making our
mountaineer believe that the son was innocent of the crime laid to
his charge by common rumour.  The probatim next appeared, and acted
_his part_ so well, and shed so many tears, that Socivisca,
confounded and convinced, gave him his hand, and consented to dine
with the family.  Then the young Morlachian said that, "in honour of
such a guest, he would kill the best lamb in his flock;" and he went
forth, but instead of going to his pastures, he rode on the spur
twelve miles to have a conference with the mir-alai who commanded a
body of Turkish horse on the bank of the Danube, and to inform him of
where Socivisca was to be found, receiving from the officer a
handsome sum for his second act of treachery.

The day wore on, and evening came without either the lamb or the
probatim appearing.  The wily host, who knew what was on the _tapis_,
left nothing unsaid to satisfy the doubts of Socivisca, who, after
night-fall, retired to his bedchamber, but not to repose; for strange
and unbidden forebodings of coming evil tormented him.  He dared not
sleep, and he seemed to hear the voices of his wife and children
mingling with the wind that shook the woods, and with the tread of
coming enemies.  His dogs, also--two of that Molossian breed which is
unsurpassed for strength and ferocity--warned him by their snorts and
restlessness of approaching danger,--for dogs at times are said to
have strange instincts.  At last, unable to endure the suspicions of
peril and treachery, he sprang from bed, dressed himself in the dark,
and sought for his arms, but _they had been removed_!

Musket, pistols, yataghan, and all were gone.  He called on his host
repeatedly, but without receiving an answer.  Then, inspired by rage
and the conviction that, like his brother, he had been snared to his
doom, with a flint and tinder-box, he lighted a lamp, went forth to
search the house, and soon appeared by the bedside of his host.

"Wretch!" he exclaimed as he seized him by the beard, "my arms--where
are they?  Speak ere it be too late for us both!"

Every moment expecting to hear his son return with a party of Turks,
the Morlachian attempted to expostulate and to temporize; but
Socivisca's eye fell on a small hatchet that lay near, and snatching
it up, with a terrible malediction, he cleft the old traitor's skull
to the chin.

On this a female servant, dreading her master's fate, gave Socivisca
his arms, and he fled into the woods close by, where he lurked long
enough to see the probatim arrive with a party of Timariots, who
surrounded the house.  On this the fugitive withdrew and retired
towards the mountains, swearing by every saint in his church to have
a terrible revenge!

Assembling his followers, he descended in the night, and guarding all
the avenues to prevent escape, he set fire to the house of the
probatim, who perished miserably with sixteen of his family, all of
whom were burned alive, save a woman, who was killed by a rifle-shot
when in the act of leaping from a window with an infant in her arms.

After these affairs the Pacha of Bosnia, a three-tailed dignitary who
resided at Traunick, scoured the country with his Timariots, and made
such incredible efforts to capture Socivisca, that though the latter
multiplied his slaughters, raids, and robberies, he was ultimately
driven, with his brothers, his wife, and two children (a son and
daughter), over the Montenegrin frontier to Karlovitz, a small place
in the Austrian territory, famous only as the scene of Prince
Eugene's victory over the Ottoman troops in the early part of the
last century.  The Hungarians being, like the Illyrians, of Slavonian
blood, there he found a comfortable shelter for three years under the
protection of the Emperor Francis I. and the Empress-Queen, and
during that time his conduct and life were alike blameless and
without reproach.  One of his brothers, however, having strayed
across the frontier, fell into the hands of the Turks, and would have
died a miserable death, had his escape not been favoured by one who
proved friendly to him, a Timariot named Nouri Othman.

In October, 1757, Osman III. died, and was succeeded by Mustapha, son
of the deposed Sultan Achmet.  Karlovitz is only forty miles from the
Bosnian frontier; so the pacha, who never lost sight of Socivisca,
anxious to please the new sovereign and display his activity, by a
lavish disposal of gold, and by the aid of some person or persons
unknown, had the exile betrayed and made prisoner.  He ordered him to
be conveyed at once to Traunick, and to be placed in the same prison
where his younger brother perished so miserably.

Though elaborately tied and bound, by some of that skill which the
rope-tricksters display in the present day, he contrived, _en route_,
to get free, and, escaping, reached Karlovitz, where he had the
unhappiness to find that, by a singular stroke of misfortune, his
wife and two children had in the interim fallen into the hands of the
pacha, that in his flight he had actually passed them on the road,
and that they were now in the strong prison of Traunick, from which
escape or release seemed alike hopeless.

By messengers from Karlovitz he strove to negotiate for their
release, but the pacha was inexorable.  He then wrote the following
letter, which appeared in a newspaper for March, 1800, where it was
given "as a curious specimen of social feeling operating on a rugged
and ardent disposition;" moreover, it is no bad specimen of the
outlaw's literary power:--

"I am informed, O Pacha of Bosnia, that you complain of my escape;
but I put it to yourself, what would you have done in my place?
Would you have suffered yourself to be bound with cords like a
miserable beast, and led away without resistance by men who, as soon
as they arrived at a certain place, would put you to death?

"Nature impels us to avoid destruction, and I have acted only in
obedience to her laws.

"Tell me, Pacha, what crime have my wife and little children
committed that, in spite of law and justice, you should retain them
like slaves?  Perhaps you hope to render me more submissive; but you
cannot surely expect that I shall return to you and hold forth my
arms to be loaded with fresh bonds.

"Hear me then, Pacha!  You may exhaust on them all your fury without
producing the least advantage.  On _my part_, I declare I shall wreak
my vengeance _on all Turks_ who may fall into my hands, and I will
omit no means of injuring you!

"For the love of God restore to me, I beseech you, my blood! obtain
my pardon from my sovereign, and no longer retain in your memory my
past offences; and I promise that I will _then_ leave your subjects
in tranquillity, and even serve them as a friend when necessary.

"If you refuse this favour, expect from me all that despair can
prompt!  I shall assemble my friends, carry destruction wherever you
reside, pillage your property, plunder your merchants; and from this
moment, if you pay no attention to my entreaties, I swear that I will
massacre every Turk that falls into my hands."

As Socivisca had been doing this for so many years past, perhaps the
pacha thought compliance would not make much difference; so this
letter, like its preceding messages, he received with contempt,
swearing by the "beard of the sultan to listen neither to the threats
nor entreaties of a common robber."  So Socivisca performed to the
full all that he had named and threatened.  At the head of a body of
Greeks and Montenegrins he ravaged all the Bosnian frontier, slaying
and decapitating every Mussulman who fell into his hands.  Seeking no
quarter and giving none, as before, flames and rapine marked his path
wherever he went.

Many of his forays were made near the Lake of Scutari, in concert
with the Montenegrins, whom the Russians supplied with arms and
artillery to add to the troubles of the Pacha of Bosnia, whose people
ere long on their knees besought him to yield up the wife and
children of Socivisca, and save them from a scourge so terrible.

Still the pacha refused; but suddenly the indomitable Socivisca
appeared with his hardy Aiducos before the walls of Traunick, and, by
a wonderful combination of force and stratagem, the gates were
stormed, the guards dispersed, and he carried off his wife, his son,
and daughter to a place of safety beyond the frontier.

In retiring from Traunick, at a wild place near Razula, his people
captured one of the Turkish Timariots, in the service of the pacha,
and would instantly have put him to death had not the brother of
Socivisca recognized in him the man who had favoured his escape a
short time before,--Nouri Othman.  These Timariots were soldiers, who
clothed, armed, and accoutred themselves out of their pay, and were
under the immediate command of the sanjiac or bey, and each
maintained under him a certain number of militiamen, as they were, in
fact, high-class Turkish cavaliers.  Those on the Hungarian frontier
had each an income of 6000 aspres, a coin then worth one shilling and
threepence British money.

In gratitude the mountain warrior permitted Othman to escape; and
while Socivisca was at prayers--a duty which he never omitted before
a meal--the prisoner was set at liberty, a fleet horse was given him,
and from the camp of the outlaws he spurred towards Traunick.
Against this act of generosity the Aiducos of the band exclaimed
loudly; and a nephew of Socivisca went so far as to draw from his
girdle a long brass-butted pistol, with which he struck his uncle on
the face; the latter, infuriated by such an insult from a junior,
shot him through the heart, and was compelled to fly from the troop.

The nephew was buried as his grandfather had been, in a grave by the
wayside; but this family quarrel and double misfortune affected
Socivisca so much that he returned to Karlovitz, relinquishing alike
his life of war and outrage for a time, but for a time only; for,
fired with enthusiasm on hearing that Stephano Piciola (known as Di
Montenero), so often victorious over the Turks, had made himself
master of all Albania, in 1770, he issued forth again at the head of
his Aiducos, and scoured the Bosnian frontier, shooting down every
Turk whom he met.

In his fiftieth year, after having led a life of such danger and
strife--after shedding so much blood, and during a period of thirty
years since the slaughter of the three Turkish brothers at his
father's farm, having plundered so much, so freely had he spent his
cash among his friends and followers, that he found his exchequer
reduced to only six hundred sequins.

To secure these, he entrusted three hundred to the care of a kinsman
and the rest to a friend, both of whom absconded with their trust to
the shelter of the pacha, and left him in abject poverty in the small
town of Grachaez, in the province of Carlstadt, on the military
frontier of Croatia.

In the year 1775 the Emperor Francis I., when passing through the
province, wished to see the famous predatory warrior of whom he had
heard so much, and visited his humble abode at Grachaez.  There he
was so greatly struck with the simple dignity, the resolute but
respectful demeanour of the white-bearded partisan, that he presented
him with a handsome sum of money, and asked him to show his numerous
wounds, and to detail the chief events of his life.

Socivisca did so, with so much simplicity and modesty that the
Emperor, whom he pleased and amused, and who was looking forward to
the capture of the Bukovine and other districts from the Turks, made
him an offer of service, and assigned him an important military
command upon the Hungarian frontier, opposed to the great pachalics
of Bosnia and Servia.

In the exercise of this office* he was alive at Grachaez in 1777,
after which year his name can no more be traced in the histories,
papers, or periodicals of the time, so that we are unable to say when
he died.


* "Arambassa of Pandonas" it is styled in the English newspapers--a
title we frankly confess ourselves unable to understand.


Such was the wild, romantic, and singular story of a mountain robber,
whose life ultimately became productive of public utility; who
enjoyed the favour and protection of Francis I. and Maria Theresa;
and whose career, in his unrelenting animosity to the Turks, presents
a curious mixture of patriotism and ferocity, religious enthusiasm
and the long-engendered rancour of rival and antagonistic races.




PAQUETTE.

AN EPISODE OF THE FRANCO-PRUSSIAN WAR.


CHAPTER I.

In the spring of the year 1870, when my merry Paquette and I used to
laugh at the cartoons of the _Kladderadatch_, representing King
William lowering a mannikin in regimentals gently, by the spike of
his helmet, into a huge chair, inscribed "Spanien," we little foresaw
the horrors that were to come, or the days when we might tremble at
the warlike news of the official _Staatsanzieger_.

We had been married a year, and were so happy in our pretty little
house at Blankenese (a short distance from Hamburg), where all the
sloping bank above the Elbe is covered with rich green copsewood,
from amid which peep out the tiny red-tiled cottages of the
fishermen; while over all tower the white-walled villas of those
opulent merchants whose names stood so high in the Neuerwall or the
Admiralitatstrasse, and higher still in the Bourse of the Free
City--free now only in name, as it has become, since the Holstein
war, an integral portion of the Prussian Empire.

Paquette Champfleurie was my first real love; yet, though still
little more than a girl, she was a widow when we married, and it all
came to pass in this fashion, for we had indeed much sorrow before
our days of joy arrived.  When I, Carl Steinmetz--for such is my
name, though no relation to the great Prussian general--was but a lad
in a merchant's office, in the quaint old gable-ended and
timber-built street called the Stubbenhuk, I had learned to love
Paquette, then a boarder in a fashionable school on the beautiful
Alsterdam.  Our interviews were stolen; our intercourse most
difficult; for her kinswoman, the Gräfine von Spitzberger--a reduced
lady of rank, with whom she was placed for educational
purposes--watched her with the eyes of a lynx.  But what will not
love achieve?

Paquette, a lively, dark-eyed, and chestnut-haired girl from
Lorraine, with a piquant little face that was not by any means French
in contour or expression, and I, a sharp-witted _burschen_ fresh from
Berlin, soon found means for prosecuting our affair of the heart,
from the time when our eyes first met on a Sunday evening in St.
Michael's Kirche, to that eventful hour when, after many a note
exchanged or concealed in a certain hollow tree near the
Lombardsbrücke, we plighted our troth in the little grove near
Schiller's bronze statue, with no witnesses but the quiet stars
overhead, and the snow-white swans that floated on the blue current
of the Alster.

But sorrow soon came to rouse us from our dreams; for three weeks
after that happy evening her father took her home, without permitting
us to say farewell, and ere long I learned that she had become the
wife of Baptiste Graindorge, a wealthy merchant of Lorraine!  With
these tidings the half of my life seemed to leave me.  They cost me
many a secret tear, and much jealous bitterness, though I knew that
French girls have no freedom of choice in matrimony; and I loathed
the odious Graindorge in my heart, while bending resolutely over my
desk, in the dingy and gloomy little office in the noisy
Stubbenhuk--bending also every energy to amass money, though for what
purpose now I scarcely know.  But fortune favoured me.

I became ere long a junior partner in the firm under whom I had
worked as a clerk, and the same year saw Paquette free; for our
horrible Graindorge had died abroad of fever, at the French colony of
Senegal, and she became mine--mine after all!  A widow, no scheming
father could interfere with her then.

In the whole of busy Hamburg there could be no happier couple than we
were--and this was but a year ago.  Wedded, we visited every place
where we had been wont to meet by stealth, in terror of the old
Gräfine--the leafy arcades of the Young Maiden's Walk, the Botanical
Gardens, the groves that cover all the old mounds about the Holstein
Wall, and the banks of the Alster, while Michael's Kirche was indeed
a holy place to us, for there we had first met.

One morning in July of last year--ah, I shall never forget it--we
were at breakfast together in the dining-room of our cottage at
Blankenese, and prior to taking the Sporvei 'bus for the city, I was
skimming over the _Staatsanzieger_, which was then beginning to be
full of threatening news concerning the Spanish succession, and
calling on Prussia to rouse herself, as all France, or Paris, at
least, was shouting "A Berlin!" and "To the Rhine!"  The atmosphere
was deliciously warm; the slender iron casements were wide open; the
fragrant roses and jessamine clambered thickly round them, and the
drowsy hum of the bees mingled with the sounds that came, softened by
distance, from the vast shining bosom of the Elbe, where ships, with
the flags of all the world, were gliding, some towards Jonashafen and
the city, others downward to the North Sea; and opposite lay the flat
but green and lovely coast of Hanover, studded with pretty red
villages, church-spires, and windmills whirling in the sunny air.

My heart felt happy and joyous, and Paquette was looking her
loveliest in a light muslin morning dress; her bright brown hair, her
pure complexion, and her dark, laughing eyes, making her seem a very
Hebe, as she poured out my coffee, buttered the little brown German
rolls, and chirruped about how we should spend the evening, after she
had joined me in the city, and we had dined, as we frequently did,
under the shady verandah of the pleasant Alster Pavilion, surrounded
by swans and pleasure boats.

"Where shall we go, Carl, darling?" she continued--"to the Circus
Renz?"

"No, Paquette; I am sick of the horsemanship and the sawdust, and the
same everlasting girl, who, when she is not flying through a hoop,
prances about in the dress of a Uhlan."

"The Botanical Gardens, then; the band of the 76th Hanoverians play
there to-night, and some ten thousand gay people will be present."

