A BOOK OF GOLDEN DEEDS

BY

CHARLOTTE M YONGE

CONTENTS

What is a Golden Deed?The Stories of Alcestis and AntigoneThe Cup of WaterHow One Man has saved a HostThe Pass of ThermopylaeThe Rock of the CapitolThe Two Friends of SyracuseThe Devotion of the DeciiRegulusThe brave Brethren of JudahThe Chief of the ArverniWithstanding the Monarch in his WrathThe last Fight in the ColiseumThe Shepherd Girl of NanterreLeo the SlaveThe Battle of the BlackwaterGuzman el BuenoFaithful till DeathWhat is better than Slaying a DragonThe Keys of CalaisThe Battle of SempachThe Constant PrinceThe Carnival of PerthThe Crown of St. StephenGeorge the TrillerSir Thomas More's DaughterUnder Ivan the TerribleFort St. ElmoThe Voluntary ConvictThe Housewives of LowenburgFathers and SonsThe Soldiers in the SnowGunpowder PerilsHeroes of the PlagueThe Second of SeptemberThe Vendeans

PREFACE

As the most striking lines of poetry are the most hackneyed, becausethey have grown to be the common inheritance of all the world, so manyof the most noble deeds that earth can show have become the best known, and enjoyed their full meed of fame. Therefore it may be feared thatmany of the events here detailed, or alluded to, may seem trite to thosein search of novelty; but it is not for such that the collection hasbeen made. It is rather intended as a treasury for young people, wherethey may find minuter particulars than their abridged histories usuallyafford of the soul-stirring deeds that give life and glory to the recordof events; and where also other like actions, out of their ordinarycourse of reading, may be placed before them, in the trust that examplemay inspire the spirit of heroism and self-devotion. For surely it mustbe a wholesome contemplation to look on actions, the very essence ofwhich is such entire absorption in others that self is forgotten; theobject of which is not to win promotion, wealth, or success, but simpleduty, mercy, and loving-kindness. These are the actions wrought, 'hopingfor nothing again', but which most surely have their reward. 

The authorities have not been given, as for the most [Page] part thenarratives lie on the surface of history. For the description of theColiseum, I have, however, been indebted to the Abbé Gerbet's RomeChrétienne; for the Housewives of Lowenburg, and St. Stephen's Crown, toFreytag's Sketches of German Life; and for the story of George theTriller, to Mr. Mayhew's Germany. The Escape of Attalus is narrated(from Gregory of Tours) in Thierry's 'Lettres sur l'Histoire de France;'the Russian officer's adventures, and those of Prascovia Lopouloff, thetrue Elisabeth of Siberia, are from M. Le Maistre; the shipwreckschiefly from Gilly's 'Shipwrecks of the British Navy;' the Jersey PowderMagazine from the Annual Registrer, and that at Ciudad Rodrigo, from thetraditions of the 52nd Regiment. 

There is a cloud of doubt resting on a few of the tales, which it may behonest to mention, though they were far too beautiful not to tell. Theseare the details of the Gallic occupation of Rome, the Legend of St. Genevieve, the Letter of Gertrude von der Wart, the stories of the Keysof Calais, of the Dragon of Rhodes, and we fear we must add, bothNelson's plan of the Battle of the Nile, and likewise the exact form ofthe heroism of young Casabianca, of which no two accounts agree. But itwas not possible to give up such stories as these, and the thread oftruth there must be in them has developed into such a beautiful tissue, that even if unsubstantial when tested, it is surely delightful tocontemplate. 

Some stories have been passed over as too devoid of foundation, inespecial that of young Henri, Duke of Nemours, who, at ten years old, was said to have been hung up with his little brother of eight in one ofLouis XI's cages at Loches, with orders that two of the children's teethshould daily be pulled out and brought to the king. The elder child wassaid to have insisted on giving the whole supply of teeth, so as to savehis brother; but though they were certainly imprisoned after theirfather's execution, they were released after Louis's death in acondition which disproves this atrocity. 

The Indian mutiny might likewise have supplied glorious instances ofChristian self-devotion, but want of materials has compelled us to stopshort of recording those noble deeds by which delicate women and light-hearted young soldiers showed, that in the hour of need there was notwanting to them the highest and deepest 'spirit of self-sacrifice. '

At some risk of prolixity, enough of the surrounding events has ingeneral been given to make the situation comprehensible, even withoutknowledge of the general history. This has been done in the hope thatthese extracts may serve as a mother's storehouse for reading aloud toher boys, or that they may be found useful for short readings to theintelligent, though uneducated classes. 

NOVEMBER 17, 1864. 

WHAT IS A GOLDEN DEED?

We all of us enjoy a story of battle and adventure. Some of us delightin the anxiety and excitement with which we watch the various strangepredicaments, hairbreadth escapes, and ingenious contrivances that arepresented to us; and the mere imaginary dread of the dangers thusdepicted, stirs our feelings and makes us feel eager and full ofsuspense. 

This taste, though it is the first step above the dullness that cannotbe interested in anything beyond its own immediate world, nor care forwhat it neither sees, touches, tastes, nor puts to any present use, isstill the lowest form that such a liking can take. It may be no betterthan a love of reading about murders in the newspaper, just for the sakeof a sort of startled sensation; and it is a taste that becomesunwholesome when it absolutely delights in dwelling on horrors andcruelties for their own sake; or upon shifty, cunning, dishoneststratagems and devices. To learn to take interest in what is evil isalways mischievous. 

But there is an element in many of such scenes of woe and violence thatmay well account for our interest in them. It is that which makes theeye gleam and the heart throb, and bears us through the details ofsuffering, bloodshed, and even barbarity--feeling our spirits moved andelevated by contemplating the courage and endurance that they havecalled forth. Nay, such is the charm of brilliant valor, that we oftenare tempted to forget the injustice of the cause that may have calledforth the actions that delight us. And this enthusiasm is often unitedwith the utmost tenderness of heart, the very appreciation of sufferingonly quickening the sense of the heroism that risked the utmost, tillthe young and ardent learn absolutely to look upon danger as an occasionfor evincing the highest qualities. 

'O Life, without thy chequer'd sceneOf right and wrong, of weal and woe, Success and failure, could a groundFor magnanimity be found?'

The true cause of such enjoyment is perhaps an inherent consciousnessthat there is nothing so noble as forgetfulness of self. Therefore it isthat we are struck by hearing of the exposure of life and limb to theutmost peril, in oblivion, or recklessness of personal safety, incomparison with a higher object. 

That object is sometimes unworthy. In the lowest form of courage it isonly avoidance of disgrace; but even fear of shame is better than merelove of bodily ease, and from that lowest motive the scale rises to themost noble and precious actions of which human nature is capable--thetruly golden and priceless deeds that are the jewels of history, thesalt of life. 

And it is a chain of Golden Deeds that we seek to lay before ourreaders; but, ere entering upon them, perhaps we had better clearlyunderstand what it is that to our mind constitutes a Golden Deed. 

It is not mere hardihood. There was plenty of hardihood in Pizarro whenhe led his men through terrible hardships to attack the empire of Peru, but he was actuated by mere greediness for gain, and all the perils heso resolutely endured could not make his courage admirable. It wasnothing but insensibility to danger, when set against the wealth andpower that he coveted, and to which he sacrificed thousands of helplessPeruvians. Daring for the sake of plunder has been found in everyrobber, every pirate, and too often in all the lower grade of warriors, from the savage plunderer of a besieged town up to the reckless monarchmaking war to feed his own ambition. 

There is a courage that breaks out in bravado, the exuberance of highspirits, delighting in defying peril for its own sake, not indeedproducing deeds which deserve to be called golden, but which, from theirheedless grace, their desperation, and absence of all base motives--except perhaps vanity have an undeniable charm about them, even when wedoubt the right of exposing a life in mere gaiety of heart. 

Such was the gallantry of the Spanish knight who, while Fernando andIsabel lay before the Moorish city of Granada, galloped out of the camp, in full view of besiegers and besieged, and fastened to the gate of thecity with his dagger a copy of the Ave Maria. It was a wildly braveaction, and yet not without service in showing the dauntless spirit ofthe Christian army. But the same can hardly be said of the daring shownby the Emperor Maximilian when he displayed himself to the citizens ofUlm upon the topmost pinnacle of their cathedral spire; or of Alonso deOjeda, who figured in like manner upon the tower of the Spanishcathedral. The same daring afterwards carried him in the track ofColumbus, and there he stained his name with the usual blots of rapacityand cruelty. These deeds, if not tinsel, were little better than goldleaf. 

A Golden Deed must be something more than mere display of fearlessness. Grave and resolute fulfillment of duty is required to give it the trueweight. Such duty kept the sentinel at his post at the gate of Pompeii, even when the stifling dust of ashes came thicker and thicker from thevolcano, and the liquid mud streamed down, and the people fled andstruggled on, and still the sentry stood at his post, unflinching, tilldeath had stiffened his limbs; and his bones, in their helmet andbreastplate, with the hand still raised to keep the suffocating dustfrom mouth and nose, have remained even till our own times to show how aRoman soldier did his duty. In like manner the last of the old Spanishinfantry originally formed by the Great Captain, Gonzalo de Cordova, were all cut off, standing fast to a man, at the battle of Rocroy, in1643, not one man breaking his rank. The whole regiment was found lyingin regular order upon the field of battle, with their colonel, the oldCount de Fuentes, at their head, expiring in a chair, in which he hadbeen carried, because he was too infirm to walk, to this his twentiethbattle. The conqueror, the high-spirited young Duke d'Enghien, afterwards Prince of Condé, exclaimed, 'Were I not a victor, I shouldhave wished thus to die!' and preserved the chair among the relics ofthe bravest of his own fellow countrymen. 

Such obedience at all costs and all risks is, however, the very essenceof a soldier's life. An army could not exist without it, a ship couldnot sail without it, and millions upon millions of those whose 'bonesare dust and good swords are rust' have shown such resolution. It is thesolid material, but it has hardly the exceptional brightness, of aGolden Deed. 

And yet perhaps it is one of the most remarkable characteristics of aGolden Deed that the doer of it is certain to feel it merely a duty; 'Ihave done that which it was my duty to do' is the natural answer ofthose capable of such actions. They have been constrained to them byduty, or by pity; have never even deemed it possible to act otherwise, and did not once think of themselves in the matter at all. 

For the true metal of a Golden Deed is self-devotion. Selfishness is thedross and alloy that gives the unsound ring to many an act that has beencalled glorious. And, on the other hand, it is not only the valor, whichmeets a thousand enemies upon the battlefield, or scales the walls in aforlorn hope, that is of true gold. It may be, but often it is a meregreed of fame, fear of shame, or lust of plunder. No, it is the spiritthat gives itself for others--the temper that for the sake of religion, of country, of duty, of kindred, nay, of pity even to a stranger, willdare all things, risk all things, endure all things, meet death in onemoment, or wear life away in slow, persevering tendance and suffering. 

Such a spirit was shown by Leaena, the Athenian woman at whose house theoverthrow of the tyranny of the Pisistratids was concerted, and who, when seized and put to the torture that she might disclose the secretsof the conspirators, fearing that the weakness of her frame mightoverpower her resolution, actually bit off her tongue, that she might beunable to betray the trust placed in her. The Athenians commemorated hertruly golden silence by raising in her honor the statue of a lionesswithout a tongue, in allusion to her name, which signifies a lioness. 

Again, Rome had a tradition of a lady whose mother was in prison undersentence of death by hunger, but who, at the peril of her own life, visited her daily, and fed her from her own bosom, until even the sternsenate were moved with pity, and granted a pardon. The same story istold of a Greek lady, called Euphrasia, who thus nourished her father;and in Scotland, in 1401, when the unhappy heir of the kingdom, David, Duke of Rothesay, had been thrown into the dungeon of Falkland Castle byhis barbarous uncle, the Duke of Albany, there to be starved to death, his only helper was one poor peasant woman, who, undeterred by fear ofthe savage men that guarded the castle, crept, at every safeopportunity, to the grated window on a level with the ground, anddropped cakes through it to the prisoner, while she allayed his thirstfrom her own breast through a pipe. Alas! the visits were detected, andthe Christian prince had less mercy than the heathen senate. Anotherwoman, in 1450, when Sir Gilles of Brittany was savagely imprisoned andstarved in much the same manner by his brother, Duke François, sustainedhim for several days by bringing wheat in her veil, and dropping itthrough the grated window, and when poison had been used to hasten hisdeath, she brought a priest to the grating to enable him to make hispeace with Heaven. Tender pity made these women venture all things; andsurely their doings were full of the gold of love. 

So again two Swiss lads, whose father was dangerously ill, found thatthey could by no means procure the needful medicine, except at a pricefar beyond their means, and heard that an English traveler had offered alarge price for a pair of eaglets. The only eyrie was on a crag supposedto be so inacessible, that no one ventured to attempt it, till theseboys, in their intense anxiety for their father, dared the fearfuldanger, scaled the precipice, captured the birds, and safely conveyedthem to the traveler. Truly this was a deed of gold. 

Such was the action of the Russian servant whose master's carriage waspursued by wolves, and who sprang out among the beasts, sacrificing hisown life willingly to slake their fury for a few minutes in order thatthe horses might be untouched, and convey his master to a place ofsafety. But his act of self-devotion has been so beautifully expanded inthe story of 'Eric's Grave', in 'Tales of Christian Heroism', that wecan only hint at it, as at that of the 'Helmsman of Lake Erie', who, with the steamer on fire around him, held fast by the wheel in the veryjaws of the flame, so as to guide the vessel into harbour, and save themany lives within her, at the cost of his own fearful agony, whileslowly scorched by the flames. 

Memorable, too, was the compassion that kept Dr. Thompson upon thebattlefield of the Alma, all alone throughout the night, striving toalleviate the sufferings and attend to the wants, not of our ownwounded, but of the enemy, some of whom, if they were not sorely belied, had been known to requite a friendly act of assistance with a pistolshot. Thus to remain in the darkness, on a battlefield in an enemy'scountry, among the enemy themselves, all for pity and mercy's sake, wasone of the noblest acts that history can show. Yet, it was paralleled inthe time of the Indian Mutiny, when every English man and woman wasflying from the rage of the Sepoys at Benares, and Dr. Hay aloneremained because he would not desert the patients in the hospital, whoselife depended on his care--many of them of those very native corps whowere advancing to massacre him. This was the Roman sentry's firmness, more voluntary and more glorious. Nor may we pass by her to whom ourtitle page points as our living type of Golden Deeds--to her who firstshowed how woman's ministrations of mercy may be carried on, not onlywithin the city, but on the borders of the camp itself--'the lady withthe lamp', whose health and strength were freely devoted to the holywork of softening the after sufferings that render war so hideous; whosevery step and shadow carried gladness and healing to the sick soldier, and who has opened a path of like shining light to many another womanwho only needed to be shown the way. Fitly, indeed, may the figure ofFlorence Nightingale be shadowed forth at the opening of our roll ofGolden Deeds. 

Thanks be to God, there is enough of His own spirit of love abroad inthe earth to make Golden Deeds of no such rare occurrence, but that theyare of 'all time'. Even heathen days were not without them, and how muchmore should they not abound after the words have been spoken, 'Greaterlove hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friend', and after the one Great Deed has been wrought that has consecrated allother deeds of self-sacrifice. Of martyrdoms we have scarcely spoken. They were truly deeds of the purest gold; but they are too numerous tobe dwelt on here: and even as soldiers deem it each man's simple duty toface death unhesitatingly, so the 'glorious army of martyrs' had, forthe most part, joined the Church with the expectation that they shouldhave to confess the faith, and confront the extremity of death andtorture for it. 

What have been here brought together are chiefly cases of self-devotionthat stand out remarkably, either from their hopelessness, theircourage, or their patience, varying with the character of their age; butwith that one essential distinction in all, that the dross of self wascast away. 

Among these we cannot forbear mentioning the poor American soldier, who, grievously wounded, had just been laid in the middle bed, by far themost comfortable of the three tiers of berths in the ship's cabin inwhich the wounded were to be conveyed to New York. Still thrilling withthe suffering of being carried from the field, and lifted to his place, he saw a comrade in even worse plight brought in, and thinking of thepain it must cost his fellow soldier to be raised to the bed above him, he surprised his kind lady nurses (daily scatterers of Golden Deeds) bysaying, 'Put me up there, I reckon I'll bear hoisting better than hewill'. 

And, even as we write, we hear of an American Railway collision thatbefell a train on the way to Elmira with prisoners. The engineer, whosename was William Ingram, might have leapt off and saved himself beforethe shock; but he remained in order to reverse the engine, though withcertain death staring him in the face. He was buried in the wreck of themeeting train, and when found, his back was against the boiler he wasjammed in, unable to move, and actually being burnt to death; but evenin that extremity of anguish he called out to those who came round tohelp him to keep away, as he expected the boiler would burst. Theydisregarded the generous cry, and used every effort to extricate him, but could not succeed until after his sufferings had ended in death. 

While men and women still exist who will thus suffer and thus die, losing themselves in the thought of others, surely the many forms of woeand misery with which this earth is spread do but give occasions ofworking out some of the highest and best qualities of which mankind arecapable. And oh, young readers, if your hearts burn within you as youread of these various forms of the truest and deepest glory, and youlong for time and place to act in the like devoted way, bethinkyourselves that the alloy of such actions is to be constantly workedaway in daily life; and that if ever it be your lot to do a Golden Deed, it will probably be in unconsciousness that you are doing anythingextraordinary, and that the whole impulse will consist in the havingabsolutely forgotten self. 

THE STORIES OF ALCESTIS AND ANTIGONE

It has been said, that even the heathens saw and knew the glory of self-devotion; and the Greeks had two early instances so very beautiful that, though they cannot in all particulars be true, they must not be passedover. There must have been some foundation for them, though we cannotnow disentangle them from the fable that has adhered to them; and, atany rate, the ancient Greeks believed them, and gathered strength andnobleness from dwelling on such examples; since, as it has been trulysaid, 'Every word, look or thought of sympathy with heroic action, helpsto make heroism'. Both tales were presented before them in their solemnreligious tragedies, and the noble poetry in which they were recountedby the great Greek dramatists has been preserved to our time. 

Alcestis was the wife of Admetus, King of Pherae, who, according to thelegend, was assured that his life might be prolonged, provided father, mother, or wife would die in his stead. It was Alcestis alone who waswilling freely to give her life to save that of her husband; and herdevotion is thus exquisitely described in the following translation, byProfessor Anstice, from the choric song in the tragedy by Euripides:

'Be patient, for thy tears are vainThey may not wake the dead again:E'en heroes, of immortal sireAnd mortal mother born, expire. Oh, she was dear While she linger'd here;She is dear now she rests below, And thou mayst boast That the bride thou hast lostWas the noblest earth can show. 

'We will not look on her burial sod As the cell of sepulchral sleep, It shall be as the shrine of a radiant god, And the pilgrim shall visit that blest abode To worship, and not to weep;And as he turns his steps aside, Thus shall he breathe his vow:'Here sleeps a self-devoted bride, Of old to save her lord she died. She is a spirit now. 

Hail, bright and blest one! grant to meThe smiles of glad prosperity. 'Thus shall he own her name divine, Thus bend him at Alcestis' shrine. '

The story, however, bore that Hercules, descending in the course of oneof his labors into the realms of the dead, rescued Alcestis, and broughther back; and Euripides gives a scene in which the rough, jovialHercules insists on the sorrowful Admetus marrying again a lady of hisown choice, and gives the veiled Alcestis back to him as the new bride. Later Greeks tried to explain the story by saying that Alcestis nursedher husband through an infectious fever, caught it herself, and had beensupposed to be dead, when a skilful physician restored her; but this isprobably only one of the many reasonable versions they tried to give ofthe old tales that were founded on the decay and revival of nature inwinter and spring, and with a presage running through them of sacrifice, death, and resurrection. Our own poet Chaucer was a great admirer ofAlcestis, and improved upon the legend by turning her into his favoriteflower---

'The daisie or els the eye of the daie, The emprise and the floure of flouris all'. 

Another Greek legend told of the maiden of Thebes, one of the most self-devoted beings that could be conceived by a fancy untrained in theknowledge of Divine Perfection. It cannot be known how much of her storyis true, but it was one that went deep into the hearts of Grecian menand women, and encouraged them in some of their best feelings; andassuredly the deeds imputed to her were golden. 

Antigone was the daughter of the old King Oedipus of Thebes. After atime heavy troubles, the consequence of the sins of his youth, came uponhim, and he was driven away from his kingdom, and sent to wander forth ablind old man, scorned and pointed at by all. Then it was that hisfaithful daughter showed true affection for him. She might have remainedat Thebes with her brother Eteocles, who had been made king in herfather's room, but she chose instead to wander forth with the forlornold man, fallen from his kingly state, and absolutely begging his bread. The great Athenian poet Sophocles began his tragedy of 'OedipusColoneus' with showing the blind old king leaning on Antigone's arm, andasking--

'Tell me, thou daughter of a blind old man, Antigone, to what land are we come, Or to what city? Who the inhabitantsWho with a slender pittance will relieveEven for a day the wandering Oedipus?' POTTER. 

The place to which they had come was in Attica, hear the city ofColonus. It was a lovely grove--

'All the haunts of Attic ground, Where the matchless coursers bound, Boast not, through their realms of bliss, Other spot so fair as this. Frequent down this greenwood daleMourns the warbling nightingale, Nestling 'mid the thickest screenOf the ivy's darksome green, Or where each empurpled shootDrooping with its myriad fruit, Curl'd in many a mazy twine, Droops the never-trodden vine. ' ANSTICE. 

This beautiful grove was sacred to the Eumenides, or avenging goddesses, and it was therefore a sanctuary where no foot might tread; but near itthe exiled king was allowed to take up his abode, and was protected bythe great Athenian King, Theseus. There his other daughter, Ismene, joined him, and, after a time, his elder son Polynices, arrived. 

Polynices had been expelled from Thebes by his brother Eteocles, and hadbeen wandering through Greece seeking aid to recover his rights. He hadcollected an army, and was come to take leave of his father and sisters;and at the same time to entreat his sisters to take care that, if heshould fall in the battle, they would prevent his corpse from being leftunburied; for the Greeks believed that till the funeral rites wereperformed, the spirit went wandering restlessly up and down upon thebanks of a dark stream, unable to enter the home of the dead. Antigonesolemnly promised to him that he should not be left without these lastrites. Before long, old Oedipus was killed by lightning, and the twosisters returned to Thebes. 

The united armies of the seven chiefs against Thebes came on, led byPolynices. Eteocles sallied out to meet them, and there was a terriblebattle, ending in all the seven chiefs being slain, and the twobrothers, Eteocles and Polynices, were killed by one another in singlecombat. Creon, the uncle, who thus became king, had always been on theside of Eteocles, and therefore commanded that whilst this youngerbrother was entombed with all due solemnities, the body of the eldershould be left upon the battlefield to be torn by dogs and vultures, andthat whosoever durst bury it should be treated as a rebel and a traitorto the state. 

This was the time for the sister to remember her oath to her deadbrother. The more timid Ismene would have dissuaded her, but sheanswered, 'To me no sufferings have that hideous formWhich can affright me from a glorious death'. 

And she crept forth by night, amid all the horrors of the deserted fieldof battles, and herself covered with loose earth the corpse ofPolynices. The barbarous uncle caused it to be taken up and againexposed, and a watch was set at some little distance. Again Antigone

'Was seen, lamenting shrill with plaintive notes, Like the poor bird that sees her lonely nest Spoil'd of her young'. 

Again she heaped dry dust with her own hands over the body, and pouredforth the libations of wine that formed an essential part of theceremony. She was seized by the guard, and led before Creon. She boldlyavowed her deed, and, in spite of the supplications of Ismene, she wasput to death, a sufferer for her noble and pious deeds; and with thisonly comfort:

 'Glowing at my heartI feel this hope, that to my father, dearAnd dear to thee, my mother, dear to thee, My brother, I shall go. ' POTTER. 

Dim and beautiful indeed was the hope that upbore the grave andbeautiful Theban maiden; and we shall see her resolution equaled, thoughhardly surpassed, by Christian Antigones of equal love and surer faith. 

THE CUP OF WATER

No touch in the history of the minstrel king David gives us a more warmand personal feeling towards him than his longing for the water of thewell of Bethlehem. Standing as the incident does in the summary of thecharacters of his mighty men, it is apt to appear to us as if it hadtaken place in his latter days; but such is not the case, it befellwhile he was still under thirty, in the time of his persecution by Saul. 

It was when the last attempt at reconciliation with the king had beenmade, when the affectionate parting with the generous and faithfulJonathan had taken place, when Saul was hunting him like a partridge onthe mountains on the one side, and the Philistines had nearly taken hislife on the other, that David, outlawed, yet loyal at the heart, senthis aged parents to the land of Moab for refuge, and himself took up hisabode in the caves of the wild limestone hills that had become familiarto him when he was a shepherd. Brave captain and Heaven-destined king ashe was, his name attracted around him a motley group of those that werein distress, or in debt, or discontented, and among them were the'mighty men' whose brave deeds won them the foremost parts in that armywith which David was to fulfill the ancient promises to his people. There were his three nephews, Joab, the ferocious and imperious, thechivalrous Abishai, and Asahel the fleet of foot; there was the warlikeLevite Benaiah, who slew lions and lionlike men, and others who, likeDavid himself, had done battle with the gigantic sons of Anak. Yet eventhese valiant men, so wild and lawless, could be kept in check by thevoice of their young captain; and, outlaws as they were, they spoiled nopeaceful villages, they lifted not their hands against the persecutingmonarch, and the neighboring farms lost not one lamb through theirviolence. Some at least listened to the song of their warlike minstrel:

'Come, ye children, and hearken to me, I will teach you the fear of the Lord. What man is he that lusteth to live, And would fain see good days?Let him refrain his tongue from evilAnd his lips that they speak no guile, Let him eschew evil and do good, Let him seek peace and ensue it. '

With such strains as these, sung to his harp, the warrior gained thehearts of his men to enthusiastic love, and gathered followers on allsides, among them eleven fierce men of Gad, with faces like lions andfeet swift as roes, who swam the Jordan in time of flood, and foughttheir way to him, putting all enemies in the valleys to flight. 

But the Eastern sun burnt on the bare rocks. A huge fissure, opening inthe mountain ridge, encumbered at the bottom with broken rocks, withprecipitous banks, scarcely affording a foothold for the wild goats---such is the spot where, upon a cleft on the steep precipice, stillremain the foundations of the 'hold', or tower, believed to have beenthe David's retreat, and near at hand is the low-browed entrance of thegalleried cave alternating between narrow passages and spacious halls, but all oppressively hot and close. Waste and wild, without a bush or atree, in the feverish atmosphere of Palestine, it was a desolate region, and at length the wanderer's heart fainted in him, as he thought of hisown home, with its rich and lovely terraced slopes, green with wheat, trellised with vines, and clouded with grey olive, and of the coolcisterns of living water by the gate of which he loved to sing--

'He shall feed me in a green pasture, And lead me forth beside the waters of comfort'. 

His parched longing lips gave utterance to the sigh, 'Oh that one wouldgive me to drink of the water of the well of Bethlehem that is by thegate?'

Three of his brave men, apparently Abishai, Benaiah, and Eleazar, heardthe wish. Between their mountain fastness and the dearly loved springlay the host of the Philistines; but their love for their leader fearedno enemies. It was not only water that he longed for, but the water fromthe fountain which he had loved in his childhood. They descended fromtheir chasm, broke through the midst of the enemy's army, and drew thewater from the favorite spring, bearing it back, once again through thefoe, to the tower upon the rock! Deeply moved was their chief at thisact of self-devotion--so much moved that the water seemed to him to betoo sacred to be put to his own use. 'May God forbid it me that I shoulddo this thing. Shall I drink the blood of these men that have put theirlives in jeopardy, for with the jeopardy of their lives they broughtit?' And as a hallowed and precious gift, he poured out unto the Lordthe water obtained at the price of such peril to his followers. 

In later times we meet with another hero, who by his personal qualitiesinspired something of the same enthusiastic attachment as did David, andwho met with an adventure somewhat similar, showing the like noblenessof mind on the part of both leader and followers. 

It was Alexander of Macedon, whose character as a man, with all its darkshades of violence, rage, and profanity, has a nobleness and sweetnessthat win our hearts, while his greatness rests on a far broader basisthan that of his conquests, though they are unrivalled. No one else sogained the love of the conquered, had such wide and comprehensive viewsfor the amelioration of the world, or rose so superior to the prejudiceof race; nor have any ten years left so lasting a trace upon the historyof the world as those of his career. 

It is not, however, of his victories that we are here to speak, but ofhis return march from the banks of the Indus, in BC 326, when he hadnewly recovered from the severe wound which he had received under thefig tree, within the mud wall of the city of the Malli. This expeditionwas as much the expedition of a discoverer as the journey of aconqueror: and, at the mouth of the Indus, he sent his ships to surveythe coasts of the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf, while he himselfmarched along the shore of the province, then called Gedrosia, and nowMekhran. It was a most dismal tract. Above towered mountains of reddish-brown bare stone, treeless and without verdure, the scanty grassproduced in the summer being burnt up long before September, the monthof his march; and all the slope below was equally desolate slopes ofgravel. The few inhabitants were called by the Greeks fish-eaters andturtle-eaters, because there was apparently, nothing else to eat; andtheir huts were built of turtle shells. 

The recollections connected with the region were dismal. Semiramis andCyrus were each said to have lost an army there through hunger andthirst; and these foes, the most fatal foes of the invader, began toattack the Greek host. Nothing but the discipline and all-pervadinginfluence of Alexander could have borne his army through. Speed wastheir sole chance; and through the burning sun, over the arid rock, hestimulated their steps with his own high spirit of unshrinkingendurance, till he had dragged them through one of the most rapid andextraordinary marches of his wonderful career. His own share in theirprivations was fully and freely taken; and once when, like the rest, hewas faint with heat and deadly thirst, a small quantity of water, wonwith great fatigue and difficulty, was brought to him, he esteemed ittoo precious to be applied to his own refreshment, but poured it forthas a libation, lest, he said, his warriors should thirst the more whenthey saw him drink alone; and, no doubt, too, because he felt theexceeding value of that which was purchased by loyal love. A like story is told of Rodolf of Hapsburgh, the founder of thegreatness of Austria, and one of the most open-hearted of men. A flagonof water was brought to him when his army was suffering from severedrought. 'I cannot, ' he said, 'drink alone, nor can all share so small aquantity. I do not thirst for myself, but for my whole army. '

Yet there have been thirsty lips that have made a still more tryingrenunciation. Our own Sir Philip Sidney, riding back, with the mortalhurt in his broken thigh, from the fight at Zutphen, and giving thedraught from his own lips to the dying man whose necessities weregreater than his own, has long been our proverb for the giver of thatself-denying cup of water that shall by no means lose its reward. 

A tradition of an act of somewhat the same character survived in aSlesvig family, now extinct. It was during the wars that ranged from1652 to 1660, between Frederick III of Denmark and Charles Gustavus ofSweden, that, after a battle, in which the victory had remained with theDanes, a stout burgher of Flensborg was about to refresh himself, ereretiring to have his wounds dressed, with a draught of beer from awooden bottle, when an imploring cry from a wounded Swede, lying on thefield, made him turn, and, with the very words of Sidney, 'Thy need isgreater than mine, ' he knelt down by the fallen enemy, to pour theliquor into his mouth. His requital was a pistol shot in the shoulderfrom the treacherous Swede. 'Rascal, ' he cried, 'I would have befriendedyou, and you would murder me in return! Now I will punish you. I wouldhave given you the whole bottle; but now you shall have only half. ' Anddrinking off half himself, he gave the rest to the Swede. The king, hearing the story, sent for the burgher, and asked him how he came tospare the life of such a rascal. 

'Sire, ' said the honest burgher, 'I could never kill a wounded enemy. '

'Thou meritest to be a noble, ' the king said, and created him oneimmediately, giving him as armorial bearings a wooden bottle piercedwith an arrow! The family only lately became extinct in the person of anold maiden lady. 

HOW ONE MAN HAS SAVED A HOST

B. C. 507

There have been times when the devotion of one man has been the savingof an army. Such, according to old Roman story, was the feat of HoratiusCocles. It was in the year B. C. 507, not long after the kings had beenexpelled from Rome, when they were endeavoring to return by the aid ofthe Etruscans. Lars Porsena, one of the great Etruscan chieftains, hadtaken up the cause of the banished Tarquinius Superbus and his sonSextus, and gathered all his forces together, to advance upon the cityof Rome. The great walls, of old Etrurian architecture, had probablyalready risen round the growing town, and all the people came flockingin from the country for shelter there; but the Tiber was the bestdefense, and it was only crossed by one wooden bridge, and the fartherside of that was guarded by a fort, called the Janiculum. But thevanguards of the overwhelming Etruscan army soon took the fort, andthen, in the gallant words of Lord Macaulay's ballad, --

'Thus in all the Senate There was no heart so boldBut sore it ached, and fast it beat, When that ill news was told. Forthwith uprose the Consul, Up rose the Fathers all, In haste they girded up their gowns, And hied them to the wall. 

