[*] This circumstance delayed for a time the appearance of the Greys in the ranks of the allied army. They departed from Nottingham in July, 1854, with their band playing "Scots wha hae," &c."Your route will be a long but very pleasant one, by classic seas and classic shores," said Louisa. "Shall we trace it on the map of the Mediterranean, in the library? Come, Cora."There was a tremulous change in her voice, and a glance in her eye that I could not mistake.Quitting the drawing-room unnoticed by our seniors, we stepped into the library, the oak shelves of which were loaded with books of all sizes in glittering bindings, more seemingly for show than use, and approaching the large stand of maps on horizontal rollers, we drew down that of the Mediterranean, while Cora, whose good little heart forboded that we needed not her geographical aid, eyed us wistfully for a second, and passed out by a door beyond.The library had green-shaded lamps, which were half lighted; thus we were almost concealed in shadow, and the huge cloth-mounted map we affected to examine hung before us like a friendly screen. We had but a few stolen moments for conversation, and one impulse animated us.I turned to Louisa; her face drew closer to mine, and our lips met in one long, long passionate kiss—such a kiss as if our souls were there."You understand all, now, Louisa?" said I."All," she said, in the same breathless voice."And forgive all—about that poor girl, I mean. How appearances were against me!""Oh yes, dear, dear Newton.""And you love me?""Oh, Newton!""You love me still?""Can you ask me while petting me thus? You have felt our separation since those few happy days at Calderwood?""As a living death, Louisa. Worse than anticipations of the greater separation that is to come.""With all its dangers!" she said, with her eyes now full of tears."Yes; for whatever happens I shall feel assured——""That your poor Louisa loves you still—loves you dearly, Newton; and ere you go to-night you must give me a lock of your hair."Her head on my shoulder; her pale brow against my cheek, her lips were close to mine."Till we are both in our graves, dear Newton, you can never, never know how much I love you, and the agony that Berkeley's cunning cost me."These were blessed words to hear—blessed words to treasure in the distant land to which I was going; and in a silence more eloquent than words, I could but press her to my heart.This was indeed a moment of reunion, never to be forgotten, but to be treasured in the secret recesses of the soul, and recalled only at times; and times there were when I recalled it, when far, far away, in the lonely watches of those dark nights, when the chafing of the Black Sea was heard afar off on the rocks of Fort Constantine, and the thunder of Sebastopol was close and nigh; and then the vague, undefined memory of the place, the time, her voice, her eyes, and her kiss, would come gradually back, filling my heart with intense melancholy, and my eyes with tears.In my doubt of the future, in my fear of ensnarements, and the exercise of parental authority (a power of which we stand in such awe in Scotland), and lest, by an unforeseen chance or circumstance, I should lose her, I actually besought her, in what terms it is impossible to remember now, to consent to a private marriage; and strange ideas of written promises and protestations, of blood mingled with wine, and many other melodramatic absurdities, occurred to me."Ah, no, no," said she, rousing herself to the occasion. "There will be time enough when you return.""If I ever do return," said I, impetuously, thinking of the chances of war, and my certain hostile meeting with Berkeley."You must return, dear Newton—you shall, and I feel it in my heart.""And there will be time——""For me," she interrupted, "to be cried, as Lydia Languish says, 'three times in a parish church', and have an enormously fat parish clerk ask the consent of every butcher in the parish to join in lawful wedlock Newton Calderwood Norcliff, bachelor, and Louisa Loftus, spinster; unless we have a special licence, St. George's, Hanover Square, and the Bishop of London in his lawn sleeves, and so forth."This sudden change of manner at such a time startled and distressed me."It is her way—a mistaken lightness of manner," thought I.But, alas! I was yet to learn some terrible lessons in the treachery of the human heart!Another brief and mute embrace, and we had just time to veil our mutual agitation and turn our attention to the outspread map of the Mediterranean, affecting to trace the distance from Cagliari to Malta, when we heard the voice of Lord Chillingham saying to Sir Nigel—"Here they are, reviving their geography apparently. Captain Norcliff," he added, "here is a note for you which has just been brought by an orderly dragoon.""Thanks, my lord. Is he waiting?""No, sir," said the servant, who presented it to me on a chased silver salver; "he immediately wheeled round his horse and galloped off.""Permit me," said I, tearing it open.It had been hurriedly pencilled by Frank Jocelyn, and ran thus:—"MY DEAR NORCLIFF,—The lieutenant-colonel in command of the consolidated depôts here informs me that the route for ours is at Maidstone, for which place the troop must march by daybreak to-morrow. Sorry to disturb your dinner-party; but now the word is 'Eastward ho!'"I handed it first to Louisa, and for a moment my voice failed me; but rallying, I said—"I have to apologize for a hasty departure, and shall thank you, my lord, to order my horse."Much that followed was confusion. I can remember my good uncle shaking me repeatedly by the hand, and patting me on the epaulettes (we were like officers then, and had epaulettes on our shoulders). Cora wept a great deal; Louisa was quite silent and very pale. Our parting scene passed away like a dissolving view; but the bitterness was somewhat taken from it by the whole party promising to "drive or ride over to Maidstone and see us march out;" and so, with a kind adieu from all, I sprang on my horse, quitted Chillingham Park, and soon reached the barracks, where I found Jocelyn in my quarters awaiting me, and Willie Pitblado, who had already relinquished his livery for his lancer uniform, whistling vigorously as he packed and buckled up my traps.Away from Louisa, I had no relief now for my mind but intense activity.In the dull grey light of the next morning I quitted Canterbury with my troop for Maidstone, into which we were played by our own band, which came a mile or two on the Rochester Road to meet us.There I learned from Colonel Beverley that, on the following day, we should march to join the expedition destined for the defence of Turkey.CHAPTER XXIV.Now, brave boys, we're bound for marchin',Both to Portingale and Spain;Drums are batin', colours flyin',And the divil a back we'll come again.So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!Eighty-eighth and Inniskillin',Boys that's able, boys that's willin';Faugh-a-ballagh and County Down,Stand by the harp, and stand by the crown.So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!The colonel cries, "Boys, are yee's ready?""We're at your back, sir, firm and steady;Our pouches filled with balls and poulther,And a firelock sloped on every shoulther."So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!Such was the doggrel ditty—some camp song of the brave old Peninsular days—with which I heard my Irish groom, Larity O'Regan, solacing himself in the grey light of the early morning, as he rubbed down my charger, and buckled his gay trappings, in the dawn of the, to me, eventful 22nd of April. How I envied that man's lightness of heart! Perhaps he had a mother in a thatched cabin in some brown Irish bog far away; sisters, too; it might be a sweetheart—some grey-eyed and black-haired Biddy, or Nora. If so, they occasioned him but little regret then; and light-hearted Lanty's queer song and jovial bearing went far to rouse my own spirit as I mounted the gallant dark horse that was to bear me in the fields of the future.The regiment, mustering about three hundred men of all ranks, came rapidly from the stables, under the eye of Studhome, and that ubiquitous and indefatigable non-commissioned officer, Sergeant-Major Drillem. The sun had not yet risen, but the barrack windows were crowded by the men of other corps to witness our departure. Their own turn would soon arrive.Wilford informed me that the route[*] had come suddenly, when the regiment was in church, and it was first announced by the chaplain from the pulpit. The sanctity of the place alone restrained the cheers of the lancers, but not the sobs of the women; and he added, that by a singular coincidence, the text the chaplain had chosen for his sermon was from Proverbs xxvii. 1—"Boast not thyself of to-morrow, for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth."