In a grotto dug by some Tartar hermit out of the cool earth are assembled a party of choice spirits, who are indeed anchorites in nothing but the delight with which they greet the refreshing atmosphere of their banqueting-hall. A flight of stone steps leads down into this well-contrived vault, in so hot a climate no contemptible exchange for the stifling interior of a tent, or even the comparative comfort of a wooden hut thoroughly baked through by the sun. A halting figure on crutches is toiling painfully down that staircase, assisted, with many a jest at their joint deficiencies, by a stalwart, handsome Guardsman, a model of manly strength and symmetry, but lacking what he is pleased to term his "liver wing." They are neither of them likely to forget the Crimea whilst they live. Ere they reach the bottom they are overtaken by a cavalry officer with jingling spurs and noisy scabbard, who, having had a taste of fighting, such as ought to have satisfied most men, at Balaklava, is now perpetually hovering about the front, disgusted with his enforced idleness at Kadikoi, and with a strong impression on his mind--which he supports by many weighty arguments--that a few squadrons of Dragoons would be valuable auxiliaries to a storming party, and that a good swordsman on a good horse can "go anywhere and do anything."
"I think we are all here now," says the host; "Monsieur le General, shall we go to dinner?"
The individual addressed gives a hearty affirmative. He is a stout, good-humoured-looking personage, with an eagle eye, and an extremely tight uniform covered with orders and decorations. He is not yet too fat to get on horseback, though the privations of campaigning seem to increase his rotundity day by day, and he expects ere long to go to battle, like an ancient Scythian, in his war-chariot. By that time he will be a marshal of France, but meanwhile he pines a little for the opera, and enjoys his dinner extremely. He occupies the seat of honour on the right hand of his host. The latter bids his guests welcome in frank, soldier-like style; and whilst the soup is handed round, and those bearded lips are occupied with its merits, let us take a look round the table at the dozen or so of guests, some of whom are destined ere long to have their likenesses in every print-shop in merry England.
First of all the dinner-giver himself--a square, middle-sized man, with a kindling eye, and a full, determined voice that suggests at once the habit of command--a kindly though energetic manner, and a countenance indicative of great resolution and clear-headedness; perhaps the best drill in the British army, and delighting much in a neat touch of parade tactics even before an enemy. Many a Guardsman nudged his comrade with a grin of humorous delight when, on a certain 20th of September, his old colonel coolly doubled a flank company in upon the rear of its battalion, and smiled to see the ground it would otherwise have occupied ploughed and riddled by the round-shot that was pouring from the enemy's batteries in position on the heights above the Alma. The British soldier likes coolness above all things; and where in command of foreign troops an officer should rave and gesticulate and tear his hair to elicit a corresponding enthusiasm from his men, our own phlegmatic Anglo-Saxons prefer the quiet smile and the good-humoured "_Now_, my lads!" which means so much.
On the left, and facing the Frenchman, sits a middle-aged decided-looking man, somewhat thoughtful and abstracted, yet giving his opinions in a clear and concise manner, and with a forcible tone and articulation that denote great energy and firmness of character. His name, too, is destined to fill the page of history--his future is bright and glowing before him, and none will grudge his honours and promotion, for he is endeared to the army by many a kindly action, and it has been exertion for their welfare and watching on their behalf, that have wasted his strong frame with fever, and turned his hair so grey in so short a time. Soldier as he is to his heart's core, he would fain be outside in the sunset with his colours and his sketch-book, arresting on its pages the glorious panorama which is even now passing away; but he is listening attentively to his neighbour, a handsome young man in the uniform of a simple private of Zouaves, and is earnestly occupied in "getting a wrinkle," as it is termed, concerning the interior economy and discipline of that far-famed corps. The Zouave gives him all the information he can desire with that peculiarly frank and fascinating manner which is fast dying out with the _ancien regime_, for though a private of Zouaves he is a marquis of France, the representative of one of the oldest families in the Empire, and a worthy scion of his chivalrous race. Rather than not draw the sword for his country, he has resigned his commission in that body of household cavalry termed "The Guides," and entered as a trooper in the Chasseurs d'Afrique: a display of martial enthusiasm for which he has been called out from the ranks of his original corps and publicly complimented by the Empress Eugenie herself. Arrived in the Crimea, he found his new comrades placed in enforced idleness at far too great a distance from active operations to suit his taste, and he forthwith exchanged once more into the Zouaves, with whom he took his regular share of duty in the trenches, and he is now enjoying a furlough of some six hours from his quarters, to dine with an English general, and cultivate the _entente cordiale_ which flourishes so vigorously on this Crimean soil. Alas for the gallant spirit, the graceful form, the warm noble heart! no bird of ill omen flew across his path as he came to-day to dinner, no warning note of impending death rang in his ears to give him notice of his doom.
