One of the Six Hundred: A Novel
admiration of the whole army. I was bathing her lips with some diluted
brandy, when she fully, and for the first time, recognised me. Then a
little smile of joy passed over her ghastly face, and she began to
speak, painfully, huskily, and at long intervals.
"It is my turn now; but I am dying, you see, _mon frere_," said she,
"dying. Many of my sisters have died in the camp--but--but few thus."
"Few, indeed," said I, in a low, sad voice.
"In ardent prayers for the repose of my soul you find no solace. I say
not this upbraidingly, yet the mortuary chants of the 'Dies Irae' and
the 'De Profundis' will never be said for me, because I die--die thus!"
she said, in a low and piercing voice, as she closed her eyes.
Perplexity was now added to my sorrow, for I knew not what the poor girl
wished or meant; but I implored her to tell me how she came to be left
thus alone and in illness. In the night when, asleep and weary, she had
fallen unseen from a French ambulance cart, some scouting Cossacks had
found and carried her off in mocking triumph; but, on finding that the
deadly pestilence had seized her, they barbarously flung her into the
Bulganak. She had crept ashore, and was making her way to our bivouac,
when the progress of her illness became so rapid and destroying that she
was reduced to the condition in which Stapylton found her. Such was the
short story she told me, in long and painful intervals, her voice being
at times so low that I had to place my ear close to her lips.
"And now," she added, with a divine smile, which brought back much of
the wonderful beauty of her face, "I am so glad--so happy that I shall
die!"
"Why, _ma soeur_?"
"Lest I should live longer; because, in doing so, I could scarcely fail
in some way to offend heaven," replied the poor girl. "I confessed me
two days ago--I die in peace, and forgive those Cossaques--_mon
ami_--_mon frere_, I should say--you will close my eyes--you will see me
buried--promise me that you will!"
I could only answer her by my tears; and strange it seemed that all
around the thicket where this solemn scene was acting, and when the
spirit of this good being was hovering between eternity and time, the
thousands of our army, horse, foot, and artillery, with ammunition and
stores, were pouring past in the bright morning sunshine, towards the
passage of the Bulganak.
All around was instinct with the glitter and bustle of martial life; but
within that olive grove was death, sublime humility, and suffering.
"Are you in pain now?" I asked, as this thought occurred to me.
"Oh, no--pain is long since passed away. If I could but live till three
in the afternoon, I could then die more than ever happily."
"Why at three?"
"For at that time our Blessed Lord yielded up his soul on Calvary!" said
she, with a voice of enthusiasm, while a strange brightness seemed to
pass over all her face.
As she turned restlessly her eyes fell upon Sergeant Stapylton and the
lancers, and beckoning them forward, she bestowed her blessing on each;
and they listened with bowed heads, and took off their caps. I was
deeply moved, and drew a pace or two aside.
"Heaven has always been so good to me," she muttered, in broken English,
as the sergeant placed his cloak as a pillow under her head; "because,
as you must know, _messieurs les soldats_, my mother dedicated me to
heaven, and I am a child of the Holy Virgin."
Poor Stapylton, a worthy but stolid John Bull, looked rather bewildered
by this information; but my Irish groom understood her.
"Thrue for you, miss," said Lanty, wiping his eyes with the worsted
tassels of his yellow sash. "Oh, it's fast she's goin' to glory, the
poor cratur. Oh, never a ha'porth she thinks of herself; but it is us
she's prayin' for, boys."
"Other souls than mine shall pass away to-day, for ere nightfall a great
battle is to be fought--I know that."
At that moment, through an opening in the olive trees, we saw a regiment
of infantry marching past in close column of subdivisions, with the band
in front, colours flying, and bayonets gleaming in the sun. It was our
88th, of gallant memory, with Colonel Shirley riding at the head of the
column, and the drums and fifes made the blue welkin ring to the air of
"The Young May Moon." She looked wistfully at the defiling ranks; there
was so much of life there, so much of death here! Then, clasping her
white hands, which were so thin and tremulous, and, closing her eyes,
she began to repeat a little prayer in Latin, for those who were to fall
on both sides--the Russians as well as the English.
Of that prayer I can only remember a single sentence--
"_O clementissime Jesu, amator animarum, lava in sanguine Tuo peccatores
totius mundi, nunc positos in agonia et hodie morituros._"[*]
[*] "O most merciful Jesus, lover of souls, wash in Thy blood the
sinners of the whole world who are now in their agony and are to die
this day!"
Then, whispering something of her "mother who was in heaven, kneeling
for her before the Mother of God," the pure spirit of this French girl
passed out into the black night of eternity. We stood for a time
silent, and nothing roused us but our rear-guard defiling to the front
from the right of troops, and then the orders of the colonel recurred to
me. Were I to live a thousand years I shall never forget the calm and
soothing, yet sorrowful, impression made upon me by this poor girl's
death. I closed her eyes, and their long, dark lashes fell over the
pale cheek, from which they never more would rise, and she lay under the
poor horse-rug, looking so calm, with a peaceful and beautiful
expression on her sweet dead face. Her hands were now folded on her
breast; her black ebony crucifix had fallen from them; but Lanty O'Regan
replaced it gently, and kindly closed the stiffening fingers round it,
and there was a big sob in Lanty's throat as he did so. Death brought
back all the strange loveliness of other days to Sister Archange; and I
could not behold her lying there, looking so peaceful, so white and
still, without feeling my heart very full indeed. For when I saw so
much self-devotion, poverty, and charity united with peace and goodwill
to all mankind--to Christian and Osmanli, to friend and foe alike--it
seemed to me truly that of such as she was the kingdom of God. I kissed
the dead girl's forehead as we drew the horse-rug over her, and prepared
for her interment, as we had not a moment to lose.