'They held a council standing Before the River Gate:Short time was there, ye well may guess, For musing or debate. Out spoke the Consul roundly, 'The bridge must straight go down, For, since Janiculum is lost, Nought else can save the town. '

'Just then a scout came flying, All wild with haste and fear:'To arms! To arms! Sir Consul, Lars Porsena is here. 'On the low hills to westward The Consul fixed his eye, And saw the swarthy storm of dust Rise fast along the sky. 

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

'But the Consul's brow was sad, And the Consul's speech was low, And darkly looked he at the wall, And darkly at the foe. 'Their van will be upon us Before the bridge goes down;And if they once may win the bridge What hope to save the town?'

'Then out spoke brave Horatius, The Captain of the Gate, 'To every man upon this earth Death cometh soon or late;And how can man die better Than facing fearful odds, For the ashes of his fathers, And the temples of his gods?

'And for the tender mother Who dandled him to rest, And for the wife who nurses His baby at her breast?And for the holy maidens Who feed the eternal flame, To save them from false Sextus, That wrought the deed of shame?

'Hew down the bridge, Sir Consul, With all the speed ye may, I, with two more to help me, Will hold the foe in play. In yon strait path a thousand May well be stopp'd by three:Now who will stand on either hand, And keep the bridge with me?'

'Then out spake Spurius Lartius, A Ramnian proud was he, 'Lo, I will stand at thy right hand, And keep the bridge with thee. 'And out spake strong Herminius, Of Titian blood was he, 'I will abide on thy left side, And keep the bridge with thee. '

So forth went these three brave men, Horatius, the Consul's nephew, Spurius Lartius, and Titus Herminius, to guard the bridge at the fartherend, while all the rest of the warriors were breaking down the timbersbehind them. 

'And Fathers mixed with commons, Seized hatchet, bar, and crow, And smote upon the planks above, And loosen'd them below. 'Meanwhile the Tuscan army, Right glorious to behold, Came flashing back the noonday light, Rank behind rank, like surges bright, Of a broad sea of gold. Four hundred trumpets sounded A peal of warlike glee, As that great host, with measured tread, And spears advanced, and ensigns spread, Roll'd slowly towards the bridge's head, Where stood the dauntless three. 

'The three stood calm and silent, And look'd upon the foes, And a great shout of laughter From all the vanguard rose. '

They laughed to see three men standing to meet the whole army; but itwas so narrow a space, that no more than three enemies could attack themat once, and it was not easy to match them. Foe after foe came forthagainst them, and went down before their swords and spears, till atlast--

'Was none that would be foremost To lead such dire attack;But those behind cried 'Forward!' And those before cried 'Back!'

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

However, the supports of the bridge had been destroyed. 

'But meanwhile axe and lever Have manfully been plied, And now the bridge hangs tottering Above the boiling tide. 'Come back, come back, Horatius!' Loud cried the Fathers all;'Back, Lartius! Back, Herminius! Back, ere the ruin fall!'

'Back darted Spurius Lartius, Herminius darted back;And as they passed, beneath their feet They felt the timbers crack;But when they turn'd their faces, And on the farther shoreSaw brave Horatius stand alone, They would have cross'd once more. 

'But with a crash like thunder Fell every loosen'd beam, And, like a dam, the mighty wreck Lay right athwart the stream;And a long shout of triumph Rose from the walls of Rome, As to the highest turret-tops Was splashed the yellow foam. '

The one last champion, behind a rampart of dead enemies, remained tillthe destruction was complete. 

'Alone stood brave Horatius, But constant still in mind, Thrice thirty thousand foes before And the broad flood behind. '

A dart had put out one eye, he was wounded in the thigh, and his workwas done. He turned round, and--

 'Saw on Palatinus, The white porch of his home, And he spake to the noble river That rolls by the walls of Rome:'O Tiber! father Tiber! To whom the Romans pray, A Roman's life, a Roman's arms Take thou in charge this day. '

And with this brief prayer he leapt into the foaming stream. Polybiuswas told that he was there drowned; but Livy gives the version which theballad follows:--

'But fiercely ran the current, Swollen high by months of rain, And fast his blood was flowing, And he was sore in pain, And heavy with his armor, And spent with changing blows, And oft they thought him sinking, But still again he rose. 

'Never, I ween, did swimmer, In such an evil case, Struggle through such a raging flood Safe to the landing place. But his limbs were borne up bravely By the brave heart within, And our good father Tiber Bare bravely up his chin. 

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

'And now he feels the bottom, Now on dry earth he stands, Now round him throng the Fathers, To press his gory hands. And now with shouts and clapping, And noise of weeping loud, He enters through the River Gate, Borne by the joyous crowd. 

'They gave him of the corn land, That was of public right, As much as two strong oxen Could plough from morn to night. And they made a molten image, And set it up on high, And there it stands unto this day, To witness if I lie. 

'It stands in the Comitium, Plain for all folk to see, Horatius in his harness, Halting upon his knee:And underneath is written, In letters all of gold, How valiantly he kept the bridge In the brave days of old. '

Never was more honorable surname than his, of Cocles, or the one-eyed;and though his lameness prevented him from ever being a Consul, orleading an army, he was so much beloved and honored by his fellowcitizens, that in the time of a famine each Roman, to the number of300, 000, brought him a day's food, lest he should suffer want. Thestatue was shown even in the time of Pliny, 600 years afterwards, andwas probably only destroyed when Rome was sacked by the barbarians. 

Nor was the Roman bridge the only one that has been defended by one managainst a host. In our own country, Stamford Bridge was, in like manner, guarded by a single brave Northman, after the battle fought A. D. 1066, when Earl Tostig, the son of Godwin, had persuaded the gallant sea king, Harald Hardrada, to come and invade England. The chosen English king, Harold, had marched at full speed from Sussex to Yorkshire, and met theinvaders marching at their ease, without expecting any enemy, andwearing no defensive armor, as they went forth to receive the keys ofthe city of York. The battle was fought by the Norsemen in the fullcertainty that it must be lost. The banner, 'Landwaster', was planted inthe midst; and the king, chanting his last song, like the minstrelwarrior he had always been, stood, with his bravest men, in a death ringaround it. There he died, and his choicest warriors with him; but manymore fled back towards the ships, rushing over the few planks that werethe only way across the River Ouse. And here stood their defender, aloneupon the bridge, keeping back the whole pursuing English army, who couldonly attack him one at a time; until, with shame be it spoken, he diedby a cowardly blow by an enemy, who had crept down the bank of theriver, and under the bridge, through the openings between the timbers ofwhich he thrust up his spear, and thus was able to hurl the braveNorthman into the river, mortally wounded, but not till great numbers ofhis countrymen had reached their ships, their lives saved by hisgallantry. 

In like manner, Robert Bruce, in the time of his wanderings, during theyear 1306, saved his whole band by his sole exertions. He had beendefeated by the forces of Edward I. At Methven, and had lost many of hisfriends. His little army went wandering among the hills, sometimesencamping in the woods, sometimes crossing the lakes in small boats. Many ladies were among them, and their summer life had some wild charmsof romance; as the knightly huntsmen brought in the salmon, the roe, andthe deer that formed their food, and the ladies gathered the floweringheather, over which soft skins were laid for their bedding. Sir JamesDouglas was the most courtly and graceful knight of all the party, andever kept them enlivened by his gay temper and ready wit; and the kinghimself cherished a few precious romances, which he used to read aloudto his followers as they rested in their mountain home. 

But their bitter foe, the Lord of Lorn, was always in pursuit of them, and, near the head of the Tay, he came upon the small army of 300 menwith 1000 Highlanders, armed with Lochaber axes, at a place which isstill called Dalry, or the King's Field. Many of the horses were killedby the axes; and James Douglas and Gilbert de la Haye were both wounded. All would have been slain or fallen into the hand of the enemy, ifRobert Bruce had not sent them all on before him, up a narrow, steeppath, and placed himself, with his armor and heavy horse, full in thepath, protecting the retreat with his single arm. It was true, that sotall and powerful a man, sheathed in armor and on horseback, had a greatadvantage against the wild Highlanders, who only wore a shirt and aplaid, with a round target upon the arm; but they were lithe, active, light-footed men, able to climb like goats on the crags around him, andholding their lives as cheaply as he did. 

Lorn, watching him from a distance, was struck with amazement, andexclaimed, 'Methinks, Marthokson, he resembles Gol Mak Morn protectinghis followers from Fingal;' thus comparing him to one the most brilliantchampions a Highland imagination could conceive. At last, three men, named M'Androsser, rushed forward, resolved to free their chief fromthis formidable enemy. There was a lake on one side, and a precipice onthe other, and the king had hardly space to manage his horse, when allthree sprang on him at once. One snatched his bridle, one caught him bythe stirrup and leg, and a third leaped from a rising ground and seatedhimself behind him on his horse. The first lost his arm by one sweep ofthe king's sword; the second was overthrown and trampled on; and thelast, by a desperate struggle, was dashed down, and his skull cleft bythe king's sword; but his dying grasp was so tight upon the plaid thatBruce was forced to unclasp the brooch that secured it, and leave bothin the dead man's hold. It was long preserved by the Macdougals of Lorn, as a trophy of the narrow escape of their enemy. 

Nor must we leave Robert the Bruce without mentioning that other GoldenDeed, more truly noble because more full of mercy; namely, his haltinghis little army in full retreat in Ireland in the face of the Englishhost under Roger Mortimer, that proper care and attendance might begiven to one sick and suffering washerwoman and her new-born babe. Wellmay his old Scotch rhyming chronicler remark:--

'This was a full great courtesyThat swilk a king and so mighty, Gert his men dwell on this manner, But for a poor lavender. '

We have seen how the sturdy Roman fought for his city, the fierceNorthman died to guard his comrades' rush to their ships after the lostbattle, and how the mail-clad knightly Bruce periled himself to securethe retreat of his friends. Here is one more instance, from far moremodern times, of a soldier, whose willing sacrifice of his own life wasthe safety of a whole army. It was in the course of the long dismalconflict between Frederick the Great of Prussia and Maria Theresa ofAustria, which was called the Seven Years' War. Louis XV. Of France hadtaken the part of Austria, and had sent an army into Germany in theautumn of 1760. From this the Marquis de Castries had been dispatched, with 25, 000 men, towards Rheinberg, and had taken up a strong positionat Klostercamp. On the night of the 15th of October, a young officer, called the Chevalier d'Assas, of the Auvergne regiment, was sent out toreconnoitre, and advanced alone into a wood, at some little distancefrom his men. Suddenly he found himself surrounded by a number ofsoldiers, whose bayonets pricked his breast, and a voice whispered inhis ear, 'Make the slightest noise, and you are a dead man!' In onemoment he understood it all. The enemy were advancing, to surprise theFrench army, and would be upon them when night was further advanced. That moment decided his fate. He shouted, as loud as his voice wouldcarry the words, 'Here, Auvergne! Here are the enemy!' By the time thecry reached the ears of his men, their captain was a senseless corpse;but his death had saved the army; the surprise had failed, and the enemyretreated. 

Louis XV was too mean-spirited and selfish to feel the beauty of thisbrave action; but when, fourteen years later, Louis XVI came to thethrone, he decreed that a pension should be given to the family as longas a male representative remained to bear the name of D'Assas. PoorLouis XVI had not long the control of the treasure of France; but acentury of changes, wars, and revolutions has not blotted out the memoryof the self-devotion of the chevalier; for, among the new war-steamersof the French fleet, there is one that bears the ever-honored name ofD'Assas. 

THE PASS OF THERMOPYLAE

B. C. 430

There was trembling in Greece. 'The Great King', as the Greeks calledthe chief potentate of the East, whose domains stretched from the IndianCaucasus to the Aegaeus, from the Caspian to the Red Sea, wasmarshalling his forces against the little free states that nestled amidthe rocks and gulfs of the Eastern Mediterranean. Already had his mightdevoured the cherished colonies of the Greeks on the eastern shore ofthe Archipelago, and every traitor to home institutions found a readyasylum at that despotic court, and tried to revenge his own wrongs bywhispering incitements to invasion. 'All people, nations, andlanguages, ' was the commencement of the decrees of that monarch's court;and it was scarcely a vain boast, for his satraps ruled over subjectkingdoms, and among his tributary nations he counted the Chaldean, withhis learning and old civilization, the wise and steadfast Jew, theskilful Phoenician, the learned Egyptian, the wild, free-booting Arab ofthe desert, the dark-skinned Ethiopian, and over all these ruled thekeen-witted, active native Persian race, the conquerors of all the rest, and led by a chosen band proudly called the Immortal. His many capitals--Babylon the great, Susa, Persepolis, and the like--were names of dreamysplendor to the Greeks, described now and then by Ionians from AsiaMinor who had carried their tribute to the king's own feet, or bycourtier slaves who had escaped with difficulty from being all tooserviceable at the tyrannic court. And the lord of this enormous empirewas about to launch his countless host against the little cluster ofstates, the whole of which together would hardly equal one province ofthe huge Asiatic realm! Moreover, it was a war not only on the men buton their gods. The Persians were zealous adorers of the sun and of fire, they abhorred the idol worship of the Greeks, and defiled and plunderedevery temple that fell in their way. Death and desolation were almostthe best that could be looked for at such hands--slavery and torturefrom cruelly barbarous masters would only too surely be the lot ofnumbers, should their land fall a prey to the conquerors. 

True it was that ten years back the former Great King had sent his besttroops to be signally defeated upon the coast of Attica; but the lossesat Marathon had but stimulated the Persian lust of conquest, and the newKing Xerxes was gathering together such myriads of men as should crushdown the Greeks and overrun their country by mere force of numbers. 

The muster place was at Sardis, and there Greek spies had seen themultitudes assembling and the state and magnificence of the king'sattendants. Envoys had come from him to demand earth and water from eachstate in Greece, as emblems that land and sea were his, but each statewas resolved to be free, and only Thessaly, that which lay first in hispath, consented to yield the token of subjugation. A council was held atthe Isthmus of Corinth, and attended by deputies from all the states ofGreece to consider of the best means of defense. The ships of the enemywould coast round the shores of the Aegean sea, the land army wouldcross the Hellespont on a bridge of boats lashed together, and marchsouthwards into Greece. The only hope of averting the danger lay indefending such passages as, from the nature of the ground, were sonarrow that only a few persons could fight hand to hand at once, so thatcourage would be of more avail than numbers. 

The first of all these passes was called Tempe, and a body of troops wassent to guard it; but they found that this was useless and impossible, and came back again. The next was at Thermopylae. Look in your map ofthe Archipelago, or Aegean Sea, as it was then called, for the greatisland of Negropont, or by its old name, Euboea. It looks like a piecebroken off from the coast, and to the north is shaped like the head of abird, with the beak running into a gulf, that would fit over it, uponthe main land, and between the island and the coast is an exceedinglynarrow strait. The Persian army would have to march round the edge ofthe gulf. They could not cut straight across the country, because theridge of mountains called Ceta rose up and barred their way. Indeed, thewoods, rocks, and precipices came down so near the seashore, that in twoplaces there was only room for one single wheel track between the steepsand the impassable morass that formed the border of the gulf on itssouth side. These two very narrow places were called the gates of thepass, and were about a mile apart. There was a little more width left inthe intervening space; but in this there were a number of springs ofwarm mineral water, salt and sulphurous, which were used for the sick tobathe in, and thus the place was called Thermopylae, or the Hot Gates. Awall had once been built across the western-most of these narrow places, when the Thessalians and Phocians, who lived on either side of it, hadbeen at war with one another; but it had been allowed to go to decay, since the Phocians had found out that there was a very steep narrowmountain path along the bed of a torrent, by which it was possible tocross from one territory to the other without going round this marshycoast road. 

This was, therefore, an excellent place to defend. The Greek ships wereall drawn up on the farther side of Euboea to prevent the Persianvessels from getting into the strait and landing men beyond the pass, and a division of the army was sent off to guard the Hot Gates. Thecouncil at the Isthmus did not know of the mountain pathway, and thoughtthat all would be safe as long as the Persians were kept out of thecoast path. 

The troops sent for this purpose were from different cities, andamounted to about 4, 000, who were to keep the pass against two millions. The leader of them was Leonidas, who had newly become one of the twokings of Sparta, the city that above all in Greece trained its sons tobe hardy soldiers, dreading death infinitely less than shame. Leonidashad already made up his mind that the expedition would probably be hisdeath, perhaps because a prophecy had been given at the Temple of Delphithat Sparta should be saved by the death of one of her kings of the raceof Hercules. He was allowed by law to take with him 300 men, and thesehe chose most carefully, not merely for their strength and courage, butselecting those who had sons, so that no family might be altogetherdestroyed. These Spartans, with their helots or slaves, made up his ownshare of the numbers, but all the army was under his generalship. It iseven said that the 300 celebrated their own funeral rites before theyset out, lest they should be deprived of them by the enemy, since, as wehave already seen, it was the Greek belief that the spirits of the deadfound no rest till their obsequies had been performed. Such preparationsdid not daunt the spirits of Leonidas and his men, and his wife, Gorgo, who was not a woman to be faint-hearted or hold him back. Long before, when she was a very little girl, a word of hers had saved her fatherfrom listening to a traitorous message from the King of Persia; andevery Spartan lady was bred up to be able to say to those she best lovedthat they must come home from battle 'with the shield or on it'--eithercarrying it victoriously or borne upon it as a corpse. 

When Leonidas came to Thermopylae, the Phocians told him of the mountainpath through the chestnut woods of Mount Ceta, and begged to have theprivilege of guarding it on a spot high up on the mountain side, assuring him that it was very hard to find at the other end, and thatthere was every probability that the enemy would never discover it. Heconsented, and encamping around the warm springs, caused the broken wallto be repaired, and made ready to meet the foe. 

The Persian army were seen covering the whole country like locusts, andthe hearts of some of the southern Greeks in the pass began to sink. Their homes in the Peloponnesus were comparatively secure--had they notbetter fall back and reserve themselves to defend the Isthmus ofCorinth? But Leonidas, though Sparta was safe below the Isthmus, had nointention of abandoning his northern allies, and kept the otherPeloponnesians to their posts, only sending messengers for further help. 

Presently a Persian on horseback rode up to reconnoitre the pass. Hecould not see over the wall, but in front of it, and on the ramparts, hesaw the Spartans, some of them engaged in active sports, and others incombing their long hair. He rode back to the king, and told him what hehad seen. Now, Xerxes had in his camp an exiled Spartan Prince, namedDemaratus, who had become a traitor to his country, and was serving ascounsellor to the enemy. Xerxes sent for him, and asked whether hiscountrymen were mad to be thus employed instead of fleeing away; butDemaratus made answer that a hard fight was no doubt in preparation, andthat it was the custom of the Spartans to array their hair with specialcare when they were about to enter upon any great peril. Xerxes would, however, not believe that so petty a force could intend to resist him, and waited four days, probably expecting his fleet to assist him, but asit did not appear, the attack was made. 

The Greeks, stronger men and more heavily armed, were far better able tofight to advantage than the Persians, with their short spears and wickershields, and beat them off with great ease. It is said that Xerxes threetimes leapt off his throne in despair at the sight of his troops beingdriven backwards; and thus for two days it seemed as easy to force a waythrough the Spartans as through the rocks themselves. Nay, how couldslavish troops, dragged from home to spread the victories of anambitious king, fight like freemen who felt that their strokes were todefend their homes and children!

But on that evening a wretched man, named Ephialtes, crept into thePersian camp, and offered, for a great sum of money, to show themountain path that would enable the enemy to take the brave defenders inthe rear! A Persian general, named Hydarnes, was sent off at nightfallwith a detachment to secure this passage, and was guided through thethick forests that clothed the hillside. In the stillness of the air, atdaybreak, the Phocian guards of the path were startled by the cracklingof the chestnut leaves under the tread of many feet. They started up, but a shower of arrows was discharged on them, and forgetting all savethe present alarm, they fled to a higher part of the mountain, and theenemy, without waiting to pursue them, began to descend. 

As day dawned, morning light showed the watchers of the Grecian campbelow a glittering and shimmering in the torrent bed where the shaggyforests opened; but it was not the sparkle of water, but the shine ofgilded helmets and the gleaming of silvered spears! Moreover, aCimmerian crept over to the wall from the Persian camp with tidings thatthe path had been betrayed, that the enemy were climbing it, and wouldcome down beyond the Eastern Gate. Still, the way was rugged andcircuitous, the Persians would hardly descend before midday, and therewas ample time for the Greeks to escape before they could be shut in bythe enemy. 

There was a short council held over the morning sacrifice. Megistias, the seer, on inspecting the entrails of the slain victim, declared, aswell he might, that their appearance boded disaster. Him Leonidasordered to retire, but he refused, though he sent home his only son. There was no disgrace to an ordinary tone of mind in leaving a post thatcould not be held, and Leonidas recommended all the allied troops underhis command to march away while yet the way was open. As to himself andhis Spartans, they had made up their minds to die at their post, andthere could be no doubt that the example of such a resolution would domore to save Greece than their best efforts could ever do if they werecareful to reserve themselves for another occasion. 

All the allies consented to retreat, except the eighty men who came fromMycenae and the 700 Thespians, who declared that they would not desertLeonidas. There were also 400 Thebans who remained; and thus the wholenumber that stayed with Leonidas to confront two million of enemies werefourteen hundred warriors, besides the helots or attendants on the 300Spartans, whose number is not known, but there was probably at least oneto each. Leonidas had two kinsmen in the camp, like himself, claimingthe blood of Hercules, and he tried to save them by giving them lettersand messages to Sparta; but one answered that 'he had come to fight, notto carry letters'; and the other, that 'his deeds would tell all thatSparta wished to know'. Another Spartan, named Dienices, when told thatthe enemy's archers were so numerous that their arrows darkened the sun, replied, 'So much the better, we shall fight in the shade. ' Two of the300 had been sent to a neighboring village, suffering severely from acomplaint in the eyes. One of them, called Eurytus, put on his armor, and commanded his helot to lead him to his place in the ranks; theother, called Aristodemus, was so overpowered with illness that heallowed himself to be carried away with the retreating allies. It wasstill early in the day when all were gone, and Leonidas gave the word tohis men to take their last meal. 'To-night, ' he said, 'we shall sup withPluto. '

Hitherto, he had stood on the defensive, and had husbanded the lives ofhis men; but he now desired to make as great a slaughter as possible, soas to inspire the enemy with dread of the Grecian name. He thereforemarched out beyond the wall, without waiting to be attacked, and thebattle began. The Persian captains went behind their wretched troops andscourged them on to the fight with whips! Poor wretches, they weredriven on to be slaughtered, pierced with the Greek spears, hurled intothe sea, or trampled into the mud of the morass; but their inexhaustiblenumbers told at length. The spears of the Greeks broke under hardservice, and their swords alone remained; they began to fall, andLeonidas himself was among the first of the slain. Hotter than ever wasthe fight over his corpse, and two Persian princes, brothers of Xerxes, were there killed; but at length word was brought that Hydarnes was overthe pass, and that the few remaining men were thus enclosed on allsides. The Spartans and Thespians made their way to a little hillockwithin the wall, resolved to let this be the place of their last stand;but the hearts of the Thebans failed them, and they came towards thePersians holding out their hands in entreaty for mercy. Quarter wasgiven to them, but they were all branded with the king's mark asuntrustworthy deserters. The helots probably at this time escaped intothe mountains; while the small desperate band stood side by side on thehill still fighting to the last, some with swords, others with daggers, others even with their hands and teeth, till not one living man remainedamongst them when the sun went down. There was only a mound of slain, bristled over with arrows. 

Twenty thousand Persians had died before that handful of men! Xerxesasked Demaratus if there were many more at Sparta like these, and wastold there were 8, 000. It must have been with a somewhat failing heartthat he invited his courtiers from the fleet to see what he had done tothe men who dared to oppose him! and showed them the head and arm ofLeonidas set up upon a cross; but he took care that all his own slain, except 1, 000, should first be put out of sight. The body of the braveking was buried where he fell, as were those of the other dead. Muchenvied were they by the unhappy Aristodemus, who found himself called byno name but the 'Coward', and was shunned by all his fellow-citizens. Noone would give him fire or water, and after a year of misery, heredeemed his honor by perishing in the forefront of the battle ofPlataea, which was the last blow that drove the Persians ingloriouslyfrom Greece. 

The Greeks then united in doing honor to the brave warriors who, hadthey been better supported, might have saved the whole country frominvasion. The poet Simonides wrote the inscriptions that were engravedupon the pillars that were set up in the pass to commemorate this greataction. One was outside the wall, where most of the fighting had been. It seems to have been in honor of the whole number who had for two daysresisted--

'Here did four thousand men from Pelops' landAgainst three hundred myriads bravely stand'. 

In honor of the Spartans was another column--

'Go, traveler, to Sparta tellThat here, obeying her, we fell'. 

On the little hillock of the last resistance was placed the figure of astone lion, in memory of Leonidas, so fitly named the lion-like, andSimonides, at his own expense, erected a pillar to his friend, the seerMegistias--

'The great Megistias' tomb you here may view, Who slew the Medes, fresh from Spercheius fords;Well the wise seer the coming death foreknew, Yet scorn'd he to forsake his Spartan lords'. 

The names of the 300 were likewise engraven on a pillar at Sparta. 

Lions, pillars, and inscriptions have all long since passed away, eventhe very spot itself has changed; new soil has been formed, and thereare miles of solid ground between Mount Ceta and the gulf, so that theHot Gates no longer exist. But more enduring than stone or brass--nay, than the very battlefield itself--has been the name of Leonidas. Twothousand three hundred years have sped since he braced himself to perishfor his country's sake in that narrow, marshy coast road, under the browof the wooded crags, with the sea by his side. Since that time how manyhearts have glowed, how many arms have been nerved at the remembrance ofthe Pass of Thermopylae, and the defeat that was worth so much more thana victory!

THE ROCK OF THE CAPITOL

B. C. 389

The city of Rome was gradually rising on the banks of the Tiber, andevery year was adding to its temples and public buildings. 

Every citizen loved his city and her greatness above all else. There wasas yet little wealth among them; the richest owned little more than afew acres, which they cultivated themselves by the help of theirfamilies, and sometimes of a few slaves, and the beautiful Campagna diRoma, girt in by hills looking like amethysts in the distance, had notthen become almost uninhabitable from pestilential air, but was rich andfertile, full of highly cultivated small farms, where corn was raised infurrows made by a small hand plough, and herds of sheep, goats, and oxenbrowsed in the pasture lands. The owners of these lands would on publicdays take off their rude working dress and broad-brimmed straw hat, andputting on the white toga with a purple hem, would enter the city, andgo to the valley called the Forum or Marketplace to give their votes forthe officers of state who were elected every year; especially the twoconsuls, who were like kings all but the crown, wore purple togas richlyembroidered, sat on ivory chairs, and were followed by lictors carryingan axe in a bundle of rods for the execution of justice. In their ownchamber sat the Senate, the great council composed of the patricians, orcitizens of highest birth, and of those who had formerly been consuls. They decided on peace or war, and made the laws, and were the realgovernors of the State, and their grave dignity made a great impressionon all who came near them. Above the buildings of the city rose steepand high the Capitoline Hill, with the Temple of Jupiter on its summit, and the strong wall in which was the chief stronghold and citadel ofRome, the Capitol, the very centre of her strength and resolution. Whena war was decided on, every citizen capable of bearing arms was calledinto the Forum, bringing his helmet, breast plate, short sword, andheavy spear, and the officers called tribunes, chose out a sufficientnumber, who were formed into bodies called legions, and marched tobattle under the command of one of the consuls. Many little States orItalian tribes, who had nearly the same customs as Rome, surrounded theCampagna, and so many disputes arose that every year, as soon as thecrops were saved, the armies marched out, the flocks were driven tofolds on the hills, the women and children were placed in the walledcities, and a battle was fought, sometimes followed up by the siege ofthe city of the defeated. The Romans did not always obtain the victory, but there was a staunchness about them that was sure to prevail in thelong run; if beaten one year, they came back to the charge the next, andthus they gradually mastered one of their neighbors after another, andspread their dominion over the central part of Italy. 

They were well used to Italian and Etruscan ways of making war, butafter nearly 400 years of this kind of fighting, a stranger and wilderenemy came upon them. These were the Gauls, a tall strong, brave people, long limbed and red-haired, of the same race as the highlanders ofScotland. They had gradually spread themselves over the middle ofEurope, and had for some generations past lived among the Alpinemountains, whence they used to come down upon the rich plans of northernItaly for forays, in which they slew and burnt, and drove off cattle, and now and then, when a country was quite depopulated, would settlethemselves in it. And thus, the Gauls conquering from the north and theRomans from the south, these two fierce nations at length came againstone another. 

The old Roman story is that it happened thus: The Gauls had an unusuallyable leader, whom Latin historians call Brennus, but whose real name wasmost likely Bran, and who is said to have come out of Britain. He hadbrought a great host of Gauls to attack Clusium, a Tuscan city, and theinhabitants sent to Rome to entreat succor. Three ambassadors, brothersof the noble old family of Fabius, were sent from Rome to intercede forthe Clusians. They asked Brennus what harm the men of Clusium had donethe Gauls, that they thus made war on them, and, according to Plutarch'saccount, Brennus made answer that the injury was that the Clusianspossessed land that the Gauls wanted, remarking that it was exactly theway in which the Romans themselves treated their neighbors, adding, however, that this was neither cruel nor unjust, but according--

 'To the good old planThat they should take who have the powerAnd they should keep who can. '

[Footnote: These lines of Wordsworth on Rob Roy's grave almost literallytranslate the speech Plutarch gives the first Kelt of history, Brennus. ]

The Fabii, on receiving this answer, were so foolish as to transgressthe rule, owned by the savage Gauls, that an ambassador should neitherfight nor be fought with; they joined the Clusians, and one brother, named Quintus, killed a remarkably large and tall Gallic chief in singlecombat. Brennus was justly enraged, and sent messengers to Rome todemand that the brothers should be given up to him for punishment. Thepriests and many of the Senate held that the rash young men had deserveddeath as covenant-breakers; but their father made strong interest forthem, and prevailed not only to have them spared, but even chosen astribunes to lead the legions in the war that was expected. [Footnote:These events happened during an experiment made by the Romans of havingsix military tribunes instead of two consuls. ] Thus he persuaded thewhole nation to take on itself the guilt of his sons, a want of trueself-devotion uncommon among the old Romans, and which was severelypunished. 

The Gauls were much enraged, and hurried southwards, not waiting forplunder by the way, but declaring that they were friends to every Statesave Rome. The Romans on their side collected their troops in haste, butwith a lurking sense of having transgressed; and since they had gainsaidthe counsel of their priests, they durst not have recourse to thesacrifices and ceremonies by which they usually sought to gain the favorof their gods. Even among heathens, the saying has often been verified, 'a sinful heart makes failing hand', and the battle on the banks of theRiver Allia, about eleven miles from Rome, was not so much a fight as arout. The Roman soldiers were ill drawn up, and were at once broken. Some fled to Veii and other towns, many were drowned in crossing theTiber, and it was but a few who showed in Rome their shame-strickenfaces, and brought word that the Gauls were upon them. 

Had the Gauls been really in pursuit, the Roman name and nation wouldhave perished under their swords; but they spent three day in feastingand sharing their plunder, and thus gave the Romans time to takemeasures for the safety of such as could yet escape. There seems to havebeen no notion of defending the city, the soldiers had been too muchdispersed; but all who still remained and could call up something oftheir ordinary courage, carried all the provisions they could collectinto the stronghold of the Capitol, and resolved to hold out there tillthe last, in hopes that the scattered army might muster again, or thatthe Gauls might retreat, after having revenged themselves on the city. Everyone who could not fight, took flight, taking with them all theycould carry, and among them went the white-clad troop of vestal virgins, carrying with them their censer of fire, which was esteemed sacred, andnever allowed to be extinguished. A man named Albinus, who saw thesesacred women footsore, weary, and weighted down with the treasures oftheir temple, removed his own family and goods from his cart and seatedthem in it--an act of reverence for which he was much esteemed--and thusthey reached the city of Cumae. The only persons left in Rome outsidethe Capitol were eighty of the oldest senators and some of the priests. Some were too feeble to fly, and would not come into the Capitol toconsume the food that might maintain fighting men; but most of them werefilled with a deep, solemn thought that, by offering themselves to theweapons of the barbarians, they might atone for the sin sanctioned bythe Republic, and that their death might be the saving of the nation. This notion that the death of a ruler would expiate a country's guiltwas one of the strange presages abroad in the heathen world of thatwhich alone takes away the sin of all mankind. 