[*] Order for marching.As the trumpets blew the assembly on this auspicious morning, their sound seemed different—more warlike in fact than usual—a portion of the great movement in which the fate of Europe, and certainly of many a poor human being, was involved.As yet Lionel Beverley, our lieutenant-colonel, who wore his Cross of the Bath, was the only decorated man among us (save a few Indian medals); but a rich crop of such tributes was to be reaped in the land to which we were going.Our plumes had been laid aside, glazed covers were on our square-crowned caps, and officers and privates alike had canvas havresacks and wooden canteens slung over the right shoulder; some of the former had telescopes and courier-bags; but all betokened coming service and preparation for it.Our horses were nearly all of a deep dark bay colour, save those of the band and trumpeters, many of which were white, or spotted grey. The guidons were all uncased; each was of white silk (the colour of our facings), embroidered with gold, measuring three feet long by twenty-one inches on the lance, which was ten feet in length—the regulation for light cavalry. On the flank of its troop each standard was now flying in the morning wind.On this occasion there were, as usual at such times, many of the fair sex interested in our departure. There was much weeping among many wives, and certainly among a great number of "very foolish virgins," as Studhome designated them. Many of the soldiers' wives were mingling in the ranks, and, fearless of the horses' hoofs, were holding up their infants for the last kiss of many a poor father who was to find his grave in the land to which we were departing; and there were many painful separations among those who were destined never to meet again.I remember a sergeant of Wilford's troop, whose wife had recently presented him with a baby. The latter died suddenly on the night before we were to march, and, by a singular coincidence, the little thing's cradle and coffin were brought into barracks together next morning, but poor Sergeant Dashwood had to mount and leave his weeping wife and unburied little one behind him.He was one of the first who fell at the passage of the Alma.There was, on the other hand, much heedless jesting and idle levity."This time," said Wilford, to the group of officers who were gathered round Beverley, "we shall do a portion of the Mediterranean, the entire Levant, and Dardanelles, at her Majesty's expense, and without the aid of Bradshaw or John Murray.""So we are actually going at last," lisped Jocelyn, while playing with his horse's mane."Ah! but we leave our representatives behind.""How, Travers?""In a squad of light infantry in arms, no doubt," replied Travers, a handsome fellow, with a clear blue eye and long fair moustache. He had the reputation of being the most rakish fellow in the regiment, and could not resist perpetrating the old dragoon joke."How clumsily we English show grief," I heard Berkeley say, as he witnessed a very affecting parting between a mother and her son. "Hear how that old—aw—woman is permitting herself to howl.""Anything is better than having every natural emotion subdued and snubbed from childhood, as among us in Scotland," thought I.Soldiers muster and march at all times merrily. Care cumbers them but little and briefly, for "with them the present is everything, the past a point, the future a blank. The greeting of surviving friends is seldom embittered by the recollection of those who are no more, and in a life of danger and casualty this is natural."Already the advanced guard had been detailed and thrown out, under young Sir Henry Scarlett. The crowd in and about the barracks was great. Many carriages full of fashionables from Canterbury, Tunbridge, and elsewhere, were arriving, for the double purpose of getting up an appetite for breakfast and seeing us depart; but I saw nothing of my friends, for whom I was looking anxiously—so much so that Studhome said, laughingly, as he rode past—"Come, look alive, Norcliff, and get your troop into shape. There is no such spoon in the service, or out of it, as an 'engaged man.'"At another time I might have resented Jack's banter, but Beverley wheeled the regiment from open column into line, and opened the ranks, as the commandant of Maidstone cantered in, with his staff, their plumes waving and epaulettes glittering. Then, from line, we were formed in close column in rear of the leading troop, for the delivery of an address, of which I did not hear one word, for just as the commandant took off his cocked hat and began his oration Lord Chillingham's carriage, preceded by two outriders, drove in, I perceived that it was occupied by Cora, Lord Chillingham, and Lord Slubber. My uncle and Lady Louisa, who were on horseback, came at once close up to me.My pale love looked tenderly at me, and her dark eyes bore unmistakable traces of recent tears, or was it the long ride in the morning wind which had inflamed them? All emotion, however, was subdued now, which was well, as her rare beauty, her bearing and seat in the saddle, attracted the eyes of half the regiment, seriously damaging the interest of the old commandant's address; and my uncle, after warmly shaking my hand, proceeded to examine, with a critical eye, the mount of our men.The party in the carriage alighted, so Louisa dismounted and gave her bridle to her groom.Our eyes seldom wandered from each other, but we had little to say beyond a few commonplaces, yet at that bitter hour of parting our hearts were very full, and she stroked and petted my horse, saying almost to it the caressing things she dared not address to me.At last the final moment of departure came, and her eyes filled with irrepressible tears. Lord Slubber hurried forward to assist her to remount; but his tremulous hands failed him, or Louisa proved too large and ample; so I leaped from my horse, and took the office upon myself.Louisa bit her lip, and smiled at Slubber, with mingled sorrow and disdain in her expressive eye, as I put one arm caressingly around her, and swung her up, arranging to her complete satisfaction the ample skirt and padded stirrup for the prettiest foot and ankle that England ever produced, and they are better there than in boasted Andalusia.At that instant a hot tear from under her veil fell on my upturned face; and then it was that I contrived, unseen, to give her the lock of hair. It was in a tiny locket, the counterpart of that which I wore at my own neck. She just touched it with her lips, and slipped it into her bosom. Save Cora and myself, I think no one noticed the little action.Another moment, and I found the whole regiment in motion, and, preceded by the band of a dragoon guard corps, departing from the barrack square. Many of our men now unslung their lances, and brandished them, while chorusing, "Cheer, boys, cheer"—a song, the patriotism of which is somewhat equivocal, though the air is fine and stirring.Louisa accompanied me, riding by my side, to the gate. What we were saying, I know not now; but my heart was beating painfully. The scene around me seemed all confusion and phantasmagoria; the tramp of the horses, the crash of the band, with cymbals and kettledrums, the cheers of the soldiers and of the people, seemed faint and far away. I heard Louisa's voice alone.But now a loud and reiterated hurrah—the full, deep, hearty cheer of warmth and welcome, of joy or triumph, which comes best from English throats, and from English throats alone—rose from the multitudes without, as the head of the column defiled slowly through the street; and I must own that three hundred mounted lancers—all handsome young men, well horsed, and in gay uniform, blue faced with white, and with all their swallow-tailed red and white banneroles fluttering in the wind—presented a magnificent spectacle.Thousands of handkerchiefs were waved from the windows, and many laurel branches and flowers were flung among us. Other troops, both horse and foot, were on the march that morning, and the crash of other bands, heard at a distance, came over the sprouting cornfields and hop-gardens of beautiful Kent. I had pressed Louisa's hand for the last time, and she had returned to her friends. We had separated at last, and with all the love that welled up in our hearts, we had parted, as some one says, "without the last seal upon the ceremony of good-bye, which it is unlawful to administer in public to any but juvenile recipients."I was alone now, and yet not quite alone, for my uncle, though his military career had been confined to the ranks of the Kirkaldy troop of Yeomanry, accompanied me for some miles, mounted on a stout cover-hack, though sorely tempted to spur after some Highland regiment, whose bagpipes we heard ringing on some parallel road, as we marched along the highway to Tunbridge,en routefor Portsmouth, where our transports lay.Sir Nigel bade me farewell at Tunbridge, and turned to ride back to Chillingham Park, whither my heart went with him. The fine old man's voice faltered and his eyes grew very moist, as he pressed my hand for the last time, and reined aside his horse, looking among the troop for Willie Pitplado, whom he had known from infancy, and with whom he also shook hands."Good-bye, Willie," said he. "Remember you are your father's son. Dinna forget Calderwood Glen, and to stick to my nephew."Willie's heart was full, and as he gnawed his chin-strap to hide his emotion, I heard him send a farewell message to his father, the old keeper.And then, as the sturdy baronet rode slowly to the rear, adopting at once the old hunting seat, several of our lancers cheered him, for he was the last specimen of his class they would probably see for many a day to come.I now remembered, with keen reproach, that in the fulness of my emotion at parting from Louisa—in fact, the selfishness of my love—I had forgotten to bid adieu to Cora and to Lord Chillingham. About the latter omission I cared little; but to leave Cora—kind, affectionate Cora—whose sad and earnest face I seemed still to see, as she gazed so wistfully from the carriage window, and to leave her, it might be for ever, without a word of farewell, was a fault almost without remedy now.However, I lost no time in writing my excuses from our first halting-place, which was at Mayfield, though some of our troops remained at Tunbridge Wells, and others had to ride to the market town of Cranbrook for quarters and stabling. Proceeding through the great hop-growing district of England, we frequently marched between gardens, where the little plants were beginning to creep up those tall and slender poles of ash or chestnut, which (before the hops gain their full growth, in September) present so singular an appearance to a stranger's eye. When those green hops were gathered, and when the hop-queen was decorated in honour of the harvest home, we were moving towards the passage of the Alma. Kent was wearing its loveliest aspect now, in the full glory of hedgerows, copse, and meadows, in the last days of spring, under a clear blue sunlit sky. The birds, in myriads, filled the hedges with melody; the purple and white lilacs were already in full bloom, and the grass was spotted with snow-white daisies and golden buttercups, while primroses and violets grew wild by the side of the chalky and flinty roads.The quaint, tumble-down cottages, covered to their chimney tops with ivy, woodbine, and wild hop-leaves; the fair, smiling faces that peeped at us from their lozenged lattices; the sturdy fellows who lounged and smoked at the turnpike; the red wheeled waggons on the road; the laden wains, and the canvas-frocked yokels far