📜 Micah Clarke – Tome I | Arthur Conan Doyle ✨

📜 Micah Clarke – Tome I | Arthur Conan Doyle ✨

Let’s dive into the world of Arthur Conan Doyle with Micah Clarke – Volume 1, a powerful and moving historical tale. Through the eyes of young Micah, the son of a former soldier, we discover an England in the throes of religious and political upheaval in the 17th century. This novel blends the innocence of youth with the gravity of war, while exploring universal themes such as loyalty, faith, and courage. Prepare to follow a journey of discovery where adventure and reflection come together in a setting that is both realistic and captivating. Chapter 1. The Cornet Joseph Clarke, Of Iron Shores. It is possible, my dear little children, that at various times I have related to you almost every incident that has occurred in my adventurous life . At least, there is none, I know, that is not well known to your father and mother. However, when I see that time is slipping away, and that a gray head is apt to contain nothing but a failing memory, it has occurred to me to use these long winter evenings to lay all this before you, in good order, from the beginning, so that you may have a clear picture in your minds, which you will transmit in the same state to those who come after you. For, now that the House of Brunswick is firmly established on the throne and peace reigns in the country, it will be every year less and less easy for you to understand the feelings of the people of my generation, at the time when English fought against English and when he who should have been the shield and protector of his subjects, had no other thought than to impose on them by force what they abhorred and detested the most. My story is one that you will do well to store in the treasury of your memory, to tell it later to others, for in all probability there remained in all this county of Hampshire no man alive who was able to speak of these events from his own knowledge, or who played a more marked part in them. All that I know, I will try to arrange in order, without pretension, before you. I will endeavor to revive these dead for you, to bring out from the mists of the past those scenes which were most vivid at the time they took place and the narration of which becomes so monotonous and so tiresome under the pen of the worthy persons who have devoted themselves to reporting them. Perhaps also my words will have, in the ears of strangers, only the effect of an old man’s chatter. But you know that these same eyes that look at you have also looked at the things I describe, and that this hand has struck blows for a good cause, and it will be quite another thing for you from then on, I am sure. While you listen to me, do not lose sight of the fact that this was your quarrel as well as ours, the one we were fighting for, and that if you now grow up to be free men in a free country, to enjoy the privilege of thinking or praying as your consciences shall bid you, you may thank God that you are reaping the harvest which your fathers sowed in blood and suffering, when the Stuarts were on the throne. It was at this time, in 1664, that I was born, in Havant, a prosperous village, situated a few miles from Portsmouth, not far from the high road to London, and there I spent the greater part of my youth. Havant is now, as it was then, a pleasant and wholesome village, with its hundred or so brick cottages scattered about in a single irregular street. Each had its own little garden in front of it, and sometimes a fruit tree or two at the back. In the middle of the village stood the old church with its square steeple, and its sundial like a wrinkle in its gray and weather-beaten front .
The Presbyterians had their chapel in the neighbourhood, but after the Act of Uniformity was passed, their good minister, Master Breckinridge, whose discourses had many times drawn a large crowd to the rough pews, while the comfortable seats of the church remained empty, was thrown into prison and his flock dispersed. As for the Independents, of whom my father was one, they were also under the law, but they went to the meeting at Elmsworth. My parents and I walked there, rain or shine, every Sunday morning. These meetings were dispersed more than once, but the congregation was made up of such harmless people, so beloved, so respected by their neighbors, that after a while the justices of the peace closed their eyes, and let them worship as they saw fit. There were also Papists among us, who were obliged to go as far as Portsmouth to hear mass. As you see, small as our village was, it represented the whole country in miniature, for we had our sects and factions, and all were the more bitter for being confined in so narrow a space. My father, Joseph Clarke, was better known in the country as Joe Ironside, for he had served, in his youth, in Yaxley’s troop, which formed Oliver Cromwell’s famous cavalry regiment. He had preached with such spirit, he had fought with such courage , that old Noll himself took him from the ranks after the battle of Dunbar, and raised him to the rank of cornet. But as luck would have it, some time afterward, as he had engaged in a discussion with one of his men about the mystery of the Trinity, this individual, who was a half-mad fanatic, struck my father in the face, and the latter returned the compliment with a thrust of his sabre, which sent his adversary to personally realize the truth of his words. In most armies, it would have been admitted that my father was within his rights to punish such a scandalous act of indiscipline on the spot ; but Cromwell’s soldiers had such a high idea of ​​their importance and privileges that they resented this summary justice done to their comrade. My father appeared before a council of war, and it is possible that he would have been offered as a sacrifice to appease the fury of the soldiery, if the Lord Protector had not intervened and reduced the punishment to dismissal from the army. Accordingly, Cornet Clarke was stripped of his buffalo coat and steel helmet. He returned to Havant and established himself there as a leather merchant and tanner, which deprived Parliament of the most devoted soldier who had ever borne a sword in its service. Seeing that he prospered in his trade, he married Mary Shopstone, a young woman attached to the Church, and I, Micah Clarke, was the first pledge of their union. My father, as I find him in my earliest recollections, was tall and erect in stature. He had broad shoulders and a powerful chest. His face was rugged and rugged, with large, hard features, bushy, prominent eyebrows, a strong, broad, fleshy nose, and thick lips that contracted and retracted when he was angry. His gray eyes were piercing, true soldier’s eyes, and yet I saw them light up with a kind smile, a joyful twinkle. His voice was terrible and calculated to inspire fear to a degree I have never been able to explain. I have no difficulty in believing what I learned, that when he sang the hundredth Psalm on horseback among the bluebonnets, at Dunbar, his voice dominated the sound of the trumpets, the noise of the shots, like the deep rolling of a wave against a breaker. But although he possessed all the qualities necessary to become an officer of distinction, he renounced his military habits, on returning to civilian life. Thanks to his prosperity and the fortune he had acquired, he would have might well have carried the sword. Instead, he had a small copy of the Bible tucked into his belt, where others hang their weapons. He was sober and measured in his speech, and even among his family, he seldom spoke of the scenes in which he had taken part, where great people such as Fleetwood and Harrison, Blake and Ireton, Desborough and Lambert, some of whom were like himself privates, when the troubles broke out. He was frugal in his food, avoiding drink, and allowed himself no other pleasure than his three daily pipes of Oroonoko tobacco, which he kept in a brown jar by the large wooden armchair, to the left of the fireplace. And yet, despite all the reserve he imposed on himself, it sometimes happened that the man of old came out in him, and burst forth in one of those fits which his enemies called fanaticism, his friends called piety, and it must be admitted that this piety had a tendency to manifest itself in a fierce and impetuous form. And when I go back into my memories, two or three incidents reappear there with such clear and distinct relief that I could take them for scenes quite recently seen at the theater, whereas they date from my childhood, from about sixty years ago, and from the time when Charles II reigned. When the first incident occurred, I was so young, that I can remember neither what preceded it, nor what immediately followed it. It planted itself in my memory among many things which have since disappeared. We were all at home on a heavy summer evening when we heard a roll of kettledrums, a clang of horseshoes, which brought my father and mother to the threshold. She carried me in her arms so that I could see better. It was a regiment of cavalry, going from Chichester to Portsmouth, flag flying, band playing, and it was the most attractive sight my childish eyes had ever seen. I was full of astonishment and admiration as I contemplated the horses with their glossy coats and their lively gait, the steel morions, the plumed hats of the officers, the sashes and baldrics. I did not believe I had ever seen such a fine troop assembled, and in my delight I clapped my hands and shouted. My father smiled gravely and took me from my mother’s arms: “Hey!” he said, “my boy; You are a soldier’s son, and you should have enough judgment not to praise such a mob. Don’t you, child as you are, see that their weapons are badly furbished, their iron spurs are rusty, their ranks without order or cohesion? And they have not sent scouts ahead of them as is proper , even in peacetime, and their rear guard has stragglers from here to Bedhampton… Yes, he continued, brandishing his long arm in the direction of the soldiers, and calling out to them, you are wheat ripe for the sickle and only waiting for the reapers. Several of them jerked at the reins at this sudden explosion. “Jack, a good blow on the shorn head of that rascal,” shouted one of them, turning his horse around. But there was something in my father’s face that made the man shrink back, and he returned to the ranks without having done what he said. The regiment marched with a great noise down the road. My mother laid her slender hands on my father’s arm and soothed with her kindness and caresses the sleeping demon that had awakened within him.
On another occasion that I can recall—it was when I was seven or eight years old—his anger burst forth in a more dangerous way in its effects. I was playing around him one spring afternoon while he was working in the tannery yard, when through the open door came waddling two handsome gentlemen with gilt lapels and cockades coquettishly pinned to the sides of their tricorns. As I learned later, they were officers of the fleet passing through Havant, and seeing us busy in the yard, they had come in to ask us for information about their route. The younger of the two accosted my father, and began the conversation with a great clatter of words which were Hebrew to me; but now I remember that it was a series of those oaths which are common in the mouth of a sailor. And yet that people who are constantly exposed to appearing before the Almighty should stray to the point of insulting him, was always a mystery to me! My father, in a harsh and severe tone, invited him to speak with more respect about holy things. Whereupon the two men gave free rein to their tongues, and called my father a preaching joker, a Presbyterian Jacquot with a cockroach face. I don’t know what else they would have said, for my father seized the large knife he used to smooth the leathers, and rushing at them, he brought it down on the side of one of their heads with such force that without the hardness of his hat, the man would have been unable to curse anymore. In any case, he fell like a log on the stones of the courtyard, while his comrade quickly drew his rapier and carried a dangerous boot. But my father, who had as much agility as vigor, sprang to one side, and bringing his club down on the officer’s outstretched arm, he broke it as he would have done with a pipe stem. This affair caused no small stir, for it arose at a time when those arch-liars, Oates, Bedloe, and Carstairs, were disturbing the public mind with their stories of conspiracy, and when it was expected that riots of one kind or another would break out in the country. In a few days, all Hampshire was talking about the seditious tanner of Havant who had broken the heads and arms of two of His Majesty’s servants. However, an investigation showed that there was nothing in the affair that resembled disloyalty, and the officers having admitted that they had been the first to speak, the justices of the peace confined themselves to punishing my father with a fine and making him enter into an undertaking to remain quiet for a period of six months. I relate these facts to you that you may have some idea of ​​the fierce and grave piety which animated not only your ancestor, but also most of the men who had been trained in the troops of Parliament. In many ways they resembled those fanatical Saracens, who believe in conversion by the sword, more than the disciples of a Christian creed. But they have the great merit of having led, for the most part, a pure and commendable life, for they practiced rigorously the laws which they would willingly have imposed on others at the point of the sword. Without doubt, there were among this great number some, for whom piety was only the mask of ambition, and others who practiced in secret what they condemned in public, but there is no cause , however good it may be, which does not have hypocritical parasites of this sort. That the great majority of these Saints, as they called themselves, were God -fearing, regular-living people is proved by the fact that after the Republican army was disbanded, the old soldiers hastened to work again throughout the country , and left their mark wherever they went, thanks to their industry and valor. There is more than one wealthy mercantile house in England at the present day which can trace its origin to the thrift and probity of a simple pikeman of Ireton or Cromwell. But to give us a better understanding of the character of your great -grandfather, I will relate an incident which shows how many were ardent and sincere the emotions to which the violent crises I have described were due. At this time, I was about twelve years old. My brothers, Hosea and Ephraim, were respectively nine and seven; little Ruth could not have been more than four. Chance had brought to our house a traveling preacher of the Independents, and his religious teachings had made my father gloomy and excitable. One evening, I had gone to bed as usual, and was sleeping soundly, side by side with my two brothers, when we were awakened and ordered to go downstairs. We dressed in haste. We followed my father into the kitchen, where my mother, pale and frightened, was sitting, holding Ruth on her knees. “Gather around me, my children,” he said in a deep and solemn voice, “that we may all appear together before the Throne. The Kingdom of the Lord is at hand; oh! be ready to receive it.” This very night, my beloved, you will see Him in His splendor, with the Angels and Archangels in their power and glory. At the third hour, He will come, at this third hour that is drawing near to us. “Dear Joe,” my mother said coaxingly, “you frighten yourself and terrify the children out of place. If it is certain that the Son of Man is coming, what does it matter whether we are up or in bed? ” “Silence, woman,” he replied sternly, “did He not say that He would come in the night like a thief, and that it is up to us to be on the lookout. Join me, then, in continual prayers, that we may be there in our betrothal attire. Let us give Him thanks for the kindness He has shown us in warning us through the voice of His servant. O great God, cast a glance upon this little flock and lead it to the fold. ” Do not mingle the little grain with the great heap of chaff. O merciful father, look with clemency on my wife, and forgive her the fault of Erastianism, seeing that she is only a woman, and little able to break the chains of Antichrist in which she was born. And these, likewise, my young children, Micah and Hosea, and Ephraim and Ruth, whose very names are those of your faithful servants of old. Oh! place them tonight at your right hand. Thus he prayed, in a rush of ardent or touching words, as he writhed prostrate on the ground, in the vehemence of these supplications, while we, poor trembling darlings, pressed ourselves against our mother’s skirts, and gazed with terror at her distraught face, by the dim light of the modest oil lamp. Suddenly the brand-new church clock chimed to tell us that the hour had come. My father jumped up abruptly, ran to the window, and looked out, his eyes shining with expectation, toward the starry heavens. Was he conjuring up a vision for his excited brain, or was the flood of sensations that assailed him when he saw that his wait was in vain too violent for him? He raised his long arms, gave a hoarse cry, and fell backward, foaming at the mouth, his limbs shaking. For an hour or more, my poor mother and I made every effort to calm him, while the little ones whimpered in a corner. At last, he staggered to his feet, and with a few short, broken words, he sent us back to our rooms. Since that time I have never heard him allude to the subject, nor did he at any time inform us why he firmly believed that the second advent was to occur that night. But I have since been informed that the preacher who lodged with us was one of those then called Fifth Monarchy men, and that this sect was particularly prone to spreading warnings of this kind. I have no doubt that some remarks made by him brought this idea in my father’s head and his ardent nature did the rest.
Such was your great-grandfather, Joe Ironside. I have thought it proper to trace these traits for you, in accordance with the principle that actions speak louder than words. I believe that when describing a man’s character, it is better to cite examples of his ways of acting than to speak in vague and general terms. If I had said that he was fierce in his religion, that he was subject to strange fits of piety, this language might have made but a faint impression on you, but after you have heard of his altercation with the officers in the tannery yard, and the order he gave us, in the middle of the night, to wait for the second advent, you are in a position to judge for yourselves to what extremes his belief could lead him. On the other hand, he understood business perfectly. He showed himself to be honest and even generous in his dealings. He had the respect of all and the affection of a few, for he was of a nature too concentrated to arouse much affection. To us he was a father full of severity and rigor, and punished us harshly for everything he disapproved of in our conduct. He had a store of proverbs like this: Satiate a child, and give satiety to a young dog, and neither will make an effort or: Children are certain cares and uncertain consolations and he used them to moderate the more indulgent impulses of my mother. He could not bear to see us playing backgammon on the grass, or dancing on Saturday nights with the other children. As for my mother, an excellent creature, it was her calming, pacifying influence which kept my father within certain bounds and softened his severe discipline. And truly it was seldom that in his darkest moments he was not calmed by the touch of that gentle hand, that his ardent spirit was not soothed by the sound of that voice. She belonged to a family of churchmen, and she held to her religion with a quiet strength, despite all that could be attempted to turn her away from it. I imagine that at one time her husband had reasoned much with her on Arminianism, on the sin of simony, but that he had recognized the futility of her exhortations, and left these subjects there, except on very rare occasions. Yet, although fervent for the Episcopate, she had remained profoundly Whig and never allowed her loyalty to the throne to cloud her judgment of the actions of the monarch who occupied it. Fifty years ago, women were good housewives, and she distinguished herself among the best. When one saw her immaculate penguins, her snow-white apron , it was hard to believe that she was a hard worker. Only the good housekeeping, the cleanliness of the rooms free from all dust, demonstrated her activity. She composed remedies, eye washes, powders and compositions, cordial and persicot, or peach kernel, orange blossom water, cherry brandy, each thing in its time, and all to perfection. She understood herbs and simples equally. The villagers and field workers preferred to consult her about their ailments rather than go to see Doctor Jackson, of Purbrook, who never took less than a silver crown to compound a remedy. In all the country, there was no woman who was the object of more deserved respect and esteem, from her superiors and inferiors. Such were my parents, according to my childhood memories. As for me, I will let my story explain the development of my character. My brothers and sister were all sturdy country children, with brown faces, with no other well-marked peculiarity than a penchant for playing tricks, moderated by the fear of their father. They and our servant Martha composed our entire household during those years of early youth when the flexible soul of the child was strengthening itself to form the character of the grown man. What influence these things had on me, I will tell in a future session, and if I bore you by relating them, you must remember that I relate these things for your profit rather than your amusement and that it may be useful to you, in your journey through life, to know how another sought his way there before you. Chapter 2. I Am Sent to School. I Leave It. From the domestic influences I have described, it will not be difficult to believe that my young mind was much concerned with matters of religion, especially as my father and mother had different views on the subject. The old Puritan soldier was convinced that the Bible alone contained all that was necessary for salvation, and that while it was advantageous for men of wisdom or eloquence to expound the Scriptures to their brethren, it was not at all necessary, indeed it was rather harmful, that there should exist an organized body of ministers or bishops, claiming special prerogatives, or arrogating to themselves the role of mediators between the creature and the Creator. He professed the most bitter contempt for the opulent dignitaries of the Church, who rode in coaches to their cathedrals to preach the doctrines of their Master, while the latter wore out his sandals in walking the countryside. He was no more indulgent toward those poor members of the clergy who overlooked the vices of their patrons in order to secure a place at their table, and who would sit all evening listening to scandalous talk rather than bid farewell to pies, cheese, and a flagon of wine. The idea that such men represented religion was abhorrent to his mind, and he would not even grant his assent to that form of ecclesiastical government dear to the Presbyterians, in which a general assembly of ministers directs the affairs of their Church. In his opinion, all men were equal in the eyes of the Almighty, and no one had a right to claim a higher place than his neighbor in matters of religion. The Book had been written for all. All were equally capable of reading it, provided their minds were enlightened by the Holy Spirit. On the other hand, my mother maintained that the very essence of any Church was the possession of a hierarchy, with a graduated scale of authority within itself, the King at the top, the archbishops below him, and having authority over the Bishops, and so on, passing through the ministers to the simple flock. Such, according to her, was the Church from its first institution, and no religion devoid of these characteristics could claim to be the true one. In her eyes, ritual had an importance equal to that of morality.
If it were permitted to the first tradesman, to the first farmer who came along, to invent prayers, to modify the service according to his whim, it would be impossible to preserve Christian doctrine in its purity. She admitted that Religion is founded on the Bible, but the Bible is a book which contains much obscurity, and unless this obscurity is dispelled by a servant of God elected and consecrated according to the rules, by a man who is descended in a direct line from the disciples, all human wisdom is insufficient to interpret it aright. My mother occupied this position. Neither discussion nor prayer was able to dislodge her. The only question of belief on which both my parents agreed and had the same ardor was their common aversion and their distrust of the ceremonies of the Roman Church, and on this point the woman, a faithful follower of the Church, was no less decided than the Independent fanatic. In these tolerant times, it may seem strange to you that the adherents of this venerable creed should have been subjected to so much malice from several successive generations of Englishmen. We now acknowledge that there are no more useful or loyal citizens than our Catholic brethren, and Mr. Alexander Pope, or any other Papist of consequence, is not held in lower esteem on account of his religion than was William Penn for his Quakerism, in the reign of James. We find it very difficult to believe that gentlemen like Lord Stafford, clergymen like Archbishop Plunkett, members of the Commons like Langhorne and Pickering, were dragged to their deaths on the testimony of the vilest people, without a voice being raised in their favor, or to understand how it could be considered an act of patriotism for an Englishman to carry a lead-tipped whip under his cloak, to threaten his peaceful neighbors, who were not of his opinion in matters of doctrine. This was a long-standing folly, which fortunately has disappeared in our days, or at least manifests itself more rarely and in a milder form. However foolish it may have seemed, it was explained by reasons of some weight. You have doubtless read that a century before my birth the great kingdom of Spain grew and prospered. Its ships covered all the seas. Its troops won victories wherever they appeared. This nation was at the head of Europe in letters, in learning, in all the arts of war and peace. You have also heard of the hostile dispositions that existed between this great nation and ourselves, and how our adventurers harassed its possessions beyond the Atlantic, and how it retaliated by having its diabolical Inquisition burn all those of our sailors it could catch, and by threatening our coasts both from Cadiz and from its provinces in the Netherlands. The quarrel grew so heated that the other nations kept away , just as I saw people make room for the swordsmen at Hockley in the Hole, so that the Spanish giant and sturdy little England found themselves face to face to settle their quarrel. During all this time, it was as the champion of the Pope and the avenger of the injuries of the Roman Church that King Philip posed. It is true that Lord Howard and many other gentlemen of the old religion fought bravely against the Castilians, but it was impossible for the people to forget that the Reformation had been the standard under which they had triumphed, and that the Pope had given his blessing to our enemies. Then came the cruel and senseless attempt of Mary to impose a creed with which we no longer sympathized, and immediately after her, another great Catholic Power on the continent threatened our liberties. The growing strength of France provoked in England a hostility proportional to Popery, a hostility which reached its highest pitch, when about the time of my narrative, Louis XIV threatened us with an invasion, and this at the very moment when the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes brought to light his spirit of intolerance towards the doctrine which was dear to us. The narrow Protestantism of England was less a religious feeling than a patriotic answer to the aggressive bigotry of her enemies.
Our Catholic compatriots were unpopular, not so much because they believed in Transubstantiation as because they were unjustly suspected of making a pact with the Emperor or the King of France. Now that our victories have removed all fear of a attack, we have happily renounced that bitter religious hatred without which the lies of Oates and Dangerfield would have been in vain. In the days of my youth, particular causes had inflamed this hostility and made it all the more bitter because it was mingled with a grain of fear. As long as the Catholics were in the state of an obscure faction, they could be neglected; but towards the end of the reign of Charles II, when it seemed absolutely certain that a Catholic dynasty would ascend the throne, that Catholicism would be the religion of the Court and the ladder to ascend to dignities, it was felt that the day was approaching when he would take vengeance on those who had trampled him underfoot in the time when he was defenseless. The Church of England, which needs the King as the bow of its key; the nobility whose estates and coffers had been enriched by the plunder of the abbeys; The populace, among whom notions about Popery were associated with those of instruments of torture, with Fox’s martyrology, were no less disturbed. And the future held nothing reassuring for our cause. Charles was a most lukewarm Protestant, and even, on his deathbed, he proved that he was not a Protestant at all. There was no longer any probability of his having legitimate offspring. The Duke of York, his younger brother, was therefore the heir to the throne. He was known to be an austere and narrow-minded Papist. His wife, Mary of Modena, was as bigoted as he. If they had children, there was no doubt that they would be raised in the religion of their parents, and that a line of Catholic kings would occupy the throne of England. And this was an intolerable prospect both for the Church, as represented by my mother, and for the nonconformists, personified by my father. I have related all this ancient history to you because you will perceive, as I proceed in my narrative, that this state of things at length caused throughout the nation such a ferment and ferment that I, a mere country lad, was swept away by the whirlwind, and felt its influence all my life long. If I did not clearly indicate to you the sequence of events, you would have great difficulty in understanding the influences which produced such an effect upon my whole career. Meanwhile, I wish to remind you that when King James ascended the throne, it was amidst the sulky silence of a great many of his subjects, and that my father and mother were in the same degree of those who ardently desired a Protestant succession. As I have already stated, my childhood was a sad one. From time to time, when there happened to be a fair at Portsdown Hell, or when a curio-showman was passing by with his portable theatre, my good mother would take a pence or two out of the household money and slip it into my hand, and putting her finger to her lips to warn me to be discreet, she would send me to see the spectacle. But these diversions were the rarest. They left such deep impressions on my mind that when I was sixteen, I could have counted on my fingers all I had seen. It was William Harker, the strong man, who lifted Farmer Alcott’s roan mare . It was Toby Lawson, the dwarf, who could fit entirely into a preserving jar. I remember these two well because of the admiration they aroused in my young soul. Then came the puppet play, The Enchanted Island, with Mynheer Munster of the Netherlands, who was playing the virginal melodiously and pirouetting on the tightrope. Last, but foremost in my estimation, came the great performance at the Portsdown Fair, entitled: The True and Ancient History of Mandlin, the Merchant’s Daughter of Bristol, and His lover Antonio, how they were cast upon the coasts of Barbary, where the Sirens are seen floating on the sea, singing in the rocks, and foretelling them dangers. This little piece gave me infinitely more pleasure than I experienced many years after, in attending the most celebrated plays of Mr. Congreve and Mr. Dryden, although they were acted by Kynaston, Betterton, and all the King’s Company. I remember that once, at Chichester, I paid a penny to see Mrs. Potiphar’s left shoe, but it looked like any old shoe, and was of such a size that it would have fitted the showman’s wife. More than once I regretted that my penny had fallen into the hands of the hussies. There were, however, other spectacles which cost me nothing to see, and which were nevertheless more real, and more interesting in every respect than those for which it was necessary to pay. From time to time, on a day off, I was allowed to go down to Portsdown. Once, my father even took me there astride his horse before him. I wandered with him through the streets, my eyes filled with wonder, admiring the singular things around me. The walls and ditches, the gates and sentries, the long High Street with the great government buildings, the incessant noise of the drums, the shrill blast of the trumpets, all this made my little heart beat faster under my baby jacket. There was at Portsdown the house where, thirty years before, the proud Duke of Buckingham had been struck by the assassin’s dagger. There was also the governor’s residence, and I remember that as I watched, he rode there, his face red and angry, with a nose such as befits a governor, his breast all bedecked with gold. “Isn’t he a handsome man?” I said, looking up at my father. He laughed and pulled his hat down over his eyes. “That’s the first time,” he said, “that I’ve seen Sir Ralph Lingard face to face, but I saw his back at the Battle of Preston. Ah! my boy, with his proud look, if he only saw old Noll coming in by the door, he would n’t think it beneath him to go out by the window. The clanging of steel, the sight of a buffalo jerkin, never failed to awaken the bitterness of the Roundheads in my father’s heart . But there were other things to see at Portsmouth besides the redcoats and their governor. It was the second port in the kingdom, after Chatham, and there was always a new warship ready on the props. There was then a squadron of the Royal Navy there. Sometimes the whole fleet was assembled at Spithead.” Then the streets were full of sailors, whose faces were as brown as mahogany, with tails of hair as stiff and hard as their cutlasses. To see them sauntering about with a swaying gait, to listen to their strange and piquant language, their tales of the wars in Holland, was a most delightful treat to me, and more than once, when I was alone, I attached myself to one of their parties, and spent the day going from tavern to tavern. However, it happened once that one of them pressed me to share his glass of Canary wine, and then, out of mere malice, persuaded me to swallow a second. The result was that I returned home, unable to speak, in the carrier’s cart, and since then I have not been allowed to go to Portsdown alone. My father was less scandalized by this incident than I had expected, and he reminded my mother that Noah had been surprised in a similar way. He also related that a certain army chaplain, named Quant, of Desborough’s regiment, having emptied several bottles of Mumm’s beer, after a hot, dry day, had begun to sing certain songs unedifying, and to dance in a way that was not appropriate to his sacred profession. He explained later that errors of this kind should not be regarded as individual faults, but rather as obsessions properly speaking of the evil Spirit, who thus contrived to give scandal to the faithful, and chose for this the holiest men. This ingenious way of excusing the army chaplain put my back in safety, because my father, who approved of Solomon’s axiom, exercised a large birch rod and a vigorous arm on everything that seemed to him to deviate from the right path. From the time when I learned my letters in the syllabary on my mother’s knee, I was always eager to increase my knowledge. Nothing printed ever came within my reach without me eagerly taking advantage of it. My father carried his sectarian hatred of education to such a point that he could not bear the presence of non-religious books in his home. From then on, I could only obtain supplies from one or two of my friends in the village, who lent me one volume after another from their small libraries. I carried them under my shirt and only took them out when I had managed to slip away into the countryside, to hide in the tall grass, or at night when the reed wick was still burning, and my father’s roundness warned me that I was not in danger of being surprised by him. It was thus that I studied Don Bellianis of Greece and The Seven Champions, then Tarleton’s Games of Wit, and other books of that kind, until I was in a state to appreciate the poetry of Waller and Herrick, or the plays of Massinger and Shakespeare. How sweet were the hours when I was permitted to leave all questions of free will and predestination, to lie with my heels in the air among the fragrant clover, listening to old Chaucer as he told me the charming story of the resigned Grisel, to weep for the chaste Desdemona, to lament the untimely death of her valiant husband. Sometimes I would rise up, my mind full of that noble poetry. I would wander my gaze over the flowery slope of the country, bounded by the shimmering sea and the purple outline of the Isle of Wight. Then the idea would be revealed to me that the Creator of all these things, the Being who had given man the faculty of uttering these beautiful thoughts, was not the property of this or that sect, that he was the father of all the little children whom he had sent to play on that beautiful playground. I felt pain, and I still do, when I think that a man as sincere, of such a lofty character as your great-grandfather, should be thus chained by iron dogmas. Could he believe that the Creator was so stingy with his mercy as to refuse it to ninety-nine hundredths of his children? After all, you are what your upbringing has made you, and if my father had a narrow brain on his broad shoulders, we must at least do him the justice of recognizing that he was ready to do anything, to suffer anything for what he believed to be the truth. My dear children, if you have more enlightenment, see that it binds you to live in accordance with this enlightenment. When I reached fourteen, and had become a boy with stringy blond hair and a brown face, I was sent to a small private school in Petersfield. I spent a year there, returning home on the last Saturday of every month. I took with me only a meager assortment of school books, besides Lilly’s Latin Grammar and Rosse’s Table of All the Religions of the Universe from Creation to the Present Day. It was my mother who slipped me this work as a farewell present. With this scanty literary background, I might have been in great difficulty, but fortunately my master, Mr. Thomas Chillingworth, possessed a good library, and was pleased to lend his books to those of his pupils who expressed a desire to educate themselves. Thanks to this kind old man, I not only acquired some Latin and Greek, but I found means to read a great many classical writers in good English translations, and to know the history of my country and others. I was rapidly developing in mind and body, when my career was abruptly interrupted by an event which was neither more nor less than my summary and ignominious expulsion. I must tell you how this unexpected interruption of my studies occurred. Petersfield had always been a strong citadel of the Church, for it would have been difficult to find a Nonconformist within its limits. This was because most of the inhabited houses were owned by zealous supporters of the Church, and they would not allow anyone to settle there unless they were a member of the Established Church. The curate, named Pinfold, owed great authority in the town to this state of affairs. He was a man with a stubby face, a fiery complexion, and pompous manners, who inspired a certain terror in the peaceful inhabitants. I can still see him, with his hooked nose, his round-cut waistcoat, and his knock-kneed legs, which seemed to have bent under the weight of the erudition they were condemned to bear. He walked slowly, his right hand stiffly outstretched, and the iron end of his cane clanging on the pavement. He was in the habit of stopping whenever he met anyone, and waiting to see if they would give him the salute to which he believed he was entitled, by virtue of his dignity. And this courtesy he never thought he should return, except when he had to do with some rich parishioner. If by chance he were omitted, he would run after the culprit, wave his cane in his face, and insistently demand that they uncover their heads. We brats, when we met him on our walks, would pass him at a run, like a flock of chickens beside a venerable turkey. Our worthy master himself seemed disposed to slip away down a side street as soon as the majestic build of the curate was seen swaying in our direction. This proud ecclesiastic prided himself on knowing the history of all the people in the parish. Having learned that I was the son of an independent, he severely reprimanded Mr. Chillingworth for having lacked tact in receiving me in his school. And, indeed, it took nothing less than my mother’s good reputation for orthodoxy for him to agree not to demand my dismissal. At the other end of the village, there was a large day school. There was a perpetual enmity between the scholars who attended it and those under the direction of our master. No one could say how the war broke out, but for many years they sought mutual quarrels, and it ended in skirmishes, altercations, ambushes, and a pitched battle from time to time. Little harm was done to each other in these encounters, for the weapons consisted of snowballs in winter, and pine cones or clods of earth in summer. Even when they came closer, when they came to blows , the worst effects were limited to a few bruises, a few drops of blood. Our adversaries had superiority over us in numbers, but we had the advantage of always being grouped together, of having a safe haven to retreat to. They, on the contrary, lived in houses scattered throughout the parish and lacked a rallying point. A stream, crossed by two bridges, ran through the middle of the city, and served as a border between our territory and that of our enemies . The