On came the Gauls at last. The gates stood open, the streets weresilent, the houses' low-browed doors showed no one in the paved courts. No living man was to be seen, till at last, hurrying down the steepempty streets, they reached the great open space of the Forum, and therethey stood still in amazement, for ranged along a gallery were a row ofivory chairs, and in each chair sat the figure of a white-haired, white-bearded man, with arms and legs bare, and robes either of snowy white, white bordered with purple, or purple richly embroidered, ivory stavesin their hands, and majestic, unmoved countenances. So motionless werethey, that the Gauls stood still, not knowing whether they beheld men orstatues. A wondrous scene it must have been, as the brawny, red-hairedGauls, with freckled visage, keen little eyes, long broad sword, andwide plaid garment, fashioned into loose trousers, came curiously downinto the marketplace, one after another; and each stood silent andtransfixed at the spectacle of those grand figures, still unmoving, savethat their large full liquid dark eyes showed them to be living beings. Surely these Gauls deemed themselves in the presence of that council ofkings who were sometimes supposed to govern Rome, nay, if they were notbefore the gods themselves. At last, one Gaul, ruder, or more curiousthan the rest, came up to one of the venerable figures, and, to makeproof whether he were flesh and blood, stroked his beard. Such an insultfrom an uncouth barbarian was more than Roman blood could brook, and theGaul soon had his doubt satisfied by a sharp blow on the head from theivory staff. All reverence was dispelled by that stroke; it was at oncereturned by a death thrust, and the fury of the savages wakening inproportion to the awe that had at first struck them, they rushed on theold senators, and slew each one in his curule chair. 

Then they dispersed through the city, burning, plundering, anddestroying. To take the Capitol they soon found to be beyond theirpower, but they hoped to starve the defenders out; and in the meantimethey spent their time in pulling down the outer walls, and such housesand temples as had resisted the fire, till the defenders of the Capitollooked down from their height on nothing but desolate black burntground, with a few heaps of ruins in the midst, and the barbariansroaming about in it, and driving in the cattle that their foragingparties collected from the country round. There was much earnest faithin their own religion among the Romans: they took all this ruin as thejust reward of their shelter of the Fabii, and even in their extremitywere resolved not to transgress any sacred rule. Though food dailybecame more scarce and starvation was fast approaching, not one of thesacred geese that were kept in Juno's Temple was touched; and one FabiusDorso, who believed that the household gods of his family requiredyearly a sacrifice on their own festival day on the Quirinal Hill, arrayed himself in the white robes of a sacrificer, took his sacredimages in his arms, and went out of the Capitol, through the midst ofthe enemy, through the ruins to the accustomed alter, and therepreformed the regular rites. The Gauls, seeing that it was a religiousceremony, let him pass through them untouched, and he returned insafety; but Brennus was resolved on completing his conquest, and whilehalf his forces went out to plunder, he remained with the other half, watching the moment to effect an entrance into the Capitol; and how werethe defenders, worn out with hunger, to resist without relief fromwithout? And who was there to bring relief to them, who were themselvesthe Roman State and government?

Now there was a citizen, named Marcus Furius Camillus, who was, withoutquestion, at that time, the first soldier of Rome, and had taken severalof the chief Italian cities, especially that of Veii, which had longbeen a most dangerous enemy. But he was a proud, haughty man, and hadbrought on himself much dislike; until, at last, a false accusation wasbrought against him, that he had taken an unfair share of the plunder ofVeii. He was too proud to stand a trial; and leaving the city, wasimmediately fined a considerable sum. He had taken up his abode at thecity of Ardea, and was there living when the plundering half of Brennus'army was reported to be coming thither. Camillus immediately offered themagistrates to undertake their defense; and getting together all the menwho could bear arms, he led them out, fell upon the Gauls as they alllay asleep and unguarded in the dead of night, made a great slaughter ofthem, and saved Ardea. All this was heard by the many Romans who hadbeen living dispersed since the rout of Allia; and they began to recoverheart and spirit, and to think that if Camillus would be their leader, they might yet do something to redeem the honor of Rome, and save theirfriends in the Capitol. An entreaty was sent to him to take the commandof them; but, like a proud, stern man as he was, he made answer, that hewas a mere exile, and could not take upon himself to lead Romans withouta decree from the Senate giving him authority. The Senate was--all thatremained of it--shut up in the Capitol; the Gauls were spread all round;how was that decree to be obtained?

A young man, named Pontius Cominius, undertook the desperate mission. Heput on a peasant dress, and hid some corks under it, supposing that heshould find no passage by the bridge over the Tiber. Traveling all dayon foot, he came at night to the bank, and saw the guard at the bridge;then, having waited for darkness, he rolled his one thin light garment, with the corks wrapped up in it, round his head, and trusted himself tothe stream of Father Tiber, like 'good Horatius' before him; and he wassafely borne along to the foot of the Capitoline Hill. He crept along, avoiding every place where he saw lights or heard noise, till he came toa rugged precipice, which he suspected would not be watched by theenemy, who would suppose it too steep to be climbed from above or below. But the resolute man did not fear the giddy dangerous ascent, even inthe darkness; he swung himself up by the stems and boughs of the vinesand climbing plants, his naked feet clung to the rocks and tufts ofgrass, and at length he stood on the top of the rampart, calling out hisname to the soldiers who came in haste around him, not knowing whetherhe were friend or foe. A joyful sound must his Latin speech have been tothe long-tried, half starved garrison, who had not seen a fresh face forsix long months! The few who represented the Senate and people of Romewere hastily awakened from their sleep, and gathered together to hearthe tidings brought them at so much risk. Pontius told them of thevictory at Ardea, and that Camillus and the Romans collected at Veiiwere only waiting to march to their succor till they should give himlawful power to take the command. There was little debate. The vote waspassed at once to make Camillus Dictator, an office to which Romans wereelected upon great emergencies, and which gave them, for the time, absolute kingly control; and then Pontius, bearing the appointment, setoff once again upon his mission, still under shelter of night, clambereddown the rock, and crossed the Gallic camp before the barbarians wereyet awake. 

There was hope in the little garrison; but danger was not over. Thesharp-eyed Gauls observed that the shrubs and creepers were broken, themoss frayed, and fresh stones and earth rolled down at the crag of theCapitol: they were sure that the rock had been climbed, and, therefore, that it might be climbed again. Should they, who were used to the snowypeaks, dark abysses, and huge glaciers of the Alps, be afraid to climbwhere a soft dweller in a tame Italian town could venture a passage?Brennus chose out the hardiest of his mountaineers, and directed them toclimb up in the dead of night, one by one, in perfect silence, and thusto surprise the Romans, and complete the slaughter and victory, beforethe forces assembling at Veii would come to their rescue. 

Silently the Gauls climbed, so stilly that not even a dog heard them;and the sentinel nearest to the post, who had fallen into a dead sleepof exhaustion from hunger, never awoke. But the fatal stillness wassuddenly broken by loud gabbling, cackling, and flapping of heavy wings. The sacred geese of Juno, which had been so religiously spared in thefamine, were frightened by the rustling beneath, and proclaimed theirterror in their own noisy fashion. The first to take the alarm wasMarcus Manlius, who started forward just in time to meet the foremostclimbers as they set foot on the rampart. One, who raised an axe tostrike, lost his arm by one stroke of Manlius' short Roman sword; thenext was by main strength hurled backwards over the precipice, andManlius stood along on the top, for a few moments, ready to strike thenext who should struggle up. The whole of the garrison were in a fewmoments on the alert, and the attack was entirely repulsed; the sleepingsentry was cast headlong down the rock; and Manlius was brought, by eachgrateful soldier, that which was then most valuable to all, a littlemeal and a small measure of wine. Still, the condition of the Capitolwas lamentable; there was no certainty that Pontius had ever reachedCamillus in safety; and, indeed, the discovery of his path by the enemywould rather have led to the supposition that he had been seized anddetected. The best hope lay in wearying out the besiegers; and thereseemed to be more chance of this since the Gauls often could be seenfrom the heights, burying the corpses of their dead; their tall, bonyforms looked gaunt and drooping, and, here and there, unburied carcasseslay amongst the ruins. Nor were the flocks and herds any longer drivenin from the country. Either all must have been exhausted, or elseCamillus and his friends must be near, and preventing their raids. Atany rate, it appeared as if the enemy was quite as ill off as toprovisions as the garrison, and in worse condition as to health. Ineffect, this was the first example of the famous saying, that Romedestroys her conquerors. In this state of things one of the Romans had adream that Jupiter, the special god of the Capitol, appeared to him, andgave the strange advice that all the remaining flour should be baked, and the loaves thrown down into the enemy's camp. Telling the dream, which may, perhaps, have been the shaping of his own thoughts, that thisapparent waste would persuade the barbarians that the garrison could notsoon be starved out, this person obtained the consent of the rest of thebesieged. Some approved the stratagem, and no one chose to act contraryto Jupiter's supposed advice; so the bread was baked, and tossed down bythe hungry men. 

After a time, there was a report from the outer guards that the Gallicwatch had been telling them that their leader would be willing to speakwith some of the Roman chiefs. Accordingly, Sulpitius, one of thetribunes, went out, and had a conference with Brennus, who declared thathe would depart, provided the Romans would lay down a ransom, for theirCapital and their own lives, of a thousand pounds' weight of gold. Tothis Sulpitius agreed, and returning to the Capitol, the gold wascollected from the treasury, and carried down to meet the Gauls, whobrought their own weights. The weights did not meet the amount of goldornaments that had been contributed for the purpose, and no doubt theGauls were resolved to have all that they beheld; for when Sulpitius wasabout to try to arrange the balance, Brennus insultingly threw his swordinto his own scale, exclaiming, Voe victis! 'Woe to the conquered!' TheRoman was not yet fallen so low as not to remonstrate, and the disputewas waxing sharp, when there was a confused outcry in the Gallic camp, ashout from the heights of the Capitol, and into the midst of the openspace rode a band of Roman patricians and knights in armor, with theDictator Camillus at their head. 

He no sooner saw what was passing, than he commanded the treasure to betaken back, and, turning to Brennus, said, 'It is with iron, not gold, that the Romans guard their country. '

Brennus declared that the treaty had been sworn to, and that it would bea breach of faith to deprive him of the ransom; to which Camillusreplied, that he himself was Dictator, and no one had the power to makea treaty in his absence. The dispute was so hot, that they drew theirswords against one another, and there was a skirmish among the ruins;but the Gauls soon fell back, and retreated to their camp, when they sawthe main body of Camillus' army marching upon them. It was no less than40, 000 in number; and Brennus knew he could not withstand them with hisbroken, sickly army. He drew off early the next morning: but wasfollowed by Camillus, and routed, with great slaughter, about eightmiles from Rome; and very few of the Gauls lived to return home, forthose who were not slain in battle were cut off in their flight by thecountry people, whom they had plundered. 

In reward for their conduct on this occasion, Camillus was termedRomulus, Father of his Country, and Second Founder of Rome; MarcusManlius received the honorable surname of Capitolinus; and even thegeese were honored by having a golden image raised to their honor inJuno's temple, and a live goose was yearly carried in triumph, upon asoft litter, in a golden cage, as long as any heathen festivals lasted. The reward of Pontius Cominius does not appear; but surely he, and theold senators who died for their country's sake, deserved to be for everremembered for their brave contempt of life when a service could be doneto the State. 

The truth of the whole narrative is greatly doubted, and it is suspectedthat the Gallic conquest was more complete than the Romans ever chose toavow. Their history is far from clear up to this very epoch, when it issaid that all their records were destroyed; but even when place andperiod are misty, great names and the main outline of their actions loomthrough the cloud, perhaps exaggerated, but still with some reality; andif the magnificent romance of the sack of Rome be not fact, yet it iscertainly history, and well worthy of note and remembrance, as one ofthe finest extant traditions of a whole chain of Golden Deeds. 

THE TWO FRIENDS OF SYRACUSE

B. C. 380 (CIRCA)

Most of the best and noblest of the Greeks held what was called thePythagorean philosophy. This was one of the many systems framed by thegreat men of heathenism, when by the feeble light of nature they were, as St. Paul says, 'seeking after God, if haply they might feel afterHim', like men groping in the darkness. Pythagoras lived before the timeof history, and almost nothing is known about him, though his teachingand his name were never lost. There is a belief that he had traveled inthe East, and in Egypt, and as he lived about the time of the dispersionof the Israelites, it is possible that some of his purest and bestteaching might have been crumbs gathered from their fuller instructionthrough the Law and the Prophets. One thing is plain, that even indealing with heathenism the Divine rule holds good, 'By their fruits yeshall know them'. Golden Deeds are only to be found among men whosebelief is earnest and sincere, and in something really high and noble. Where there was nothing worshiped but savage or impure power, and thevery form of adoration was cruel and unclean, as among the Canaanitesand Carthaginians, there we find no true self-devotion. The great deedsof the heathen world were all done by early Greeks and Romans before yetthe last gleams of purer light had faded out of their belief, and whiletheir moral sense still nerved them to energy; or else by such laterGreeks as had embraced the deeper and more earnest yearnings of theminds that had become a 'law unto themselves'. 

The Pythagoreans were bound together in a brotherhood, the members ofwhich had rules that are not now understood, but which linked them so asto form a sort of club, with common religious observances and pursuitsof science, especially mathematics and music. And they were taught torestrain their passions, especially that of anger, and to endure withpatience all kinds of suffering; believing that such self-restraintbrought them nearer to the gods, and that death would set them free fromthe prison of the body. The souls of evil-doers would, they thought, pass into the lower and more degraded animals, while those of good menwould be gradually purified, and rise to a higher existence. This, though lamentably deficient, and false in some points, was a realreligion, inasmuch as it gave a rule of life, with a motive for strivingfor wisdom and virtue. Two friends of this Pythagorean sect lived atSyracuse, in the end of the fourth century before the Christian era. Syracuse was a great Greek city, built in Sicily, and full of all kindsof Greek art and learning; but it was a place of danger in their time, for it had fallen under the tyranny of a man of strange and capricioustemper, though of great abilities, namely Dionysius. He is said to havebeen originally only a clerk in a public office, but his talents raisedhim to continually higher situations, and at length, in a great war withthe Carthaginians, who had many settlements in Sicily, he became generalof the army, and then found it easy to establish his power over thecity. 

This power was not according to the laws, for Syracuse, like most othercities, ought to have been governed by a council of magistrates; butDionysius was an exceedingly able man, and made the city much more richand powerful, he defeated the Carthaginians, and rendered Syracuse byfar the chief city in the island, and he contrived to make everyone somuch afraid of him that no one durst attempt to overthrow his power. Hewas a good scholar, and very fond of philosophy and poetry, and hedelighted to have learned men around him, and he had naturally agenerous spirit; but the sense that he was in a position that did notbelong to him, and that everyone hated him for assuming it, made himvery harsh and suspicious. It is of him that the story is told, that hehad a chamber hollowed in the rock near his state prison, andconstructed with galleries to conduct sounds like an ear, so that hemight overhear the conversation of his captives; and of him, too, istold that famous anecdote which has become a proverb, that on hearing afriend, named Damocles, express a wish to be in his situation for asingle day, he took him at his word, and Damocles found himself at abanquet with everything that could delight his senses, delicious food, costly wine, flowers, perfumes, music; but with a sword with the pointalmost touching his head, and hanging by a single horsehair! This was toshow the condition in which a usurper lived!

Thus Dionysius was in constant dread. He had a wide trench round hisbedroom, with a drawbridge that he drew up and put down with his ownhands; and he put one barber to death for boasting that he held a razorto the tyrant's throat every morning. After this he made his youngdaughters shave him; but by and by he would not trust them with a razor, and caused them to singe of his beard with hot nutshells! He was said tohave put a man named Antiphon to death for answering him, when he askedwhat was the best kind of brass, 'That of which the statues of Harmodiusand Aristogeiton were made. ' These were the two Athenians who had killedthe sons of Pisistratus the tyrant, so that the jest was most offensive, but its boldness might have gained forgiveness for it. One philosopher, named Philoxenus, he sent to a dungeon for finding fault with hispoetry, but he afterwards composed another piece, which he thought sosuperior, that he could not be content without sending for this adversecritic to hear it. When he had finished reading it, he looked toPhiloxenus for a compliment; but the philosopher only turned round tothe guards, and said dryly, 'Carry me back to prison. ' This timeDionysius had the sense to laugh, and forgive his honesty. 

All these stories may not be true; but that they should have beencurrent in the ancient world shows what was the character of the man ofwhom they were told, how stern and terrible was his anger, and howeasily it was incurred. Among those who came under it was a Pythagoreancalled Pythias, who was sentenced to death, according to the usual fateof those who fell under his suspicion. 

Pythias had lands and relations in Greece, and he entreated as a favorto be allowed to return thither and arrange his affairs, engaging toreturn within a specified time to suffer death. The tyrant laughed hisrequest to scorn. Once safe out of Sicily, who would answer for hisreturn? Pythias made reply that he had a friend, who would becomesecurity for his return; and while Dionysius, the miserable man whotrusted nobody, was ready to scoff at his simplicity, anotherPythagorean, by name of Damon, came forward, and offered to becomesurety for his friend, engaging, if Pythias did not return according topromise, to suffer death in his stead. 

Dionysius, much astonished, consented to let Pythias go, marveling whatwould be the issue of the affair. Time went on and Pythias did notappear. The Syracusans watched Damon, but he showed no uneasiness. Hesaid he was secure of his friend's truth and honor, and that if anyaccident had cause the delay of his return, he should rejoice in dyingto save the life of one so dear to him. 

Even to the last day Damon continued serene and content, however itmight fall out; nay even when the very hour drew nigh and still noPythias. His trust was so perfect, that he did not even grieve at havingto die for a faithless friend who had left him to the fate to which hehad unwarily pledged himself. It was not Pythias' own will, but thewinds and waves, so he still declared, when the decree was brought andthe instruments of death made ready. The hour had come, and a fewmoments more would have ended Damon's life, when Pythias duly presentedhimself, embraced his friend, and stood forward himself to receive hissentence, calm, resolute, and rejoiced that he had come in time. 

Even the dim hope they owned of a future state was enough to make thesetwo brave men keep their word, and confront death for one anotherwithout quailing. Dionysius looked on more struck than ever. He feltthat neither of such men must die. He reversed the sentence of Pythias, and calling the two to his judgment seat, he entreated them to admit himas a third in their friendship. Yet all the time he must have known itwas a mockery that he should ever be such as they were to each other--hewho had lost the very power of trusting, and constantly sacrificedothers to secure his own life, whilst they counted not their lives dearto them in comparison with their truth to their word, and love to oneanother. No wonder that Damon and Pythias have become such a byword thatthey seem too well known to have their story told here, except that aname in everyone's mouth sometimes seems to be mentioned by those whohave forgotten or never heard the tale attached to it. 

THE DEVOTION OF THE DECII

B. C. 339

The spirit of self-devotion is so beautiful and noble, that even whenthe act is performed in obedience to the dictates of a false religion, it is impossible not to be struck with admiration and almost reverencefor the unconscious type of the one great act that has hallowed everyother sacrifice. Thus it was that Codrus, the Athenian king, has eversince been honored for the tradition that he gave his own life to securethe safety of his people; and there is a touching story, with neithername nor place, of a heathen monarch who was bidden by his priests toappease the supposed wrath of his gods by the sacrifice of the beingdearest to him. His young son had been seized on as his most beloved, when his wife rushed between and declared that her son must live, andnot by his death rob her of her right to fall, as her husband's dearest. The priest looked at the father; the face that had been sternly composedbefore was full of uncontrolled anguish as he sprang forward to save thewife rather than the child. That impulse was an answer, like theentreaty of the mother before Solomon; the priest struck the fatal blowere the king's hand could withhold him, and the mother died with a lastlook of exceeding joy at her husband's love and her son's safety. Humansacrifices are of course accursed, and even the better sort of heathensviewed them with horror; but the voluntary confronting of death, even atthe call of a distorted presage of future atonement, required qualitiesthat were perhaps the highest that could be exercised among those whowere devoid of the light of truth. 

In the year 339 there was a remarkable instance of such devotion. TheRomans were at war with the Latins, a nation dwelling to the south ofthem, and almost exactly resembling themselves in language, habits, government, and fashions of fighting. Indeed the city of Rome itself wasbut an offshoot from the old Latin kingdom; and there was not muchdifference between the two nations even in courage and perseverance. Thetwo consuls of the year were Titus Manlius Torquatus and Publius DeciusMus. They were both very distinguished men. Manlius was a patrician, orone of the high ancient nobles of Rome, and had in early youth fought asingle combat with a gigantic Gaul, who offered himself, like Goliath, as a champion of his tribe; had slain him, and taken from him a goldtorque, or collar, whence his surname Torquatus. Decius was a plebeian;one of the free though not noble citizens who had votes, but only withina few years had been capable of being chosen to the higher offices ofstate, and who looked upon every election to the consulship as avictory. Three years previously, when a tribune in command of a legion, Decius had saved the consul, Cornelius Cossus, from a dangeroussituation, and enabled him to gain a great victory; and this exploit wasremembered, and led to the choice of this well-experienced soldier asthe colleague of Manlius. 

The two consuls both went out together in command of the forces, eachhaving a separate army, and intending to act in concert. They marched tothe beautiful country at the foot of Mount Vesuvius, which was then aharmless mountain clothed with chestnut woods, with spaces openingbetween, where farms and vineyards rejoiced in the sunshine and thefresh breezes of the lovely blue bay that lay stretched beneath. Thosewho climbed to the summit might indeed find beds of ashes and the jaggededge of a huge basin or gulf; the houses and walls were built of dark-red and black material that once had flowed from the crater in boilingtorrents: but these had long since cooled, and so long was it since acolumn of smoke had been seen to rise from the mountain top, that itonly remained as a matter of tradition that this region was one ofmysterious fire, and that the dark cool lake Avernus, near the mountainskirts, was the very entrance to the shadowy realms beneath, that weresupposed to be inhabited by the spirits of the dead. 

It might be that the neighborhood of this lake, with the dreadimaginations connected with it by pagan fancy, influenced even the stouthearts of the consuls; for, the night after they came in sight of theenemy, each dreamt the same dream, namely, that he beheld a mighty formof gigantic height and stature, who told him 'that the victory wasdecreed to that army of the two whose leader should devote himself tothe Dii Manes, ' that is, to the deities who watched over the shades ofthe dead. Probably these older Romans held the old Etruscan belief, which took these 'gods beneath' to be winged beings, who bore away thedeparting soul, weighted its merits and demerits, and placed it in aregion of peace or of woe, according to its deserts. This was part ofthe grave and earnest faith that gave the earlier Romans such truth andresolution; but latterly they so corrupted it with the Greek myths, that, in after times, they did not even know who the gods of Deciuswere. 

At daybreak the two consuls sought one another out, and told theirdreams; and they agreed that they would join their armies in one, Deciusleading the right and Manlius the left wing; and that whichever foundhis troops giving way, should at once rush into the enemy's columns anddie, to secure the victory to his colleague. At the same time strictcommands were given that no Roman should come out of his rank to fightin single combat with the enemy; a necessary regulation, as the Latinswere so like, in every respect, to the Romans, that there would havebeen fatal confusion had there been any mingling together before thebattle. Just as this command had been given out, young Titus Manlius, the son of the consul, met a Latin leader, who called him by name andchallenged him to fight hand to hand. The youth was emulous of the honorhis father had gained by his own combat at the same age with the Gaul, but forgot both the present edict and that his father had scrupulouslyasked permission before accepting the challenge. He at once cameforward, and after a brave conflict, slew his adversary, and taking hisarmor, presented himself at his father's tent and laid the spoils at hisfeet. 

But old Manlius turned aside sadly, and collected his troops to hear hisaddress to his son: 'You have transgressed, ' he said, 'the disciplinewhich has been the support of the Roman people, and reduced me to thehard necessity of either forgetting myself and mine, or else the regardI owe to the general safety. Rome must not suffer by one fault. We mustexpiate it ourselves. A sad example shall we be, but a wholesome one tothe Roman youth. For me, both the natural love of a father, and thatspecimen thou hast given of thy valor move me exceedingly; but sinceeither the consular authority must be established by thy death, ordestroyed by thy impunity, I cannot think, if thou be a true Manlius, that thou wilt be backward to repair the breach thou hast made inmilitary discipline by undergoing the just meed of thine offence. Hethen placed the wreath of leaves, the reward of a victor, upon his son'shead, and gave the command to the lictor to bind the young man to astake, and strike off his head. The troops stood round as men stunned, no one durst utter a word; the son submitted without one complaint, since his death was for the good of Rome: and the father, trusting thatthe doom of the Dii Manes was about to overtake him, beheld the bravebut rash young head fall, then watched the corpse covered with thetrophies won from the Latins, and made no hindrance to the gloriousobsequies with which the whole army honored this untimely death. Strictdiscipline was indeed established, and no one again durst break hisrank; but the younger men greatly hated Manlius for his severity, andgave him no credit for the agony he had concealed while giving up hisgallant son to the wellbeing of Rome. 

A few days after, the expected battle took place, and after some littletime the front rank of Decius' men began to fall back upon the line intheir rear. This was the token he had waited for. He called to Valerius, the chief priest of Rome, to consecrate him, and was directed to put onhis chief robe of office, the beautiful toga proetexta, to cover hishead, and standing on his javelin, call aloud to the 'nine gods' toaccept his devotion, to save the Roman legions, and strike terror intohis enemies. This done, he commanded his lictors to carry word to hiscolleague that the sacrifice was accomplished, and then girding his roberound him in the manner adopted in sacrificing to the gods, he mountedhis white horse, and rushed like lightning into the thickest of theLatins. At first they fell away on all sides as if some heavenlyapparition had come down on them; then, as some recognized him, theyclosed in on him, and pierced his breast with their weapons; but even ashe fell the superstition that a devoted leader was sure to win thefield, came full on their minds, they broke and fled. Meanwhile themessage came to Manlius, and drew from him a burst of tears--tears thathe had not shed for his son--his hope of himself meeting the doom andending his sorrow was gone; but none the less he nerved himself tocomplete the advantage gained by Decius' death. Only one wing of theLatins had fled, the other fought long and bravely, and when at last itwas defeated, and cut down on the field of battle, both conqueror andconquered declared that, if Manlius had been the leader of the Latins, they would have had the victory. Manlius afterwards completely subduedthe Latins, who became incorporated with the Romans; but bravely as hehad borne up, his health gave way under his sorrow, and before the endof the year he was unable to take the field. 

Forty-five years later, in the year 294, another Decius was consul. Hewas the son of the first devoted Decius, and had shown himself worthy ofhis name, both as a citizen and soldier. His first consulate had been inconjunction with one of the most high-spirited and famous Roman nobles, Quintus Fabius, surnamed Maximus, or the Greatest, and at three years'end they were again chosen together, when the Romans had been broughtinto considerable peril by an alliance between the Gauls and theSamnites, their chief enemies in Italy. 

One being a patrician and the other a plebeian, there was every attemptmade at Rome to stir up jealousies and dissensions between them; butboth were much too noble and generous to be thus set one against theother; and when Fabius found how serious was the state of affairs inEtruria, he sent to Rome to entreat that Decius would come and act withhim. 'With him I shall never want forces, nor have too many enemies todeal with. '

The Gauls, since the time of Brennus, had so entirely settled innorthern Italy, that it had acquired the name of Cisalpine Gaul, andthey were as warlike as ever, while better armed and trained. The unitedarmies of Gauls, Samnites, and their allies, together, are said to haveamounted to 143, 330 foot and 46, 000 horse, and the Roman army consistedof four legions, 24, 000 in all, with an unspecified number of horse. Theplace of battle was at Sentinum, and here for the first time the Gaulsbrought armed chariots into use, --probably the wicker chariots, withscythes in the midst of the clumsy wooden wheels, which were used by theKelts in Britain two centuries later. It was the first time the Romanshad encountered these barbarous vehicles; they were taken by surprise, the horses started, and could not be brought back to the charge, and thelegions were mowed down like corn where the furious Gaul impelled hisscythe. Decius shouted in vain, and tried to gather his men and leadthem back; but the terror at this new mode of warfare had so masteredthem, that they paid no attention to his call. Then, half in policy, half in superstition, he resolved to follow his father in his death. Hecalled the chief priest, Marcus Livius, and standing on his javelin, went through the same formula of self-dedication, and in the like mannerthrew himself, alone and unarmed, in the midst of the enemy, among whomhe soon fell, under many a savage stroke. The priest, himself a gallantsoldier, called to the troops that their victory was now secured, andthoroughly believing him, they let him lead them back to the charge, androuted the Gauls; whilst Fabius so well did his part against the othernations, that the victory was complete, and 25, 000 enemies were slain. So covered was the body of Decius by the corpses of his enemies, thatall that day it could not be found; but on the next it was discovered, and Fabius, with a full heart, pronounced the funeral oration of thesecond Decius, who had willingly offered himself to turn the tide ofbattle in favor of his country. It was the last of such acts ofdedication--the Romans became more learned and philosophical, andperhaps more reasonable; and yet, mistaken as was the object, it seems afalling off that, 200 years later, Cicero should not know who were the'nine gods' of the Decii, and should regard their sacrifice as 'heroicindeed, but unworthy of men of understanding'. 

REGULUS

B. C. 249

The first wars that the Romans engaged in beyond the bounds of Italy, were with the Carthaginians. This race came from Tyre and Zidon; andwere descended from some of the Phoenicians, or Zidonians, who were suchdangerous foes, or more dangerous friends, to the Israelites. Carthagehad, as some say, been first founded by some of the Canaanites who fledwhen Joshua conquered the Promised Land; and whether this were so ornot, the inhabitants were in all their ways the same as the Tyrians andZidonians, of whom so much is said in the prophecies of Isaiah andEzekiel. Like them, they worshipped Baal and Ashtoreth, and thefrightful Moloch, with foul and cruel rites; and, like them, they wereexcellent sailors and great merchants trading with every known country, and living in great riches and splendor at their grand city on thesouthern shore of the Mediterranean. That they were a wicked and cruelrace is also certain; the Romans used to call deceit Punic faith, thatis, Phoenician faith, and though no doubt Roman writers show them up intheir worst colours, yet, after the time of Hiram, Solomon's ally atTyre, it is plain from Holy Scripture that their crimes were great. 

The first dispute between Rome and Carthage was about their possessionin the island of Sicily; and the war thus begun had lasted eight yearswhen it was resolved to send an army to fight the Carthaginians on theirown shores. The army and fleet were placed under the command of the twoconsuls, Lucius Manlius and Marcus Attilius Regulus. On the way, therewas a great sea fight with the Carthaginian fleet, and this was thefirst naval battle that the Romans ever gained. It made the way toAfrica free; but the soldiers, who had never been so far from homebefore, murmured, for they expected to meet not only human enemies, butmonstrous serpents, lions, elephants, asses with horns, and dog-headedmonsters, to have a scorching sun overhead, and a noisome marsh undertheir feet. However, Regulus sternly put a stop to all murmurs, bymaking it known that disaffection would be punished by death, and thearmy safely landed, and set up a fortification at Clypea, and plunderedthe whole country round. Orders here came from Rome that Manlius shouldreturn thither, but that Regulus should remain to carry on the war. Thiswas a great grief to him. He was a very poor man, with nothing of hisown but a little farm of seven acres, and the person whom he hademployed to cultivate it had died in his absence; a hired laborer hadundertaken the care of it, but had been unfaithful, and had run awaywith his tools and his cattle; so that he was afraid that, unless hecould return quickly, his wife and children would starve. However, theSenate engaged to provide for his family, and he remained, makingexpeditions into the country round, in the course of which the Romansreally did fall in with a serpent as monstrous as their imagination haddepicted. It was said to be 120 feet long, and dwelt upon the banks ofthe River Bagrada, where it used to devour the Roman soldiers as theywent to fetch water. It had such tough scales that they were obliged toattack it with their engines meant for battering city walls, and onlysucceeded with much difficulty in destroying it. 

The country was most beautiful, covered with fertile cornfields and fullof rich fruit trees, and all the rich Carthaginians had country housesand gardens, which were made delicious with fountains, trees, andflowers. The Roman soldiers, plain, hardy, fierce, and pitiless, did, itmust be feared, cruel damage among these peaceful scenes; they boastedof having sacked 300 villages, and mercy was not yet known to them. TheCarthaginian army, though strong in horsemen and in elephants, kept uponthe hills and did nothing to save the country, and the wild deserttribes of Numidians came rushing in to plunder what the Romans had left. The Carthaginians sent to offer terms of peace; but Regulus, who hadbecome uplifted by his conquests, made such demands that the messengersremonstrated. He answered, 'Men who are good for anything should eitherconquer or submit to their betters;' and he sent them rudely away, likea stern old Roman as he was. His merit was that he had no more mercy onhimself than on others. 