a-field; the lowing cattle that browsed on the upland slope; the square white tower of the little village church on one side; the red-brick manor-house on the other, with all its gables and oriels peeping above the woodlands; the whistle of the distant railway train, and its white smoke curling up in the sunshine, were all indicative of happy, peaceful, and prosperous England, and of a soil long untrodden by a hostile foot. From every port in the United Kingdom; between Portsmouth and Aberdeen, troops were quickly departing now. Being cavalry, on our route through Kent, Sussex, and a little part of Hampshire, we overtook and passed several corps of infantry and artillery, which were marching by the same roads for the same place of embarkation, and stirring were the cheers with which we greeted each other.We remarked that the bands of the Scottish and Irish regiments were almost invariably playing the national quick marches peculiar to their own countries, while those of English corps played German, and even Yankee music.The Black Watch, the Cameron Highlanders, the Scotch Fusiliers, &c., stirred each other's hearts by such airs as "Scots wha hae," "Lochaber no more," and so forth; the Connaught Rangers and the 97th made the welkin ring to "Garryowen," and similar airs, which are more inspiring to the British soldier than those of Prussia or Austria can ever be; and, as our colonel remarked it, it would have been better taste had the English bands played the quicksteps of the sister countries than foreign airs, with which an Englishman can have no sympathy whatever.[*][*] The same defect was observed on that great day when Her Majesty distributed the Victoria Cross. The bands of the Guards played Scottish airs for the Highlanders, and "Rule Britannia" for the Marines; but otherwise "favoured the troops and the people with a great deal of German music, to which no attention was paid. National airs would have gratified both, and stirred up the patriotism of the people. The Enniskilling Dragoons and Rifles were chiefly composed of Irishmen; but the bands did not venture upon a single air peculiar to Ireland."—Nolan's History of the War, p. 770.I remembered a pleasant little incident during our march through Sussex. As we passed a village parsonage—a quaint old gable-ended house, secluded among moss-grown trees—the sound of our kettledrums and trumpets, the tramp of the horses, and the clatter of the chain bridles and steel scabbards, drew forth the inmates—an aged clergyman and his two daughters—to a green wicket in the close-clipped holly-hedge, where the group stood, as in a green frame of leaves, looking with deep interest at the passing lancers, who were riding in what was then the order—sections of three. White-haired and reverend, with his thin locks shining in the sun, the curate took off his hat, and lifted up his hands and eyes in a manner there could be no mistaking. The old man was evidently praying for us. His face was expressive of the finest emotion; he felt that he was looking on many a man he would never see again. Perhaps he had a son a soldier, or was himself a soldier's son; or he felt that he, though old and stricken with years, was destined to survive many of the young, the hale and hearty in our ranks, who were still "on life's morning march." Some of our officers lifted their caps and bowed to the little group, and I am sure that Frank Jocelyn kissed his hands to the girls, who were waving their handkerchiefs, while more than one of ours cried, "God bless you, old boy!" and frequently, long after, in the snows of Sebastopol and the terrors of the valley of death, the face and form of that good old man, and the kindness of his mute prayer, came to the memory of some of us. It formed one of our last and most pleasing incidents connected with England.In four days we reached Portsmouth, which presented a scene of indescribable bustle and activity; and the fifth day saw my troop, consisting of fifty men, with sixty horses, and with the colonel, Studhome, M'Goldrick, one surgeon, the sergeant-major, and rest of the staff, embarked from the dockyard jetty at eleven A.M., on board a splendid clipper ship, thePride of the Ocean, Captain Robert Binnacle, bound for Turkey. The other five troops of the corps were embarked on board the transportsGanges,Bannockburn, and other vessels.We had not been without hope of going in theHimalaya, which would have taken the entire regiment in her capacious womb, and which, moreover, is our only cavalry ship; but the authorities had declared otherwise.The morning of our embarkation was beautiful; the scene animated, picturesque, and bustling, such as Portsmouth alone could exhibit at such a time; but we were sorely troubled by our horses. Some were conveyed on board in stall-boxes, others were lowered down the hatches by bellybands and slings, in which, being spirited and young, they were very restive, lashing out, to the imminent danger of the brains and bones of those in their vicinity, until they found themselves in the tow-padded stalls below the maindeck.Adding to the bustle and interest of the scene, several ships of war were taking in stores and preparing for sea; boats, manned by seamen and marines in white jackets, were shooting to and fro between Portsmouth on one side and Gosport on the other. A strong detachment of the 19th (1st Yorkshire) Regiment was embarking on board theMelita, a Cunard steamer; theEuxine, a Peninsular and Oriental liner, was receiving many of the staff, a number of horses, and nearly twenty tons of ball cartridges. A squadron of the 8th, or Royal Irish Hussars, under Major de Salis, were stowing themselves on board of theMary Annetransport; and a great body of Woolwich Pensioners, a numerous staff of veterinary surgeons, members of the ambulance, ordnance, and transport corps, were all embarking at the same time. Thus the hurly-burly was prodigious, and the whole of the quays were encumbered by baggage, stores, field-pieces, mortars, shot and shell, chests of arms, tents and camp equipage, guarded by marines with fixed bayonets, or seamen with drawn cutlasses. With all this apparent activity there was, of course, the counteracting influence of that red-tapism which is the curse of the British service. When war was declared the Royal Arsenal did not contain a sufficient quantity of shells to furnish the first battering train that went to Turkey, and the fuses then issued had been in store ever since the battle of Waterloo! Even the mattocks and shovels issued to the troops had been sent home from the Peninsula by the Duke of Wellington as worthless!Here at Portsmouth we saw many a bitter—also to too many it proved a final—adieu. With all my soul I loved Louisa; and yet, when, standing on the dockyard jetty there, I saw the partings of husbands from their wives, and fathers from their children, I thanked Heaven in my heart that in this, to them, most bitter hour, I had only my good black charger to care for.Midday was past ere all the passengers for thePride of the Ocean, with their baggage, &c., were on board. I had personally to see the cattle stabled below; the men told off to their messes and watches; the lances, swords, and other arms stowed away in racks; the valises and hammocks slung to their cleats, and so forth. In the stables one stall on each side was left vacant, with spare slings, in case of accidents at sea.Fortunately, I was spared the annoyance of Berkeley's society on the voyage out, as there was not space for more than one troop on board the clipper; so he was with Wilford's on board theGanges. He was not exactly "in Coventry," but somehow our mess disliked him, and could not exactly comprehend, as they phrased it, "what was up" between him and me.Now that I was again in favour with Louisa Loftus; now that the untoward affair at the Reculvers had been completely explained, and that the victory was mine, and his the shame, defeat, and rejection—nearly all emotion of hostility against him had died away, or been replaced by settled contempt. Yet the hostile meeting was still looming in the future, and would have to ensue on the first suitable opportunity.I was not sorry when the bustle of embarkation was over, and the clipper was towed out to the famous reach or roadstead at Spithead, where she came to anchor for a time, under the shelter of the high lands of the Isle of Wight.The noblest army that ever left the shores of the British Isles was, undoubtedly, that which departed under Lord Raglan's orders for the East.It was the carefully-developed army of forty years of peace, during which the world had made a mighty stride in art, in science, and in civilization—greater than it had done, perhaps, between the days of the Twelfth Crusade and the last day of Waterloo."War," says Napier, in his "Peninsular History," "war tries the military framework; but it is in peace that the framework itself must be formed—otherwise barbarians would be the leading soldiers of the world. A perfect army can only be made by civil institutions."The same magnificent writer says elsewhere, with terrible truth, "In the beginning of each war England has to seek in blood the knowledge necessary to insure success; and like the fiend's progress towards Eden, her conquering course is through chaos, followed by Death!" and that such was her course in the Crimea, let the errors of general routine, the trenches of Sebastopol, and the criminal red-tapism at home bear witness.Of the morale of that army there can be no higher evidence than the voices that came from the poor fellows in our ranks—the letters with which they filled the newspapers of the day, detailing with spirit, simplicity, and pathos their humble experiences in the great events of the war.All our men loved Beverley, who was a model commanding officer, and my troop deemed themselves (as I did) peculiarly lucky in being with him and the head-quarters staff. He took great care of his regiment, and a strict supervision of the horses.He had left nothing undone while at home, by the establishment and encouragement of a school, a library, and so forth, to raise the moral tone of the lancers, their wives and families; hence some of the contributions of our privates to the newspapers were fully