child, who crossed one of the bridges, found himself in hostile territory. Chance would have it that in the first battle which followed my arrival at the school, I distinguished myself by attacking separately the most formidable of our adversaries, and striking him with such force that he fell without being able to get up, and was carried off as a prisoner by our troop. This feat established my reputation as a warrior, so well that I came to play the role of leader of our army, and to be an object of envy for boys older than me. This promotion tickled my self-esteem so well, that I set out to prove that I deserved it, by inventing new and ingenious means to defeat our adversaries. One winter evening, we learned that our rivals were preparing to attack us under cover of darkness, and that they intended to arrive by the plank bridge, which was seldom used, so as not to be noticed by us. This bridge was almost outside the town. It consisted simply of a large beam, without parapet or any support, placed there for the convenience of the town clerk, who lived just opposite. We decided to lie in ambush behind the bushes on our side, and attack the invaders unexpectedly as they passed. But just as we were leaving, I became aware of an ingenious stratagem which was practiced in the German wars, as I had read. I explained it to my delighted comrades. We took Mr. Chillingworth’s saw, and we left for the theater of operations. When we arrived at the bridge, all was quiet and still. It was very dark and very cold, for Christmas was approaching. No sign revealed our adversaries. We exchanged a few words in low voices, wondering who would make this bold move, and as I was too proud to propose something I would not dare to carry out, I took the saw. I sat down, leg over leg over leg, on the plank and attacked it at its very center. I intended to lessen its resistance to the point that it could still bear the weight of a body, but that it would break at the moment when the main body of the enemy force entered it so as to throw them into the icy water of the stream. The water was at most two feet deep, so that they would get off with fear and a plunge. The freshness of this reception would deter them forever from invading us and would establish my reputation as a bold leader. Ruben Lockarby, my lieutenant, son of Father John Lockarby, who held the Wheat Sheaf, drew up our forces behind the hedge while I worked the saw vigorously and cut almost the entire plank. I felt no remorse in destroying the bridge, for I understood enough about carpentry to know that a skillful carpenter would in an hour’s work rebuild it so that it would be stronger than ever, by erecting a prop under the place where I had sawed it. When at last the curvature of the plank warned me that I had gone far enough, and that the slightest strain would snap it at once, I crept away, took my post among my fellow soldiers, and awaited the arrival of the enemy. Scarcely had I hidden myself when I heard the footsteps of someone on the path leading to the bridge. We bent behind the curtain of the hedge. We were convinced that this noise came from a scout that our adversaries had sent ahead. He was obviously a big fellow, for his step was heavy and slow, and there was a metallic clinking mixed with it that we could not understand . The noise grew closer and we finally saw a vague silhouette emerging from the darkness on the other side. It stopped for a moment to spy around. Then she walked towards the bridge. It was only when the figure set foot on the bridge and cautiously advanced to cross it that we distinguished familiar outlines. Then we grasped the terrible truth. The individual we had taken for the enemy’s vanguard was none other than the Rev. Pinfold, and it was the rhythmic fall of the tip of his cane that we had heard between each of his steps. Paralyzed by this sight, we stood there without being able to warn him. We were nothing more than a row of motionless eyes. The proud clergyman took a first step, a second, a third. Then there was a loud crack, and he disappeared amidst a vast splash into the fast-flowing stream. He must have fallen on his back, for we could see the curve of his majestic belly above the surface, while he struggled desperately to get back on his feet. He finally managed to right himself, and climbed onto the edge to shake himself off, letting out a volley of pious exclamations and profane curses that made us burst out laughing despite our fright. We left under his feet like a brood of partridges. We made our way out into the open countryside and returned to the school. As you can imagine, we said nothing of what had happened to our good master. But the matter was too serious to be kept quiet. The sudden chill somehow made the bottle of Rhine wine that the priest had just drunk with the town secretary turn, and he had an attack of gout that put him on his back for a fortnight. Meanwhile, an examination of the bridge revealed that it had been sawn off, and an investigation led to the discovery of the role of Mr. Chillingworth’s boarders in this affair. To save the school from a mass expulsion from the town, I felt it necessary to acknowledge myself as both the inventor and the instrument of the exploit. Chillingworth was entirely at the discretion of the curate. He was therefore forced to address me in public with a long homily—which he compensated for with kind words when he bade me farewell in private—and he had to solemnly dismiss me from the school. I never saw my old master again, for he died a few years later, but I learned that his second son, William, still runs the school, which is more flourishing than ever. His eldest son became a Quaker and left for Penn’s colony, where, it seems, he was massacred by the savages. This adventure caused my mother great pain, but it was very well received by my father. He laughed at it so much that the outbursts of his Stentorian gaiety were heard throughout the village . It reminded him, he said, of a similar stratagem, which that pious servant of God, Colonel Pride, had employed at Market Drayton, and which resulted in the drowning of a captain and three soldiers of Lunsford’s cavalry regiment, to the great glory of the true Church, and for the satisfaction of the chosen people. Even among the partisans of the Church, more than one secretly rejoiced at the misfortune of the curate whose pretensions and pride had made him odious throughout the country. By this time, I had grown into a strong, broad-shouldered boy. Every month added to my strength and size. At the age of sixteen, I was able to carry a sack of flour or a barrel of beer as far as any man in the village, and to throw the fifteen-pound stone discus a distance of thirty-six feet, that is, four feet further than Ted Dawson, the blacksmith. One day, when my father could not manage to carry a bale of hides out of the yard, I lifted it at once and carried it on my shoulders. The old man often looked at me gravely from under his thick, prominent eyebrows, and shook his grizzled head, when he was sitting in his armchair, smoking his pipe. “You’re getting too big for your nest, my boy,” he sometimes said to me. “I wonder if one of these days the wings won’t grow on you and carry you far from here.” Deep down, I longed for this opportunity, for I missed the peaceful life of the village. I longed to see that vast universe about which I had heard and read so much. I could not look south without feeling an inner agitation at the sight of those dark waves, whose white crests seemed like an ever-present signal to invite a young Englishman and send him off in pursuit of some unknown but glorious goal. Chapter 3. On Two Friends of My Youth. I fear, my children, that you will find the prologue too long for the play; but the foundations must be laid before the building can be erected, and a story of this sort would be very pitiful, very sterile, if you knew nothing of the people who figure in it. So, be patient, while I tell you about my old friends of youth, some of whom will be found in my story, others of whom remained in the native village, exercising, however, on my character, from that time, an influence whose traces could still be found. First among the best of those I knew, was Zachariah Palmer, the village carpenter, whose aged and deformed body by work hid the simplest and purest soul imaginable. But his simplicity was not in the least the result of ignorance, for there were few systems that he had not studied and weighed, from the lessons of Plato to those of Hobbes. In the days of my boyhood, books were much rarer than they are now , carpenters were less well paid, but old Palmer had neither wife nor children. He spent little for his food or maintenance. It was thus that he came to have on the shelf above his bed a collection of books more choice—for they were few—than those of the squire or the curate. And these books he had read so well that he was not only able to understand them, but also to explain them to others. This venerable village philosopher with the white beard often sat on summer evenings by the door of his cottage, and was never more pleased than when some young men deserted the game of bowls or rings to come and sit on the grass at his feet, and ask him questions about the great men of old, their words and their deeds. But among the young people, I and Ruben Lockarby, the innkeeper’s son, were his favorites, for we were the first to come and listen to the old man’s talk and the last to leave him. No father ever had more affection for his children than he showed us. He spared no effort to penetrate our primitive intelligence and shed light on what embarrassed or troubled us. Like all beings who grow up, we gave our heads against the problem of the universe. We had spied, watched with our childish eyes in those infinite abysses where the most clear-sighted eyes of the human race had not seen a bottom. And yet when we looked at what surrounded us in the world of our village, before the bitterness and sourness with which all sects were penetrated, we could not fail to say to ourselves that a tree which bore such fruit must have some defect. This was one of the thoughts we did not express to our parents, but submitted to old Zacharias. He had many things to say on this point to encourage and comfort us. “Quarrels, these squabbles,” he said, “are only superficial. They have a source in the infinite variety of the mind.” human, always inclined to modify a doctrine to adapt it to his habits of thought. What matters is the polished kernel that lies at the bottom of every Christian belief. If you could live again among the Romans or the Greeks, before the time when this new doctrine was preached, you would then recognize the change it has accomplished in the world. Whether one gives this or that meaning to a text means nothing. What is of capital importance is that every man has a good, solid reason for leading a simple and pure life. This is what the Christian faith has given us. I would not like to see you virtuous out of fear, he said another time. The experience of a long life, however, has taught me that sin is always punished in this world, whatever it may be in the next . There is no fault that one does not pay for with one’s health, one’s comfort, one’s peace of mind. It is with nations as it is with individuals. See how the luxurious Babylonians were destroyed by the frugal Persians, and how the same Persians succumbed under the sword of the Greeks, when they had learned the vices of prosperity. Read again, and note that the sensual Greeks were crushed under the feet of the more robust Romans, more hardy to labor, and finally that the Romans, after having lost their virile virtues, were subdued by the nations of the North. Vice and ruin always go together. Thus Providence employs them in turn to punish by one the follies of the other. These things do not happen by chance. They are part of a great system which acts even in our own existence. The further you advance in life, the more you will see that sin and suffering are never far from each other, and that outside of virtue, there can be no true prosperity. A master quite different from that one, the sea dog, Salomon Sprent, who lived in the penultimate cottage on the left, in the main street of the village! He belonged to the generation of old sailors, who had fought under the red cross flag, against the French, the Spanish, the Dutch, the Moors, until the day when a cannonball had taken off one of his feet and put an end to his exploits forever. He was thin in body, hard, dark, as nimble, as lively as a cat. He had a short body , extremely long arms, each of which ended in a large hand always half-closed, as if gripping a cable. He was covered from head to toe with the most marvelous tattoos, traced in blue, red, and green. It began with the Creation, on his neck and ended with the Ascension, on his left ankle. I have never seen such a walking work of art. He often said that if he had been drowned, and his body washed ashore in some wild country, the natives could have learned the whole of the Holy Gospel, merely by studying his carcass. And yet I am sorry to have to say that the whole of the sailor’s religion seemed confined to his skin, so that he had little left for internal use. It had erupted on the surface, like the spotted fever, but without leaving a trace in the rest of his organization. He could swear in eight languages ​​and twenty-three dialects, and he did not allow his great faculties to rust for lack of exercise. He swore when he was sad, or when he was happy, when he was angry or in an affectionate mood, but his swearing was only a form of language, without malice or bitterness, so much so that my father himself could not be very severe towards this sinner. But with time, the old man became more mellow, and in the last years of his life, he returned to the simple beliefs of his childhood. He learned to fight the devil with the same firmness and courage he had shown against the enemies of his country. Old Solomon was an inexhaustible source of amusement and interest to my friend Lockarby and me. On special occasions, he would invite us to dine with him and treat us to minced meat, salmigondis, or some foreign dish, pilau, olla podrida, or grilled fish as they do in the Azores, for he was a marvelous cook and knew how to prepare the favorite dishes of all nations. And all the time we spent in his company, he would tell us the most extraordinary stories about Prince Rupert, under whom he had served, how he would fire from the stern the order for his squadron to turn or charge, as the occasion required, as if he were still in command of his cavalry regiment. He had many stories about Blake, too. But the name of Blake himself was not as dear to our sailors of old as that of Sir Christopher Mings. Solomon had been his boatswain for some time, and knew endlessly of the valiant exploits by which he had distinguished himself, from the day he entered the navy as a cabin boy, until the day he fell on the deck of his ship with the rank of Admiral of the Reds, and was buried by his weeping crew in the churchyard at Chatham. “If it is true that there is a sea of ​​jasper up there,” said the old sailor, “I wager that Sir Christopher will take care to ensure that the English flag is properly respected there , and that foreigners will not come to mock us. I served under him in this world, and I ask nothing more than to be his boatswain in the next, if by chance the office should happen to fall vacant.” These reminiscences always resulted in the preparation of a new bowl of punch, which was solemnly emptied in memory of the deceased. However animated Solomon Sprent’s stories about his former leaders were, they did not have as much effect on us as when, after his second or third glass, the floodgates of his memories opened. Then they were long stories about the countries he had visited, the people he had seen. Leaning back in our chairs, our chins in our hands, we, the adolescents, would remain there for hours, our eyes fixed on the old adventurer, drinking in his words, while, flattered by the interest he excited, he took slow puffs from his pipe, and unrolled one by one the stories of the things he had seen or done. In those days, my dear children, there was no Defoe to tell us the wonders of the universe, no Spectator within our reach at the breakfast table, no Gulliver to gratify our love of adventures by telling us of adventures that had not taken place. More than a month passed without a News Sheet falling into our hands. Casual acquaintances, therefore, had a greater importance than they have today, and the conversation of a man, such as old Solomon, was a library in itself. To us, all this was real. His hoarse voice, his ill-chosen words, were like the voice of an angel, and our alert minds added the details and filled in the gaps in the narratives. In one evening we have taken a privateer from Sallee across the Pillars of Hercules, we have tacked along the coasts of the African continent, we have seen the great waves of the Spanish sea breaking on the yellow sands, we have passed the Negro ivory traders with their human cargoes, we have stood up to the terrible hurricanes which blow constantly around the Cape of Good Hope; and finally, we have set sail on the vast Ocean which stretches beyond among the coral islands covered with palm trees, with the certainty that the kingdoms of Prester John begin somewhere on the other side of the golden mist that is glimpsed on the horizon. After a flight of this extent, when we returned to our Hampshire village, among the monotonous realities of country life, we felt like wild birds that the fowler has caught in a trap and suddenly shut up in narrow cages. It was then that my father’s words came back to me: One day you will feel that your wings have grown and this threw me into such an uneasy mood, that all the wise words of Zachary Palmer were powerless to calm me. Chapter 4. On the Strange Fish We Caught at Spithead. One evening in May 1685, towards the end of the first week of the month, my friend Reuben Lockarby and I borrowed Ned Marley’s pleasure boat , and went fishing out of Langston Bay. I was then well near twenty-one years old, and my companion was a year younger than myself. We had become very close friends, thanks to a mutual esteem; for, not having reached his full growth, he was proud of my strength and size, while I, with my melancholy disposition and somewhat heavy mind, delighted in the energy and jovial humor that never deserted him, and in the wit that shone with the harmless brilliance of a summer flash in everything he said. Physically, he was short and fat with a round face, ruddy cheeks , and to tell the truth, rather inclined to plumpness, although he would not admit to anything more than a pleasing plumpness, which, according to him, was the last word in beauty among the Ancients. The severe test of danger and common privations authorizes me to affirm that no one ever had a more attached, more reliable comrade. As he was destined to be with me later, it was very fitting that he should be there also on that May evening, which was the starting point of our adventures. We rowed past the Warner Sands to reach a spot halfway to the Nab, where we usually caught a lot of sea bass. There we threw the large stone that served as our anchor, and set our lines. The sun, setting slowly behind a bank of fog, had adorned the whole western sky with scarlet bands against which stood out in vaporous purple outlines the wooded peaks of the Isle of Wight. A fresh breeze blew from the southeast and made the long green waves look like plumes of foam, spreading the salty sensation of sea spray over our eyes and lips . Near Pointe Sainte Hélène, a King’s ship was following the narrows, at the same time as a large isolated brig which was tacking not more than a mile from where we were. We were so close to it that we could see the figures moving on its deck, while it was giving to the list to the breeze. We could even hear the creaking of its yards, and the flapping of its weather-stained sails, just as it was about to resume its course. “Look here, Micah,” said my companion, looking up from his line, “there is a ship that hardly knows what it wants to do… a ship that will not make its way in the world. Do you see this irresolute attitude to leeward? It does not know whether to tack or to go ahead.” He’s a courtier of circumstance, a Lord Halifax of the sea. “No,” I said, staring fixedly, my eyes sheltered under my hand, “there’s some accident on board. She’s teetering as if there were no one at the helm. Her main-yard is coming down! No, she’s starting now! The people on deck look to me as if they were fighting or dancing. Let’s raise the anchor, Reuben, and row away from her. ” “Let’s raise the anchor and row away from her,” replied Reuben, his eye still fixed on the unknown ship. “What is this mania?” What do you have to do to always get yourselves into some danger? He flies the Dutch flag, but who knows where he really comes from? It would be a pretty business if we were captured and sold to the plantations. “A buccaneer in the Solent!” I cried mockingly. “All we need now is to see the black ensign in Elmsworth Cove. But listen: what is that?” From the brig came the sound of a musket shot. There was a moment of silence. Then a second musket shot rang out, followed by a chorus of exclamations and shouts. At the same time the yards turned into position, the sails caught the breeze once more, and the ship sped off in a direction that would take her past Bembridge Point and into the English Channel. And as she was speeding, her helm was suddenly turned, a cloud of smoke rose from her quarter, and a cannonball passed over the waves, making the water spurt out, less than a hundred yards from us. And after having also bid us farewell, the ship returned to the wind and resumed her course towards the south. “Heart of mercy!” cried Reuben, his lips gaping in shock; “the murderers, the bandits! ” “I would give anything for the King’s ship to pick them up as they passed,” I cried furiously, for this aggression was so unjustified that it stirred my bile. “What do these scoundrels want? Certainly they are drunk or mad. ” “Hold on the anchor, friend, hold on the anchor!” cried my comrade, rising abruptly from his seat. “I understand, hold on the anchor. ” “What is it?” I asked, helping him pull up the big rock until it came out of the water, still dripping. “They’re not shooting at us, my boy. They were aiming at someone in the water between them and us. Pull, Micah! Give it a good tug. It might be some poor fellow drowning. ” “Yes, yes,” I said, looking behind me between two strokes of the oars. ” I see his head on the crest of a wave. Easy, or we’ll go over him. Two more strokes, and be ready to grab him. Hold on, friend. We’re coming to your aid. ” “Offer aid to those who need help!” said a voice from the sea. “Good heavens, friend, watch your oar. I’m more afraid of getting hit by it than I am of the water.” These words were spoken with such calmness and composure that all our fears about the swimmer disappeared. We retracted the oars and turned to take a look at him. The boat, in drifting, had come so close to him that he could have grabbed the side if he had thought fit to do so. “Sapperment!” he cried gruffly, “to think that it is my brother Nonus who is playing such a trick on me! What would our holy mother have said if she had seen this? All my equipment lost, not to mention my share of the profits of the voyage! And now here I am, throwing a pair of brand-new riding boots, which cost sixteen rixdollars at Vanseddar’s in Amsterdam! With these, it is impossible to swim! Without them, it is impossible to walk! ” “Won’t you get out of the water, sir?” asked Ruben.
He had great difficulty keeping a straight face when he saw the stranger’s appearance and heard his words. Long arms protruded from the water. In an instant, with the flexible movements of a snake, the man entered the boat and stretched his long body out on the stern planks. He was extremely thin, very slender, with a face carved with an axe, a hard expression, clean-shaven, annealed by the sun, and with a thousand little wrinkles crisscrossing in all directions. He had lost his hat and his short, stiff hair, slightly graying, stood up in a brush all over his head. It was difficult to guess his age, but he must have been very close to fifty years of age, despite the agility with which he had entered our boat, proof that he had lost none of his vigor and energy. Of all the features that characterized him, the one that most attracted my attention was his eyes, which, almost covered by the lowering of the eyelids, nevertheless appeared through the narrow slit with a remarkable brilliance and vivacity. A superficial glance might have led one to believe that he was in a state of languor, of half-sleep, but with more attention, one perceived these brilliant, moving lines, and one saw in them a warning to be on one’s guard against one’s first impressions. “I could have swum to Portsmouth,” he said, searching in the pockets of his waterlogged jacket. “I could swim to any place.” I once swam down the Danube from Gran to Buda, while a hundred janissaries stamped their feet in rage on the other side. I did it, yes, by the keys of Saint Peter! The Pandours of Wessenburg could tell you if Decimus Saxon knows how to swim. Take my advice, young man. Always keep your tobacco in a metal box, so that water cannot get in. So saying, he took from his pocket a flat box and several wooden tubes, which he screwed end to end so as to make a long pipe. He stuffed it with tobacco, lit it by means of a flint and a lighter, with a piece of tinder paper, which he had in his box. Then he folded his legs under him in the oriental fashion, and sat down to smoke his pipe at his ease. There was something so bizarre about the whole incident, the man and his actions so absurd in appearance, that we both burst into a fit of laughter that lasted until exhaustion put an end to it. He took no part in our mirth, but did not appear at all hurt by it. He continued to smoke to the end with a perfectly insensible and impassive air, except that his half-covered eyes glittered as he looked at us alternately. “You will excuse us for laughing, sir,” I said at last, “but my friend and I are not accustomed to such adventures, and we are glad that this one ended so happily. May I ask whom we have taken in? ” “My name is Decimus Saxon,” replied the stranger. “I am the tenth son of a worthy father, as my Latin name indicates. There are only nine men between me and an inheritance. Who knows? Smallpox or the plague might interfere.” “We heard a shot on the brig?” asked Ruben. “It was Nonus, my brother, who was shooting at me,” remarked the stranger, shaking his head sadly. “But there was a second shot. ” “It was me shooting at my brother Nonus. ” “Good heavens!” I cried, “I hope you didn’t hit him.” “Oh! At most, a graze in the flesh,” he replied. “But I thought it best to leave, for fear the matter might turn into a quarrel. I’m sure it was he who fired the nine-pounder while I was in the water. The cannonball passed so close that it parted my hair. He was always an excellent shot with a falconet or a mortar. He couldn’t have been badly hurt, since he had time to get down from the stern onto the deck.” There was then a moment of silence, during which the stranger took a long knife from his belt, which he used to clean his pipe. Ruben and I took our oars, picked up our tangled lines, which had trailed behind the boat, and set out to regain the shore. “Now we have to decide where we are going,” said the stranger. “We are going down Langston Bay,” I replied. “We are going down, we are going down…” he said mockingly. ” Are you quite sure? Are you certain we are not going to France?” We’ve got a mast and a sail here, I see, and water in the tank. All we need is a few fish, and I’ve heard they’re plentiful around here, and we could make a trip down to Barfleur. “We’re going down Langston Bay,” I repeated coldly. “You know, on the water, might is right,” he explained with a smile that covered his face with wrinkles. “I’m an old soldier and a tough fighter. You’re a pair of chumps. I’ve got a knife and you’ve got no weapons. Do you see where that leads? Now it’s a question of where we’re going.” I turned to him, an oar in my hands. “You boasted you could swim to Portsmouth,” I said, “and that’s what you’ll do. Into the water, you sea viper, or I’ll throw you in, as sure as my name is Micah Clarke.” “Throw down your knife, or I’ll run the boat hook through your body,” cried Ruben, thrusting it within a few inches of the man’s throat. “By my dive, that’s very commendable!” he said, putting his knife back in its sheath, and chuckling to himself, “I like to make young men’s courage spring forth. You see, I am the tinderbox that makes the spark of valor spring from your flint. It’s a remarkable comparison, and worthy in every way of Samuel Butler, the most witty of men… This,” he continued, patting a bump I had noticed on his chest, “is not a natural deformity. He is a copy of that incomparable Hudibras, who unites the lightness of Horace with the more ample gaiety of Catullus. Well! what do you say to this appreciation? ” “Give me that knife,” I said, sharply. “Certainly,” he replied, handing it to me with a polite inclination of his head. “Is there anything else I can reasonably ask that will enable me to oblige you? I would give anything to please you, except my good name and renown as a soldier, or this copy of Hudibras, which I never part with, nor a Latin treatise on the customs of war, composed by a Fleming and printed at Liège, in the Low Countries. ” I sat down beside him, knife in hand. “You row,” I said to Ruben, “while I keep an eye on our man and see that he plays no tricks on us. I believe you are right, and that he is nothing better than a pirate. We will deliver him to the justices of the peace when we arrive at Havant.” I believe our passenger’s composure left him for a moment, and an expression of uneasiness appeared on his face. “Wait a moment,” he said, “your name is Clarke, and you live in Havant, I understand. Are you a relation of Joseph Clarke, the old Roundhead of this town? ” “He is my father,” I replied. “Now listen,” he cried, after a loud burst of laughter. ” I have a peculiar talent for landing on my feet. Look at this, my boy, look at this.” He took from his inside pocket a bundle of letters wrapped in a square of oilcloth, took one out, and laid it on my knee. “Read,” he said, pointing to it with his long, thin finger. ” The address, in large, neat letters, ran thus: To Joseph Clarke, leather merchant at Havant. By the hands of Master Decimus Saxon, owner of a share in the ship Providence, plying from Amsterdam to Portsmouth.” It was sealed on both sides with a large red seal, and further strengthened with a wide silk band. “I have twenty-three more to deliver into the country,” he remarked. “That indicates what people think of Decimus Saxon. I have in my hands the lives and liberty of twenty-three people. Ah! my boy; that is not how bills of lading and cargo tickets are made. This is not a cargo of Flemish skins that we send to the old man. In the skins, there are brave English hearts, and they have English swords in their hands to conquer liberty. I risk my life by taking this letter to your father, and you, his son, you threaten to deliver me to the judges! It’s shameful, shameful! I blush for you. “I don’t know what you’re referring to,” I replied. “You must speak more clearly if you want me to understand you. ” “Can we trust him?” he said, pointing to Reuben with a sharp movement of his head. “As with myself. ” “That’s charming!” he said with a grimace that was part smile , part mockery. “David and Jonathan, or… let’s be more classical and less biblical, Damon and Pythias, eh? So these papers come from the faithful who live abroad, from the exiles of Holland, do you hear me?” They are thinking of leaving and coming to visit King James, their swords buckled in their belts. The letters are addressed to those whose sympathy they hope for, and inform them of the date and place where they will make a landing. Now, my dear boy, you will recognize that it is not I who am in your power, and that on the contrary you are so well in my hands that a word from me is enough to annihilate your whole family. But Decimus Saxon is a tried man, and this word will never be spoken. “If all this is true,” I said, “and if your mission is really the one you speak of, why did you propose, only a moment ago, to us to go to France? ” “That is a very well-put question and yet the answer is quite clear,” he replied. “Your faces are pleasant and intelligent, but it was not possible for me to read in them that you were really Whigs, friends of the good old cause.” You could have taken me to some place where customs officers and others would have felt the need to look closely, to pry, which would have put my mission at risk. Better a trip to France in an open boat than that. “I will take you to my father,” I said after thinking for a few moments. “You can give him your letter and explain your case. If you are in good faith, you will be received with eagerness, but if he discovers that you are a scoundrel, as I suspect, do not count on any pity. ” “Ah! that boy! He speaks like the Lord High Chancellor of England. What does the old man say? He could not open his mouth Without a trope falling out. No, it is a threat that would be needed, it is the merchandise you like to peddle most: He could not let a minute pass Without making a threat. Isn’t that so? Waller himself could not have found a better rhyme. Meanwhile, Reuben had been rowing vigorously. We had entered Langston Bay, in the midst of sheltered waters, and were making rapid progress. Sitting on one of the benches, I turned over and over in my mind everything this castaway had said. I had glanced over his shoulder at the addresses of some letters: Steadman, of Basingstoke; Wintle, of Alresford; Fortescue, of Bognor, all leaders among the Dissenters. If they were such as he represented them, he was not exaggerating in the least when he said that he held the fortunes and fates of these men in his hands. The government would be only too happy to possess a plausible motive for striking hard at the men it dreaded. All things considered, it was necessary to proceed with caution in this matter. I therefore restored our prisoner’s knife and treated him with more deference. It was almost night when we grounded the boat, and it was very dark before we arrived at Havant, and this was fortunate because the condition of our companion, dripping with water, without boots, without hat, would not have did not fail to set tongues wagging, and perhaps also to attract the curiosity of the authorities. But we did not meet a living soul until we arrived at my father’s door. Chapter 5. Of The Man With Drooping Eyelids. My mother and father were sitting in their high-backed armchairs on either side of the empty hearth when we arrived. He was smoking Oroonoko’s tobacco pipe, which he tuned every evening, and she was working on her embroidery. As I opened the door, the man I had brought in came briskly in, bowed to the two old men, and began to apologize volubly for the lateness of his visit, and to relate how I had taken him in. I could not suppress a smile at the extreme astonishment my mother showed when she first glanced at him, for the loss of his high boots had exposed a pair of flutes that seemed to go on forever, the thinness of which was further accentuated by the wide, bouffant Dutch-style breeches with which they were surmounted. Decimus’s tunic was of a coarse cloth of a sad color, with new, flat copper buttons. Beneath it was a waistcoat of whitish calamanco edged with silver. Over the collar of his coat ran a wide white collar in the Dutch fashion, and from it emerged his long, knobbly neck, supporting a round head covered with a crew-cut hair. He looked like the turnip stuck on the end of a stick we used to pull at fairs. Thus equipped, he stood blinking, closing his eyes against the glare of the light, uttering his apologies, accompanied by as many bows and curtsies as Sir Peter Witling does in the comedy. I was about to enter the room with him when Reuben tugged at my sleeve to restrain me. “No,” he said, “I will not go in with you. It is likely that all this will end in some misfortune. My father may grumble when he has drunk his jugs of ale, but he is nonetheless a High Churchman and a determined Tory, and I prefer to stay out of the whole business. ” “You are right,” I replied. “There is no need for you to meddle in this matter. Keep your mouth shut, especially what you have heard. ” “Dumb as a rat,” he said, shaking my hand, and slipping away into the darkness. When I returned to the room, I saw that my mother had run to the kitchen, where the crackling of the kindling indicated that she was lighting a fire. Decimus Saxon was sitting on the edge of the oaken chest beside my father and was watching him attentively with his small, blinking eyes, while the old man adjusted his horn-rimmed spectacles and broke the seal of the letter which the unknown visitor had just given him. I saw that my father, after glancing at the signature which ended the long, tightly written epistle, gave a start of surprise and remained motionless for a moment, staring at it fixedly. Then he began to read, from the beginning, with the greatest attention. Evidently it did not bring him bad news, for his eyes sparkled with joy when he looked up after reading it, and more than once he laughed aloud. Finally, he asked Saxon how it had come into his hands, and if he knew its contents. “Oh!” for that, said the messenger, it was delivered to me by a personage who was none other than Dicky Rumbold himself, and in the presence of others whom it is not for me to name. As for the contents, your common sense will tell you that I would be careful not to risk my neck by carrying a message without knowing the nature of that message. Cartels, pronunciamientos, challenges, signals of truce, proposals for waffenstillstand, as the Germans call them, all this has passed by my hands, without ever straying. “Truly!” said my father, “are you also among the faithful? ” “I hope to be among those who walk the narrow and thorny path,” he said, speaking through his nose like the most hardened sectarians. “A path on which no prelate can serve as our guide,” said my father. “Where man is nothing, where the Lord is everything,” rejoined Saxon. “Very well! very well!” cried my father. “Micah, you will lead this worthy man to my room. You will see that he has dry linen, and my second suit of Utrecht velvet. It may serve him until his own is dry. My boots may also be of use to him, my riding boots, of untanned leather. There is a silver-rimmed hat hanging in the wardrobe. See that he lacks nothing that may be found in the house.” Supper will be ready when he has changed his clothes. I beg you to come up at once, my good Mr. Saxon. Otherwise you will catch a cold. “We have forgotten only one thing,” said our visitor, rising from his chair with a solemn air and joining his long, nervous hands, “let us not delay a moment longer in addressing a few words of homage to the Almighty for his many benefits, and for the favor he has shown me in pulling me and my letters from the abyss, just as Jonah was saved from the violence of the wicked who threw him overboard and perhaps shot at him with falcons, although this is not mentioned in Holy Scripture. So, let us pray, my friends.” Then, assuming a high tone and a singing voice, he delivered a long prayer of thanksgiving, which he concluded by imploring grace and divine light upon the house and all its inhabitants. He ended with a resounding amen, and then was kind enough to let himself be led upstairs, while my mother, who had arrived unexpectedly and had been extremely edified to hear him, hurried back to prepare him a glass of green usquebaugh, with ten drops of Daffy’s Elixir , which was her sovereign recipe for the after-effects of a cold bath. There was not a single event in life, from baptism to marriage, which did not correspond, in my mother’s vocabulary, to something that could be eaten or drunk, not an ailment for which she did not have a pleasant remedy in her well-stocked drawers. Master Decimus Saxon, dressed in the velvet coat of Utrecht, and wearing my father’s untanned