The Carthaginians were driven to extremity, and made horrible offeringsto Moloch, giving the little children of the noblest families to bedropped into the fire between the brazen hands of his statue, and grown-up people of the noblest families rushed in of their own accord, hopingthus to propitiate their gods, and obtain safety for their country. Their time was not yet fully come, and a respite was granted to them. They had sent, in their distress, to hire soldiers in Greece, and amongthese came a Spartan, named Xanthippus, who at once took the command, and led the army out to battle, with a long line of elephants ranged infront of them, and with clouds of horsemen hovering on the wings. TheRomans had not yet learnt the best mode of fighting with elephants, namely, to leave lanes in their columns where these huge beasts mightadvance harmlessly; instead of which, the ranks were thrust and trampleddown by the creatures' bulk, and they suffered a terrible defeat;Regulus himself was seized by the horsemen, and dragged into Carthage, where the victors feasted and rejoiced through half the night, andtestified their thanks to Moloch by offering in his fires the bravest oftheir captives. 

Regulus himself was not, however, one of these victims. He was kept aclose prisoner for two years, pining and sickening in his loneliness, while in the meantime the war continued, and at last a victory sodecisive was gained by the Romans, that the people of Carthage werediscouraged, and resolved to ask terms of peace. They thought that noone would be so readily listened to at Rome as Regulus, and theytherefore sent him there with their envoys, having first made him swearthat he would come back to his prison if there should neither be peacenor an exchange of prisoners. They little knew how much more a true-hearted Roman cared for his city than for himself--for his word than forhis life. 

Worn and dejected, the captive warrior came to the outside of the gatesof his own city, and there paused, refusing to enter. 'I am no longer aRoman citizen, ' he said; 'I am but the barbarian's slave, and the Senatemay not give audience to strangers within the walls. '

His wife Marcia ran out to greet him, with his two sons, but he did notlook up, and received their caresses as one beneath their notice, as amere slave, and he continued, in spite of all entreaty, to remainoutside the city, and would not even go to the little farm he had lovedso well. 

The Roman Senate, as he would not come in to them, came out to holdtheir meeting in the Campagna. 

The ambassadors spoke first, then Regulus, standing up, said, as onerepeating a task, 'Conscript fathers, being a slave to theCarthaginians, I come on the part of my masters to treat with youconcerning peace, and an exchange of prisoners. ' He then turned to goaway with the ambassadors, as a stranger might not be present at thedeliberations of the Senate. His old friends pressed him to stay andgive his opinion as a senator who had twice been consul; but he refusedto degrade that dignity by claiming it, slave as he was. But, at thecommand of his Carthaginian masters, he remained, though not taking hisseat. 

Then he spoke. He told the senators to persevere in the war. He said hehad seen the distress of Carthage, and that a peace would only be to heradvantage, not to that of Rome, and therefore he strongly advised thatthe war should continue. Then, as to the exchange of prisoners, theCarthaginian generals, who were in the hands of the Romans, were in fullhealth and strength, whilst he himself was too much broken down to befit for service again, and indeed he believed that his enemies had givenhim a slow poison, and that he could not live long. Thus he insistedthat no exchange of prisoners should be made. 

It was wonderful, even to Romans, to hear a man thus pleading againsthimself, and their chief priest came forward, and declared that, as hisoath had been wrested from him by force, he was not bound to return tohis captivity. But Regulus was too noble to listen to this for a moment. 'Have you resolved to dishonor me?' he said. 'I am not ignorant thatdeath and the extremest tortures are preparing for me; but what arethese to the shame of an infamous action, or the wounds of a guiltymind? Slave as I am to Carthage, I have still the spirit of a Roman. Ihave sworn to return. It is my duty to go; let the gods take care of therest. '

The Senate decided to follow the advice of Regulus, though they bitterlyregretted his sacrifice. His wife wept and entreated in vain that theywould detain him; they could merely repeat their permission to him toremain; but nothing could prevail with him to break his word, and heturned back to the chains and death he expected so calmly as if he hadbeen returning to his home. This was in the year B. C. 249. 

'Let the gods take care of the rest, ' said the Roman; the gods whomalone he knew, and through whom he ignorantly worshipped the true God, whose Light was shining out even in this heathen's truth and constancy. How his trust was fulfilled is not known. The Senate, after the nextvictory, gave two Carthaginian generals to his wife and sons to hold aspledges for his good treatment; but when tidings arrived that Reguluswas dead, Marcia began to treat them both with savage cruelty, thoughone of them assured her that he had been careful to have her husbandwell used. Horrible stories were told that Regulus had been put out inthe sun with his eyelids cut off, rolled down a hill in a barrel withspikes, killed by being constantly kept awake, or else crucified. Marciaseems to have set about, and perhaps believed in these horrors, andavenged them on her unhappy captives till one had died, and the Senatesent for her sons and severely reprimanded them. They declared it wastheir mother's doing, not theirs, and thenceforth were careful of thecomfort of the remaining prisoner. 

It may thus be hoped that the frightful tale of Regulus' sufferings wasbut formed by report acting on the fancy of a vindictive woman, and thatRegulus was permitted to die in peace of the disease brought on far moreprobably by the climate and imprisonment, than by the poison to which heascribed it. It is not the tortures he may have endured that make himone of the noblest characters of history, but the resolution that wouldneither let him save himself at the risk of his country's prosperity, nor forfeit the word that he had pledged. 

THE BRAVE BRETHREN OF JUDAH

B. C. 180

It was about 180 years before the Christian era. The Jews had long sincecome home from Babylon, and built up their city and Temple at Jerusalem. But they were not free as they had been before. Their country belongedto some greater power, they had a foreign governor over them, and had topay tribute to the king who was their master. 

At the time we are going to speak of, this king was Antiochus Epiphanes, King of Syria. He was descended from one of those generals who, upon thedeath of Alexander the Great, had shared the East between them, and hereigned over all the country from the Mediterranean Sea even into Persiaand the borders of India. He spoke Greek, and believed in both the Greekand Roman gods, for he had spent some time at Rome in his youth; but inhis Eastern kingdom he had learnt all the self-indulgent and violenthabits to which people in those hot countries are especially tempted. 

He was so fierce and passionate, that he was often called the 'Madman', and he was very cruel to all who offended him. One of his greatestdesires was, that the Jews should leave their true faith in one God, anddo like the Greeks and Syrians, his other subjects, worship the sameidols, and hold drunken feasts in their honor. Sad to say, a great manyof the Jews had grown ashamed of their own true religion and the strictways of their law, and thought them old-fashioned. They joined in theGreek sports, played games naked in the theatre, joined in riotousprocessions, carrying ivy in honor of Bacchus, the god of wine, andoffered incense to the idols; and the worst of all these was the falsehigh priest, Menelaus, who led the King Antiochus into the Templeitself, even into the Holy of Holies, and told him all that would mostdesecrate it and grieve the Jews. So a little altar to the Roman godJupiter was set up on the top of the great brazen altar of burntofferings, a hog was offered up, and broth of its flesh sprinkledeverywhere in the Temple; then all the precious vessels were seized, theshewbread table of gold, the candlesticks, and the whole treasury, andcarried away by the king; the walls were thrown down, and the place madedesolate. 

Some Jews were still faithful to their God, but they were horriblypunished and tortured to death before the eyes of the king; and when atlast he went away to his own country, taking with him the wicked highpriest Menelaus, he left behind him a governor and an army of soldiersstationed in the tower of Acra, which overlooked the Temple hill, andsent for an old man from Athens to teach the people the heathen ritesand ceremonies. Any person who observed the Sabbath day, or any otherordinance of the law of Moses, was put to death in a most cruel manner;all the books of the Old Testament Scripture that could be found wereeither burnt or defiled, by having pictures of Greek gods painted uponthem; and the heathen priests went from place to place, with a littlebrazen altar and image and a guard of soldiers, who were to kill everyperson who refused to burn incense before the idol. It was the verysaddest time that the Jews had ever known, and there seemed no help nearor far off; they could have no hope, except in the promises that Godwould never fail His people, or forsake His inheritance, and in theprophecies that bad times should come, but good ones after them. 

The Greeks, in going through the towns to enforce the idol worship, cameto a little city called Modin, somewhere on the hills on the coast ofthe Mediterranean Sea, not far from Joppa. There they sent out, asusual, orders to all the men of the town to meet them in themarketplace; but they were told beforehand, that the chief person in theplace was an old man named Mattathias, of a priestly family, and so muchrespected, that all the other inhabitants of the place were sure to dowhatever he might lead them in. So the Greeks sent for him first of all, and he came at their summons, a grand and noble old man, followed by hisfive sons, Johanan, Simon, Judas, Jonathan, and Eleazar. The Greekpriest tried to talk him over. He told him that the high priest hadforsaken the Jewish superstition, that the Temple was in ruins, and thatresistance was in vain; and exhorted him to obtain gratitude and honorfor himself, by leading his countrymen in thus adoring the deities ofthe king's choice, promising him rewards and treasures if he wouldcomply. 

But the old man spoke out with a loud and fearless voice: 'Though allthe nations that are under the king's dominion obey him, and fall awayevery one from the religion of their fathers, and give consent to hiscommandments; yet will I and my sons and my brethren walk in thecovenant of our fathers. God forbid that we should forsake the law andthe ordinances! We will not hearken to the king's words, to go from ourreligion, either on the right hand or the left!'

As he spoke, up came an apostate Jew to do sacrifice at the heathenaltar. Mattathias trembled at the sight, and his zeal broke forth. Heslew the offender, and his brave sons gathering round him, they attackedthe Syrian soldiers, killed the commissioner, and threw down the altar. Then, as they knew that they could not there hold out against the king'spower, Mattathias proclaimed throughout the city: 'Whosoever is zealousof the law, and maintaineth the covenant, let him follow me!' With that, he and his five sons, with their families, left their houses and lands, and drove their cattle with them up into the wild hills and caves, whereDavid had once made his home; and all the Jews who wished to be stillfaithful, gathered around them, to worship God and keep Hiscommandments. 

There they were, a handful of brave men in the mountains, and all theheathen world and apostate Jews against them. They used to come downinto the villages, remind the people of the law, promise their help, andthrow down any idol altars that they found, and the enemy never wereable to follow them into their rocky strongholds. But the old Mattathiascould not long bear the rude wild life in the cold mountains, and hesoon died. First he called all his five sons, and bade them to 'bezealous for the law, and give their lives for the covenant of theirfathers'; and he reminded them of all the many brave men who had beforeserved God, and been aided in their extremity. He appointed his sonJudas, as the strongest and mightiest, to lead his brethren to battle, and Simon, as the wisest, to be their counsellor; then he blessed themand died; and his sons were able to bury him in the tomb of his fathersat Modin. 

Judas was one of the bravest men who ever lived; never dreading thenumbers that came against him. He was surnamed Maccabeus, which somepeople say meant the hammerer; but others think it was made up of thefirst letters of the words he carried on his banner, which meant 'Who islike unto Thee, among the gods, O Lord?' Altogether he had about sixthousand men round him when the Greek governor, Apollonius, came out tofight with him. The Jews gained here their first victory, and Judaskilled Apollonius, took his sword, and fought all his other battles withit. Next came a captain called Seron, who went out to the hills to layhold of the bold rebels that dared to rise against the King of Syria. The place where Judas met him was one to make the Jews' hearts leap withhope and trust. It was on the steep stony broken hillside of Beth-horon, the very place where Joshua had conquered the five kings of theAmorites, in the first battle on the coming in of the children of Israelto Palestine. There was the rugged path where Joshua had stood andcalled out to the sun to stand still in Gibeon, and the moon in thevalley of Ajalon. Miracles were over, and Judas looked for no wonder tohelp him; but when he came up the mountain road from Joppa, his heartwas full of the same trust as Joshua's, and he won another greatvictory. 

By this time King Antiochus began to think the rising of the Jews aserious matter, but he could not come himself against them, because hisprovinces in Armenia and Persia had refused their tribute, and he had togo in person to reduce them. He appointed, however, a governor, namedLysias, to chastise the Jews, giving him an army of 40, 000 foot and 7000horse. Half of these Lysias sent on before him, with two captains, namedNicanor and Gorgias, thinking that these would be more than enough tohunt down and crush the little handful that were lurking in the hills. And with them came a great number of slave merchants, who had bargainedwith Nicanor that they should have ninety Jews for one talent, to sellto the Greeks and Romans, by whom Jewish slaves were much esteemed. 

There was great terror in Palestine at these tidings, and many of theweaker-minded fell away from Judas; but he called all the faithfultogether at Mizpeh, the same place where, 1000 years before, Samuel hadcollected the Israelites, and, after prayer and fasting, had sent themforth to free their country from the Philistines. Shiloh, the sanctuary, was then lying desolate, just as Jerusalem now lay in ruins; and yetbetter times had come. But very mournful was that fast day at Mizpeh, asthe Jews looked along the hillside to their own holy mountain crowned byno white marble and gold Temple flashing back the sunbeams, but onlywith the tall castle of their enemies towering over the precipice. Theycould not sacrifice, because a sacrifice could only be made atJerusalem, and the only book of the Scriptures that they had to readfrom was painted over with the hateful idol figures of the Greeks. Andthe huge army of enemies was ever coming nearer! The whole assemblywept, and put on sackcloth and prayed aloud for help, and then there wasa loud sounding of trumpets, and Judas stood forth before them. And hemade the old proclamation that Moses had long ago decreed, that no oneshould go out to battle who was building a house, or planting avineyard, or had just betrothed a wife, or who was fearful and faint-hearted. All these were to go home again. Judas had 6, 000 followers whenhe made this proclamation. He had only 3, 000 at the end of the day, andthey were but poorly armed. He told them of the former aid that had cometo their fathers in extremity, and made them bold with his noble words. Then he gave them for their watchword 'the help of God', and divided theleadership of the band between himself and his brothers, appointingEleazar, the youngest, to read the Holy Book. 

With these valiant men, Judas set up his camp; but tidings were soonbrought him that Gorgias, with 5000 foot and 1000 horse, had left themain body to fall on his little camp by night. He therefore secretlyleft the place in the twilight; so that when the enemy attacked hiscamp, they found it deserted, and supposing them to be hid in themountains, proceeded hither in pursuit of them. 

But in the early morning Judas and his 3, 000 men were all in battlearray in the plains, and marching full upon the enemy's camp withtrumpet sound, took them by surprise in the absence of Gorgias and hischoice troops, and utterly defeated and put them to flight, but withoutpursuing them, since the fight with Gorgias and his 5, 000 might be yetto come. Even as Judas was reminding his men of this, Gorgias's troopswere seen looking down from the mountains where they had been wanderingall night; but seeing their own camp all smoke and flame, they turnedand fled away. Nine thousand of the invaders had been slain, and thewhole camp, full of arms and treasures, was in the hands of Judas, whothere rested for a Sabbath of glad thanksgiving, and the next day partedthe spoil, first putting out the share for the widows and orphans andthe wounded, and then dividing the rest among his warriors. As to theslave merchants, they were all made prisoners, and instead of giving atalent for ninety Jews, were sold themselves. 

The next year Lysias came himself, but was driven back and defeated atBethshur, four or five miles south of Bethlehem. And now came thesaddest, yet the greatest, day of Judas's life, when he ventured to goback into the holy city and take possession of the Temple again. Thestrong tower of Acra, which stood on a ridge of Mount Moriah lookingdown on the Temple rock, was still held by the Syrians, and he had nomeans of taking it; but he and his men loved the sanctuary too well tokeep away from it, and again they marched up the steps and slopes thatled up the holy hill. They went up to find the walls broken, the gatesburnt, the cloisters and priests' chambers pulled down, and the courtsthickly grown with grass and shrubs, the altar of their one true Godwith the false idol Jupiter's altar in the middle of it. These warriors, who had turned three armies to flight, could not bear the sight. Theyfell down on their faces, threw dust on their heads, and wept aloud forthe desolation of their holy place. But in the midst Judas caused thetrumpets to sound an alarm. They were to do something besides grieving. The bravest of them were set to keep watch and ward against the Syriansin the tower, while he chose out the most faithful priests to cleanseout the sanctuary, and renew all that could be renewed, making new holyvessels from the spoil taken in Nicanor's camp, and setting the stonesof the profaned altar apart while a new one was raised. On the thirdanniversary of the great profanation, the Temple was newly dedicated, with songs and hymns of rejoicing, and a festival day was appointed, which has been observed by the Jews ever since. The Temple rock and citywere again fortified so as to be able to hold out against their enemies, and this year and the next were the most prosperous of the life of theloyal-hearted Maccabee. 

The great enemy of the Jews, Antiochus Epiphanes, was in the meantimedying in great agony in Persia, and his son Antiochus Eupator was set onthe throne by Lysias, who brought him with an enormous army to reducethe rising in Judea. The fight was again at Bethshur, where Judas hadbuilt a strong fort on a point of rock that guarded the road to Hebron. Lysias tried to take this fort, and Judas came to the rescue with hislittle army, to meet the far mightier Syrian force, which was made moreterrific by possessing thirty war elephants imported from the Indianfrontier. Each of these creatures carried a tower containing thirty-twomen armed with darts and javelins, and an Indian driver on his neck; andthey had 1000 foot and 500 horse attached to the special following ofthe beast, who, gentle as he was by nature, often produced a fearfuleffect on the enemy; not so much by his huge bulk as by the terror heinspired among men, and far more among horses. The whole host was spreadover the mountains and the valleys so that it is said that their brightarmor and gold and silver shields made the mountains glisten like lampsof fire. 

Still Judas pressed on to the attack, and his brother Eleazar, perceiving that one of the elephants was more adorned than the rest, thought it might be carrying the king, and devoted himself for hiscountry. He fought his way to the monster, crept under it, and stabbedit from beneath, so that the mighty weight sank down on him and crushedhim to death in his fall. He gained a 'perpetual name' for valor andself-devotion; but the king was not upon the elephant, and after a hard-fought battle, Judas was obliged to draw off and leave Bethshur to betaken by the enemy, and to shut himself up in Jerusalem. 

There, want of provisions had brought him to great distress, whentidings came that another son of Antiochus Epiphanes had claimed thethrone, and Lysias made peace in haste with Judas, promising him fullliberty of worship, and left Palestine in peace. 

This did not, however, last long. Lysias and his young master were slainby the new king, Demetrius, who again sent an army for the subjection ofJudas, and further appointed a high priest, named Alcimus, of the familyof Aaron, but inclined to favor the new heathen fashions. 

This was the most fatal thing that had happened to Judas. Though of thepriestly line, he was so much of a warrior, that he seems to havethought it would be profane to offer sacrifice himself; and many of theJews were so glad of another high priest, that they let Alcimus into theTemple, and Jerusalem was again lost to Judas. One more battle was wonby him at Beth-horon, and then finding how hard it was to make headagainst the Syrians, he sent to ask the aid of the great Roman power. But long before the answer could come, a huge Syrian army had marched inon the Holy Land, 20, 000 men, and Judas had again no more than 3000. Some had gone over to Alcimus, some were offended at his seeking Romanalliance, and when at Eleasah he came in sight of the host, his men'shearts failed more than they ever had done before, and, out of the 3000at first collected, only 800 stood with him, and they would fain havepersuaded him to retreat. 

'God forbid that I should do this thing, ' he said, 'and flee away fromthem. If our time be come, let us die manfully for our brethren, and letus not stain our honor. '

Sore was the battle, as sore as that waged by the 800 at Thermopylae, and the end was the same. Judas and his 800 were not driven from thefield, but lay dead upon it. But their work was done. What is called themoral effect of such a defeat goes further than many a victory. Thoselives, sold so dearly, were the price of freedom for Judea. 

Judas's brothers Jonathan and Simon laid him in his father's tomb, andthen ended the work that he had begun; and when Simon died, the Jews, once so trodden on, were the most prosperous race in the East. TheTemple was raised from its ruins, and the exploits of the Maccabees hadnerved the whole people to do or die in defense of the holy faith oftheir fathers. 

THE CHIEF OF THE ARVERNI

B. C. 52

We have seen the Gauls in the heart of Rome, we have now to see themshowing the last courage of despair, defending their native landsagainst the greatest of all the conquerors that Rome ever sent forth. 

These lands, where they had dwelt for so many years as justly to regardthem as their inheritance, were Gaul. There the Celtic race had hadtheir abode ever since history has spoken clearly, and had become, inGaul especially, slightly more civilized from intercourse with the Greekcolony at Massilia, or Marseilles. But they had become borderers uponthe Roman dominions, and there was little chance that they would not beabsorbed; the tribes of Provence, the first Roman province, were alreadyconquered, others were in alliance with Rome, and some had called in theRomans to help them fight their battles. There is no occasion todescribe the seven years' war by which Julius Caesar added Gaul to theprovinces claimed by Rome, and when he visited Britain; such conquestsare far from being Golden Deeds, but are far worthier of the iron age. It is the stand made by the losing party, and the true patriotism of oneyoung chieftain, that we would wish here to dwell upon. 

In the sixth year of the war the conquest seemed to have been made, andthe Roman legions were guarding the north and west, while Caesar himselfhad crossed the Alps. Subjection pressed heavily on the Gauls, some oftheir chiefs had been put to death, and the high spirit of the nationwas stirred. Meetings took place between the warriors of the varioustribes, and an oath was taken by those who inhabited the centre of thecountry, that if they once revolted, they would stand by one another tothe last. These Gauls were probably not tall, bony giants, like thepillagers of Rome; their appearance and character would be more likethat of the modern Welsh, or of their own French descendants, small, alert, and dark-eyed, full of fire, but, though fierce at the firstonset, soon rebuffed, yet with much perseverance in the long run. Theirworship was conducted by Druids, like that of the Britons, and theirdress was of checked material, formed into a loose coat and widetrousers. The superior chiefs, who had had any dealings with Rome, wouldspeak a little Latin, and have a few Roman weapons as great improvementsupon their own. Their fortifications were wonderfully strong. Trunks oftrees were laid on the ground at two feet apart, so that the depth ofthe wall was their full length. Over these another tier of beams waslaid crosswise, and the space between was filled up with earth, and theoutside faced with large stones; the building of earth and stone wascarried up to some height, then came another tier of timbers, crossed asbefore, and this was repeated again to a considerable height, the innerends of the beams being fastened to a planking within the wall, so thatthe whole was of immense compactness. Fire could not damage the mineralpart of the construction, nor the battering ram hurt the wood, and theRomans had been often placed in great difficulties by these rude butadmirable constructions, within which the Gauls placed their familiesand cattle, building huts for present shelter. Of late, some attemptshad been made at copying the regular streets and houses built roundcourts that were in use among the Romans, and Roman colonies had beenestablished in various places, where veteran soldiers had receivedgrants of land on condition of keeping the natives in check. A growingtaste for arts and civilization was leading to Romans of inferiorclasses settling themselves in other Gallic cities. 

The first rising of the Gauls began by a quarrel at the city we now callOrleans, ending in a massacre of all the Romans there. The tidings werespread through all the country by loud shouts, repeated from one to theother by men stationed on every hill, and thus, what had been done atOrleans at sunrise was known by nine at night 160 miles off among themountains, which were then the homes of a tribe called by the Romans theArverni, who have left their name to the province of Auvergne. 

Here dwelt a young chieftain, probably really called Fearcuincedorigh, or Man who is chief of a hundred heads, known to us by Caesar's versionof his name, as Vercingetorix, a high-spirited youth, who keenly feltthe servitude of his country, and who, on receiving these tidings, instantly called on his friends to endeavor to shake off the yoke. Hisuncle, who feared to provoke Roman vengeance, expelled him from thechief city, Gergovia, the remains of which may be traced on the mountainstill called Gergoie, about six miles from Clermont; but he collectedall the younger and more high-spirited men, forced a way into the city, and was proclaimed chief of his tribe. All the neighboring tribes joinedin the league against the common enemy, and tidings were brought toCaesar that the whole country round the Loire was in a state of revolt. 

In the heart of winter he hurried back, and took the Gauls by surpriseby crossing the snows that lay thick on the wild waste of the Cebenna, which the Arverni had always considered as their impenetrable barrierthroughout the winter. The towns quickly fell into his hands, and he wasrapidly recovering all he had lost, when Vercingetorix, collecting hischief supporters, represented to them that their best hope would be inburning all the inhabited places themselves and driving off all thecattle, then lying in wait to cut off all the convoys of provisions thatshould be sent to the enemy, and thus starving them into a retreat. Hesaid that burning houses were indeed a grievous sight, but it would bemore grievous to see their wives and children dragged into captivity. Tothis all the allies agreed, and twenty towns in one district were burntin a single day; but when they came to the city of Avaricum, now calledBourges, the tribe of Bituriges, to whom it belonged, entreated on theirknees not to be obliged to destroy the most beautiful city in thecountry, representing that, as it had a river on one side, and a morasseverywhere else, except at a very narrow entrance, it might be easilyheld out against the enemy, and to their entreaties Vercingetorixyielded, though much against his own judgment. 

Caesar laid siege to the place, but his army suffered severely from coldand hunger; they had no bread at all, and lived only on the cattledriven in from distant villages, while Vercingetorix hovered round, cutting off their supplies. They however labored diligently to raise amount against a wall of the town; but as fast as they worked, the higherdid the Gauls within raise the stages of their rampart, and for twenty-five days there was a most brave defense; but at last the Romans madetheir entrance, and slaughtered all they found there, except 800, whoescaped to the camp of Vercingetorix. He was not disconcerted by thisloss, which he had always expected, but sheltered and clothed thefugitives, and raised a great body of archers and of horsemen, with whomhe returned to his own territory in Auvergne. There was much fightingaround the city of Gergovia; but at length, owing to the revolt of theAedui, another Gallic tribe, Caesar was forced to retreat over theLoire; and the wild peaks of volcanic Auvergne were free again. 

But no gallant resolution could long prevail against the ever-advancingpower of Rome, and at length the Gauls were driven into their fortifiedcamp at Alesia, now called Alise [footnote: In Burgundy, between Semurand Dijon. ], a city standing on a high hill, with two rivers flowinground its base, and a plain in front about three miles wide. Everywhereelse it was circled in by high hills, and here Caesar resolved to shutthese brave men in and bring them to bay. He caused his men to beginthat mighty system of earthworks by which the Romans carried on theirattacks, compassing their victim round on every side with a deadlyslowness and sureness, by those broad ditches and terraced ramparts thateverywhere mark where their foot of iron was trod. Eleven miles rounddid this huge rampart extend, strengthened by three-and-twenty redoubts, or places of defense, where a watch was continually kept. Before thelines were complete, Vercingetorix brought out his cavalry, and gavebattle, at one time with a hope of success; but the enemy were toostrong for him, and his horsemen were driven into the camp. He thenresolved to send home all of these, since they could be of no use in thecamp, and had better escape before the ditch should have shut them in onevery side. He charged them to go to their several tribes and endeavorto assemble all the fighting men to come to his rescue; for, if he werenot speedily succored, he and 80, 000 of the bravest of the Gauls mustfall into the hands of the Romans, since he had only corn for thirtydays, even with the utmost saving. 

Having thus exhorted them, he took leave of them, and sent them away atnine at night, so that they might escape in the dark where the Romantrench had not yet extended. Then he distributed the cattle among hismen, but retained the corn himself, serving it out with the utmostcaution. The Romans outside fortified their camp with a double ditch, one of them full of water, behind which was a bank twelve feet high, with stakes forked like the horns of a stag. The space between theditches was filled with pits, and scattered with iron caltrops or hookedspikes. All this was against the garrison, to prevent them from breakingout; and outside the camp he made another line of ditches and rampartsagainst the Gauls who might be coming to the rescue. 

The other tribes were not deaf to the summons of their friends, butassembled in large numbers, and just as the besieged had exhausted theirprovisions, an army was seen on the hills beyond the camp. Theircommander was Vergosillaunus (most probably Fearsaighan, the Man of theStandard), a near kinsman of Vercingetorix; and all that bravery coulddo, they did to break through the defenses of the camp from outside, while within, Vercingetorix and his 80, 000 tried to fill up the ditches, and force their way out to meet their friends. But Caesar himselfcommanded the Romans, who were confident in his fortunes, and raised ashout of ecstasy wherever they beheld his thin, marked, eagle face andpurple robe, rushing on the enemy with a confidence of victory that didin fact render them invincible. The Gauls gave way, lost seventy-four oftheir standards, and Vergosillaunus himself was taken a prisoner; and asfor the brave garrison within Alesia, they were but like so many fliesstruggling in vain within the enormous web that had been woven aroundthem. Hope was gone, but the chief of the Arverni could yet do one thingfor his countrymen--he could offer up himself in order to obtain betterterms for them. 

The next day he convened his companions in arms, and told them that hehad only fought for the freedom of their country, not to secure hisprivate interest; and that now, since yield they must, he freely offeredhimself to become a victim for their safety, whether they should judgeit best for themselves to appease the anger of the conqueror by puttinghim to death themselves, or whether they preferred giving him up alive. 

It was a piteous necessity to have to sacrifice their noblest andbravest, who had led them so gallantly during the long war; but they hadlittle choice, and could only send messengers to the camp to offer toyield Vercingetorix as the price of their safety. Caesar made it knownthat he was willing to accept their submission, and drawing up histroops in battle array, with the Eagle standards around him, he watchedthe whole Gallic army march past him. First, Vercingetorix was placed asa prisoner in his hands, and then each man lay down sword, javelin, orbow and arrows, helmet, buckler and breastplate, in one mournful heap, and proceeded on his way, scarcely thankful that the generosity of theirchieftain had purchased for them subjection rather than death. 

Vercingetorix himself had become the property of the great man from whomalone we know of his deeds; who could perceive his generous spirit andhigh qualities as a general, nay, who honored the self-devotion by whichhe endeavored to save his countrymen. He remained in captivity--six longyears sped by--while Caesar passed the Rubicon, fought out his strugglefor power at Rome, and subdued Egypt, Pontus, and Northern Africa--andall the time the brave Gaul remained closely watched and guarded, andwith no hope of seeing the jagged peaks and wild valleys of his ownbeautiful Auvergne. For well did he, like every other marked foe ofRome, know for what he was reserved, and no doubt he yielded himself inthe full expectation of that fate which many a man, as brave as he, hadescaped by self-destruction. 

The day came at last. In July, B. C. 45, the victorious Caesar hadleisure to celebrate his victories in four grand triumphs, all in onemonth, and that in honor of the conquest of Gaul came the first. Thetriumphal gate of Rome was thrown wide open, every house was decked withhangings of silk and tapestry, the household images of every family, dressed with fresh flowers, were placed in their porches, those of thegods stood on the steps of the temples, and in marched the procession, the magistrates first in their robes of office, and then the trumpeters. Next came the tokens of the victory--figures of the supposed gods of thetwo great rivers, Rhine and Rhone, and even of the captive Ocean, madein gold, were carried along, with pictures framed in citron wood, showing the scenes of victory--the wild waste of the Cevennes, the steeppeaks of Auvergne, the mighty camp of Alesia; nay, there too would bethe white cliffs of Dover, and the struggle with the Britons on thebeach. Models in wood and ivory showed the fortifications of Avaricum, and of many another city; and here too were carried specimens of theolives and vines, and other curious plants of the newly won land; herewas the breastplate of British pearls that Caesar dedicated to Venus. Aband of flute-players followed, and then came the white oxen that wereto be sacrificed, their horns gilded and flowers hung round them, thesacrificing priests with wreathed heads marching with them. Specimens ofbears and wolves from the woods and mountains came next in order, andafter them waved for the last time the national ensigns of the manytribes of Gaul. Once more Vercingetorix and Vergosillaunus saw their ownArvernian standard, and marched behind it with the noblest of theirclan: once more they wore their native dress and well-tried armor. Butchains were on their hands and feet, and the men who had fought so longand well for freedom, were the captive gazing-stock of Rome. Long, longwas the line of chained Gauls of every tribe, before the four whitehorses appeared, all abreast, drawing the gilded car, in which stood aslight form in a purple robe, with the bald head and narrow templesencircled with a wreath of bay, the thin cheeks tinted with vermilion, the eager aquiline face and narrow lips gravely composed to Romandignity, and the quick eye searching out what impression the display wasmaking on the people. Over his head a slave held a golden crown, butwhispered, 'Remember that thou too art a man. ' And in following that oldcustom, how little did the victor know that, bay-crowned like himself, there followed close behind, in one of the chariots of the officers, theman whose dagger-thrust would, two years later, be answered by his dyingword of reproach! The horsemen of the army followed, and then thelegions, every spear wreathed, every head crowned with bay, so that anevergreen grove might have seemed marching through the Roman streets, but for the war songs, and the wild jests, and ribald ballads thatcustom allowed the soldiers to shout out, often in pretended mockery oftheir own victorious general, the Imperator. 