equal to any that emanated from Sir Colin's famous Highland Brigade. Beverley regularly visited the sick in hospital, and cheered them by his kindly manner; and all the little ones who played in the barrack square smiled and welcomed the approach of the colonel, who was seldom without a few small coins to scatter among them, and cause a scramble; yet, as I have said, he was somewhat of a dandy, and not without a tinge of affectation in his tone and manner.Next evening saw us at sea.The Nab Light had sunk far astern, and the pale cliffs of the Isle of Wight had melted into the world of waters.Old Jack Bloater, the pilot from Selsey, had drunk his last horn of grog at the binnacle, and left us with every wish for "an 'appy journey—a bong woyage, as the monseers called it, and that we would soon give them Roosians a skewerin'."And now I knew that many a day, and week, and month, it might be years, filled up by the perils and stormy passages of a life of campaigning, must inevitably pass ere I should again hear Louisa's voice, before I had her hand in mine, and looked into her tender eyes again—if I was kindly permitted by Heaven to return at all. But little knew our departing army of the suffering and horrors that were before it—horrors and sufferings to which the bayonets and bullets of the Russians were but child's play.I was now away from her finally, and without the least arrangement having been made for that which alone can soothe the agony and anxiety of such a separation—correspondence! I clung to the hope that she might write to me; if not, I could only hear of her from Cora, or perhaps when Miss Wilford wrote to her brother Fred; and, it might be, from some stray paragraph in theCourt JournalorMorning Post, if either ever found its way beyond the Dardanelles, which seemed doubtful.I had her treasured lock of hair and the miniature, on which I was never tired of gazing, especially when I could do so unseen in my swinging cot, for a crowded transport is the last place in the world for indulging in lover's dreams or reveries. It was a poor, feeble daguerreotype, yet there were times when, by force of imagination, the pictured face seemed to light up with Louisa's smile, and when the fine feminine features became filled by a blaze of light and life, so like the original that they became perfectly lovely.Then I would think of Cora, too, and when I reflected over all her bearing towards me, the light which broke upon me at first became clearer.Her tears when she first told Sir Nigel of her suspicion that I loved Louisa; her sudden changes of colour, from pallor to ruddy suffusion of the cheek; her hesitation in addressing me at times, her abruptness at others, or her silence; her vehemence in defending me against the accusations of Berkeley, and her joy at my victory; her occasional coldness to Louisa and her silent sorrow at my departure; all that had at any time puzzled me was explained now.Cora loved me with a love beyond that of cousin, and I must often have stabbed her good little heart by my impertinent confidences regarding my passion for another.Well, well, Cora's love and my regrets were alike vain now, for the swift clipper ship was running on a taut bowline by the skirts of Biscay's stormy bay, as she bore us on "to glory" and Gallipoli.CHAPTER XXV.A wet sheet and a flowing sea,A wind that follows fast,And fills the white and rustling sail,And bends the gallant mast.And bends the gallant mast, my boys.While, like the eagle free,Away the good ship flies, and leavesOld England on the lee.The cabin was spacious and comfortable. Binnacle, the skipper, was a short, thick-set little stump of a fellow, with a round, good-humoured face, which had become browned by exposure in every climate and on every sea under the sun. He was very anecdotical, perpetually joking and laughing, and had one peculiarity, that he never in conversation inter-larded his remarks with nautical phraseology, like the conventional or orthodox sailor of romance and the stage.He had never sailed before with a horse on board, and now that he had actually one hundred of those useful quadrupeds under his hatches, he spent a great deal of his spare time among them, tickling their ears and noses—more, perhaps, than some of them quite relished, if one might judge of the manner in which they occasionally showed the whites of their eyes, and lashed out at the rear end of their stall-boxes.On board we smoked, of course, played chess, loo (rouge-et-noir, a little), and daily watched with interest the steamers which passed us, full of troops, British or French, all on their way to the East. Some of us kept diaries and made memoranda for friends at home: but some grew tired of doing so, or reflected that they might not live to record that, on such a day, the white cliffs of old England were again in sight.We had quite a bale of the "Railway Library" on board; but to reading we preferred telling stories, to kill time, or watching, telescope in hand, for bits of continental scenery, as we ran along the coast of Portugal, spanned the Gulf of Cadiz, and hauled up for the Straits of Gibraltar, after passing the rocky promontory of Cape St. Vincent, which we saw rising from the sea north-north-east of us, about ten miles distant, on the fifth day after we sailed from Spithead.During the day we had not many leisure hours, as there is no situation in which troops more urgently require the personal superintendence of their officers than when on board ship.All the lancers were supplied with white canvas frocks, to save their uniforms, and were divided into three watches, each of which in turn was on deck, with at least one officer. We had an officer of the day and guard, who posted sentinels, armed with the sword, at the breaks of the poop and forecastle, to maintain order, and, when the weather permitted, we had an hour of carbine and sword exercise, to the great edification of Captain Binnacle and his crew. Every morning the bedding was brought on deck and triced in nettings alongside; no smoking was permitted in the stables or between decks.The cattle were of course our chief care, and Beverley was always particular about his mounts. Experience and theory had long convinced him that the sire dominated in the breed of chargers; thus he ever eschewed the produce of half-bred stallions and stud horses. We gave them mashes dashed with nitre, and mixed bran with their corn; daily we had their hoofs and fetlocks washed in clean salt water, their eyes and noses sponged, and when at times the windsails failed to act, and the hold became close, we washed the mangers with vinegar and water, and sponged the horses' nostrils with the same refreshing dilution.Notwithstanding all our care, however, before we sighted Malta we lost three—one of which was my uncle's present, the black cover-hack with the white star on her counter. It became glandered.Pitblado, who had seen the nag foaled, and had many a day taken it to graze in Falkland Park, and on the green slopes of the Mid Lomond, flatly refused to shoot it when I ordered him to do so, but gave his loaded carbine to Lanty O'Regan, who had fewer scruples on the subject.When this episode occurred, Cape Espartel was bearing south-east of us, about twelve miles distant; and by our glasses we could distinctly see the features of that remarkable headland of Morocco, the north-western extremity of the mighty continent of Africa, with its range of basaltic columns, which nearly rival in magnificence those of Fingal's Cave at Staffa; and the noon of the following day, as we bore into the Mediterranean, saw the great peak of Gibraltar rising from the horizon like a couchant lion, with its tail turned to Spain.When my poor nag, previous to its slaughter, was being slung up from the hold, Beverley was much impressed by the real grief of honest Pitblado for its loss; and told me an interesting Indian anecdote of a pet horse that belonged to the 8th Royal Irish Hussars.Beverley seldom spoke of India, for it was a land that was not without sorrowful recollections to him; and we all knew that he wore at his neck a large gold locket, containing a braid of the hair of his intended bride—a lovely girl, who was shot in his arms, and when seated on his saddle, as he was spurring with his troop through the horrors and the carnage of the Khyber Pass—on that day when nearly our whole 44th Regiment perished—and poor Beverley, with her dead body, fell into the hands of the Afghans."When we last went out to India," said he, "that was when I was but a cornet of sixteen, and several years before you joined us, we relieved the 8th Royal Irish, who had been there long—I know not how many years, but time enough to gain on their coloursPristinæ virtutis memores, with 'Leswaree,' and 'Hindostan'—honours which they shared with the old 25th Light Dragoons,[*] for five-and-twenty years was then the common term of Indian expatriation.
[*] This circumstance delayed for a time the appearance of the Greys in the ranks of the allied army. They departed from Nottingham in July, 1854, with their band playing "Scots wha hae," &c.
"Your route will be a long but very pleasant one, by classic seas and classic shores," said Louisa. "Shall we trace it on the map of the Mediterranean, in the library? Come, Cora."
There was a tremulous change in her voice, and a glance in her eye that I could not mistake.
Quitting the drawing-room unnoticed by our seniors, we stepped into the library, the oak shelves of which were loaded with books of all sizes in glittering bindings, more seemingly for show than use, and approaching the large stand of maps on horizontal rollers, we drew down that of the Mediterranean, while Cora, whose good little heart forboded that we needed not her geographical aid, eyed us wistfully for a second, and passed out by a door beyond.
The library had green-shaded lamps, which were half lighted; thus we were almost concealed in shadow, and the huge cloth-mounted map we affected to examine hung before us like a friendly screen. We had but a few stolen moments for conversation, and one impulse animated us.
I turned to Louisa; her face drew closer to mine, and our lips met in one long, long passionate kiss—such a kiss as if our souls were there.