The soil was soft, and we had only our sword-blades and hands to dig
with; but we contrived to scoop a hole about three feet deep.
Reverently, as if she had been their sister, my comrades laid her in it,
and then we heaped the mould above her. She lies in that little thicket
of olives, about a mile from Bulganak, and sleeps in what is called
unconsecrated earth; though the ashes of that sister of charity might
bring a blessing on the city of the Sultan. We now mounted, put our
horses to full speed, and soon passing our rear-guard, came up with our
brigade, and rejoined the regiment. By this time the whole army was on
the march to force the position of the Alma, and already our right flank
was almost united to the left of the French column under General
Bosquet, as the allies advanced together.
*CHAPTER XXXVII.*
News of battle!--news of battle!
Hark, 'tis ringing down the street!
And the archways and the pavement
Bear the clang of hurrying feet.
News of battle!--who hath brought it?
News of triumph! Who should bring
Tidings from our noble army?
Greetings from our gallant king?
LAYS OF THE SCOTTISH CAVALIERS.
While these events were occurring by the shore of the Euxine, brown
autumn was spreading her sober tints upon the Scottish woods; and one
seldom sees the country more attractive than when its beauty is
decaying, and a soothing sadness mingles with our delight.
The long grass is dank in the shady places, for there the dew falls
early at eve, and lingers long after sunrise; and now in Calderwood Glen
the dark leaves of the chestnuts were varied by the golden yellow of the
lime tree, whose frail leaves are among the earliest to whirl before the
gusty autumn wind.
Already the first leaves--the early spoil of the season--were lying in
the long, shady avenue, or were gathered in heaps, even as the breeze
had swept them, about the well of James V., the yew hedgerows, and the
grass walks of the antique Scottish garden, where tradition avers that
Anne of Denmark flirted with the bonnie Earl of Gowrie. There the
asters and dahlias still contended for a place with the old-fashioned
hollyhock. Summer had gone; but the corn-marigold and the gorgeous
crimson poppy yet lingered among the yellow stubble, or on the green
burn braes; scarlet hips and haws made gay the hedgerows, and the
ladybirds were pecking at the sweet apples in the orchard. The shadows
of the flying clouds passed over the green mountain slopes, over Largo's
lofty cone, the round swelling Lomonds--the Mamelles of Fife, as a
French officer not inaptly termed them--the breeze of the German Sea
came up the long, fertile Howe, and brought softly to the ear the lowing
of cattle from Falkland Woods and many a cosy homestead. The autumn was
lovely in Calderwood Glen; but the old manor house seemed empty and
silent, and the heart of Cora was sad, for--
Great events were on the gale,
And each hour brought a varying tale,
and she knew that the same autumnal sun which was browning the woods of
Scotland was lighting her kilted regiments on their path of death and
peril by the Alma. There were times when Cora thought that, bitter
though it was, this hopeless sorrow for the absence of one she loved,
how sweet it might have been--how sadly sweet--had Newton loved her in
return. Ah! it had not been hopeless then; but Newton loved another,
who loved him too. Yet, did that other love him so well as she, poor
quiet Cora, did? And would she love him always? Then, when she heard
the thistlefinch, with its golden wings, singing among the linden trees,
the words of the old, old song seemed to come home truly to her heart as
she hummed them over.
There sat upon the linden tree
A bird, and sang its strain;
So sweet it sang, that, as I heard,
My heart went back again;
It went to one remembered spot,
It saw the rose-trees grow,
And thought again the thoughts of love
There cherished long ago.
A thousand years to me it seems
Since by my love I sate,
Yet thus to have been a stranger long,
Was not my choice, but fate;
Since then I have not seen the flowers,
Nor heard the bird's sweet song,
My joys have all too briefly passed,
My griefs have been too long!
Ladies were setting forth to join the army of the East as nurses! An
idea occurred to her, and then she shrank from it, for Cora was not one
of our strong-minded British females but a good and kind-hearted,
earnest and high-souled Scottish girl; and it is a peculiarity of the
women of Scotland ever to shrink from publicity; and, somehow, public
life seems neither their _forte_ nor their _role_.
"Ah, oh!" thought Cora; "what if this is not merely a separation, but a
loss for ever!"
No battle had yet been fought; but already many men had perished at
Varna, at Scutari, and elsewhere, of fever and cholera. And so, often
as she wandered alone in the garden walks, by the old Battle Stone in
the woods, by the Adder's Craig, or King James's Well, she wept, as she
thought of the lively young lancer whom she had last seen marching for
the East, and still more for her early playmate and cousin, who in
boyhood so petted her at home.