"Well, darling, it shall be as you wish; and after looking in at the
Stadt Theatre, to see Kathie Lanner's Swedish ballet, a droski will
soon whirl us home from the Damthor-wall."

"But it was in that theatre, Carl, love, we saw each other last, and
at a distance, on the night----"

"Before--before----" I began.

"I was torn from you to become the wife of another, Carl," she
exclaimed, in a low voice, as she took my face between her pretty
hands, and kissed me playfully.

"Ah, Graindorge!" thought I, with a little bitterness, as I kissed
her in return, and rose to fill my meerschaum prior to setting forth
for the city; but a strange cry from Paquette made me wheel sharply
round on the varnished floor, and to my bewilderment and terror, I
saw her sinking back in her chair, pallid as death, like one
transfixed--her jaw relaxed, her poor little hands clasped, her eyes
expressive only of horror and woe, and bent on something outside the
window.  My gaze involuntarily followed hers, as I sprung to her side.

At the railing before our little flower-garden stood a shabby-looking
man, whose face will ever haunt me.  His hat, well worn, tall and
shiny, was pressed knowingly over the right eye.  He was looking
steadily at us, and appeared as if he had been doing so for some
time.  A diabolical grin, like that of Mephistopheles, was over all
his features--in his carbuncle-like eyes, and in his wide mouth,
where all his teeth seemed to glisten.  He had a sallow and
dissipated face, a hooked, sardonic nose, and on his left cheek a
large black mole.  A faded green dress-coat, with brass buttons, a
yellow vest, and short inexpressibles of checked stuff, formed his
attire.

My wife was almost fainting, and seemed on the verge of distraction.

"Paquette, my love," I began; but she held up her trembling hands as
if deprecatingly between us, and said in a low, broken, and wailing
voice--

"Do not speak to me--do not touch me.  I am not your wife!  Oh, my
poor deluded Carl!--oh, my poor heart!  Oh, death, come and end this
horror--this mystery!"

Her words, her voice, her whole air and expression, made my blood run
cold with a sudden terror, that her reason had become affected.

"Paquette--dearest Paquette," I said, in a soothing and an imploring
manner, "what do these terrible words mean?  That man----"

"Is Monsieur Baptiste Graindorge, my first husband, come back from
the grave to torment me!"

"Impossible--girl, you rave!" said I, in deep distress, as I vaulted
over the window and rushed out upon the road; but the scurvy
eavesdropper was gone, and no trace of him remained.  In great grief,
and feeling sorely disturbed by the whole affair, I returned to
Paquette, whom I found crouching on the sofa, crushed by agitation
and despair.  She gazed at me lovingly, sorrowfully, and yet as if
fearful that I might approach and touch her.

"Is there not some terrible mistake or misconception in this?" said
I, seeking to gather courage from my own words.

"None--none," she replied.  "I recognized too surely his face--the
mole--the odious smile."

"But the man died in Africa--it is impossible; and you are my wife,
Paquette, whom none can take from me," I continued, with excited
utterance, as she permitted me to kiss her: but the poor little pet
was cold as marble, and her tremulous hands played almost fatuously,
yet caressingly, with my hair, while she murmured--

"Oh, Carl--my poor Carl--what _will_ become of us now?"

The whole affair seemed too improbable for realization.  I besought
her to take courage--to consider the likeness which had startled her
as a mere fancy--an optical delusion; and, aware that my presence was
imperatively necessary at business in the city, I was compelled to
leave her, and did so not without a sorrowful foreboding.

So strong was the latter emotion, that the closing of the house-door
rang like a knell in my heart.  I paused irresolute at the garden
gate, and again on the road; but the jingling bells of the
approaching Sporvei 'bus ended my doubts.  I sprang in, and in due
time found myself at my office in the busy Admiralitatstrasse,
opposite the Rath Haus.

Haunted by the strange episode of the morning, I strove vainly to
become absorbed in bills of lading, and so forth, till one o'clock
should toll from the spires--the time for plunging into the crowd of
noisy speculators at the Bourse--and I was just about to set forth,
when a stranger was announced; I looked up, and was face to face with
the horrible Graindorge!  He stood before me just as I had seen him
at the garden-rail, with his tall shiny hat, his shabby coat, his
bloated visage with its black mole and malignant smile.

"Your business?" I asked curtly.

"Will be briefly stated, Herr Steinmetz," said he.  "So madame fully
recognized me this morning?"

"Or thought she did," said I, after a short interval of silence.

"There was no doubt in the matter, but firm conviction.  I did _not_
die in Senegal, the report was false; and so, Herr Steinmetz, I am
here to claim my wife and take her back with me to Lorraine."

"You are a foul impostor!" cried I furiously, yet with a sinking
heart; "and I shall hand you over to the watch."

"Pardon me, but you will do nothing of the kind," replied the other,
with the most exasperating composure; "it will not be pleasant to
have your wife--your _supposed_ wife, I mean--made a source of
speculation to all Hamburg, by any public exposé."

"Oh, my God! my poor Paquette!" I exclaimed involuntarily; "and I
love her so!"

"Milles diables!" grinned the Frenchman; "it is more than I do."

"Wretch!  what proof have we that you are Baptiste Graindorge, and
not a cheat--a trickster?"

"The effect produced by my presence--my appearance--on madame, who
dare not deny my identity, which the Gräfine Spitzberger has already
admitted--with great reluctance, I grant you.  Well, I am supposed to
be dead.  I shall be content to let this supposition remain, and to
quit Hamburg for a consideration."

"Name it," I asked, thankful for the prospect of being rid of his
horrid presence even for a time, that I might consult some legal
friend; and yet, even while I spoke and thought of purchasing his
silence, I knew that Paquette, my adored wife, would be no wife of
mine!  It was a horrible dilemma.  Graindorge the Lorrainer was rich;
now he seemed to be poor and needy.  I knew not what to think; grief
was uppermost in my soul.  After a pause he said slowly--

"For six thousand Prussian dollars I shall quit Hamburg."

With a trembling hand, yet without hesitation, I wrote him a cheque
on my banker, Herr Berger in the Gras-keller, for the sum named, and
the snaky eyes of the Frenchman flashed as he clutched the document.
He inserted it in his tattered pocket-book, and carefully buttoned
his shabby green coat over it; then he placed his hat jauntily on one
side of his head, and tapping the crown with his hand, made me a low
ironical bow, and with a pirouette and a malicious smile quitted the
room, saying--

"Adieu, Monsieur Steinmetz--I go; but for _a time_ only."




CHAPTER II.

I saw the whole scheme now.  The bankrupt--for such I had no doubt he
was--meant to make his power over Paquette and me a source of future
revenue to himself; and I felt sure that when his last dollar was
spent--by to-morrow, perhaps--he would present himself again with a
fresh demand.  Like one in a dream I went to the Bourse; but little
or no business was done there that day, for war rumours were hourly
growing more rife.  There were riots in its neighbourhood, too.  The
tradesmen were "on strike," and the swords of the watch had been
busy, for no less than seven unarmed men were cut down in the
Adolphsplatz.  Then, that evening I heard that a spy, supposed to be
a Frenchman, had been hovering about the northern ramparts, near the
Damthor, and had been seen to count the cannon on the
Holstein-wall--a spy who had escaped alike the watch and the guard of
the Seventy-sixth Regiment, and whom I heard described as a shabby
man in a green coat, with a _mole_ on his cheek!

My heart leaped within me; could this personage and M. Baptiste
Graindorge be one and the same?  If so, neither Hamburg nor I was
likely to be troubled by his presence again.

Before my usual hour, I hastened home--home to my pretty little villa
among the rose-trees at Blankenese; but, alas! to find it desolate,
and our servant, Trüey, a faithful young Vierlander, in tears, and
filled with wonder; for her mistress had packed up some clothes, and
leaving all her jewels, even to her wedding-ring, had departed, after
writing a letter for me.

I tore it open, and found it to contain but a few words, to confirm
my terror and fill up the cup of my misery.


"The Gräfine von Spitzberger has been with me.  The man we saw is
indeed my husband, M. Graindorge, the story of whose death has been
all a mistake; and he proved _to her_ his identity, by his knowledge
of all our family affairs.  Oh, Carl! oh, my poor darling! the real
husband of my heart and my only love!  I must leave you--yes--and by
the time you read this, shall be far on the railroad for France.
Graindorge shall never see me more; my father's house or a convent
must be my shelter now.  My last hope is, that you will not attempt
to follow me; my last prayer, that God may bless and comfort you."


The lines were written tremulously.  I kissed my darling's
wedding-ring, placed it by a ribbon at my neck, and wept bitterly.
Then the room seemed to swim around me; I became senseless, and was
ill in bed for days.  Our home was broken now.  It was desolate--oh,
so desolate, without my Paquette!  She was gone.  She had left me for
ever!  And every object around seemed to recall her more vividly to
me--her piano, her music, the little ornaments we had bought together
at the Alster Arcade, and the pillow her cheek had rested on.  "She
will write to me," thought I; but no letter came.  And something of
jealousy began to mingle with the bitterness of my soul.  Was she
with Graindorge?

I think I should have gone mad but for the events that occurred so
quickly now, for one week sufficed to change the whole face of
affairs in Hamburg.  France had declared war against Prussia.  Trade
stood still; silence reigned in our splendid Bourse, usually the most
noisy and busy scene in the world; the Elbe was empty of shipping,
for its buoys and lights were all destroyed.  The Prussians, horse,
foot, and artillery, were pouring towards Travemünde, where a landing
of the French was expected.  In one day nearly every horse in Hamburg
was seized for military purposes, and the city was ordered to furnish
eighteen thousand infantry for the Landwehr.

Of this force I was one.  A strip of paper was left at my office one
day, and the next noon saw me in the barracks near the Damthor-wall,
and before the colonel, an officer of Scottish descent, the Graf von
Hamilton.  Then, like thousands of others, my plain clothes were
taken from me, and I received in lieu a spiked helmet of glazed
leather, a blue tunic faced with white, a goat-skin knapsack,
great-coat, and camp-kettle, a needle-gun, bayonet, and sword.  We
were all accoutred without delay, and within two hours were at drill,
under a burning sun, in the Heilinghaist-feld, between Hamburg and
Altona.  My desk, my office, my home, knew me no more; yet I often
mounted guard near the chambers of our firm in the
Admiralitatstrasse.  Paquette and my previous existence seemed all a
dream--a dream that had passed away for ever.  And though the gay
streets, the tall spires, the sights and sounds in our
pleasure-loving city were all unchanged, I seemed to have lost my
identity.  My former life was completely blotted out.

From the Landwehr, with many others, I was speedily drafted into the
Seventy-sixth Hanoverians, and in three weeks we were ordered to join
the Army of the Rhine.  Though I had studied in Berlin, I was not a
Prussian, but a native of the free city of Hamburg.  Like many of my
comrades, who were fathers of families, or only sons, torn from their
homes and peaceful occupations, I had no interest in the cruel and
wanton war on which we were about to enter; and more than all, I
loved France, for it was the native land of Paquette Champfleurie.

In the then horror of my mind, the war was certainly somewhat of a
change or relief, and the excitement around drew me from my own
terrible thoughts.  I was going towards Lorraine, where even while
fighting against her poor countrymen, I might see my lost one, my
wife--for such I still deemed her, despite the odious Baptiste
Graindorge; and so I fondly and wildly speculated.  The idea of being
killed and buried where Paquette might perhaps pass near my grave,
was even soothing to my now morbid soul, for I knew that she had
loved me long before _that man_ came between us with his wealth of
gold napoleons; so she must love me still--Carl, whose heart had
never wandered from her.

But there is something great and inspiring in war and its adjuncts,
after all.  I remember that on the day we left our beautiful Hamburg,
when I heard the crash of the brass bands and saw the North German
colours waving in the wind, above the long, long column of glazed
helmets and bright bayonets, as our regiment, with the Forty-seventh
Silesians, the Fifty-third Westphalians, and the Eighty-eighth
Nassauers, defiled through the Damthor, and past the Esplanade
towards the Bahnhof, I became infected by the enthusiasm around me,
and found myself joining in the mad shouts of "Hurrah, Germania!" and
in the old Teutonic song which the advanced guard of Uhlans struck
up, brandishing their lances the while--

  "O Tannebaum, O Tannebaum, wie grün sind deine Blatter!"

as we marched for the Rhine, towards which we were forwarded fast by
road and rail.

We were soon face to face with the gallant French, and how fast those
terrible battles followed each other at Weissenburg, Forbach,
Spicheren, and elsewhere, the public prints have already most fully
related.  Though I did not seek death any more than others my
comrades, I cared little for life, yet (until one night in October) I
escaped in all three of those bloody conflicts, and many a daily
skirmish, without a wound, though the chassepot balls whistled
thickly round me, and more than once the fire of a mitrailleuse, a
veritable stream of bullets, swept away whole sections by my side.  I
have had my uniform riddled with holes, my helmet grazed many times,
and part of my knapsack shot away; yet somehow fate always spared
poor Carl Steinmetz; for he had no enmity in his heart towards the
poor fellows who fell before his needle-gun.  At last we rapidly
pushed on, and reduced many fortified places as we advanced to
blockade Metz.  Then Lorraine lay around us, and I gazed on the
scenery with emotions peculiarly my own, for I thought of Paquette,
of her animated face and all her pretty ways, and of all she had told
me of her native province, its dense forests where wolves lurked, its
wild mountains, its salt springs and lakes--Lorraine now, as in
centuries long past, a subject for dispute between France and Germany.

The Seventy-sixth, under the Graf von Hamilton, formed part of the
army which, under Prince Frederick Carl, blockaded Metz with such
cruel success; and we had severe work in the wet nights of October,
while forming the _feld-wacht_ in the advanced rifle-pits.  Often
when lying there alone, in the damp hole behind a sand-bag or
sap-roller, waiting for a chance shot in the early dawn at some
unfortunate Frenchman, I thought bitterly and sadly of our once happy
home, of Paquette, my lost wife, and wondered where she was _now_, or
if, when she saw the Prussian columns, with all their bright-polished
barrels and spiked helmets shining in the sun, she could dream that
I, Carl Steinmetz, was a unit in that mighty host.  Then I would
marvel in my heart whether I, with the spiked helmet and needle-gun,
loaded with accoutrements and spattered with mud, was the same Carl
Steinmetz who, but a few months before, sat daily at his desk in the
Admiralitatstrasse, and had the sweet smiles of Paquette to welcome
him home and listen to his news from the Bourse.  Was this military
transformation madness or witchcraft?  It was neither, but stern
reality, as an unexpected shot from a hedge about four hundred yards
distant, tore the brass eagle from my helmet and fully informed me.

This was just about daybreak on the morning of the 26th October last,
and when I could see all the village quarters, from Mars-la-Tour to
Mazières, lit up, and all the bivouac fires burning redly on our left
and in the rear.

With a few others I started from the rifle-pits, and we made a dash
at the hedge, which we believed to conceal some of those
Francs-tireurs, whom we had orders to shoot without mercy, though
they were only fighting for home and country.  We were on the extreme
flank of the blockading force, and the hedge in question surrounded a
villa which stood somewhat apart from the road to Château Salins.
Led by the Graf's son, a young captain, we rushed forward, and found
it manned by some fifty men of the French line, who had crept out of
Metz intending to desert, for Bazaine permitted them to do so when
provisions began to fail.  "A bas les Pru-essiens!" cried their
leader--a tall sub-officer in very tattered uniform--thus
accentuating the word in the excess of his hatred.