The victor climbed the Capitol steps, and laid his wreath of bay onJupiter's knees, the white oxen were sacrificed, and the feast began bytorchlight. Where was the vanquished? He was led to the dark prisonvault in the side of Capitoline hill, and there one sharp sword-thrustended the gallant life and long captivity. 

It was no special cruelty in Julius Caesar. Every Roman triumph wasstained by the slaughter of the most distinguished captives, after thedegradation of walking in chains had been undergone. He had spirit toappreciate Vercingetorix, but had not nobleness to spare him from theordinary fate. Yet we may doubt which, in true moral greatness, was thesuperior in that hour of triumph, the conqueror who trod down all thathe might minister to his own glory, or the conquered, who, when noresistance had availed, had voluntarily confronted shame and death inhopes to win pardon and safety for his comrades. 

WITHSTANDING THE MONARCH IN HIS WRATH

A. D. 389

When a monarch's power is unchecked by his people, there is only One towhom he believes himself accountable; and if he have forgotten thedagger of Damocles, or if he be too high-spirited to regard it, thenthat Higher One alone can restrain his actions. And there have beentimes when princes have so broken the bounds of right, that no hoperemains of recalling them to their duty save by the voice of theministers of God upon Earth. But as these ministers bear no charmedlife, and are subjects themselves of the prince, such rebukes have beengiven at the utmost risk of liberty and life. 

Thus it was that though Nathan, unharmed, showed David his sin, andElijah, the wondrous prophet of Gilead, was protected from Jezebel'sfury, when he denounced her and her husband Ahab for the idolatry ofBaal and the murder of Naboth; yet no Divine hand interposed to shieldZachariah, the son of Jehoiada, the high priest, when he rebuked theapostasy of his cousin, Jehoash, King of Judah, and was stoned to deathby the ungrateful king's command in that very temple court whereJehoiada and his armed Levites had encountered the savage usurpingAthaliah, and won back the kingdom for the child Jehoash. And when 'inthe spirit and power of Elijah', St. John the Baptist denounced the sinof Herod Antipas in marrying his brother Philip's wife, he bore theconsequences to the utmost, when thrown into prison and then beheaded togratify the rage of the vindictive woman. 

Since Scripture Saints in the age of miracles were not always shieldedfrom the wrath of kings, Christian bishops could expect no specialinterposition in their favor, when they stood forth to stop the way ofthe sovereign's passions, and to proclaim that the cause of mercy, purity, and truth is the cause of God. 

The first of these Christian bishops was Ambrose, the sainted prelate ofMilan. It was indeed a Christian Emperor whom he opposed, no other thanthe great Theodosius, but it was a new and unheard-of thing for anyvoice to rebuke an Emperor of Rome, and Theodosius had proved himself aman of violent passions. 

The fourth century was a time when races and all sorts of shows were thefashion, nay, literally the rage; for furious quarrels used to ariseamong the spectators who took the part of one or other of thecompetitors, and would call themselves after their colours, the Blues orthe Greens. A favorite chariot driver, who had excelled in these racesat Thessalonica, was thrown into prison for some misdemeanor byBotheric, the Governor of Illyria, and his absence so enraged theThessalonican mob, that they rose in tumult, and demanded hisrestoration. On being refused, they threw such a hail of stones that thegovernor himself and some of his officers were slain. 

Theodosius might well be displeased, but his rage passed all bounds. Hewas at Milan at the time, and at first Ambrose so worked on his feelingsas to make him promise to temper justice with mercy; but afterwardsfresh accounts of the murder, together with the representations of hiscourtier Rufinus, made him resolve not to relent, and he sent offmessengers commanding that there should be a general slaughter of allthe race-going Thessalonicans, since all were equally guilty ofBotheric's death. He took care that his horrible command should be kepta secret from Ambrose, and the first that the Bishop heard of it was thetidings that 7, 000 persons had been killed in the theatre, in a massacrelasting three hours!

There was no saving these lives, but Ambrose felt it his duty to makethe Emperor feel his sin, in hopes of saving others. Besides, it was notconsistent with the honor of God to receive at his altar a man reekingwith innocent blood. The Bishop, however, took time to consider; he wentinto the country for a few days, and thence wrote a letter to theEmperor, telling him that thus stained with crime, he could not beadmitted to the Holy Communion, nor received into church. Still theEmperor does not seem to have believed he could be really withstood byany subject, and on Ambrose's return, he found the imperial procession, lictors, guards, and all, escorting the Emperor as usual to the Basilicaor Justice Hall, that had been turned into a church. Then to the door came the Bishop and stood in the way, forbidding theentrance, and announcing that there, at least, sacrilege should not beadded to murder. 

'Nay, ' said the Emperor, 'did not holy King David commit both murder andadultery, yet was he not received again?'

'If you have sinned like him, repent like him, ' answered Ambrose. 

Theodosius turned away, troubled. He was great enough not to turn hisanger against the Bishop; he felt that he had sinned, and that thechastisement was merited, and he went back to his palace weeping, andthere spent eight months, attending to his duties of state, but tooproud to go through the tokens of penitence that the discipline of theChurch had prescribed before a great sinner could be received back intothe congregation of the faithful. Easter was the usual time forreconciling penitents, and Ambrose was not inclined to show any respectof persons, or to excuse the Emperor from a penance he would haveimposed on any offender. However, Rufinus could not believe in suchdisregard, and thought all would give way to the Emperor's will. Christmas had come, but for one man at Milan there were no hymns, noshouts of 'glad tidings!' no midnight festival, no rejoicing that 'to usa Child is born; to us a Son is given'. The Basilica was thronged withworshippers and rang with their Amens, resounding like thunder, andtheir echoing song--the Te Deum--then their newest hymn of praise. Butthe lord of all those multitudes was alone in his palace. He had notshown good will to man; he had not learnt mercy and peace from thePrince of Peace; and the door was shut upon him. He was a resoluteSpanish Roman, a well-tried soldier, a man advancing in years, but hewept, and wept bitterly. Rufinus found him thus weeping. It must havebeen strange to the courtier that his master did not send his lictors tocarry the offending bishop to a dungeon, and give all his court favor tothe heretics, like the last empress who had reigned at Milan. Nay, hemight even, like Julian the Apostate, have altogether renounced thatChristian faith which could humble an emperor below the poorest of hissubjects. 

But Rufinus contented himself with urging the Emperor not to remain athome lamenting, but to endeavor again to obtain admission into thechurch, assuring him that the Bishop would give way. Theodosius repliedthat he did not expect it, but yielded to the persuasions, and Rufinushastened on before to warn the Bishop of his coming, and represented howinexpedient it was to offend him. 

'I warn you, ' replied Ambrose, 'that I shall oppose his entrance, but ifhe chooses to turn his power into tyranny, I shall willingly let himslay me. '

The Emperor did not try to enter the church, but sought Ambrose in anadjoining building, where he entreated to be absolved from his sin. 

'Beware, ' returned the Bishop, 'of trampling on the laws of God. ''I respect them, ' said the Emperor, 'therefore I have not set foot inthe church, but I pray thee to deliver me from these bonds, and not toclose against me the door that the Lord hath opened to all who trulyrepent. '

'What repentance have you shown for such a sin?' asked Ambrose. 

'Appoint my penance, ' said the Emperor, entirely subdued. 

And Ambrose caused him at once to sign a decree that thirty days shouldalways elapse between a sentence of death and its execution. After this, Theodosius was allowed to come into the church, but only to the cornerhe had shunned all these eight months, till the 'dull hard stone withinhim' had 'melted', to the spot appointed for the penitents. There, without his crown, his purple robe, and buskins, worked with goldeneagles, all laid aside, he lay prostrate on the stones, repeating theverse, 'My soul cleaveth unto the dust; quicken me, O Lord, according tothy word. ' This was the place that penitents always occupied, and therefasts and other discipline were also appointed. When the due course hadbeen gone through, probably at the next Easter, Ambrose, in his Master'sname, pronounced the forgiveness of Theodosius, and received him back tothe full privileges of a Christian. When we look at the course of manyanother emperor, and see how easily, where the power was irresponsible, justice became severity, and severity, bloodthirstiness, we see whatAmbrose dared to meet, and from what he spared Theodosius and all thecivilized world under his sway. Who can tell how many innocent liveshave been saved by that thirty days' respite?

Pass over nearly 700 years, and again we find a church door barredagainst a monarch. This time it is not under the bright Italian sky, butunder the grey fogs of the Baltic sea. It is not the stately marblegateway of the Milanese Basilica, but the low-arched, rough stone portalof the newly built cathedral of Roskilde, in Zealand, where, if a zigzagsurrounds the arch, it is a great effort of genius. The Danish kingSwend, the nephew of the well-known Knut, stands before it; a stern andpowerful man, fierce and passionate, and with many a Danish axe at hiscommand. Nay, only lately for a few rude jests, he caused some of hischief jarls to be slain without a trial. Half the country is stillpagan, and though the king himself is baptized, there is no certaintythat, if the Christian faith do not suit his taste, he may not join theheathen party and return to the worship of Thor and Tyr, where deeds ofblood would be not blameworthy, but a passport to the rude joys ofValhall. Nevertheless there is a pastoral staff across the doorway, barring the way of the king, and that staff is held against him by anEnglishman, William, Bishop of Roskilde, the missionary who hadconverted a great part of Zealand, but who will not accept Christianswho have not laid aside their sins. 

He confronts the king who has never been opposed before. 'Go back, ' hesays, 'nor dare approach the alter of God--thou who art not a king but amurderer. '

Some of the jarls seized their swords and axes, and were about to strikethe bishop away from the threshold, but he, without removing his staff, bent his head, and bade them strike, saying he was ready to die in thecause of God. But the king came to a better frame of mind, he called thejarls away, and returning humbly to his palace, took off his royalrobes, and came again barefoot and in sackcloth to the church door, where Bishop William met him, took him by the hand, gave him the kiss ofpeace, and led him to the penitents' place. After three days he wasabsolved, and for the rest of his life, the bishop and the king lived inthe closest friendship, so much so that William always prayed that evenin death he might not be divided from his friend. The prayer wasgranted. The two died almost at the same time, and were buried togetherin the cathedral at Roskilde, where the one had taught and other learntthe great lesson of mercy. 

THE LAST FIGHT IN THE COLISEUM

A. D. 404

As the Romans grew prouder and more fond of pleasure, no one could hopeto please them who did not give them sports and entertainments. When anyperson wished to be elected to any public office, it was a matter ofcourse that he should compliment his fellow citizens by exhibitions ofthe kind they loved, and when the common people were discontented, theircry was that they wanted panem ac Circenses, 'bread and sports', theonly things they cared for. In most places where there has been a largeRoman colony, remains can be seen of the amphitheatres, where thecitizens were wont to assemble for these diversions. Sometimes these arestages of circular galleries of seats hewn out of the hillside, whererows of spectators might sit one above the other, all looking down on abroad, flat space in the centre, under their feet, where therepresentations took place. Sometimes, when the country was flat, or itwas easier to build than to excavate, the amphitheatre was raised aboveground, rising up to a considerable height. 

The grandest and most renowned of all these amphitheatres is theColiseum at Rome. It was built by Vespasian and his son Titus, theconquerors of Jerusalem, in a valley in the midst of the seven hills ofRome. The captive Jews were forced to labour at it; and the materials, granite outside, and softer travertine stone within, are so solid and soadmirably built, that still at the end of eighteen centuries it hasscarcely even become a ruin, but remains one of the greatest wonders ofRome. 

Five acres of ground were enclosed within the oval of its outer wall, which outside rises perpendicularly in tiers of arches one above theother. Within, the galleries of seats projected forwards, each tiercoming out far beyond the one above it, so that between the lowest andthe outer wall there was room for a great space of chambers, passages, and vaults around the central space, called the arena, from the arena, or sand, with which it was strewn. 

When the Roman Emperors grew very vain and luxurious, they used to havethis sand made ornamental with metallic filings, vermilion, and evenpowdered precious stones; but it was thought better taste to use thescrapings of a soft white stone, which, when thickly strewn, made thewhole arena look as if covered with untrodden snow. Around the border ofthis space flowed a stream of fresh water. Then came a straight wall, rising to a considerable height, and surmounted by a broad platform, onwhich stood a throne for the Emperor, curule chairs of ivory and goldfor the chief magistrates and senators, and seats for the vestalvirgins. Next above were galleries for the equestrian order, the greatmass of those who considered themselves as of gentle station, though notof the highest rank; farther up, and therefore farther back, were thegalleries belonging to the freemen of Rome; and these were againsurmounted by another plain wall with a platform on the top, where wereplaces for the ladies, who were not (except the vestal virgins) allowedto look on nearer, because of the unclothed state of some of theperformers in the arena. Between the ladies' boxes, benches weresqueezed in where the lowest people could seat themselves; and some ofthese likewise found room in the two uppermost tiers of porticoes, wheresailors, mechanics, and persons in the service of the Coliseum had theirpost. Altogether, when full, this huge building held no less than 87, 000spectators. It had no roof; but when there was rain, or if the sun wastoo hot, the sailors in the porticoes unfurled awnings that ran alongupon ropes, and formed a covering of silk and gold tissue over thewhole. Purple was the favorite color for this velamen, or veil; because, when the sun shone through it, it cast such beautiful rosy tints on thesnowy arena and the white purple-edged togas of the Roman citizens. 

Long days were spent from morning till evening upon those galleries. Themultitude who poured in early would watch the great dignitaries arriveand take their seats, greeting them either with shouts of applause orhootings of dislike, according as they were favorites or otherwise; andwhen the Emperor came in to take his place under his canopy, there wasone loud acclamation, 'Joy to thee, master of all, first of all, happiest of all. Victory to thee for ever!'

When the Emperor had seated himself and given the signal, the sportsbegan. Sometimes a rope-dancing elephant would begin the entertainment, by mounting even to the summit of the building and descending by a cord. Then a bear, dressed up as a Roman matron, would be carried along in achair between porters, as ladies were wont to go abroad, and anotherbear, in a lawyer's robe, would stand on his hind legs and go throughthe motions of pleading a case. Or a lion came forth with a jeweledcrown on his head, a diamond necklace round his neck, his mane plaitedwith gold, and his claws gilded, and played a hundred pretty gentleantics with a little hare that danced fearlessly within his grasp. Thenin would come twelve elephants, six males in togas, six females with theveil and pallium; they took their places on couches around an ivorytable, dined with great decorum, playfully sprinkled a little rosewaterover the nearest spectators, and then received more guests of theirunwieldy kind, who arrived in ball dresses, scattered flowers, andperformed a dance. 

Sometimes water was let into the arena, a ship sailed in, and falling topieces in the midst, sent a crowd of strange animals swimming in alldirections. Sometimes the ground opened, and trees came growing upthrough it, bearing golden fruit. Or the beautiful old tale of Orpheuswas acted; these trees would follow the harp and song of the musician;but--to make the whole part complete--it was no mere play, but realearnest, that the Orpheus of the piece fell a prey to live bears. 

For the Coliseum had not been built for such harmless spectacles asthose first described. The fierce Romans wanted to be excited and feelthemselves strongly stirred; and, presently, the doors of the pits anddens round the arena were thrown open, and absolutely savage beasts werelet loose upon one another--rhinoceroses and tigers, bulls and lions, leopards and wild boars--while the people watched with savage curiosityto see the various kinds of attack and defense; or, if the animals werecowed or sullen, their rage would be worked up--red would be shown tothe bulls, white to boars, red-hot goads would be driven into some, whips would be lashed at others, till the work of slaughter was fairlycommenced, and gazed on with greedy eyes and ears delighted, instead ofhorror-struck, by the roars and howls of the noble creatures whosecourage was thus misused. Sometimes indeed, when some especially strongor ferocious animal had slain a whole heap of victims, the cries of thepeople would decree that it should be turned loose in its native forest, and, amid shouts of 'A triumph! a triumph!' the beast would prowl roundthe arena, upon the carcasses of the slain victims. Almost incrediblenumbers of animals were imported for these cruel sports, and thegovernors of distant provinces made it a duty to collect troops oflions, elephants, ostriches, leopards--the fiercer or the newer thecreature the better--to be thus tortured to frenzy, to make sport in theamphitheatre. However, there was daintiness joined with cruelty: theRomans did not like the smell of blood, though they enjoyed the sight ofit, and all the solid stonework was pierced with tubes, through whichwas conducted the stream of spices and saffron, boiled in wine, that theperfume might overpower the scent of slaughter below. 

Wild beasts tearing each other to pieces might, one would think, satisfyany taste of horror; but the spectators needed even nobler game to beset before their favorite monsters--men were brought forward to confrontthem. Some of these were at first in full armor, and fought hard, generally with success; and there was a revolving machine, somethinglike a squirrel's cage, in which the bear was always climbing after hisenemy, and then rolling over by his own weight. Or hunters came, almostunarmed, and gaining the victory by swiftness and dexterity, throwing apiece of cloth over a lion's head, or disconcerting him by putting theirfist down his throat. But it was not only skill, but death, that theRomans loved to see; and condemned criminals and deserters were reservedto feast the lions, and to entertain the populace with their variouskinds of death. Among these condemned was many a Christian martyr, whowitnessed a good confession before the savage-eyed multitude around thearena, and 'met the lion's gory mane' with a calm resolution and hopefuljoy that the lookers-on could not understand. To see a Christian die, with upward gaze and hymns of joy on his tongue, was the most strangeunaccountable sight the Coliseum could offer, and it was therefore thechoicest, and reserved for the last part of the spectacles in which thebrute creation had a part. 

The carcasses were dragged off with hooks, and bloodstained sand wascovered with a fresh clean layer, the perfume wafted in stronger clouds, and a procession came forward--tall, well-made men, in the prime oftheir strength. Some carried a sword and a lasso, others a trident and anet; some were in light armor, others in the full heavy equipment of asoldier; some on horseback, some in chariots, some on foot. They marchedin, and made their obeisance to the Emperor; and with one voice, theirgreeting sounded through the building, Ave, Caesar, morituri tesalutant! 'Hail, Caesar, those about to die salute thee!'

They were the gladiators--the swordsmen trained to fight to the death toamuse the populace. They were usually slaves placed in schools of armsunder the care of a master; but sometimes persons would voluntarily hirethemselves out to fight by way of a profession: and both these, and suchslave gladiators as did not die in the arena, would sometimes retire, and spend an old age of quiet; but there was little hope of this, forthe Romans were not apt to have mercy on the fallen. 

Fights of all sorts took place--the light-armed soldier and the netsman--the lasso and the javelin--the two heavy-armed warriors--allcombinations of single combat, and sometimes a general melee. When agladiator wounded his adversary, he shouted to the spectators, Hochabet! 'He has it!' and looked up to know whether he should kill orspare. If the people held up their thumbs, the conquered was left torecover, if he could; if they turned them down, he was to die: and if heshowed any reluctance to present his throat for the deathblow, there wasa scornful shout, Recipe ferrum! 'Receive the steel!' Many of us musthave seen casts of the most touching statue of the wounded man, thatcalled forth the noble lines of indignant pity which, though so oftenrepeated, cannot be passed over here:

 'I see before me the Gladiator lie; He leans upon his hand--his manly brow Consents to death, but conquers agony. And his droop'd head sinks gradually low, And through his side the last drops, ebbing slow From the red gash, fall heavy one by one, Like the first of a thunder shower; and now The arena swims around him--he is gone Ere ceased the inhuman shout which hailed the wretch who won. 

 'He heard it, but he heeded no--this eyes Were with his heart, and that was far away. He reck'd not of the life he lost, nor prize, But where his rude hut by the Danube lay, There were his young barbarians all at play, There was their Dacian mother--he their sire, Butcher'd to make a Roman holiday. All this rush'd with his blood--Shall he expire, And unavenged? Arise ye Goths and glut your ire. '

Sacred vestals, tender mothers, fat, good-humored senators, all thoughtit fair play, and were equally pitiless in the strange frenzy forexciting scenes to which they gave themselves up, when they mounted thestone stairs of the Coliseum. Privileged persons would even descend intothe arena, examine the death agonies, and taste the blood of somespecially brave victim ere the corpse was drawn forth at the death gate, that the frightful game might continue undisturbed and unencumbered. Gladiator shows were the great passion of Rome, and popular favor couldhardly be gained except by ministering to it. Even when the barbarianswere beginning to close in on the Empire, hosts of brave men were stillkept for this slavish mimic warfare--sport to the beholders, but sadearnest to the actors. 

Christianity worked its way upwards, and at least was professed by theEmperor on his throne. Persecution came to an end, and no more martyrsfed the beasts in the Coliseum. The Christian emperors endeavored toprevent any more shows where cruelty and death formed the chief interestand no truly religious person could endure the spectacle; but custom andlove of excitement prevailed even against the Emperor. Mere tricks ofbeasts, horse and chariot races, or bloodless contests, were tame anddull, according to the diseased taste of Rome; it was thought weak andsentimental to object to looking on at a death scene; the Emperors weregenerally absent at Constantinople, and no one could get elected to anyoffice unless he treated the citizens to such a show as they best liked, with a little bloodshed and death to stir their feelings; and thus itwent on for full a hundred years after Rome had, in name, become aChristian city, and the same custom prevailed wherever there was anamphitheatre and pleasure-loving people. 

Meantime the enemies of Rome were coming nearer and nearer, and Alaric, the great chief of the Goths, led his forces into Italy, and threatenedthe city itself. Honorius, the Emperor, was a cowardly, almostidiotical, boy; but his brave general, Stilicho, assembled his forces, met the Goths at Pollentia (about twenty-five miles from where Turin nowstands), and gave them a complete defeat on the Easter Day of the year403. He pursued them into the mountains, and for that time saved Rome. In the joy of the victory the Roman senate invited the conqueror and hisward Honorius to enter the city in triumph, at the opening of the newyear, with the white steeds, purple robes, and vermilion cheeks withwhich, of old, victorious generals were welcomed at Rome. The churcheswere visited instead of the Temple of Jupiter, and there was no murderof the captives; but Roman bloodthirstiness was not yet allayed, and, after all the procession had been completed, the Coliseum showscommenced, innocently at first, with races on foot, on horseback, and inchariots; then followed a grand hunting of beasts turned loose in thearena; and next a sword dance. But after the sword dance came thearraying of swordsmen, with no blunted weapons, but with sharp spearsand swords--a gladiator combat in full earnest. The people, enchanted, applauded with shouts of ecstasy this gratification of their savagetastes. Suddenly, however, there was an interruption. A rude, roughlyrobed man, bareheaded and barefooted, had sprung into the arena, and, signing back the gladiators, began to call aloud upon the people tocease from the shedding of innocent blood, and not to requite God'smercy in turning away the sword of the enemy by encouraging murder. Shouts, howls, cries, broke in upon his words; this was no place forpreachings--the old customs of Rome should be observed 'Back, old man!''On, gladiators!' The gladiators thrust aside the meddler, and rushed tothe attack. He still stood between, holding them apart, striving in vainto be heard. 'Sedition! Sedition!' 'Down with him!' was the cry; and theman in authority, Alypius, the prefect, himself added his voice. Thegladiators, enraged at interference with their vocation, cut him down. Stones, or whatever came to hand, rained down upon him from the furiouspeople, and he perished in the midst of the arena! He lay dead, and thencame the feeling of what had been done. 

His dress showed that he was one of the hermits who vowed themselves toa holy life of prayer and self-denial, and who were greatly reverenced, even by the most thoughtless. The few who had previously seen him, toldthat he had come from the wilds of Asia on pilgrimage, to visit theshrines and keep his Christmas at Rome--they knew he was a holy man--nomore, and it is not even certain whether his name was Alymachus orTelemachus. His spirit had been stirred by the sight of thousandsflocking to see men slaughter one another, and in his simple-heartedzeal he had resolved to stop the cruelty or die. He had died, but not invain. His work was done. The shock of such a death before their eyesturned the hearts of the people; they saw the wickedness and cruelty towhich they had blindly surrendered themselves; and from the day when thehermit died in the Coliseum there was never another fight of theGladiators. Not merely at Rome, but in every province of the Empire, thecustom was utterly abolished; and one habitual crime at least was wipedfrom the earth by the self-devotion of one humble, obscure, almostnameless man. 

THE SHEPHERD GIRL OF NANTERRE

A. D. 438

Four hundred years of the Roman dominion had entirely tamed the oncewild and independent Gauls. Everywhere, except in the moorlands ofBrittany, they had become as much like Romans themselves as they couldaccomplish; they had Latin names, spoke the Latin tongue, all theirpersonages of higher rank were enrolled as Roman citizens, their chiefcities were colonies where the laws were administered by magistrates inthe Roman fashion, and the houses, dress, and amusements were the sameas those of Italy. The greater part of the towns had been converted toChristianity, though some Paganism still lurked in the more remotevillages and mountainous districts. 

It was upon these civilized Gauls that the terrible attacks came fromthe wild nations who poured out of the centre and east of Europe. TheFranks came over the Rhine and its dependent rivers, and made furiousattacks upon the peaceful plains, where the Gauls had long lived insecurity, and reports were everywhere heard of villages harried by wildhorsemen, with short double-headed battleaxes, and a horrible shortpike, covered with iron and with several large hooks, like a giganticartificial minnow, and like it fastened to a long rope, so that the preywhich it had grappled might be pulled up to the owner. Walled citiesusually stopped them, but every farm or villa outside was stripped ofits valuables, set on fire, the cattle driven off, and the more healthyinhabitants seized for slaves. 

It was during this state of things that a girl was born to a wealthypeasant at the village now called Nanterre, about two miles fromLutetia, which was already a prosperous city, though not as yet soentirely the capital as it was destined to become under the name ofParis. She was christened by an old Gallic name, probably Gwenfrewi, orWhite Stream, in Latin Genovefa, but she is best known by the lateFrench form of Genevieve. When she was about seven years old, twocelebrated bishops passed through the village, Germanus, of Auxerre, andLupus, of Troyes, who had been invited to Britain to dispute the falsedoctrine of Pelagius. All the inhabitants flocked into the church to seethem, pray with them, and receive their blessing; and here the sweetchildish devotion of Genevieve so struck Germanus, that he called her tohim, talked to her, made her sit beside him at the feast, gave her hisspecial blessing, and presented her with a copper medal with a crossengraven upon it. From that time the little maiden always deemed herselfespecially consecrated to the service of Heaven, but she still remainedat home, daily keeping her father's sheep, and spinning their wool asshe sat under the trees watching them, but always with a heart full ofprayer. 

After this St. Germanus proceeded to Britain, and there encouraged hisconverts to meet the heathen Picts at Maes Garmon, in Flintshire, wherethe exulting shout of the white-robed catechumens turned to flight thewild superstitious savages of the north, --and the Hallelujah victory wasgained without a drop of bloodshed. He never lost sight of Genevieve, the little maid whom he had so early distinguished for her piety. 

After she lost her parents she went to live with her godmother, andcontinued the same simple habits, leading a life of sincere devotion andstrict self-denial, constant prayer, and much charity to her poorerneighbors. 

In the year 451 the whole of Gaul was in the most dreadful state ofterror at the advance of Attila, the savage chief of the Huns, who camefrom the banks of the Danube with a host of savages of hideous features, scarred and disfigured to render them more frightful. The old enemies, the Goths and the Franks, seemed like friends compared with theseformidable beings whose cruelties were said to be intolerable, and ofwhom every exaggerated story was told that could add to the horrors ofthe miserable people who lay in their path. Tidings came that this'Scourge of God', as Attila called himself, had passed the Rhine, destroyed Tongres and Metz, and was in full march for Paris. The wholecountry was in the utmost terror. Everyone seized their most valuablepossessions, and would have fled; but Genevieve placed herself on theonly bridge across the Seine, and argued with them, assuring them in astrain that was afterwards thought of as prophetic, that, if they wouldpray, repent, and defend instead of abandoning their homes, God wouldprotect them. They were at first almost ready to stone her for thuswithstanding their panic, but just then a priest arrived from Auxerre, with a present for Genevieve from St. Germanus, and they were thusreminded of the high estimation in which he held her; they becameashamed of their violence, and she held them back to pray and to armthemselves. In a few days they heard that Attila had paused to besiegeOrleans, and that Aetius, the Roman general, hurrying from Italy, hadunited his troops with those of the Goths and Franks, and given Attilaso terrible a defeat at Chalons that the Huns were fairly driven out ofGaul. And here it must be mentioned that when the next year, 452, Attilawith his murderous host came down into Italy, and after horribledevastation of all the northern provinces, came to the gates of Rome, noone dared to meet him but one venerable Bishop, Leo, the Pope, who, whenhis flock were in transports of despair, went forth only accompanied byone magistrate to meet the invader, and endeavor to turn his wrath side. The savage Huns were struck with awe by the fearless majesty of theunarmed old man. They conducted him safely to Attila, who listened tohim with respect, and promised not to lead his people into Rome, provided a tribute should be paid to him. He then retreated, and, to thejoy of all Europe, died on his way back to his native dominions. 

But with the Huns the danger and suffering of Europe did not end. Thehappy state described in the Prophets as 'dwelling safely, with none tomake them afraid', was utterly unknown in Europe throughout the longbreak-up of the Roman Empire; and in a few more years the Franks wereoverrunning the banks of the Seine, and actually venturing to lay siegeto the Roman walls of Paris itself. The fortifications were strongenough, but hunger began to do the work of the besiegers, and thegarrison, unwarlike and untrained, began to despair. But Genevieve'scourage and trust never failed; and finding no warriors willing to runthe risk of going beyond the walls to obtain food for the women andchildren who were perishing around them, this brave shepherdess embarkedalone in a little boat, and guiding it down the stream, landed beyondthe Frankish camp, and repairing to the different Gallic cities, sheimplored them to send succor to the famished brethren. She obtainedcomplete success. Probably the Franks had no means of obstructing thepassage of the river, so that a convoy of boats could easily penetrateinto the town, and at any rate they looked upon Genevieve as somethingsacred and inspired whom they durst not touch; probably as one of thebattle maids in whom their own myths taught them to believe. One accountindeed says that, instead of going alone to obtain help, Genevieveplaced herself at the head of a forage party, and that the mere sight ofher inspired bearing caused them to be allowed to enter and return insafety; but the boat version seems the more probable, since a singleboat on a broad river would more easily elude the enemy than a troop ofGauls pass through their army. 

But a city where all the valor resided in one woman could not long holdout, and in another inroad, when Genevieve was absent, Paris wasactually seized by the Franks. Their leader, Hilperik, was absolutelyafraid of what the mysteriously brave maiden might do to him, andcommanded the gates of the city to be carefully guarded lest she shouldenter; but Geneviere learnt that some of the chief citizens wereimprisoned, and that Hilperik intended their death, and nothing couldwithhold her from making an effort in their behalf. The Franks had madeup their minds to settle, and not to destroy. They were not burning andslaying indiscriminately, but while despising the Romans, as they calledthe Gauls, for their cowardice, they were in awe of the superiorcivilization and the knowledge of arts. The country people had freeaccess to the city, and Genevieve in her homely gown and veil passed byHilperik's guards without being suspected of being more than an ordinaryGaulish village maid; and thus she fearlessly made her way, even to theold Roman halls, where the long-haired Hilperik was holding his wildcarousal. Would that we knew more of that interview--one of the moststriking that ever took place! We can only picture to ourselves theRoman tessellated pavement bestrewn with wine, bones, and fragments ofthe barbarous revelry. There were untamed Franks, their sun-burnt hairtied up in a knot at the top of their heads, and falling down like ahorse's tail, their faces close shaven, except two moustaches, anddressed in tight leather garments, with swords at their wide belts. Someslept, some feasted, some greased their long locks, some shouted outtheir favorite war songs around the table which was covered with thespoils of churches, and at their heads sat the wild, long-hairedchieftain, who was a few years later driven away by his own followersfor his excesses, the whole scene was all that was abhorrent to a pure, devout, and faithful nature, most full of terror to a woman. Yet, there, in her strength, stood the peasant maiden, her heart full of trust andpity, her looks full of the power that is given by fearlessness of themthat can kill the body. What she said we do not know--we only know thatthe barbarous Hilperik was overawed; he trembled before theexpostulations of the brave woman, and granted all she asked--the safetyof his prisoners, and mercy to the terrified inhabitants. No wonder thatthe people of Paris have ever since looked back to Genevieve as theirprotectress, and that in after ages she has grown to be the patron saintof the city. 

She lived to see the son of Hilperik, Chlodweh, or, as he was morecommonly called, Clovis, marry a Christian wife, Clotilda, and after atime became a Christian. She saw the foundation of the Cathedral ofNotre-Dame, and of the two famous churches of St. Denys and of St. Martin of Tours, and gave her full share to the first efforts forbringing the rude and bloodthirsty conquerors to some knowledge ofChristian faith, mercy, and purity. After a life of constant prayer andcharity she died, three months after King Clovis, in the year 512, theeighty-ninth of her age. [Footnote: Perhaps the exploits of the Maid ofOrleans were the most like those of Genevieve, but they are not hereadded to our collection of 'Golden Deeds, ' because the Maid's beliefthat she was directly inspired removes them from the ordinary class. Alas! the English did not treat her as Hilperik treated Genevieve. 