To-night he is as gay, as lively, as cheerful as usual; to-morrow he will be but a form of senseless clay, shot through the head in the trenches.
Meanwhile the champagne goes round, and is none the less appreciated that although there is an abundance of bottles, there is a sad deficiency of glasses. A light-hearted aide-de-camp, well accustomed to every emergency, great or small, darts off to his adjoining tent, from which he presently returns, bearing two tin cups and the broken remains of a coffee-pot; with these auxiliaries dinner progresses merrily, and a fat turkey--how obtained it is needless to inquire--is soon reduced to a skeleton. A little wit goes a long way when men are before an enemy; and as the aide-de-camp strongly repudiates the accusation of having purloined this hapless bird, jokes are bandied about from one to another, every one wishing to fasten on his neighbour the accusation of knowing how to "make war support war."
The English officers are a long way behind their allies in this useful accomplishment; and the French general shakes his jolly sides as he relates with much gusto sundry Algerian experiences of what we should term larceny and rapine, but which his more liberal ideas seem to consider excusable, if not positively meritorious.
"The best foragers I had in Algeria," says he, "were my best soldiers too. If I wanted fresh milk for my coffee, I trusted to the same men that formed my storming parties, and I was never disappointed in one case or the other. In effect, they were droll fellows, my Zouaves Indigenes--cunning too, as the cat that steals cream; the Khabyles could keep nothing from them. If we entered their tents, everything of value was taken away before you could look round. To be sure we could carry nothing with us, but that made no difference. I have seen the men wind shawls round their waists that were worth a hundred louis apiece, and throw them aside on a hot day on the march. There was one Khabyle chief who was very conspicuous for the magnificent scarlet cashmere which he wore as a turban. On foot or on horseback, there he was, always fighting and always in the front. Heaven knows why, but the men called him Bobouton, and wherever there was a skirmish Bobouton was sure to be in the thick of it. One day I happened to remark 'that I was tired of Bobouton and his red shawl, and I wished some one would bring me the turban and rid me of the wearer.' A little swarthy Zouave, named Pepe, overheard my observation. '_Mon Colonel_,' said he, with a most ceremonious bow,' to-morrow is your _jour de fete_--will you permit me to celebrate it by presenting you with the scarlet turban of Bobouton?'
I laughed, thanked him, and thought no more about it.
"The following morning, at sunrise, I rode out to make a reconnaissance.
A party, of whom Pepe was one, moved forward to clear the ground.
Contrary to all discipline and _ordonnance_, my droll little friend had mounted a magnificent pair of epaulettes. Worn on his Zouave uniform, the effect was the least thing ridiculous. As I knew of no epaulettes in the camp besides my own, I confess I was rather angry, but the enemy having opened a sharp fire upon my skirmishers, I did not choose to sacrifice an aide-de-camp by bidding him ride on and visit Pepe with condign punishment; so, reserving to myself that duty on his return, I watched him meanwhile through my glass with an interest proportioned to my regard for my epaulettes, an article not too easily replaced in Algeria. Nor were mine the only eyes that looked so eagerly on the flashing bullion. Bobouton soon made his appearance from behind a rock, and by the manner in which he and Pepe watched, and, so to speak, 'stalked' each other, I saw that a regular duel was pending between the two. In fine, after very many manoeuvres on both sides, the Zouave incautiously exposed himself at a distance of eighty or ninety paces, and was instantaneously covered by his watchful enemy. As the smoke cleared away from the Khabyle's rifle, poor Pepe sprang convulsively in the air, and fell headlong on his face. 'Tenez!' said I to myself, 'there is Pepe shot through the heart, and I shall never see my epaulettes again.'
"The Khabyle rushed from his hiding-place to strip his fallen antagonist. Already his eyes glittered with delight at the idea of possessing those tempting ornaments--already he was within a few feet of the prostrate body, when 'crack!' once more I heard the sharp report of a rifle, and presto, like some scene at a carnival, it was Bobouton that lay slain upon the rocks, and Pepe that stood over him and stripped him of the spoils of war. In another minute he unrolled the red turban at my horse's feet. '_Mon Colonel_,' said he, 'accept my congratulations for yourself and your amiable family. Accept also this trifling token of remembrance taken from that incautious individual who, like the mouse in the fable, thinks the cat must be dead because she lies prostrate without moving. And accept, moreover, my thanks for the loan of these handsome ornaments, without the aid of which I could not have procured myself the pleasure of presenting my worthy colonel with the shawl of _ce malheureux Bobouton_.' The rascal had stolen them out of my tent the night before, though my aide-de-camp slept within two paces of me, and my head rested on the very box in which they were contained."