"Vorwarts--für Vaterland--hurrah, Germania!" shouted the young Von
Hamilton.  A volley that killed ten of our number tore among us, but
we broke through and fell upon them with the bayonet.  Clubbing his
chassepot the French sous-officier, with a yell on his lips, beat
down poor Hamilton; then he rushed upon me, and what was my
emotion--what my astonishment, to find myself face to face with
Graindorge--he who had robbed me of Paquette--the same beer-bloated
and scurvy-looking fellow, with the huge black mole, whom I had last
seen in Hamburg!  I charged him with my bayonet breast high, but
agitation so bewildered me that he easily eluded my point, and felled
me to the earth with his clubbed rifle.  Now came a sense of
confusion, of light flashing from my eyes, the clash of steel, the
_ping_ of passing balls; then darkness seemed to envelop me, and
death to enter my heart as I became senseless.

I remained long thus, for the sun was in the west when full
consciousness returned.  The thick leather helmet had saved my head
from fracture, but dried blood plastered all my face, and I found my
right arm broken by a bullet.  All the French in the rear of the
hedge had been shot down or bayoneted, and they presented a terrible
spectacle.  All were dead save one--the sous-officier, who lay near
me, dying of many bayonet wounds.  Our wounded had been removed, but
ten of the Seventy-sixth lay near me stiff and cold.  What a scene it
was in that pretty garden, amid the rose-trees, the last flowers of
autumn, and the twittering sparrows, to see all those poor fellows,
made in God's fair image, butchered thus--and for WHAT?  My wounds
were sore, my heart was sad and heavy; oh, when was it otherwise now?
Staggering up I turned to the Frenchman, whose half-glazing eyes
regarded me with a fiercely defiant expression, for he doubted not
that in this _guerre à la mort_ his last moment had come.  I took off
my battered helmet, and then with a thrill of terror he seemed to
recognize me.

"Carl Steinmetz of Hamburg!" said he, with difficulty.

"You know me then?" I asked grimly.

"Oh, yes--in God's name give me water--I am dying!"

My canteen was empty; but I found some wine in that of a corpse which
lay near.  I poured it down his throat and it partially revived him.

"Yes, fellow," said I, "in me you see that Steinmetz who was so happy
till you came and my wife fled; so we know each other, Monsieur
Baptiste Graindorge."

"I am _not_ Baptiste--_he_ is lying quiet in his grave on the shore
of the Senegal river."

"Who, in the name of Heaven, are you?"

"Achille Graindorge--his cousin.  I took advantage of our casual but
strong resemblance to impose upon you--and--and get money--when in
Hamburg--acting----"

"As a spy--eh?"

"Yes."

"Has she--has Paquette seen you since?"

"No--for she would at once have detected the cheat."

"And you know not where she is?"

"As I have Heaven soon to answer--no," he gasped out, and sinking
back, shortly after expired, his last breath seeming to issue from
the wounds in his chest.  I had no pity for him, but felt a glow of
joy in my heart, as I turned away, and crept--for I was unable to
stand--towards the door of the villa in search of succour, the agony
of my thirst and wounds being so great that I cared little whether
the inmates aided or killed me.

However, the coincidences of this day were not yet over.

The door, on which I struck feebly with my short Prussian sword, was
opened ultimately by an old gentleman, beyond whom I saw a female,
shrinking back in evident terror.  I recognized M. de Champfleurie,
my father-in-law; but being now unable to speak, I could only point
to my parched lips and powerless arm, as I sank at his feet and
fainted.

When I recovered, my uniform was open, my accoutrements were off; I
was lying upon a sofa with my aching head pillowed softly--on
what?--The tender bosom of Paquette, my darling little wife; for she
had recognized me, though disguised alike by dress and blood, and now
her tears were falling on my weather-beaten face.

It chanced that, flying from place to place in Lorraine, before our
advancing troops, and having failed to reach Metz, they had taken
shelter in that abandoned villa; and thus happily I could reveal the
secret of our separation before the burial party bore away the body
of Achille Graindorge, who had actually been quartered at Senegal
when his cousin Baptiste died there.

My story is told.  On the following day Metz capitulated, and poor M.
Champfleurie danced with rage on learning that Bazaine had
surrendered with two other Marshals of the Empire, 173,000 prisoners
and 20,000 sick, wounded, and starving men.  My fighting days were
over now; Paquette was restored to me, and happiness was again before
us.

For their kindness in succouring me, the Graf von Hamilton gave M. de
Champfleurie and his daughter a pass to the rear, and we speedily
availed ourselves of it, for I was discharged with a shattered arm;
and now I write these lines, again in pleasant Blankenese, our dear
home, with the broad Elbe shining blue beneath our windows, and the
autumn leaves falling fast from the thick woods that cover all its
green and beautiful shore.




APPARITIONS AND WONDERS.



CHAPTER I.

LEAVES FROM OLD LONDON LIFE: 1664-1705.

The Scottish newspaper recorded, not long ago, some instances of
mirages in the Firth of Forth exactly like the freaks of the Fata
Morgana in the Straits of Messina, and on three distinct occasions
the Bass Rock has assumed, to the eyes of the crowds upon the sands
of Dunbar, the form of a giant sugar-loaf crowned by battlements,
while the island of May seemed broken into several portions, which
appeared to be perforated by caverns where none in fact exist.

Such optical delusions have been common at all times in certain
states of the atmosphere, and science finds a ready solution for
them; but in the days of our forefathers, they were deemed the sure
precursors of dire calamities, invasion, or pestilence.

The years shortly before and after the beginning of the last century
seem to have been singularly fruitful in the marvellous; and the most
superstitious Celtic peasant in the Scottish glens or the wilds of
Connemara would not have believed in more startling events than those
which are chronicled in the occasional broadsides, and were hawked
about the streets of London by the flying stationers of those days.

To take a few of these at random: we find that all London was excited
by strange news from Goeree, in Holland, where, on the evening of the
14th of August, 1664, there was seen by many spectators an apparition
of two fleets upon the ocean; these, after seeming to engage in close
battle for one hour and a half (the smoke of the noiseless cannon
rolling from their sides), vanished, as if shown from a
magic-lantern.  Then appeared in the air two lions, or the figures
thereof, which fought three times with great fury, till there came a
third of greater size, which destroyed them both.  Immediately after
this, there came slowly athwart the sky, as represented in the
woodcut which surmounted this veracious broadsheet, the giant figure
of a crowned king.  This form was seen so plainly, that the buttons
on his dress could be distinguished by the awe-stricken crowd
assembled on the sands.  Next morning the same apparition was seen
again; and all the ocean was as red as blood.  "And this happening at
this juncture of time," concludes the narrator, "begets some strange
apprehensions; for that, about six months before Van Tromp was slain
in war with England, there was seen near the same place an apparition
of ships in the air fighting with each other."*


* London: printed by Thomas Leach, Shoe Lane, 1664.


Sixteen years later, another broadsheet announced to the metropolis,
that the forms of ships and men also had been seen on the road near
Abington, on the 26th of August, 1680, "of the truth whereof you may
be fully satisfied at the Sarazen's Head Inn, Carter Lane."  It would
seem that John Nibb, "a very sober fellow," the carrier of
Cirencester, with five passengers in his waggon, all proceeding to
London about a quarter of an hour after sunrise, were horrified to
perceive at the far horizon, the giant figure of a man in a black
habit, and armed with a broadsword, towering into the sky.  Like the
spectre of the Brocken, this faded away; but to add to the
bewilderment of Nibb and his companions, it was replaced by "about a
hundred ships of several bigness and various shapes."  Then rose a
great hill covered with little villages, and before it spread a
plain, on which rode thirty horsemen, armed with carbine and pistol.

The same document records that, on the 12th of the subsequent
September, a naval engagement was seen in the air, near Porsnet, in
Monmouthshire, between two fleets, one of which came from the
northern quarter of the sky, the other from the south.  A great ship
fired first, "and after her, the rest discharged their vollies in
order, so that great flashings of fire, and even smoak was visible,
and noises in the ayr as of great guns."  Then an army of phantoms
engaged in "a square medow" near Porsnet, closing in with sword and
pistol, and the cries of the wounded and dying were heard.  On the
27th of December, Ottery, near Exeter, had a visitation of the same
kind, when at five in the evening two armies fought in the air till
six o'clock.  "This was seen by a reverend minister and several
others to their great amazement."  On the 2nd of the same month, the
people in Shropshire were, according to another sheet, sorely
perplexed by the sudden appearance of two suns in the firmament, and
it was duly remembered, that "such a sign was seen before the death
of that tempestuous firebrand of Rome here in England, Thomas
Beckett, Archbishop of Canterbury, and when Queen Mary began her
bloody reign."

Then follow the death of the three lions in the Tower, and a vast
enumeration of fiery darts, bullets, storms of hail, and floods,
making up that which the writer hopes will prove "a word in season to
a sinking kingdom."*


* London: Printed for J. B., Anno Domini 1680; and P. Brooksly,
Golden Ball, near the Hospital Gate, 1681.


Nor were ghosts wanting at this time, of a political nature, too;
for, in the same year, there was hawked in London an account of an
apparition which appeared three several times to Elizabeth Freeman,
thirty-one years of age, on each occasion delivering a message to his
sacred majesty King Charles the Second.  As certified before Sir
Joseph Jorden, knight, and Richard Lee, D.D., rector of Hatfield, her
story was as follows, and was, no doubt, a political trick:

On the night of the 24th of January, 1680, she was sitting at her
mother's fire-side, with a child on her knee, when a solemn voice
behind her said, "Sweetheart!" and, on turning, she was startled to
perceive a veiled woman all in white, whose face was concealed, and
whose hand--a pale and ghastly one--rested on the back of her chair.

"The 15th day of May is appointed for the royal blood to be
poisoned," said the figure.  "Be not afraid, for I am only sent to
tell thee," it added, and straightway vanished.

On Tuesday, the 25th of January, the same figure met her at the house
door, and asked Elizabeth if she "remembered the message," but the
woman, instead of replying, exclaimed: "In the name of the Father,
Son, and Holy Ghost, what art thou?"  Upon this the figure assumed "a
very glorious shape," and saying, "Tell King Charles, from me, not to
remove his parliament, but stand to his council," vanished as before.
Next evening the veiled figure appeared again, when Elizabeth was
with her mother, who, on beholding her daughter's manifest terror,
said: "Dost thou see anything?"  She was then warned to retire, after
which the spectre said, sternly: "Do your message."  "I shall, if God
enable me," replied Elizabeth.  After this the spectre appeared but
once again, and remained silent.  "This was taken from the maid's own
mouth by me, Richard Wilkinson, schoolmaster in the said town of
Hatfield."*


* London: Printed for J. B., Anno Domini 1680; and P. Brooksly,
Golden Ball, near the Hospital Gate, 1681.


In 1683, as a variety, London was treated to an account of a dreadful
earthquake in Oxfordshire, where the houses were rocked like ships or
cradles, while tables, stools, and chests "rowled to and fro with the
violence of the Shog."*


* Printed for R. Baldwin, at the Old Bailey.


The year 1687 brought "strange and wonderful news from Cornwall,
being an account of a miraculous accident which happened near the
town of Bodmyn, at a place called Park.  Printed by J. Wallis, White
Fryars Gate--next Fleet St.--near the Joyners Shop."

From this it would appear that on Sunday, the 8th of May, Jacob
Mutton, whose relations were of good repute, and who was servant to
William Hicks, rector of Cordingham (at a house he had near the old
parish church of Eglashayle, called Park), heard, on going into his
chamber about eight o'clock in the evening, a hollow voice cry, "So
hoe! so hoe! so hoe!"  This drew him to the window of the next room,
from whence, to the terror of a lad who shared his bed, he
disappeared, and could nowhere be found.

According to his own narrative, he had no sooner laid a hand upon an
iron bar of the window, which was seventeen feet from the ground,
than the whole grating fell into the yard below, all save the bar
which he had grasped.  This bar was discovered in his hand next
morning, as he lay asleep in a narrow lane beyond the little town of
Stratton, among the hills, thirty miles distant from Park.  There he
was wakened by the earliest goers to Stratton fair, who sent him
home, sorely bewildered, by the way of Camelford.  "On Tuesday he
returned to his master's estate, without any hurt, but very
melancholy, saying 'that a tall man bore him company all the journey,
over hedges and brakes, yet without weariness.'"  What became of this
mysterious man he knew not, neither had he any memory of how the iron
bar came to be in his hand.  "To conclude, the young man who is the
occasion of this wonderful relation, was never before this accident
accounted any ways inclinable to sadness, but, on the contrary, was
esteemed an airy, brisk, and honest young fellow."

But Mutton's adventure was a joke when compared with that of Mr.
Jacob Seeley, of Exeter, as he related it to the judges on the
western circuit, when, on the 22nd of September, 1690, he was beset
by a veritable crowd of dreadful spectres.  He took horse for
Taunton, in Somersetshire, by the Hinton Cliff road, on which he had
to pass a solitary place, known as the Black Down.  Prior to this, he
halted at a town called Cleston, where the coach and waggons usually
tarried, and there he had some roast beef, with a tankard of beer and
a noggin of brandy, in company with a stranger, who looked like a
farmer, and who rode by his side for three miles, till they reached
the Black Down, when he suddenly vanished into the earth or air, to
the great perplexity of Mr. Jacob Seeley.  This emotion was rather
increased when he found himself surrounded by from one to two hundred
spectres, attired as judges, magistrates, and peasantry, the latter
armed with pikes; but, gathering courage, he hewed at them with his
sword, though they threw over his head something like a fishing-net,
in which they retained him from nine at night till four next morning.
He thrust at the shadows with his rapier, but he felt nothing, till
he saw one "was cut and had four of his fingers hanging by the skin,"
and then he found blood upon his sword.  After this, ten spectre
funerals passed; then two dead bodies were dragged near him by the
hair of the head; and other horrors succeeded, till the spell broke
at cock-crow.

It was now remembered that the house wherein Mr. Seeley had his beef,
beer, and brandy had been kept by one of Monmouth's men (the spectre
farmer, probably), who had been hung on his own sign-post, and the
piece of ground where the net confined the traveller, was a place
where maay of the hapless duke's adherents had been executed and
interred.  Hence it was named the Black Down, according to the sheet
before us, which was "Printed for T. M., London, 2nd Oct., 1690."

A sheet circulated at the close of the preceding year warns "all
hypocrites and atheists to beware in time," as there had been a
dreadful tempest of thunder and lightning in Hants, at Alton, where
the atmosphere became so obscure that the electric flashes alone
lighted the church during the service, in which two balls of fire
passed through its eastern wall, another tore the steeple to pieces,
broke the clock to shreds, and bore away the weathercock.  The
narrator adds, that all Friesland was under water, and that a flood
in the Tiber had swept away a portion of the Castle of St. Angelo.

As another warning, London was visited, in 1689, by a tempest, which
uprooted sixty-five trees in St. James's Park and Moorfields, blew
down the vane of St. Michael's Church in Cornhill, and innumerable
chimneys, and injured many well-built houses, and part of the
Armourers' Hall in Coleman Street.  Several persons were killed in
Gravel Lane and Shoreditch; sixty empty boats were dashed to pieces
against the bridge; three Gravesend barges full of people were cast
away, and the Crown man-of-war was stranded at Woolwich.*


* Printed for W. F., Bishopgate Without.


But the warning seems to have been in vain, for London, in 1692, was
treated to an earthquake, which--as another sheet records--spread
terror and astonishment about the Royal Exchange, all along Cornhill,
in Lothbury, and elsewhere, on the 8th of September.  All things on
shelves were cast down, and furniture was tossed from wall to wall;
the Spitalfields weavers had to seek shelter in flight, and all their
looms were destroyed; these and other calamities were, it was
alleged, "occasioned by the sins of the nation," and to avert such
prodigies, the prayers of all good men were invoked.*


* J. Gerard, Cornhill, 1692.