LEO THE SLAVE

A. D. 533

The Franks had fully gained possession of all the north of Gaul, exceptBrittany. Chlodweh had made them Christians in name, but they stillremained horribly savage--and the life of the Gauls under them waswretched. The Burgundians and Visigoths who had peopled the southern andeastern provinces were far from being equally violent. They had enteredon their settlements on friendly terms, and even showed considerablerespect for the Roman-Gallic senators, magistrates, and higher clergy, who all remained unmolested in their dignities and riches. Thus it wasthat Gregory, Bishop of Langres, was a man of high rank andconsideration in the Burgundian kingdom, whence the Christian QueenClotilda had come; and even after the Burgundians had been subdued bythe four sons of Chlodweh, he continued a rich and prosperous man. 

After one of the many quarrels and reconciliations between these fiercebrethren, there was an exchange of hostages for the observance of theterms of the treaty. These were not taken from among the Franks, whowere too proud to submit to captivity, but from among the Gaulishnobles, a much more convenient arrangement to the Frankish kings, whocared for the life of a 'Roman' infinitely less than even for the lifeof a Frank. Thus many young men of senatorial families were exchangedbetween the domains of Theodrik to the south, and of Hildebert to thenorthward, and quartered among Frankish chiefs, with whom at first theyhad nothing more to endure than the discomfort of living as guests withsuch rude and coarse barbarians. But ere long fresh quarrels broke outbetween Theodrik and Hildebert, and the unfortunate hostages were atonce turned into slaves. Some of them ran away if they were near thefrontier, but Bishop Gregory was in the utmost anxiety about his youngnephew Attalus, who had been last heard of as being placed under thecharge of a Frank who lived between Treves and Metz. The Bishop sentemissaries to make secret enquiries, and they brought word that theunfortunate youth had indeed been reduced to slavery, and was made tokeep his master's herds of horses. Upon this the uncle again sent offhis messengers with presents for the ransom of Attalus, but the Frankrejected them, saying, 'One of such high race can only be redeemed forten pounds' weight of gold. '

This was beyond the Bishop's means, and while he was considering how toraise the sum, the slaves were all lamenting for their young lord, towhom they were much attached, till one of them, named Leo, the cook tothe household, came to the Bishop, saying to him, 'If thou wilt give meleave to go, I will deliver him from captivity. ' The Bishop replied thathe gave free permission, and the slave set off for Treves, and therewatched anxiously for an opportunity of gaining access to Attalus; butthough the poor young man--no longer daintily dressed, bathed, andperfumed, but ragged and squalid--might be seen following his herds ofhorses, he was too well watched for any communication to be held withhim. Then Leo went to a person, probably of Gallic birth, and said, 'Come with me to this barbarian's house, and there sell me for a slave. Thou shalt have the money, I only ask thee to help me thus far. '

Both repaired to the Frank's abode, the chief among a confusedcollection of clay and timber huts intended for shelter during eatingand sleeping. The Frank looked at the slave, and asked him what he coulddo. 

'I can dress whatever is eaten at lordly tables, ' replied Leo. 'I amafraid of no rival; I only tell thee the truth when I say that if thouwouldst give a feast to the king, I would send it up in the neatestmanner. '

'Ha!' said the barbarian, 'the Sun's day is coming--I shall invite mykinsmen and friends. Cook me such a dinner as may amaze them, and makethen say, 'We saw nothing better in the king's house. ''Let me have plenty of poultry, and I will do according to my master'sbidding, ' returned Leo. 

Accordingly, he was purchased for twelve gold pieces, and on the Sunday(as Bishop Gregory of Tours, who tells the story, explains that thebarbarians called the Lord's day) he produced a banquet after the mostapproved Roman fashion, much to the surprise and delight of the Franks, who had never tasted such delicacies before, and complimented their hostupon them all the evening. Leo gradually became a great favorite, andwas placed in authority over the other slaves, to whom he gave out theirdaily portions of broth and meat; but from the first he had not shownany recognition of Attalus, and had signed to him that they must bestrangers to one another. A whole year had passed away in this manner, when one day Leo wandered, as if for pastime, into the plain whereAttalus was watching the horses, and sitting down on the ground at somepaces off, and with his back towards his young master, so that theymight not be seen together, he said, 'This is the time for thoughts ofhome! When thou hast led the horses to the stable to-night, sleep not. Be ready at the first call!'

That day the Frank lord was entertaining a large number of guests, amongthem his daughter's husband, a jovial young man, given to jesting. Ongoing to rest he fancied he should be thirsty at night and called Leo toset a pitcher of hydromel by his bedside. As the slave was setting itdown, the Frank looked slyly from under his eyelids, and said in joke, 'Tell me, my father-in-law's trusty man, wilt not thou some night takeone of those horses, and run away to thine own home?'

'Please God, it is what I mean to do this very night, ' answered theGaul, so undauntedly that the Frank took it as a jest, and answered, 'Ishall look out that thou dost not carry off anything of mine, ' and thenLeo left him, both laughing. 

All were soon asleep, and the cook crept out to the stable, whereAttalus usually slept among the horses. He was broad awake now, andready to saddle the two swiftest; but he had no weapon except a smalllance, so Leo boldly went back to his master's sleeping hut, and tookdown his sword and shield, but not without awaking him enough to ask whowas moving. 'It is I--Leo, ' was the answer, 'I have been to call Attalusto take out the horses early. He sleeps as hard as a drunkard. ' TheFrank went to sleep again, quite satisfied, and Leo, carrying out theweapons, soon made Attalus feel like a free man and a noble once more. They passed unseen out of the enclosure, mounted their horses, and rodealong the great Roman road from Treves as far as the Meuse, but theyfound the bridge guarded, and were obliged to wait till night, when theycast their horses loose and swam the river, supporting themselves onboards that they found on the bank. They had as yet had no food sincethe supper at their master's, and were thankful to find a plum tree inthe wood, with fruit, to refresh them in some degree, before they laydown for the night. The next morning they went on in the direction ofRheims, carefully listening whether there were any sounds behind, until, on the broad hard-paved causeway, they actually heard the trampling ofhorses. Happily a bush was near, behind which they crept, with theirnaked swords before them, and here the riders actually halted for a fewmoments to arrange their harness. Men and horses were both those theyfeared, and they trembled at hearing one say, 'Woe is me that thoserogues have made off, and have not been caught! On my salvation, if Icatch them, I will have one hung and the other chopped into bits!' Itwas no small comfort to hear the trot of the horses resumed, and soondying away in the distance. That same night the two faint, hungry, wearytravelers, footsore and exhausted, came stumbling into Rheims, lookingabout for some person still awake to tell them the way to the house ofthe Priest Paul, a friend of Attalus' uncle. They found it just as thechurch bell was ringing for matins, a sound that must have seemed verylike home to these members of an episcopal household. They knocked, andin the morning twilight met the Priest going to his earliest Sundaymorning service. 

Leo told his young master's name, and how they had escaped, and thePriest's first exclamation was a strange one: 'My dream is true. Thisvery night I saw two doves, one white and one black, who came andperched on my hand. '

The good man was overjoyed, but he scrupled to give them any food, as itwas contrary to the Church's rules for the fast to be broken beforemass; but the travelers were half dead with hunger, and could only say, 'The good Lord pardon us, for, saving the respect due to His day, wemust eat something, since this is the forth day since we have touchedbread or meat. ' The Priest upon this gave them some bread and wine, andafter hiding them carefully, went to church, hoping to avert suspicion;but their master was already at Rheims, making strict search for them, and learning that Paul the Priest was a friend of the Bishop of Langres, he went to church, and there questioned him closely. But the Priestsucceeded in guarding his secret, and though he incurred much danger, asthe Salic law was very severe against concealers of runaway slaves, hekept Attalus and Leo for two days till the search was blown over, andtheir strength was restored, so that they could proceed to Langres. There they were welcomed like men risen from the dead; the Bishop wepton the neck of Attalus, and was ready to receive Leo as a slave no more, but a friend and deliverer. 

A few days after Leo was solemnly led to the church. Every door was setopen as a sign that he might henceforth go whithersoever he would. Bishop Gregorus took him by the hand, and, standing before theArchdeacon, declared that for the sake of the good services rendered byhis slave, Leo, he set him free, and created him a Roman citizen. 

Then the Archdeacon read a writing of manumission. 'Whatever is doneaccording to the Roman law is irrevocable. According to the constitutionof the Emperor Constantine, of happy memory, and the edict that declaresthat whosoever is manumitted in church, in the presence of the bishops, priests, and deacons, shall become a Roman citizen under the protectionof the Church: from this day Leo becomes a member of the city, free togo and come where he will as if he had been born of free parents. Fromthis day forward, he is exempt from all subjection of servitude, of allduty of a freed-man, all bond of client-ship. He is and shall be free, with full and entire freedom, and shall never cease to belong to thebody of Roman citizens. '

At the same time Leo was endowed with lands, which raised him to therank of what the Franks called a Roman proprietor--the highest reward inthe Bishop's power for the faithful devotion that had incurred suchdangers in order to rescue the young Attalus from his miserable bondage. 

Somewhat of the same kind of faithfulness was shown early in thenineteenth century by Ivan Simonoff, a soldier servant belonging toMajor Kascambo, an officer in the Russian army, who was made prisoner byone of the wild tribes of the Caucasus. But though the soldier'sattachment to his master was quite as brave and disinterested as that ofthe Gallic slave, yet he was far from being equally blameless in themeans he employed, and if his were a golden deed at all, it was mixedwith much of iron. 

Major Kascambo, with a guard of fifty Cossacks, was going to take thecommand of the Russian outpost of Lars, one of the forts by which theRussian Czars have slowly been carrying on the aggressive warfare thathas nearly absorbed into their vast dominions all the mountains betweenthe Caspian and Black seas. On his way he was set upon by seven hundredhorsemen of the savage and independent tribe of Tchetchenges. There wasa sharp fight, more than half his men were killed, and he with the restmade a rampart of the carcasses of their horses, over which they wereabout to fire their last shots, when the Tchetchenges made a Russiandeserter call out to the Cossacks that they would let them all escapeprovided they would give up their officer. Kascambo on this came forwardand delivered himself into their hands; while the remainder of thetroops galloped off. His servant, Ivan, with a mule carrying hisbaggage, had been hidden in a ravine, and now, instead of retreatingwith the Cossacks, came to join his master. All the baggage was, however, instantly seized and divided among the Tchetchenges; nothingwas left but a guitar, which they threw scornfully to the Major. Hewould have let it lie, but Ivan picked it up, and insisted on keepingit. 'Why be dispirited?' he said; 'the God of the Russians is great, itis the interest of the robbers to save you, they will do you no harm. '

Scouts brought word that the Russian outposts were alarmed, and thattroops were assembling to rescue the officer. Upon this the sevenhundred broke up into small parties, leaving only ten men on foot toconduct the prisoners, whom they forced to take off their iron-shodboots and walk barefoot over stones and thorns, till the Major was soexhausted that they were obliged to drag him by cords fastened to hisbelt. 

After a terrible journey, the prisoners were placed in a remote village, where the Major had heavy chains fastened to his hands and feet, andanother to his neck, with a huge block of oak as a clog at the otherend; they half-starved him, and made him sleep on the bare ground of thehut in which he lodged. The hut belonged to a huge, fierce old man ofsixty named Ibrahim, whose son had been killed in a skirmish with theRussians. This man, together with his son's widow, were continuallytrying to revenge themselves on their captive. The only person whoshowed him any kindness was his little grandson, a child of seven yearsold, called Mamet, who often caressed him, and brought him food bystealth. Ivan was also in the same hut, but less heavily ironed than hismaster, and able to attempt a few alleviations for his wretchedcondition. An interpreter brought the Major a sheet of paper and a reedpen, and commanded him to write to his friends that he might be ransomedfor 10, 000 roubles, but that, if the whole sum were not paid, he wouldbe put to death. He obeyed, but he knew that his friends could notpossibly raise such a sum, and his only hope was in the government, which had once ransomed a colonel who had fallen into the hands of thesame tribe. 

These Tchetchenges professed to be Mahometans, but their religion satvery loose upon them, and they were utter barbarians. One piece ofrespect they paid the Major's superior education was curious--they madehim judge in all the disputes that arose. The houses in the village werehollowed out underground, and the walls only raised three or four feet, and then covered by a flat roof, formed of beaten clay, where theinhabitants spent much of their time. Kascambo was every now and thenbrought, in all his chains, to the roof of the hut, which served as atribunal whence he was expected to dispense justice. For instance, a manhad commissioned his neighbour to pay five roubles to a person inanother valley, but the messenger's horse having died by the way, aclaim was set up to the roubles to make up for it. Both partiescollected all their friends, and a bloody quarrel was about to takeplace, when they agreed to refer the question to the prisoner, who wasaccordingly set upon his judgment seat. 

'Pray, ' said he, 'if, instead of giving you five roubles, your comradehad desired you to carry his greetings to his creditor, would not yourhorse have died all the same?'

'Most likely. '

'Then what should you have done with the greetings? Should you have keptthem in compensation? My sentence is that you should give back theroubles, and that your comrade gives you a greeting. '

The whole assembly approved the decision, and the man only grumbled out, as he gave back the money, 'I knew I should lose it, if that dog of aChristian meddled with it. '

All this respect, however, did not avail to procure any better usage forthe unfortunate judge, whose health was suffering severely under hisprivations. Ivan, however, had recommended himself in the same way asLeo, by his perfections as a cook, and moreover he was a capitalbuffoon. His fetters were sometimes taken off that he might divert thevillagers by his dances and strange antics while his master played theguitar. Sometimes they sang Russian songs together to the instrument, and on these occasions the Major's hands were released that he mightplay on it; but one day he was unfortunately heard playing in his chainsfor his own amusement, and from that time he was never released from hisfetters. 

In the course of a year, three urgent letters had been sent; but nonotice was taken of them, and Ivan began to despair of aid from home, and set himself to work. His first step was to profess himself aMahometan. He durst not tell his master till the deed was done, and thenKascambo was infinitely shocked; but the act did not procure Ivan somuch freedom as he had hoped. He was, indeed, no longer in chains, buthe was evidently distrusted, and was so closely watched, that the onlyway in which he could communicate with his master was when they were setto sing together, when they chanted out question and answer in Russ, unsuspected, to the tune of their national airs. He was taken on anexpedition against the Russians, and very nearly killed by thesuspicious Tchetchenges on one side, and by the Cossacks on the other, as a deserter. He saved a young man of the tribe from drowning; butthough he thus earned the friendship of the family, the rest of thevillagers hated and dreaded him all the more, since he had not been ableto help proving himself a man of courage, instead of the feeble buffoonhe had tried to appear. 

Three months after this expedition, another took place; but Ivan was notallowed even to know of it. He saw preparations making, but nothing wassaid to him; only one morning he found the village entirely deserted byall the young men, and as he wandered round it, the aged ones would notspeak to him. A child told him that his father had meant to kill him, and on the roof of her house stood the sister of the man he had saved, making signals of great terror, and pointing towards Russia. Home hewent and found that, besides old Ibrahim, his master was watched by awarrior, who had been prevented by an intermitting fever from joiningthe expedition. He was convinced that if the tribe returnedunsuccessful, the murder of both himself and his master was certain; buthe resolved not to fly alone, and as he busied himself in preparing themeal, he sung the burden of a Russian ballad, intermingled with words ofencouragement for his master:

The time is come; Hai Luli!The time is come, Hai Luli!Our woe is at an end, Hai Luli!Or we die at once! Hai Luli!To-morrow, to-morrow, Hai Luli!We are off for a town, Hai Luli!For a fine, fine town, Hai Luli!But I name no names, Hai Luli!Courage, courage, master dear, Hai Luli!Never, never, despair, Hai Luli!For the God of the Russians is great, Hai Luli!

Poor Kascambo, broken down, sick, and despairing, only muttered, 'Do asyou please, only hold your peace!'

Ivan's cookery incited the additional guard to eat so much supper, thathe brought on a severe attack of his fever, and was obliged to go home;but old Ibrahim, instead of going to bed, sat down on a log of woodopposite the prisoner, and seemed resolved to watch him all night. Thewoman and child went to bed in the inner room, and Ivan signed to hismaster to take the guitar, and began to dance. The old man's axe was inan open cupboard at the other end of the room, and after many gambolsand contortions, during which the Major could hardly control his fingersto touch the strings, Ivan succeeded in laying his hands upon it, justwhen the old man was bending over the fire to mend it. Then, as Ibrahimdesired that the music should cease, he cut him down with a single blow, on his own hearth. And the daughter-in-law coming out to see what hadhappened, he slew her with the same weapon. And then, alas! in spite ofthe commands, entreaties, and cries of his master, he dashed into theinner room, and killed the sleeping child, lest it should give thealarm. Kascambo, utterly helpless to save, fell almost fainting upon thebloody floor, and did not cease to reproach Ivan, who was searching theold man's pockets for the key of the fetters, but it was not there, noranywhere else in the hut, and the irons were so heavy that escape wasimpossible in them. Ivan at last knocked off the clog and the chains onthe wrist with the axe, but he could not break the chains round thelegs, and could only fasten them as close as he could to hinder themclanking. Then securing all the provisions he could carry, and puttinghis master into his military cloak, obtaining also a pistol and dagger, they crept out, but not on the direct road. It was February, and theground was covered with snow. All night they walked easily, but at noonthe sun so softened it that they sank in at every step, and the Major'schains rendered each motion terrible labour. It was only on the secondnight that Ivan, with his axe, succeeded in breaking through thefastenings, and by that time the Major's legs were so swollen andstiffened that he could not move without extreme pain. However, he wasdragged on through the wild mountain paths, and then over the plains forseveral days more, till they were on the confines of another tribe ofTchetchenges, who were overawed by Russia, and in a sort of unwillingalliance. Here, however, a sharp storm, and a fall into the water, completely finished Kascambo's strength, and he sank down on the snow, telling Ivan to go home and explain his fate, and give his last messageto his mother. 

'If you perish here, ' said Ivan, 'trust me, neither your mother nor minewill ever see me again. '

He covered his master with his cloak, gave him the pistol, and walked onto a hut, where he found a Tchetchenge man, and told him that here was ameans of obtaining two hundred roubles. He had only to shelter the majoras a guest for three days, whilst Ivan himself went on to Mosdok, toprocure the money, and bring back help for his master. The man was fullof suspicion, but Ivan prevailed, and Kascambo was carried into thevillage nearly dying, and was very ill all the time of his servant'sabsence. Ivan set off for the nearest Russian station, where he foundsome of the Cossacks who had been present when the major was taken. Alleagerly subscribed to raise the two hundred roubles, but the Colonelwould not let Ivan go back alone, as he had engaged to do, and sent aguard of Cossacks. This had nearly been fatal to the Major, for as soonas his host saw the lances, he suspected treachery, and dragging hispoor sick guest to the roof of the house, he tied him up to a stake, andstood over him with a pistol, shouting to Ivan, 'If you come nearer, Ishall blow his brains out, and I have fifty cartridges more for myenemies, and the traitor who leads them. '

'No traitor!' cried Ivan. 'Here are the roubles. I have kept my word!'

'Let the Cossacks go back, or I shall fire. '

Kascambo himself begged the officer to retire, and Ivan went back withthe detachment, and returned alone. Even then the suspicious host madehim count out the roubles at a hundred paces from the house, and at onceordered him out of sight; but then went up to the roof, and asked theMajor's pardon for all this rough usage. 

'I shall only recollect that you were my host, and kept your word, ' saidKascambo. 

In a few hours more, Kascambo was in safety among his brother officers. Ivan was made a non-commissioned officer, and some months after was seenby the traveler who told the story, whistling the air of Hai Luli at hisformer master's wedding feast. He was even then scarcely twenty yearsold, and peculiarly quiet and soft in manners. 

THE BATTLE OF THE BLACKWATER

991

In the evil days of King Ethelred the Unready, when the teaching of goodKing Alfred was fast fading away from the minds of his descendants, andself-indulgence was ruining the bold and hardy habits of the English, the fleet was allowed to fall into decay, and Danish ships againventured to appear on the English coasts. 

The first Northmen who had ravaged England came eager for blood andplunder, and hating the sight of a Christian church as an insult totheir gods, Thor and Odin; but the lapse of a hundred years had in somedegree changed the temper of the North; and though almost every youngman thought it due to his fame to have sailed forth as a sea rover, yetthe attacks of these marauders might be bought off, and provided theyhad treasure to show for their voyage, they were willing to spare thelives and lands of the people of the coasts they visited. 

King Ethelred and his cowardly, selfish Court were well satisfied withthis expedient, and the tax called Danegeld was laid upon the people, inorder to raise a fund for buying off the enemy. But there were still inEngland men of bolder and truer hearts, who held that bribery was falsepolicy, merely inviting the enemy to come again and again, and that theonly wise course would be in driving them back by English valor, andkeeping the fleet in a condition to repel the 'Long Serpent' shipsbefore the foe could set foot upon the coast. 

Among those who held this opinion was Brythnoth, Earl of Essex. He wasof partly Danish descent himself, but had become a thorough Englishman, and had long and faithfully served the King and his father. He was afriend to the clergy, a founder of churches and convents, and his manorhouse of Hadleigh was a home of hospitality and charity. It wouldprobably be a sort of huge farmyard, full of great barn-like buildingsand sheds, all one story high; some of them serving for storehouses, andothers for living-rooms and places of entertainment for his numerousservants and retainers, and for the guests of all degrees who gatheredround him as the chief dispenser of justice in his East-Saxon earldom. When he heard the advice given and accepted that the Danes should bebribed, instead of being fought with, he made up his mind that he, atleast, would try to raise up a nobler spirit, and, at the sacrifice ofhis own life, would show the effect of making a manful stand againstthem. 

He made his will, and placed it in the hands of the Archbishop ofCanterbury; and then, retiring to Hadleigh, he provided horses and arms, and caused all the young men in his earldom to be trained in warlikeexercises, according to the good old English law, that every man shouldbe provided with weapons and know the use of them. 

The Danes sailed forth, in the year 991, with ninety-three vessels, theterrible 'Long Serpents', carved with snakes' heads at the prow, and thestern finished as the gilded tail of the reptile; and many a lessership, meant for carrying plunder. The Sea King, Olaf (or Anlaff), wasthe leader; and as tidings came that their sails had been seen upon theNorth Sea, more earnest than ever rang out the petition in the Litany, 'From the fury of the Northmen, good Lord, deliver us'. 

Sandwich and Ipswich made no defense, and were plundered; and the fleetthen sailed into the mouth of the River Blackwater, as far as Maldon, where the ravagers landed, and began to collect spoil. When, however, they came back to their ships, they found that the tide would not yetserve them to re-embark; and upon the farther bank of the river bristledthe spears of a body of warriors, drawn up in battle array, but innumbers far inferior to their own. 

Anlaff sent a messenger, over the wooden bridge that crossed the river, to the Earl, who, he understood, commanded this small army. The braveold man, his grey hair hanging down beneath his helmet, stood, sword inhand, at the head of his warriors. 

'Lord Earl, ' said the messenger, 'I come to bid thee to yield to us thytreasure, for thy safety. Buy off the fight, and we will ratify a peacewith gold. '

'Hear, O thou sailor!' was Brythnoth's answer, 'the reply of thispeople. Instead of Danegeld, thou shalt have from them the edge of thesword, and the point of the spear. Here stands an English Earl, who willdefend his earldom and the lands of his King. Point and edge shall judgebetween us. '

Back went the Dane with his message to Anlaff, and the fight beganaround the bridge, where the Danes long strove to force their wayacross, but were always driven back by the gallant East-Saxons. The tidehad risen, and for some time the two armies only shot at one anotherwith bows and arrows; but when it ebbed, leaving the salt-marches dry, the stout old Earl's love of fair play overpowered his prudence, and hesent to offer the enemy a free passage, and an open field in which tomeasure their strength. 

The numbers were too unequal; but the battle was long and bloody beforethe English could be overpowered. Brythnoth slew one of the chief Danishleaders with his own hand, but not without receiving a wound. He wasstill able to fight on, though with ebbing strength and failing numbers. His hand was pierced by a dart; but a young boy at his side instantlywithdrew it, and, launching it back again, slew the foe who had aimedit. Another Dane, seeing the Earl faint and sinking, advanced to plunderhim of his ring and jeweled weapons; but he still had strength to laythe spoiler low with his battleaxe. This was his last blow; he gatheredhis strength for one last cheer to his brave men, and then, sinking onthe ground, he looked up to heaven, exclaiming: 'I thank thee, Lord ofnations, for all the joys I have known on earth. Now, O mild Creator!have I the utmost need that Thou shouldst grant grace unto my soul, thatmy spirit may speed to Thee with peace, O King of angels! to pass intothy keeping. I sue to Thee that Thou suffer not the rebel spirits ofhell to vex my parting soul!'

With these words he died; but an aged follower, of like spirit, stoodover his corpse, and exhorted his fellows. 'Our spirit shall be thehardier, and our soul the greater, the fewer our numbers become!' hecried. 'Here lies our chief, the brave, the good, the much-loved lord, who has blessed us with many a gift. Old as I am, I will not yield, butavenge his death, or lay me at his side. Shame befall him that thinks tofly from such a field as this!'

Nor did the English warriors fly. Night came down, at last, upon thebattlefield, and saved the lives of the few survivors; but they wereforced to leave the body of their lord, and the Danes bore away withthem his head as a trophy, and with it, alas! ten thousand pounds ofsilver from the King, who, in his sluggishness and weakness had leftBrythnoth to fight and die unaided for the cause of the whole nation. One of the retainers, a minstrel in the happy old days of Hadleigh, whohad done his part manfully in the battle, had heard these last goodlysayings of his master, and, living on to peaceful days, loved torehearse them to the sound of his harp, and dwell on the glories of onewho could die, but not be defeated. 

Ere those better days had come, another faithful-hearted Englishman hadgiven his life for his people. In the year 1012, a huge army, calledfrom their leader, 'Thorkill's Host', were overrunning Kent, andbesieging Canterbury. The Archbishop Aelfeg was earnestly entreated toleave the city while yet there was time to escape; but he replied, 'Nonebut a hireling would leave his flock in time of danger;' and hesupported the resolution of the inhabitants, so that they held out thecity for twenty days; and as the wild Danes had very little chanceagainst a well-walled town, they would probably have saved it, had notthe gates been secretly opened to them by the traitorous Abbot Aelfman, whom Aelfeg had once himself saved, when accused of treason before theKing. 

The Danes slaughtered all whom they found in the streets, and theArchbishop's friends tried to keep him in the church, lest he should runupon his fate; but he broke from them, and, confronting the enemy, cried: 'Spare the guiltless! Is there glory in shedding such blood? Turnyour wrath on me! It is I who have denounced your cruelty, have ransomedand re-clad your captive. ' The Danes seized upon him, and, after he hadseen his cathedral burnt and his clergy slain, they threw him into adungeon, whence he was told he could only come forth upon the payment ofa heavy ransom. 

His flock loved him, and would have striven to raise the sum; but, miserably used as they were by the enemy, and stripped by the exactionsof the Danes, he would not consent that they should be asked for afurther contribution on his account. After seven months' patience in hiscaptivity, the Danish chiefs, who were then at Greenwich desired him tobe brought into their camp, where they had just been holding a greatfeast. It was Easter Eve, and the quiet of that day of calm waiting wasdisturbed with their songs, and shouts of drunken revelry, as thechained Archbishop was led to the open space where the warriors sat andlay amid the remains of their rude repast. The leader then told him thatthey had agreed to let him off for his own share with a much smallerpayment than had been demanded, provided he would obtain a largesse forthem from the King, his master. 

'I am not the man, ' he answered, 'to provide Christian flesh for Paganwolves;' and when again they repeated the demand, 'Gold I have none tooffer you, save the true wisdom of the knowledge of the living God. ' Andhe began, as he stood in the midst, to 'reason to them of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come. '

They were mad with rage and drink. The old man's voice was drowned withshouts of 'Gold, Bishop--give us gold!' The bones and cups that layaround were hurled at him, and he fell to the ground, with the cry, 'OChief Shepherd, guard Thine own children!' As he partly raised himself, axes were thrown at him; and, at last, a Dane, who had begun to love andlisten to him in his captivity, deemed it mercy to give him a deathblowwith an axe. The English maintained that Aelfeg had died to save hisflock from cruel extortion, and held him as a saint and martyr, keepinghis death day (the 19th of April) as a holiday; and when the ItalianArchbishop of Canterbury (Lanfranc) disputed his right to be soesteemed, there was strong opposition and discontent. Indeed, our ownPrayer Book still retains his name, under the altered form of St. Alphege; and surely no one better merits to be remembered, for havingloved his people far better than himself. 

GUZMAN EL BUENO

1293

In the early times of Spanish history, before the Moors had beenexpelled from the peninsula, or the blight of Western gold had enervatedthe nation, the old honor and loyalty of the Gothic race were high andpure, fostered by constant combats with a generous enemy. The SpanishArabs were indeed the flower of the Mahometan races, endowed with thevigor and honor of the desert tribes, yet capable of culture andcivilization, excelling all other nations of their time in science andart, and almost the equals of their Christian foes in the attributes ofchivalry. Wars with them were a constant crusade, consecrated in theminds of the Spaniards as being in the cause of religion, and yet insome degree freed from savagery and cruelty by the respect exacted bythe honorable character of the enemy, and by the fact that thecivilization and learning of the Christian kingdoms were far morederived from the Moors than from the kindred nations of Europe. 

By the close of the thirteenth century, the Christian kingdoms ofCastille and Aragon were descending from their mountain fastnesses, andspreading over the lovely plains of the south, even to the Mediterraneancoast, as one beautiful Moorish city after another yielded to thepersevering advances of the children of the Goths; and in 1291 thenephew of our own beloved Eleanor of Castille, Sancho V. Called ElBravo, ventured to invest the city of Tarifa. 

This was the western buttress of the gate of the Mediterranean, the baseof the northern Pillar of Hercules, and esteemed one of the gates ofSpain. By it five hundred years previously had the Moorish enemy firstentered Spain at the summons of Count Julian, under their leader Tarif-abu-Zearah, whose name was bestowed upon it in remembrance of hislanding there. The form of the ground is said to be like a broken punchbowl, with the broken part towards the sea. The Moors had fortified thecity with a surrounding wall and twenty-six towers, and had built acastle with a lighthouse on a small adjacent island, called Isla Verde, which they had connected with the city by a causeway. Theirfortifications, always admirable, have existed ever since, and in 1811, another five hundred years after, were successfully defended against theFrench by a small force of British troops under the command of ColonelHugh Gough, better known in his old age as the victor of Aliwal. Thewalls were then unable to support the weight of artillery, for which ofcourse they had never been built, but were perfectly effective againstescalade. 

For six months King Sancho besieged Tarifa by land and sea, his fleet, hired from the Genoese, lying in the waters where the battle ofTrafalgar was to be fought. The city at length yielded under stress offamine, but the King feared that he had no resources to enable him tokeep it, and intended to dismantle and forsake it, when the Grand Masterof the military order of Calatrava offered to undertake the defense withhis knights for one year, hoping that some other noble would comeforward at the end of that time and take the charge upon himself. 

He was not mistaken. The noble who made himself responsible for thispost of danger was a Leonese knight of high distinction, by name AlonsoPerez de Guzman, already called El Bueno, or 'The Good', from the highqualities he had manifested in the service of the late King, Don AlonsoVI, by whom he had always stood when the present King, Don Sancho, wasin rebellion. The offer was readily accepted, and the whole Guzmanfamily removed to Tarifa, with the exception of the eldest son, who wasin the train of the Infant Don Juan, the second son of the late King, who had always taken part with his father against his brother, and onSancho's accession, continued his enmity, and fled to Portugal. 

The King of Portugal, however, being requested by Sancho not to permithim to remain there, he proceeded to offer his services to the King ofMorocco, Yusuf-ben-Yacoub, for whom he undertook to recover Tarifa, if5, 000 horse were granted to him for the purpose. The force would havebeen most disproportionate for the attack of such a city as Tarifa, butDon Juan reckoned on means that he had already found efficacious; whenhe had obtained the surrender of Zamora to his father by threatening toput to death a child of the lady in command of the fortress. 

Therefore, after summoning Tarifa at the head of his 5, 000 Moors, he ledforth before the gates the boy who had been confided to his care, anddeclared that unless the city were yielded instantly, Guzman shouldbehold the death of his own son at his hand! Before, he had had to dealwith a weak woman on a question of divided allegiance. It was otherwisehere. The point was whether the city should be made over to the enemiesof the faith and country, whether the plighted word of a loyal knightshould be broken. The boy was held in the grasp of the cruel prince, stretching out his hands and weeping as he saw his father upon thewalls. Don Alonso's eyes, we are told, filled with tears as he cast onelong, last look at his first-born, whom he might not save except at theexpense of his truth and honor. 