leather boots, cut a completely different figure from the soiled wreck that had slipped into our fishing boat with the movements of a conger eel. It seemed as if he had changed his manners by changing his clothes, for during supper he showed my mother a discreet gallantry, and this became him much better than the mocking and self-important manner he had used with us in the boat. To tell the truth, if he was now very reserved, it was for an excellent reason, for he made such a wide dent in the victuals laid on the table that he had scarcely any time left for conversation. At last, after passing from the slice of cold beef to the capon pie, and continuing with a two-pound pole, which he brought down with a large pot of ale, he gave us all a smile, and declared that for the moment his carnal needs were satisfied. “I make it a rule,” he said, “to obey the wise precept, according to which one must rise from table with enough appetite to eat as much as one has just eaten. ” “I conclude from your words, sir, that you have had some hard campaigns,” my father remarked, when the table was cleared, and my mother had retired for the night. “I am an old warrior,” replied our host, screwing his pipe, such a thin old dog of the breed of the Tiens ferme. This body here bears the marks of many thrusts and cuts received in the service of the Protestant law, without counting others, received for the defense of Christianity in general in the wars against the Turk. Sir, there are drops of my blood all over the map of Europe. Doubtless, I admit, it was not always shed in the public interest, but to defend my honor in one or two duels, or holmgangs, as it was called among the nations of the North. It is necessary that a cavalier of fortune, who is most often a foreigner in a foreign land, be a little touchy on this point, for he is in some way the representative of his country whose good name must be dearer to him than his own. –In such circumstances, your weapon was the sword, I suppose? said my father, shifting in his chair with an embarrassed air, as he did when his old instincts were awakened. “Saber, rapier, Toledo blade, espontoon, battle-axe, pike or half-pike, morning sword, and halberd. I speak with proper modesty , but when I hold in my hand the single-edged saber, the saber with dagger, the saber with shield, the curved saber alone or the assortment of curved sabers, I undertake to stand up to anyone who has worn the buffalo coat, with the exception of my brother Quartus. ” “By my faith,” said my father, his eyes shining, “if I were twenty years younger , I would try my hand with you. My straight saber game has been judged good by rough warriors. May God forgive me for still allowing myself to be moved by such vanities!” “I have heard good things about it from pious people,” remarked Saxon. ” Master Richard Rumbold himself spoke of your exploits to the Duke of Argyle. Was there not a Scot named Storr or Stour? ” “Yes, yes, Stour, of Drumlithie. I split him in two almost to the saddle in a skirmish, the day before Dunbar. So Dicky has not forgotten that? He stood firm to the last, whether it came to prayer or to fighting. We stood side by side on the field of battle, and we sought the truth together in the barracks. So Dick will take up the harness again! It was impossible for him to remain quiet, while there was a blow to be given for the trampled faith. If the tide of war advances this way, so will I… who knows, who knows? ” “And here is a stout fighter,” said Saxon, laying his hand on my arm. He has nerve and muscle, and can speak proudly on occasion, as I have good reason to know, though we have only known each other for a short time. Might it not be that he, too, may strike his blow in this quarrel? “We will discuss that,” said my father thoughtfully, looking at me from under his bushy eyebrows, “but I pray you, Master Saxon, give us some other particulars of this affair. As I understand it, my son Micah pulled you from the waves. How did you fall into it?” Decimus Saxon smoked his pipe for more than a minute without saying anything, like a man who reviews events in order to arrange them in proper order. “This is how it happened,” he said at last. “When John of Poland drove the Turk from the gates of Vienna, peace was established among the Principalities, and many a knight errant, like myself, found himself without employment. There was no longer any war anywhere, except for petty skirmishes in Italy, where a soldier could expect to reap money or fame. I therefore wandered through the Continent, very sorry for the strange peace that reigned everywhere. At last, however, having arrived in the Netherlands, I learned that Providence, having as owners and commanders my two brothers Nonus and Quartus, was about to leave Amsterdam for an expedition to the coast of Guinea. I proposed to them that I join them in them. I was therefore taken in as a partner on condition of paying a third of the price of the cargo. While I was waiting at the port, I met some of the exiles, who, having heard of my devotion to the Protestant cause, introduced me to the Duke and Master Rumbold, who entrusted these letters to my care. This clearly explains how they came into my hands. “But not how you and they ended up in the water,” suggested my father. “Oh! it was by the greatest of chances,” said the adventurer with a slight unease. “It was fortuna belli, or to speak more proprietily , pacis. I had asked my brothers to stop at Portsmouth so that I could get rid of these letters. To which they replied in the language of ill-bred people, of oafs, that they were waiting for the thousand guineas which represented my share in the enterprise. To which I replied with brotherly familiarity that it was a small amount, and that this sum would be taken from the profits of our business. They alleged that I had promised to pay in advance and that they needed the money. Then I set about proving by both Aristotelian and Platonic methods, and the deductive method, that having no guineas in my possession, it was impossible for me to pay a thousand. I pointed out to them at the same time that the participation taken in the business by an honest man was in itself ample compensation for the money, since their reputation had suffered somewhat. Besides, giving a new proof of my frankness and conciliatory spirit, I proposed to them an encounter with swords or pistols, with any one of them, a proposition which would have satisfied any knight who loved honor. But their base and mercantile souls suggested they take two muskets, Nonus discharged one at me, and it is probable that Quartus would have imitated him, if I had not snatched the weapon from his hands, and if I had not made him leave to prevent a new misdeed. I fear that in discharging it, one of the ingots made a hole in the skin of my brother Nonus. Seeing that other complications might well arise on board the ship, I decided to leave him at once, and to do this, I had to take off my fine cuffed boots, which, according to Vanseddars himself, were the best pair that had ever left his store. Square-toed, double-soled hoods! Alas! Alas! “It is strange that you should have been taken in by the very son of the man for whom you had a letter. ” “These are the ways of Providence,” replied Saxon. I have twenty-two others which must be delivered from hand to hand. If you will allow me to use your dwelling for a while, I will make it my headquarters . “Use it as if it were your own,” said my father. “Your most grateful servant,” replied Decimus, rising abruptly and placing his hand on his heart. “I am indeed in a haven of rest, after the impious and profane society of my brothers. Shall we not sing a hymn before we relax from the day’s business ? ” My father eagerly consented, and we sang: “O happy land.” After which our host followed us into his room, carrying with him the unopened bottle of usquebaugh which my mother had left on the table. If he acted thus, it was, according to him, because he feared an attack of Persian fever, contracted in his campaigns against the Ottomans, and liable to return at any moment. I left him in our best bedroom and went to find my father, still sitting, his head bent under the weight of reflection, in his usual corner. “What do you think of my discovery, papa?” I asked. “A man of talent and piety,” he replied, “but the truth is, that he brought me the news most likely to gladden my heart. So I could not have given him a bad reception, even if he had been the Pope of Rome. “What news, then?” “Here it is, here it is,” he cried, drawing the letter from his breast, looking very joyful. “I will read it to you, my boy. No, I had better go to sleep on it, and read it tomorrow, when our ideas are clearer. May the Lord direct me on my path, and confound the tyrant! Pray for enlightenment, my boy, for it may happen that my life and yours are equally at stake. Chapter 6. On the Subject of the Letter from the Netherlands. I got up early in the morning, and ran, according to the custom of country people, to our host’s room to see if I could be of any use to him. On pushing open the door, I saw that it resisted. This surprised me all the more because I knew there was neither key nor lock inside . But it gradually gave way under my pressure, and I recognized that a heavy chest usually placed near the window had changed position and been put there to prevent any intrusion. This precaution, taken under the paternal roof, as if it were in a den of thieves, made me angry. I gave a violent blow with my shoulder which moved the chest, which allowed me to enter the room. Mr. Saxon was sitting up in bed and casting fixed glances around him, as if he did not quite know where he was. He had tied a white handkerchief around his head, by way of a nightcap , and his hard-featured, clean-shaven face, seen under this shelter, contributed, with his bony body, to give him the appearance of a gigantic old woman. The empty bottle of usquebaugh was lying beside his bed. Evidently the fears had been realized. He had had an attack of Persian fever. “Ah! my young friend,” he said at last, “so it is the custom in this part of the country to storm or climb into the rooms of your hosts in the early hours of the morning? ” “Is it customary,” I replied harshly, “to barricade your door when you are sleeping under the roof of an honest man! What did you have to fear to take such a precaution! ” “Good! You are a fire-eater!” he replied, throwing himself back on his pillow and pulling the sheets over himself, a feuerkopf, as the Germans say, or rather a tollkopf, a word which, taken in its proper sense, means mad head. Your father, from what I have learned, was a vigorous and violent man, when the blood of youth circulated in his veins; but, as far as I can judge, you are not behind him.” Know, then, that the bearer of important papers , documenta pretiosa sed periculosa, has the duty to leave nothing to chance, and to watch over in every way the deposit entrusted to him. In truth, I am in the house of an honest man, but I do not know who may enter, who may come during the hours of the night. Really, for this matter… But I have said enough, I will be with you in a moment. “Your clothes are dry and all ready,” I remarked. “Enough! Enough! I do not want to complain about the complete suit of clothes your father lent me. Perhaps I was accustomed to wearing better ones, but this one will do. The camp is not the court. For me, it was obvious that my father’s garment was infinitely better, both in cut and material, than the one our host had worn. But since he had completely tucked his head under the bedclothes, there was nothing more to say. I went downstairs to the room below, where I found my father busily engaged in fastening a new buckle to the baldric of his sword, while my mother prepared the morning meal. “Come into the yard with me, Micah,” said my father. “I would like you say a word. The workmen were not yet at their work. So we went out on this beautiful morning to sit on the little stone parapet that is used for spreading the hides. “I went out this morning to see how I am doing with my saber practice,” he said. “I see that I have retained all my vivacity for a pointing blow, but for cutting blows I feel a painful stiffness. I could be of some service on occasion, but alas! I am no longer the saber-fighter who led the left wing of the finest cavalry regiment that ever marched behind the drummers. The Lord gave me, the Lord has taken me away. But if I am old and worn out, I have the fruit of my loins to take my place and wield the same sword for the same cause. You will go in my place, Micah. ” “Go! Where?” “Hush, my boy, and listen.” Don’t say too much to your mother, for women have weak hearts. When Abraham offered his firstborn, I’m sure he said little to Sarah. Here is the letter. Do you know who this Rumbold is? “I’m sure I heard you speak of him as one of your old companions. ” “He is indeed he, a trustworthy and sincere man. He was so faithful—faithful to the point of murder—that when the army of the Righteous dispersed, he did not lay down his zeal along with his buffalo jerkin. He established himself as a malt manufacturer at Hoddesdon, and it was at his house that the famous Rye House plot was prepared, in which so many good people were implicated. ” “Was it not a disloyal plan of assassination?” I asked. “No! Do not be deceived by words.” These are malicious people who are the authors of this vile slander that Rumbold and his friends were planning an assassination. What they wanted to accomplish, they were resolved to do in broad daylight, thirty of them against fifty men of the Royal Guard, when Charles and James went to Newmarket. If the king and his brother had received a bullet or a blow from a saber point, they would have received it in the open battle, where their assailants would have exposed themselves. It was blow for blow; it was not assassination. He fell silent and looked at me questioningly. I cannot frankly say that I was satisfied, for an attack on unarmed and unsuspecting people, even if they were surrounded by bodyguards, was not justifiable in my eyes. “When the plot failed,” my father continued, “Rumbold had to flee for his life, but he managed to slip through the hands of his pursuers and reach the Netherlands. There he found a large number of enemies of the government gathered. Repeated messages from England, and especially from the western counties and London, assured them that if they finally wanted to attempt an invasion, they could count on support both in men and money. But they were for some time in difficulty, for lack of a leader who was important enough to carry out such a grand project, but now at last they have one, the best that could be chosen. It is none other than the well-loved Protestant captain, James, Duke of Monmouth, son of Charles II. “Legitimate son,” I remarked. “It is true or it is false. Some claim that Lucy Walters was a legitimate wife. Bastard or not, he professes the true principles of the venerable Church and is beloved by the people. Let him show himself in the West, and the soldiers will spring up like flowers in spring. He fell silent and led me to the other end of the courtyard, for the workmen were already arriving and surrounding the pit for plunging the hides. “Monmouth is on his way,” he continued, “and expects to rally all the brave Protestants under his standard. The Duke of Argyle is to command a separate force, which will set fire to all the Highlands of Scotland. Between them , they hope to force the persecutor of the faithful to ask for mercy.” But I hear the voice of friend Saxon, and I do not want him to say that I have behaved like a boor to him. Here is the letter, my boy. Read it carefully, and remember that when brave men fight for their rights, it is only right that a member of the old rebel family of Clarke should be in their ranks. I took the letter, and after walking in the countryside, I settled myself comfortably under a tree to read it. This yellowed leaf that I am holding now is the very one that was brought by Decimus Saxon, the one that I read on that beautiful May morning in the shade of the hawthorn tree. I reproduce it for you exactly as it was. To my friend and companion in the cause of the Lord, Joseph Clarke. Know, friend, that deliverance is near for Israel, and that the criminal king and those who support him will be stricken and utterly cut down, so that their place on earth will not be known. Hasten, therefore, to give proof of your faith, so that in the day of trouble you will not be found wanting. It has happened that from time to time many of those who belong to the suffering Church, both in our country and among the Scots, have gathered together in this good Lutheran city of Amsterdam, and that at last they have been found in sufficient number to undertake a good work. For there are among us My Lord Grey of Wark, Wade, Dare of Taunton, Ayloffe, Holmes, Hollis, Goodenough, and others whom you will know. Among the Scots there is the Duke of Argyle, who suffered cruelly for the Covenant, Sir Patrick Hume, Fletcher of Saltoun, Sir John Cochrane, Doctor Ferguson, Major Elphinstone and others. To these we would gladly have added Locke and old Hal Ludlow, but they are neither hot nor cold, like those of the Church of Laodicea. However, it has now happened that Monmouth, after having lived for a long time in the shameful chains of that Midianite woman named Wentworth, has at last turned to higher things and consented to proclaim his rights to the crown. It has been recognized that the Scots preferred to follow a leader of their own nation, and it has accordingly been decided that Argyle, or MacCallum the Great, as the breeched savages of Inverary call him, shall command a separate expedition to the western coast of Scotland. It is hoped to raise five thousand Campbells, and to be joined by all the Covenanters and Whigs of the West, people who would make good troops as of old, if they only had God-fearing officers experienced in the hazards of battle and the customs of war. With such an army, he would be able to occupy Glasgow and draw the royal forces north. Ayloffe and I are leaving with Argyle. It is likely that our feet will have touched Scottish soil before this letter is before you. The main body leaves with Monmouth and lands at a favorable point in the west, where we are assured of numerous friends. I cannot name this place, for fear that this letter will go astray, but you will soon learn it. I have written to all the honest people who live near the coast, asking them to be ready to support the revolt. The king is weak and hated by the majority of his subjects. It only takes a great blow to bring his crown to dust. Monmouth will leave in a few weeks, when his armament is complete and the weather is favorable. If you can come, my old comrade, I know well that I will not have to pray to you to be under our flag. If by chance a peaceful existence and the decline of your strength should forbid you from joining us, I hope that you will fight for us by prayer, as did the holy prophet of old. Perhaps even, for I hear that you have prospered in matters the things of this world, will you be able to equip a pikeman or two, or send a present for the army’s coffers, which will not be the best provided for? It is not in gold that we put our trust, but in steel and in the goodness of our cause. However, the gold will be welcome. If we fail, we will fall as men and as Christians. If we succeed, we will see how this perjurer James, this persecutor of the saints, this man with a heart as hard as the bottom stone in a mill, and who smiled at Edinburgh when the thumbs of the faithful were torn from their joints, we will see if he will bear adversity manfully when it falls upon him. May the hand of the Almighty be over us! I know little of the account of the bearer of this letter, except that he calls himself one of the elect. If you come to Monmouth’s camp, see that you have him with you, for he has acquired great experience in the wars of Germany, Spain, and Turkey. Your friend in the faith of Christ. RICHARD RUMBOLD Offer my compliments to your wife. Let her read the Epistle to Timothy, chapter eight, from the ninth to the fifteenth verse. I had carefully read this long letter. I then put it back in my pocket and went home to breakfast. My father gave me an inquiring look when I came in, but I said nothing in reply, for my mind was full of darkness and uncertainty. That day, Decimus Saxon left us, with the intention of going around the country to deliver the letters, but promising to return soon. A little mishap occurred before his departure, for while we were talking about his journey, my brother Hosea thought it wise to play with my father’s powder flask, which suddenly caught fire, throwing out a great flame, and scattered the walls with shards of metal. The explosion was so sudden and violent that my father and I jumped up, but Saxon, who had his back to my brother, remained motionless, sitting firmly in his chair, without glancing behind him, without a change appearing in his rugged face. By incredible luck, no one was hurt, not even Hosea, but this incident gave me some esteem for our new acquaintance. When he left, as he walked along the village street, his long, gaunt body, his strange face and hard features, and my father’s silver-embroidered hat, which he wore, attracted more attention than I had wished for, because of the importance of the letters he was carrying, and the certainty that they would be discovered, in the event that he was arrested as an unknown person with no one to answer for. Fortunately, the curiosity of the companions had no other effect than to group them at their doors and windows, from where they gazed at the passerby with wide eyes, while he, delighted by the attention he excited, went off with great strides, his nose in the air and twirling my cudgel in his hand. He had left behind him the best opinion of himself. My father’s goodwill had been acquired by his piety and the sacrifices he claimed to have made for the faith. He had taught my mother how the Serbs wear their caps. He had also shown her a new way of preparing marigolds, used among the Lithuanians. As for me, I confess that I still had a vague reservation about this personage, and that I was resolved not to show him more confidence than was necessary. But for the moment, there was only one course to follow, which was to treat him as the ambassador of friendly people. And me? What should I do? Obey my father’s wishes and draw my virgin sword in favor of the insurgents, or keep aside and see what turn of events would take of their own accord? It was more fitting that I should go and not he. But on the other hand, I had nothing of the zealot’s ardor in religion. Popery, Church, Dissenters, all seemed to me to have their good points, but none seemed worth the shedding of human blood. James may have been a perjurer, a contemptible man, but as far as I could see, he was the rightful king of England, and stories of secret marriages, of a black casket, were not calculated to make us forget that his rival was apparently an illegitimate son, and as such ineligible for the throne. Could one say what culpable act on the part of the monarch gave his people the right to drive him out? Who should be the judge in such a case? And yet, it was common knowledge that this man had violated his promises, and this must release his subjects from their submission. This was a very difficult question for a young countryman to resolve. Yet it had to be resolved, and without delay. I took my hat and went along the village street, turning the matter over in my mind. But it was not very easy for me to think of anything serious in the village, for I was to a certain extent the favorite of the young and old, so that I could not go ten steps without being greeted or spoken to. I dragged my brothers after me. The baker Misford’s children were hanging on my coattails, and I held the miller’s two daughters by the hand. Then, when I had succeeded in getting rid of all these heedless people, I fell in with Dame Fullerton, the widow. She told me in a lamentable tone the affair of her grindstone, which had fallen from its stand, and which neither she nor her servants could manage to put back in place. I put the matter in order, and resumed my walk, but I could scarcely pass the sign of the Wheatsheaf without John Lockarby, Father Reuben, falling upon me, and earnestly pressing me in to drink the morning’s drink with him. “A glass of the best ale in the country, brewed under my own roof,” said he, pouring it into the cup. “Why, Master Micah, a chest like yours certainly requires a large dose of good malt to keep it in good condition. ” “And beer like that deserves a good chest to hold it in,” said Reuben, who was busy among the bottles. “What do you think, Micah?” said the innkeeper. “Yesterday morning the Squire of Milton was here with Johnny Fernley, the one from the Bank, and they say there’s a man at Farnham who can wrestle you , two times out of three, and find out your game, for a stake worth his salt.”
“Phew!” I replied, “you would make me a fighting mastiff, who bares my teeth to all the people in the country! What would it prove if this man fell me, or if I fell him? ” “What would it prove? Well, what about the honor of Havant? Does it mean nothing?… But you are right,” he resumed, emptying his horn goblet, “what is all this village life, with its little triumphs, to such people as you? You are as much out of place as vintage wine at a harvest supper. It is all wide England, and not the streets of Havant, that forms a scene worthy of a man of your sort. Is it your business to beat hides, and tan leather? ” “My father would have you go and play the knight-errant,” said Reuben, laughing. “You might have your hide beaten and your leather tanned.” “Has anyone ever seen such a long tongue in such a short body?” cried the innkeeper. “But let’s speak for real, Master Micah. I tell you this quite seriously! You are wasting your youthful days, while life sparkles and shines, and you will regret it when you have nothing left but the dregs without strength or flavor.” of old age. “So spoke the brewer,” said Reuben, “but my father is right all the same , with his way of saying things like a man who lives in broth and water. ” “I’ll think about it,” I said. Then, taking leave of this pair of friends with a nod, I set off again. As I passed, Zachary Palmer was busy planing a board. He looked up and wished me good morning. “I have a book for you, my boy,” he said. “I have just finished the Comus,” I replied, “for he had lent me Milton’s poem, but what is this new book, papa? ” “It is by the learned Locke, and it treats of the State and the science of government. It is a very small work, but if wisdom could be put in a balance, it would weigh as much as a library. You will have it as soon as I have finished it, perhaps tomorrow or the day after.” He is a great man, Master Locke. Is he not at this moment wandering about the Low Countries rather than bend the knee to what his conscience does not approve? “There are many honest people among the exiles, are there not?” I said. “The best of the country,” he replied. “A country is very sick when it drives away the greatest and bravest of its citizens. The day is approaching, I fear, when everyone will be forced to choose between his beliefs and his liberty. I am an old man, Micah, my boy, but I may live long enough to see strange things in this once Protestant kingdom. ” “But if these exiles carried out their plans,” I objected, “they would put Monmouth on the throne, and thus unjustly change the order of succession.” “No, no,” replied old Zacharias, laying down his plane, “if they use the name of Monmouth, it is only to give more strength to their cause, and to show that they have a renowned leader. If James were driven from the throne, the Commons of England assembled in Parliament would have to choose a successor for him. There are men behind Monmouth who would not budge if it were otherwise. ” “Then, papa,” I said, “since I can trust you and you will tell me what you really think, would it be well, in the event that the Monmouth flag were unfurled, for me to join him?” The carpenter stroked his white beard and reflected for a moment. “That is a big question,” he said at last, “and yet I think it has only one answer, especially for your father’s son.” If the reign of James were put to an end, it would not be too late to maintain the nation in the old belief, but if the evil were allowed to spread, it might happen that the expulsion of the tyrant himself would not prevent the bad seed from sprouting. Therefore, I am of opinion that if the exiles make such an attempt, it is the duty of all who attach any value to liberty of conscience, to join them. And you, my son, the pride of the village, can you make a better use of your vigor than to devote it to the work of delivering your country from this intolerable yoke? This is advice that would be called treason, dangerous advice, which might end in a short confession and a bloody death, but, on the living God, I would not speak otherwise to you , if you were my own son. Thus spoke the old carpenter in a voice all vibrant, so grave was his tone. Then he went back to working on his plank, while I said a few words of gratitude to him. Afterward, I walked away, thinking over what he had said. I was not far off when the hoarse voice of Solomon Sprent interrupted my meditations. “Ahoy, there, ahoy!” he bellowed, though his mouth was only a few yards from my ear, “will you get through my hawsehole without slowing down? Furling the sails, I say, Reef the sails. “Ah!” I said, “Captain, I didn’t see you. I was completely lost in my thoughts. ” “All adrift, and no one at the guard post!” he said, forcing his way through the gap in the hedge. “By all the Negroes, my boy, there aren’t so many friends, do you believe, that one can pass in front of them without saluting the flag. By my word, if I had artillery, I would have sent a cannonball through the beams. ” “Don’t be angry, Captain,” he replied, “for the veteran seemed upset . I have many things to worry about this morning. ” “And me too, sailor,” he replied in a softer voice, “what do you say about my rigging, eh?” He turned slowly in the full sunlight, while speaking, and I saw then that he was dressed with unusual refinement. He wore a complete outfit of blue cloth with eight rows of buttons, and similar breeches, with large waves of ribbon attached to the knees. His waistcoat was of a lighter material, strewn with silver anchors, with a lace border a finger’s width. His boot was so wide that it looked as if his foot was in a bucket, and he wore a cutlass suspended from a leather belt that rested on his right shoulder. “I’ve given it a new coat of paint,” he said, winking . “Caramba, the old boat isn’t leaking yet. What would you say now, if I were about to throw a hawser to a small boat to take it in. ” “A cow! ” “A cow! What do you take me for? No, my boy, a beautiful girl, a small skiff such as has hardly been seen more solid, setting sail for the marital port.” “It’s been a long time since I heard better news,” I said. “I didn’t even know you were engaged. So, when’s the wedding? ” “Easy, friend, easy, and drop your sounding. You’ve left your channel, and you’re in shallow water. I never said I was engaged. ” “What then?” I asked. “I’m weighing anchor for the moment. I’m going to bear down on her and give her a warning. Watch out, my boy,” he continued, taking off his cap and scratching his unruly hair. “I’ve had enough to do with maidens, from the Levant to the Antilles, maidens like the sailor finds, all in makeup and pockets. As soon as you throw your first hand grenade, they lower their flag.” No, it’s a ship of another cut, one I don’t know, and if I don’t steer carefully, it might well leave me there between the wind and the water, before I even know if I’m engaged. What do you say? Hey! Must I come boldly alongside , tell me, and carry her off with a knife, or would it be better to keep out to sea and try a long-distance fire? I ‘m not one of those learned lawyers, sly with a well-oiled tongue, but if she consents to take a companion, I will be devoted to her, whatever the wind, whatever the weather, as long as my planks last. “I am hardly in a position to give advice in such a case,” I said, “for my experience is less than yours. I think, however, that it would be better to speak to her heart on my sleeve, in very clear language, in sailor’s language. ” “Yes, yes, it will be for her to take or leave.” It’s Phoebe Dawson, the blacksmith’s daughter, that’s in question. Let’s maneuver back, and take a drop of real Nantes, before we leave. I have a barrel that just arrived and hasn’t paid a penny to the King. “No, it’s better not to touch it,” I replied. “Hey! What do you say? Perhaps you’re right. Then cut your moorings, and unfurl your sails, for we must leave. ” “But that doesn’t concern me,” I said. “That doesn’t concern you? That…” He was too agitated to continue: he had to confine himself to turning towards me a face full of reproaches. –I had a better opinion of you, Micah; are you going to let this old, dislocated carcass go into battle without you being there to help it with a broadside? –What do you want me to do? –Well, I would like you to be there to encourage me according to the circumstances. If I launch a boarding, you would have to take it from enfilade, so as to cover it with fire. If I attack it from the starboard side, you would do the same from the port side. If I am put out of action, you would draw its fire on you while I repair. Come now, friend, you are not going to abandon me. The figures, the naval eloquence of the old sailor were not always intelligible to me, but it was clear that he had counted on me to accompany him, and I was equally determined not to do so. Finally, by dint of reasoning, I made him understand that my presence would be more harmful than useful, and that it would probably destroy all chances of success. “Good! Good!” he grumbled, “well, I have never taken part in an expedition of this kind. And if it is the custom of single ships to leave alone for the engagement, I will expose myself all alone. However, you will come with me as a traveling companion, you will tack between me and the said one, or you will sink me if I take a step back. ” My mind was entirely absorbed by my father’s plans and the prospects that lay before me. But it seemed impossible to refuse, for old Solomon spoke in the most convincing tone. The only course to take was to leave the matter aside and see how this expedition would turn out. “Remember well, Solomon,” I said, “that I do not want to cross the threshold. ” “Yes, yes, sailor, you will do as you wish.” We shall have to march all the time against the wind. She is listening, for I hailed her last night, and I let her know that I would be on her at seven o’clock in the morning. While walking with him on the road, I was thinking that Phoebe must be well acquainted with nautical terms to understand anything the good man was saying, when he stopped short, and slapped his pockets. “Damn it!” he cried, “I forgot to take a pistol. ” “In heaven’s name!” I said, quite frightened, “what need do you have of a pistol?” “Eh! but to make signals,” he said. “It is very singular that I did not think of that. How will a convoy know what is happening ahead of him, if the flagship has no artillery? If the young lady had received me kindly, I would have fired a cannon to let you know.” “But,” I replied, “if you don’t come out, I’ll assume all is well. If things go wrong, I won’t be long before I see you again. ” “Yes, or wait. I’ll hoist a white flag on the left gunport; a white flag will mean she has surrendered. Nombre de Dios, when I was a cabin boy on the old ship the Lion, the day we attacked the Spiritus Sanctus, which had two decks of cannon, the first time I heard the whistle of a bullet, my heart never beat as it does now. What do you say, if we retreat to wait for a favorable wind and have a word with that barrel of Nantes brandy? ” “No, friend, hold fast,” I said. By this time we had arrived at the ivy-clad cottage behind which stood the village smithy. “What, Solomon!” I continued. “Did an English sailor ever fear an enemy, with or without petticoats?” “No, damn me if I’m afraid!” said Solomon, standing back. ” Never a single Spaniard, devil or Dutchman! So onward to her!” And so saying, he went into the cottage, and left me standing at the open gate of the garden, where I was amused as much as vexed by to see my thoughts interrupted. And, indeed, the sailor had no great difficulty in getting his request accepted. He maneuvered in such a way as to capture his prize, to use his own language. I heard from the garden the buzzing of his harsh voice, then a high-pitched peal of laughter ending in a little cry. This undoubtedly meant that they were closing in. Then, there was a short moment of silence, and finally I saw a white handkerchief fluttering at the window, and I realized that it was Phoebe herself who was making it flutter. Bah! she was a sprightly girl, with a tender soul, and deep down, I was delighted that the old sailor had such a companion near him to look after him . So here was an excellent friend whose life was definitely fixed. Another, whom I consulted, assured me that I was wasting my best years in the village. A third, the most respected of all, frankly urged me to join the insurgents, if the opportunity presented itself. In case of refusal, I would be ashamed to see my old father leave for the fighting, while I languished at home. And why refuse? Had it not long been the secret desire of my heart to see a little of the world, and could a more favorable opportunity present itself? My wishes, the advice of my friends, the hopes of my father, all tended in the same direction. “Father,” I said, returning home, “I am ready to go wherever you wish.
” “May the Lord be glorified!” he cried in a solemn tone. ” May he watch over your young life and keep your heart firmly attached to the cause which is certainly his! And it was thus, my dear little children, that the great resolution was taken, and I found myself engaged in one of the parties of the national quarrel. Chapter 7. Of the Rider Who Came From the West. My father set about preparing our equipment without delay. He dealt with Saxon, as with me, in the most liberal manner, for he had determined that the fortune of his old age should be devoted to the Cause, as much as the vigor of his youth had been. It was necessary to act with the greatest caution in these preparations, for the Episcopalians were numerous in the village, and in the agitated state of public opinion, activity, noticed in a man so well known, would have immediately aroused attention. But the old and cunning soldier maneuvered with such care that we were soon in a position to start within an hour of receiving notice, without any of our neighbors suspecting it. My father’s first care was to purchase, through an agent, two suitable horses at the market at Chichester. They were taken to the stable of a Whig farmer, a trustworthy man, who lived near Portchester, and who was to keep them until they were required. One of these horses was dapple-grey, and remarkable for his strength and spirit, seventeen and a half hands high, and quite capable of carrying my weight, for, at that time, my dear children, I was not overburdened with flesh, and notwithstanding my size and strength, I weighed a little less than two hundred and twenty-four pounds. A difficult judge might perhaps have found Covenant, as I named my stallion, a little heavy in the head and neck, but I recognized in him a sure, docile beast, with much vigor and stamina. Saxon, who, fully equipped, must have weighed at most one hundred and sixty-four pounds, had a light bay Spanish broom, very fast and very ardent. He named his mare Chloe, a name borne by a pious young lady of his acquaintance, although my father found something profane and pagan in that name. These horses and their harness were kept ready without my father had to show himself in any way. When this important point had been settled, there remained another question to be discussed, that of armament. This gave rise to more than one serious discussion between Decimus Saxon and my father. Each of them took arguments from his own experience, and insisted on the very serious consequences that the presence or absence of this or that tasset or this or that plate of cuirass could have for the wearer. Your great-grandfather was very keen to see me wear the cuirass which still bore the marks of Dunbar’s Scottish spears, but when I tried it on, it was found to be too small for me. I confess that I was surprised, for when I remember the terror and respect I felt when contemplating the vast build of my father, I had good reason to be astonished at this convincing proof that I had surpassed him. My mother contrived to arrange the matter by splitting the side straps and boring holes through which a cord would pass, and she did so well that I was able to fit this cuirass without being hindered. A pair of tassets or cuissards, armlets to protect the arm, and gauntlets were borrowed from the old soldier’s gear of the Parliament, as well as the heavy straight sabre, and the pair of pommel pistols which formed the ordinary armament of the cavalier. My father had bought me at Portsmouth a fluted helmet, with good bars, well padded with flexible leather, very light and yet very strong. When I was completely equipped, Saxon, as well as my father, acknowledged that I had everything necessary to make a well- mounted soldier.