Two years later saw another marvel, when "the dumb maid of Wapping,"
Sarah Bowers, recovered her power of speech through the prayers of
Messrs. Russell and Veil, "two pious divines," who exorcised and
expelled the evil spirit which possessed her; and in 1696 the
metropolis was treated to the "detection of a popish cheat"
concerning two boys who conversed with the devil, though none seemed
to doubt the Protestant miracle.

The close of the century 1700 saw "the dark and hellish powers of
witchcraft exercised upon the Reverend Mr. Wood, minister of Bodmyn,"
on whom a spell was cast by a mysterious paper, or written document,
which was given to him by a man and woman on horseback (the latter
probably seated on a pillion), after which he became strangely
disordered, and wandered about in fields, meadows, woods, and lonely
places, drenched the while with copious perspirations; however, "the
spell was ultimately found in his doublet, and on the burning
thereof, Mr. Wood was perfectly restored," and wrote to his uncle an
account of the affair, which appeared in a broadsheet published at
Exeter, by Darker and Farley, 1700.

Rosemary Lane was the scene of another wonder, when a notorious witch
was found in a garret there, and carried before Justice Bateman, in
Well Close, on the 23rd July, 1704, and committed to Clerkenwell
Prison.  Her neighbour's children, through her alleged diabolical
power, vomited pins, and were terrified by apparitions of enormous
cats; by uttering one word she turned the entire contents of a large
shop topsy-turvy.  She was judicially tossed into the river from a
ducking-stool, "but, like a bladder when put under water, she popped
up again, for this witch swam like a cork."  This was an indisputable
sign of guilt; and in her rage or terror she smote a young man on the
arm, where the mark of her hand remained "as black as coal;" he died
soon after in agony, and was buried in St. Sepulchre's churchyard.*
Of the woman's ultimate fate we know nothing.


* H. Hills, in the Blackfriars, near the waterside.


In 1705, London was excited by a new affair: "The female ghost and
wonderful discovery of an iron chest of money;" a rare example of the
gullibility of people in the days of the good Queen Anne.

A certain Madam Maybel, who had several houses in Rosemary Lane, lost
them by unlucky suits and unjust decrees of the law: for a time they
were tenantless and fell to decay and ruin.  For several weeks, nay
months past (continues the broadsheet), a strange apparition appeared
nightly to a Mrs. Harvey and her sister, near relations of the late
Madam Maybel, announcing that an iron chest filled with treasure lay
in a certain part of one of the old houses in the lane.  On their
neglecting to heed the vision, the ghost became more importunate, and
proceeded to threaten Mrs. Harvey, "that if she did not cause it to
be digged up in a certain time (naming it) she should be torn to
pieces."  On this the terrified gentlewoman sought the counsel of a
minister, who advised her to "demand in the name of the Holy Trinity
how the said treasure should be disposed of."

Next night she questioned the spectre, and it replied:

"Fear nothing; but take the whole four thousand pounds into your own
possession, and when you have paid twenty pounds of it to one Sarah
Goodwin, of Tower Hill, the rest is your own; and be sure you dig it
up on the night of Thursday, the 7th December!"

Accordingly men were set to work, and certainly a great iron chest
"was found under an old wall in the very place which the spirit had
described."

One of the diggers, John Fishpool, a private of the Guards, "has been
under examination about it, and 'tis thought that the gentleman who
owns the ground will claim the treasure as his right, and 'tis
thought there will be a suit of law commenced on it."  Many persons
crowded to see the hole from whence the chest had been exhumed in
Rosemary Lane, and, by a date upon the lid, it would seem to have
been made or concealed in the ninth year of the reign of Henry the
Eighth.*


* London: printed for John Green, near the Exchange, 1705.


The dreadful effects of going to conjurers next occupied the mind of
the public.

Mr. Rowland Rushway, a gentleman of good reputation, having lost
money and plate to a considerable amount, Hester, his wife, took God
to witness, "that if all the cunning men in London could tell, she
should discover the thief, though it cost her ten pounds!"

With this view she repaired to the house of a judicial astrologer in
Moorfields, about noon, when the day was one of great serenity and
beauty.  After some preliminary mummery or trickery, the wizard
placed before her a large mirror, wherein she saw gradually appear
certain indistinct things, which ultimately assumed "the full
proportion of one man and two women."

"These are the persons who stole your property," said the astrologer;
"do you know them?"

"No," she replied.

"Then," quoth he, "you will never have your goods again."

She paid him and retired, but had not gone three roods from the house
when the air became darkened, the serene sky was suddenly overcast,
and there swept through the streets a dreadful tempest of wind and
rain, done, as she alleged, "by this cunning man, Satan's agent, with
diabolical black art," forcing her to take shelter in an ale-house to
escape its fury.  Many chairmen and market folks were all cognizant
of this storm, which was confined to the vicinity of the ale-house,
and a portion of the adjacent river, where many boats were cast away;
and the skirt of it would seem to have visited Gray's Inn Walk, where
three stately trees were uprooted.




CHAPTER II.

THE WILD BEAST OF GEVAUDAN.

In the year 1765, the French, Dutch, and Brussels papers teemed with
marvellous accounts of a monstrous creature, called "The Wild Beast
of Gévaudan," whose ravages for a time spread terror and even despair
among the peasantry of Provence and Languedoc, especially in those
districts of the ancient Narbonne Gaul which were mountainous, woody,
and cold, and where communication was rendered difficult by the want
of good roads and navigable rivers.

In the April of that year a drawing of this animal was sent to the
Intendant of Alençon, entitled "_Figure de la beste_ (sic) _feroce
l'ou nomme l'hyene qui a devoré plus que_ 80 _personnes dans le
Gévaudan_."  An engraving of this is now before us, and certainly its
circulation must have added to the confusion of the nature of the
original.  This print represents the beast with a huge head, large
eyes, a long tongue, a double row of sharp fangs, small and erect
ears like those of a cat, the paws and body of a lion, with the tail
of a cow, which trails on the ground with a bushy tuft at the end.*


* The History of France records that there appeared a wild beast in
the Forest of Fontainebleau in 1653, which devoured _one hundred and
forty_ persons, before it was killed by twelve mousquetaires of the
Royal Guards!


In December, 1764, it first made its appearance at St. Flour, in
Provence, and on the 20th it devoured a little girl who was herding
cattle near Mende.  A detachment of light dragoons, sent in search of
it, hunted in vain for six weeks the wild and mountainous parts of
Languedoc.  Though a thousand crowns were offered by the province of
Mende to any person who would slay it, and public prayers were put up
in all the churches for deliverance from this singular scourge, which
soon became so great a terror to those districts, as ever the dragon
was of which we read in the "_Seven Champions of Christendom_."

No two accounts tallied as to the appearance of this animal, and some
of these, doubtless the offspring of the terror and superstition of
the peasantry, added greatly to the dread it inspired.  French
hyperbole was not wanting, and the gazettes were filled with the most
singular exaggerations and gasconades.

The groves of olive and mulberry trees, and the vineyards, were
neglected, the wood-cutters abandoned the forests, and hence fuel
became provokingly dear, even in Paris.

In the month of January we are told that it devoured a great many
persons, chiefly children and young girls.  It was said by those who
escaped to be larger than a wolf, but that previous to springing on
its victim, by crouching on the ground, it seemed no longer than a
fox.  "At the distance of one or two fathoms it rises on its hind
legs, and leaps upon its prey, which it seizes by the neck or throat,
but is afraid of horned cattle, from which it runs away."

It was alleged by some to be the cub of a tiger and lioness; by
others, of a panther and hyena, which had escaped from a private
menagerie belonging to Victor Amadeus, duke of Savoy.  A peasant of
Marvejols, who wounded it by a musket shot, found a handful of its
hair, "which stank very much;" he averred it to "be the bigness of a
year-old calf, the head a foot in length, the chest large as that of
a horse, his howling in the night resembled the braying of an ass."
According to collated statements, the beast was seen within the same
hour at different places, in one instance twenty-four miles apart;
hence many persons naturally maintained that there were _two_.

On the 27th December, 1764, a young woman, in her nineteenth year,
was torn to pieces by it at Bounesal, near Mende.  Next day it
appeared in the wood of St. Martin de Born, and was about to spring
upon a girl of twelve years, when her father rushed to her
protection.  The woodman, a bold and hardy fellow, rendered desperate
by the danger of his child, kept it at bay for a quarter of an hour,
"the beast all the while endeavouring to fly at the girl, and they
would both inevitably have become its prey if some horned cattle
which the father kept in the wood had not fortunately come up, on
which the beast was terrified and ran away."

This account was attested on oath by the woodman, before the mayor
and other civil authorities of Mende, an episcopal city in Languedoc.

On the 9th of January an entire troop of the 10th Light Horse (the
Volontaires Etrangers de Clermont-Prince), then stationed at St.
Chely, was despatched under Captain Duhamel in quest of the animal,
which had just torn and disembowelled a man midway between their
quarters and La Garge.  On this occasion the Bishop of Mende said a
solemn mass, and the consecrated Host was elevated in the cathedral,
which was thronged by the devout for the entire day; but the beast
still defied all efforts for his capture or destruction, and soon
after, "in the wood of St. Colme, four leagues from Rhodez, it
devoured a shepherdess of eighteen years of age, celebrated for her
beauty."

The English papers began to treat the affair of "the wild beast" as a
jest or allegory invented by the Jesuits to render the Protestants
odious and absurd, as it was said to have escaped from the Duke of
Savoy's collection; and "this circumstance is designed," says one
journal, "to point out the Protestants who are supposed to derive
their principles from the ancient Waldensee, who inhabited the
valleys of Piedmont, and were the earliest promoters of the
Reformation."

A writer in a Scottish newspaper of the period goes still farther,
and announces his firm belief that this tormentor of the Gévaudanois
was nothing more or less than the wild beast prophesied in the
Apocalypse of St. John, whereon the scarlet lady was mounted.
Another asserts that it was typical of the whole Romish clergy, and
that its voracious appetite answered to another part of Scripture,
"conceived in the words _eating up my people as they eat
bread_,"--his favourite food being generally little boys and girls of
Protestant parentage.*


* _Edinburgh Advertiser_, 1764.


After a long and fruitless chase, Captain Duhamel, before returning
to quarters at St. Chely, resolved to make a vigorous attempt to
destroy this mysterious scourge of Languedoc; but his extreme ardour
caused his plans to miscarry.

Posting his volontaires, some on horseback, and some on foot, at all
the avenues of a wood to which it had been traced, it was soon roused
from its lair by the explosion of pistols and sound of trumpets.
There was a cry raised of "_Voilà!  Gardez la-Bête!_" and Duhamel, an
officer of great courage, who had dismounted, rushed forward to
assail it sword in hand, but had the mortification to see it, with a
terrible roar, spring past the very place he had just quitted.

Two of his dragoons fired their pistols, but both missed.  They then
pursued it on the spur for nearly a league, and though seldom more
than four or five paces from it, they were unable to cut it down, and
ultimately it escaped, by leaping a high stone wall which their
horses were unable to surmount; and after crossing a marsh which lay
on the other side, it leisurely retired to a wild forest beyond.

The baffled dragoons reported that it "was as big as the largest park
dog, very shaggy, of a brown colour, a yellow belly, a very large
head, and had two very long tusks, ears short and erect, and a
branched tail, which it sets up very much when running."  Fear had no
share in this strange description, for the officers of Clermont's
regiment asserted that the two dragoons were as brave men as any in
the corps; but some declared that it was a bear, and others a wild
boar!

On the 12th of January it attacked seven children (five boys and two
girls) who were at play near the Mountain of Marguerite.  It tore the
entire cheek off one boy, and gobbled it up before him; but the other
four, led by a boy named Portefaix, having stakes shod with iron,
drove the beast into a marsh, where it sunk up to the belly, and then
disappeared.  That night a boy's body was found half devoured in the
neighbourhood of St. Marcel; on the 21st it severely lacerated a
girl, and (according to the _Paris Gazette_) "next day attacked a
woman, and _bit off her head_!"

The four brave boys who put it to flight received a handsome gratuity
from the Bishop of Mende, and by the king's order were educated for
the army; the _Gazette_ adds that the king gave the young Portefaix a
gift of four hundred livres, and three hundred to each of his
companions.

As females and little ones seemed the favourite food of the beast,
Captain Duhamel now ordered several of his dragoons to dress
themselves as women, and with their pistols and fusils concealed, to
accompany the children who watched the cattle; and the King of France
now offered from his privy purse two thousand crowns, in addition to
the one thousand offered by the province of Mende, for the head of
this terrible animal.

Inspired by a hope of winning the proffered reward, a stout and hardy
peasant of Languedoc, armed with a good musket, set out in search of
it; but on beholding the beast suddenly near him, surrounded by all
the real and imaginary terrors it inspired, he forgot alike his
musket and his resolution; he shrieked with terror and fled, and soon
after "the creature devoured a woman of the village of Jullange, at
the foot of the Mountain of Marguerite."

As the terror was increasing in Gévaudan and the Vivarez, the offered
rewards were again increased to no less than ten thousand livres; by
the diocese of Mende, two thousand; by the province of Languedoc, two
thousand; by the king, six thousand; and the following placard was
posted up in all the towns and cities of the adjacent provinces:--

"By order of the King, and the Intendant of the Province of Languedoc:

"Notice is given to all persons, that his Majesty, being deeply
affected by the situation of his subjects, now exposed to the ravages
of the wild beast which for four months past has infested Vivarez and
Gévaudan, and being desirous to stop the progress of such a calamity,
has determined to promise a reward of six thousand livres to any
person or persons who shall kill the animal.  Such as are willing to
undertake the pursuit of him, may previously apply to the Sieur de la
Font, sub-deputy to the Intendant of Mende, who will give them the
necessary instructions, agreeable to what has been prescribed by the
ministry on the part of his Majesty."

Still the ubiquitous beast remained untaken; and a letter from Paris
of the 13th February relates the terror it occasioned to a party
consisting of M. le Tivre, a councillor, and two young ladies, who
were on their way to visit M. de Sante, the curé of Vaisour.

They were travelling in a berlingo, drawn by four post-horses, with
two postilions, and accompanied by a footman, who rode a
saddle-horse, and was armed with a sabre.  The first night, on
approaching the dreaded district, they halted at Guimpe, and next
morning at nine o'clock set forth, intending to lunch at Roteaux, a
village situated in a bleak and mountainous place.  The bailiff of
Guimpe deemed it his duty to warn them, as strangers, "that the wild
beast had been often seen lurking about the Chaussée that week, and
that it would be proper to take an escort of armed men for their
protection."

M. le Tivre and the councillor, being foolhardy, declined, and took
the young ladies under their own protection; but they had scarcely
proceeded two leagues when they perceived a post-chaise, attended by
an outrider, coming down the rugged road that traversed the hill of
Credi, at a frightful pace, and pursued by the wild beast!

The leading horse fell, on which the terrible pursuer made a spring
towards it; but M. le Tivre's footman interposed with his drawn
sabre, on which the beast pricked up its ears, stood erect, and
showed its fangs and mouth full of froth, whisked round, and gave the
terrified valet a blow with its tail, covering all his face with
blood.  The rest of the narrative is ridiculously incredible, for it
states, that, on perceiving a gentleman levelling a blunderbuss
(which flashed in the pan), the beast darted right through the chaise
of M. le Tivre, smashing the side glasses and escaped to the wood.
"The stench left in the shattered chaise was past description, and no
burning of frankincense, or other method, removed it, so that it was
sold for two louis, and though burned to ashes, the cinders were
obliged, by order of the commissary, to be buried without the town
walls!" (_Advertiser_, 1765).