The struggle was bitter, but he broke forth at last in these words: 'Idid not beget a son to be made use of against my country, but that heshould serve her against her foes. Should Don Juan put him to death, hewill but confer honor on me, true life on my son, and on himself eternalshame in this world and everlasting wrath after death. So far am I fromyielding this place or betraying my trust, that in case he should want aweapon for his cruel purpose, there goes my knife!'

He cast the knife in his belt over the walls, and returned to the Castlewhere, commanding his countenance, he sat down to table with his wife. Loud shouts of horror and dismay almost instantly called him forthagain. He was told that Don Juan had been seen to cut the boy's throatin a transport of blind rage. 'I thought the enemy had broken in, ' hecalmly said, and went back again. 

The Moors themselves were horrorstruck at the atrocity of their ally, and as the siege was hopeless they gave it up; and Don Juan, afraid andashamed to return to Morocco, wandered to the Court of Granada. 

King Sancho was lying sick at Alcala de Henares when the tidings of theprice of Guzman's fidelity reached him. Touched to the depths of hisheart he wrote a letter to his faithful subject, comparing his sacrificeto that of Abraham, confirming to him the surname of Good, lamenting hisown inability to come and offer his thanks and regrets, but entreatingGuzman's presence at Alcala. 

All the way thither, the people thronged to see the man true to his wordat such a fearful cost. The Court was sent out to meet him, and theKing, after embracing him, exclaimed, 'Here learn, ye knights, what areexploits of virtue. Behold your model. '

Lands and honors were heaped upon Alonso de Guzman, and they were not amockery of his loss, for he had other sons to inherit them. He was thestaunch friend of Sancho's widow and son in a long and perilousminority, and died full of years and honors. The lands granted to himwere those of Medina Sidonia which lie between the Rivers Guadiana andGuadalquivir, and they have ever since been held by his descendants, whostill bear the honored name of Guzman, witnessing that the man who gavethe life of his first-born rather than break his faith to the King hasleft a posterity as noble and enduring as any family in Europe. 

FAITHFUL TILL DEATH

1308

One of the ladies most admired by the ancient Romans was Arria, the wifeof Caecina Paetus, a Roman who was condemned by the Emperor Claudius tobecome his own executioner. Seeing him waver, his wife, who was resolvedto be with him in death as in life, took the dagger from his hand, plunged it into her own breast, and with her last strength held it outto him, gasping out, 'It is not painful, my Paetus. '

Such was heathen faithfulness even to death; and where the teaching ofChristianity had not forbidden the taking away of life by one's ownhand, perhaps wifely love could not go higher. Yet Christian women haveendured a yet more fearful ordeal to their tender affection, watching, supporting, and finding unfailing fortitude to uphold the sufferer inagonies that must have rent their hearts. 

Natalia was the fair young wife of Adrian, an officer at Nicomedia, inthe guards of the Emperor Galerius Maximianus, and only about twenty-eight years old. Natalia was a Christian, but her husband remained apagan, until, when he was charged with the execution of some martyrs, their constancy, coupled with the testimony of his own wife's virtues, triumphed over his unbelief, and he confessed himself likewise aChristian. He was thrown into prison, and sentenced to death, but heprevailed on his gaoler to permit him to leave the dungeon for a time, that he might see his wife. The report came to Natalia that he was nolonger in prison, and she threw herself on the ground, lamenting aloud:'Now will men point at me, and say, 'Behold the wife of the coward andapostate, who, for fear of death, hath denied his God. '

'Oh, thou noble and strong-hearted woman, ' said Adrian's voice at thedoor, 'I bless God that I am not unworthy of thee. Open the door that Imay bid thee farewell. '

But this was not the last farewell, though he duly went back to theprison; for when, the next day, he had been cruelly scourged andtortured before the tribunal, Natalia, with her hair cut short, andwearing the disguise of a youth, was there to tend and comfort him. Shetook him in her arms saying, 'Oh, light of mine eyes, and husband ofmine heart, blessed art thou, who art chosen to suffer for Christ'ssake. '

On the following day, the tyrant ordered that Adrian's limbs should beone by one struck off on a blacksmith's anvil, and lastly his head. Andstill it was his wife who held him and sustained him through all and, ere the last stroke of the executioner, had received his last breath. She took up one of the severed hands, kissed it, and placed it in herbosom, and escaping to Byzantium, there spent her life in widowhood. 

Nor among these devoted wives should we pass by Gertrude, the wife ofRudolf, Baron von der Wart, a Swabian nobleman, who was so ill-advisedas to join in a conspiracy of Johann of Hapsburg, in 1308, against theEmperor, Albrecht I, the son of the great and good Rudolf of Hapsburg. 

This Johann was the son of the Emperor's brother Rudolf, a brave knightwho had died young, and Johann had been brought up by a Baron calledWalther von Eschenbach, until, at nineteen years old, he went to hisuncle to demand his father's inheritance. Albrecht was a rude anduncouth man, and refused disdainfully the demand, whereupon the noblemenof the disputed territory stirred up the young prince to form a plotagainst him, all having evidently different views of the lengths towhich they would proceed. This was just at the time that the Swiss, angry at the overweening and oppressive behaviour of Albrecht'sgovernors, were first taking up arms to maintain that they owed no dutyto him as Duke of Austria, but merely as Emperor of Germany. He set outon his way to chastise them as rebels, taking with him a considerabletrain, of whom his nephew Johann was one. At Baden, Johann, as a lastexperiment, again applied for his inheritance, but by way of answer, Albrecht held out a wreath of flowers, telling him they better becamehis years than did the cares of government. He burst into tears, threwthe wreath upon the ground, and fed his mind upon the savage purpose ofletting his uncle find out what he was fit for. 

By and by, the party came to the banks of the Reuss, where there was nobridge, and only one single boat to carry the whole across. The first tocross were the Emperor with one attendant, besides his nephew and fourof the secret partisans of Johann. Albrecht's son Leopold was left tofollow with the rest of the suite, and the Emperor rode on towards thehills of his home, towards the Castle of Hapsburg, where his father'snoble qualities had earned the reputation which was the cause of all thegreatness of the line. Suddenly his nephew rode up to him, and while oneof the conspirators seized the bridle of his horse, exclaimed, 'Will younow restore my inheritance?' and wounded him in the neck. The attendantfled; Der Wart, who had never thought murder was to be a part of thescheme, stood aghast, but the other two fell on the unhappy Albrecht, and each gave him a mortal wound, and then all five fled in differentdirections. The whole horrible affair took place full in view of Leopoldand the army on the other side of the river, and when it became possiblefor any of them to cross, they found that the Emperor had just expired, with his head in the lap of a poor woman. 

The murderers escaped into the Swiss mountains, expecting shelter there;but the stout, honest men of the cantons were resolved not to have anyconnection with assassins, and refused to protect them. Johann himself, after long and miserable wanderings in disguise, bitterly repented, owned his crime to the Pope, and was received into a convent; Eschenbachescaped, and lived fifteen years as a cowherd. The others all fell intothe hands of the sons and daughters of Albrecht, and woeful was therevenge that was taken upon them, and upon their innocent families andretainers. 

That Leopold, who had seen his father slain before his eyes, should havebeen deeply incensed, was not wonderful, and his elder brotherFrederick, as Duke of Austria, was charged with the execution ofjustice; but both brothers were horribly savage and violent in theirproceedings, and their sister Agnes surpassed them in her atrociousthirst for vengeance. She was the wife of the King of Hungary, veryclever and discerning, and also supposed to be very religious, but allbetter thoughts were swept away by her furious passion. She had nearlystrangled Eschenbach's infant son with her own bare hands, when he wasrescued from her by her own soldiers, and when she was watching thebeheading of sixty-three vassals of another of the murderers, sherepeatedly exclaimed, 'Now I bathe in May dew. ' Once, indeed, she metwith a stern rebuke. A hermit, for whom she had offered to build aconvent, answered her, 'Woman, God is not served by shedding innocentblood and by building convents out of the plunder of families, but bycompassion and forgiveness of injuries. '

Rudolf von der Wart received the horrible sentence of being broken onthe wheel. On his trial the Emperor's attendant declared that Der Warthad attacked Albert with his dagger, and the cry, 'How long will yesuffer this carrion to sit on horseback?' but he persisted to the lastthat he had been taken by surprise by the murder. However, there was nomercy for him; and, by the express command of Queen Agnes, after he hadbeen bound upon one wheel, and his limbs broken by heavy blows from theexecutioner, he was fastened to another wheel, which was set upon apole, where he was to linger out the remaining hours of his life. Hisyoung wife, Gertrude, who had clung to him through all the trial, wastorn away and carried off to the Castle of Kyburg; but she made herescape at dusk, and found her way, as night came on, to the spot whereher husband hung still living upon the wheel. That night of agony wasdescribed in a letter ascribed to Gertrude herself. The guard left towatch fled at her approach, and she prayed beneath the scaffold, andthen, heaping some heavy logs of wood together, was able to climb upnear enough to embrace him and stroke back the hair from his face, whilst he entreated her to leave him, lest she should be found there, and fall under the cruel revenge of the Queen, telling her that thus itwould be possible to increase his suffering. 

'I will die with you, ' she said, 'tis for that I came, and no powershall force me from you;' and she prayed for the one mercy she hopedfor, speedy death for her husband. 

In Mrs. Hemans' beautiful words--

'And bid me not depart, ' she cried, 'My Rudolf, say not so;This is no time to quit thy side, Peace, peace, I cannot go!Hath the world aught for me to fear When death is on thy brow?The world! what means it? Mine is here! I will not leave thee now. 'I have been with thee in thine hour Of glory and of bliss;Doubt not its memory's living power To strengthen me through this. And thou, mine honor'd love and true, Bear on, bear nobly on;We have the blessed heaven in view, Whose rest shall soon be won. '

When day began to break, the guard returned, and Gertrude took down herstage of wood and continued kneeling at the foot of the pole. Crowds ofpeople came to look, among them the wife of one of the officials, whomGertrude implored to intercede that her husband's sufferings might beended; but though this might not be, some pitied her, and tried to giveher wine and confections, which she could not touch. The priest came andexhorted Rudolf to confess the crime, but with a great effort herepeated his former statement of innocence. 

A band of horsemen rode by. Among them was the young Prince Leopold andhis sister Agnes herself, clad as a knight. They were very angry at thecompassion shown by the crowd, and after frightfully harsh languagecommanded that Gertrude should be dragged away; but one of the noblesinterceded for her, and when she had been carried away to a littledistance her entreaties were heard, and she was allowed to break awayand come back to her husband. The priest blessed Gertrude, gave her hishand and said, 'Be faithful unto death, and God will give you the crownof life, ' and she was no further molested. 

Night came on, and with it a stormy wind, whose howling mingled with thevoice of her prayers, and whistled in the hair of the sufferer. One ofthe guard brought her a cloak. She climbed on the wheel, and spread thecovering over her husband's limbs; then fetched some water in her shoe, and moistened his lips with it, sustaining him above all with herprayers, and exhortations to look to the joys beyond. He had ceased totry to send her away, and thanked her for the comfort she gave him. Andstill she watched when morning came again, and noon passed over her, andit was verging to evening, when for the last time he moved his head; andshe raised herself so as to be close to him. With a smile, he murmured, 'Gertrude, this is faithfulness till death, ' and died. She knelt down tothank God for having enabled her to remain for that last breath--

'While even as o'er a martyr's grave She knelt on that sad spot, And, weeping, blessed the God who gave Strength to forsake it not!'

She found shelter in a convent at Basle, where she spent the rest of herlife in a quiet round of prayer and good works; till the time came whenher widowed heart should find its true rest for ever. 

WHAT IS BETTER THAN SLAYING A DRAGON

1332

The next story we have to tell is so strange and wild, that it wouldseem better to befit the cloudy times when history had not yet beendisentangled from fable, than the comparatively clear light of thefourteenth century. 

It took place in the island of Rhodes. This Greek isle had become thehome of the Knights of St. John, or Hospitaliers, an order of swornbrethren who had arisen at the time of the Crusades. At first they hadbeen merely monks, who kept open house for the reception of the poorpenniless pilgrims who arrived at Jerusalem in need of shelter, andoften of nursing and healing. The good monks not only fed and housedthem, but did their best to cure the many diseases that they would catchin the toilsome journey in that feverish climate; and thus it has cometo pass that the word hospitium, which in Latin only means an inn, has, in modern languages, given birth, on the one hand, to hotel, or lodginghouse, on the other, to hospital, or house of healing. The Hospital atJerusalem was called after St. John the Almoner, a charitable Bishop ofold, and the brethren were Hospitaliers. By and by, when the firstCrusade was over, and there was a great need of warriors to maintain theChristian cause in Jerusalem, the Hospitaliers thought it a pity that somany strong arms should be prevented from exerting themselves, by thelaws that forbade the clergy to do battle, and they obtained permissionfrom the Pope to become warriors as well as monks. They were thus all inone--knights, priests, and nurses; their monasteries were both castlesand hospitals; and the sick pilgrim or wounded Crusader was sure of allthe best tendance and medical care that the times could afford, as wellas of all the ghostly comfort and counsel that he might need, and, if herecovered, he was escorted safely down to the seashore by a party strongenough to protect him from the hordes of robber Arabs. All this was forcharity's sake, and without reward. Surely the constitution of the Orderwas as golden as its badge--the eight-pointed cross--which the brethrenwore round their neck. They wore it also in white over their shoulderupon a black mantle. And the knights who had been admitted to the fullhonors of the Order had a scarlet surcoat, likewise with the whitecross, over their armor. The whole brotherhood was under the command ofa Grand Master, who was elected in a chapter of all the knights, and towhom all vowed to render implicit obedience. 

Good service in all their three capacities had been done by the Order aslong as the Crusaders were able to keep a footing in the Holy Land; butthey were driven back step by step, and at last, in 1291, their laststronghold at Acre was taken, after much desperate fighting, and theremnant of the Hospitaliers sailed away to the isle of Cyprus, where, after a few years, they recruited their forces, and, in 1307, capturedthe island of Rhodes, which had been a nest of Greek and Mahometanpirates. Here they remained, hoping for a fresh Crusade to recover theHoly Sepulcher, and in the meantime fulfilling their old mission as theprotectors and nurses of the weak. All the Mediterranean Sea wasinfested by corsairs from the African coast and the Greek isles, andthese brave knights, becoming sailors as well as all they had beenbefore, placed their red flag with its white cross at the masthead ofmany a gallant vessel that guarded the peaceful traveler, hunted downthe cruel pirate, and brought home his Christian slave, rescued fromlaboring at the oar, to the Hospital for rest and tendance. Or theirtreasures were used in redeeming the captives in the pirate cities. Noknight of St. John might offer any ransom for himself save his sword andscarf; but for the redemption of their poor fellow Christians theirwealth was ready, and many a captive was released from toiling inAlgiers or Tripoli, or still worse, from rowing the pirate vessels, chained to the oar, between the decks, and was restored to health andreturned to his friends, blessing the day he had been brought into thecurving harbour of Rhodes, with the fine fortified town of churches andmonasteries. 

Some eighteen years after the conquest of Rhodes, the whole island wasfilled with dismay by the ravages of an enormous creature, living in amorass at the foot of Mount St. Stephen, about two miles from the cityof Rhodes. Tradition calls it a dragon, and whether it were a crocodileor a serpent is uncertain. There is reason to think that the monsters ofearly creation were slow in becoming extinct, or it is not impossiblethat either a crocodile or a python might have been brought over bystorms or currents from Africa, and have grown to a more formidable sizethan usual in solitude among the marshes, while the island was changingowners. The reptile, whatever it might be, was the object of extremedread; it devoured sheep and cattle, when they came down to the water, and even young shepherd boys were missing. And the pilgrimage to theChapel of St. Stephen, on the hill above its lair, was especially aservice of danger, for pilgrims were believed to be snapped up by thedragon before they could mount the hill. 

Several knights had gone out to attempt the destruction of the creature, but not one had returned, and at last the Grand Master, Helion deVilleneuve, forbade any further attacks to be made. The dragon is saidto have been covered with scales that were perfectly impenetrable eitherto arrows or any cutting weapon; and the severe loss that encounterswith him had cost the Order, convinced the Grand Master that he must belet alone. 

However, a young knight, named Dieudonne de Gozon, was by no meanswilling to acquiesce in the decree; perhaps all the less because it cameafter he had once gone out in quest of the monster, but had returned, byhis own confession, without striking a blow. He requested leave ofabsence, and went home for a time to his father's castle of Gozon, inLanguedoc; and there he caused a model of the monster to be made. He hadobserved that the scales did not protect the animal's belly, though itwas almost impossible to get a blow at it, owing to its tremendousteeth, and the furious strokes of its length of tail. He thereforecaused this part of his model to be made hollow, and filled with food, and obtaining two fierce young mastiffs, he trained them to fly at theunder side of the monster, while he mounted his warhorse, and endeavoredto accustom it likewise to attack the strange shape without swerving. 

When he thought the education of horse and dogs complete, he returned toRhodes; but fearing to be prevented from carrying out his design, he didnot land at the city, but on a remote part of the coast, whence he madehis way to the chapel of St. Stephen. There, after having recommendedhimself to God, he left his two French squires, desiring them to returnhome if he were slain, but to watch and come to him if he killed thedragon, or were only hurt by it. He then rode down the hillside, andtowards the haunt of the dragon. It roused itself at his advance, and atfirst he charged it with his lance, which was perfectly useless againstthe scales. His horse was quick to perceive the difference between thetrue and the false monster, and started back, so that he was forced toleap to the ground; but the two dogs were more staunch, and sprang atthe animal, whilst their master struck at it with his sword, but stillwithout reaching a vulnerable part, and a blow from the tail had thrownhim down, and the dragon was turning upon him, when the movement leftthe undefended belly exposed. Both mastiffs fastened on it at once, andthe knight, regaining his feet, thrust his sword into it. There was adeath grapple, and finally the servants, coming down the hill, foundtheir knight lying apparently dead under the carcass of the dragon. Whenthey had extricated him, taken off his helmet, and sprinkled him withwater, he recovered, and presently was led into the city amid theecstatic shouts of the whole populace, who conducted him in triumph tothe palace of the Grand Master. 

We have seen how Titus Manlius was requited by his father for his breachof discipline. It was somewhat in the same manner that Helion deVilleneuve received Dieudonne. We borrow Schiller's beautiful version ofthe conversation that took place, as the young knight, pale, with hisblack mantle rent, his shining armor dinted, his scarlet surcoat stainedwith blood, came into the Knights' Great Hall. 

'Severe and grave was the Master's brow, Quoth he, 'A hero bold art thou, By valor 't is that knights are known;A valiant spirit hast thou shown;But the first duty of a knight, Now tell, who vows for CHRIST to fightAnd bears the Cross on his coat of mail. 'The listeners all with fear grew pale, While, bending lowly, spake the knight, His cheeks with blushes burning, 'He who the Cross would bear aright Obedience must be learning. '

Even after hearing the account of the conflict, the Grand Master did notabate his displeasure. 

'My son, the spoiler of the landLies slain by thy victorious handThou art the people's god, but soThou art become thine Order's foe;A deadlier foe thine heart has bredThan this which by thy hand is dead, That serpent still the heart defilingTo ruin and to strife beguiling, It is that spirit rash and bold, That scorns the bands of order;Rages against them uncontrolled Till earth is in disorder. 

'Courage by Saracens is shown, Submission is the Christian's own;And where our Saviour, high and holy, Wandered a pilgrim poor and lowlyUpon that ground with mystery fraught, The fathers of our Order taughtThe duty hardest to fulfilIs to give up your own self-willThou art elate with glory vain. Away then from my sight!Who can his Saviour's yoke disdain Bears not his Cross aright. '

'An angry cry burst from the crowd, The hall rang with their tumult loud;Each knightly brother prayed for grace. The victor downward bent his face, Aside his cloak in silence laid, Kissed the Grand Master's hand, nor stayed. The Master watched him from the hall, Then summoned him with loving call, 'Come to embrace me, noble son, Thine is the conquest of the soul;Take up the Cross, now truly won, By meekness and by self-control. '

The probation of Dieudonne is said to have been somewhat longer than thepoem represents, but after the claims of discipline had beenestablished, he became a great favorite with stern old Villeneuve, andthe dragon's head was set up over the gate of the city, where Thèvenotprofessed to have seen it in the seventeenth century, and said that itwas larger than that of a horse, with a huge mouth and teeth and verylarge eyes. The name of Rhodes is said to come from a Phoenician word, meaning a serpent, and the Greeks called this isle of serpents, which isall in favor of the truth of the story. But, on the other hand, suchtraditions often are prompted by the sight of the fossil skeletons ofthe dragons of the elder world, and are generally to be met with wheresuch minerals prevail as are found in the northern part of Rhodes. Thetale is disbelieved by many, but it is hard to suppose it an entireinvention, though the description of the monster may have beenexaggerated. 

Dieudonne de Gozon was elected to the Grand Mastership after the deathof Villeneuve, and is said to have voted for himself. If so, it seems asif he might have had, in his earlier days, an overweening opinion of hisown abilities. However, he was an excellent Grand Master, a greatsoldier, and much beloved by all the poor peasants of the island, towhom he was exceedingly kind. He died in 1353, and his tomb is said tohave been the only inscribed with these words, 'Here lies the DragonSlayer. '

THE KEYS OF CALAIS

1347

Nowhere does the continent of Europe approach Great Britain so closelyas at the straits of Dover, and when our sovereigns were full of thevain hope of obtaining the crown of France, or at least of regaining thegreat possessions that their forefathers has owned as French nobles, there was no spot so coveted by them as the fortress of Calais, thepossession of which gave an entrance into France. 

Thus it was that when, in 1346, Edward III. Had beaten Philippe VI. Atthe battle of Crecy, the first use he made of his victory was to marchupon Calais, and lay siege to it. The walls were exceedingly strong andsolid, mighty defenses of masonry, of huge thickness and like rocks forsolidity, guarded it, and the king knew that it would be useless toattempt a direct assault. Indeed, during all the Middle Ages, the modesof protecting fortifications were far more efficient than the modes ofattacking them. The walls could be made enormously massive, the towersraised to a great height, and the defenders so completely sheltered bybattlements that they could not easily be injured and could take aimfrom the top of their turrets, or from their loophole windows. The gateshad absolute little castles of their own, a moat flowed round the wallsfull of water, and only capable of being crossed by a drawbridge, behindwhich the portcullis, a grating armed beneath with spikes, was alwaysready to drop from the archway of the gate and close up the entrance. The only chance of taking a fortress by direct attack was to fill up themoat with earth and faggots, and then raise ladders against the walls;or else to drive engines against the defenses, battering-rams whichstruck them with heavy beams, mangonels which launched stones, sowswhose arched wooden backs protected troops of workmen who tried toundermine the wall, and moving towers consisting of a succession ofstages or shelves, filled with soldiers, and with a bridge with ironhooks, capable of being launched from the highest story to the top ofthe battlements. The besieged could generally disconcert the battering-ram by hanging beds or mattresses over the walls to receive the brunt ofthe blow, the sows could be crushed with heavy stones, the towers burntby well-directed flaming missiles, the ladders overthrown, and ingeneral the besiegers suffered a great deal more damage than they couldinflict. Cannon had indeed just been brought into use at the battle ofCrecy, but they only consisted of iron bars fastened together withhoops, and were as yet of little use, and thus there seemed to be littledanger to a well-guarded city from any enemy outside the walls. 

King Edward arrived before the place with all his victorious army earlyin August, his good knights and squires arrayed in glittering steelarmor, covered with surcoats richly embroidered with their heraldicbearings; his stout men-at-arms, each of whom was attended by three boldfollowers; and his archers, with their crossbows to shoot bolts, andlongbows to shoot arrows of a yard long, so that it used to be said thateach went into battle with three men's lives under his girdle, namely, the three arrows he kept there ready to his hand. With the King was hisson, Edward, Prince of Wales, who had just won the golden spurs ofknighthood so gallantly at Crecy, when only in his seventeenth year, andlikewise the famous Hainault knight, Sir Walter Mauny, and all that wasnoblest and bravest in England. 

This whole glittering army, at their head the King's great royalstandard bearing the golden lilies of France quartered with the lions ofEngland, and each troop guided by the square banner, swallow-tailedpennon or pointed pennoncel of their leader, came marching to the gatesof Calais, above which floated the blue standard of France with itsgolden flowers, and with it the banner of the governor, Sir Jean deVienne. A herald, in a rich long robe embroidered with the arms ofEngland, rode up to the gate, a trumpet sounding before him, and calledupon Sir Jean de Vienne to give up the place to Edward, King of England, and of France, as he claimed to be. Sir Jean made answer that he heldthe town for Philippe, King of France, and that he would defend it tothe last; the herald rode back again and the English began the siege ofthe city. 

At first they only encamped, and the people of Calais must have seen thewhole plain covered with the white canvas tents, marshalled round theensigns of the leaders, and here and there a more gorgeous onedisplaying the colours of the owner. Still there was no attack upon thewalls. The warriors were to be seen walking about in the leathern suitsthey wore under their armor; or if a party was to be seen with theircoats of mail on, helmet on head, and lance in hand, it was not againstCalais that they came; they rode out into the country, and by and bymight be seen driving back before them herds of cattle and flocks ofsheep or pigs that they had seized and taken away from the poorpeasants; and at night the sky would show red lights where farms andhomesteads had been set on fire. After a time, in front of the tents, the English were to be seen hard at work with beams and boards, settingup huts for themselves, and thatching them over with straw or broom. These wooden houses were all ranged in regular streets, and there was amarketplace in the midst, whither every Saturday came farmers andbutchers to sell corn and meat, and hay for the horses; and the Englishmerchants and Flemish weavers would come by sea and by land to bringcloth, bread, weapons, and everything that could be needed to be sold inthis warlike market. 

The Governor, Sir Jean de Vienne, began to perceive that the King didnot mean to waste his men by making vain attacks on the strong walls ofCalais, but to shut up the entrance by land, and watch the coast by seaso as to prevent any provisions from being taken in, and so to starvehim into surrendering. Sir Jean de Vienne, however, hoped that before heshould be entirely reduced by famine, the King of France would be ableto get together another army and come to his relief, and at any rate hewas determined to do his duty, and hold out for his master to the last. But as food was already beginning to grow scarce, he was obliged to turnout such persons as could not fight and had no stores of their own, andso one Wednesday morning he caused all the poor to be brought together, men, women, and children, and sent them all out of the town, to thenumber of 1, 700. It was probably the truest mercy, for he had no food togive them, and they could only have starved miserably within the town, or have hindered him from saving it for his sovereign; but to them itwas dreadful to be driven out of house and home, straight down upon theenemy, and they went along weeping and wailing, till the Englishsoldiers met them and asked why they had come out. They answered thatthey had been put out because they had nothing to eat, and theirsorrowful, famished looks gained pity for them. King Edward sent ordersthat not only should they go safely through his camp, but that theyshould all rest, and have the first hearty dinner that they had eatenfor many a day, and he sent every one a small sum of money before theyleft the camp, so that many of them went on their way praying aloud forthe enemy who had been so kind to them. 

A great deal happened whilst King Edward kept watch in his wooden townand the citizens of Calais guarded their walls. England was invaded byKing David II. Of Scotland, with a great army, and the good QueenPhilippa, who was left to govern at home in the name of her little sonLionel, assembled all the forces that were left at home, and crossed theStraits of Dover, and a messenger brought King Edward letters from hisQueen to say that the Scots army had been entirely defeated at Nevil'sCross, near Durham, and that their King was a prisoner, but that he hadbeen taken by a squire named John Copeland, who would not give him up toher. 

King Edward sent letters to John Copeland to come to him at Calais, andwhen the squire had made his journey, the King took him by the handsaying, 'Ha! welcome, my squire, who by his valor has captured ouradversary the King of Scotland. '

Copeland, falling on one knee, replied, 'If God, out of His greatkindness, has given me the King of Scotland, no one ought to be jealousof it, for God can, when He pleases, send His grace to a poor squire aswell as to a great Lord. Sir, do not take it amiss if I did notsurrender him to the orders of my lady the Queen, for I hold my lands ofyou, and my oath is to you, not to her. '

The King was not displeased with his squire's sturdiness, but made him aknight, gave him a pension of 500l. A year, and desired him to surrenderhis prisoner to the Queen, as his own representative. This wasaccordingly done, and King David was lodged in the Tower of London. Soonafter, three days before All Saint's Day, there was a large and gayfleet to be seen crossing from the white cliffs of Dover, and the King, his son, and his knights rode down to the landing place to welcomeplump, fair haired Queen Philippa, and all her train of ladies, who hadcome in great numbers to visit their husbands, fathers, or brothers inthe wooden town. 

Then there was a great Court, and numerous feasts and dances, and theknights and squires were constantly striving who could do the bravestdeed of prowess to please the ladies. The King of France had placednumerous knights and men-at-arms in the neighboring towns and castles, and there were constant fights whenever the English went out foraging, and many bold deeds that were much admired were done. The great pointwas to keep provisions out of the town, and there was much fightingbetween the French who tried to bring in supplies, and the English whointercepted them. Very little was brought in by land, and Sir Jean deVienne and his garrison would have been quite starved but for twosailors of Abbeville, named Marant and Mestriel, who knew the coastthoroughly, and often, in the dark autumn evenings, would guide in awhole fleet of little boats, loaded with bread and meat for the starvingmen within the city. They were often chased by King Edward's vessels, and were sometimes very nearly taken, but they always managed to escape, and thus they still enabled the garrison to hold out. 

So all the winter passed, Christmas was kept with brilliant feastingsand high merriment by the King and his Queen in their wooden palaceoutside, and with lean cheeks and scanty fare by the besieged within. Lent was strictly observed perforce by the besieged, and Easter broughta betrothal in the English camp; a very unwilling one on the part of thebridegroom, the young Count of Flanders, who loved the French muchbetter than the English, and had only been tormented into giving hisconsent by his unruly vassals because they depended on the wool ofEnglish sheep for their cloth works. So, though King Edward's daughterIsabel was a beautiful fair-haired girl of fifteen, the young Countwould scarcely look at her; and in the last week before the marriageday, while her robes and her jewels were being prepared, and her fatherand mother were arranging the presents they should make to all theirCourt on the wedding day, the bridegroom, when out hawking, gave hisattendants the slip, and galloped off to Paris, where he was welcomed byKing Philippe. 

This made Edward very wrathful, and more than ever determined to takeCalais. About Whitsuntide he completed a great wooden castle upon theseashore, and placed in it numerous warlike engines, with forty men-at-arms and 200 archers, who kept such a watch upon the harbour that noteven the two Abbeville sailors could enter it, without having theirboats crushed and sunk by the great stones that the mangonels launchedupon them. The townspeople began to feel what hunger really was, buttheir spirits were kept up by the hope that their King was at lastcollecting an army for their rescue. 

And Philippe did collect all his forces, a great and noble army, andcame one night to the hill of Sangate, just behind the English army, theknights' armor glancing and their pennons flying in the moonlight, so asto be a beautiful sight to the hungry garrison who could see the whitetents pitched upon the hillside. Still there were but two roads by whichthe French could reach their friends in the town--one along theseacoast, the other by a marshy road higher up the country, and therewas but one bridge by which the river could be crossed. The EnglishKing's fleet could prevent any troops from passing along the coast road, the Earl of Derby guarded the bridge, and there was a great tower, strongly fortified, close upon Calais. There were a few skirmishes, butthe French King, finding it difficult to force his way to relieve thetown, sent a party of knights with a challenge to King Edward to comeout of his camp and do battle upon a fair field. 

To this Edward made answer, that he had been nearly a year beforeCalais, and had spent large sums of money on the siege, and that he hadnearly become master of the place, so that he had no intention of comingout only to gratify his adversary, who must try some other road if hecould not make his way in by that before him. 

Three days were spent in parleys, and then, without the slightest effortto rescue the brave, patient men within the town, away went KingPhilippe of France, with all his men, and the garrison saw the host thathad crowded the hill of Sangate melt away like a summer cloud. 

August had come again, and they had suffered privation for a whole yearfor the sake of the King who deserted them at their utmost need. Theywere in so grievous a state of hunger and distress that the hardiestcould endure no more, for ever since Whitsuntide no fresh provisions hadreached them. The Governor, therefore, went to the battlements and madesigns that he wished to hold a parley, and the King appointed LordBasset and Sir Walter Mauny to meet him, and appoint the terms ofsurrender. 

The Governor owned that the garrison was reduced to the greatestextremity of distress, and requested that the King would be contentedwith obtaining the city and fortress, leaving the soldiers andinhabitants to depart in peace. 