Saxon had bought a buffalo coat, a steel helmet, a pair of knee-high boots, so that with the rapier and pistols which my father presented to him, he was ready to enter the field at the first call. We hoped that we would not encounter great difficulty in joining Monmouth’s forces when the time came. In those troubled times, the principal roads were so infested with highwaymen and vagabonds that travelers were accustomed to carrying arms, and even armor for their defense. There was, therefore, no reason why our outward appearance should arouse suspicion. If we were questioned, Saxon had a long story ready, according to which we were on our way to Henry Somerset, Duke of Beaufort, to whose house we belonged. He explained this invention to me, teaching me many details that I would have to give to confirm it, but when I told him that I would rather be hanged as a rebel than tell a lie, he looked at me with wide eyes, and shook his head with an offended air. “A few weeks’ campaign,” he said, “would soon cure me of my scruples.” As for him, a child studying his syllabary was no more sincere than he, but on the Danube he had learned to lie and regarded it as an indispensable part of a soldier’s education. “Indeed,” he argued, “what are all stratagems, what are ambushes , what are traps, if they do not consist in lying on a vast scale? What is a skillful commander, if not one who can easily disguise the truth? At the Battle of Senlac, when William of Normandy ordered his men to feign flight, in order to break the ranks of the enemy, a ruse much employed by the Scythians of old and by the Croats of our time, I ask you if this was not putting a lie into action?” And when Hannibal attached torches to the horns of many herds of cattle and thus made the Roman consuls believe that his army was retreating, was this not a deception, an infringement of the truth?… This is a subject which has been thoroughly treated by a renowned soldier in the treatise entitled: An in bello dolo uti liceat; an apud hostes falsiloquio uti liceat Which means: is it permissible to use deception in war? Is it permissible to use words with the enemy that are likely to deceive him? So then, if, following the example of these great models, and with a view to achieving our ends, I declare that we are going to join Beaufort, while we are going to Monmouth, is this not in accordance with the customs of war, with the customs of great generals? I did not attempt to respond to these specious reasonings. I confined myself to repeating that he could use this custom as his authority, but that he should not count on me to confirm his statements. Besides, I promised not to let slip anything that could cause him difficulties and he had to be content with this guarantee. Here I am now, my patient listeners, in a position to take you far from humble village existence. I will not have to gossip about people who were old men in my youth, and who have now been buried for many years in the churchyard of Bedhampton. You will therefore go with me, you will see England as it was at that time; you will learn how we set out for the war, and all the adventures that befell us. And if what I tell you does not always resemble what you have read in the works of Mr. Coke or Mr. Oldmixon, or any other author who has published writings on these events, remember that I speak of things that I have seen with my own eyes, that I have contributed to making history, which is a nobler thing than writing it. So, it was around nightfall, on June 12, 1685, that news reached our region of the landing made the day before by Monmouth at Lyme, a small seaport on the boundary between the counties of Dorset and Devon. A great fire lit as a signal on Portsdown Mountain was the first news. Then came the clanging of iron, the rolling of drums from Portsmouth, where the troops were mustered under arms. Mounted messengers roared through the village street, their heads bent low over their mounts’ necks, for the great news had to be carried to London, so that the Governor of Portsmouth would know what to do. We were at our gate watching the red sunset, the comings and goings, the blaze of the line of signal fires stretching eastward, when a little man came galloping up to the gate and stopped his panting horse. “Is Joseph Clarke here?” he asked. “It’s me,” said my father. “Are these men sure?” he said in a low voice, pointing at me and Saxon with his whip. …Then, he continued, the rendezvous is Taunton. Pass it on to everyone you know. Give my horse something to drink and eat, please , for I must be on my way again. My younger brother Hosea looked after the tired beast while we brought in the rider to give him some refreshment. He was a nervous man, with sharp features, and a magnifying glass on his temple. His face and clothes were covered with dried earth, and his limbs were so stiff that when he dismounted, he could hardly put one foot in front of the other. “I have punctured a horse,” he said, “and this one will hardly have the strength to go twenty miles more. I must be in London this morning, for we hope that Danvers and Wildman will be able to raise the City. Yesterday I left the camp at Monmouth. His blue standard is flying over Lyme.
” “What strength has he?” my father asked anxiously. –He has brought only leaders. As for the troops, they will have to be provided by you locals. He has with him Lord Grey of Wark, Wade, the German Buyse, and eighty or a hundred others. Alas, two of those who have arrived are already lost to us. This is bad, bad omen. –What was the matter then? –Dare, the goldsmith of Taunton, was killed by Fletcher, of Saltoun, in a childish quarrel about a horse. The peasants loudly cried for the Scotsman’s blood, and he was forced to flee to the ships. It is a sad misfortune, for he was a skillful leader and an old soldier. –Yes, yes, cried Saxon angrily, there will soon be other skillful leaders in the west, other old soldiers, to take his place. But if he knew the ways of war, how is it that he should have engaged in a personal quarrel at such a time? And taking from under his coat a thin brown book, he ran his long thin finger over the table of contents. –Subsection nine, he continued, here is the case under discussion: If in a public war, one can refuse, out of private friendship, a duel to which one has been provoked. The learned Fleming is of opinion that a man’s private honor must give way to the good of the cause. Did it not happen, as far as I am concerned personally, that the day before the siege of Vienna was lifted, we, the foreign officers, had been invited into the general’s tent. Now, it happened that a Rousseau of Irish, a certain O’Daffy, who had served for a long time in Pappenheimer’s regiment, claimed precedence over me, alleging that he was of better birth. Whereupon, I passed my glove over his face, not, mind you, not that I was angry, but to show that I was not entirely of his opinion. This disagreement led him to offer at once to assert his assertion, but I read him this subsection, and demonstrated to him that honor forbade us to settle this matter until the Turk was driven from Vienna. Therefore, after the attack… “No, sir… I may hear the rest of the story some day ,” said the messenger, who rose unsteadily. “I hope to find a relay at Chichester, and time is pressing. Work the cause now, or be eternally enslaved. Farewell.” And he struggled back into the saddle. Then we heard the sound of irons gradually diminishing on the London road. “The time for your departure has come, Micah,” said my father solemnly… “No, woman, do not weep. Rather, encourage our boy with an affectionate word and a cheerful face. I need not tell you to fight like a man, fearlessly, in this quarrel.” If the tide of warfare turns this way, you may find your old father riding beside you. Now let us kneel and implore the Almighty’s favor on this expedition. We all knelt in the low room with the ceiling made of heavy beams, while the old man improvised an ardent, energetic prayer for our success. Even now, as I speak to you, I see your ancestor again, with his marked face, his austere expression, his gathered eyebrows, his gnarled hands clasped in the fervor of his supplication. My mother is kneeling beside him, tears rolling down her sweet, placid face one by one . She stifles her sobs for fear that, hearing them, I might find the separation more cruel. The little ones are in the bedroom upstairs, and the sound of their bare feet reaches us. Sir Saxon is sprawled on one of the oak chairs, where he has placed one knee, leaning forward. His long legs trail behind, and he hides his face in his hands.
All around me, in the flickering light of the hanging lamp, I see the objects familiar to me from my childhood: the bench by the fireplace, the high-backed, stiff-supported chairs, the stuffed fox above the door, the picture of Christian considering the Promised Land from the top of the delectable Mountains, all these small objects without value of their own, but whose reunion constitutes this marvelous thing which we call the domestic hearth, this all-powerful magnet which attracts the traveler from the ends of the universe. Will I ever see him again, even in my dreams, I who move away from this well-sheltered harbor to plunge into the heart of the storm? The prayer ended, everyone stood up, with the exception of Saxon, who remained with his face hidden in his hands for a minute or two before sitting up. I had the audacity to think that he had fallen deeply asleep, although he claimed that his delay was due to an additional prayer. My father put his hands on my head and invoked the blessing of Heaven upon me.
Then, he took my companion aside and I heard the clinking of coins , which made me suppose that he was giving him some viaticum for the journey. My mother pressed me to her heart and slipped a small square of paper into my hand, telling me that I should read it when I had leisure, and that I would make her happy if I complied with the instructions it contained. I promised her I would, and then tearing myself away, I reached the dark street of the village, my companion walking with long strides beside me. It was nearly one o’clock in the morning, and all the country people had long since gone to bed. As I passed the Sheaf and old Solomon’s house, I could not help wondering what they would think of my warlike attire, if they were up. I had hardly had time to ask myself the same question in front of Zacharie Palmer’s cottage when its door opened and the carpenter ran in, his white hair floating in the fresh night breeze. “I was expecting you, Micah,” he cried. I heard that Monmouth had appeared, and I knew you would not let a night pass before leaving. God bless you, my boy, God bless you! Strong of arm, gentle of heart, tender to the weak and fierce against the oppressor, you have the prayers and affection of all who know you! I clasped his outstretched hands, and the last of the objects of my native village that presented itself to my sight was the dim figure of the carpenter, while with a gesture of his hand he sent me his best wishes through the night. We crossed the fields to Whittier, the Whig farmer. Saxon harnessed himself there for war. We found our horses saddled and ready, for at the first alarm my father had sent a messenger thither to say that we should need them. At two o’clock in the morning we skirted Portsdown Hill, armed and mounted, and set out this time to reach the Rebel camp. Chapter 8. Our Departure for War. As we walked along the heights of Portsdown, we saw all the time the lights of Portsmouth, and those of the ships in the harbor, flashing to our left, while to our right the forest of Bere was illuminated by the signal fires announcing the landing of the invader. A great pyre blazed on the top of Butser, and further on, as far as the eye could see, bright scintillations showed that the news was reaching Berkshire to the north and Sussex to the east. Among these fires, some were made of people huddled together; others with barrels of tar stuck on the end of a pole. We passed one of these last, right opposite Portchester. Those who guarded them, hearing the noise of our horses and arms, gave a loud cheer, for they doubtless took us for officers of the King on their way to the West. Master Decimus Saxon had thrown to the wind those meticulous manners which he had displayed in the presence of my father and he chattered abundantly, in frequently mixing verses or bits of songs into his remarks, while we galloped through the night. “Ah! Ah!” he said frankly, “it is good to speak without constraint, without people expecting you to end each sentence with an Alleluia or an Amen! ” “You were always the first in these pious exercises,” I remarked dryly. “Yes, it is true, you hit the nail on the head: when something has to be done, arrange to carry it out yourself, whatever it may be. It is a famous recommendation, and one that has served me many times to this day.” I don’t remember if I told you that at one time I was taken prisoner by the Turks and taken to Istanbul. There were more than a hundred of us there, but the others perished under the stick, or they are currently chained to an oar on the Ottoman imperial galleys, and they will undoubtedly remain there until the day when a Venetian or Genoese bullet finds its way to their miserable carcass. I alone have managed to regain my freedom. “Ah! Tell me how you escaped?” I asked. “By taking advantage of the mind with which Providence has endowed me,” he continued in an enchanted tone, “for seeing that their accursed religion is precisely what blinds these infidels, I set to work to profit from it. To this end, I observed the way in which our guards carried out their morning and evening exercises. I made a prie dieu out of my jacket and imitated them. Only I took more time and more fervor. “What!” I cried with horror, “you pretended to be a Muslim? ” “No, I didn’t pretend. I became one completely. However, that’s between us, since it might not put me in the odor of sanctity with some Reverend Aminadab, Source of Grace, if there is one in the rebel camp, who is not an admirer of Mahomet. ” I was so stunned by this impudent confession from the mouth of a man who had always been the first to lead the exercises of a pious Christian family, that it was impossible for me to find a word. Decimus Saxon whistled a few bars in a cheerful manner. Then he continued: “My perseverance in these devotions resulted in me being separated from the other prisoners.” I acquired enough influence over the jailers to have the gates opened for me, and they let me out, on condition that I present myself once a day at the prison gate. And what use did I make of my freedom? Do you doubt it? “No, you are capable of anything,” I said. “I went immediately to their principal mosque, that of Saint Sophia. When the gates opened and the muezzin gave his call, I was always the first to run to perform my devotions and the last to stop. If I saw a Muslim strike his forehead once, I struck him twice. If I saw him bend his body or his head, I hastened to prostrate myself. So it was not long before the piety of the Gnaim became the subject of conversation throughout the city, and I was given a cabin to devote myself to my religious meditations. I could have easily accommodated myself to it, and in truth I had firmly decided to pose as a prophet and write an additional chapter for the Koran, when a silly detail inspired doubts among the faithful about my sincerity. Very little, in fact. A silly young lady allowed herself to be surprised in my cabin by someone who came to consult me ​​on some point of doctrine; But that was all it took to set the tongues of these pagans in motion. I therefore judged it prudent to slip through their fingers by boarding a Levantine coaster and leaving the Koran unfinished. The thing is perhaps worth as much, for it would be a cruel ordeal to renounce Christian women and pork for their houris who smell of garlic and their cursed sheep kybobs. During this conversation, we had passed through Farnham and Botley; we were then on the road to Bishopstoke. At this point, the soil changes in nature: the limestone gives way to sand, so that the shoes of our horses no longer made anything but a dull sound.
This did not in the least hinder our conversation, or rather that of my companion; for I confined myself to the role of listener. In truth, my mind was so full of hypotheses about what awaited us and of thoughts, which went back to the home I was leaving behind me, that I was hardly in a mood for pleasant talk. The sky was a little cloudy, but the moon shone with a metallic glare through the rents in the clouds and showed us before us a long ribbon of road. On both sides were scattered houses with gardens, on the slopes, which descended towards the road. There was a heavy and insipid smell of strawberries in the air. “Have you ever killed a man in a moment of anger?” asked Saxon, as we galloped. “Never,” I replied. “There! You will recognize then that when you hear the clink of steel against steel, and you look into the eyes of your adversary, you instantly forget all the rules, all the maxims, all the precepts of fencing that your father or others taught you . ” “I learned very little of those things,” I said. “My father taught me only how to deliver a good, clean straight blow. This saber can cut through an iron bar an inch thick. ” “Scanderbeg’s saber needs Scanderbeg’s arm,” he remarked. ” I have found it to be a blade of the best steel.” This is one of those true old-fashioned arguments for bringing in a text, or explaining a psalm, such as the faithful of old drew, when they proved the orthodoxy of their religion by apostolic blows and slaps. So you haven’t done much fencing? “I’ve done very little, almost none,” I said. “That’s almost as good. For an old, tried swordsman like myself, the chief point is to know your weapon, but for a young Hotspur of your sort, there is much to be hoped for from strength and energy. I have often observed that the most skillful people in bird shooting, in the art of splitting the Turk’s head, and other sports, are always stragglers on the field of battle. If the bird, too, were armed with a crossbow, with an arrow on the string, if the Turk had a fist as well as a head, your little dandy would have just enough nerves for his game. Master Clarke, I am certain, we shall be excellent comrades. What does old Butler say? Never did a faithful squire leap better with a knight. Never did a knight leap better with a squire. For several weeks I have not dared to mention Hudibras for fear of setting the Covenant boiling in the old man’s veins. “If we are indeed to be comrades,” I said harshly, ” you must learn to speak with more respect and less flippancy about my father. He would never have granted you hospitality, had he heard the story you told me only a moment ago. ” “Probably,” said the adventurer, chuckling. There’s a long way between a mosque and a conventicle. But don’t get so hot-headed , my friend. You lack that equanimity of character which you will undoubtedly acquire in your mature years. What! My boy, less than five minutes after seeing me, you’ll knock me to my knees with an oar, and since then you’ve been on my heels like a hound, ready to give voice, if I so much as set foot on what you call the straight line. Think of it, you will you find yourself among people who fight over the slightest quarrel. A cross word and a rapier thrust follow one another . “Are you in that mood?” I replied briskly. “I have a peaceful disposition, but disguised threats, veiled bravado, I will not tolerate them. ” “Good heavens!” he cried, “I see you are preparing to cut me into pieces and send me piece by piece to the camp at Monmouth. No, we will have enough to fight about without picking a fight with each other. What are those houses on the left? ” “That is the village of Swathling,” I replied. “The lights of Bishopstoke shine on the right, in the hollow. ” “So we have traveled fifteen miles of our journey, and it seems to me that we can already see a faint glimmer of dawn. Hallo! what is that? Beds must be scarce for people to sleep on the highways . ”
A dark stain I had noticed on the roadway in front of us became, as we approached, a human body, stretched out at full length, face down, his head resting on his crossed arms. “A man who has been celebrating, at the village inn no doubt?” I remarked. “There is blood in the air,” said Saxon, raising his curved nose like a vulture sniffing out carrion. The pale, cold light of the first dawn, falling on wide- open eyes and a bloodless face, proved to me that the old soldier’s instinct had not deceived him and that the man had breathed his last . “That’s fine work,” said Saxon, kneeling beside the corpse and putting his hands in his pockets, “vagabonds no doubt! Not a farthing in his pockets! Not even the value of a cufflink to pay for his burial. “How was he killed?” I asked, full of horror at the sight of that poor expressionless face, empty house, whose inhabitant had departed. “A stab from behind, and a sharp blow on the head with the butt of a pistol. He can’t have been dead long, and yet he hasn’t a penny on him. Yet he was a man of consequence, judging by his clothes: fine broadcloth, by the feel of it, velvet breeches, silver buckles on his shoes. The rogues must have made a rich haul of him. If we could catch them, Clarke, it would be a great and fine thing. ” “Indeed, it would be fine!” I cried enthusiastically. “What nobler task than to do justice to such cowardly murderers! ” “Phew! Phew!” he cried. “Justice is a lady subject to slips, and the sword she carries has two edges. It may well be that in our role as rebels we have justice to spare.” If I am thinking of pursuing these thieves, it is so that we can relieve them of their spolia opima, as well as the other valuable things they may have amassed illegally. My learned friend the Fleming establishes that it is not stealing to steal from a thief. But where are we going to hide this body? “Why should we hide it?” I asked. “Hey, friend, however ignorant you may be of the things of war or the precautions of a soldier, you must see that if this corpse were found here, there would be cries of murder throughout the country, and that unknown people like us would be arrested as suspects. And if we managed to justify ourselves, which is not an easy thing, the justice of the peace would at least want to know where we came from, where we are going; and all this would end in searches that do not bode well. So then, my unknown and silent friend,” he continued, “I am going to take the liberty of dragging you into the undergrowth. It is likely that you will spend at least one or two days there without anyone noticing your presence, and that you will thus not cause trouble to honest people .
“For heaven’s sake, don’t treat him with such brutality,” I cried, jumping down from my horse and placing my hand on my companion’s arm. There is no need to drag him with such embarrassment. Since he must be removed from here, I will transport him with all due respect. Saying these words, I took the body in my arms. I carried it to a clump of flowering gorse near the road, set it down respectfully , and drew the branches over him to hide him. “You have the muscles of an ox and the heart of a woman,” my companion muttered. By the Mass, he was right, that white-haired psalm singer , for, if my memory serves me right, he said something to this effect. A few handfuls of dust will make the stains disappear. Now we can set off again without fear of being called to answer for someone else’s crimes. I will only tighten my belt and no doubt we will soon be out of danger. I have had dealings, Saxon continued, as we resumed our ride, with many gentlemen of this kind, with Albanian brigands, Piedmontese banditti, lansquenets, free riders of the Rhine, picaroons of Algeria, and others of their ilk. However, I cannot recall a single one who was able to retire in his old age with sufficient wealth. It is always a precarious business, and must end sooner or later with a dance in the void at the end of a tightrope, with a good friend pulling you with all his strength by the legs to rid you of the excess breath that may remain. “And it does not all end there!” I remarked. “No, on the other side there is Tophet and the fires of hell. So our good friends the curates tell us.” Well, if one fails to make money in this world, if one ends up being hanged in it, and if one must finally burn eternally, it is certain that one has embarked on a road strewn with thorns. But on the other hand, if one succeeds in getting one’s hands on a well-lined purse, as these rogues are doing tonight, one may well risk something in the world to come.
“But,” I said, “what good will this full purse do them? Of what use will the twenty or thirty pieces taken from this unfortunate man by these rogues be when their last hour strikes? ” “True,” said Saxon dryly, “but they may be of some use to them in the meantime. You say this is Bishopstoke? What are those lights that we see further on? ” “They come from Bishop’s Waltham,” I replied. “We must go faster, for I would very much like to be in Salisbury before it is broad daylight.” We will rest our hair there until evening, and we will rest too, for man and beast gain nothing by arriving exhausted on the scene of war. During this whole day, one will see not only couriers upon couriers on all the roads of the west. There will perhaps also be cavalry patrols and we will not be able to show our faces there without risking being stopped and questioned. Now, if we stay in it during the day, and if we resume our journey at nightfall, turning away from the main road and crossing Salisbury Plain and the downs of Somerset County, we will probably arrive at the goal without accident. –But if Monmouth had started the fight before we arrived? –Then we will have missed an opportunity to have our throats cut. Hey! Friend, supposing he were routed, and his people scattered, would it not be a great idea of ​​us to present ourselves as two loyal yeomen, who had ridden all the way from Hampshire, to strike a blow against the King’s enemies? We might obtain a present of money or land as a reward for our zeal… No, don’t frown, it was only a joke. Let our horses breathe as we climb this hill at a walk. My broom is as fresh as when we started, but your large frame is beginning to weigh on your dappled gray. The bright patch of light in the east had lengthened and widened. The sky was dotted with small scarlet aigrettes formed by As we crossed the low hills near the ford of Chandler and Romsey, we could see the smoke of Southampton to the southeast, and the vast , dark mass of the New Forest over which the morning mist hung. A few riders passed close to us, spurring, and too preoccupied with their own affairs to inquire after ours. Two or three carts, and a long line of packhorses, whose load consisted mainly of bales of wool, arrived widely spaced along a side road. The drivers took off their hats and wished us a good journey. At Dunbridge, the inhabitants were beginning to move. They took down the shutters of the cottages and came to the gate of their gardens to see us pass. When we entered Dean, the great red sun raised its rosy globe above the horizon. The air was filled with the buzzing of insects and the sweet scent of the morning. We dismounted in the last village and drank a glass of ale while our horses rested and quenched their thirst. The innkeeper could give us no information about the insurgents and, moreover, seemed to care very little whether the matter turned out one way or the other. “As long as brandy pays a duty of six shillings eight pence per gallon and with freight and pouring it comes to half a crown, from which I expect to get twelve shillings, I care little whether this or that person is King of England. Tell me of a king who would prevent the hop disease, I am his man.” Such was the innkeeper’s policy, and I dare say there were many others who thought like him. From Dean to Salisbury, one goes in a straight line across moorland, marshes, and mires on either side of the road, with no other halt than the hamlet of Aldesbury, astride the very boundary of the county of Wilts. Our mounts, invigorated by a short rest, were going at a good pace. This rapid movement, the brightness of the sun, the beauty of the morning, all conspired to cheer our spirits, to cheer us up, after the dejection caused by our long night ride and the incident of the murdered traveler. The wild ducks, the scoters, the woodcocks set off with a great noise on both sides of the road at the sound of the horseshoes. Once, a herd of red deer stood up in the middle of the bracken and fled in the direction of the forest. Another time, as we were passing a thick clump of trees, I glimpsed a creature of indistinct form, half hidden by the tree trunks, and which was doubtless, as I imagined, one of those wild oxen of which I have heard the peasants speak, beings which, according to them, inhabit the depths of the southern forests and are so wild, so intractable that no one dares to approach them. The breadth of the perspective, the biting freshness of the air, the brand-new sensation of a great task to be accomplished, all combined to make circulate in my veins a kind of ardent life, such as the quiet stay in the village could never have given me. My companion, with his superior experience, also felt this influence for he began to sing in a cracked voice a monotonous song, which, he claimed, was an oriental ode and which had been taught to him by the younger sister of the Hospodar of Wallachia. “Let’s talk a little about Monmouth,” he remarked, suddenly returning to the realities of our situation. “It is unlikely that he will be fit to enter the field for a few days, although he is extremely It is important for him to strike a blow without delay, so as to excite the courage of his partisans before he has the king’s troops on his hands.
Mind you, he must not only find soldiers, but arm them as well, and it is likely that this will be even more difficult. Let us suppose that he succeeds in mustering five thousand men—and he cannot make a movement with a smaller number—he will not have one musket for every five men. The rest will have to get by with pikes, clubs, and whatever primitive weapons can be found. All this takes time; there may be skirmishes, but probably no serious engagement before our arrival. “By the time we reach him, he will have been landed three or four days,” I said. “That is a very short time, with his small staff of officers to enlist his men and organize them into regiments. I hardly expect to find him at Taunton, although we have been sent there.” Have you heard of rich Papists in this country? “I don’t know,” I replied. “If there were, there would be chests of goldsmith’s work, silver plate, not to mention Milady’s jewels and other trifles fit to reward a faithful soldier. What would war be without plunder? A bottle without wine, a shell without an oyster. Do you see that house over there, peeking furtively between the trees? I bet there are a heap of good things under that roof, which you and I would have, if we took the trouble to ask for them, provided we asked for them with our swords firmly in hand. You are my witness that your father gave me this horse as a present, that he did not lend it to me? ” “Then why do you say that? ” “For fear he might claim half the booty I could make.” What does my Flemish scholar say in the chapter entitled: An qui militi equum proebuit proedoe ab eo captoe particeps esse debeat? which means: If he who lends a horse to a soldier, must have part of the booty taken by the latter? In this passage, he cites the case of a Spanish commander, who had lent a horse to one of his captains, and the captain having taken the enemy general prisoner, the commander sued him for half of the twenty thousand crowns which amounted to the prisoner’s ransom. A similar case is reported by the famous Petrinus Bellus in his book: De Re militari, a favorite reading of leaders of great renown. –I can promise you, I say, that my father will never make any claim of this kind from you. Do you see, there, over the top of the hill, how the sun makes the high bell tower of the cathedral shine, which seems like a gigantic finger of stone, pointing out the road that every man must follow. “There is a fine supply of gold and silver in these same churches,” said my companion. “I remember that at Leipzig, at the time of my first campaign, I got hold of a candlestick, which I was forced to sell to a Jewish dealer for a quarter of its value; and yet, even at that price, I had enough to fill my haversack with large coins . While he was speaking, it so happened that the Saxon mare had gained one or two lengths on my mount, which allowed me to look at him at leisure without turning my head. During our ride, I had had too little light to judge the air he had under his equipment; I was astonished at the change this had produced in my man. Dressed as a private, his extreme thinness and the length of his limbs made him look awkward, but on horseback, his thin, dry face, seen under his steel helmet, his cuirass and buffalo jerkin widening his body, his high boots of soft leather reaching to mid-thigh, he looked like the veteran he claimed to be. The ease with which he sat in the saddle, the haughty expression and The boldness of his face, the great length of his arms, all indicated a man capable of playing his part well in the fray. His language alone inspired little confidence in me, but his attitude was also enough to convince a novice that he was a man deeply experienced in the things of war. “Here is the Aven shining among the trees,” I remarked. “We are about three miles from the city of Salisbury. ” “Here is a fine steeple,” he said, glancing at the high stone tower that stood before us. “It seems as if people of old spent their lives piling stones upon stones. And yet history tells us of hard battles, tells us of good blows given! This proves that they had leisure to amuse themselves with warlike exercises, and that they were not always occupied with masons’ tasks.” “In those days the Church was rough,” I replied, shaking my reins, for Covenant was beginning to show signs of laziness. ” But
here is someone who might be able to give us news of the war. A rider, whose appearance indicated that he must have made a long and hard trek, was rapidly approaching us. Man and horse were alike covered with gray dust, besmeared with mud. Nevertheless, the man broke into a gallop, letting go of the reins, and bending over his neck like a man to whom an extra stride is worth something. “Hello! Hey, friend,” cried Saxon, steering his mare so as to bar the road as the man passed, “what’s new in the West?” “I must not delay,” said the messenger in a panting voice, slowing his pace for a moment. “I carry important papers sent by Gregory Alford, Mayor of Lyme, for Her Majesty’s Council . The Rebels are raising their heads, and gathering like bees in swarming time. There are already several thousand in arms, and all Devonshire is in turmoil. The rebel cavalry, commanded by Lord Grey, has been driven from Bridport by the Dorset Red Militia, but every pointed-eared Whig , from the Canal to the Severn, is on his way to Monmouth.” And after this brief summary of the news, he passed us and clattered on , amidst a cloud of dust, to fulfill his mission. “So here’s the porridge on the fire,” said Decimus Saxon, when we resumed our march. “Now that there are ripped skins, the rebels can draw their swords and throw away their scabbards. Either it’s victory for them, or their quarters will be hung in every town in the kingdom that has a market. Hey, lad, we’re throwing a low card for a good stake. ” “Mind you, Lord Grey has suffered a check,” I said. “Phew! it doesn’t matter. A cavalry skirmish, at most, for it’s impossible for Monmouth to have brought the main body of his force to Bridport, and if he could have brought it there, he would have kept away, for that place is not on his route. It was one of those affairs that consist of three shots and a gallop, where each combatant gains a wide margin by claiming the victory. But here we are in the streets of Salisbury.” Now let me speak. Otherwise your cursed truthfulness may make us tumble before the hour has struck. We went down the broad High Street to dismount in front of the Blue Boar Inn. We entrusted our tired horses to the stablehand, to whom Saxon gave minute instructions on how to care for them, speaking very loudly, and peppering his remarks with many harsh soldierly oaths. After which, he made a noisy entrance into the common room, sat down on a chair, put his feet up on another chair, and summoned the innkeeper to make known our needs, in a tone and with manners well calculated to give him a high idea of ​​our condition. “The best you have, and immediately,” he said. “Have your largest bedroom ready with two beds, on which you will put the finest sheets, scented with lavender, for we have had a tiring journey on horseback, and we need rest. And then, you understand me, innkeeper, do not try to pass off your stale and moldy goods as fresh produce , any more than your French wine wash as authentic Hainaut . I want you to know that my friend and I are people who enjoy some consideration in the world, although we do not think it necessary to make our names known to the first scamp who comes along. So see to it that you deserve well from us, or otherwise it will be too bad for you.” This speech, as well as the haughty manner and fierce air of my companion, produced such an effect on the innkeeper that he immediately served us a lunch that had been prepared for three officers of the Blues, who were waiting for him in the next room. They had to spend another half hour fasting. We could hear their curses and complaints very well while we devoured their capon and game pâté. When we had made this good meal, washed down with a bottle of Burgundy, we went up to our room to stretch out our weary limbs on the beds , and we were soon plunged into a deep sleep. Chapter 9. A Pass of Arms at the Blue Boar. I had been asleep for several hours when I was abruptly awakened by a prodigious crash, followed by the sound of clashing weapons and piercing cries coming from the ground floor. I got up immediately. I noticed that the bed my comrade had occupied was empty, and that the door of the room was open. As the uproar continued and I seemed to recognize his voice, I took my sword and without taking the time to cover myself with my helmet, my breastplate and my armbands, I ran towards the place where this scene of disorder was taking place. The vestibule and the corridor were cluttered with foolish maids and carters, who remained there, opening their eyes wide, and whom the uproar had attracted, like me. I made my way through these people, into the room where we had breakfasted that morning, and where the greatest confusion reigned. The round table, which occupied the center, had been overturned and three bottles of wine broken. Apples, pears, nuts, the pieces of the plates which had contained them, littered the floor. Two packs of cards and a dice box lay among the debris of the feast. Near the door, Decimus Saxon stood, his rapier drawn in his hand, a second rapier under his feet. Opposite him, a young officer in a blue uniform, his face purple with confusion and anger, casting furious glances around him as if seeking a weapon to replace the one taken from him. He might have served as a model for Cibber or Gibbons for a statue representing impotent rage. Two other officers , wearing the same blue uniform, were standing near their comrade, and as I saw them lay hands on the hilts of their swords, I took my place beside Saxon, ready to strike, if the opportunity presented itself. “What would the fencing master say, the fencing master?” my companion mocked. “I reckon he would be dismissed from his job for not teaching you to cut a better figure. Damn him! Is this how he teaches the officers of His Majesty’s Guard to use their weapons?” “This mockery, sir,” said the oldest of the three, a stocky, dark-haired man with broad features, “is not undeserved. And yet, you could have done without it. I take the liberty of finding that our friend attacked you.” with a little too much haste and that such a young soldier should have shown a little more deference to such an experienced horseman as yourself. The other officer, a fine-featured, noble-looking personage, expressed himself in almost the same way. “If these excuses are admitted,” he said, “I am ready to add my own. If, however, more is demanded, I shall be happy to take the quarrel on my own account. ” “No, no, pick up your awl,” replied Saxon, in a good-natured tone, pushing the rapier with his foot towards his very young adversary, “only be careful of this: when you lunge at full speed, direct your point downwards rather than upwards. Otherwise you risk exposing your wrist to the blow of your adversary, who, no doubt, will not fail to disarm you. Whether you are firing in quarte, tierce or seconde, the same rule applies. The young man sheathed his sword, but he was so ashamed at having been beaten so easily, and at the disdainful way in which his adversary dismissed him, that he turned and left. Meanwhile, Decimus Saxon and the two officers set to work straightening the table and restoring relative order to the room. I did my best to help them. “I had three ladies in hand today for the first time, ” grumbled the soldier of fortune. “I was about to announce them when that young cockerel jumped at my throat. He was also the one who caused us the loss of three bottles of the best wine. When he has drunk as much loathsome wine as I had to swallow, he will not be in such a hurry to waste good wine. ” “He is a hot-headed lad,” said the older officer, “and a few moments of solitary reflection added to the lesson you gave him may be of use to him. ” As for the muscat wine, the loss will be easily repaired, all the more happily as your friend here will help us to drink it. “I was awakened by the noise of weapons,” I said, “and now I hardly suspect what happened.” “Bah! a simple tavern quarrel, which the skill and judgment of your friend prevented from turning serious. I pray you, take this rush-bottomed chair, and you, Jack, order the wine. If our comrade spilled the last bottle, it is ours to offer this one, and of the best there is in the cellar. We were playing a game of bossette, in which Mr. Saxon here displayed the same skill as in the handling of the fighting sword. Chance turned the odds against young Horsford, which no doubt disposed him to take things too quickly on the wrong side. In the course of the conversation, your friend, speaking of what he had seen in different countries, remarked that the troops of the guard, in France, seemed subject to stricter discipline than our regiments. At this, Horsford burst into flames, and after a few sharp words, they found themselves, as you saw them, face to face, swords drawn. The little fellow has not yet been in the field. Therefore, he is very anxious to prove that he has courage. “In which,” said the tall officer, “he showed me very little consideration, for if the remarks had been offensive, it would have been for me to correct them, as a senior captain and a brevet major, and not for a little ensign, who knows just enough to drill his troops. ” “You speak reason, Ogilvy,” said the other officer, resuming his seat near the table and wiping away the maps that had been splashed with wine. If the comparison had been made by an officer of Louis’s guard with the intention of insulting and out of bravado, it would have been appropriate for us to risk a pass. But these words coming from an Englishman matured by experience can only constitute an instructive criticism which should be taken advantage of instead to be angry about it. “It’s true, Ambrose,” replied the other, “without criticism of this sort, an army rots on the spot, and it cannot hope to maintain itself at the level of these continental troops who are constantly competing with each other to see who will become the most efficient. ” I was so delighted to hear these officers make these sensible remarks that I was truly happy to have the opportunity to become better acquainted with them through a bottle of excellent wine. My father’s prejudices had led me to believe that an officer of the King could be nothing other than a combination of a fop and a braggart, but I recognized, faced with reality, that this idea was, like almost all those that one accepts on trust, devoid of any foundation. In fact, if they had been dressed in less warlike clothes, if their swords and high boots had been removed, they might have been taken for people remarkable for the gentleness of their manners, for their conversation turned on scientific subjects. They discussed Boyle’s researches, on the passage of air, with a very grave laugh, and with a great display of knowledge. At the same time, their alert movements, and their manly bearing proved that in cultivating the scholarly, they had not sacrificed the soldier. “May I ask you,” said one of them, addressing Saxon, “if in the course of your numerous travels, you have ever met one of these wise men, these philosophers who have brought so much honor and glory to France and Germany?” My companion seemed embarrassed. He had the air of a man who is being put on ground that is not his own. “There was indeed one at Nuremberg,” he said, “a certain Gervinus or Gervianus who, according to the story, was able to change a piece of iron into an ingot of gold as easily as I change this tobacco into ashes. Old Pappenheimer locked him up with a ton of metal, threatening to make him suffer the thumbs if he did not change it into gold pieces. I can assure you that there was not a single yellow in the ton, for I was captain of the guard, and I searched the prison thoroughly. I say this to my regret, for I had added a small iron grate to the pile of it on my own initiative, in the hope that if there were any metamorphoses of this kind, it would be well for me to have my small share of the experience. ” “Alchemy, the transmutation of metals, and other things of that sort have been rejected by true science,” remarked the grand officer. Even old Sir Thomas Browne of Norwich, who was always inclined to plead the cause of the Ancients, finds nothing to say in favor of these ideas. From Trismegistus, through Albertus Magnus, Thomas Aquinas, Raymond Llull, Basil Valentine, Paracelsus, and the rest, there is not one who left behind him anything but a cloud of words. “And the rascal I speak of left no more,” said Saxon. “There was another, Van Helstadt, who was a scholar. He cast horoscopes for a small fee or commission. I never knew a man as wise as he; he talked of planets and constellations as if he kept them all in his backyard.” He thought no more of a comet than if it were a rotten Chinese orange, and he explained their nature to us, saying that they were simply ordinary stars in which a hole had been made, through which their intestines, their entrails, came out. He was a real philosopher, that one. “And have you ever put his skill to the test?” asked one of the officers, smiling. “No, not me, for I have always kept myself away from black magic, and all the devilry of that kind. My comrade Pierre Scotton, who was Oberst Colonel in the Imperial Cavalry Brigade , paid him a nobleman with a rose to have his future. If I remember correctly, the stars said that he was too fond of wine and women: he had a mischievous eye, and a nose the color of a carbuncle. They also predicted that one day he would have a marshal’s baton, that he would die at a ripe old age, and all this might well have happened if he had not fallen from his horse a month later at Obergraustock and perished under the irons of his own horses. Neither the planets, nor even the regimental farrier, a man of experience, could have predicted that the animal would have died so completely. The officers laughed heartily at my companion’s way of seeing things and rose from their chairs, for the bottle was finished, and it was getting late. “We have work to do around here,” said one of them, the one who had answered to the name of Ogilvy. Besides, we must find our young fool and show him that there is nothing dishonorable in being disarmed by such a skilled swordsman. We must prepare quarters for the regiment, which is to join Churchill’s troops this evening. You, too, are being sent to the West, I believe. “We belong to the Duke of Beaufort’s household,” said Saxon. “Ah! indeed! I thought you belonged to Portman’s Yellow Regiment of militia. I expect the Duke will arm as many men as possible and occupy the carpet until the royal troops arrive . ” “How many men will Churchill bring?” asked my companion indifferently . “Eight hundred horse at the most, but my Lord Feversham will follow with nearly four thousand foot soldiers. ” “We may meet on the field, if not before,” I said. And we bade a cordial farewell to our excellent enemies. “That’s not a bad equivocation, Master Micah,” said Decimus Saxon, “and it has a whiff of mental restriction in a man as fond of truth as you are. If we ever meet them on the field of battle, I hope it will be behind chevaux-de- frise made of pikes and morgenstierns, and lined in front with a row of caltrops, for Monmouth has no cavalry capable of holding out for a moment against the royal guard. ” “How did you come to make their acquaintance?” I asked. “I slept only a few hours, but I learned in the camps to be content with a short sleep.” Seeing you fast asleep, and hearing the dice-horn down there, I went downstairs very quietly, and found a way to take part in their game, which made me thirty guineas richer, and might have made me richer still, if that young fool had not jumped upon me, or if the conversation had not afterwards veered into indecent subjects, like the laws of chemistry and the rest. I ask you, what connection has there between the Blue Cavalry of the Guard and the laws of chemistry! Wessemburg, of the Pandours, allowed frank talk at his own mess table. He perhaps even tolerated more than was proper for a self-respecting commander. But if his officers had ventured on such subjects, he would soon have brought them before a court martial, or at least stripped them of their rank. Without stopping to discuss the assessments of Master Saxon, or those of Wessenburg, of the Pandours, I proposed to order supper, and to spend an hour or two of the broad day in a tour of the city. The most interesting thing to see was obviously the majestic cathedral, built on such just proportions that unless one entered it and walked along its dark aisles in their entire length, it was impossible to comprehend its vast dimensions. There was so much grandeur in those wide arcades, in those long bands of colored light which passed through the stained-glass windows and threw strange shadows among the columns, that my companion, though difficult to move, remained silent, subjugated. It was a large prayer in stone. On returning to the inn, we passed the city jail .