Eluding the many armed hunters who were now in pursuit of it, in the
early part of February the wild beast was seen hovering in
well-frequented places, on the skirts of the forests adjoining the
fields and vineyards, in the hamlets, and on the highways.  In
Janols, the capital of Gévaudanois, it sprang upon a child, whose
cries brought his father to his aid, but ere a rescue could be
effected, the poor little creature was rent asunder.

Three days afterwards, on the Feast of the Purification, five
peasants, going to mass at Reintort de Randon, suddenly perceived it
on the highway before them.  It was crouching, and about to spring,
when their shouts, and the pointed staves with which they were armed,
put it to flight.  On Sunday, the 3rd February, it was heard howling
in the little village of St. Aman's during the celebration of high
mass.  All the inhabitants were in church, "but as they had taken the
precaution to shut up the children in their houses, it retired
without doing any mischief."  On the 8th it was perceived within a
hundred yards of the town of Aumont.  A general chase through the
snow was made by the armed huntsmen; but night came on before they
came within range of the dreaded fugitive.

In February and March we find it still continuing its ravages through
all the pleasant valleys of the Aisne.  At Soissons it worried a
woman to death and partly devoured her.  Two girls were brought to
the Hospital of St. Flour in a dying state from wounds it had
inflicted:

"Catherine Boyer, aged twenty years, who was attacked on the 15th of
January at Bastide-de-Montfort; all that part of the head on which
the hair grew is torn away, with a part of the os coronæ, and the
whole pericranium with the upper part of the ear is lost.  The
occipital bone is likewise laid bare.  The other girl belongs to St.
Just; the left side of her head and neck is carried away, with part
of her nose and upper lip."

On the 1st of March, a man boldly charged it on horseback, but was
thrown, and leaving his nag to its mercy, scrambled away and found
refuge in a mill, where it besieged him for some time, till a lad of
seventeen appeared, whom it lacerated with teeth and claws and left
expiring outside the door.  On the road near Bazoches, it tore to
pieces a woman who attempted to save a girl on which it was about to
spring; and four men of that place, armed with loaded guns, watched
all night, near the mangled body, in the hope that it might return;
but the animal was several miles distant, and after biting several
sheep and cows in a farm-yard, was at last severely wounded by
Antoine Savanelle, an old soldier, who assailed it with a pitchfork,
which he thrust into its throat, and he was vain enough to declare
that the wound was mortal and that he must have killed it.

This boast, however, was premature, for it soon reappeared, biting,
tearing, and devouring, and though a man of Malzieu wounded it by a
musket shot, making it roll over with a hideous cry, it was able on
the 9th to drag a child for two hundred yards from a cottage door.
It dropped its prey unhurt; but on the same evening, we are told that
it partly devoured a young woman near the village of Miolonettes, and
committed other ravages, the mere enumeration of which would weary
rather than astonish, though it was stated that not less "than twenty
thousand men" (a sad exaggeration surely), noblesse, hunters,
woodmen, and soldiers, were in pursuit of it, under the Count de
Morangies, an old maréchal de camp, who passed a whole night near the
body of the half-devoured girl, in the vain hope that the monster
would return within range of his musket.

Great astonishment and ridicule were excited in England by these
continued details, and under date of 13th March, a pretended letter
from Paris, headed "Wonderful Intelligence!" went the round of the
press.

"The wild beast that makes such a noise all over Europe, and after
whom there are at least thirty thousand regular forces and seventy
thousand militia and armed peasants, proves to be a descendant on the
mother's side from the famous Dragon of Wantley, and on the father's
side from a Scotch Highland Laird.  He eats a house as an alderman
eats a custard, and with the wag of his tail he throws down a church.
He was attacked on the night of the 8th instant, in his den, by a
detachment of fourteen thousand men, under the command of Duc de
Valliant; but the platoon firing, and even the artillery, had only
the effect of making him sneeze; at last he gave a slash with his
tail by which we lost seven thousand men; then making a jump over the
left wing, made his escape."

Elsewhere we find:--"Yesterday, about ten in the morning, a courier
arrived (in London) from France, with the melancholy news that the
wild beast had, on the 25th instant, been attacked by the _whole_
French army, consisting of one hundred and twenty thousand men, whom
he totally defeated in the twinkling of an eye, swallowing the whole
train of artillery and devouring twenty-five thousand men."

But still in Languedoc, lovers who had lost their brides, brothers
their sisters, and parents their children, armed with guns and
spears, beat the mountain sides and wild thickets for this animal,
the existence of which was considered nearly or quite fabulous in
London.

It would seem to have been deemed so in Holland, too, for the
_Utrecht Gazette_, after detailing how bravely a poor woman of La
Bessiere, name Jane Chaston, defended her little children against the
beast, which appeared in her garden and tore one with its teeth,
states that whatever scoffers might say, its existence was no longer
doubtful, adding, "that unless we believe in the accounts of it which
come from France, we must reject the greatest part of the events to
which we give credit, as being of much less authority."

Louis XV gave a handsome gratuity to Jane Chaston for her courage and
tenderness in defending her children, but we are not informed how or
with what she was armed.

The Duc de Praslin received a report from the Comte de Montargis, who
commanded the troops in the neighbourhood of La Bessiere, to the
effect that, three days after the adventure of Jane Chaston, a party
of eighty dragoons, _en route_ to join their regiment, fell in with
the beast, and rode at full speed towards it.  When first discovered
it was one hundred and fifty yards distant, and fled into a hollow
place, which was environed by marshes and water, and then they
endeavoured to hunt it forth by dogs.  They opened a fire upon it
with their carbines; but as the rain was falling in torrents, all
these flashed in the pan, save _one_, which went off without effect.
"The rain," continues the report, which is not very flattering to M.
le Comte's cavalry, "not only hindered aid from coming to the
troopers (the explosion of the carbine and their incessant cries of
'the beast! the beast!' having alarmed the whole neighbourhood), but
by filling up the hollows with water, made them unable any longer."

Three-quarters of an hour after this the beast appeared in a field
where tiles were made, at the base of Mount Mimat, where there is a
hermitage dedicated to St. Privat, partly hewn out of the rock.  This
was then inhabited by an aged recluse and an officer of artillery, a
reformed _roué_, who had dwelt with him for eighteen months, by way
of penance.  From the window they could plainly see the beast
gambolling playfully on the grass, and climbing up the trees like a
squirrel; but being without arms, they shut and made fast the door of
the grotto, near which it remained watching for half an hour.  This
time the officer employed in making a sketch of it, which next day he
sent to the Bishop of Mende; and here, perhaps, we have the startling
engraving which was produced by the Intendant of Alençon.

The Comte de Montargis forwarded this sketch to the Duc de Praslin,
to whose office the people flocked in multitudes to behold it; but
public opinion was divided as to whether the animal was a lynx or a
bear; "but I am certain," adds the writer of the news, "that if it
was brought to the fair of St. Germain, it would draw more spectators
than the famous Indian bird."

This celebrated fair was then held in a large meadow contiguous to
the ancient Abbey of St. Germain-des-Prés, and was the grand
rendezvous of all the dissipated society of Paris, to whom its
gaming-tables, booths, theatres, cafes, cabarets, formed a
never-ending source of attraction.

In April the beast devoured a young woman of twenty, who was watching
some cattle.  After that event the country became quite deserted;
though its preference for the fair sex seemed very decided, no men
would work in the fields, herd the flocks, or go abroad, save in
armed bands.

The _Brussels Gazette_ of May records a new phase in the history of
the beast.  Of eighteen persons whom it had bitten, thirteen are
stated to have died raving mad.  One patient began to howl like a
dog, on which he was bled copiously, and chained hand and foot.
Endued with terrible strength, he burst his bonds, and raved about in
wild frenzy, destroying everything that came in his way, until he was
shot down by an officer with a double-barrelled gun, when attempting,
with a crowbar, to break into a country-house near Broine, where
thirty persons had taken refuge from him.

About six in the evening of the 1st of May, the Sieur Martel de la
Chaumette, whose château was at St. Alban's, in the bishopric of
Mende, perceived, from a window, an animal which he was certain could
be no other than the wild beast of Gévaudan.  It was in a grass
meadow, seated on its hind legs, and was gazing steadfastly at a lad,
about fifteen years of age, who was herding some horned cattle, and
was all unaware of its vicinity and ulterior views.  The Sieur de la
Chaumette summoned his two brothers, and armed with guns they issued
forth in pursuit of the animal, which fled at their approach.

The youngest overtook it in the forest, and put a ball into it at
sixty-seven paces; it rolled over three times, which enabled the
elder Chaumette to put in another ball at fifty-two paces, on which
it fled, and escaped, losing blood in great quantities.  Night came
on, and the pursuit was abandoned; but next day the Chaumettes were
joined by the Sieurs d'Ennival, father and son, and a band of
hunters.  Its trail and traces of blood were found, and followed for
a great distance, but they tracked it in vain.

The Sieur de la Chaumette, who had slain a great many wolves,
declared that the animal he had seen in the meadow was _not_ one; but
his description of its appearance coincided exactly with that given
by the Sieur Duhamel of the 10th Light Horse, and with the sketch
made by the military hermit of St. Privat.  The Chaumettes were in
great hopes that the two bullets had slain the monster; but on the
day following, at five in the evening, at a spot five leagues distant
from the château, it devoured a girl fourteen years of age, and the
terror of the people increased, as the beast seemed to have a charmed
life, and to be almost bullet-proof.

The picked marksmen of fifty parishes now joined in the chase.  Two
remarkably fine dogs of the Sieur d'Ennival were so eager in the
pursuit, that they left the hunt far behind, and, as they were never
seen again, were supposed to have been killed and eaten.  The society
of the knights of St. Hubert, in the city of Puy, composed of forty
men, joined in the crusade against this denizen of the wilds of
Languedoc; but it was not until the end of September, 1765, that it
was ultimately vanquished and slain by a game-keeper and the Sieur
Antoine de Bauterne, a gentleman of Paris, who set out for Gévaudan
on purpose to encounter it.

After a long, arduous, and exciting chase, through forest and over
fell, on bringing it to bay at fifty yards, he shot it in the eye.
Mad with pain and fury, it was crouching prior to springing upon him,
when his companion, M. Rheinchard, gamekeeper to Louis, Duke of
Orleans (son of Philip, so long regent of France), by a single
bullet, in a vital spot, shot it dead.

It was then measured, and found to be five feet seven inches long,
thirty-two inches high, and only one hundred and thirty pounds in
weight.  On the 4th of October, the Sieur de Bauterne, who was
extolled as if he had been the victor of another Steenkirk or
Fontenoy, arrived triumphantly in Paris, and had the honour to
present it to the king; and then great was the astonishment and the
disappointment of all who saw this animal--the terrible wild beast of
Gévaudan, whose sanguinary career had for so many months excited such
dismay there and wonder elsewhere--and found that it was only a wolf
after all, and not a very large one!  Horace Walpole, fourth Earl of
Orford--the brilliant and witty Walpole of Strawberry Hill--saw the
carcass as it lay in the queen's antechamber at Versailles, and
asserts that it was simply a common wolf.  Its nature accounted for
some of the peculiarities it exhibited during its ravages, as the
wolf, according to Weissenborn, destroys every other creature it can
master, and, on a moderate calculation, consumes during the year
about _thirty times_ its own weight of animal substance; and to
increase the list of its crimes, it has, he adds, in many instances,
communicated hydrophobia to man.




CHAPTER III.

"THERE WERE GIANTS IN THOSE DAYS."

Among many other strange things, our unlettered ancestors believed in
the past existence of those tall fellows, giants (individually, or
even collectively as nations), quite as implicitly as they, worthy
folks, did in the pranks and appearances of contemporary witches and
ghosts; but even among the learned a more than tacit belief in a
defunct class of beings, whose bulk and stature far exceeded those of
common humanity, found full sway until the beginning of the present
century.

A love of the marvellous is strong; and even Buffon, the eminent
naturalist, fell into the old and vague delusion that "there were
giants in those days," and he made the bones of an elephant to figure
as the remains of a man of vast stature.

With Scripture for a basis to their assertions, it was difficult, no
doubt, for the over-learned, and still more for the unlearned, of
past times to subdue their belief in the existence of such foes as
were encountered by our old friend Jack of gallant memory--veritable
giants, tall as steeples, to whom such men as Big Sam of the Black
Watch, O'Brien the Irish giant (whose skeleton is in the museum of
the College of Surgeons), even the King of Prussia's famous
grenadiers, and the girl fifteen years old and more than seven feet
high, "who was presented to their majesties at Dresden,"* were all as
pigmies and Liliputians by comparison.


* _Gentleman's Magazine_, 1753.


The Bible gives us four distinct races of giants, the chief of whom
were the Anakims, or sons of Anak, the people of the chosen land, to
which Moses was to lead the children of Israel, who were unto them
but as grasshoppers in size.  Og, the king of this tall race and of
Bashan, however, if judged by the measurement of the present day, was
not taller than eight feet six inches, as his brazen bedstead
measured just nine Jewish cubits; but the Rabbis maintain that the
bed described was only his _cradle_ when an infant.  The Anakims are
referred to in the fifth chapter of the Koran, which speaks of
Jericho as a city inhabited by giants.  The father of Og is also
asserted to have been of stature so great, that he escaped the Flood
by--_wading_!

When told (as we are) in 1 Samuel that Goliath was in height six
cubits and a span, that his coat of mail weighed five thousand
shekels of brass, that the staff of his spear was as a weaver's beam,
and that its head weighed six hundred shekels of iron, it was
difficult for the simple people of past days, when, in some remote
cavern or river's bed, or fallen chalk cliff, the monster bones of
the elephant, the mastodon, or the rhinoceros came unexpectedly to
light, not to believe that there might have been many Goliaths in the
world once.

Josephus records that in _his_ time there were to be seen in Gaza,
Gath, and Azoth the tombs of those mighty men of old, the sons of
Anak, who had been slain when Joshua marched into the land of Canaan,
and slew the people of Hebron and Dabir.

According to the Moslems, even Joshua was a man of prodigious
stature; and the highest mountain on the shores of the Bosphorus is
at this hour called by the Turks the Grave of Joshua,--_Juscha
Taghi_,--or the Giant's Mountain.*


* The grave is fifty feet long, and has been called the tomb of
Amycus and of Hercules.


Tradition ascribes the origin of the name of Antwerp to a giant whose
abode was in the woody swamps through which the Scheldt then wandered
to the German Sea, and who used to cut off the hands and feet of
those who displeased him; "and to prove this" (vide _Atlas
Geographus_, 1711) "they show there a tooth, which they pretend to be
his.  It is a hand's-breadth long, and weighs six ounces.  Moreover,
the city has hands cut off as part of its arms."

Giants figure largely among the earlier fables of Wales, Scotland,
and Ireland, the two latter contending still for the nationality of
the famous

                       "Finn MacCoul,
  Wha dung the deil, and gart him yowl,"

and who, by the famous causeway of his own construction, could cross
the Irish Channel to Britain whenever he chose.

Fiannam is probably the same personage.  He is said to have lived in
the time of Ewen II. of Scotland, a potentate who, according to
Buchanan, "reigned in the year before Christ 77, and was a good and
civil king;" and local story connects with his name the Giant's
Chair, a rock above the river Dullan, in the parish of Mortlach.

England, too, is not without traces of some interest in the sons of
Anak.  We have the Giant's Grave, a long and grassy ridge in the
beautiful Fairy Glen at Hawkstone, in Salop; another place so named
on the coast of Bristol, and a third at Penrith, where two stone
pillars in the churchyard, standing fifteen feet asunder at the
opposite ends of a grave, and covered with runes or unintelligible
carving, mark the size and tomb of Owen Cæsarius.  Near these pillars
is a third stone, called the Giant's Thumb.