"You understand all, now, Louisa?" said I.
"All," she said, in the same breathless voice.
"And forgive all—about that poor girl, I mean. How appearances were against me!"
"Oh yes, dear, dear Newton."
"And you love me?"
"Oh, Newton!"
"You love me still?"
"Can you ask me while petting me thus? You have felt our separation since those few happy days at Calderwood?"
"As a living death, Louisa. Worse than anticipations of the greater separation that is to come."
"With all its dangers!" she said, with her eyes now full of tears.
"Yes; for whatever happens I shall feel assured——"
"That your poor Louisa loves you still—loves you dearly, Newton; and ere you go to-night you must give me a lock of your hair."
Her head on my shoulder; her pale brow against my cheek, her lips were close to mine.
"Till we are both in our graves, dear Newton, you can never, never know how much I love you, and the agony that Berkeley's cunning cost me."
These were blessed words to hear—blessed words to treasure in the distant land to which I was going; and in a silence more eloquent than words, I could but press her to my heart.
This was indeed a moment of reunion, never to be forgotten, but to be treasured in the secret recesses of the soul, and recalled only at times; and times there were when I recalled it, when far, far away, in the lonely watches of those dark nights, when the chafing of the Black Sea was heard afar off on the rocks of Fort Constantine, and the thunder of Sebastopol was close and nigh; and then the vague, undefined memory of the place, the time, her voice, her eyes, and her kiss, would come gradually back, filling my heart with intense melancholy, and my eyes with tears.
In my doubt of the future, in my fear of ensnarements, and the exercise of parental authority (a power of which we stand in such awe in Scotland), and lest, by an unforeseen chance or circumstance, I should lose her, I actually besought her, in what terms it is impossible to remember now, to consent to a private marriage; and strange ideas of written promises and protestations, of blood mingled with wine, and many other melodramatic absurdities, occurred to me.
"Ah, no, no," said she, rousing herself to the occasion. "There will be time enough when you return."
"If I ever do return," said I, impetuously, thinking of the chances of war, and my certain hostile meeting with Berkeley.
"You must return, dear Newton—you shall, and I feel it in my heart."
"And there will be time——"
"For me," she interrupted, "to be cried, as Lydia Languish says, 'three times in a parish church', and have an enormously fat parish clerk ask the consent of every butcher in the parish to join in lawful wedlock Newton Calderwood Norcliff, bachelor, and Louisa Loftus, spinster; unless we have a special licence, St. George's, Hanover Square, and the Bishop of London in his lawn sleeves, and so forth."
This sudden change of manner at such a time startled and distressed me.
"It is her way—a mistaken lightness of manner," thought I.
But, alas! I was yet to learn some terrible lessons in the treachery of the human heart!
Another brief and mute embrace, and we had just time to veil our mutual agitation and turn our attention to the outspread map of the Mediterranean, affecting to trace the distance from Cagliari to Malta, when we heard the voice of Lord Chillingham saying to Sir Nigel—
"Here they are, reviving their geography apparently. Captain Norcliff," he added, "here is a note for you which has just been brought by an orderly dragoon."
"Thanks, my lord. Is he waiting?"
"No, sir," said the servant, who presented it to me on a chased silver salver; "he immediately wheeled round his horse and galloped off."
"Permit me," said I, tearing it open.
It had been hurriedly pencilled by Frank Jocelyn, and ran thus:—
"MY DEAR NORCLIFF,—The lieutenant-colonel in command of the consolidated depôts here informs me that the route for ours is at Maidstone, for which place the troop must march by daybreak to-morrow. Sorry to disturb your dinner-party; but now the word is 'Eastward ho!'"
I handed it first to Louisa, and for a moment my voice failed me; but rallying, I said—"I have to apologize for a hasty departure, and shall thank you, my lord, to order my horse."
Much that followed was confusion. I can remember my good uncle shaking me repeatedly by the hand, and patting me on the epaulettes (we were like officers then, and had epaulettes on our shoulders). Cora wept a great deal; Louisa was quite silent and very pale. Our parting scene passed away like a dissolving view; but the bitterness was somewhat taken from it by the whole party promising to "drive or ride over to Maidstone and see us march out;" and so, with a kind adieu from all, I sprang on my horse, quitted Chillingham Park, and soon reached the barracks, where I found Jocelyn in my quarters awaiting me, and Willie Pitblado, who had already relinquished his livery for his lancer uniform, whistling vigorously as he packed and buckled up my traps.
Away from Louisa, I had no relief now for my mind but intense activity.
In the dull grey light of the next morning I quitted Canterbury with my troop for Maidstone, into which we were played by our own band, which came a mile or two on the Rochester Road to meet us.
There I learned from Colonel Beverley that, on the following day, we should march to join the expedition destined for the defence of Turkey.
CHAPTER XXIV.
Now, brave boys, we're bound for marchin',Both to Portingale and Spain;Drums are batin', colours flyin',And the divil a back we'll come again.So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!Eighty-eighth and Inniskillin',Boys that's able, boys that's willin';Faugh-a-ballagh and County Down,Stand by the harp, and stand by the crown.So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!The colonel cries, "Boys, are yee's ready?""We're at your back, sir, firm and steady;Our pouches filled with balls and poulther,And a firelock sloped on every shoulther."So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!
Now, brave boys, we're bound for marchin',Both to Portingale and Spain;Drums are batin', colours flyin',And the divil a back we'll come again.So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!
Now, brave boys, we're bound for marchin',
Both to Portingale and Spain;
Both to Portingale and Spain;
Drums are batin', colours flyin',
And the divil a back we'll come again.So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!
And the divil a back we'll come again.
So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!
So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!
Eighty-eighth and Inniskillin',Boys that's able, boys that's willin';Faugh-a-ballagh and County Down,Stand by the harp, and stand by the crown.So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!
Eighty-eighth and Inniskillin',
Boys that's able, boys that's willin';
Boys that's able, boys that's willin';
Faugh-a-ballagh and County Down,
Stand by the harp, and stand by the crown.So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!
Stand by the harp, and stand by the crown.
So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!
So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!
The colonel cries, "Boys, are yee's ready?""We're at your back, sir, firm and steady;Our pouches filled with balls and poulther,And a firelock sloped on every shoulther."So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!
The colonel cries, "Boys, are yee's ready?"
"We're at your back, sir, firm and steady;
"We're at your back, sir, firm and steady;
Our pouches filled with balls and poulther,
And a firelock sloped on every shoulther."So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!
And a firelock sloped on every shoulther."
So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!
So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!
Such was the doggrel ditty—some camp song of the brave old Peninsular days—with which I heard my Irish groom, Larity O'Regan, solacing himself in the grey light of the early morning, as he rubbed down my charger, and buckled his gay trappings, in the dawn of the, to me, eventful 22nd of April. How I envied that man's lightness of heart! Perhaps he had a mother in a thatched cabin in some brown Irish bog far away; sisters, too; it might be a sweetheart—some grey-eyed and black-haired Biddy, or Nora. If so, they occasioned him but little regret then; and light-hearted Lanty's queer song and jovial bearing went far to rouse my own spirit as I mounted the gallant dark horse that was to bear me in the fields of the future.
The regiment, mustering about three hundred men of all ranks, came rapidly from the stables, under the eye of Studhome, and that ubiquitous and indefatigable non-commissioned officer, Sergeant-Major Drillem. The sun had not yet risen, but the barrack windows were crowded by the men of other corps to witness our departure. Their own turn would soon arrive.
Wilford informed me that the route[*] had come suddenly, when the regiment was in church, and it was first announced by the chaplain from the pulpit. The sanctity of the place alone restrained the cheers of the lancers, but not the sobs of the women; and he added, that by a singular coincidence, the text the chaplain had chosen for his sermon was from Proverbs xxvii. 1—"Boast not thyself of to-morrow, for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth."
[*] Order for marching.
As the trumpets blew the assembly on this auspicious morning, their sound seemed different—more warlike in fact than usual—a portion of the great movement in which the fate of Europe, and certainly of many a poor human being, was involved.
As yet Lionel Beverley, our lieutenant-colonel, who wore his Cross of the Bath, was the only decorated man among us (save a few Indian medals); but a rich crop of such tributes was to be reaped in the land to which we were going.
Our plumes had been laid aside, glazed covers were on our square-crowned caps, and officers and privates alike had canvas havresacks and wooden canteens slung over the right shoulder; some of the former had telescopes and courier-bags; but all betokened coming service and preparation for it.