The front of it was formed by a grating, and three large mastiffs with black muzzles were walking about with fierce, bloodshot eyes and red tongues hanging out of their mouths. Someone who was there informed us that they were employed in hunting down culprits on Salisbury Plain, which had become a refuge for rogues and thieves, until one day this method was resorted to to reach them even in their hiding places. It was almost night when we returned to the inn, and quite dark when we had had supper, paid our bills, and set out again. Before leaving, I remembered the paper my mother had slipped into my hand at the moment of parting. I took it from my satchel and read it by the light of the rush wick. It was still stained by the tears the good creature had shed. It read: Instructions given by Mistress Mary Clarke to her son Micah, the twelfth of June, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and eighty-five. On the occasion of his going forth, as David did of old, to do battle with the Goliath of Popery, who had overshadowed and brought into disrepute that sincere and respectable attachment to ritual which should exist in the true Church of England, as constituted by law. Let him comply with the following advice, namely: 1. Change his drawers when occasion requires it; You have two pairs in your saddlebag, and you can buy more, since woolens are of good quality in the West. 2° A hare’s foot hung around your neck protects against colic. 3° Say the Lord’s Prayer in the evening and in the morning. Also read the Scriptures, and especially Job, the Psalms and the Gospel according to Saint Matthew. 4° Daffy’s elixir has extraordinary virtues for purifying the blood, and driving out all phlegm, humors, vapors or flux. The dose is five drops. There is a small bottle in the barrel of your left pistol, with cloth around it so that it is not damaged. 5° Ten gold pieces are sewn into the edge of your under doublet . Do not touch them except as a last resort. 6° Fight valiantly for the Lord! And yet, Micah, I beg you not to expose yourself too much in the fight, and to let others do their part. Do not rush into the fray, and yet do not abandon the Protestant standard. O Micah! my brave son, return safe and sound to your mother, or I shall certainly die of grief. And the undersigned will not cease to pray. The sudden effusion of tenderness which overflowed in the last lines brought tears to my eyes; and yet I could not help smiling as I read the whole of this composition. My mother had had very little time to cultivate the graces of style. She had certainly had the idea of ​​making her instructions more imperative by expressing them in a form which had something of the legal about it. But I had little leisure to reflect on it, for I had hardly finished reading, when I heard the voice of Decimus Saxon. The loud clatter of horseshoes on the pebbles with which the courtyard was paved informed me that everything was ready for our departure. Chapter 10. Our Perilous Adventure in the Plain. We had scarcely gone half a mile from the town when the roll of kettledrums, and the fanfare of trumpets, whose musical sounds were heard more and more clearly through darkness, announced the arrival of the cavalry regiment expected by our friends from the inn. “We did very well to leave them there,” said Saxon, “for that young starling might have fanned the game and played some nasty trick on us. Have you, by any chance, seen my silk handkerchief? ” “No,” I replied. “No? Then it must have fallen out of my buttonhole during the quarrel. I shall have difficulty in doing without it, for I seldom take on baggage on the road… Eight hundred men at first, said the major, and soon after, three thousand. If I happen to meet this same Oglethorpe, or Ogilvy, when this little affair is over, I will give him a lesson to teach him to concern himself less with chemistry and a little more with the necessity of conforming to the rules of military prudence… It is well always to be polite to strangers and to give information, provided that this information is false.” “As perhaps hers are,” I suggested. “Oh! no, they came out of her mouth with too much volubility… Easy ! Chloe, easy. She’s full of oats and is just waiting to gallop, but it’s devilishly dark. We can hardly see our way. We had trotted along the highway, marked by a vague whiteness in the darkness, while the thick foliage of the trees stirred on both sides, barely glimpsed against the black background of the clouds. We were now arriving at the eastern edge of the great plain which extends forty miles in one direction and twenty miles in the other, over a large part of Wilts County, and further than the boundary of Somerset County. The highway to the west skirts this wilderness, but we had decided to follow a less beaten track which would lead us to our goal, but in a more tedious way. His unimportance, as we hoped, would make the royal cavalry forget to watch him. We had reached the place where this side road branches off from the main road, when we heard behind us the sound of a horse’s hoofs. “Here’s one who’s not afraid to gallop,” I remarked. “Let’s halt here in the shadows!” Saxon shouted. Then in a low, rapid voice, “Make sure your sword is sheathed. He must have an order to give to go at this rate in the middle of the night.” By dint of searching the darkness of the road, we finally glimpsed an indecisive blur which soon took the form of a man on horseback. The rider was almost in line with us, before he had noticed our presence. Then he urged his horse on with a singular and clumsy gesture and turned back in our direction. “Is Micah Clarke here?” he said in a voice whose timbre was strangely familiar to me. “I am Micah Clarke,” I said. “And I am Ruben Lockarby,” cried the pursuer, assuming a heroic comic intonation. “Ah! Micah, I would embrace you, if I were not sure that in trying to do so I should fall from my horse, and perhaps drag you down with me. This sudden evolution nearly threw me onto the highway. I have been slipping and clinging all the time since I said good-bye to Havant. Surely never was a horse ridden that knew so well how to slide under you. ” “Good heavens! Ruben!” I cried, quite astonished, “why all this journey from home? It is the same cause that made you and Don Decimo Saxon leave the Solent, whom I think I glimpse in the shadows behind you. How are things, illustrious personage?” “So it’s you, young woodcock?” Saxon growled in a voice that expressed no excess of joy. “No more, no less,” said Reuben. “And now, my merry riders, turn your horses around and trot on your way. There is no a moment to spare. We must all be at Taunton tomorrow. “But,” I said, “my dear Reuben, it is not possible for you to come with us to Monmouth. What would your father say? This is not a holiday outing, but an expedition which may end in a sad and cruel way. Let us put things at their best. Victory will only be obtained at the cost of much bloodshed and danger. If it goes wrong, we may have to mount the scaffold. ” “Forward, friends, forward!” he cried, spurring his horse, “everything is arranged, settled. I have come expressly to offer my august person, together with a sword which I have borrowed, and a horse which I have stolen, to His Most Protestant Highness, James, Duke of Monmouth. ” “But how is that?” I asked, as we rode side by side. It warms me to the bottom of my heart to see you, but you have never concerned yourself with religion or politics; where does this sudden resolution come from? “Well, to tell the truth,” he replied, “I am neither the King’s nor the Duke’s man, and I wouldn’t give a button to see either of them on the throne. I don’t suppose either contributes more than the other to increasing the custom of the Wheatsheaf, or that he needs the advice of Reuben Lockarby. I am Micah Clarke’s man, from the tips of my hair to the soles of my feet, and if he rides off to war, may the plague take me, if I am not by his side.” And as he spoke, he raised his hand in an enthusiastic gesture. This threw him off his balance, and he fell into a thicket of brushwood by the roadside, from which his legs emerged, flailing helplessly in the darkness. “That’s the tenth time,” he said, freeing himself and climbing back into the saddle. “My father used to tell me: get into the habit of not staying glued to your horse. You have to get up and let yourself fall gently. It doesn’t matter; we let ourselves fall more often than we get up. And the fall isn’t gentle. ” “By Jove, it’s true,” cried Saxon, “in the name of all the saints in the calendar, how do you expect to stay in the saddle, facing the enemy, if you can’t do it on a quiet road? ” “All I can do is try, illustrious personage,” said Ruben, repairing the disorder of his clothes. ” Perhaps the sudden and unexpected sight of my movements will disconcert the said enemy.” “Well, well, there may be more truth in what you say than you suspect,” said Saxon, riding on the side where Lockarby held the bridle, so that there was little room between us for another fall. “I would rather have to fight against a man like this young fool from the inn, than against Micah here, or against you, who know nothing. One can foresee what the first will do, but the other will invent a system that will serve him for the occasion. Muller, the captain first, was considered the finest foil player in the Imperial army, and he was capable, at a moment’s notice, of popping any button off his opponent’s waistcoat without touching the material. And yet he perished in a duel with the flag-bearer Zollner, who was a cornet in our Pandours corps, and who knew as much about fencing as you do about horsemanship.” For, you must know, the rapier is made for thrusts and not for cutting blows, so that the one who wields it never keeps himself on guard against a side blow. But Zollner, who had long arms, struck his opponent across the face as he would have done with a cane, and then before the other had time to recover from his astonishment, he skewered him. Obviously, if it had to be done again, the captain would have arranged to give the first thrust, but the thing was made; no explanation, no excuse could change the fact that my man was dead. “If lack of knowledge makes a swordsman dangerous, then,” said Reuben, “I am far more formidable than the gentleman with the barbarous name you have just spoken of. To return to my story, which I interrupted to dismount , I learned first thing in the morning that you had left, and Zachary Palmer was able to tell me for what purpose. My resolution was immediately taken. I would also go on my journey around the world. With this intention in mind, I borrowed a sword from Solomon Sprent, and as my father had gone to Gosport, I seized the best horse he had in his stable, for I respect the old man too much to admit that a man of his flesh and blood should go to war in a pitiful equipage. I rode all day, since first thing in the morning, I was arrested twice as a suspect of bad intentions, but I was lucky to get away with it twice. I knew I was following you closely , for I saw that they were looking for you in Salisbury. Decimus Saxon whistled. “Are they looking for us? ” “Yes, it seems that they imagine there that you were not what you claimed to be. So that when I passed, the inn was surrounded, but no one knew which road you had taken. ” “Didn’t I say so?” cried Saxon. “That little viper has stirred up the whole regiment against us. We must go at a good pace, because they can send a detachment after us. ” “We are now off the main road,” I remarked, “and even if they were to pursue us, it is unlikely that they would take this side road.” “Nevertheless, it would be wise to show them a good pair of heels,” said Saxon, spurring his mare into a gallop. Lockarby and I followed his example, and went at full speed along this path across the moor. We crossed thick clumps of pine, where the wildcat howled, where the owl hooted, then wide stretches of bracken, of marshland, where the silence was only broken by the dull cry of the bittern, or by the sound of the wings of the wild duck high above our heads. In some places, the road was entirely overgrown with brambles and cut with ruts so deep, with so many holes, with edges so steep, so dangerous, that our horses fell to their knees more than once. Elsewhere, the wooden bridge over a stream was broken. Nothing had been done to repair it. We were therefore forced to put our horses into the water, up to their girths, to cross the torrent. At first, a few scattered lights had indicated the vicinity of human habitations, but they became rarer as we advanced, and when the last had disappeared, we were in a desolate moor that stretched on all sides, a vast solitude limited by the black horizon. The moon had shown itself through the clouds. At that moment, it shone under a light mist, among bands of fog. It cast a vague light on this wild landscape, which allowed us to follow the path, which was not marked by any barrier and was barely distinguishable from the surrounding plain. We had slowed down, telling ourselves that we no longer had any pursuit to fear, and Reuben was entertaining us by telling us about the commotion that had occurred in Havant before our disappearance, when through the silence of the night came a shrill noise, rat tat tat, but muffled. At that same moment, Saxon jumped from his horse and listened attentively, his head tilted to one side. “Saddle and boots!” he cried, leaping back onto his horse. ” They’re after us, as sure as fate. From the sound of it, there are a dozen soldiers. We must get rid of them, or else, hello!” to Monmouth. “Let’s give them the bridle,” I replied. We spurred our steeds and thundered through the darkness. Covenant and Chloe were as fresh as could be desired, and soon broke into a bouncing, extended gallop. But my friend’s horse had been traveling all day. His labored, labored breathing indicated that he could not hold out much longer . Through the loud clatter of our horseshoes, I could occasionally distinguish the disquieting murmur that came from behind us. “This is not right, Reuben,” I said anxiously, as his weary beast stumbled, and his rider was very nearly going over his head. “The old horse is almost worn out,” he replied piteously. “We are off the highway now, and this uneven ground is tiring him too much.” “Yes, we’re off the trail,” cried Saxon over his shoulder, for he was a few steps ahead of us. “Remember that the bluecoats have been on the march all day, and that their horses may be exhausted too. How in heaven’s name could they have discovered the route we took?” And as if in answer to his question, there arose behind us in the night a single, clear, vibrant sound like a bell, whose volume increased and swelled, so that its melody seemed to fill the whole space. “A mastiff,” cried Saxon. Another, higher-pitched, more piercing sound, ending in a howl that was impossible to mistake, succeeded the first. ” And another!” he said. “They’ve let their animals loose, the ones we saw near the cathedral.” By Jove, when we were watching them through the bars just a few hours ago, we hardly suspected we would have them on our trail so soon. Knees firm, and hold on tight to the saddle, for a slip would be the last. “Holy Virgin!” cried Reuben, “I covered myself with steel to die in battle; but to become dog meat! That is not in the contract! ” “They keep them on a leash,” said Saxon between his teeth. “Otherwise they would overtake the horses and we would lose sight of them in the darkness. If we could only find running water, we might make them lose the trail. ” “My horse will only be able to take a few more steps at this speed,” cried Reuben. “If I fall, keep going, for remember that they are on your trail, not mine. They have found grounds for suspicion against the two strangers at the inn, but they have none against me.” “No, Reuben, we will save ourselves or die together,” I said sadly, for with every step his horse grew weaker. “In this darkness, they will not make much difference between people. ” “Have a firm heart,” cried the old soldier, who was now twenty yards ahead of us at most. “We can hear them because the wind is blowing from that direction, but it would be very strange if they could hear us. It seems to me that they are slowing down their pursuit. ” “Indeed, the sound of their horses has become less distinct,” I said joyfully. “So indistinct that I can no longer hear it at all,” cried my comrade. We stopped our panting steeds and listened. But no sound was to be heard except the soft murmur of the breeze through the broom and the melancholy cry of the nightjar. Behind us stretched the vast, undulating plain, half lit, half in shadow, and running away towards the dark horizon, without a trace of life or movement to be seen. “We have completely overtaken them, or they have given up chasing us,” I said. “But what is the matter with horses that they tremble and snort like this ?” “My poor beast is almost dead,” remarked Ruben, leaning over before, and striking his hand on the smoking mane of his horse. “Despite all this, it is impossible to rest,” said Saxon, “it may be that we are not yet out of danger. One or two miles more will get us out of trouble. But here is something that does not please me. ” “What does not please you?” “These horses, and their fright. At certain times the animals can see and hear better than we, as I could prove by various examples from my own experience on the Danube or in the Palatinate, if the time and place were right. One more effort, before we rest! The tired horses responded bravely to the call, and thus covered with great difficulty a fairly long distance over this uneven ground. We were thinking of stopping for good and were about to congratulate ourselves on having overcome our pursuers by fatigue, when suddenly there sounded a call like a bell, and this time much louder than it had been before, so loud in fact that it was evident that we had the dogs almost at our heels. “Damned mastiffs!” cried Saxon, spurring his horse and rushing ahead of us, “this is what I feared. They have taken off their leashes. There is no escaping these demons, but we can choose a place to face them. ” “Forward, Reuben,” I cried, “we have only the dogs to deal with now. Their masters have let them loose to return to Salisbury. ” “God grant they break their necks before they get there,” he cried. “They are setting dogs after us as if we were rats shut up in a cockfight.” And to think that England is called a Christian country? It’s all in vain, Micah! Poor Dido can’t take another step. While he spoke, the piercing, ferocious barking of the mastiffs was heard again, clear and harsh in the night air. It rose, passing from a low, muffled rumble to a shrill, furious screech . One would have thought one could catch a vibration, joyous in the highest degree, in their fierce cry, as if they believed their prey ready to be skinned. “Not even a step further,” said Reuben Lockarby, halting his horse and drawing his sword. “If I must fight, I will fight here. ” “Impossible to find a more favorable spot,” I replied. Two great jagged rocks rose before us, rising abruptly from the ground, and leaving between them an interval of twelve or fifteen feet. We mounted up in this opening, and I shouted at the top of my lungs to Saxon to come and join us. But his horse had been steadily outstripping ours. This increased alarm made him increase his speed even more, so that he was a few hundred yards away. It was useless to call him back, even though he might have heard our voices, for the dogs would be upon us before he had returned to our side. “Don’t worry about him,” I said in a hurried voice. “Tie your horse by the bridle behind this rock, and I’ll do the same behind the other. That will always serve to resist the first shock. Do n’t dismount. Strike low, but strike hard.” We waited in silence, side by side, in the shadow of the rocks, for the arrival of our terrible hunters. When I look back, my dear children, I cannot help thinking that it was a severe trial for soldiers as young as Reuben and myself to be put through, to find ourselves in such a situation, when we had to draw our swords for the first time. Indeed, I have recognized, and others have confirmed my opinion, that of all the dangers a man is obliged to face, there is none more calculated to make you lose courage than the attack of wild and resolute animals. When you have to deal with men, there is always a chance that a detail betrays the weak side or the lack of courage, which assures you superiority over him, but one cannot count on anything similar with beasts. We knew that the beings, to whose attack we were prey, would not cease to jump at our throats as long as they had a breath of life in their bodies. Then, one feels, deep in the heart that the fight is unequal, because your life is precious, at least for your friends, while their life… what is it? All these thoughts, and many others besides, quickly presented themselves to our minds while, sword in hand, we waited for the arrival of the mastiffs, reassuring our frightened horses as best we could. And we did not have long to wait. Another long, sonorous bark, resounding like thunder, was followed by a profound silence, in which one could barely perceive the rapid and agitated breathing of the horses. Then, suddenly, without a sound, an enormous beast, tan in color, its black muzzle against the ground, with hanging lips on either side of its jaw, passed in the moonlight between the rocks, then disappeared into the darkness, farther away. It did not stop, did not turn away for a moment. It continued its course, straight ahead, without looking to the right or to the left. Almost immediately behind it, another appeared, then a third, all three of enormous size, and appearing all the larger and more terrible, as they were in an indecisive and moving light. Like the first, they paid no attention to our presence. They set off in great bounds on the trail of Decimus Saxon. I let the first and second of the dogs pass, for I barely had time to see that they were not paying any attention to us at all. But when the third found himself by a leap in full light, I drew my pistol from the right-hand side, laid its long barrel on my left arm, and fired at it as it passed. The bullet hit the mark, for the animal uttered a fierce howl of rage and pain, but remained glued to the trail, without swerving, without turning. Lockarby fired from his side as the animal disappeared into the undergrowth, but without producing any visible effect. The large dogs had passed so quickly and with so little noise that one might have taken them for the formidable and silent spirits of the night, the ghost dogs of the hunter Herne, had it not been for the lugubrious barking which had succeeded my shot. “What brutes!” cried my comrade. “What are we going to do, Micah? ” “It is evident that they have been sent on Saxon’s trail,” I said, “and we must follow them to the end, or they will be too much for him.” Do you hear anything from those who are pursuing us? “Nothing. ” “Then they have given up the chase and have let the dogs loose as a last resort. No doubt these animals are trained to return home. But we must hurry, Reuben, if we want to rescue our companion. ” “One more push, then, little Dido,” cried Reuben. ” Can you muster enough strength for that? No, I haven’t the courage to use the spur. If you can, I know you will.” The brave mare snorted, as if she understood her rider’s language , and worked her legs to get into a gallop. She responded so energetically to the call that even when Covenant went at his fastest pace, he could not regain the two or three lengths she had on him. “He’s taken that direction,” I said, searching the darkness with an anxious look. He can’t have gone far, he talked about standing his ground. Or perhaps, not seeing us with him, he relied on his horse’s speed. “What chance does a horse have of outpacing animals like that?” Ruben replied. “They’ll force him until he falls, and he knows that.” that. Hello! What is this? A dark body, with vague outlines, lay before us in the moonlight . It was the corpse of a dog, evidently the one I had shot. “Here’s one who’s had his fill,” I cried cheerfully. “We only have two to deal with now.” While I was speaking, I heard two pistol shots a short distance to the left. We set our horses in that direction, pushing them as fast as we could. Soon we heard a growl from the darkness in front of us , a bark so furious that we almost felt faint. It was not an isolated cry, such as the mastiffs utter when they were on the trail. It was a suppressed growl, of a deep timbre, so ferocious and prolonged that we had not a moment’s doubt. They had reached the goal of their race. –God grant they had not dropped him. The same idea had come to my mind, for I had heard a similar, but less intense, uproar occurring in a pack hunting otter , at the moment when the dogs had reached the prey and were tearing it to pieces. With a failing heart, I drew my sword, fully resolved to avenge the death of my companion on these four-legged demons, if we arrived too late to save him. We leaped through a thick border of tangled broom and gorse and found ourselves before a scene so different from the one we expected that in our astonishment we stopped our horses. We had before us a circular clearing, illuminated by the silvery glare of the moon. In the center stood a gigantic stone, one of those tall, black pillars found scattered all over the plain, and especially in the place called Stonehenge. This one must have been at least fifteen feet high. It had certainly been vertical, but wind, weather, and the settling of the ground had gradually inclined it to such an angle that an agile man could climb to its very tip. On the summit of this ancient block, Decimus Saxon, cross-legged, motionless, like some strange carved idol of old, sat quietly puffing on the long pipe that was his certain consolation in times of difficulty. Below him, at the base of the monolith, to use the language of our scholars, the two enormous mastiffs reared up to their full height, leaped, and climbed on each other’s backs, in their furious and helpless efforts to reach the impassive figure perched above them, they vented their rage and disappointment by making the dreadful din that had given rise to such terrible thoughts in our minds. But we had little time to contemplate this strange scene. As soon as we appeared, the mastiffs abandoned their useless efforts to reach Saxon and, with a fierce growl of satisfaction, they rushed at Reuben and me. A large animal, with blazing eyes, a gaping maw, and white fangs gleaming in the moonlight, sprang at my horse’s throat, but I stopped it short with a blow from all angles, which severed its muzzle and sent it rolling and writhing in a pool of blood. Meanwhile, Reuben had spurred his horse to approach his enemy, but the poor, exhausted beast weakened at the sight of the ferocious mastiff and stopped suddenly, which had the effect of throwing its rider head first and throwing him to the ground almost under the animal’s jaws. Things might have turned out badly for Ruben if he had been left to his own devices. He could hardly keep the cruel teeth away from his throat for a short time; but at the sight of this accident, I took the pistol which remained, I jumped from my horse, and discharged my weapon into the beast’s flank, while it struggled against my friend. The dog uttered a last howl of rage and pain. In a last and helpless effort, it stretched out its neck to bite . Then it slowly sank down and fell on its side, while Reuben freed himself from underneath, frightened, bruised, but otherwise unaffected by his perilous fall. “That is my first debt to you, Micah,” he said gratefully . “Perhaps I shall live to repay it. ” “And I am indebted to you both,” said Saxon, who had come down from his refuge. “I too pay my debts, for good and for evil. I could have stayed there until the day I ate my knee-high boots, for I had little chance of ever coming down again. Santa Maria!” What a fine saber blow you gave there, Clarke! The animal’s head was cut in two like a spoiled pumpkin. It’s no wonder they followed my trail, for I left not only my spare girth, but my handkerchief there, and that was enough to put them on Chloe’s trail as well as on mine. “And Chloe, where is she?” I asked, wiping my sword. “Chloe must have gotten out of it as best she could. You see, I noticed the dogs were getting faster than me. I let them get within range of my pistols, but with a horse going at twenty miles an hour, there’s little chance of a single bullet hitting the mark.” The thing was thus taking a funereal turn, for I had no time to reload, and the rapier, which is the queen of weapons in a duel, is not heavy enough to be relied upon on such an occasion. And at the very moment of my greatest embarrassment, what did chance offer me? This so accessible stone, which the good priests of old evidently erected for the sole purpose of assuring worthy caballeros a resource against these ignoble, grumbling enemies. Without losing time, I climbed onto it, not without having had some difficulty in tearing one of my heels from the mouth of the first one; he might have succeeded in dragging me away if he had not found my spur a little too hard to swallow. But I am sure that one of my bullets reached the target. Lighting a piece of tinder taken from his tobacco box, he ran it along the body of the dog that had attacked me, then over the other. “Look! This one’s riddled like a skimmer,” he cried. “What do you load your kneaders with, good Master Clarke? ” “With two lead buckshot. ” “With two lead buckshot that have made at least twenty holes. And the most curious thing in the world is that there’s a bottle neck embedded in the animal’s skin. ” “Good heavens!” I cried. “I remember: my good mother had placed a bottle of Daffy’s elixir in the barrel of my pistol. ” “And you discharged it at this mastiff?” shouted Ruben. “Ho! Ho! When this story is told in front of the taps at the Sheaf of Wheat, more than one throat will dry up with laughter. What saved my life was a bottle of Daffy’s elixir fired into the body of a dog.” “But there was a bullet in it too, Reuben, and I think the comrades will be careful not to mention that detail. It was a stroke of luck that the pistol didn’t burst. And now, what do you propose to do, Master Saxon? ” “First I want to try to get my mare back, if it’s possible,” said the adventurer. “But on this immense moor in the darkness, it will be as difficult as finding a Scotsman’s breeches or a tasteless verse in Hudibras. ” “And Reuben Lockarby’s mount is incapable of going any further,” I remarked. ” But do my eyes deceive me? It seems to me that I see a luminous point over there. “A will-o’-the-wisp,” said Saxon. “An ignis fatuus that bewitches and draws people into pools and quagmires. But I recognize that its state is fixed and clear, as if produced by a lamp, a candle, a torch, a lantern, or some other object of human hands .