"Alas! we have no experiences like yours, General," says a tall, handsome colonel of infantry, with the Cape and Crimean ribbons on his breast; "wherever we have made war with savages, they have had nothing worth taking. A Kaffre chief goes to battle with very little on besides his skin, and that is indeed scarce worth the trouble of stripping.
When we captured Sandilli, I give you my word he had no earthly article upon his person but a string of blue beads, and yet he fought like a wildcat to make his escape."
"Your health, my friend," replies the General, clinking his glass with that of his new acquaintance. "You have been in Caffraria? Ah! I should have known it by your decorations. Are they not a fierce and formidable enemy? Is it not a good school for war? Tell me, now"--looking round the table for an explanation--"why do you not reserve South Africa, you others, as we do the northern shore, to make of it a drill-ground for your soldiers and a school for your officers?
It would cost but little--a few hundred men a year would be the only loss. Bah!--a mere trifle to the richest and most populous country in the world. I do not understand your English _sang-froid_. Why do you not establish _your_ Algeria at the Cape?"
Many voices are immediately raised in explanation; but it is difficult to make the thorough soldier--the man who has all his life been the military servant of a military Government--understand how repugnant would be such a proceeding to the feelings of the British people--how contrary to the whole spirit of their constitution. At length, with another glass of champagne, a new light seems to break in upon him.
"Ah!" says he, "it would not be approved of by _Le Times_; now I understand perfectly. We manage these matters better with us. _Peste!_ if we go to war, there it is. We employ our _Gazettes_ to celebrate our victories. Your health, _mon General_; this is indeed a wearisome business in which we are engaged--a life totally brutalising. Without change, without manoeuvring, and without pleasure: what would you? I trust the next campaign in which we shall meet may be in a civilised country--the borders of the Rhine, for instance; what think you?--where, instead of this barbarian desert, you find a village every mile, and a good house in every village, with a bottle of wine in the cellar, a smoked ham in the chimney, and a handsome Saxon _blonde_ in the kitchen.
'_A la guerre, comme a la guerre, n'est ce pas, mon General?_'"
The company are getting merry and talkative; cigars are lit, and coffee is handed round; the small hours are approaching, and what Falstaff calls the "sweet of the night" is coming on, when the tramp and snort of a horse are heard at the entrance of the grotto, a steel scabbard rings upon the stone steps, and although the new-comer's place at one end of the table has been vacant the whole of dinner-time, he does not sit down to eat till he has whispered a few words in the ear of the English general, who receives the intelligence with as much coolness as it is imparted.
In five minutes the grotto is cleared of all save its customary occupants. The French general has galloped off to his head-quarters; the English officers are hurrying to their men; each as he leaves the grotto casts a look at an ingenious arrangement at its mouth, which, by means of a diagram formed of white shells, each line pointing to a particular portion of the attack, enables the observer to ascertain at once in which direction the fire is most severe. The originator of this simple and ingenious indicator meanwhile sits down for a mouthful of food. He has brought intelligence of the sortie already described, and which will turn out the troops of all arms in about ten minutes; but in the meantime he has five to spare, and, being very hungry, he makes the best use of his time. As the light from the solitary lamp brings into relief that square, powerful form--that statue-like head, with its fearless beauty and its classical features--above all, the frank, kindly smile, that never fades under difficulties, and the clear, unwavering eye that never quails in danger,--any physiognomist worthy of the name would declare "that man was born to be a hero!" And the physiognomist would not be mistaken.
CHAPTER XXXIX
THE REDAN
The days dragged on in the camp. Sometimes wearily enough, sometimes enlivened by a party of pleasure to Baidar, an expedition to the monastery of St. George, a general action at the Tchernaya, a hurdle-race at Kadikoi, or some trifling excitement of the same kind.
Already the great heat was beginning to be tempered by the bracing air of autumn, and the army was more than half inclined to speculate on the possibility of another long dreary winter before Sebastopol.
But the time had come at last. The blow so long withheld was to be launched in earnest, and for a day or two before the final and successful assault, men's minds seemed to tell them--they scarce knew why--that a great change was impending, and that every night might now be the last on which the dogged valour of the besieged would man those formidable defences that, under the names of the Malakhoff, the Redan, etc., had for so long occupied the attention of France, England, and indeed the whole of Europe.