Our horses were nearly all of a deep dark bay colour, save those of the band and trumpeters, many of which were white, or spotted grey. The guidons were all uncased; each was of white silk (the colour of our facings), embroidered with gold, measuring three feet long by twenty-one inches on the lance, which was ten feet in length—the regulation for light cavalry. On the flank of its troop each standard was now flying in the morning wind.
On this occasion there were, as usual at such times, many of the fair sex interested in our departure. There was much weeping among many wives, and certainly among a great number of "very foolish virgins," as Studhome designated them. Many of the soldiers' wives were mingling in the ranks, and, fearless of the horses' hoofs, were holding up their infants for the last kiss of many a poor father who was to find his grave in the land to which we were departing; and there were many painful separations among those who were destined never to meet again.
I remember a sergeant of Wilford's troop, whose wife had recently presented him with a baby. The latter died suddenly on the night before we were to march, and, by a singular coincidence, the little thing's cradle and coffin were brought into barracks together next morning, but poor Sergeant Dashwood had to mount and leave his weeping wife and unburied little one behind him.
He was one of the first who fell at the passage of the Alma.
There was, on the other hand, much heedless jesting and idle levity.
"This time," said Wilford, to the group of officers who were gathered round Beverley, "we shall do a portion of the Mediterranean, the entire Levant, and Dardanelles, at her Majesty's expense, and without the aid of Bradshaw or John Murray."
"So we are actually going at last," lisped Jocelyn, while playing with his horse's mane.
"Ah! but we leave our representatives behind."
"How, Travers?"
"In a squad of light infantry in arms, no doubt," replied Travers, a handsome fellow, with a clear blue eye and long fair moustache. He had the reputation of being the most rakish fellow in the regiment, and could not resist perpetrating the old dragoon joke.
"How clumsily we English show grief," I heard Berkeley say, as he witnessed a very affecting parting between a mother and her son. "Hear how that old—aw—woman is permitting herself to howl."
"Anything is better than having every natural emotion subdued and snubbed from childhood, as among us in Scotland," thought I.
Soldiers muster and march at all times merrily. Care cumbers them but little and briefly, for "with them the present is everything, the past a point, the future a blank. The greeting of surviving friends is seldom embittered by the recollection of those who are no more, and in a life of danger and casualty this is natural."
Already the advanced guard had been detailed and thrown out, under young Sir Henry Scarlett. The crowd in and about the barracks was great. Many carriages full of fashionables from Canterbury, Tunbridge, and elsewhere, were arriving, for the double purpose of getting up an appetite for breakfast and seeing us depart; but I saw nothing of my friends, for whom I was looking anxiously—so much so that Studhome said, laughingly, as he rode past—
"Come, look alive, Norcliff, and get your troop into shape. There is no such spoon in the service, or out of it, as an 'engaged man.'"
At another time I might have resented Jack's banter, but Beverley wheeled the regiment from open column into line, and opened the ranks, as the commandant of Maidstone cantered in, with his staff, their plumes waving and epaulettes glittering. Then, from line, we were formed in close column in rear of the leading troop, for the delivery of an address, of which I did not hear one word, for just as the commandant took off his cocked hat and began his oration Lord Chillingham's carriage, preceded by two outriders, drove in, I perceived that it was occupied by Cora, Lord Chillingham, and Lord Slubber. My uncle and Lady Louisa, who were on horseback, came at once close up to me.
My pale love looked tenderly at me, and her dark eyes bore unmistakable traces of recent tears, or was it the long ride in the morning wind which had inflamed them? All emotion, however, was subdued now, which was well, as her rare beauty, her bearing and seat in the saddle, attracted the eyes of half the regiment, seriously damaging the interest of the old commandant's address; and my uncle, after warmly shaking my hand, proceeded to examine, with a critical eye, the mount of our men.
The party in the carriage alighted, so Louisa dismounted and gave her bridle to her groom.
Our eyes seldom wandered from each other, but we had little to say beyond a few commonplaces, yet at that bitter hour of parting our hearts were very full, and she stroked and petted my horse, saying almost to it the caressing things she dared not address to me.
At last the final moment of departure came, and her eyes filled with irrepressible tears. Lord Slubber hurried forward to assist her to remount; but his tremulous hands failed him, or Louisa proved too large and ample; so I leaped from my horse, and took the office upon myself.
Louisa bit her lip, and smiled at Slubber, with mingled sorrow and disdain in her expressive eye, as I put one arm caressingly around her, and swung her up, arranging to her complete satisfaction the ample skirt and padded stirrup for the prettiest foot and ankle that England ever produced, and they are better there than in boasted Andalusia.
At that instant a hot tear from under her veil fell on my upturned face; and then it was that I contrived, unseen, to give her the lock of hair. It was in a tiny locket, the counterpart of that which I wore at my own neck. She just touched it with her lips, and slipped it into her bosom. Save Cora and myself, I think no one noticed the little action.
Another moment, and I found the whole regiment in motion, and, preceded by the band of a dragoon guard corps, departing from the barrack square. Many of our men now unslung their lances, and brandished them, while chorusing, "Cheer, boys, cheer"—a song, the patriotism of which is somewhat equivocal, though the air is fine and stirring.
Louisa accompanied me, riding by my side, to the gate. What we were saying, I know not now; but my heart was beating painfully. The scene around me seemed all confusion and phantasmagoria; the tramp of the horses, the crash of the band, with cymbals and kettledrums, the cheers of the soldiers and of the people, seemed faint and far away. I heard Louisa's voice alone.
But now a loud and reiterated hurrah—the full, deep, hearty cheer of warmth and welcome, of joy or triumph, which comes best from English throats, and from English throats alone—rose from the multitudes without, as the head of the column defiled slowly through the street; and I must own that three hundred mounted lancers—all handsome young men, well horsed, and in gay uniform, blue faced with white, and with all their swallow-tailed red and white banneroles fluttering in the wind—presented a magnificent spectacle.
Thousands of handkerchiefs were waved from the windows, and many laurel branches and flowers were flung among us. Other troops, both horse and foot, were on the march that morning, and the crash of other bands, heard at a distance, came over the sprouting cornfields and hop-gardens of beautiful Kent. I had pressed Louisa's hand for the last time, and she had returned to her friends. We had separated at last, and with all the love that welled up in our hearts, we had parted, as some one says, "without the last seal upon the ceremony of good-bye, which it is unlawful to administer in public to any but juvenile recipients."
I was alone now, and yet not quite alone, for my uncle, though his military career had been confined to the ranks of the Kirkaldy troop of Yeomanry, accompanied me for some miles, mounted on a stout cover-hack, though sorely tempted to spur after some Highland regiment, whose bagpipes we heard ringing on some parallel road, as we marched along the highway to Tunbridge,en routefor Portsmouth, where our transports lay.
Sir Nigel bade me farewell at Tunbridge, and turned to ride back to Chillingham Park, whither my heart went with him. The fine old man's voice faltered and his eyes grew very moist, as he pressed my hand for the last time, and reined aside his horse, looking among the troop for Willie Pitplado, whom he had known from infancy, and with whom he also shook hands.
"Good-bye, Willie," said he. "Remember you are your father's son. Dinna forget Calderwood Glen, and to stick to my nephew."
Willie's heart was full, and as he gnawed his chin-strap to hide his emotion, I heard him send a farewell message to his father, the old keeper.
And then, as the sturdy baronet rode slowly to the rear, adopting at once the old hunting seat, several of our lancers cheered him, for he was the last specimen of his class they would probably see for many a day to come.
I now remembered, with keen reproach, that in the fulness of my emotion at parting from Louisa—in fact, the selfishness of my love—I had forgotten to bid adieu to Cora and to Lord Chillingham. About the latter omission I cared little; but to leave Cora—kind, affectionate Cora—whose sad and earnest face I seemed still to see, as she gazed so wistfully from the carriage window, and to leave her, it might be for ever, without a word of farewell, was a fault almost without remedy now.
However, I lost no time in writing my excuses from our first halting-place, which was at Mayfield, though some of our troops remained at Tunbridge Wells, and others had to ride to the market town of Cranbrook for quarters and stabling. Proceeding through the great hop-growing district of England, we frequently marched between gardens, where the little plants were beginning to creep up those tall and slender poles of ash or chestnut, which (before the hops gain their full growth, in September) present so singular an appearance to a stranger's eye. When those green hops were gathered, and when the hop-queen was decorated in honour of the harvest home, we were moving towards the passage of the Alma. Kent was wearing its loveliest aspect now, in the full glory of hedgerows, copse, and meadows, in the last days of spring, under a clear blue sunlit sky. The birds, in myriads, filled the hedges with melody; the purple and white lilacs were already in full bloom, and the grass was spotted with snow-white daisies and golden buttercups, while primroses and violets grew wild by the side of the chalky and flinty roads.