Two miles below Brougham Castle, on the steep banks of the Eamont,
are two excavations in the rock, having traces of a door and window,
and of a strong column indented with iron; and these caves are
assigned by tradition to a giant, who bore the classic name of Isis.

The vast stature of the Patagonians was long the subject of implicit
belief, until it passed into a proverb.  Antonio Pagifeta, who
accompanied the adventurous Ferdinand Magellan on his famous voyage
in 1519, records that on the coast of Brazil they found wild and
gigantic cannibals so nimble of foot, that no man could overtake
them.  Bearing on thence to south latitude 49°, the land seemed all
desolate and uninhabited, for they could see no living creature.  At
last a giant came singing and dancing towards them, and threw dust on
his head.  He was so tall, that the head of a Spaniard reached only
to his waist.  His apparel was the skin of a monstrous beast.  All
the inhabitants were men of the same kind, wherefore "the admiral
called them Patagons."

This absurd story was corroborated a hundred years later by Jacob le
Maire, in a voyage to the same region, and by the Dutch navigator
Schouten, when they relate that at Port Desire they found graves
containing human skeletons from eleven to twelve feet long.  However,
the Spanish officers of Cordova's squadron, by accurate measurements,
reduced the utmost stature of the real Patagonian to seven feet one
and a half inches, and their common height to six feet.

Premising that, of course, the great bones about to be referred to
were those of the mammoth, the mastodon and other antediluvian
animals, perhaps the most amusing instance of the credulity and
gullibility even of the learned in such matters was a _mémoire_, read
seriously to the Royal Academy of Sciences at Rouen, in the middle of
the last century, by a savan named M. le Cat.

Therein he asserted and affected to give proof that Ferragas, who was
slain by Orlando, the nephew of Charlemagne, was eighteen feet in
height; that Isoret, whose tomb lay near the chapel of St. Pierre, in
the suburbs of Paris, had been twenty feet high; and that in the city
of Rouen, when digging near the convent of the Jacobins in 1509,
during the reign of Louis XII., there was found in a tomb of stone a
skeleton, the skull of which would hold a bushel (thirty-eight pounds
weight) of corn.  The shin-bones were entire, and measured four feet
long.  On this astounding tomb was a plate of copper, bearing the
epitaph, "In this grave lies the noble and puissant Lord Riccon de
Valmont and his bones."  He then proceeds to tell us that Valence in
Dauphiné possesses the bones of the giant Buccart, tyrant of the
Vivarais, whom his vassal, the Count de Cabillon, slew by a barbed
arrow, the iron head of which was found in his tomb when it--with all
his bones intact--was discovered in 1705, at the base of the mountain
of Crussol, whereon the giant dwelt, and whence he used to come daily
to drink of the river Merderet.  The skeleton when measured was
twenty-two feet six inches long.*


* "In the Dominican Church there's the picture of a giant called
Buard, who they pretend, by his bones dug up in their monastery, was
fifteen cubits high and seven broad."--_Atlas Geographus_, 1711, 4to.


"Father Crozart assured me," continued the veracious M. le Cat, "that
the physicians who were in the train of the princes who passed
through Valence all acknowledged the bones to be human, and offered
twenty-two pistoles for them."  He farther appends a copy of the
epitaph of this personage, forwarded to him by the same Father Crozat
in 1746, and beginning, "Hæc est effigiis gigantis Baardi Vivariensis
tiranni in Montis Cressoli Stantis," &c.

This tall personage, a second whose bones were exposed by the waters
of the Rhone in 1456, and a third whose skeleton, nineteen feet long,
was found near Lucerne in 1577, were all jokes and swindle when
compared with others that were found in later years, particularly the
remains of Teutobochus, king of the Teutones, which were discovered
near the ruined castle of Chaumont in Dauphine, in the year 1613, by
some masons who were digging a well.  At the depth of eighteen feet,
in light sandy soil, they came upon a tomb built of brick; above it
was a stone inscribed, "Teutobochus Rex."  Five years afterwards
Mazurier, a surgeon, published his _Histoire Véritable du Géant
Teutobochus_, which excited keen controversy, and brought all
Paris--the Paris of Louis the Just and of Richelieu--rushing in
crowds to see the bones of the mastodon, or whatever it was, whose
tomb bore a royal inscription.

This king of the Teutones, who is said to have been vanquished and
slain in battle a few miles from Valence, and to have been buried
with all honour by Marius, his conqueror, was carefully measured, and
found to be twenty-five feet six inches long, ten feet across the
shoulders, and five from breast to back-bone.  His teeth were each
the size of an ox's foot.  All France heard of this with wonder, and
a belief which the anatomist Riolan sought in vain to ridicule and
expose.

Sicily was peculiarly the favourite abode of giants.

At Mazarino, a town near Girgenti, there were found in 1516 the bones
of a giant whose skull was like a sugar-hogshead, with teeth each
five ounces in weight; and in the Val di Mazzara, thirty years after,
the alleged remains of another were found, whose stature was the same!

Patrick Brydone, in his _Tour to Sicily and Malta_, in 1773, mentions
some of these marvellous discoveries.

"In the mountain above it (_il Mar Dolce_) they show you a cavern
where a gigantic skeleton is said to have been found; however, it
fell to dust when they attempted to remove it.  Fazzello says its
teeth were the only part that resisted the impression of the air;
that he procured two of them, and that they weighed near two ounces.
There are many such stories to be met with in the Sicilian legends,
as it seems to be a universal belief that this island (Sicily) was
once inhabited by giants; but, although we have made diligent
inquiry, we have never yet been able to procure a sight of any of
those gigantic bones which are said to be still preserved in many
parts of the island.  Had there been any foundation for this, I think
it is probable they must have found their way into some of the
museums.  But this is not the case; nor indeed have we met with any
person of sense and credibility that could say they have seen them.
We had been assured at Naples that an entire skeleton, upwards of ten
feet high, was preserved in the museum at Palermo; but there is no
such thing there, nor I believe anywhere else in the island."

This Palermitan giant is gravely referred to in the _mémoire_ of M.
le Cat, as well as "another thirty-three feet high, found in 1550."

According to Plutarch, Serbonius had the grave of Antæus (the Libyan
giant and antagonist of Hercules) opened in the city of Tungis, and,
finding his body to be "sixty cubits long, was infinitely
astonished," as well he might be, and gave orders for the tomb to be
closed, but added new honours to his memory.  The bones of a giant,
forty-six cubits in length, were laid bare by an earthquake in Crete,
as Pliny states with implicit faith; and it was disputed whether they
were those of Otus, son of Neptune, who built a city in his ninth
year, or of the equally fabulous Orion.  But all that we have noted
are overtopped by the giant found at Thessalonica in 1691, who was
ninety-six feet high (as certified by M. Quoinet, consul for France),
and by another found at Trepani, in Sicily--the ancient _Drepanum_.
The latter, Boccaccio states the learned of his time to have taken
for the skeleton of Polyphemus, the son of Neptune and Thoosa--the
one-eyed Cyclop of the _Odyssey_.

  "A form enormous! far unlike the race
  Of human birth, in stature and in face;"

and on being measured, the bones proved to be exactly _three hundred
feet_ long!




CHAPTER IV.

BURIED HEARTS.

It is natural enough that the human heart--deemed by poets and
philosophers to be the seat of our affections and passions, of our
understanding and will, courage and conscience, by some men looked
upon as the root of life itself--should have been considered by many
of the dying in past times as a votive gift peculiarly sacred.  And
this feeling has been the cause in many instances of the burial of
the heart apart from the place where the ashes of the body might
repose.

Among the earliest instances of the separate mode of heart-burial is
that of Henry the Second of England.  After this luckless monarch
expired in a passion of grief, before the altar of the church of
Chinon, in 1189, his heart was interred at Fontevrault, but his body,
from the nostrils of which tradition alleges blood to have dropped on
the approach of his rebellious son Richard, was laid in a separate
vault.  From Fontevrault his heart, according to a statement in a
public print, was brought a few years ago to Edinburgh, by Bishop
Gillis, of that city.  If so, where is it now?

When Richard Cœur de Lion fell beneath Gourdon's arrow at the
siege of Chaluz, the gallant heart, which, in its greatness and
mercy, inspired him to forgive, and even to reward the luckless
archer, was, after his death, preserved in a casket in the treasury
of that splendid cathedral which William the Conqueror built at
Rouen; for Richard, by a last will, directed that his body should be
interred in Fontevrault, "at the feet of his father, to testify his
sorrow for the many uneasinesses he had created him during his
lifetime."  His bowels he bequeathed to Poictou (Grafton has it
Carlisle), and his heart to Normandy, out of his great love for the
people thereof.  Above the relic at Rouen there was erected an
elaborate little shrine, which was demolished in 1738, but exactly a
hundred years later the heart was found in its old place, and
reinterred.  It was again exhumed, however, cased in glass, and
exhibited in the Musée des Antiquités of the city; but December,
1869, saw it once more replaced in the cathedral, with a leaden plate
on the cover, bearing the inscription:

  "Hie jacet cor Ricardi Regis Anglorum."

So there finally lies the heart of him who, in chivalry, was the
rival of Saladin and Philip Augustus, the hero of the historian, and
the novelist, and who was the idol of the English people for many a
generation.

When this great crusader's nephew, Richard, Earl of Cornwall, and
King of the Romans, died, after a stirring life--during which he
formed a conspiracy against the king his father, then, like all the
wild, pious, and bankrupt lords of those days, took a turn of service
in the Holy Land, and next drew his sword in the battle fought at
Lewes between Henry the Third and the confederate barons--his body
was interred at Hayles, in Gloucestershire, but his heart was
deposited at Rewley Abbey, near Oxford, while the heart of his son,
who died before him, and for whose tragical fate he died of grief,
was laid in Westminster Abbey in 1271.

Two successive holders of the see of Durham made votive offerings of
their hearts to two different churches.  The first of these was
Richard Poore, previously Dean of Salisbury, Bishop of Chichester,
and then of Durham, from 1228 to 1237.  He was buried in the
cathedral of his diocese, but his heart was sent to Tarrant, in
Dorsetshire.  A successor in the episcopate, Robert de Stitchell, who
had formerly been Prior of Finchale, dying on his way home from the
Council of Lyons, in 1274, was buried in Durham, but, at his own
request, his heart was left behind, as a gift to the Benedictine
convent near Arbepellis, in France.  At Henley, in Yorkshire, in the
old burial vault of the noble family of Bolton, there lies the leaden
coffin of a female member of the house, who had died in France, and
been brought from thence embalmed, and cased in lead.  On the top of
the coffin is deposited her heart in a kind of urn.  The heart of
Agnes Sorel was interred in the abbey of Jumieges.

In Scotland there have been several instances of the separate burial
of the human heart.  The earliest known is that connected with the
founding and erection of Newabbey, or the abbey of Dulce Cor, in the
stewartry of Kirkcudbright, by Derorgilla, daughter of Alan the
Celtic Lord of Galloway, and wife of John Baliol, of Barnard Castle,
father of the unpopular competitor for the Scottish crown.  Baliol,
to whom she was deeply attached, died an exile in France in 1269; but
Derorgilla had his heart embalmed, and as the Scotichronicon records,
"lokyt and bunden with sylver brycht;" and this relic so sad and grim
she always carried about with her.  In 1289, as death approached,
when she was in her eightieth year, she directed that "this silent
and daily companion in life for twenty years should be laid upon her
bosom when she was buried in the abbey she had founded;" the
beautiful old church, the secluded ruins of which now moulder by the
bank of the Nith.  For five centuries and more, in memory of her
untiring affection, the place has been named locally the Abbey of
Sweet-heart.

History and song have alike made us familiar with the last wish of
Robert Bruce, the heroic King of Scotland, when, after two years of
peace and contemplation, he died in the north, at Cardross.  He
desired that in part fulfilment of a vow he had made to march to
Jerusalem, a purpose which the incessant war with England baffled,
his heart should be laid in the church of the Holy Sepulchre, and on
his death-bed he besought his old friend and faithful brother
soldier, the good Sir James Douglas, to undertake that which was then
a most arduous journey, and be the bearer of the relic.  "And it is
my command," he added, to quote Froissart, "that you do use that
royal state and maintenance in your journey, both for yourself and
your companions, that into whatever lands or cities you may come, all
may know that ye have in charge, to bear beyond the seas, the heart
of King Robert of Scotland."

Then all who stood around his bed began to weep, and Douglas replied:

"Assuredly, my liege, I do promise, by the faith which I owe to God
and to the order of knighthood."

"Now praise be to God," said the king, "I shall die in peace."

It is a matter of history how Douglas departed on this errand with a
train of knights, and, choosing to land on the Spanish coast, heard
that Alphonso of Leon and Castile was at war with Osman, the Moorish
king of Granada.  In the true spirit of the age, he could not resist
the temptation of striking a blow for the Christian faith, and so
joined the Spaniards.  He led their van upon the plain of Theba, near
the Andalusian frontier.  In a silver casket at his neck he bore the
heart of Bruce, which rashly and repeatedly he cast before him amid
the Moors, crying:

"Now pass on as ye were wont, and Douglas, as of old, will follow
thee or die."

And there he fell, together with Sir William Sinclair, of Roslin, Sir
Robert and Walter Logan, of Restalrig, and others.  Bruce's heart,
instead of being taken to Jerusalem, was brought home by Sir Simon of
Lee, and deposited in Melrose Abbey.  Douglas was laid among his
kindred in Liddesdale, and from thenceforward "the bloody heart,"
surmounted by a crown, became the cognizance of all the Douglasses in
Scotland.  Bruce was interred at Dunfermline; and when his skeleton
was discovered in 1818, the breast-bone was found to have been sawn
across to permit the removal of the heart, in accordance with the
terms of his last will.

But of all the treasured hearts of the heroic or illustrious dead,
none perhaps ever underwent so many marvellous adventures as that of
James, Marquis of Montrose, who was executed by the Scottish Puritans
in 1650.

On his body being interred among those of common criminals, by the
side of a road leading southward from Edinburgh, his niece, the Lady
Napier, whose castle of Merchiston still stands near the place, had
the deal box in which the trunk of the corpse lay (the head and limbs
had been sent to different towns in Scotland) opened in the night,
and his heart, "which he had always promised at his death to leave
her, as a mark of the affection she had ever felt towards him," was
taken forth.  It was secretly embalmed and enclosed in a little case
of steel, made from the blade of that sword which Montrose had drawn
for King Charles at the battles of Auldearn, Tippermuir, and
Kilsythe.  This case she placed in a gold filigree box that had been
presented by the Doge of Venice to John Napier, of Merchiston, and
she enclosed the whole in a silver urn which had been given to her
husband by the great cavalier marquis before the Civil War.  She sent
this carefully guarded relic to the second marquis, afterwards first
Duke of Montrose, who was then in exile with her husband; but it
never reached either of them, being unfortunately lost by the bearer
on the journey.