” “Where there is light, there is life,” cried Reuben, “let us direct our steps in that direction, and see what shelter chance has offered us there. ” “It cannot come from our friends the dragoons,” observed Decimus. ” Plague be with them. How could they have discovered our true role? Unless it was to avenge an affront done to the whole regiment that this young ensign sent them on our trail. If ever I have him at the point of my sword, he will not get off so lightly.” Well, lead your horses by hand, and we will see what this light is , since we have no better course to take. We guided ourselves as best we could across the moor, walking towards the bright point that glittered in the distance. As we advanced, we made many conjectures as to where it could come from. If it was from a human habitation, what being was it that, not content to live in the very heart of solitude, had chosen a spot so remote from the beaten roads that crossed it? The highway was several miles behind us, and in all probability, only those who were compelled by necessity, as we had been, could happen to find themselves in this desolate region. A hermit would not have wished for a spot so completely isolated from all communication with his fellows. As we drew nearer, we saw that the light was indeed coming from a small cottage built in a hollow, so as to be invisible from all sides except the one by which we had arrived. In front of this humble dwelling, a small space had been cleared of brambles, and it was in the middle of this patch of ground that our lost horse was, grazing at leisure on the thin turf. The same light, which had attracted us, had doubtless caught his eye, and he had gone thither in the hope of obtaining oats and water. Saxon gave a grunt of satisfaction as he regained possession of his lost property, and pulling the horse by the bridle, he approached the door of the solitary cottage. Chapter 11. The Lonely Man with the Chest Full of Gold. The strong yellow light which had attracted us across the moor filtered through a single narrow slit in the door, which at the same time fulfilled in a primitive way the role of a window. As we approached, the light suddenly took on a red color, then turned green, spreading a fantastic tint over our faces, and especially bringing out the cadaverous shade of the hard Saxon features. At the same time we smelled a very subtle, very disagreeable odor, which poisoned the air all around the cottage. This gathering of singularities, in such a deserted place, acted on the superstitious ideas of the old warrior with such force that he stopped to cast us an inquiring look. But Reuben and I were equally resolved to go through with the adventure. He therefore confined himself to remaining a little behind us and muttering on his own account an exorcism appropriate to the occasion. I advanced to the door, where I knocked with the pommel of my sword, announcing that we were spying on weary travelers and that we were seeking shelter for the night. The first result of my call was a noise similar to that made by rushing to and fro, moving metal objects, turning keys in locks. This noise was followed by silence, and I was about to knock again, when, from the other side of the door, a cracked voice welcomed us: “There is little to shelter you, gentlemen, and even less of provisions, she said. You are only six miles from Amesbury, and there you will find at the sign of the Cecil Arms everything you need for people and beasts. “Not so, my invisible friend,” said Saxon, who recovered his composure at the sound of a human voice, “this is surely a discouraging reception. One of our horses is completely worn out, and none are in very good condition, so that it would be as impossible for us to go to Amesbury at the Cecil Arms as it would be to go to the Green Man at Lubeck. I pray you, then, allow us to spend the rest of the night under your roof. ” This call was followed by many creakings of locks closing, bolts being drawn, and when it was over, the door slowly opened and revealed the person who had answered us. Thanks to the strong light that shone behind him, we saw a man of venerable appearance, with snow-white hair, and features that indicated a thoughtful but ardent character. The high, intelligent forehead, the long, flowing beard, all this smacked of the philosopher, but the brightness of the eyes, the aquiline nose with a very strong curve, the slender, straight body that the weight of years had not been able to bend, suggested a soldier. His proud bearing, his rich, though severe, costume of black velvet, contrasted singularly with the humble aspect of the dwelling he had chosen for his home. “Oh!” he said, casting us a penetrating glance, “two of you are novices in war, and the other is an old soldier. You have been pursued, I see. ” “But how do you know?” asked Saxon. “Ah! my friend, I too served in my time.” My eyes are not so old that they cannot recognize that horses have been spurred to excess, and it is not difficult to see that the sword of this young giant has been employed in a less innocent task than roasting bacon. Your assertion can therefore be admitted. A true soldier always begins by taking care of his horse. I therefore ask you to hobble yours outside, for I have neither a stable boy nor servants to whom to entrust them. The unknown house, which we entered at once, had been enlarged at the expense of the slope of the height against which it had been built, so that it formed a very long and very narrow room. The ends of this large room, at the moment of our entry, were plunged in shadow, but in the center blazed with a bright light a brazier full of coal, above which hung a copper pot. Beside the fire, a long wooden table was covered with glass flasks with curved necks, basins, tubes, and other instruments whose names and uses I knew neither. A long row of bottles containing liquids and powders of various colors was arranged on a shelf. Another shelf supported a rather fine collection of brown volumes.
There was, in addition, a second table of rough workmanship, two chests of drawers, three or four wooden stools, several large sheets pinned to the walls and entirely covered with numbers and symbolic figures , of which I understood nothing. The disagreeable odor that had greeted us outside was even more foul inside and seemed to be produced by the vapors of the boiling liquid contained in the copper pot. “You see in me,” said our host, bowing politely before us, “the last descendant of an ancient family. I am Sir Jacob Clancing, of Snellaby Hall.” “It would be more like Snelle a pue Hall, in my opinion,” murmured Ruben, whose joke, fortunately, was not heard by the old knight. “Please sit down, I beg you,” he said, “take off your breastplates, your helmets and your boots. Consider this dwelling as your inn and make yourself comfortable. You will excuse me for a moment if I cease to attend to you for to supervise the operation I had begun, which does not involve delay. Saxon immediately began to undo his buckles and remove the pieces of his equipment, while Ruben, dropping onto a chair, seemed too tired to do better than unfasten his belt. As for me, I was glad to be able to get rid of my armament, but I did not cease for a moment to observe the actions of our host, whose courteous manners and distinguished language had aroused my curiosity and admiration. He approached the unpleasant-smelling pot and stirred its contents, with an expression of countenance that indicated the greatest anxiety. It was evident that he had pushed his courtesy towards us to the point of perhaps missing an important experiment. He dipped a spoon into the liquid, brought back a certain quantity and poured it back into the vase, which revealed a yellow and cloudy fluid. The sight evidently seemed reassuring to him, for the look of anxiety vanished from his features, and he uttered an exclamation of relief. Then, taking a pinch of whitish powder from a plate beside him , he threw it into the pot, the contents of which immediately began to boil, and to throw foam upon the fire, which gave to the flame the strange green tint which we had noticed before entering. This treatment had the result of rendering the liquid clear, for the chemist was able to pour into a bottle a certain quantity of liquid as transparent as water, while at the bottom of the vessel a brown deposit formed, which was poured onto a sheet of paper. This done, Sir Jacob Clancing put all the bottles aside and turned towards us, with a smiling and satisfied air. “We will see what my poor pantry can provide,” he said, ” but this odor may be troublesome to your sense of smell, which is not accustomed to it; we will drive it away.” He threw a few grains of balsamic resin on the fire, which filled the whole room with the most agreeable fragrance. Then he spread a white cloth on the table, took from a cupboard a dish of cold trout and a large meat pie, which he set before us, after inviting us to draw our seats closer and get to work. “I would ask nothing better than to offer you something more appetizing,” he said. “If we were at Snellaby Hall, you would not be received in this miserable manner, I promise you. But still, it may be of service to people who are hungry, and I am still able to lay my hands on a couple of bottles of old Alicante. ” With this, he took two bottles from a recess. He invited us to help ourselves, to fill our glasses, and sat down on a high-backed oak chair, to preside over our feast with the courtesy of old times. During supper, I related to him our adventures of the night, without saying anything about our destination. “You are on your way to Monmouth’s camp,” he said quietly, looking me straight in the face with his black, penetrating eyes, when I had finished. “I know it, but you need not fear that I will betray you, even if it were in my power. In your opinion, what chance has the Duke in the presence of the royal troops? ” “As much chance as a barnyard cock against a spurred fighting cock, if he had to rely only on those around him,” replied Saxon. “However, he has reason to believe that all England is like a powder keg, and he hopes to be the spark that will set it alight. ” The old man shook his head sadly. “The King,” he remarked, “has great resources. Where will Monmouth get trained soldiers? ” “There is the militia,” I suggested. –And there are still a good many of the old parliamentary troops, who are not so old that they cannot strike a blow for their belief, said Saxon. Let only one be placed in a camp Half a dozen of these preachers with their broad-brimmed hats and their nasal speech, and the whole tribe of Presbyterians will swarm around them like flies around a honeypot. Never will recruiting sergeants muster an army comparable to that of old Noll ‘s preachers in the eastern counties, where the promise of a place beside the Throne of the Lamb was worth more than a ten- pound gratuity. I would ask nothing better than to pay my debts with promises like those. “Judging from your language, sir,” remarked our host, “you are not one of the sectarians. How is it then that you throw the weight of your sword and your experience into the weakest pan? ” “For that very reason, that it is the weakest,” said the soldier of fortune. I would gladly have gone with my brother to the Guinea Coast, and I would have only interfered in the affair to carry letters, or for other trifles. Since I must do something, I take the side of fighting for Protestantism and for Monmouth. It is perfectly indifferent to me whether James Stuart or James Walters is on the throne, but the court and the king’s army are things already established. Well, since Monmouth is still seeking courtiers and soldiers, it might well happen that he is delighted with my services and that he rewards them with advantages and honors. “Your logic is irreproachable,” said our host, “except on one point: that is, that you have left out the very great risk to your head, in the event that the duke’s party should succumb under the disproportion of forces. ” “One does not play a throw of dice without putting a stake.” “And you, young sir,” asked the old man, “what has engaged you in this dangerous game?” “I am the son of one of the Roundheads,” I replied, “and my family have always fought for the liberty of the people and the subjugation of tyranny. I come to take my father’s place. ” “And you, sir?” continued the questioner, looking at Reuben. “I am going to see a little of the world and to accompany my friend and comrade here,” he replied. “And I have stronger reasons than any of you,” cried Sir Jacob, “for going to war against any man who bears the name of Stuart. If I had not a mission that does not involve any negligence, I might be tempted to sail with you to the East and put the harsh pressure of a steel helmet on my gray hair. Where is the noble castle of Snellaby now?” Where are these groves, these forests in which the Clancings grew up, lived, and died , since the time when William of Normandy set foot on English soil. A trader, a man who amassed a contemptible fortune, thanks to the sweat of half-starved workers, is now the owner of this beautiful domain. If I, the last of the Clancings, were to appear there, they would have the right to deliver me to the village bailiff like a vagabond, or to drive me out with whips braided with the crossbow cords of insolent piqueurs. “And how did such a sudden change of fortune come about?” I asked. “Fill your glasses,” cried the old man, matching action to words. “I drink to your health, I drink to the ruin of all faithless princes . How did it come about, you asked? Well then! When Charles I saw the first agitations falling upon him, I supported him as if he had been my own brother. At Edgehill, at Naseby, in twenty skirmishes or battles, I fought valiantly for his cause, I maintained at my own expense a troop of cavalry, raised from among my gardeners, grooms and servants. Then, the army’s coffers began to empty; money was needed to prolong the struggle. My silver dishes and candlesticks were thrown into the crucible. They entered as metal and came out as soldiers and pikemen. We lasted thus for some months, until the purse was emptied; and, by our joint efforts, we filled it again. This time, it was the demesne farm and the oak wood that went. Then came Marston Morr. It was necessary to resort to the last penny, the last man, to repair this great disaster. I did not weaken. I gave everything. This soap maker, a prudent man with a ruddy, chubby face, had kept himself out of civil quarrels, and for a long time, he had cast his greedy eyes on the castle. It was the ambition of this miserable worm to be a gentleman, as if a gabled roof and a crumbling house were enough for that. But I let him indulge his whim, and the money I received I threw, down to the last guinea, into the king’s coffers. And I held out like this until the final catastrophe, that of the Worcester, where I covered the young prince’s retreat, and I can rightly say that outside the Isle of Man, I was the last Royalist who defended the authority of the Crown. The republic put a price on my head, regarding me as a dangerous enemy. I was therefore forced to embark on a merchant ship at Harwich and arrived in the Netherlands with no other possessions than my sword and a few pieces of silver in my pocket. “A cavalier can get by very well with that,” Saxon remarked. “There are incessant wars in Germany where a man can sell his services; when the North Germans are not in arms against the Swedes or the French, the South Germans are sure to have the Janissaries on their hands.” –Indeed, I bore arms for some time in the service of the United Provinces, which brought me face to face more than once with my old enemies the Roundheads. Olivier had lent Reynolds’s brigade to the French, and Louis was delighted to have such tried and tested troops in his service. By God, I found myself on the counterscarp at Dunkirk, and I happened to applaud the attack when my duty would have been to encourage the defense. My heart swelled with pride when I saw these fellows, tenacious as bulldogs, climbing into the breach with their pikes trailing behind them, singing their psalms with a voice that did not tremble, although the bullets flew around them as thick as bees at the moment of swarming. And when they came to hand-to-hand combat with the Flemings, I tell you they gave a shout in which there was so much soldierly joy that my pride at finding such Englishmen prevailed over my hatred of enemies. But my military career was not of long duration, for peace was soon concluded. Then I returned to the study of chemistry for which I had a great passion, first under Vorhaager of Leyden, then with De Huy, of Strasbourg, but I fear that these great names are a dead letter for you. “Truly,” said Saxon, “one would say that this chemistry exercises a very powerful attraction, for we met at Salisbury two officers of the Blue Guard, who also had a weakness of this kind, although they were solid fellows, real soldiers in all other respects. ” “Ha!” cried Sir Jacob, with interest, to which school did they belong? “Oh! I don’t understand anything about such things, replied Saxon, I only know that according to them Gervinus, of Nuremberg, the one I kept in prison, or any other man, was capable of transforming metals. “For Gervinus, I cannot answer,” said our host, “but as to the possibility of the thing, I can give my word as a knight. We will speak of that again. ” Finally, the time came when Charles II was invited to take possession of the throne, and all of us, from Jeffrey Hudson, the court dwarf, to My Lord Clarendon, were transported with joy at the thought that we would recover what was ours. I let my claim sleep for a while, imagining that the King would be magnanimous in helping a poor Cavalier who had ruined himself for his family, without waiting for him to ask for it. I waited and waited! I received not a word. One day, therefore, I went to the levee, and was presented in due form: “Ah!” said he, with that cordiality which he knew so well how to feign, “if I am not mistaken, you are Sir Jaspar Killigrew? ” “No, Sire,” I replied, “I am Sir Jacob Clancing, formerly of Snellaby Hall, in the county of Stafford. ” Then I recalled to his memory the battle of Worcester, and several other events which had happened to us in common. “Oh! “Oh, by Jove,” he cried, “how forgetful I am! And how are they getting on in Snellaby? ” I then explained to him that the Manor was no longer my property. I told him in a few words what situation I was reduced to. His face immediately darkened, and he showed me an icy coldness . “Everyone throws themselves at me for money and places,” he said, “and the truth is, the Commons are so stingy that I have little to be generous with to others. However, Sir Jacob, we will see what can be done for you.” And with these words he dismissed me. That same evening, My Lord Clarendon’s secretary came to me, and informed me that, in consideration of my long devotion and the losses I had suffered, the King had done me the favor of giving me the title of Knight of the Lottery. “I pray you, sir, tell us what a Knight of the Lottery is,” I asked. “He’s the keeper of a gambling house, nothing more, nothing less. That’s how he rewarded me. I was given permission to keep a free carpet in Covent Garden Square and to attract the young starlings of the city to shear them at the game of hombre. To restore my fortune, I had to ruin others. My honor, my family, my reputation, all that counted for nothing , so long as I had the means to extract their guineas from a few fools. ” “I have heard that certain Knights of the Lottery have done well,” said Saxon, thoughtfully. “Good or bad, it was not a suitable employment for me; I went to the King and begged him to give his generosity another form. He only replied that I was being very difficult for a man as poor as I was. I hovered around the Court for weeks.” I and other cavaliers saw the King and his brother waste on gambling and on courtesans sums that would have restored our patrimonies. I saw Charles risk on a single card a sum that would have satisfied the most demanding of us. I did my best to stay in the Parks of Saint James, in the gallery of White Hall, hoping that something would be done for me. At last, I received a second message from him. It was told me that if I could not dress more fashionable, he would excuse me from my assiduity. This is what he had the worn-out old soldier say, who had sacrificed health, fortune, position, everything in the service of his father and his own. “What a shame!” we cried with one voice. “Can you then wonder that I have cursed the whole race of Stuarts, that lying, debauched, and cruel race?” As for the Manor, I could buy it back tomorrow if I pleased, but why should I, since I have no heir. “Oh! So you have succeeded?” said Decimus Saxon, with one of his sideways glances so full of mischief. “Perhaps you have yourself found a way of converting pots and pans into gold, from what you you said. But that is impossible, for I see in this room that there is still copper and iron to be changed into gold. “Gold has its use, iron has its use,” said Sir Jacob, in an oracular tone. “One cannot take the place of the other. ” “Yet,” I remarked, “these officers assured us that this was only a superstition of the common people. ” “Then these officers have proved that their knowledge was less extensive than their prejudices. Alexander Setonius, a Scot, was the first to do it, among the moderns. In 1602 in the month of March, he changed a bar of lead into gold in the hand of a certain Hansen, at Rotterdam, and the latter testified to it. He did not limit himself to repeating this operation before the scholars sent by the Emperor Rudolf; He also taught it to Johann Wolfgang Dreisheim of Fribourg, and to Gustenhofer of Strasbourg, who himself taught it to my illustrious master the… “Who taught it to you in turn,” cried Saxon in a tone of triumph. ” I don’t have a supply of metal on me, dear sir, but here is my helmet, my breastplate, my armlets, my thighs, then my sword, my spurs, the buckles of my harness. I beg you, use your most excellent, most praiseworthy art on these objects, and I promise to bring you in a few days a quantity of metal more worthy of your skill. ” “No, no,” said the alchemist, smiling and shaking his head, “it can be done, no doubt, but slowly, little by little, in small pieces at a time, with great expense and patience. ” It would be a long and arduous task for a man to seek to enrich himself thus, but I will not deny that the thing cannot be done in the end. And now, as the bottles are empty, and your young comrade dozed off in his chair, it may be better for you to employ the rest of the night in sleep. He took from a corner several blankets and rugs, and spread them on the floor. “It is a soldier’s bed,” he remarked, “but you will perhaps be in even worse shape, by the time you put Monmouth on the throne of England. As for me, I am accustomed to sleeping in an inner chamber made up above.” After adding a few words relative to the precautions to be taken to be at our ease, he withdrew, taking the lamp, and passed by a door which was at the end of the room, and which had escaped our observation. Reuben, who had not had a moment’s rest since leaving Havant, had already stretched himself out on the blankets and was sleeping soundly , with a saddle for a pillow. As for Saxon and I, we sat for a few minutes longer, in the light of the burning brazier. “One could do worse than devote oneself to this chemist’s trade,” remarked my companion, shaking the ashes from his pipe. “Do you see there in the corner, that chest reinforced with ironwork? ” “Well? ” “It is two-thirds full of the gold that the worthy gentleman made. ” “How do you know?” I asked incredulously. “When you rapped on the door-panel with the hilt of your sword, as if you would have forced him in, you doubtless heard a rapid coming and going, and then the sound of ironwork.” Well, thanks to my height, I was able to peer through that crack in the wall, and I saw our friend throw something resounding into that chest before closing it. I could only glimpse the contents, but I can swear that this dark yellow color does not come from any other metal than gold. Let us see if it is properly locked. He stood up, went to the chest, and pulled hard on the lid. “Stop, Saxon, stop,” I shouted angrily, “what would our host say if he surprised us? ” “Well, he shouldn’t keep such things under his roof. With a chisel or a dagger, perhaps the lid could be forced open. “By heaven,” I said in a low voice, “if you try it, I’ll lay you on your back. ” “All right, all right, young Anak, it was only a whim, to take one more look at the treasure. Now, if he were a devoted supporter of the King, that would be a fine prize of war. Have you not noticed that he claimed to have been the last Royalist who drew a sword in England and that he admitted that a price had been put on his head as a rebel? Your father, pious as he is, would hardly feel compunction in despoiling such an Amalekite. Besides , don’t forget, he is no more embarrassed about making gold than your good mother would be about making raspberry fritters. ” “That’s enough,” I replied harshly, “no point in arguing!” Lie down, or I will call our host and tell him to whom he has given hospitality. Saxon, after much grumbling, finally decided to stretch his long limbs on a mat, while I rested beside him. I lay awake until the soft morning light showed itself through the cracks in the poorly covered joists of the roof. To tell the truth, I dared not fall asleep, for fear that the plundering habits of the soldier of fortune would take over and he would disgrace us in the eyes of our so considerate host. At last, however, his prolonged breathing proved to me that he had fallen asleep and I was able to enjoy a few hours of well-earned rest. Chapter 12. Of Some Adventures on the Moor. In the morning, after breakfasting on the remains of our supper, we busied ourselves with our horses and the preparations for departure. But, before allowing us to mount, our excellent host ran up to us, carrying armor. “Come this way,” he said to Reuben. “My boy, it is not right for you to go to the enemy with your chest unprotected, while your comrades are covered in steel. I have here my breastplate and helmet, which will fit you, I believe, for if you are better in flesh than I, I am, on the other hand, of a larger build. Ah! did I not say so! Even if Silas Thompson, the court armorer, had made it for you, it would not have fitted you better. Now let us see about the helmet. It fits very well too. You are now become a horseman such as Monmouth or any other chieftain would be proud to have around his banner. The helmet and complete breastplate were of the best Milanese steel, with rich inlays of silver and gold, and rare and curious designs in relief on all sides. The result was so severe, so martial, that the red and gay countenance of my friend, seen in this panoply, had something offensive , something pleasing. “No, no,” cried the old Cavalier, seeing a smile on our features, “it is only right that so precious a jewel as an honest heart should be in a case capable of protecting it. ” “I am truly grateful to you, sir,” said Reuben. “I do not know how to find words to thank you. Ah! Holy Mother! I have a great desire to return straight to Havant and show them the solid man-at-arms who was brought up among the inhabitants. ” “It is tried steel,” insisted Sir Jacob. “A pistol bullet would bounce off it. And you,” he continued, addressing me, “here is a little present to remind you of our meeting. I have noticed you casting curious glances at my shelf of books.” These are the Lives of the Great Men of Old, by Plutarch, translated into English by the ingenious Mr. Latimer. Carry this volume with you and conform your lives to the examples of the giants whose exploits are recounted therein. I place in your saddle pockets a packet of little volume but of a great importance, which I beg you to deliver to Monmouth the day you arrive at his camp. For you, sir, he said, speaking to Decimus Saxon, here is a blank gold ingot, from which you may make a pin or any other ornament. Have a clear conscience in wearing it, for it is given to you in all loyalty and has not been swindled from your host while he slept. Saxon and I exchanged a quick glance of surprise at this speech, which proved to us that our host was not ignorant of the discussions we had held during the night. But Sir Jacob showed no sign of anger. He proceeded to show us the route to follow and advise us on our journey. “You must follow this path made by the sheep until you come to another, wider path that runs west,” he said. “But it is a path that is little used, and there is little chance of you falling in with enemies.” The road will take you between the villages of Fovant and Hindon, before leading you to Mere, which is a short distance from Bruton, on the boundary of the county of Somerset. After thanking our venerable host for the kindness he had shown us, we released the reins, and he was able to resume the strange and solitary existence in which we had found him. The site of his cottage had been so skillfully chosen, that when we turned to offer him a last greeting, he and his dwelling had already disappeared from our sight, and among the numerous mounds and hollows, it was impossible for us to recognize the spot where the cottage had been in which we had found such a convenient shelter. Before and beside us the plain stretched in a brown carpet to the horizon, with nothing protruding from its barren and gorse-covered surface. Throughout this space, nothing revealed life, except for the occasional rabbit, which hurried back to its holes at the sound of our approach, or a few emaciated, starving sheep, which barely found sustenance in the coarse, stringy grass produced by this sterile soil. The path was so narrow that we could only follow it one by one, but we soon left it entirely, using it only as a guide, and galloping side by side across the undulating plain. We all remained silent. Reuben was contemplating his new breastplate, as I could judge by the frequent glances he cast there. Saxon, with half-closed eyes, was brooding over some matter that interested him. As for me, my thoughts rested on the infamous projects that the chest of gold had inspired in the old soldier, and on the increased shame caused me by the certainty that our host had, I know not how, guessed his intention. Nothing good could come of an alliance with a man so devoid of all feelings of honor or gratitude. I felt this so strongly that I at last broke the silence, pointing out a path that crossed ours, and led away from it, and recommending him to follow it, since he had proved that he was not made for the company of honest people. “By the holy cross!” he said, placing his hand on the hilt of his rapier, “have you given up your good sense? These are words that no cavalier of honor could tolerate. ” “They are no less the expression of the truth,” I replied. His blade immediately came out of its scabbard, while his mare made a leap of twice its length, under the sudden contact of the spurs. “Here,” he cried, turning him around, his fierce , thin face quivering with anger, “is a well-leveled spot, which will be excellent for settling the matter. Pull out your needle and back up your words. ” “I will not move a hair’s breadth to attack you,” I replied. Why should I, when I bear you no grudge? But if you rush upon me, I shall surely throw you from your saddle, in spite of all your fencing artifices. So saying, I drew my saber and put myself on guard, for I felt that with an old soldier like that, the first shock would be harsh and sudden. “By all the Saints in heaven,” cried Ruben, “the first of the two to strike the other, I discharge this pistol into his head. No such games, Don Decimo, for by the Lord, I am rushing upon you, even if you were my own mother’s son. Sheathe your sword, for a trigger goes off easily, and my finger itches. ” “To hell with the spoilsport!” Saxon growled, scabbing his sword gruffly. No, Clarke, he resumed, after a few moments of reflection, it is only a childish joke, played by two comrades to see which of them will get angry over a trifle. I, who am old enough to be your father, should have controlled myself enough not to draw against you, for a young man’s tongue flies on impulse, and without reflection. Only say that you have said more than you meant. “My way of saying it may have been too plain and too harsh,” I replied, for I saw that he only asked for a little ointment for the place where my brief words had wounded him; but our characters differ from yours, and that difference must disappear, otherwise you cannot be a reliable comrade to us. ” “Very well, Master Morals, I shall have to unlearn some of the tricks of my trade. By Jove, my man, if you are being picky about me, what would you think of some of the people I have known?” It is high time we began the war, for our good blades will not lie still in their scabbards. The sharp blade, the faithful blade of Toledo, Had rusted for want of fighting, And had eaten itself away, having No one to cut, to skin. You could not express an idea that old Samuel did not have before you. “We shall surely soon reach the end of this terrible plain,” cried Reuben. “The insipid flatness is enough to set the best of friends at odds. We might be in the deserts of Libya as well as in Wiltshire, which belongs to His Most Ungraceful Majesty. ” “There is smoke over there, on the side of that height,” said Saxon, pointing south. “I think I see a row of houses in a straight line,” I remarked, shading my eyes with my hand. But it’s far away, and the glare of the sun prevents me from seeing clearly. “This must be the hamlet of Hindon,” said Reuben. “Oh! how hot it is under this steel coat! I wonder if it would be in accordance with military custom to undo it and hang it around Dido’s neck. Otherwise I’ll be roasted alive like a crab in its shell. What do you say, illustrious man? Is it contrary to one of those Thirty-nine Articles of War that you carry in your heart? ” “Carrying the weight of the harness, young man,” replied Saxon gravely, “is one of the exercises of war, and therefore it is a quality that one attains only by practicing the test to which you are subjected at this moment. You have many things to learn, and one of them is not to put a petrinal so quickly at the head of people when you are on horseback. ” The sudden jolt your horse produces would have been enough to pull the trigger in a second, which would have deprived Monmouth of an old and experienced soldier. “Your remark would be of great importance,” replied my friend, “if I did not now remember that I forgot to reload my pistol, since I discharged it last night at that enormous yellow beast.” Decimus Saxon shook his head dejectedly. “I wonder,” he remarked, “if we will ever make a soldier of you. You fall from your horse as soon as the animal changes its gait. You display a frivolity that is hardly in harmony with the seriousness of the true soldado. You threaten with your petrinal when it is not loaded, and finally, you ask permission to tie your armor around your horse’s neck, an armor that the Cid himself might be proud to wear. Yet you have heart, activity, I believe. Without it, you would not be here. ” “Gracias, Senior,” said Ruben, with a salute that almost unseated him, “this last remark makes everything else go away. Otherwise, I would have been forced to cross swords with you, to maintain my reputation as a soldier.” “About that incident of the night,” said Saxon, “about the chest, which I thought was full of gold and which I was willing to seize as legitimate booty, I am now quite ready to acknowledge that I showed too much haste, too much precipitation, for the old man had received us loyally. ” “Speak no more of it,” I replied, “if you will only be on your guard against such impulses henceforth. ” “They are not mine alone,” he replied. “They came from Will Spotterbridge, who was a man of no reputation. ” “And how did he get mixed up in the affair?” I asked curiously. “Well, this is how: my father married the daughter of the said Will Spotterbridge, and thus weakened the value of a good old family by the introduction of unwholesome blood. Will was a devil of Fleet Street, in the time of James, a notable light of Alsace, the abode of braggarts and quarrel-seekers. His blood was transmitted through his daughter to the ten of us, though I have the joy of saying that, being the tenth, he had by this time lost a good deal of his virulence, and little more than a fair amount of pride and a laudable desire to succeed remains. “But how has he affected the race?” I asked. “Here he is,” he replied. “The Saxons of old were a generation of full-faced, contented people, busy at their desks six days a week and their Bibles the seventh. If my father drank one more glass of small ale than usual, or if, through provocation , he happened to let out one of his favorite curses, such as ‘ Oh, swarthy!’ or ‘live heart!’ he fretted over them as if they were the seven deadly sins. Is it likely, in accordance with the natural course of things, that a man of that sort should have fathered ten long, gaunt boys, nine of whom might have been first cousins ​​of Lucifer and foster brothers of Beelzebub! “It was very troublesome for him,” remarked Reuben. “For him? Oh no, all the trouble was for us! If, with his eyes open, he thought it proper to marry the daughter of a devil incarnate like Will Spotterbridge, because that day she was powdered and painted to his liking, what cause had he to complain? It is we who have in our veins the blood of that tavern bravo, grafted onto our good, honest nature, it is we who have the most reason to protest. ” “Upon my word, according to the same chain of reasons,” said Reuben, “one of my ancestors must have married a woman who had a terribly dry throat , for my father and I were afflicted with the same disease. “You must have inherited a sharp tongue,” snarled Saxon. ” From what I have told you, you see that our whole life is a conflict between our natural Saxon virtue and the impious impulses due to the Spotterbridge stain. The one you had cause to complain of last night is only one example of the evil to which I am subject. ” “And your brothers and sisters,” I asked, “what effect has it produced on them?” this circumstance? The road was dull and long, so that the old soldier’s chatter was a most opportune diversion from the tedium of the voyage. “They all succumbed,” said Saxon, groaning. “Alas! alas! what a pious band they would have made, had they employed their talents to better uses. Prima was our eldest. She lived well until she became a woman. Secundus was a valiant sailor, and had his own ship while he was still a young man. However, it was remarked that he went on a voyage in a schooner, and returned in a brig, which gave rise to an investigation. It may be, as he says, that he met him drifting in the North Sea, and abandoned his ship for his find, but he was hanged before he could prove it. Tertia escaped with a cattle driver from the North, and has been running ever since. Quartus and Nonus have long devoted themselves to their trade of snatching blacks from their lands of darkness and idolatry to transport them as cargo to the plantations, where they can learn the beauties of the Christian religion. However, they are men of a hot temper, of profane language, who feel no affection for their younger brother. Quintus was a young boy who showed much promise, but he found a barrel of rum that had been thrown overboard in a shipwreck, and he died soon after. Septus might have turned out well, for he had become a clerk to John Tranter, attorney, but he was of an enterprising nature and transported to the Netherlands everything that was in the office, papers, money, and the rest; which caused no small trouble to his patron, who has never been able to get either back from that day until now. Septimus died young. As for Octavus, Will Spotterbridge’s blood ran early at home, and he was killed in a brawl over a throw of dice, which his enemies claimed had been rigged so as to invariably bring out a six. Let this moving tale serve as a warning to you: if you are foolish enough to impose on yourselves the burden of a wife, see that she is not afflicted with any vice, for a pretty face is a very small compensation for a bad mind. Reuben and I could not help laughing at this family confession, which our comrade delivered without showing the slightest confusion or embarrassment. “You have paid dearly for your father’s lack of discernment,” I remarked. “But what can this object be, here on our left?” “It’s a gallows, judging by its appearance,” said Saxon, examining the tall framework that stood on a small mound. ” Let’s come closer, for it’s not far from our road. These are rare objects in England, and I can tell you on my word that when Turenne was in the Palatinate, more gallows than road markers were seen on the roads. Also, to say nothing of the spies, the traitors engendered by the war, the rogues of the Black Knights and the Lansknechts, the Bohemian vagabonds, and here and there a local man who was suppressed to prevent him from doing wrong, the crows were never seen at such a festival. When we were near this solitary gallows, we saw a sort of bundle of dried rags in which it was hardly possible to recognize human remains, swinging in the center. This miserable remnant of humanity was attached to the crossbar by an iron chain, and swung monotonously back and forth in the morning breeze. We had stopped our horses, and were gazing in silence at this ensign of death, when the object which had seemed to us to be a bundle of rags thrown at the foot of the gallows, suddenly stirred and turned towards showing us the ravaged face of an old woman, so deeply imbued with evil passions, so wicked in her expression, that she inspired us with even more horror than the impure object that swung above her head. “Gott in Himmel!” cried Saxon, “it’s always like this. A gallows attracts witches as strongly as a magnet attracts needles. All the witchcraft in the country wants to settle around it, like cats around a bowl of milk. Beware of her, for she has the evil eye. ” “Poor creature, it’s rather a bad stomach she has,” said Reuben, spurring his horse towards the woman. “Who ever saw such a bag of bones? I bet she’s dying for lack of a crust of bread.” The creature moaned and stretched out two bony claws to seize the silver coin my friend had thrown at her. Her black eyes with their fierce expression, her beak-like nose, the dried bones over which the yellow, parched skin was tightly drawn, gave her the air of a spirit that inspires fear. She would have said she was an impure bird of prey, one of those vampires that storytellers speak of. “What good is money in this desert?” I remarked. “She cannot live on a silver coin.” She hastened to tie the coin in a corner of her rags as if she feared I would come and take it from her by force. “It will buy bread,” she croaked. “But who will sell you some, good woman?” I asked. “They sell it in Fovant, and they sell it in Hindon,” she replied. “I stay here during the day, but I travel during the night. ” “I warrant that she does indeed travel, and on a broomstick,” said Saxon, “but tell us, mother, who is this hanged man above you?” “He is the one who killed my last-born,” said the old woman, casting a spiteful glance at the mummy hanging there, and holding out her closed fist, on which scarcely more flesh remained than on the other. “He is the one who killed my brave little boy. He met him on the wide moor, and tore away his young life, when no helping hand was there to stop the blow. It was here that my boy’s blood was shed . Thus, under this watering, this beautiful gallows grew, with the ripe fruit it bears. And here, rain or shine, I, his mother, will remain as long as two bones still hold together, of the man who killed the darling of my heart.” And speaking thus, she wrapped herself in her rags, then resting her chin on her hands, she raised her eyes to contemplate with a redoubled hatred the hideous remains. “Let’s go, Reuben,” I cried, for the sight was indeed such as to inspire horror in his fellow man; “she’s a ghoul, not a woman. ” “Ugh!” said Saxon, “that makes the taste of a corpse rise in your mouth! Who wants to go full speed over the Dunes? To hell with worry and carrion! ” Sir John mounted his brave brown steed, For a ride to Monmouth, ah! A good buffalo jerkin on his back, A sabre at his side. Ah! Ha! Ha! Young man, we rebels will know How to bring down the pride of King James. Ah! Onward, my fellows, at full speed, and blood on the spurs! We spurred our horses to gallop away from this accursed place as fast as our brave beasts could carry us. The air had a purer flavor for all of us, the heather a sweeter scent, thanks to the contrast with the two horrible beings we had left behind us. How charming the world would be, my children, without man and his practices. When we finally stopped, we had put three or four miles between the gallows and us. Directly opposite us, on a gentle slope, rose a charming little village, with its red-roofed church rising from the midst of a clump of trees. To our eyes, after the monotonous carpet of the plain, it was a delightful sight, this vast display of green foliage, and these pleasant gardens which surrounded the hamlet on all sides. During the whole morning, we had seen no other human beings than the old hag of the moor and some peat cutters in the distance. Then, our belts began to become too large, and we had but a faint recollection of our breakfast. “That,” I said, “must be the village of Mere, which we must pass before arriving at Bruton. We shall soon cross the boundary of the county of Somerset. ” “I hope we shall soon come into the presence of a beefsteak,” groaned Reuben. “I am half starved to death. Such a pretty village must have a tolerable hostelry, though in my travels I have not met with any that bears comparison with the old Wheatsheaf.” “There is neither inn nor dinner for us at this moment,” said Saxon. ” Look down there to the north and tell me what you see.” On the far horizon was a long line of bright, scintillating points , which threw out rapid rays like a diamond necklace. All these bright spots were animated by a rapid movement, and yet they maintained their respective distances. “What is it?” we said in one voice. “Cavalry on the march,” said Saxon. “It could be our friends from Salisbury, who will have had a long day’s march, or, as I am inclined to believe, it is another body of the royal cavalry. They are very far away, and what we see is only the reflection of the sun on their helmets; and yet, if I am not mistaken, it is towards this very village that they are heading. It would be very prudent not to enter it, for fear that the peasants will put them on our trail.” We must double it and push on to Bruton, where we will have time to spare for soup and supper. “Alas! Alas! our dinner!” cried Reuben in a piteous tone. “I have diminished so much that my body is stirring within this shell of armor, like a pea in its pod. No matter, my friends. Onward for the Protestant faith! ” “One more good push to reach Bruton, and we will be able to rest peacefully. It is a bad dinner where they can serve us a dragoon as dessert after the roast. Our horses are still fresh, and we will arrive in an hour at the most.” So we set off again, keeping our distance from danger and from Mere, the village where Charles II hid after the Battle of Worcester. On leaving thence, the road was crowded with peasants, who were abandoning the county of Somerset, and with farmers’ carts, which were carrying loads of provisions to the west and who were willing to receive a few guineas from the royal troops as well as from the rebels. We questioned a great number of them for news of the war, but although we were then in the vicinity of the country which was disturbed, we could learn nothing definite of the situation, except that, by all accounts, the rising was gaining ground. The country we were traveling through was beautiful: formed of low, undulating hills, well cultivated and watered by numerous small streams. We crossed the River Brue on a good stone bridge and at last arrived at the small country town which was the object of our journey. It lies in the midst of a vast expanse of meadows, orchards, and fertile pastures. From the height overlooking the town, our view wandered over the plain we had left behind us, without seeing any trace of soldiers. We also learned from an old woman of the place that a troop of the Yeomen of the County of Wilts had indeed passed by there the day before, but that there were no soldiers established in the country. Thus reassured, we boldly made our entry on horseback into the town, and we soon found our way to the principal inn. I have a vague recollection of an old church on a rise, and of a queer stone cross in the market-place, but surely of all the memories I have of Bruton, none is more pleasing to me than that of the beaming face of the mistress of the inn, and of the steaming dishes which she wasted no time in serving us.