The quaint, tumble-down cottages, covered to their chimney tops with ivy, woodbine, and wild hop-leaves; the fair, smiling faces that peeped at us from their lozenged lattices; the sturdy fellows who lounged and smoked at the turnpike; the red wheeled waggons on the road; the laden wains, and the canvas-frocked yokels far a-field; the lowing cattle that browsed on the upland slope; the square white tower of the little village church on one side; the red-brick manor-house on the other, with all its gables and oriels peeping above the woodlands; the whistle of the distant railway train, and its white smoke curling up in the sunshine, were all indicative of happy, peaceful, and prosperous England, and of a soil long untrodden by a hostile foot. From every port in the United Kingdom; between Portsmouth and Aberdeen, troops were quickly departing now. Being cavalry, on our route through Kent, Sussex, and a little part of Hampshire, we overtook and passed several corps of infantry and artillery, which were marching by the same roads for the same place of embarkation, and stirring were the cheers with which we greeted each other.
We remarked that the bands of the Scottish and Irish regiments were almost invariably playing the national quick marches peculiar to their own countries, while those of English corps played German, and even Yankee music.
The Black Watch, the Cameron Highlanders, the Scotch Fusiliers, &c., stirred each other's hearts by such airs as "Scots wha hae," "Lochaber no more," and so forth; the Connaught Rangers and the 97th made the welkin ring to "Garryowen," and similar airs, which are more inspiring to the British soldier than those of Prussia or Austria can ever be; and, as our colonel remarked it, it would have been better taste had the English bands played the quicksteps of the sister countries than foreign airs, with which an Englishman can have no sympathy whatever.[*]
[*] The same defect was observed on that great day when Her Majesty distributed the Victoria Cross. The bands of the Guards played Scottish airs for the Highlanders, and "Rule Britannia" for the Marines; but otherwise "favoured the troops and the people with a great deal of German music, to which no attention was paid. National airs would have gratified both, and stirred up the patriotism of the people. The Enniskilling Dragoons and Rifles were chiefly composed of Irishmen; but the bands did not venture upon a single air peculiar to Ireland."—Nolan's History of the War, p. 770.
I remembered a pleasant little incident during our march through Sussex. As we passed a village parsonage—a quaint old gable-ended house, secluded among moss-grown trees—the sound of our kettledrums and trumpets, the tramp of the horses, and the clatter of the chain bridles and steel scabbards, drew forth the inmates—an aged clergyman and his two daughters—to a green wicket in the close-clipped holly-hedge, where the group stood, as in a green frame of leaves, looking with deep interest at the passing lancers, who were riding in what was then the order—sections of three. White-haired and reverend, with his thin locks shining in the sun, the curate took off his hat, and lifted up his hands and eyes in a manner there could be no mistaking. The old man was evidently praying for us. His face was expressive of the finest emotion; he felt that he was looking on many a man he would never see again. Perhaps he had a son a soldier, or was himself a soldier's son; or he felt that he, though old and stricken with years, was destined to survive many of the young, the hale and hearty in our ranks, who were still "on life's morning march." Some of our officers lifted their caps and bowed to the little group, and I am sure that Frank Jocelyn kissed his hands to the girls, who were waving their handkerchiefs, while more than one of ours cried, "God bless you, old boy!" and frequently, long after, in the snows of Sebastopol and the terrors of the valley of death, the face and form of that good old man, and the kindness of his mute prayer, came to the memory of some of us. It formed one of our last and most pleasing incidents connected with England.
In four days we reached Portsmouth, which presented a scene of indescribable bustle and activity; and the fifth day saw my troop, consisting of fifty men, with sixty horses, and with the colonel, Studhome, M'Goldrick, one surgeon, the sergeant-major, and rest of the staff, embarked from the dockyard jetty at eleven A.M., on board a splendid clipper ship, thePride of the Ocean, Captain Robert Binnacle, bound for Turkey. The other five troops of the corps were embarked on board the transportsGanges,Bannockburn, and other vessels.
We had not been without hope of going in theHimalaya, which would have taken the entire regiment in her capacious womb, and which, moreover, is our only cavalry ship; but the authorities had declared otherwise.
The morning of our embarkation was beautiful; the scene animated, picturesque, and bustling, such as Portsmouth alone could exhibit at such a time; but we were sorely troubled by our horses. Some were conveyed on board in stall-boxes, others were lowered down the hatches by bellybands and slings, in which, being spirited and young, they were very restive, lashing out, to the imminent danger of the brains and bones of those in their vicinity, until they found themselves in the tow-padded stalls below the maindeck.
Adding to the bustle and interest of the scene, several ships of war were taking in stores and preparing for sea; boats, manned by seamen and marines in white jackets, were shooting to and fro between Portsmouth on one side and Gosport on the other. A strong detachment of the 19th (1st Yorkshire) Regiment was embarking on board theMelita, a Cunard steamer; theEuxine, a Peninsular and Oriental liner, was receiving many of the staff, a number of horses, and nearly twenty tons of ball cartridges. A squadron of the 8th, or Royal Irish Hussars, under Major de Salis, were stowing themselves on board of theMary Annetransport; and a great body of Woolwich Pensioners, a numerous staff of veterinary surgeons, members of the ambulance, ordnance, and transport corps, were all embarking at the same time. Thus the hurly-burly was prodigious, and the whole of the quays were encumbered by baggage, stores, field-pieces, mortars, shot and shell, chests of arms, tents and camp equipage, guarded by marines with fixed bayonets, or seamen with drawn cutlasses. With all this apparent activity there was, of course, the counteracting influence of that red-tapism which is the curse of the British service. When war was declared the Royal Arsenal did not contain a sufficient quantity of shells to furnish the first battering train that went to Turkey, and the fuses then issued had been in store ever since the battle of Waterloo! Even the mattocks and shovels issued to the troops had been sent home from the Peninsula by the Duke of Wellington as worthless!
Here at Portsmouth we saw many a bitter—also to too many it proved a final—adieu. With all my soul I loved Louisa; and yet, when, standing on the dockyard jetty there, I saw the partings of husbands from their wives, and fathers from their children, I thanked Heaven in my heart that in this, to them, most bitter hour, I had only my good black charger to care for.
Midday was past ere all the passengers for thePride of the Ocean, with their baggage, &c., were on board. I had personally to see the cattle stabled below; the men told off to their messes and watches; the lances, swords, and other arms stowed away in racks; the valises and hammocks slung to their cleats, and so forth. In the stables one stall on each side was left vacant, with spare slings, in case of accidents at sea.
Fortunately, I was spared the annoyance of Berkeley's society on the voyage out, as there was not space for more than one troop on board the clipper; so he was with Wilford's on board theGanges. He was not exactly "in Coventry," but somehow our mess disliked him, and could not exactly comprehend, as they phrased it, "what was up" between him and me.
Now that I was again in favour with Louisa Loftus; now that the untoward affair at the Reculvers had been completely explained, and that the victory was mine, and his the shame, defeat, and rejection—nearly all emotion of hostility against him had died away, or been replaced by settled contempt. Yet the hostile meeting was still looming in the future, and would have to ensue on the first suitable opportunity.
I was not sorry when the bustle of embarkation was over, and the clipper was towed out to the famous reach or roadstead at Spithead, where she came to anchor for a time, under the shelter of the high lands of the Isle of Wight.
The noblest army that ever left the shores of the British Isles was, undoubtedly, that which departed under Lord Raglan's orders for the East.
It was the carefully-developed army of forty years of peace, during which the world had made a mighty stride in art, in science, and in civilization—greater than it had done, perhaps, between the days of the Twelfth Crusade and the last day of Waterloo.
"War," says Napier, in his "Peninsular History," "war tries the military framework; but it is in peace that the framework itself must be formed—otherwise barbarians would be the leading soldiers of the world. A perfect army can only be made by civil institutions."
The same magnificent writer says elsewhere, with terrible truth, "In the beginning of each war England has to seek in blood the knowledge necessary to insure success; and like the fiend's progress towards Eden, her conquering course is through chaos, followed by Death!" and that such was her course in the Crimea, let the errors of general routine, the trenches of Sebastopol, and the criminal red-tapism at home bear witness.