I was sitting outside Ropsley's tent, sharing my breakfast of hard biscuit with Bold, at daybreak of a fine September morning. The old dog seemed on this occasion to have renewed his youth, and was so demonstrative and affectionate as to call down a strong reproof from Ropsley, with whom he was never on very friendly terms, for laying his broad paw on the well-brushed uniform of the Colonel. "Tie the brute up, Vere," said he, carefully removing the dirt from his threadbare sleeve, "or he will follow us on parade. Are you ready? if so, come along. I would not be late to-day of all days, for a thousand a year."
I remained in his rear, as he completed the inspection of his company.
I had never seen the men so brisk or so smartly turned out, and there was an exhilarated yet earnest look on their countenances that denoted their own opinion of the coming day. Ropsley himself was more of the _bon camarade_, and less of the "fine gentleman" than usual. As we marched down to the trenches side by side, he talked freely of old times,--our school-days at Everdon, our later meeting at Beverley, and, by a natural transition, turned the subject of conversation to Victor de Rohan and his sister Valerie. I had never known him allude to the latter of his own accord before. He seemed to have something on his mind which pride or mistrust, or both, would not permit him to bring out. At last, apparently with a strong effort, he whispered hurriedly--
"Vere, I've a favour to ask you--if I should be _hit_ to-day by chance, and badly, you know, I should like you to write and remember me to the De Rohans, and--and--particularly to Countess Valerie. If ever you should see her again, you might tell her so."
I pressed his hand in answer, and I thought his voice was hoarser as he resumed.
"Vere, it is not often I confess myself wrong, but I have wronged you fearfully. If I'm alive to-morrow I'll tell you all; if not, Vere, can you--_can_ you forgive me?"
"From my heart," was all I had time to reply, for at that instant up rode the leader of the assault, and Ropsley's voice was calm and measured, his manner cold and cynical as ever, while he answered the short and military catechism usual on such occasions.
"Then it's all right," was the remark of the mounted officer, in as good-humoured and jovial a tone as if the affair in hand were a mere question of one of his own Norfolk battues; "and what a fine morning we've got for the business," he added, dismounting, and patting his horse as it was led away, ere he turned round to put himself at the head of the storming party.
I watched him as one watches a man whose experiences of danger have given him a fascination perfectly irresistible to inferior minds. It was the same officer whom I have already mentioned as the latest arrival to disturb the dinner-party in the grotto, but to-day he looked, if possible, more cheerful, and in better spirits than his wont. I thought of his antecedents, as they had often been related to me by one of his oldest friends,--of his unfailing good-humour and kindliness of disposition--of his popularity in his regiment--of his skill and prowess at all sports and pastimes, with the gloves, the foils, the sharp-rowelled spurs of the hunting-field, or the velvet cap that fails to protect the steeplechaser from a broken neck--of his wanderings in the desert amongst the Bedouin Arabs, and his cold bivouacs on the prairie with the Red Indians--of his lonely ride after the Alma, when, steering by the stars through a country with which he was totally unacquainted, he arrived at the fleet with the news of the famous flank march to Balaklava--of his daring _sang-froid_ when "the thickest of war's tempest lowered" at Inkermann, and of the daily dangers and privations of the weary siege, always borne and faced out with the same merry light-hearted smile; and now he was to _lead the assault_.
None but a soldier knows all that is comprised in those three simple words--the coolness, the daring, the lightning glance, the ready resource, the wary tactics, and the headlong gallantry which must all be combined successfully to fill that post of honour; and then to think that the odds are ten to one he never comes back alive!
As I looked at his athletic frame and handsome, manly face, as I returned his cordial, off-hand greeting, as courteous to the nameless Interpreter as it would have been to General Pelissier himself, my heart tightened to think of what might--nay, what _must_ surely happen on that fire-swept glacis, unless he bore indeed a life charmed with immunity from shot and steel.
Man by man he inspected the Forlorn Hope,--their arms, their ammunition pouches, their scaling-ladders, all the tackle and paraphernalia of death. For each he had a word of encouragement, a jest, or a smile.
Ropsley and his company were to remain in support in the advanced trenches. All was at length reported "ready," and then came the awful hush that ever ushers in the most desperate deeds--the minutes of pale and breathless suspense, that fly so quickly and yet seem to pass like lead--when the boldest cheek is blanched, and the stoutest heart beats painfully, and the change to action and real peril is felt to be an unspeakable relief to all.
A cold wet nose was poked into my hand. Bold had tracked me from the camp, and had followed me even here; nothing would induce him now to quit my side, for even the dog seemed to think something awful was impending, and watched with red, angry eyes and lowered tail and bristling neck, as if he too had been "told off" for the attack.