Chapter 13. On Sir Gervas Jerome, Knight Banneret of the County of Surrey. The inn was crowded, for there were both many government agents and couriers going to and from the roads to the hotbed of rebellion, and the cronies of the locality, who went there to exchange news and to consume the beer which Dame Robson, the innkeeper, herself made. Notwithstanding this throng of guests and the resulting uproar, the landlady consented to show us to her own room, where we could enjoy her good cheer in peace and security. This favor, I believe, was due to some clever little maneuvering, and a few words spoken in an undertone by Saxon. Among other talents acquired during his eventful career, he had a particularly agreeable knack for getting on friendly terms with the fair sex, without otherwise caring about age, size, or reputation. Nobility and common people, friends of the Church or Dissenters, Whig and Tory, it mattered little; as long as one was in a petticoat, our comrade always succeeded, despite his fifty years, in establishing himself in the good graces of the sex, by the aid of his sharp tongue and self- assurance. “We are your grateful servants, Mistress,” he said, when the steaming roast and pudding had been served. “We have deprived you of your room.” Will you do us the great honor of sitting at our table and sharing our meal? “No, dear sir,” said the imposing lady, very flattered by the proposal, “it is not for me to sit next to gentlemen like you. ” “Beauty has rights that people of quality, and above all the caballeros of the sword, are the first to recognize,” cried Saxon, fixing his small, blinking eyes, full of admiration, on the plump person of the landlady. “No, upon my word, you will not leave us. I will begin by locking the door. If you will not eat, you will at least drink a glass of Alicante with us. ” “No, sir, you are doing me too much honor,” cried Dame Robson, simpering; “I will go down to the cellar and bring a bottle of the best. ” “No, upon my word, you will not,” said Saxon, rising abruptly. Where are those devilish idle servants, that you are reduced to doing menial tasks? And installing the widow on a chair, he left with a loud noise for the great hall, where we heard him swear at the boys, calling them a bunch of rogues who pretend to be busy, who abuse the angelic kindness of their mistress and her incomparable sweetness of character. “Here is the wine, fair Mistress,” he said, holding out a bottle in each hand. “Allow me to fill your glass. Ah! how clear and yellow it runs, like the first vintage! Those rogues get restless when they feel they have a man to command them. ” “Ah! if they could always be like that,” said the widow, in a significant tone, throwing our companion a languorous look. “To you, sir… And to you too, my young gentlemen,” she added, raising the glass to her lips. May God grant that the insurrection may soon be ended, for judging by your fine attire, you are in the King’s service. “His business calls us to the West,” said Reuben, “and we have every reason to hope that the insurrection will soon be over.” “Yes, yes, but there will be bloodshed first,” she said, nodding her head. ” I have been told that the rebels now number seven thousand, and that they swear to give and ask neither quarter; the bandits, the murderers! Alas! how can a gentleman engage in this bloody business, when he could occupy himself in a virtuous, honorable way, such as keeping an inn! This is what my poor mind cannot conceive. There is a sad difference between the man who sleeps on the cold earth, without knowing how long it will be before he has three feet of it on his body, and the one who spends the night on a warm feather bed, perhaps over a cellar well supplied with wine like that which we are drinking at this very moment.” And as she spoke, she looked Saxon straight in the face, while Reuben and I exchanged signals under the table. “This business has doubtless made your trade go well, fair Mistress,” said Saxon. “Yes, and in the way that yields the most profit,” she said. “A few barrels of beer more or less, drunk by the common people, do not make much difference one way or the other. But now that we have county lieutenants, officers, mayors, and nobility, playing with the spur as if it were a question of saving their lives, on all the highways, I have sold more of my old wines, my precious wines in three days than I ever sold in a month of thirty days. I warrant you, it is not ale, nor brandy, that these gentlemen drink. We need Prignac, Languedoc, Tent, Muscat, Chianti, Tokay: not a bottle that costs less than half a guinea. ” “Ah!” Really, said Saxon thoughtfully, a comfortable house and a regular income! “Ah! if my poor Peter had lived to enjoy it with me,” said Dame Robson, putting down her glass and rubbing her eyes with the corner of her handkerchief. “He was a good man, the poor deceased, and yet, one may well say, among friends, for it is the truth, he had grown as fat and as broad as one of the casks. That is true, but the heart is the essential thing. But in fact, after all, if a woman had to always wait for the object of her whim to come and pass, there would be more young ladies than mothers in the country. ” “I ask you, good lady, what is the object of your whim like?” asked Reuben slyly. “He is not a big, fat young man,” she retorted briskly , casting a sly glance at our plump comrade. “She threw that right in your face, Reuben,” I said. “I wouldn’t want a young whippersnapper with a loose tongue,” she continued, “but a man who knows the world, who is matured by experience. He should be tall, and well-muscled, with a tongue loose enough to entertain long hours and help amuse gentlemen while they enjoy a bottle of good wine. He must also be accustomed to business, for isn’t this a well-stocked inn, and where two hundred good pounds pass through its hands every year? If Lady Robson ever lets herself be led down the aisle again, it will have to be by a man like that.” Saxon had listened very attentively to the widow’s words and had just opened his mouth to reply when a loud noise and comings and goings announced the arrival of a traveler. Our hostess finished her wine and pricked up her ears, but a loud , authoritative voice being heard in the corridor requesting a private room and a glass of Rhine wine, she said to herself that her duty took precedence over her personal affairs, and she left immediately, apologizing in a few words to take the measure of the newcomer . “Corbleu, my children,” said Decimus Saxon, as soon as she had disappeared, “you can easily see where we are. I almost want to leave Monmouth make their way through, and pitch a tent in this quiet English locality. “Your tent!” you say, said Reuben. “It’s a fine tent, this one, with cellars stocked with wine like the one we drink. And as for rest, my illustrious personage, if you take up residence here, I guarantee you won’t be long at rest. ” “You saw the lady,” said Saxon, her brow furrowed with wrinkles under the influence of preoccupation. “She has many things to recommend her. A man must provide for his own interests. Two hundred pounds a year is not something you can pick up on the highway every June morning. It is not princely, but it is something for an old soldier of fortune who has been at war for thirty-five years, who sees the time coming when his limbs will become stiff under the harness. What does our learned Flemish say about it: an mulier is what a woman… But, in the name of the devil, what is going on?” Our companion’s exclamation was provoked by the sound of a slight jostling behind the door, accompanied by an “Oh! sir,” and “What will the maids think?” The discussion ended with the re-entry of Dame Robson, her face quite red, and the appearance at her heels of a very slender young man, dressed in the latest fashion. “I am convinced, my good gentlemen,” she said, “that you will not object to this young gentleman drinking his wine in the same room with you, especially as the other rooms are full of the townspeople and the council. ” “Upon my word, I must be my own introducer,” said the stranger, putting his gold-embroidered headdress under his left arm, and placing his hand on his heart, and at the same time bowing so low that his forehead almost struck the edge of the table. Your very humble servant, Sir Gervas Jerome, Knight Banneret of His Majesty for the County of Surrey and formerly Custos Rotulorum Keeper of the Rolls for the district of Blacham Ford. “Welcome, sir,” said Reuben, with a wink of his eye. ” You have before you Don Decimo Saxon, of the Spanish nobility, as well as Sir Micah Clarke, and Sir Reuben Lockarby, both subjects of His Majesty, County of Hampshire. ” “Proud and happy to make your acquaintance,” said the newcomer, with a sweep of his hand. “But what is on the table? Alicante? Fi! Fi! It is a young boys’ brew. Give us some good Rhine wine, full-bodied. Claret for young men, I say, Rhine wine for middle age, and brandy for old age.” Fly, my darling, move your pretty little feet, for, by God, my throat is like leather. It’s true, I drank a good deal last night, and yet I hadn’t drunk enough, for when I awoke I was as dry as a concordance. Saxon sat at the table, saying nothing, but casting upon the stranger, through his half-closed eyelids, such a sly glance with his shining eyes, that I dreaded to witness another quarrel like the one we had at Salisbury, and which might perhaps turn out worse .
But finally the bad humor caused by the unabashed manners and eagerness of the gallant with the landlady was reduced to a few half-voiced oaths, and he lit his long pipe, his infallible resource when he was annoyed. As for Ruben and I, we examined our new companion with a mixture of surprise and amusement, for his appearance and manner were well calculated to excite the interest of two inexperienced young people like ourselves. I have said that he was dressed in the latest fashion. Such, in fact, was the impression he produced at first glance . His face was thin, aristocratic, his nose strong, his features delicate, his air gay, carefree. A certain pallor of the cheeks, the eyes slightly darkened, which could be the effect of a tiring journey, or of the abuse of pleasures, only added a new grace to his appearance. His white wig, his riding coat of velvet and silver, his lavender-colored waistcoat, his red satin breeches reaching down to the knee, all this was of the best style, of the best cut, but when one looked closely at all the pieces of this costume and his whole suggested that they had seen better days. Without speaking of the dust and stains produced by the journey, there were here and there shiny or discolored spots which were little in keeping with the high price of the material or the bearing of the one who wore it. Of his long riding boots, one had a gaping slit on the side, while the toes sought to emerge from the end of the other. As for the rest, he wore a fine rapier with a silver hilt, a muslin shirt with puffed pleats, which had gained nothing from being worn for long, and which opened in the front, according to the fashion adopted by the gallants of that time. While he spoke, he kept chewing a toothpick, which, together with his habit of pronouncing the o’s as the a’s, made his conversation rather strange to our ears. While we were noticing these details, he stretched himself on the best of Dame Robson’s taffeta-covered armchairs and leisurely combed his wig with a pretty ivory comb which he had taken from a satin bag hanging on the right of his baldric. “May the Lord preserve us from country inns,” he remarked. “And then all these oafs who swarm in every room, not to mention the lack of mirrors, the want of jasmine and other necessary things, I want to die if one is not forced to wash in the common room. Ah! I would so love to travel to the land of the Great Mongol. “When you are my age, young sir,” replied Saxon, ” you will know enough not to disregard a comfortable country inn. ” “It is probable, sir, very probable,” replied the gallant with a careless laugh. “But at my age, I still find the deserts of the county of Wilts, and the inns of Bruton, a bad change, after the Mall, and the fare at Pantack’s, or the Caca Tree. Ah! Lud, here is the Rhine wine arriving. Uncork it, my pretty Hebe, and send a waiter with more glasses, for these gentlemen will do me the honor of drinking with me. A pinch of snuff, gentlemen? Ah! yes, you may look at this snuffbox. A very pretty little object, gentlemen, and which comes to me from a certain titled lady, who shall not be named.” However, if I said that his name begins with a D and ends with a C, a gentleman of the court might hazard a guess. Our landlady brought new glasses and withdrew. Decimus Saxon soon found an excuse to follow her. Sir Gervas Jerome continued to chatter familiarly with Reuben and me, while he drank the wine, playing with his tongue as casually and without embarrassment as if we were old acquaintances. “I’ll die if I haven’t put your comrade to flight,” he remarked. “Or he might have gone after that fat widow. I think he didn’t seem in a very good humor when I kissed the lady before the door. Yet it is a civility I seldom refuse to any creature who wears a cap. Your comrade’s appearance made him think of Mars rather than Venus; although ordinarily the worshippers of the God are generally on good terms with the Goddess.” A tough old soldier, I think, from his features and his costume. “He’s seen a lot of service abroad,” I replied. “Ah! You’re lucky, you, to be going to war in the company of such an accomplished horseman. I suppose, indeed, that you’re going to war, since you are all armed and equipped like this. “Indeed, we are leaving for the West,” I replied, with some embarrassment, for in the absence of Saxon, I did not want to give free rein to my words. “And in what capacity?” he insisted. ” Are you going to risk your crowns in the defense of King James, or are you going to strike, hit or miss, in the company of these boors from Devon and Somerset? Let my vital breath stop if I would not rather side with the boor, rather than with that of the crown, yet with all the respect that is due to your principles. ” “You are a bold man,” I said, thus proclaiming your opinions in the first inn room I came across. “Do you not know that a word of what you have said to us, repeated in the ear of the nearest justice of the peace , may cost you your liberty, if not your life?” “I care for liberty, and even for life, as much as for the rind of a rotten orange,” cried our recent friend, snapping his fingers. “Burnt me, if it would not be a very new sensation to me to quarrel with a heavy-looking country justice of the peace, with the Popish plot still stuck in his gizzard, and then be shut up in a prison, like that hero in John Dryden’s last play. I have been put in the round-house more than once by the watch, in the days of Haweub, but this time it would be a more dramatic affair, the block and the axe for the background— ” “And the rack, and the tongs for the prologue,” said Reuben. “That ambition is the strangest thing I ever heard of. ” “A change at any price,” cried Sir Gervas, filling a glass. This one to the young girl who is closest to our hearts, and this other to the heart that loves young ladies! War , wine, women, how dull the world would be without them! But you have not answered my question. “Truly, sir,” I said, “as frank as you have been with us, I cannot be as frank with you without the permission of the gentleman who has just left. He is the leader of our troop. However pleasant our short interview may have been, we are nonetheless in a difficult time, and hasty confidences may be a cause for repentance. ” “A Daniel for judgment!” These are ancient words, truly ancient for such a young head. You are, I believe, five years younger than a fool like me, and yet you speak like the seven Sages of Greece. Do you want me for a servant? ” “A servant!” I cried. “Yes, for a servant, for a domestic.” I have been served so long, that now it is my turn to serve, and I wish for no better master. By the Lord! in asking for a place, I must give the details of my character, and a list of my talents. This is what my rogues have always done with me, though to tell the truth, I have never listened to their stories. Honesty! here I am scoring a trick. Sobriety! Ananias himself could not say that I have this quality. Sincerity, bad enough in that respect . Perseverance! hmm! about as much as Gorraway’s weathercock. Hang me, friend, if I am not full of good resolutions, but the sparkle of a glass, a roguish eye, there I am, and I am thrown off course as sailors say of the compass. So much for my weaknesses. Now let us see what qualities I can bring to the fore. Nerves well tempered, except in the morning, when I have my attacks, and my heart disposed to joy; I score two for that. I know how to dance the saraband, the minuet, the courante, fence , ride a horse, sing French songs. Good God, did anyone ever hear a valet boast such knowledge? I
am the best piquet player there is in London. That’s what Sir George Etheredge said, the day I won him a thousand pounds, to the Groom Parter, but that won’t do me much good. What can I recommend myself to? Ah! I’m there: I know how to make a bowl of punch and I know how to roast a fowl on a spit, it’s not much, but I can do it very well. “Really, my dear sir,” I said, smiling, “neither of these talents seems likely to be of any use to us in the matter at hand. But no doubt you only mean to joke when you talk of lowering yourself to such a situation. ” “Not at all! Not at all,” he replied seriously. “It is to such low employments that we come, as Will Shakespeare says. If you want to be able to say that you have as your servant Sir Gervas Jerome, Knight Banneret, sole owner of Beacham Ford Park, with an income of four thousand good pounds a year, he is now for sale, and will be delivered to the purchaser he pleases best .” You have only to say the word, and we will send for another bottle of Rhine wine to seal the deal. “But,” I said, “if you are truly the possessor of this fine fortune, why descend to such a servile profession? ” “The Jews, the Jews, O you the most cunning and yet the slowest -witted master he has! The ten tribes have fallen upon me. I have been harassed, devastated, bound, kidnapped, despoiled. Never was Agag, king of Amalek, more completely in the hands of the chosen people. The only difference is that they cut my domain into tiny pieces instead of tearing me apart. ” “Have you lost everything?” asked Reuben, opening his eyes wide.
“All, no… not all, far from it,” he replied with a joyous laugh. ” I have a gold Jacobus and a couple of guineas in my purse. That’s enough to drink another bottle or two.” Here is my silver-hilted rapier, my rings, my gold snuffbox, my watch by Thompson, with the Three Crowns emblem. It was not paid for less than a hundred pounds, I warrant. Then there are still some remnants of my grandeur about me, as you see, though they are beginning to look as fragile, as worn as a maid’s virtue. In this bag I still preserve enough to maintain that personal cleanliness, that elegance which has made me, if I may say so, the best-groomed man who ever set foot in St. James’s Park. There are French scissors, a brush for his eyebrows, a box of toothpicks, a fly-box, a sachet of powder, a comb, a tuft, and my pair of red-heeled shoes. What more can a man desire? That, and besides a dry throat, a content heart, a dexterous hand, that is all my stock in trade. Ruben and I could not help laughing at this curious inventory of the objects Sir Gervas had saved from the wreck of his fortune. As for him, seeing our hilarity, he felt so tickled by his own misfortunes that he burst into a high-pitched laugh that resounded throughout the house. “By the Mass!” he cried at last. “During my prosperity, I never amused myself so honestly as now after my decline. Fill your glasses. ” “We still have a long way to go tonight, and we must not drink any more,” I remarked. Prudence told me that it was a dangerous game for two sober young countrymen to compete with a tried and tested drinker. “Really,” he said with surprise, “I would have thought that was a reason for more, as the French say.” But I should like to see your long-legged friend return, even though he intends to cut off my whistle as punishment for my attentions to the widow. He is not a man to shrink from drink, I will answer for it. Cursed dust of the county of Wilts, which remains adherent to my wig. “While waiting for my comrade to return, Sir Gervas,” I said, “since this subject seems to have nothing painful for you, tell us how these unhappy times came about, which you bear with such philosophy. ” “The old story!” he replied, chasing away some tobacco grains with his embroidered cambric handkerchief. “The old, old story! My father, a good country baronet, in comfort, finding the family purse a little too heavy, judged it appropriate to send me to the city to make a man of me. When I was very young, I was presented at Court, and as I was a handsome fellow, full of activity, with a sharp tongue, and having a lot of poise, I attracted the attention of the Queen, who made me one of her Pages of Honor. I kept this post until my age drove me out, and then I left the town, but upon my word, I found I must return there, for Beacham Ford Park was as dull as a monastery, after the merry life I had led. Back in the town, I made friends with merry fellows, like Tommy Lawson, My Lord Halifax, Sir Jasper Lemarck, little Geordie Chichester, ay, and old Sidney Godolphin, of the Treasury; for with his steady manner, and his endless bookkeeping, he could drain a glass like none of us, and knew as much about the assortment of fighting-cocks as a Committee of Ways and Means. Well, we had a great time while it lasted, and I want to be drowned if I am not ready to do it again, in case I am free to do so. All the same, it’s as if one were sliding on a soaped board, for at first one goes rather slowly, and one imagines that one can hold oneself, but soon one goes faster and faster, and finally one reaches the end, to break with a crash against the rocks of ruin which await you below. “And have you managed to get through four thousand pounds of annual income?” I cried. “Ah! Good heavens! You speak of this miserable sum as if it were all the wealth of the Indies. Well, from Ormonde or Buckingham, who had their twenty thousand pounds, to that preacher Dick Talbot, there was not one of my company who could not have bought me. And yet I needed my four-horse carriage, my house in the city, my liveried servants, my stable full of horses. To be in fashion, I needed my poet, to whom I threw a handful of guineas to pay for his dedication. Eh! The poor devil, he’s the only one who misses me. I’m sure he had a weight on his heart as heavy as his verses the day he discovered I was gone, though at that moment he might have earned a few guineas by composing a satire against me. It would have found many buyers among my friends. Pardieu! I wonder how I get up, and whom my courtiers have pounced on at present. They were there every morning, the French pimp, the English braggart, the needy man of letters, the unsung inventor, I never thought I could get rid of them, but now I have rid myself of them in the most complete way. When the honeypot is broken, farewell flies! “And your noble friends?” I asked, “did not one of them come to your aid in adversity? ” “Eh! Eh!” “I have no cause for complaint,” cried Sir Gervas, ” they were mostly good fellows, I would have had their signatures on my notes as long as their fingers could hold a quill, but let me have my throat cut, I don’t want to bleed my companions. They could also have found me employment, if I had consented to play second fiddle, where I had become accustomed to conducting the orchestra. By my faith, it is indifferent to me to extend my hand to strangers, but I would be very anxious to leave a good memory in the City.” “As for your proposal to serve as our valet,” I said, “it is not to be entertained. In spite of my comrade’s giddy appearance, we are only two very uncouth young peasants, and we have no more need of a servant than one of those poets you spoke of. Besides , if you would agree to follow our course, we will take care to take you to wherever you will have to perform a service more to your liking than curling wigs or smoothing eyebrows. ” “Ah! my friend,” he cried, “do not speak with this unseemly frivolity of the mysteries of the toilet. You yourselves would not be too badly off with a stroke of my ivory comb, and if you learned to know the virtues of the famous purifying lotion for the skin, invented by Murphy, and which I am in the habit of using.” “I am very much obliged to you, sir,” said Ruben, “but the famous spring water lotion of Providence is perfectly suited to this purpose.