Of the morale of that army there can be no higher evidence than the voices that came from the poor fellows in our ranks—the letters with which they filled the newspapers of the day, detailing with spirit, simplicity, and pathos their humble experiences in the great events of the war.
All our men loved Beverley, who was a model commanding officer, and my troop deemed themselves (as I did) peculiarly lucky in being with him and the head-quarters staff. He took great care of his regiment, and a strict supervision of the horses.
He had left nothing undone while at home, by the establishment and encouragement of a school, a library, and so forth, to raise the moral tone of the lancers, their wives and families; hence some of the contributions of our privates to the newspapers were fully equal to any that emanated from Sir Colin's famous Highland Brigade. Beverley regularly visited the sick in hospital, and cheered them by his kindly manner; and all the little ones who played in the barrack square smiled and welcomed the approach of the colonel, who was seldom without a few small coins to scatter among them, and cause a scramble; yet, as I have said, he was somewhat of a dandy, and not without a tinge of affectation in his tone and manner.
Next evening saw us at sea.
The Nab Light had sunk far astern, and the pale cliffs of the Isle of Wight had melted into the world of waters.
Old Jack Bloater, the pilot from Selsey, had drunk his last horn of grog at the binnacle, and left us with every wish for "an 'appy journey—a bong woyage, as the monseers called it, and that we would soon give them Roosians a skewerin'."
And now I knew that many a day, and week, and month, it might be years, filled up by the perils and stormy passages of a life of campaigning, must inevitably pass ere I should again hear Louisa's voice, before I had her hand in mine, and looked into her tender eyes again—if I was kindly permitted by Heaven to return at all. But little knew our departing army of the suffering and horrors that were before it—horrors and sufferings to which the bayonets and bullets of the Russians were but child's play.
I was now away from her finally, and without the least arrangement having been made for that which alone can soothe the agony and anxiety of such a separation—correspondence! I clung to the hope that she might write to me; if not, I could only hear of her from Cora, or perhaps when Miss Wilford wrote to her brother Fred; and, it might be, from some stray paragraph in theCourt JournalorMorning Post, if either ever found its way beyond the Dardanelles, which seemed doubtful.
I had her treasured lock of hair and the miniature, on which I was never tired of gazing, especially when I could do so unseen in my swinging cot, for a crowded transport is the last place in the world for indulging in lover's dreams or reveries. It was a poor, feeble daguerreotype, yet there were times when, by force of imagination, the pictured face seemed to light up with Louisa's smile, and when the fine feminine features became filled by a blaze of light and life, so like the original that they became perfectly lovely.
Then I would think of Cora, too, and when I reflected over all her bearing towards me, the light which broke upon me at first became clearer.
Her tears when she first told Sir Nigel of her suspicion that I loved Louisa; her sudden changes of colour, from pallor to ruddy suffusion of the cheek; her hesitation in addressing me at times, her abruptness at others, or her silence; her vehemence in defending me against the accusations of Berkeley, and her joy at my victory; her occasional coldness to Louisa and her silent sorrow at my departure; all that had at any time puzzled me was explained now.
Cora loved me with a love beyond that of cousin, and I must often have stabbed her good little heart by my impertinent confidences regarding my passion for another.
Well, well, Cora's love and my regrets were alike vain now, for the swift clipper ship was running on a taut bowline by the skirts of Biscay's stormy bay, as she bore us on "to glory" and Gallipoli.
CHAPTER XXV.
A wet sheet and a flowing sea,A wind that follows fast,And fills the white and rustling sail,And bends the gallant mast.And bends the gallant mast, my boys.While, like the eagle free,Away the good ship flies, and leavesOld England on the lee.
A wet sheet and a flowing sea,A wind that follows fast,And fills the white and rustling sail,And bends the gallant mast.And bends the gallant mast, my boys.While, like the eagle free,Away the good ship flies, and leavesOld England on the lee.
A wet sheet and a flowing sea,
A wind that follows fast,
A wind that follows fast,
And fills the white and rustling sail,
And bends the gallant mast.
And bends the gallant mast.
And bends the gallant mast, my boys.
While, like the eagle free,
While, like the eagle free,
Away the good ship flies, and leaves
Old England on the lee.
Old England on the lee.
The cabin was spacious and comfortable. Binnacle, the skipper, was a short, thick-set little stump of a fellow, with a round, good-humoured face, which had become browned by exposure in every climate and on every sea under the sun. He was very anecdotical, perpetually joking and laughing, and had one peculiarity, that he never in conversation inter-larded his remarks with nautical phraseology, like the conventional or orthodox sailor of romance and the stage.
He had never sailed before with a horse on board, and now that he had actually one hundred of those useful quadrupeds under his hatches, he spent a great deal of his spare time among them, tickling their ears and noses—more, perhaps, than some of them quite relished, if one might judge of the manner in which they occasionally showed the whites of their eyes, and lashed out at the rear end of their stall-boxes.
On board we smoked, of course, played chess, loo (rouge-et-noir, a little), and daily watched with interest the steamers which passed us, full of troops, British or French, all on their way to the East. Some of us kept diaries and made memoranda for friends at home: but some grew tired of doing so, or reflected that they might not live to record that, on such a day, the white cliffs of old England were again in sight.
We had quite a bale of the "Railway Library" on board; but to reading we preferred telling stories, to kill time, or watching, telescope in hand, for bits of continental scenery, as we ran along the coast of Portugal, spanned the Gulf of Cadiz, and hauled up for the Straits of Gibraltar, after passing the rocky promontory of Cape St. Vincent, which we saw rising from the sea north-north-east of us, about ten miles distant, on the fifth day after we sailed from Spithead.
During the day we had not many leisure hours, as there is no situation in which troops more urgently require the personal superintendence of their officers than when on board ship.
All the lancers were supplied with white canvas frocks, to save their uniforms, and were divided into three watches, each of which in turn was on deck, with at least one officer. We had an officer of the day and guard, who posted sentinels, armed with the sword, at the breaks of the poop and forecastle, to maintain order, and, when the weather permitted, we had an hour of carbine and sword exercise, to the great edification of Captain Binnacle and his crew. Every morning the bedding was brought on deck and triced in nettings alongside; no smoking was permitted in the stables or between decks.
The cattle were of course our chief care, and Beverley was always particular about his mounts. Experience and theory had long convinced him that the sire dominated in the breed of chargers; thus he ever eschewed the produce of half-bred stallions and stud horses. We gave them mashes dashed with nitre, and mixed bran with their corn; daily we had their hoofs and fetlocks washed in clean salt water, their eyes and noses sponged, and when at times the windsails failed to act, and the hold became close, we washed the mangers with vinegar and water, and sponged the horses' nostrils with the same refreshing dilution.
Notwithstanding all our care, however, before we sighted Malta we lost three—one of which was my uncle's present, the black cover-hack with the white star on her counter. It became glandered.
Pitblado, who had seen the nag foaled, and had many a day taken it to graze in Falkland Park, and on the green slopes of the Mid Lomond, flatly refused to shoot it when I ordered him to do so, but gave his loaded carbine to Lanty O'Regan, who had fewer scruples on the subject.
When this episode occurred, Cape Espartel was bearing south-east of us, about twelve miles distant; and by our glasses we could distinctly see the features of that remarkable headland of Morocco, the north-western extremity of the mighty continent of Africa, with its range of basaltic columns, which nearly rival in magnificence those of Fingal's Cave at Staffa; and the noon of the following day, as we bore into the Mediterranean, saw the great peak of Gibraltar rising from the horizon like a couchant lion, with its tail turned to Spain.
When my poor nag, previous to its slaughter, was being slung up from the hold, Beverley was much impressed by the real grief of honest Pitblado for its loss; and told me an interesting Indian anecdote of a pet horse that belonged to the 8th Royal Irish Hussars.
Beverley seldom spoke of India, for it was a land that was not without sorrowful recollections to him; and we all knew that he wore at his neck a large gold locket, containing a braid of the hair of his intended bride—a lovely girl, who was shot in his arms, and when seated on his saddle, as he was spurring with his troop through the horrors and the carnage of the Khyber Pass—on that day when nearly our whole 44th Regiment perished—and poor Beverley, with her dead body, fell into the hands of the Afghans.
"When we last went out to India," said he, "that was when I was but a cornet of sixteen, and several years before you joined us, we relieved the 8th Royal Irish, who had been there long—I know not how many years, but time enough to gain on their coloursPristinæ virtutis memores, with 'Leswaree,' and 'Hindostan'—honours which they shared with the old 25th Light Dragoons,[*] for five-and-twenty years was then the common term of Indian expatriation.