A roar of artillery shakes the air; our allies have opened their fire on the Malakhoff, and their columns are swarming like bees to the assault.
Battalion after battalion, regiment after regiment, come surging through the ditch, to break like waves on the sea-shore, as the depressed guns of the enemy hew awful gaps in their ranks--to break indeed but to re-form, and as fresh supports keep pressing them on from the rear, to dash upwards against the earthwork, and to overflow and fling themselves from the parapet in the face of the Russian gunners below.
The Muscovite fights doggedly, and without dream of surrender or retreat. Hand to hand the conflict must be decided with the bayonet, and the little Zouaves shout, and yell, and stab, and press onward, and revel, so to speak, in the wild orgy of battle.
But the Northman is a grim, uncompromising foe, and more than once the "red pantaloons" waver and give back, and rally, and press on again to death. Instances of gallantry and self-devotion are rife amongst the officers. Here, a young captain of infantry flings himself alone upon the bayonets of the enemy, and falls pierced with a hundred wounds; there, an old white-headed colonel, _decore_ up to his chin, draws an ominous revolver, and threatens to shoot any one of his own men through the head that shows the slightest disinclination to rush on. "_Ma foi_,"
says he, "_c'est pour encourager les autres!_" The southern blood boils up under the influence of example, and if French troops are once a little flushed with success, their _elan_, as they call that quality for which we have no corresponding expression, is irresistible. The Russians cannot face the impetuosity of their charge; already many of the guns are spiked, and the gunners bayoneted; the grey-coated columns are yielding ground foot by foot; fresh troops pour in over the parapet, for the living are now able to pass unscathed over the dead, with whom the ditch is filled. The fire of the Russians is slackening, and their yell dies away fainter on the breeze. A French cheer, wild, joyous, and unearthly, fills the air,--it thrills in the ears of Pelissier, sitting immovable on his horse at no great distance from the conflict; his telescope is pressed to his eye, and he is watching eagerly for the well-known signal. And now he sees it! A gleam of fierce joy lights up his features, and as the tricolor of France is run up to the crest of the Malakhoff, he shuts his glass with a snap, dismounts from his horse, and rolling himself round in his cloak, lies down for a few minutes'
repose, and observes, with a zest of which none but a Frenchman is capable, "_Tenez! voila mon baton de Marechal!_"
His are not the only eyes eagerly watching the progress of the attack; many a veteran of both armies is busied recalling all his own experiences and all his knowledge of warfare, to calculate the probabilities of their success whose task it is to cross that wide and deadly glacis which is swept by the batteries of the Redan.
The men are formed for the assault, and the word is given to advance.
"Now, my lads," says the leader, "keep cool--keep steady--and keep together--we'll do it handsomely when we're about it. Forward!"
It is related of him whom Napoleon called "the bravest of the brave,"
the famous Ney, that he was the only officer of that day who could preserve his _sang-froid_ totally unmoved when standing with _his back_ to a heavy fire. Many a gallant fellow facing the enemy would pay no more regard to the missiles whistling about his ears, than to the hailstones of an April shower; but it was quite a different sensation to _front_ his own advancing troops, and never look round at the grim archer whose every shaft might be the last. What the French Marshal, however, piqued himself upon as the acme of personal courage and conduct, our English leader seems to consider a mere matter-of-course in the performance of an every-day duty. Step by step, calm, collected, and good-humoured, he regulates the movements of the attacking force.
Fronting their ranks, as if he were on parade, he brings them out of their sheltering defences into the iron storm, now pouring forth its deadly wrath upon that rocky plateau which _must_ be crossed in defiance of everything.
"Steady, men," he observes once more, as he forms them for the desperate effort; "we'll have them _out of that_ in ten minutes. Now, my lads!
Forward, and follow me!"
The cocked hat is waving amongst the smoke--the daring Colonel is forward under the very guns--with a British cheer, the Forlorn Hope dash eagerly on, comrade encouraging comrade, side by side, shoulder to shoulder--hearts throbbing wild and high, and a grip of iron on good "Brown Bess." Men live a lifetime in a few such moments. There are two brothers in that doomed band who have not met for years--they quarrelled in their hot youth over their father's grave, about the quiet orchard and the peaceful homestead that each had since longed so painfully to see once more; and now they have served, with half the globe between them, and each believes the other to have forgotten him, and the orchard and the homestead have passed away from their name for ever. They would weep and be friends if they could meet again. There are but four men between them at this moment, and two are down, stark and dead, and two are dragging their mangled bodies slowly to the rear, and the brothers are face to face under the fatal batteries of the Redan.