Years after all these actors in the drama of life had passed away, a
gentleman of Gueldres, a friend of Francis, fifth Lord Napier (who
died in 1773), recognized, in the collection of a Flemish virtuoso,
by the coat-armorial and other engravings upon it, the identical gold
filigree box belonging to the Napiers of Merchiston.  The steel case
was within it; but the silver urn was gone.  The former "was the size
and shape of an egg.  It was opened by pressing down a little knob,
as is done in opening a watch-case.  Inside was a little parcel
containing all that remained of Montrose's heart, wrapped in a piece
of coarse cloth, and done over with a substance like glue."  Restored
by this friend to the Napiers, it was presented to Miss Hester
Napier, by her father, Lord Francis, when his speculations in the
Caledonian Canal and elsewhere led him to fear the sale of his
patrimonial castle of Merchiston, and that he would lose all, even to
this relic, on which he set so much store.  Miss Napier took it with
her on her marriage with Johnstone of Carnsalloch, and it accompanied
her when she sailed for India with her husband.  Off the Cape de Verd
Isles their ship was attacked by Admiral de Suffrien, who was also
bound for the East with five French sail of the line.  In the
engagement which ensued, Mrs. Johnstone, who refused to quit her
husband's side on the quarter-deck, was wounded by a splinter in the
arm, while carrying in her hand a reticule in which she had placed
all her most valuable trinkets, and, among these, the heart of
Montrose, as it was feared that the Indiaman would be taken by
boarding; Suffrien, however, was beaten off.

At Madura, in India, she had an urn made like the old one to contain
the heart, and on it was engraved, in Tamil and Telegu, a legend
telling what it held.  Her constant anxiety concerning its safety
naturally caused a story to be spread concerning it among the
Madrassees, who deemed it a powerful talisman.  Thus it was stolen,
and became the property of a chief; so the loyal heart that had beat
proudly in so many Scottish battles, hung as an amulet at the neck of
a Hindoo warrior.  The latter, however, on hearing what it really
was, generously restored it to its owner, and it was brought to
Europe by the Johnstones on their return in 1792.  In that year they
were in France, when an edict of the revolutionary government
required all persons to surrender their plate and ornaments for the
service of the sovereign people.  Mrs. Johnstone intrusted the heart
of Montrose to one of her English attendants named Knowles, that it
might be secretly and safely conveyed to England; but the custodian
died by the way; the relic was again lost, and heard of no more.

In the wall of an aisle of the old ruined church of Culross, there
was found, not long ago, enclosed in a silver case of oval form,
chased and engraved, the heart of Edward Bruce, second Lord Kinloss
(ancestor of the Earls of Elgin), in his day a fiery and gallant
young noble, who fought the famous duel with a kindred spirit, Sir
Edward Sackville, afterwards Earl of Dorset, a conflict which is
detailed at such length, and so quaintly, in No. 133 of the
_Guardian_.  Bruce was the challenger, and after a long and careful
pre-arrangement, attended by their seconds and surgeons, they
encountered each other, with the sword, minus their doublets, and in
their shirtsleeves, under the walls of Antwerp, in August, 1613.
Sackville had a finger hewn off, and received three thrusts in his
body, yet he contrived to pass his rapier twice, mortally, through
the breast of his Scottish antagonist, who fell on his back, dying
and choking with blood.

"I re-demanded of him," wrote Sir Edward, "if he would request his
life; but it seemed he prized it not at so dear a rate to be beholden
for it, bravely replying that 'he scorned it,' which answer of his
was so noble and worthy, as I protest I could not find in my heart to
offer him any more violence."

As Sackville was borne away fainting, he escaped, as he relates, "a
great danger.  Lord Bruce's surgeon, when nobody dreamt of it, came
full at me with his lordship's sword, and had not mine, with my
sword, interposed, I had been slain, although my Lord Bruce,
weltering in his blood, and past all expectation of life, conformable
to all his former carriage, which was undoubtedly noble, cried out,
'Rascal, hold thy hand!'"

Sackville was borne to a neighbouring monastery to be cured, and died
in 1652 of sorrow, it was alleged, for the death of Charles the
First.  Kinloss died on the ground where the duel was fought, and was
buried in Antwerp; but his heart was sent home to the family vault,
in the old abbey church, which lies so pleasantly half hidden among
ancient trees, by the margin of the Forth; and a brass plate in the
wall, with a detail of the catastrophe engraved upon it, still
indicates its locality to the visitor.

Still more recently there was supposed to be found in the vault of
the Maitlands, at St. Mary's Church, in Haddington, an urn containing
the heart of the great but terrible duke, John of Lauderdale, the
scourge of the Covenanters, a truculent peer, who, for his services
to the powers that were, was created Baron Petersham and Earl of
Guildford, and who died at Tunbridge Wells in 1682.  He was buried in
the family aisle, amid the execrations of the peasantry, to whom his
character rendered him odious, and his coffin on tressels was long an
object of grotesque terror to the truant urchin who peeped through
the narrow slit that lighted the vault where the lords of Thirlstane
lie.  The heart of the unhappy king, James the Second of England,
which was taken from his body, and interred separately in an urn, in
the church of Sainte Marie de Chaillot, near Paris, was lost at the
Revolution, in 1792, while the heart of his queen, Mary d'Este, of
Modena, and that of their faithful friend and adherent, Mary Gordon,
daughter of Lewis, Marquis of Huntley, and wife of James, Duke of
Perth (whilom Lord Justice-General, and High Chancellor of Scotland),
were long kept where the ashes of the latter still repose, in the
pretty little chapel of the Scottish College, at Paris, in the Rue
des Fosses St. Victoire, one of the oldest portions of the city.

When the body of the Emperor Napoleon was prepared for interment at
St. Helena, in May, 1821, the heart was removed by a medical officer,
to be soldered up in a separate case.  Madame Bertrand, in her grief
and enthusiasm, had made some vow, or expressed a vehement desire, to
obtain possession of this as a precious relic, and the doctor,
fearing that some trick might be played him, and his commission be
thereby imperilled, kept it all night in his own room, and under his
own eye, in a wine-glass.  The noise of crystal breaking roused him,
if not from sleep, at least from a waking doze, and he started
forward, only in time to rescue the heart of the emperor from a huge
brown rat, which was dragging it across the floor to its hole.  It
was rescued by the doctor, soldered up in a silver urn, filled with
spirits, by Sergeant Abraham Millington, of the St. Helena Artillery,
and placed in the coffin.

During the repair of Christ's Church, at Cork, in 1829, a human
heart, in a leaden case, was found embedded among the masonry; but to
whom it had belonged, what was its story, the piety or love its owner
wished to commemorate, no legend or inscription remained to tell.

In 1774, Sir Francis Dashwood, Lord Le Despenser, seems to have
received the singular bequest of a human heart, as the obituaries of
that year record, that when "Paul Whitehead, Esq., a gentleman much
admired by the literati for his publications, died at his apartments
in Henrietta-street, Covent Garden, among other whimsical legacies
was his heart, which, with fifty pounds, he bequeathed to his
lordship."  But of all the relics on record, perhaps the most
singular, if the story be true, is that related in the second volume
of the memoirs of the Empress Josephine, published in 1829, when the
Duc de Lauragnois had not only the heart of his wife, to whom he was
tenderly devoted, but her entire body, "by some chemical process
reduced to a sort of small stone, which was set in a ring, that the
duke always wore on his finger."  After this, who will say that the
eighteenth century was not a romantic age?




CHAPTER V.

PHANTASMAGORIA.

On the 29th of January, 1719, a Scottish gentleman, named Alexander
Jaffray, Laird of Kingswells, was riding across a piece of wide and
waste moorland to the westward of Aberdeen, when, about eight o'clock
in the morning, he beheld--to his great alarm and bewilderment, as he
states in a letter to his friend, Sir Archibald Grant of Monymusk
(printed by the Spalding Club)--a body of about seven thousand
soldiers drawn up in front of him, all under arms, with colours
uncased and waving, and the drums slung on the drummers' backs.  A
clear morning sun was shining, so he saw them distinctly, and also a
commander who rode along the line, mounted on a white charger.

Dubious whether to advance or retire, and sorely perplexed as to what
mysterious army this was, the worthy Laird of Kingswells and a
companion, an old Scottish soldier, who had served in Low Country
wars, reined in their horses, and continued to gaze on this
unexpected array for nearly two hours; till suddenly the troops broke
into marching order, and departed towards Aberdeen, near which, he
adds, "the hill called the Stockett tooke them out of sight."

Nothing more was heard or seen of this phantom force until the 21st
of the ensuing October, when upon the same ground--the then open and
desolate White-myres--on a fine clear afternoon, when some hundred
persons were returning home from the yearly fair at Old Aberdeen,
about two thousand infantry, clad in blue uniforms faced with white,
and with all their arms shining in the evening sun, were distinctly
visible; and after a space, the same commander on the same white
charger rode slowly along the shadowy line.  Then a long "wreath of
smoak apiered, as if they had fired, but no noise" followed.

To add to the marvel of this scene, the spectators, who, we have
said, were numerous, saw many of their friends, who were coming from
the fair, pass _through_ this line of impalpable shadows, of which
they could see nothing until they came to a certain point upon the
moor and looked back to the sloping ground.  Then, precisely as
before, those phantoms in foreign uniform broke into marching order,
and moved towards the Bridge of the Dee.  They remained visible,
however, for three hours, and only seemed to fade out or melt
gradually away as the sun set behind the mountains.  "This will
puzzle thy philosophy," adds the laird at the close of his letter to
the baronet of Monymusk; "but thou needst not doubt of the certainty
of either."

Scottish tradition, and even Scottish history, especially after the
Reformation, record many such instances of optical phenomena, which
were a source of great terror and amazement to the simple folks of
those days; and England was not without her full share of them
either; but science finds a ready solution for all such delusions
now.  They are chiefly peculiar to mountainous districts, and may
appear in many shapes and in many numbers, or singly, like the giant
of the Brocken, the spectator's own shadow cast on the opposite
clouds, and girt with rings of concentric light--or like the wondrous
fog-bow, so recently seen from the Matterhorn.

Almost on the same ground where the Laird of Kingswells saw the
second army of phantoms, and doubtless resulting from the same
natural and atmospheric causes, a similar appearance had been visible
on the 12th of February, 1643, when a great body of horse and foot
appeared as if under arms on the Brimman Hill.  Accoutred with
matchlock, pike, and morion, they looked ghost-like and misty as they
skimmed through the gray vapour about eight o'clock in the morning;
but on the sun breaking forth from a bank of cloud, they vanished,
and the green hill-slopes were left bare, or occupied by sheep alone.
Much about the same time, another army was seen to hover in the air
over the Moor of Forfar.  "Quhilkis visons," adds the Commissary
Spalding, "the people thocht to be prodigious tokens, and it fell out
owre trew, as may be seen hereafter."

Many such omens are gravely recorded as preceding and accompanying
the long struggle of the Covenant, and the fatal war in which the
three kingdoms were plunged by Charles I. and his evil advisers.

Indigestion, heavy dinners, and heavier drinking had doubtless much
to do in creating some of the spectral delusions of those days; and
inborn superstition, together with a heated fancy, were often not
wanting as additional accessories.  But in the gloomy and stormy
autumn that preceded the march of the Scottish Covenanters into
England, omens of all kinds teemed to a wonderful extent in the land.
When Alaster Macdonnel, son of Coll the Devastator, as the Whigs
named him, landed from Ireland, at the Rhu of Ardnamurchan, in
Morven, to join the Scottish cavaliers under the Marquis of Montrose,
then in arms for the king, it was alleged that the _hum_ of
cannon-shot was heard in the air, passing all over Scotland from the
Atlantic to the German Sea; that many strange lights appeared in the
firmament; and that, on a gloomy night in the winter of 1650, a
spectre drummer, beating in succession the Scottish and English
marches, summoned to a ghostly conference, at the castle-gate of
Edinburgh, Colonel Dundas of that Ilk, a corrupt officer, who, on
being bribed by gold, afterwards surrendered to Cromwell the
fortress, together with some sixty pieces of cannon.

All the private diaries and quaint chronicles, of late years
published by the various literary clubs in England and Scotland, teem
with such marvels, but the latter country was more particularly
afflicted by them; omens, warnings, and predictions of coming peril
rendering it, by their number and character, extremely doubtful
whether Heaven or the _other place_ was most interested in Scottish
affairs.

In 1638, fairy drums were heard beating on the hills of Dun Echt, in
Aberdeenshire, according to the narrative of the parson of Rothiemay;
in 1643, we hear of the noise of drums "and apparitions of armyes" at
Bankafoir in the same county.  "The wraith of General Leslie in his
buff-coat and on horseback, carrying his own banner with its bend
_azure_ and three buckles _or_, appeared on the summit of a tower at
St. Johnstown.  Science now explains such visions as the aerial
Morgana, produced by the reflection of real objects on a peculiar
atmospheric arrangement; but then they were a source of unlimited
terror."  Law, in his _Memorials_, records that, in 1676, a wondrous
star blazed at noon on the hill of Gargunnock, and a great army of
spectres was seen to glide along the hills near Aberdeen.

A folio of _Apparitions and Wonders_, preserved in the British
Museum, records that, at Durham, on the 27th September, 1703, when
the evening sky was serene and full of stars, a strange and
prodigious light spread over its north-western quarter, as if the sun
itself was shining; then came streamers which turned to armed men
ranked on horseback.  J. Edmonson, the writer of the broadsheet,
adds: "It was thought they would see the apparition better in
Scotland, because it appeared a great way north; the same," he
continues gravely, "was seen in the latter end of March, 1704," and
the battle of Hochstadt followed it.  This must refer to the second
battle fought there, which we call Blenheim, when Marshal Tallard was
defeated and taken prisoner by Marlborough.  But this wonderful light
which turned to armed men at Durham was outdone by a marvel at
Churchill, Oxfordshire, where (in the same collection) we find that,
on the 9th January, 1705, _four suns_ were all visible in the air at
once, "sent for signs unto mankind," adds the publisher, Mr. Tookey
of St. Christopher's Court, "and having their significations of the
Lord, like the hand-writing unto his servant Daniel."

In 1744, a man named D. Stricket, when servant to Mr. Lancaster of
Blakehills, saw one evening, about seven o'clock, a troop of horse
riding leisurely along Souter Fell in Cumberland.  They were in close
ranks, and ere long quickened their pace.  As this man had been
sharply ridiculed as the solitary beholder of a spectre horseman in
the same place in the preceding year, he watched these strange
troopers for some time ere he summoned his master from the house to
look too.  But ere Stricket spoke of what was to be seen, "Mr.
Lancaster discovered the aerial troopers," whose appearance was as
plainly visible to him as to his servant.  "These visionary horsemen
_seemed_ to come from the lowest part of Souter Fell, and became
visible at a place named Knott; they moved in successive troops (or
squadrons) along the side of the Fell till they came opposite to
Blakehills, where they went over the mountain.  They thus described a
kind of curvilinear path, their first and last appearances being
bounded by the mountain."  They were two hours in sight; and "this
phenomenon was seen by _every person_ (twenty-six in number) in every
cottage within the distance of a mile," according to the statement
attested before a magistrate by Lancaster and Stricket, on the 21st
of July, 1745.

During the middle of the last century, a toll-keeper in Perthshire
affirmed on oath, before certain justices of the peace, that an
entire regiment passed through his toll-gate at midnight; but as no
such force had left any town in the neighbourhood, or arrived at any
other, or, in fact, were ever seen anywhere but at his particular
turnpike, the whole story was naturally treated as a delusion; though
the Highlanders sought in some way to connect the vision with the
unquiet spirits of those who fought at Culloden, for there, the
peasantry aver, that "in the soft twilight of the summer evening,
solitary wayfarers, when passing near the burial mounds, have
suddenly found themselves amid the smoke and hurly-burly of a battle,
and could recognize the various clans engaged by their tartans and
badges.  On those occasions, a certain Laird of Culduthil was always
seen amid the fray on a white horse, and the people believe that once
again a great battle will be fought there by the clans; but with
whom, or about what, no seer has ventured to predict."