” “Then,” I added, “Mother Nature has put a wig on my head in her own fashion, which I would not at all care to change. ” “What Goths! Real Goths!” cried the little master, raising his white hands… “But I hear a heavy step and the sound of armor in the corridor. It is our friend the knight of the choleric figure, if I am not mistaken. It was, in fact, Saxon, who was entering with great strides, to inform us that our horses were at the door and that everything was ready for our departure. I took him in private, and I informed him, in a low voice, of what had passed between the stranger and us, adding the details which had made me think that he would join our party. At this news, the old soldier frowned. “What can we do with a coxcomb like that?” he said. “We have some hard blows ahead of us and an even harder existence. He is not fit for this task. ” “You yourself said,” I replied, “that Monmouth lacked cavalry. Here is a well-mounted horseman, and to all appearances a man driven to his last extremities and ready for anything. Why should we not enlist him? ” “What I fear,” said Saxon, “is that his body is like the bran with which a new cushion is stuffed, and which has no other value than that of its covering. But perhaps it is for the best. The series of his titles will ensure him a good reception in the camp, for, I am told, they would not be very satisfied with the indifference shown by the nobility towards the enterprise. ” “I was afraid,” I said, still in a low voice, “that we would lose one of us instead of making a recruit, in this English inn.” “I have made my reflections,” he replied, smiling. “But I will speak to you about it later… Well, Sir Gervas Jerome,” he continued aloud , addressing our new associate, “I hear that you are coming with us. You will have to be content to follow us for a day without asking any questions or making any remarks. Is that agreed? ” “I accept with alacrity,” cried Sir Gervas. “Now, let us empty a glass to become better acquainted,” cried Saxon, raising his glass. “I drink to you all,” said the gallant. “Let us drink to a fair fight and to the triumph of the bravest! ” “Lightning and thunder!” said Saxon, “despite your pretty plumage, you seem to me a determined fellow; I am beginning to take a liking to you. Give me your hand.” The long brown claw of the soldier of fortune closed on the slender hand of our new friend, as a token of camaraderie. Then, having paid our farewell, we bade a cordial farewell to Dame Robson, who, I believe, gave Saxon a reproachful or questioning look . We mounted up and resumed our journey amidst a crowd of astonished villagers, who cheered us loudly when we had passed through their circle. Chapter 14. Of the Stiff-Legged Priest and His Flock. Our route took us through Castle Carey and Somerton, small towns situated in a very beautiful pastoral region, well wooded and watered by numerous streams. The valleys, whose center the road cuts, are of exuberant richness , sheltered from the winds by long, rolling hills, which are also cultivated with the greatest care. From time to time we passed the ivy-covered turret of an old castle, or the pointed gables of an irregularly built country house, which loomed up among the trees. These marked the rural residence of some well-known family. More than once, when these mansions were not too far from the road, we could distinguish the untouched traces, the gaping cracks which the storms of the Civil Wars had caused in the walls . Fairfax, it seemed, had passed this way and left many relics of his visit. I am convinced that my father would have had much to tell of these signs of Puritan anger, had he ridden side by side with us. The road was crowded with peasants, who traveled in two strong currents in opposite directions: one directed from east to west, and the other from west to east. The latter consisted chiefly of old people and children, who were being sent for safety to reside in the less troubled counties until the disturbances were over. Many of these poor people pushed wheelbarrows laden with bedding and a few cracked utensils, which formed their whole fortune in this world. Others, more prosperous, had small carts, drawn by the small, wild, hairy horses which the Somerset moors produce. Owing to the liveliness of these half-trained beasts and the weakness of the drivers, accidents were not uncommon, and we passed several unfortunate groups who had fallen into the ditch with their belongings, or who were gathering around, anxiously discussing a split pole or a broken axle. As for the country folk who were heading west, they were mostly men in the prime of life, and laden with little or no baggage. Their brown faces, their heavy boots, and their limousines indicated that they were, for the most part, simple farmhands , although among them, one could recognize, by their cuffed boots or their ribbed clothing, small farmers or landowners. These people marched in bands. The majority were armed with large oak cudgels, which served them as staves during their journey, but which, wielded by sturdy men, could be formidable weapons. From time to time, one of them would sing a psalm, which would be joined in chorus by all who were within hearing, so that the chanting would eventually spread along the entire length of the road in successive waves. As we passed, several cast angry glances at us. Others exchanged a few words in low voices, nodding their heads, and evidently wondering who we were and what our purpose was. Here and there, among this people, we perceived the tall, broad-brimmed hat and the Genevan mantle which were the insignia of the Puritan clergy. “We are now at last in the country of Monmouth,” Saxon told me, “for Reuben Lockarby and Sir Gervas Jerome preceded us; these are the raw materials which we will have to carve to make soldiers. ” “And materials which are not too bad,” I replied, for I had noticed the bodily strength, and the expression of energy and good nature in the faces. So you think these people are on their way to Monmouth’s camp? –Certainly, they are. Do you see that long- limbed preacher over there on the left, the one with the big-brimmed hat. Don’t you notice how stiffly he walks? “Why, yes, it’s probably because he’s tired of traveling! ” “Ho! Ho!” said my companion, laughing, “I’ve already seen this sort of stiffness: it’s because our man has a straight saber in one of his breeches. It’s a device that smells like a Parliamentarian. When he’s on safe ground, he’ll take it out, and he’ll use it too, but as long as he’s not out of danger, when he risks falling on the royal cavalry, he’ll be careful not to attach it to his belt. By its cut, you recognize an old man, one of those: Who call fire, the sword, desolation, A pious and perfect reformation. Old Samuel puts them to you with a stroke of the pen. Here’s another one, in front of him, hiding a sickle head under his limousine; can’t you make out its outline?” I’ll wager there isn’t one of these scoundrels who isn’t armed with a pickaxe head, a scythe blade hidden somewhere on his person. I’m beginning to feel the sulphur of war once more, and it makes me feel younger. Listen, my boy, I’m glad I didn’t linger at the inn. “You seemed to be hesitating between two sides about it,” I said. “Yes, yes, she was a fine woman, and the quarters were comfortable. For that, I don’t deny it. But, you see, marriage is a citadel which is devilishly easy to penetrate, but once you’re in, old Tilly himself would n’t let you out to your credit. I once saw a trap of this kind on the Danube.” At the first attack, the Mamelukes had abandoned the breach on purpose to lure the imperial troops into the trap, in the narrow streets that stretched beyond, and very few men returned. It is not with such tricks that one catches old birds. I found a way to talk with one of the accomplices and ask him what he thought of the good lady and her inn. It seems that on occasion, she knows how to make scenes and that her tongue contributed more to the death of her husband than the dropsy to which the doctor attributed it. Moreover, another inn has been created in the village, which is well run, and which will probably take away the customers. And then, as you said, it is a boring, sleepy country. I have weighed all these reasons, and I have decided that it would be better to give up besieging the widow and retreat while I could still do so with the reputation and honors of war. “That is better too,” I said. “You would have been unable to accustom yourself to a life of drink and idleness. But our new comrade—what do you think of him? ” “By my faith,” replied Saxon, “we shall end up forming a platoon of cavalry, if we enlist all the gallants in search of a job. But as for this Sir Gervas, I am of opinion, as I said at the inn, that he has more activity than one would at first give him credit for. These giddy young nobles are always ready to fight, but I wonder if he is hardened enough, if he has enough perseverance for a campaign such as this one will undoubtedly be.” Then, his appearance is such as to make him look unfavorably on the Saints, and although Monmouth is not of fierce virtue, it is likely that the Saints will have a preponderant voice in his council. But just look at the way he leads his fine gray stallion of such fine appearance, and how he turns to look at us. See that riding hat pulled down over his eyes, his chest half uncovered, his whip hanging from his buttonhole, his hand on his hip, and as many oaths on his lips as ribbons on his doublet. Notice the way he looks down at the peasants beside him. He will have to change his manner if he wants to fight side by side with these fanatics. But be careful! Either I’m very mistaken, or he ‘s already got himself into trouble. Our friends had stopped their horses to wait for us. But they had barely halted when the stream of peasants rolling alongside them slowed their pace. They crowded around them, making ominous murmurs, accompanied by threatening gestures. Other countrymen, seeing that something was happening, rushed to support their companions. Saxon and I spurred our mounts. We made our way through the crowd, which was growing larger and more hostile by the minute , and rushed to the aid of our friends, but we were pressed on all sides by the crush. Reuben had put his hand on the hilt of his sword, while Sir Gervas quietly chewed his toothpick and looked at the irritated crowd with a look of both amusement and disdain. “One or two flasks of eau de parfum would not be amiss,” he remarked, “if I had a spray bottle. ” “Be on your guard, but don’t draw your sword,” cried Saxon. “What’s the matter with these bacon-eaters? Well, my friends, what is this uproar?” This question, instead of calming the tumult, seemed to make it ten times more violent. All around us, twenty men deep, were fierce faces, irritated eyes, and here and there the glint of a weapon half out of its hiding place. The uproar, which at first was only a hoarse rumble, now assumed a definite form. “Down with the Papist,” they cried, “down with the prelatists! Death to the Erastian butcher! Death to the Philistine horsemen! Down! Down! A few stones had already whistled past our ears, and to defend ourselves, we had been forced to draw our swords, when the tall minister, whom we had already noticed, forced his way through the crowd, and thanks to his stature and commanding voice, succeeded in obtaining silence. “What have you to say?” he asked, turning to us. ” Are you fighting for Baal or for the Lord? Whoever is not with us is against us. ” “On which side is Baal, most reverend sir, and on which side is the Lord?” asked Sir Gervas Jerome. “I think if you spoke in good English instead of Hebrew, we would be able to understand each other better.” “This is no time for light talk,” cried the minister, his face flushing with anger. “If you value the integrity of your skin, tell me whether you are for the bloodthirsty usurper James Stuart, or for his Most Protestant Majesty King Monmouth. ” “What! Has he already taken that title?” cried Saxon. “Well, know that we are, all four of us, unworthy instruments no doubt, on our way to offer our services to the Protestant cause. ” “He lies, good Master Pettigrue, he lies very impudently,” shouted a sturdy fellow from the back of the crowd. “Has anyone ever seen a good Protestant in that Punchinello costume, like the one over there? Is not the name Amalekite written on his garment? Is he not dressed as befits a fiancé of the Roman Courtesan. Then why should we not strike them?” “I thank you, my worthy friend,” said Sir Gervas, whose costume had aroused the anger of this champion, “if I were nearer you, I would return to you a good part of the attention you have given me. ” “What proof have we that you are not in the pay of the usurper and on your way to persecute the faithful?” asked the Puritan clergyman. “I tell you again, my man,” said Saxon impatiently, “we have come all the way from Hampshire to fight against James Stuart. We are going on horseback to the camp at Monmouth in your company. Can you demand better proof?” “It may be that you are simply seeking a means of escaping captivity among us,” remarked the minister, after deliberating with one or two of the peasant leaders. “We are therefore of opinion that before accompanying us, you should surrender your swords, pistols, and other carnal weapons. ” “No, my dear sir, that cannot be. A rider cannot honorably part with his blade or his liberty, in the manner you request. Stand close to me on the bridle side, Clarke, and saber the first scoundrel who lays hands on you. ” A roar of fury rose from the crowd. A score of clubs and sickle blades were raised against us, when the minister again intervened and silenced his noisy escort. “Did I hear correctly?” he asked. “Is your name Clarke? ” “Yes,” I replied. “Your Christian name? “Micah.” “Residing at…” –Havant. The Clergyman spoke for a few moments with a hard-featured old man, dressed in black buckram, who was standing close by. –If you are really Micah Clarke, of Havant, he said, you can tell us the name of an old soldier, who learned of the war in Germany and who was to go with you to the camp of the faithful. –But here he is, I replied. His name was Decimus Saxon. –Yes, yes, Master Pettigrue, cried the old man, that is the name given by Dicky Rumbold. He said that old Roundhead Clarke or his son would come with him. But who are these people? –This one is friend Ruben Lockarby, also of Havant, and Sir Gervas Jerome, of Surrey. They are both here as volunteers, willing to serve under the Duke of Monmouth. “I am quite delighted to see you then,” said the imposing minister. “Friends, I can assure you that these gentlemen are well disposed towards honest people and the old cause.” At these words, the fury of the crowd instantly gave way to adulation, to the most extravagant joy. They crowded around us; they stroked our riding boots; they tugged at the edges of our coats; they shook hands; they called down the blessings of heaven upon our heads. The Clergyman finally succeeded in freeing us from these attentions and setting his people on their way. We placed ourselves in the middle of the crowd, the minister lengthening his stride between Saxon and me. As Ruben remarked, he was built so as to serve as a transition between us two, for he was taller but less broad than I. He was broader and less tall than the adventurer. He had a long, thin face, with hollow cheeks, and a pair of very prominent eyebrows, deep-set eyes, with a melancholy expression, through which flashed from time to time the sudden flame of ardent enthusiasm. “My name is Joshua Pettigrue, gentlemen,” he said. ” I am a worthy laborer in the Lord’s vineyard, and ready to bear witness by voice and arm to his holy Covenant. These are my faithful flock, which I am leading west, that they may be all ready for their harvest, when it shall please the Almighty to summon them. ” “But why have you not made them take some sort of order or formation?” asked Saxon. “They are scattered all the way down the road like a flock of geese through a common, as Michaelmas approaches. Are you not afraid?” Is it not written that your misfortune comes suddenly, that you will be broken suddenly, without remedy? –Yes, friend, but is it not written elsewhere: Put your trust in God with all your heart, and do not lean it on your own understanding. Note, if I were to arrange my men in the manner of soldiers, it would attract attention, and bring an attack from James’s cavalry which would arrive on our side. My desire is to bring my flock to Monmouth’s camp and provide them with muskets before exposing them in such an unequal struggle. “Truly, sir, that is a wise resolution,” said Saxon sternly , “for if a troop of cavalry fell upon these good people, the shepherd would have no flock. ” “No, that would never happen,” cried Master Pettigrue with enthusiasm. ” Say rather that shepherd, flock, and the rest would set out on the thorny path of martyrdom, which leads to the New Jerusalem. Know, friend, that I left Monmouth to bring these men under his standard. I have received instructions from him, or rather from Master Ferguson, ordering me to find you, and several others of the faithful, whose arrival we expect from the east. By what road did you come? “Across Salisbury Plain, and then by Bruton.” “And did you meet any of our people on the road?” “Not one,” replied Saxon, “but we left the Blue Guards at Salisbury, and we saw either these or another regiment quite close by on this side of the Plain, at the village of Mere. ” “Ah! here is the gathering of the eagles,” cried Master Joshua Pettigrue, shaking his head. “They are finely dressed people, with warhorses and chariots, and harness, like the Assyrians of old, but the Angel of the Lord will blow upon them in the night. Yes, in his anger he will cut them all down, and they shall be destroyed. ” “Amen! Amen!” cried all the peasants who were near enough to hear. “They have lifted up their horn, Master Pettigrue,” said the gray-haired Puritan . “They have set up their candlestick on a height, the candlestick of corrupt ritual and idolatrous ceremony. Will it not be cut down by the hands of the righteous? ” “Oh!” “Behold, the said candlestick has grown fat, and burns with soot, and was even a subject of repugnance to the nostrils in the days of our fathers,” cried a red-faced oaf, whose dress indicated him to be of the yeomen class. ” So it was when old Noll took his snuffers and began to arrange it. It is a wick that can only be trimmed by the sword of the faithful. ” A fierce laugh from the whole party showed how much they relished the companion’s pious jests. “Ah! Brother Sandcroft,” cried the minister, “there is so much sweetness, so much hidden manna in your conversation. But the road is long and monotonous. Shall we not lighten it with a song of praise? Where is Brother Thistlethwaite, whose voice is like the cymbal, the drum, and the dulcimer? ” “Here I am, most pious Master Pettigrue,” said Saxon. I myself ventured to raise my voice before the Lord. And without further preamble, he attacked in a stentorian voice the following hymn, taken up in chorus by the shepherd and his flock: The Lord! He is a morion Who protects me against all wounds; The Lord! He is a coat of mail That surrounds my whole body. From now on, who fears to draw the sword. And to fight the battles of the Lord? The Lord! He is my faithful shield, Who is suspended on my left arm, The Lord! He is the tested breastplate That defends me against all blows. From now on, who fears to draw the sword And to fight the battles of the Lord? Who then fears the violent Or trembles before the proud. Will I flee before two or three, When HE is at my side? From now on, who fears to draw the sword, And to fight the battles of the Lord? That surrounding on all sides ditch and walls Neither mine, nor sap, nor breach, nor opening Could prevail against it From then on, who fears to draw the sword And to fight the battles of the Lord? Saxon fell silent, but the Reverend Joshua Pettigrue waved his long arms and repeated the refrain which was taken up many times by the column of Peasants on the march. “It is a pious hymn,” said our companion, who had resumed the nasal and weeping voice to which he had resorted in the presence of my father, and which thus excited my disgust, at the same time as the astonishment of Reuben and Sir Gervas, “and it has rendered great service on the battlefield . ” “Truly,” said the clergyman, “if your comrades are of as sweet a taste as yourself, you will be worth to the faithful a brigade of pikemen.” This appreciation raised an approving murmur from the Puritans who surrounded us. “Sir,” he continued, “since you are full of experience in the practices of war, I shall be happy to give you command of this small body of faithful until the time when we rejoin the army. ” “Indeed,” said Decimus Saxon quietly, “it is only time, in good faith, to put a soldier at your head.” Either my eyes are deceiving me greatly, or I see the reflection of swords and breastplates at the top of this slope. I think our pious exercises have drawn the enemy upon us. Chapter 15. Where We Measure Ourselves Against the King’s Dragoons. A short distance from us, another road led to the one we were following in the company of this motley crowd. This road described a curve around the base of a well -wooded height. Then, it continued in a straight line for a mile or two before joining the other. At the highest point of the height, there was a thick thicket of trees. Among their trunks, bright steely reflections could be seen coming and going, indicating the presence of armed people. Further on, at the point where the road abruptly changed direction, and running over the crest of the height, the outline of several horsemen could be seen clearly outlined against the evening sky. And yet, there reigned such calm, such peace over this vast expanse of countryside, where the softened and golden light of the setting sun spread, with its dozen village steeples, and its manors rising up among the woods, that it was hard to believe that the cloud, laden with warlike thunders, was gradually descending on this beautiful valley, and that at any moment, lightning might flash from it. However, the country people seemed to understand without any difficulty the danger to which they were exposed. Those who were fleeing from the West, gave a howl of dismay and ran downstairs frantically, whipping their beasts of burden, in the hope of putting as much distance as possible between themselves and the assailants. The chorus of piercing cries, exclamations, the cracking of whips, the grinding of wheels, and the sound of collapse when a loaded cart came to overturn, all this formed a deafening din, dominated by the voice of our leader with its lively, energetic timbre. He encouraged, he gave orders. But when the sonorous, metallic song of bugles burst from the wood and the first ranks of a cavalry squadron began to descend the slope, the panic increased, and it became difficult for us to maintain any order in this furious flood of terrified fugitives. “Stop that cart, Clarke,” Saxon shouted in a firm voice. With his sword, he pointed to an old cart piled high with furniture and bedding, which was moving heavily, drawn by two horses with protruding bones. At the same moment, I saw him spur his horse into the middle of the crowd and seize the features of another similar cart. I gave Covenant a rein. I was soon on the same line as the cart he had indicated, and I managed to control the two young horses despite their resistance. “Bring it in,” shouted our leader, maneuvering with the coolness that only a long apprenticeship in war gives. “Now, friend, cut the darts.” Immediately a dozen knives were at work. The animals, kicking and struggling, fled, leaving their load behind them. Saxon jumped from his horse and gave the example of placing the cart across the road, while other peasants, under the command of Reuben and Master Joshua Pettigrue, arranged two other carts so as to block the road about fifty yards further on. This last precaution was intended to ward off an attack by the royal cavalry, who might cut across the fields and take us from behind. This plan was so promptly conceived and executed that within a few minutes of the first alarm we found ourselves sheltered behind a high barricade, and this improvised fortress contained a garrison of one hundred and fifty men. “How many firearms can we have at our disposal?” asked Saxon, in a hurried voice. “A dozen pistols at the most,” replied the old Puritan, whom his companions called Williams, “My Hope is up there.” John Rodway, the driver, has his blunderbuss. There are also two pious men from Hungerford, who are gamekeepers and who have brought their muskets. “Here they are, sir,” cried another, pointing to two sturdy, bearded fellows, busy pushing the charges into their long muskets with their ramrods. Their names are Wat and Nat Millman. “Two men hitting the mark are worth a battalion firing in the air,” remarked our leader. “Place yourselves under the carts, my friends, and rest your muskets on the spokes of the wheels. Do not pull the trigger until the sons of Betial are within the length of three pikes. ” “My brother and I,” said one of them, “will shoot a deer running at two hundred paces. Our lives are in the hands of the Lord, but at least we shall dispatch two of these mercenary butchers before us.” “With as much pleasure as when we killed martens or wild cats,” cried the other, slipping under the cart. ” Now we watch over the Lord’s preserve, Brother Wat, and truly these people are among them. The vermin that infest it. ” “All who have pistols, line up behind the cart,” said Saxon, tying his mare to the hedge, and we did as he did… Clarke, take charge of the right, with Sir Gervas, while Lockarby will help Master Pettigrue watch over the left. The rest of you, position yourselves behind, with stones. If our barricades should be forced , throw your scythes at the horses. Once on the ground, the horsemen are incapable of resisting you.” A low, dark murmur, indicating a firm resolution, rose from among the peasants, mingled with pious exclamations and some scraps of hymns or prayers. All had taken some rustic weapon from under their cloaks. Ten or twelve of them had petrinals which, judging from their antique appearance and the rust that covered them, seemed likely to be more dangerous to their possessors than to the enemy. Others had sickles, scythes, half-pikes, flails, or mallets; a few, long knives and oaken cudgels . Simple as such weapons were, history has proven that they are by no means to be disdained in the hands of men possessed by religious fanaticism. It was enough to cast a glance at the austere, contracted faces of our men, at their eyes shining with enthusiasm and expectation, to see that they were not men to be frightened in the face of adversaries superior either in number or in armament. “By the mass!” said Sir Gervas in a low voice. ” It is magnificent! An hour spent here is worth a year of the Mail.” That old Puritan bull is well and truly at bay. Let’s see what kind of sport it will be when the fighting dogs attack him! I’ll bet the bacon eaters five to four . “No, this is not the proper time for futile bets,” I said shortly, for his giddy babbling irritated me on such a solemn occasion. “Five against four for the soldiers, then!” he insisted. “It’s too good a match not to put a stake on one side or the other. ” “Our lives are the stake,” I said. “Well! I forgot about it,” he replied, chewing his toothpick. ” To be or not to be, as Will says, of Stratford.” Kynaston was superb in this tirade. But here comes the bell that announces the rising of the curtain. While we were making our preparations, the squadron—for it seemed there was only one—had trotted down the by-lane and drawn up on the high road. It consisted, as far as I could judge, of ninety soldiers, and it was evident, from their three-cornered hats, their breastplates, their red sleeves, and their bandoliers, that they were part of the dragoons of the regular army. The main body of the troop halted a quarter of a mile from us. Three officers advanced to the front, consulted for a short time, and as a probable consequence of this conversation, one of them spurred his horse and trotted towards us. A trumpeter followed him a few paces behind, waving a white handkerchief and giving occasional blasts on the bugle. “Here is a parliamentarian,” said Saxon, who was standing on his cart. “Now, my brothers, we have neither kettledrums nor sounding brass, but we have the instrument with which Providence has provided us. Let us show the redcoats that we know how to use it.” So why fear the violent, why dread the proud ? Will I flee from two or three, if he is beside me? One hundred and forty voices answered him in a chorus of hoarse voices: Who then would fear to draw the sword and to fight the battles of the Lord? At that moment I had no difficulty in understanding how the Spartans had discovered in Tyrtaeus, the lame singer, the happiest of their generals, for the sound of their own voices increased the confidence of the peasants, at the same time as the martial words of the anthem excited in their hearts an invincible determination. Their courage was so exalted that their song ended in a resounding war cry, that they brandished their weapons above their heads and were ready, I believe, to leap from their barricades to throw themselves upon the horsemen. In the midst of this clamor, this agitation, the young dragoon officer, a handsome young man with a tanned complexion, approached the barricade without fear, stopped his superb roan horse and raised his hand in an imperious gesture to request silence. “Who is the leader of this band?” he asked. “Address me your message, sir,” said our commander, from the top of the cart, “but know that your white flag will only protect you if you use the language appropriate between courteous adversaries. Say what you have to say or withdraw? ” “Courtesy and honor,” said the officer mockingly, “are not appropriate with rebels who arm themselves against their legitimate sovereign. If you are the leader of this mob, I warn you that if within five minutes at these words, he took out a fine gold watch, they do not disperse, we will charge them and saber them.” “The Lord will protect his own,” replied Saxon, amidst a fierce roar from the crowd in approval. ” Is that all your message amounts to? ” “That is all, and you will see that it is enough, Presbyterian traitor,” shouted the dragoon cornet. “Listen to me, fools who are being misled,” he continued, rising on his spurs and speaking to the peasants on the other side of the cart. “You can still save your skins, if you will only consent to hand over your leaders, to throw away what you please to call your arms, and to place yourselves at the mercy of the King. “That goes beyond the bounds of your privileges,” said Saxon, drawing a pistol from his belt and priming it. “If you say another word to turn these people from their loyalty, I will fire. ” “Do not hope to reinforce Monmouth,” shouted the young officer, unconcerned by the threat, and still addressing the peasants. “The whole royal army is assembling to surround him and… ” “Beware,” cried our leader in a harsh, guttural voice. “…his head will roll on the scaffold in less than a month. ” “But you will not live to see it,” said Saxon, stooping and firing his shot straight at the cornet’s head. At the flash of the pistol, the trumpeter wheeled and galloped off as if for his life, while the roan horse pirouetted to his side and rode off too, with its rider firmly fixed in the saddle. “You really missed that Midianite!” cried Williams; “my Hope is up there. ” “He died,” said our leader, “while reloading his pistol. It’s the law of war, Clarke,” he added, turning to me. “He saw fit to break it, and he had to pay for his fault.” While he was speaking, I saw the young officer gradually lean in his saddle. Then, when he was halfway to his troop, he lost his balance and fell heavily on the road, where the violence of his fall made him spin around two or three times. A great cry of rage rose from the squadron at this sight, and the Puritan peasants responded with a cry of defiance. “Face down, everyone!” shouted Saxon. “They’re going to fire.” The crackle of musketry, a hail of bullets striking the hard ground, cutting the small branches of the hedges on both sides, supported our leader’s order. A large number of peasants lay down behind the feather mattresses and tables that had been pulled from the cart. Others stretched out at full length in the cart itself. Others sought shelter behind or beneath it. Still others threw themselves into the ditches to the right and left. A few proved their confidence in the intervention of Providence by remaining upright, impassive, without bending before the bullets. Among these were Saxon and Sir Gervas. The former wanted to set an example to his inexperienced troops. The second acted thus simply out of carelessness, out of indifference. Reuben and I sat side by side in the ditch, and I can assure you, my dear little children, that we felt the greatest desire to bow our heads when we heard the bullets whizzing all around us. If ever a soldier told you that he did not do this the first time he went into action, that soldier is a man who deserves no confidence. However, when we had remained sitting, stiff and silent, as if our necks were numb, for a few minutes at most, this sensation entirely disappeared, and since that day I have never experienced it. You see, familiarity breeds contempt for bullets as for other things, and although it is not easy to come to love them, like the King of Sweden or My Lord Cutts, it is not very difficult to look at them with indifference. The cornet’s death did not remain unavenged for long. A little old man, armed with a sickle, who had been standing near Sir Gervas, suddenly gave a shrill cry, jumped up, shouting a loud Glory to God, and fell face down. He was dead. A bullet had struck him just above his right eye. Almost at the same moment one of the peasants in the cart was pierced through the chest and fell down, covering the wheels with his blood, which he coughed up. I saw Master Joshua Pettigrue seize him in his long arms and put some pillows under his head, so that the man lay there, breathing hard and muttering prayers. On that day, the minister showed himself to be a man, for he went boldly into the fire, his rifles, his sword in his left hand—for he was left-handed—and his Bible in his right. “This is what you die for, dear brothers,” he kept shouting, holding the brown volume aloft, “are you not ready to die for HIM?” And every time he asked this question, a dull and prompt murmur of agreement came from the ditch, the cart, and the road. “They shoot like scamps at a militia parade,” said Saxon, sitting down on the edge of the cart. “Like all young soldiers, they aim too high.” When I was an adjutant, I never failed to lower the barrels of the muskets until a glance proved to me that they were aimed in a horizontal line. These scoundrels imagine that they have done their work when they have discharged their weapon, although they are as sure of hitting the plovers as of hitting us. “Five of the faithful have fallen,” said William, “my Hope is up there. Are we not going to make a sortie and give battle to the children of Antichrist? Are we going to stay here like wooden birds that soldiers practice shooting at a village festival? ” “There is a stone barn up there on the slope,” I remarked. ” If we who have horses, and a few others, could occupy the dragoons, the people might succeed in getting there and thus be safe from fire.” “At least let my brother and I give them one or two shots,” cried one of the marksmen posted between the wheels. But to all our prayers, to all our advice, our leader responded by shaking his head, and he continued to swing his long legs over the sides of the cart, and to keep his eyes attentively fixed on the riders, a great number of whom had dismounted and were resting their rifles on the rumps of their horses. “This cannot last, sir,” said the minister, in a low, grave voice, “there are still two men injured. ” “Even if there were fifty more,” replied Saxon, “we must wait for them to charge. What would you do, my man? If you leave this shelter, you will be cut off and annihilated to the last one. When you have seen as much war as I have, you will learn to calmly accept what is inevitable. ” I remember that in a similar situation, as the rearguard, or nach hut of the imperial army, was pursued by the Croats, then in the pay of the Grand Turk, I lost half my company before being able to fight hand to hand against these renegade mercenaries. Ah! my brave boys. Here they are remounting: we will not have to wait long. Indeed, the dragoons were getting back in the saddle and forming up on the road, evidently with the intention of charging us. At the same time, about thirty men detached themselves from the squadron and trot across the fields to our left. Saxon stifled a sincere oath at the sight of them. “They do understand a little about war, after all,” he said. “They are preparing to charge us from the front and from the flank. Master Joshua, have your men armed with scythes line up along the hedge on the right.” Stand firm, my brothers, and do not retreat before the horses. You others, who have sickles, lie down in this ditch, and cut off the horses’ legs. A line of stone throwers behind them. A heavy stone is worth a bullet, at point-blank range. If you want to see your wives and children again, defend this hedge well against the horsemen. Now let us see about the front attack. Let the men armed with petrins get into the cart. There are your two pistols, Clarke, and your two, Lockarby. I One left for me too: that makes five. Then ten more of the same kind and three muskets, that makes twenty shots in all. You have no pistols, Sir Gervas? “No, but I can get some,” said our companion, who jumped into the saddle, crossed the ditch, passed the barricade and was soon on the road, in the direction of the dragoons. This maneuver was so sudden, so unexpected, that for a few seconds there was absolute silence, followed by a general clamor of hatred and curses among the peasants. “Fire on him! Fire on the perfidious Amalekite!” they yelled. “He has gone to join his fellows. He has delivered us into the hands of the enemy. Judas! Judas! ” As for the dragoons, who continued to form up for the charge and waited for the flank attack to be ready, they remained motionless, silent, not knowing what to think of the brilliantly dressed rider who was coming towards them. But we did not remain in doubt for long. As soon as he arrived at the spot where the cornet had fallen, he jumped from his horse, took the dead man’s pistol and the belt containing the powder and bullets. Then he got back into the saddle, without hurrying, in the midst of a hail of bullets that made the white dust fly around him, went towards the dragoons and discharged one of his pistols at them. Then turning around, he politely took off his hat and came to join us at a gallop, without having received a scratch, although a market had grazed one of his horse’s pasterns, and another had made a hole in the hem of his coat. The peasants gave a great shout of joy at his return, and from that day on, our friend could wear his brilliant costumes and behave as he pleased, without being suspected of being mounted on an infernal horse or of lacking zeal for the cause of the Saints. “They’re advancing,” shouted Saxon. “Let no one pull the trigger until they see me fire! If anyone does, I’ll fire a bullet at them, even if it were my last, and even if the soldiers were in our midst. ” When our leader had uttered this threat and cast a fierce look over us to show that he would carry it out, the piercing sound of a bugle came from the cavalry facing us, and those who threatened us from the flank responded in kind. At this signal, both troops played their spurs and rushed at us with all their speed. Those who were in the field were delayed for a moment and thrown into some confusion by the soft nature of the sodden ground, but after emerging from it, they reformed on the other side and pushed briskly towards the hedge. As for our adversaries, who had no obstacle to overcome, they did not slow their pace and rushed, with a noise of thunder, a din of harnesses, a storm of oaths, on our rough barricades. Ah! my children, when a man, having reached old age, tries to describe such things and to show others what he has seen, only then does he understand how poor is the language of an ordinary man, the language that suffices for the uses of life, and how insufficient it is in such cases. Indeed, if at this very moment I can see this white road of Somerset, with the furious, whirling charge of the horsemen, the red, irritated faces of the men, the dilated nostrils of the horses, among the clouds of dust that rise and frame them, I could not hope to represent clearly before your young eyes such a scene, which you have never contemplated and which you will never contemplate, I hope. Then, when I think of the noise, at first a simple creaking, a ringing, which swelled, redoubled in force and extent with each step, until the moment when it arrived upon us, formidable as thunder, with a rumbling which gave the idea of ​​an irresistible power, I I feel that there is something here too which my feeble words cannot express. To inexperienced soldiers like ourselves, it seemed that our fragile protection and our feeble weapons were absolutely powerless to stop the dash and impulse of the dragoons. To the right and left, I saw pale, contracted faces, with dilated eyes, rigid features, with an air of obstinacy which expressed less hope than despair. From all sides rose exclamations and prayers: “Lord, save your people! ” “Mercy, Lord, mercy! ” “Be with us this day! ” “Receive our souls, O merciful Father!” Saxon was lying across the cart. His eyes sparkled like diamonds. He held his pistol at the end of his outstretched and rigid arm. Following his example, each of us aimed with all possible coolness at the enemy’s first rank. Our only hope of salvation lay in delivering this single volley, so terrible that our adversaries would be shaken and thus rendered unable to continue their attack. Would this man never fire? They were now only about ten paces from us. I could easily make out the buckles on their breastplates and the cartridges slung over their shoulders. They took another step closer. Finally, our leader’s pistol went off, and we fired at full blast at point-blank range, supported by a hail of large stones thrown from the hands of sturdy peasants behind us. I heard them strike helmets and breastplates. It sounded like hail striking the windowpanes. The cloud of smoke, which for a moment had veiled the line of galloping horses and brave riders, slowly dissipated to reveal a very different scene. A dozen men and horses formed a confused mass, rolling around, splashing each other with jets of blood, those who were not wounded falling on top of those whom our bullets and stones had brought down. Destriers struggling, snorting, shod feet, human bodies getting up, staggering, falling again, panicked soldiers, hatless, bewildered, almost knocked out by a fall, not knowing which way to turn, such was the foreground of the scene, and in the background the rest of the squadron was fleeing at full speed, the wounded and the others, all driven by a common desire to reach a safe place, where they could reform their disordered ranks. A great cry of enthusiasm and gratitude was heard among the delighted peasants. They jumped over the barricades, killing or putting out of action the few unwounded soldiers who had been unable or unwilling to follow their companions in their flight. The victors eagerly seized carbines, swords, and bandoliers, for several of them had served in the militia and were very adept at handling the weapons they had won. But the victory was still far from complete. The flank squadron had boldly approached the hedge. At least a dozen horsemen had forced their way through, despite the rain of stones and the blows of pikes and scythes thrown with desperate energy. As soon as the dragoons, with their long sabers and breastplates, were in the midst of the peasants, they had a great superiority over them, and although the sickles had brought down several horses, the soldiers continued to play with their sabers and to hold off the fierce resistance of their poorly armed adversaries. A dragoon sergeant, a very resolute man of prodigious strength, seemed to command the platoon and encouraged his men both by his words and by his example. A blow from a half-pike felled his horse, but he jumped down before the animal fell and avenged its death with a blow he delivered with all his might with his heavy sabre. Brandishing his hat in his left hand, he continued to rally his men, to strike any Puritan who ventured against him. Finally, a blow from an axe made him fall to his knees and a flail broke his saber near the hilt. Seeing their leader fall, his comrades turned around and fled through the hedge. But the valiant soldier, wounded, covered in blood, persisted in standing his ground and would have ended up being knocked unconscious to atone for his bravery, if I had not seized him and thrown into the cart, where he had the good sense to remain calm until the end of the skirmish. Of the twelve who had forced the hedge, at most four escaped. Several others lay dead or wounded, skewered by the scythes or thrown from their horses by the stones. In total, nine dragoons died, fourteen were wounded, and we took prisoner seven others who had not been hit. There remained in our hands ten serviceable horses, about twenty carbines, with a good supply of matchlock, powder, and bullets. The rest of the squadron confined itself to isolated, scattered, and irregular shots . Then they galloped off along the side road and disappeared among the trees from which they had emerged. But the result had not been achieved without cruel losses on our side. Three men had been killed and six wounded; one of them had been very seriously wounded by musketry fire. Five had been sabered by the flanking platoon when it forced the hedge; only one of them left any hope of recovery. In addition, one man had died as a result of the explosion of an ancient petrinal, and another had had an arm broken by a horse’s kick . Our total losses, therefore, amounted to eight killed and as many wounded, but it was necessary to recognize that this number was small, after such a sharp skirmish, and in the face of an enemy who was superior to us in discipline as well as in armament. The peasants were so enthusiastic about their victory that those among them who had taken horses loudly demanded permission to pursue the dragoons, and this all the more urgently since Sir Gervas Jerome and Reuben eagerly offered to lead them. But Decimus Saxon flatly refused to lend himself to any enterprise of this kind. He was no more welcoming to the Reverend Joshua Pettigrue, when the latter, in his capacity as pastor, spoke of mounting the cart, to pronounce the few encouraging and unctuous words that the situation required. “It is true, good Master Pettigrue, that we are obliged to many praises and thanksgivings, and that we must vie with each other in sweet and holy emulation to celebrate the blessing that has been poured out upon Israel,” he said, “but the time has not yet come. There is an hour for prayer, there is an hour for labor. Listen to me, friend,” he said to one of the prisoners. ” To which regiment do you belong? ” “It is not for me to answer your questions,” the man replied harshly . “No? Then we will try whether a rope around the skull, tightly tightened with a drumstick, will not loosen your tongue,” said Saxon, bringing his face close to the prisoner’s and looking into his eyes with such a ferocious air that the man recoiled in fear. “It is a squadron of the second regiment of dragoons,” he said. “And the regiment itself, where is it?” “We left him on the road to Ilchester and Landport. ” “Do you hear?” said our leader. “We have not a moment to lose, otherwise we might have the whole troop on our hands. Put the dead and wounded on the cart! We will harness these two troop horses to it. We will not be safe until we arrive at Taunton. ” Even Master Joshua understood that they were in too much of a hurry to have time for any spiritual practice. The wounded were hoisted into the cart and laid on the mattresses, while the dead were placed in the other cart that had protected our rear. The peasants, who owned them, far from objecting to this way of disposing of their property, helped us as best they could, tightening the girths and buckling the lines. Less than an hour after the fight, we had resumed our march and cast a last glance through the twilight at the dark, scattered patches that marked the white road. They were the bodies of the dragoons that indicated the place where we had been victorious. Thus ends the first volume of Micah Clarke by Arthur Conan Doyle, a historical epic where the destiny of a young man merges with the tumults of a nation. Through his trials and choices, Conan Doyle offers us much more than a simple adventure story: it’s a meditation on freedom, conviction, and the weight of individual decisions. If this journey through 17th-century England captivated you, continue the adventure with the sequel. Thank you for listening, and we’ll see you soon for more literary treasures on Audiobooks.

Plongez dans l’univers palpitant de *Micah Clarke – Tome I* ✨, un roman historique d’Arthur Conan Doyle, auteur mondialement célèbre pour Sherlock Holmes 🕵️‍♂️. Dans cette œuvre monumentale, l’auteur nous transporte dans l’Angleterre du XVIIe siècle, en pleine rébellion de Monmouth, à travers les yeux d’un jeune homme qui découvre l’honneur, la loyauté et les sacrifices de la guerre ⚔️.

👉 Ce récit, mêlant aventures, intrigues politiques et drame humain, illustre parfaitement le talent de Conan Doyle à recréer une époque avec intensité et réalisme. Micah Clarke, jeune protagoniste plein d’idéaux, se retrouve pris dans une tourmente qui changera sa vie à jamais.

💡 Pourquoi écouter cette histoire ?
– Une fresque historique captivante qui éclaire une période clé de l’histoire anglaise 📖
– Un mélange subtil entre fiction et faits historiques 🏰
– Des personnages riches en émotions et en dilemmes moraux 🤔
– L’art narratif unique de Conan Doyle ✍️

✨ Si vous aimez les récits d’aventures historiques, les intrigues politiques et les personnages inoubliables, ce chef-d’œuvre est fait pour vous.

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-📜 Micah Clarke – Tome I | Arthur Conan Doyle ✨ [https://youtu.be/255ZBJMXVrU]

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