Shadowy figures of armed men were seen in Stockton Forest, Yorkshire,
prior to the war with France, as the _Leeds Mercury_ and local prints
record; and so lately as 1812, much curiosity and no small ridicule
were excited by the alleged appearance of a phantom army in the
vicinity of hard-working prosaic Leeds, and all the newspapers and
magazines of the time show how much the story amused the sceptical,
and occupied the attention of the scientific.

It would appear that between seven and eight o'clock on the evening
of Sunday, the 28th October, Mr. Anthony Jackson, a farmer, in his
forty-fifth year, and a lad of fifteen, named Turner, were
overlooking their cattle, which were at grass in Havarah Park, near
Ripley, the seat of Sir John Ingilby, when the lad suddenly
exclaimed: "Look, Anthony; what a number of beasts!"  "Beasts?  Lord
bless us!" replied the farmer with fear and wonder, "they are _men_!"
And, as he spoke, there immediately became visible "an army of
soldiers dressed in white uniforms, and in the centre a personage of
commanding aspect clad in scarlet."  These phantoms (according to the
_Leeds Mercury_ and _Edinburgh Annual Register_) were four deep,
extended over thirty acres, and performed many evolutions.  Other
bodies in dark uniforms now appeared, and smoke, as if from
artillery, rolled over the grass of the park.  On this, Jackson and
Turner, thinking they had seen quite enough, turned and fled.

Like the spells of the Fairy Morgana, which were alleged to create
such beautiful effects in the Bay of Reggio, and which Fra Antonio
Minasi saw thrice in 1773, and "deemed to exceed by far the most
beautiful theatrical exhibition in the world," science has explained
away, or fully discovered the true source of all such spectral
phenomena.  The northern aurora was deemed by the superstitious, from
the days of Plutarch even to those of the sage Sir Richard Baker, as
portentous of dire events; and the fancies of the timid saw only war
and battle in the shining streamers; but those supposed spectral
armies whose appearance we have noted, were something more, in most
instances, than mere _deceptio visus_, being actually the shadows of
_realities_--the airy reproductions of events, bodily passing in
other parts of the country, reflected in the clouds, and imaged again
on the mountain slopes or elsewhere, by a peculiar operation of the
sun's rays.




CHAPTER VI.

A STRING OF GHOST STORIES.

A belief in the ghost of vulgar superstition is as much exploded in
England now as are the opinions advanced by King James in his
"Demonologie."  Yet the learned Bacon admitted that such things might
be.  Luther, Pascal, Guy Patin, Milton, Dr. Johnson, and even
Southey, believed in the existence of such mediums with the unseen
world.  "My serious belief amounts to this," wrote the latter: "that
preternatural impressions are sometimes communicated to us for wise
purposes; and that departed spirits are sometimes permitted to
manifest themselves."  And had Pope not entertained some similar
idea, he had not written:

  "'Tis true, 'tis certain, man, though dead, retains
  Part of himself; the immortal mind remains:
  The _form_ subsists without the _body's_ aid,
  Aerial semblance and an empty shade."

Upon the truth or falsehood, the theories or rather hypotheses, of
such alleged appearances, we mean not to dwell; but merely to relate
a few little anecdotes connected with them, and drawn--save in Lord
Brougham's instance--from sources remote and scarce.

In the memoirs of the celebrated Agrippa d'Aubigné, grandfather of
Madame de Maintenon, the wife of Louis XIV., a man famous for his
zeal in Calvinism and disbelief in the spiritual world, and one whose
integrity was deemed alike rigid and inflexible, we read the
following of a spectre like that of a nursery tale:

"I was," he wrote, "in my bed, and entirely awake, when I heard some
one enter my apartment; and perceived at my bedside a woman,
remarkably pale, whose clothes rustled against my curtains as she
passed.  Withdrawing the latter, she stooped towards me, and giving
me a kiss that was cold as ice, vanished in a moment!"

D'Aubigné started from bed, and was almost immediately after informed
of the sudden death, of his mother, to whom he was tenderly attached.

In a letter of Philip, second Earl of Chesterfield, we find a curious
story of a double apparition occurring at the same moment, and which,
though it somewhat illustrates Ennemoser's theory of polarity, is
beyond the pale of modern philosophy.

In the gray daylight of an early morning in 1652, the earl saw a
figure in white, "like a standing sheet," appear within a yard of his
bedside.  He attempted to grasp it; but, eluding him, the figure slid
towards the foot of the bed, and melted away.  He felt a strange
anxiety; but his thoughts immediately turned to the Countess (Lady
Anne Percy), who was then at Networth with her father, the Earl of
Northumberland, and thither he immediately repaired.  On his arrival
a footman met him on the staircase, with a packet directed to him
from his lady; whom he found with her sister, the Countess of Essex,
and a Mrs. Ramsay.  He was asked why he had come so suddenly.  He
told his motive, his alarm and anxiety; and, on perusing the letter
in the sealed packet, he found that the countess had written to him,
requesting his return; "as she had seen a thing in white, with a
black face, by her bedside."  These apparitions were identically the
same in appearance, and were seen by the earl and countess _at the
same moment_, though they were in two places forty miles apart.  No
catastrophe followed.  The earl, however, survived his lady, and
lived till the year 1713.

In the _St. James's Chronicle_ for 1762 we find a strange story of an
apparition being the means of revealing a murder, and bringing the
guilty parties to the fatal tree at Tyburn.  The narrative was said
to have been found among the legal papers of a counsellor of the
Middle Temple, then recently deceased.

"In the year 1668 a young gentleman of the West Country, named
Stobbine, came to London, and soon after, as ill luck would have it,
he wedded a wife of Wapping, the youngest daughter of a Mrs. Alceald;
and in the space of fifteen months the providence of God sent them a
daughter, which (_sic_) was left under the care of the grandmother,
the husband and his wife retiring to their house in the country."

In 1676, when the daughter was six years old, Mrs. Alceald died, and
the child was sent home, and remained there till 1679, when a Mrs.
Myltstre, her maternal aunt, "having greatly increased her means,
forsook the canaille and low habitations of Wapping, came into a
polite part of the town, took a house among people of quality, and
set up for a woman of fashion," and thither did she invite the
Stobbines and their daughter to spend the winter with her.  Among her
visitors were her husband's brother, who had the title or rank of
captain, and who seems to have been a bully and gamester--a "blood,"
in a flowing wig and laced coat--and there was another relation, who
practised as an apothecary.

All these five persons dined together on the birthday of the little
girl Stobbine, when a terrible catastrophe ensued.  In a spirit of
play, it was presumed, she took up a sword that was in the room, and
pointing it at Mr. Stobbine, cried, "Stick him, stick him!"

"What!" said he, "would you stab your father?"

"You are not my father; but Captain Myltstre is."

Her father, upon this, boxed her ears, and was instantly run through
the body by the captain.  "Down he dropped," we are told, and then
his wife, her sister, the captain, and the apothecary, all trampled
upon him till he was quite dead, and interring him secretly, gave out
that he had returned to the West Country.  Time passed on, and though
inquiries were made, and messengers sent after the missing Stobbine,
he was heard of no more for a time.  His daughter was sent to a
distant school, and her mother, "who pretended to go distracted, was
sent to a village a few miles out of town, where the captain had a
pretty little box for his convenience."

A memory of the terrible scene she had witnessed haunted the
daughter, she had nightly horrible dreams and frights, to the terror
of a young lady who slept with her; and she always alleged that a
spectre haunted her, a spectre visible to her only, and on these
occasions she would exclaim, with every manifestation of horror,

"There is a spirit in the room!  It is Mr. Stobbine's spirit.  Oh,
how terrible it looks!"

These appearances and her paroxysms led to an inquiry before a
justice of the peace; and without any warning given, the whole of the
guilty parties were apprehended and committed to the Gate-house,
tried at the Old Bailey, "and condemned, to the entire satisfaction
of the county, the court, and all present."

After this, Stobbine's troubled spirit appeared no more.  Mrs.
Myltstre was hanged, and her body was thrown into the gully-hole near
her old house in Wapping; Mrs. Stobbine was strangled and burned.
The captain and the apothecary were hanged at Tyburn, and the latter
was anatomized; and so ended this tragedy.

Another remarkable detection of murder through the alleged appearance
of a ghost, occurred in 1724.

A farmer, returning homeward from Southam market in Warwickshire,
disappeared by the way.  Next day a man presented himself at the
farmhouse, and asked of the wife if her husband had come back.

"No," she replied; "and I am under the utmost anxiety and terror."

"Your terror," said he, "cannot surpass mine; for last night as I lay
in bed, quite awake, the apparition of your poor husband appeared to
me.  He showed me several ghastly stabs in his body, which is now
lying in a marl-pit."

The pit was searched, the corpse was found, and the stabs, in number
and position, answered in every way to the description given by the
ghost-seer, to whom the spectre had named a certain man as the
culprit; and this person was committed to prison and brought to trial
at Warwick for the crime, before a jury and the Lord Chief Justice,
Sir Robert (afterwards Lord) Raymond, who was succeeded in 1733 by
Sir Philip Yorke.  The jury would speedily have brought in a verdict
of guilty; but he checked them by saying,

"Gentlemen, you lay more stress on the allegations of this apparition
than they will bear.  I cannot give credit to these kind of stories.
We are now in a court of law, and must determine according to it; and
I know not of any law which will admit of the testimony of an
apparition; nor yet if it did, doth the ghost appear to give
evidence.  Crier," he added, "call the ghost."

The farmer's spirit being thrice summoned in vain, Sir Robert again
addressed the jury on the hitherto unblemished character of the man
accused, and stoutly asserted a belief in his perfect innocence;
adding, "I do strongly suspect that the gentleman who saw the
apparition was himself the murderer, and knew all about the stabs and
the marl-pit without any supernatural assistance; hence I deem myself
justified in committing him to close custody till further inquiries
are made."

The result of these was, that on searching his house sufficient
proofs of his guilt were found; he confessed his crime, and was
executed at the next assize.

In the list of the officers of the 33rd Regiment, when serving under
Lord Cornwallis in America, and then called the 1st West York, will
be found the names of Captain (afterwards Sir John Coape) Sherbrooke
and Lieutenant George Wynward.  The former had recently joined the
33rd from the 4th, or King's Own Regiment.  These young men, being
similar in tastes and very attached friends, spent much of their time
in each other's society, and when off duty were seldom apart.  One
evening Sherbrooke was in Wynward's quarters.  The room in which they
were seated had two doors, one that led into the common passage of
the officers' barrack, the other into Wynward's bedroom, from which
there was no other mode of egress.

Both officers were engaged in study, till Sherbrooke, on raising his
eyes from a book, suddenly saw a young man about twenty years of age
open the entrance door and advance into the room.  The lad looked
pale, ghastly, and thin, as if in the last stage of a mortal malady.
Startled and alarmed, Captain Sherbrooke called Wynward's attention
to their noiseless visitor; and the moment the lieutenant saw him he
became ashy white and incapable of speech, and, ere he could recover,
the figure passed them both and entered the bedroom.

"Good God--my poor brother!" exclaimed Wynward.

"Your brother!" repeated Sherbrooke in great perplexity.  "There must
be some mistake in all this.  Follow me."

They entered the little bedroom--it was tenantless; and Sherbrooke's
agitation was certainly not soothed by Wynward expressing his
conviction that from the first he believed they had seen a spectre;
and they mutually took note of the day and hour at which this
inexplicable affair occurred.  Wynward at times tried to persuade
himself that they might have been duped by the practical joke of some
brother officer; yet his mind was evidently so harassed by it, that
when he related what had occurred, all had the good taste to withhold
comments, and to await with interest the then slow arrival of the
English mails.  When the latter came, there were missives for every
officer in the regiment except Wynward, whose hopes began to rise;
but there was one solitary letter for Sherbrooke, which he had no
sooner read than he changed colour and left the mess table.  Ere long
he returned and said,

"Wynward's younger brother is actually no more!"  The whole contents
of his note were as follows: "Dear John, break to your friend Wynward
the death of his favourite brother."

He had died at the very moment the apparition had appeared in that
remote Canadian barrack.  Strange though the story, the veracity of
the witnesses was unimpeachable; and Arch-deacon Wrangham alludes to
it in his edition of Plutarch, who, like Pliny the younger, believed
in spectres.  Of Wynward, we only know that he was out of the
regiment soon after his brother's death; and of Sherbrooke, that he
lived to see the three days of Waterloo, became Colonel of the 33rd,
Commander of the Forces in North America, and died a General and
G.C.B.

Prior to accompanying his regiment, the 92nd Highlanders, in the
Waterloo campaign, the famous Colonel John Cameron, of Fassifern, a
grandson of the Lochiel of the "Forty-five," dined with
Lieutenant-colonel Simon Macdonell, of Morar, who had formerly been
in the corps when it was embodied at Aberdeen as the old 100th, or
Gordon Highlanders.  On the occasion of this farewell dinner there
were present other officers of the regiment, some of whom died very
recently, and it occurred in the house of Morar, at Arasaig, a wild
part of Ardnamurchan, on the western coast of Inverness-shire.

As the guests were passing from the drawing-room towards the
dining-room, old Colonel Macdonell courteously paused to usher in
Cameron before him, and in doing so he was observed to stagger and
become pale, while placing his hands before his face, as if to hide
something that terrified him.  Cameron saw nothing of this, though
others did; and all were aware that subsequently, during dinner,
their host seemed disconcerted and "out of sorts."

Those unbidden visions known as the _taisch_, or second-sight, were
alleged to be hereditary in the family of Morar; and hence when
Cameron fell at Quatre Bras a few weeks afterwards, the old Colonel
asserted solemnly, that at the moment when Cameron passed before him
he saw his figure suddenly become enveloped in a dark shroud, which
had blood-gouts upon it about the region of the heart; but no shroud
enveloped the gallant Cameron when his foster-brother buried him in
the _allée verte_ of Brussels, where his body lay for six months,
till it was brought home to Kilmalie, and buried under a monument on
which is an inscription penned by Scott.

One of the latest testimonies of the existence of a spiritual world
is that given in the _Life and Times of Henry Lord Brougham_, written
by himself.

In volume first, he tells us that after he left the High School of
Edinburgh to attend the University, one of his most intimate friends
there was a Mr. G----, with whom, in their solitary walks in the
neighbourhood of the city, he frequently discussed and speculated on
the immortality of the soul, the possibility of ghosts walking
abroad, and of the dead appearing to the living; and they actually
committed the folly of drawing up an agreement, written mutually
_with their blood_, to the effect, "that whichever died first should
appear to the other, and thus solve any doubts entertained of the
life after death."

G---- went to India, and after the lapse of a few years Brougham had
almost forgotten his existence, when one day in winter--the 19th of
December--as he was indulging in the half sleepy luxury of a warm
bath, he turned to the chair on which he had deposited his clothes,
and thereon sat his old college-chum G----, looking him coolly,
quietly, and sadly in the face.  Lord Brougham adds that he swooned,
and found himself lying on the floor.  He noted the circumstance,
believing it to be all a dream, and yet, when remembering the
compact, he could not discharge from his mind a dread that G---- must
have died, and that his appearance even in a dream, was to be
received as a proof of a future state.  Sixty-three years afterwards
the veteran statesman and lawyer appends the following note to this
story of the apparition:

"Brougham, Oct. 16, 1862.--I have just been copying out from my
journal the account of this strange dream, _certissima mortis imago_.
Soon after my return there arrived a letter from India announcing
G----'s death, and stating that he died on the 19th of December!
Singular coincidence!  Yet when one reflects on the vast number of
dreams which night after night pass through our brains, the number of
coincidences between the vision and the event are perhaps fewer and
less remarkable than a fair calculation of chances would warrant us
to expect."



THE END.



BILLING, PRINTER, GUILDFORD, SURREY.