But Sir Walter Mauny was forced to make answer that the King, his lord, was so much enraged at the delay and expense that Calais had cost him, that he would only consent to receive the whole on unconditional terms, leaving him free to slay, or to ransom, or make prisoners whomsoever hepleased, and he was known to consider that there was a heavy reckoningto pay, both for the trouble the siege had cost him and the damage theCalesians had previously done to his ships. 

The brave answer was: 'These conditions are too hard for us. We are buta small number of knights and squires, who have loyally served our lordand master as you would have done, and have suffered much ill anddisquiet, but we will endure far more than any man has done in such apost, before we consent that the smallest boy in the town shall fareworse than ourselves. I therefore entreat you, for pity's sake, toreturn to the King and beg him to have compassion, for I have such anopinion of his gallantry that I think he will alter his mind. '

The King's mind seemed, however, sternly made up; and all that SirWalter Mauny and the barons of the council could obtain from him wasthat he would pardon the garrison and townsmen on condition that six ofthe chief citizens should present themselves to him, coming forth withbare feet and heads, with halters round their necks, carrying the keysof the town, and becoming absolutely his own to punish for theirobstinacy as he should think fit. 

On hearing this reply, Sir Jean de Vienne begged Sir Walter Mauny towait till he could consult the citizens, and, repairing to themarketplace, he caused a great bell to be rung, at sound of which allthe inhabitants came together in the town hall. When he told them ofthese hard terms he could not refrain from weeping bitterly, and wailingand lamentation arose all round him. Should all starve together, orsacrifice their best and most honored after all suffering in common solong?

Then a voice was heard; it was that of the richest burgher in the town, Eustache de St. Pierre. 'Messieurs high and low, ' he said, 'it would bea sad pity to suffer so many people to die through hunger, if it couldbe prevented; and to hinder it would be meritorious in the eyes of ourSaviour. I have such faith and trust in finding grace before God, if Idie to save my townsmen, that I name myself as the first of the six. '

As the burgher ceased, his fellow townsmen wept aloud, and many, amidtears and groans, threw themselves at his feet in a transport of griefand gratitude. Another citizen, very rich and respected, rose up andsaid, 'I will be second to my comrade, Eustache. ' His name was JeanDaire. After him, Jacques Wissant, another very rich man, offeredhimself as companion to these, who were both his cousins; and hisbrother Pierre would not be left behind: and two more, unnamed, made upthis gallant band of men willing to offer their lives for the rescue oftheir fellow townsmen. 

Sir Jean de Vienne mounted a little horse--for he had been wounded, andwas still lame--and came to the gate with them, followed by all thepeople of the town, weeping and wailing, yet, for their own sakes andtheir children's not daring to prevent the sacrifice. The gates wereopened, the governor and the six passed out, and the gates were againshut behind them. Sir Jean then rode up to Sir Walter Mauny, and toldhim how these burghers had voluntarily offered themselves, begging himto do all in his power to save them; and Sir Walter promised with hiswhole heart to plead their cause. De Vienne then went back into thetown, full of heaviness and anxiety; and the six citizens were led bySir Walter to the presence of the King, in his full Court. They allknelt down, and the foremost said: 'Most gallant King, you see beforeyou six burghers of Calais, who have all been capital merchants, and whobring you the keys of the castle and town. We yield ourselves to yourabsolute will and pleasure, in order to save the remainder of theinhabitants of Calais, who have suffered much distress and misery. Condescend, therefore, out of your nobleness of mind, to have pity onus. '

Strong emotion was excited among all the barons and knights who stoodround, as they saw the resigned countenances, pale and thin withpatiently endured hunger, of these venerable men, offering themselves inthe cause of their fellow townsmen. Many tears of pity were shed; butthe King still showed himself implacable, and commanded that they shouldbe led away, and their heads stricken off. Sir Walter Mauny intercededfor them with all his might, even telling the King that such anexecution would tarnish his honor, and that reprisals would be made onhis own garrisons; and all the nobles joined in entreating pardon forthe citizens, but still without effect; and the headsman had beenactually sent for, when Queen Philippa, her eyes streaming with tears, threw herself on her knees amongst the captives, and said, 'Ah, gentlesir, since I have crossed the sea, with much danger, to see you, I havenever asked you one favor; now I beg as a boon to myself, for the sakeof the Son of the Blessed Mary, and for your love to me, that you willbe merciful to these men!'

For some time the King looked at her in silence; then he exclaimed:'Dame, dame, would that you had been anywhere than here! You haveentreated in such a manner that I cannot refuse you; I therefore givethese men to you, to do as you please with. '

Joyfully did Queen Philippa conduct the six citizens to her ownapartments, where she made them welcome, sent them new garments, entertained them with a plentiful dinner, and dismissed them each with agift of six nobles. After this, Sir Walter Mauny entered the city, andtook possession of it; retaining Sir Jean de Vienne and the otherknights and squires till they should ransom themselves, and sending outthe old French inhabitants; for the King was resolved to people the cityentirely of English, in order to gain a thoroughly strong hold of thisfirst step in France. 

The King and Queen took up their abode in the city; and the houses ofJean Daire were, it appears, granted to the Queen--perhaps, because sheconsidered the man himself as her charge, and wished to secure them forhim--and her little daughter Margaret was, shortly after, born in one ofhis houses. Eustache de St. Pierre was taken into high favor, and placedin charge of the new citizens whom the King placed in the city. 

Indeed, as this story is told by no chronicler but Froissart, some havedoubted of it, and thought the violent resentment thus imputed to EdwardIII inconsistent with his general character; but it is evident that themen of Calais had given him strong provocation by attacks on hisshipping--piracies which are not easily forgiven--and that he consideredthat he had a right to make an example of them. It is not unlikely thathe might, after all, have intended to forgive them, and have given theQueen the grace of obtaining their pardon, so as to excuse himself fromthe fulfillment of some over-hasty threat. But, however this may havebeen, nothing can lessen the glory of the six grave and patient men whowent forth, by their own free will, to meet what might be a cruel anddisgraceful death, in order to obtain the safety of their fellow-townsmen. 

Very recently, in the summer of 1864, an instance has occurred of self-devotion worthy to be recorded with that of Eustache de St. Pierre. TheCity of Palmyra, in Tennessee, one of the Southern States of America, had been occupied by a Federal army. An officer of this army wasassassinated, and, on the cruel and mistaken system of taking reprisals, the general arrested ten of the principal inhabitants, and condemnedthem to be shot, as deeming the city responsible for the lives of hisofficers. One of them was the highly respected father of a large family, and could ill be spared. A young man, not related to him, upon this, came forward and insisted on being taken in his stead, as a lessvaluable life. And great as was the distress of his friend, thisgenerous substitution was carried out, and not only spared a father tohis children, but showed how the sharpest strokes of barbarity can stillelicit light from the dark stone--light that but for these blows mighthave slept unseen. 

THE BATTLE OF SEMPACH

1397

Nothing in history has been more remarkable than the union of thecantons and cities of the little republic of Switzerland. Of differingraces, languages, and, latterly, even religions--unlike in habits, tastes, opinions and costumes--they have, however, been held together, as it were, by pressure from without, and one spirit of patriotism haskept the little mountain republic complete for five hundred years. 

Originally the lands were fiefs of the Holy Roman Empire, the citymunicipalities owning the Emperor for their lord, and the great familyof Hapsburg, in whom the Empire became at length hereditary, was inreality Swiss, the county that gave them title lying in the canton ofAargau. Rodolf of Hapsburg was elected leader of the burghers of Zurich, long before he was chosen to the Empire; and he continued a Swiss inheart, retaining his mountaineer's open simplicity and honesty to theend of his life. Privileges were granted by him to the cities and thenobles, and the country was loyal and prosperous in his reign. 

His son Albert, the same who was slain by his nephew Johann, as before-mentioned, permitted those tyrannies of his bailiffs which goaded theSwiss to their celebrated revolt, and commenced the long series of warswith the House of Hapsburgor, as it was now termed, of Austria--whichfinally established their independence. 

On the one side, the Dukes of Austria and their ponderous Germanchivalry wanted to reduce the cantons and cities to vassalage, not tothe Imperial Crown, a distant and scarcely felt obligation, but to theDuchy of Austria; on the other, the hardy mountain peasants and stoutburghers well knew their true position, and were aware that to admit theAustrian usurpation would expose their young men to be drawn upon forthe Duke's wars, cause their property to be subject to perpetualrapacious exactions, and fill their hills with castles for ducalbailiffs, who would be little better than licensed robbers. No wonder, then, that the generations of William Tell and Arnold Melchthalbequeathed a resolute purpose of resistance to their descendants. 

It was in 1397, ninety years since the first assertion of Swissindependence, when Leopold the Handsome, Duke of Austria, a bold butmisproud and violent prince, involved himself in one of the constantquarrels with the Swiss that were always arising on account of theinsulting exactions of toll and tribute in the Austrian border cities. Asharp war broke out, and the Swiss city of Lucerne took the opportunityof destroying the Austrian castle of Rothemburg, where the tolls hadbeen particularly vexatious, and of admitting to their league the citiesof Sempach and Richensee. 

Leopold and all the neighboring nobles united their forces. Hatred andcontempt of the Swiss, as low-born and presumptuous, spurred them on;and twenty messengers reached the Duke in one day, with promises ofsupport, in his march against Sempach and Lucerne. He had sent a largeforce in the direction of Zurich with Johann Bonstetten, and advancedhimself with 4, 000 horse and 1, 400 foot upon Sempach. Zurich undertookits own defense, and the Forest cantons sent their brave peasants to thesupport of Lucerne and Sempach, but only to the number of 1, 300, who, onthe 9th of July, took post in the woods around the little lake ofSempach. 

Meanwhile, Leopold's troops rode round the walls of the little city, insulting the inhabitants, one holding up a halter, which he said wasfor the chief magistrate; and another, pointing to the reckless wastethat his comrades were perpetrating on the fields, shouted, 'Send abreakfast to the reapers. ' The burgomaster pointed to the wood where hisallies lay hid, and answered, 'My masters of Lucerne and their friendswill bring it. '

The story of that day was told by one of the burghers who fought in theranks of Lucerne, a shoemaker, named Albert Tchudi, who was both a bravewarrior and a master-singer; and as his ballad was translated by anothermaster-singer, Sir Walter Scott, and is the spirited record of aneyewitness, we will quote from him some of his descriptions of thebattle and its golden deed. 

The Duke's wiser friends proposed to wait till he could be joined byBonstetten and the troops who had gone towards Zurich, and the Baron vonHasenburg (i. E. Hare-rock) strongly urged this prudent counsel; but--

'O, Hare-Castle, thou heart of hare!' Fierce Oxenstiern he cried, 'Shalt see then how the game will fare, ' The taunted knight replied. '

'This very noon, ' said the younger knight to the Duke, 'we will deliverup to you this handful of villains. '

'And thus they to each other said, 'Yon handful down to hewWill be no boastful tale to tell The peasants are so few. '

Characteristically enough, the doughty cobbler describes how the firstexecution that took place was the lopping off the long-peaked toes ofthe boots that the gentlemen wore chained to their knees, and whichwould have impeded them on foot; since it had been decided that thehorses were too much tired to be serviceable in the action. 

'There was lacing then of helmets bright, And closing ranks amain, The peaks they hewed from their boot points Might well nigh load a wain. '

They were drawn up in a solid compact body, presenting an unbroken lineof spears, projecting beyond the wall of gay shields and polishedimpenetrable armor. 

The Swiss were not only few in number, but armor was scarce among them;some had only boards fastened on their arms by way of shields, some hadhalberts, which had been used by their fathers at the battle ofMorgarten, others two-handed swords and battleaxes. They drew themselvesup in the form of a wedge and

'The gallant Swiss confederates then They prayed to God aloud, And He displayed His rainbow fair, Against a swarthy cloud. '

Then they rushed upon the serried spears, but in vain. 'The game wasnothing sweet. '

The banner of Lucerne was in the utmost danger, the Landamman was slain, and sixty of his men, and not an Austrian had been wounded. The flanksof the Austrian host began to advance so as to enclose the small peasantforce, and involve it in irremediable destruction. A moment of dismayand stillness ensued. Then Arnold von Winkelried of Unterwalden, with aneagle glance saw the only means of saving his country, and, with thedecision of a man who dares by dying to do all things, shouted aloud: 'Iwill open a passage. '

'I have a virtuous wife at home, A wife and infant son:I leave them to my country's care, The field shall yet be won!'He rushed against the Austrian band In desperate career, And with his body, breast, and hand, Bore down each hostile spear;Four lances splintered on his crest, Six shivered in his side, Still on the serried files he pressed, He broke their ranks and died!'

The very weight of the desperate charge of this self-devoted man openeda breach in the line of spears. In rushed the Swiss wedge, and theweight of the nobles' armor and length of their spears was onlyencumbering. They began to fall before the Swiss blows, and Duke Leopoldwas urged to fly. 'I had rather die honorably than live with dishonor, 'he said. He saw his standard bearer struck to the ground, and seizinghis banner from his hand, waved it over his head, and threw himselfamong the thickest of the foe. His corpse was found amid a heap ofslain, and no less then 2000 of his companions perished with him, ofwhom a third are said to have been counts, barons and knights. 

'Then lost was banner, spear and shield At Sempach in the flight;The cloister vaults at Konigsfeldt Hold many an Austrian knight. '

The Swiss only lost 200; but, as they were spent with the excessive heatof the July sun, they did not pursue their enemies. They gave thanks onthe battlefield to the God of victories, and the next day buried thedead, carrying Duke Leopold and twenty-seven of his most illustriouscompanions to the Abbey of Konigsfeldt, where they buried him in the oldtomb of his forefathers, the lords of Aargau, who had been laid there inthe good old times, before the house of Hapsburg had grown arrogant withsuccess. 

As to the master-singer, he tells us of himself that

'A merry man was he, I wot, The night he made the lay, Returning from the bloody spot, Where God had judged the day. '

On every 9th of July subsequently, the people of the country have beenwont to assemble on the battlefield, around four stone crosses whichmark the spot. A priest from a pulpit in the open air gives athanksgiving sermon on the victory that ensured the freedom ofSwitzerland, and another reads the narrative of the battle, and the rollof the brave 200, who, after Winkelried's example, gave their lives inthe cause. All this is in the face of the mountains and the lake nowlying in summer stillness, and the harvest fields whose crops are securefrom marauders, and the congregation then proceed to the small chapel, the walls of which are painted with the deed of Arnold von Winkelried, and the other distinguished achievements of the confederates, and massesare sung for the souls of those who were slain. No wonder that men thusnurtured in the memory of such actions were, even to the fall of theFrench monarchy, among the most trustworthy soldiery of Europe. 

THE CONSTANT PRINCE

1433

The illustrious days of Portugal were during the century and a half ofthe dynasty termed the House of Aviz, because its founder, Dom Joao I. Had been grand master of the military order of Aviz. 

His right to the throne was questionable, or more truly null, and he hadonly obtained the crown from the desire of the nation to be independentof Castile, and by the assistance of our own John of Gaunt, whosedaughter, Philippa of Lancaster, became his wife, thus connecting theglories of his line with our own house of Plantagenet. 

Philippa was greatly beloved in Portugal, and was a most noble-mindedwoman, who infused her own spirit into her children. She had five sons, and when they all had attained an age to be admitted to the order ofknighthood, their father proposed to give a grand tournament in whichthey might evince their prowess. This, however, seemed but play to thehigh-spirited youths, who had no doubt fed upon the story of the mannerin which their uncle, the Black Prince, whose name was borne by theeldest, had won his spurs at Crecy. Their entreaty was, not to becarpet--knights dubbed in time of peace, and King Joao on the other handobjected to entering on a war merely for the sake of knighting his sons. At last Dom Fernando, the youngest of the brothers, a lad of fourteen, proposed that their knighthood should be earned by an expedition to takeCeuta from the Moors. A war with the infidel never came amiss, and wasin fact regarded as a sacred duty; moreover, Ceuta was a nest ofcorsairs who infested the whole Mediterranean coast. Up to thenineteenth century the seaports along the African coast of theMediterranean were the hives of pirates, whose small rapid vessels werethe terror of every unarmed ship that sailed in those waters, and whosedescents upon the coasts of Spain, France, and Italy rendered life andproperty constantly insecure. A regular system of kidnapping prevailed;prisoners had their fixed price, and were carried off to labour in theAfrican dockyards, or to be chained to the benches of the Moorish shipswhich their oars propelled, until either a ransom could be procured fromtheir friends, or they could be persuaded to become renegades, or deathput an end to their sufferings. A captivity among the Moors was by nomeans an uncommon circumstance even in the lives of Englishmen down tothe eighteenth century, and pious persons frequently bequeathed sums ofmoney for the ransom of the poorer captives. 

Ceuta, perched upon the southern Pillar of Hercules, was one of the mostperilous of these dens of robbery, and to seize it might well appear aworthy action, not only to the fiery princes, but to their cautiousfather. He kept his designs absolutely secret, and contrived to obtain aplan of the town by causing one of his vessels to put in there as inquest of provisions, while, to cover his preparations for war, he sent apublic challenge to the Count of Holland, and a secret message at thesame time, with the assurance that it was only a blind. Theseproceedings were certainly underhand, and partook of treachery; but theywere probably excused in the King's own mind by the notion, that nofaith was to be kept with unbelievers, and, moreover, such people as theCeutans were likely never to be wanting in the supply of pretexts forattack. 

Just as all was ready, the plague broke out in Lisbon, and the Queenfell sick of it. Her husband would not leave her, and just before herdeath she sent for all her sons, and gave to each a sword, charging themto defend the widow and orphan, and to fight against the infidel. In thefull freshness of their sorrow, the King and his sons set sail from theBay of Lagos, in the August of 1415, with 59 galleys, 33 ships of war, and 120 transports; the largest fleet ever yet sent forth by the littlekingdom, and the first that had left a Peninsular port with the bannersand streamers of which the more northern armaments were so profuse. 

The governor of Ceuta, Zala ben Zala, was not unprepared for the attack, and had collected 5, 000 allies to resist the Christians; but a greatstorm having dispersed the fleet on the first day of its appearance, hethought the danger over, and dismissed his friends On the 14th August, however, the whole fleet again appeared, and the King, in a little boat, directed the landing of his men, led by his sons, the Infantes Duarteand Henrique. The Moors gave way before them, and they entered the citywith 500 men, among the flying enemy, and there, after a period of muchdanger, were joined by their brother Pedro. The three fought their wayto a mosque, where they defended themselves till the King with the restof his army made their way in. Zala ben Zala fled to the citadel, but, after one assault, quitted it in the night. 

The Christian captives were released, the mosque purified andconsecrated as a cathedral, a bishop was appointed, and the King gavethe government of the place to Dom Pedro de Menezes, a knight of suchknown fidelity that the King would not suffer him to take the oath ofallegiance. An attempt was made by the Moors four years later to recoverthe place; but the Infantes Pedro and Henrique hurried from Portugal tosuccor Menezes, and drove back the besiegers; whereupon the Moorsmurdered their King, Abu Sayd, on whom they laid the blame of thedisaster. 

On the very day, eighteen years later, of the taking of Ceuta, King Joaodied of the plague at Lisbon, on the 14th of August, 1433. Duarte cameto the throne; and, a few months after, his young brother, Fernando, persuaded him into fitting out another expedition to Africa, of whichTangier should be the object. 

Duarte doubted of the justice of the war, and referred the question tothe Pope, who decided against it; but the answer came too late, thepreparations were made, and the Infantes Henrique and Fernando took thecommand. Henrique was a most enlightened prince, a great mathematicianand naval discoverer, but he does not appear to have made good use ofhis abilities on the present occasion; for, on arriving at Ceuta, andreviewing the troops, they proved to have but 8, 000, instead of 14, 000, as they had intended. Still they proceeded, Henrique by land andFernando by sea, and laid siege to Tangier, which was defended by theirold enemy, Zala ben Zala. Everything was against them; their scalingladders were too short to reach to the top of the walls, and the Moorshad time to collect in enormous numbers for the relief of the city, under the command of the kings of Fez and Morocco. 

The little Christian army was caught as in a net, and, after a day'shard fighting, saw the necessity of re-embarking. All was arranged forthis to be done at night; but a vile traitor, chaplain to the army, passed over to the Moors, and revealed their intention. The beach wasguarded, and the retreat cut off. Another day of fighting passed, and atnight hunger reduced them to eating their horses. 

It was necessary to come to terms, and messengers were sent to treatwith the two kings. The only terms on which the army could be allowed todepart were that one of the Infantes should remain as a hostage for thedelivery of Ceuta to the Moors. For this purpose Fernando offeredhimself, though it was exceedingly doubtful whether Ceuta would berestored; and the Spanish poet, Calderon, puts into his mouth a generousmessage to his brother the King, that they both were Christian princes, and that his liberty was not to be weighed in the scale with theirfather's fairest conquest. 

Henrique was forced thus to leave his brave brother, and return with theremnants of his army to Ceuta, where he fell sick with grief andvexation. He sent the fleet home; but it met with a great storm, andmany vessels were driven on the coast of Andalusia, where, by orders ofthe King, the battered sailors and defeated soldiers were most kindlyand generously treated. 

Dom Duarte, having in the meantime found out with how insufficient anarmy his brothers had been sent forth, had equipped a fresh fleet, thearrival of which at Ceuta cheered Henrique with hope of rescuing hisbrother; but it was soon followed by express orders from the King thatHenrique should give up all such projects and return home. He wasobliged to comply, but, unable to look Duarte in the face, he retired tohis own estates at the Algarve. 

Duarte convoked the States-general of the kingdom, to consider whetherCeuta should be yielded to purchase his brother's freedom. They decidedthat the place was too important to be parted with, but undertook toraise any sum of money for the ransom; and if this were not accepted, proposed to ask the Pope to proclaim a crusade for his rescue. 

At first Fernando was treated well, and kept at Tangier as an honorableprisoner; but disappointment enraged the Moors, and he was thrown into adungeon, starved, and maltreated. All this usage he endured with theutmost calmness and resolution, and could by no means be threatened intoentreating for liberty to be won at the cost of the now Christian citywhere his knighthood had been won. 

His brother Duarte meantime endeavored to raise the country for hisdeliverance; but the plague was still desolating Portugal, so that itwas impossible to collect an army, and the infection at length seized onthe King himself, from a letter which he incautiously opened, and hedied, in his thirty-eighth year, in 1438, the sixth year of his reignand the second of his brother's captivity. His successor, Affonso V. , was a child of six years old, and quarrels and disputes between theQueen Mother and the Infante Dom Pedro rendered the chance of redeemingthe captivity of Fernando less and less. 

The King of Castille, and even the Moorish King of Granada, shocked athis sufferings and touched by his constancy, proposed to unite theirforces against Tangier for his deliverance; but the effect of this wasthat Zala ben Zala made him over to Muley Xeques, the King of Fez, bywhom he was thrown into a dungeon without light or air. After a time, hewas brought back to daylight, but only to toil among the other Christianslaves, to whom he was a model of patience, resignation, and kindness. Even his enemies became struck with admiration of his high qualities, and the King of Fez declared that he even deserved to be a Mahometan!

At last, in 1443, Fernando's captivity ended, but only by his death. Muley Xeque caused a tall tower to be erected on his tomb, in memory ofthe victory of Tangier; but in 1473, two sons of Muley being madeprisoners by the Portuguese, one was ransomed for the body of DomFernando, who was then solemnly laid in the vaults of the beautifulAbbey of Batalha on the field of Aljubarota, which had given his fatherthe throne. Universal honor attended the name of the Constant Prince, the Portuguese Regulus; and seldom as the Spanish admire anythingPortuguese, a fine drama of the poet Calderon is founded upon that noblespirit which preferred dreary captivity to the yielding up his father'sconquest to the enemies of his country and religion. Nor was thisconstancy thrown away; Ceuta remained a Christian city. It was held byPortugal till the house of Aviz was extinguished in Dom Sebastiao, andsince that time has belonged to the crown of Spain. 

THE CARNIVAL OF PERTH

1435

It was bedtime, and the old vaulted chambers of the Dominican monasteryat Perth echoed with sounds that would seem incongruous in such a homeof austerity, but that the disturbed state of Scotland rendered it thehabit of her kings to attach their palaces to convents, that theythemselves might benefit by the 'peace of the Church', which was ingeneral accorded to all sacred spots. 

Thus it was that Christmas and Carnival time of 1435-6 had been spent bythe Court in the cloisters of Perth, and the dance, the song, and thetourney had strangely contrasted with the grave and self-denying habitsto which the Dominicans were devoted in their neighboring cells. Thefestive season was nearly at an end, for it was the 20th of February;but the evening had been more than usually gay, and had been spent ingames at chess, tables, or backgammon, reading romances of chivalry, harping, and singing. King James himself, brave and handsome, and in theprime of life, was the blithest of the whole joyous party. He was themost accomplished man in his dominions; for though he had been baselykept a prisoner at Windsor throughout his boyhood by Henry IV ofEngland, an education had been bestowed on him far above what he wouldhave otherwise obtained; and he was naturally a man of great ability, refinement, and strength of character. Not only was he a perfect knighton horseback, but in wrestling and running, throwing the hammer, and'putting the stane', he had scarcely a rival, and he was skilled in allthe learned lore of the time, wrote poetry, composed music both sacredand profane, and was a complete minstrel, able to sing beautifully andto play on the harp and organ. His Queen, the beautiful Joan Beaufort, had been the lady of his minstrelsy in the days of his captivity, eversince he had watched her walking on the slopes of Windsor Park, andwooed her in verses that are still preserved. They had now been elevenyears married, and their Court was one bright spot of civilization, refinement, and grace, amid the savagery of Scotland. And now, after thepleasant social evening, the Queen, with her long fair hair unbound, wassitting under the hands of her tire-women, who were preparing her forthe nights rest; and the King, in his furred nightgown, was standingbefore the bright fire on the hearth of the wide chimney, laughing andtalking with the attendant ladies. 

Yet dark hints had already been whispered, which might have cast ashadow over that careless mirth. Always fierce and vindictive, the Scotshad been growing more and more lawless and savage ever since thedisputed succession of Bruce and Balliol had unsettled all royalauthority, and led to one perpetual war with the English. The twentyyears of James's captivity had been the worst of all--almost every noblewas a robber chief; Scottish Borderer preyed upon English Borderer, Highlander upon Lowlander, knight upon traveler, everyone who had armorupon him who had not; each clan was at deadly feud with its neighbour;blood was shed like water from end to end of the miserable land, and thehigher the birth of the offender the greater the impunity he claimed. 

Indeed, James himself had been brought next to the throne by one of themost savage and horrible murders ever perpetrated--that of his elderbrother, David, by his own uncle; and he himself had probably been onlysaved from sharing the like fate by being sent out of the kingdom. Hisearnest words on his return to take the rule of this unhappy realm werethese: 'Let God but grant me life, and there shall not be a spot in myrealm where the key shall not keep the castle, and the bracken bush thecow, though I should lead the life of a dog to accomplish it. '

This great purpose had been before James through the eleven years of hisreign, and he had worked it out resolutely. The lawless nobles would notbrook his ruling hand, and strong and bitter was the hatred that hadarisen against him. In many of his transactions he was far fromblameless: he was sometimes tempted to craft, sometimes to tyranny; buthis object was always a high and kingly one, though he was led by thehorrid wickedness of the men he had to deal with more than once toforget that evil is not to be overcome with evil, but with good. In themain, it was his high and uncompromising resolution to enforce the lawsupon high and low alike that led to the nobles' conspiracies againsthim; though, if he had always been true to his purpose of swervingneither to the right nor to the left, he might have avoided the lastfatal offence that armed the murderer against his life. 

The chief misdoers in the long period of anarchy had been his uncles andcousins; nor was it till after his eldest uncle's death that his returnhome had been possible. With a strong hand had he avenged upon theprinces and their followers the many miseries they had inflicted uponhis people; and in carrying out these measures he had seized upon thegreat earldom of Strathern, which had descended to one of their party inright of his wife, declaring that it could not be inherited by a female. In this he appears to have acted unjustly, from the strong desire toavail himself by any pretext of an opportunity of breaking theoverweening power of the great turbulent nobles; and, to make up for theloss, he created the new earldom of Menteith, for the young MaliseGraham, the son of the dispossessed earl. But the proud and vindictiveGrahams were not thus to be pacified. Sir Robert Graham, the uncle ofthe young earl, drew off into the Highlands, and there formed aconspiracy among other discontented men who hated the resolutegovernment that repressed their violence. Men of princely blood joinedin the plot, and 300 Highland catherans were ready to accompany theexpedition that promised the delights of war and plunder. 

Even when the hard-worked King was setting forth to enjoy his holiday atPerth, the traitors had fixed upon that spot as the place of his doom;but the scheme was known to so many, that it could not be kept entirelysecret, and warnings began to gather round the King. When, on his way toPerth, he was about to cross the Firth of Forth, the wild figure of aHighland woman appeared at his bridle rein, and solemnly warned him'that, if he crossed that water, he would never return alive'. He wasstruck by the apparition, and bade one of his knights to enquire of herwhat she meant; but the knight must have been a dullard or a traitor, for he told the King that the woman was either mad or drunk, and nonotice was taken of her warning. 

There was likewise a saying abroad in Scotland, that the new year, 1436, should see the death of a king; and this same carnival night, James, while playing at chess with a young friend, whom he was wont to call theking of love, laughingly observed that 'it must be you or I, since thereare but two kings in Scotland--therefore, look well to yourself'. 

Little did the blithe monarch guess that at that moment one of theconspirators, touched by a moment's misgiving, was hovering round, seeking in vain for an opportunity of giving him warning; that even thenhis chamberlain and kinsman, Sir Robert Stewart, was enabling thetraitors to place boards across the moat for their passage, and toremove the bolts and bars of all the doors in their way. And theHighland woman was at the door, earnestly entreating to see the King, ifbut for one moment! The message was even brought to him, but, alas! hebade her wait till the morrow, and she turned away, declaring that sheshould never more see his face!

And now, as before said, the feast was over, and the King stood, gailychatting with his wife and her ladies, when the clang of arms was heard, and the glare of torches in the court below flashed on the windows. Theladies flew to secure the doors. Alas! the bolts and bars were gone! Toolate the warnings returned upon the King's mind, and he knew it was healone who was sought. He tried to escape by the windows, but here thebars were but too firm. Then he seized the tongs, and tore up a board inthe floor, by which he let himself down into the vault below, just asthe murderers came rushing along the passage, slaying on their way apage named Walter Straiton. 

There was no bar to the door. Yes, there was. Catherine Douglas, worthyof her name, worthy of the cognizance of the bleeding heart, thrust herarm through the empty staples to gain for her sovereign a few momentsmore for escape and safety! But though true as steel, the brave arm wasnot as strong. It was quickly broken. She was thrust fainting aside, andthe ruffians rushed in. Queen Joan stood in the midst of the room, withher hair streaming round her, and her mantle thrown hastily on. Some ofthe wretches even struck and wounded her, but Graham called them off, and bade them search for the King. They sought him in vain in everycorner of the women's apartments, and dispersed through the other roomsin search of their prey. The ladies began to hope that the citizens andnobles in the town were coming to their help, and that the King mighthave escaped through an opening that led from the vault into the tenniscourt. Presently, however, the King called to them to draw him up again, for he had not been able to get out of the vault, having a few daysbefore caused the hole to be bricked up, because his tennis balls usedto fly into it and be lost. In trying to draw him up by the sheets, Elizabeth Douglas, another of the ladies, was actually pulled down intothe vault; the noise was heard by the assassins, who were still watchingoutside, and they returned. 

There is no need to tell of the foul and cruel slaughter that ensued, nor of the barbarous vengeance that visited it. Our tale is of golden, not of brazen deeds; and if we have turned our eyes for a moment to theBloody Carnival of Perth, it is for the sake of the King, who was tooupright for his bloodthirsty subjects, and, above all, for that of thenoble-hearted lady whose frail arm was the guardian of her sovereign'slife in the extremity of peril. 

In like manner, on the dreadful 6th of October, 1787, when theinfuriated mob of Paris had been incited by the revolutionary leaders torush to Versailles in pursuit of the royal family, whose absence theyfancied deprived them of bread and liberty, a woman shared the honor ofsaving her sovereign's life, at least for that time. 

The confusion of the day, with the multitude thronging the courts andpark of Versailles, uttering the most frightful threats and insults, hadbeen beyond all description; but there had been a pause at night, and attwo o'clock, poor Queen Marie Antoinette, spent with horror and fatigue, at last went to bed, advising her ladies to do the same; but theiranxiety was too great, and they sat up at her door. At half-past fourthey heard musket shots, and loud shouts, and while one awakened theQueen, the other, Madame Auguier, flew towards the place whence thenoise came. As she opened the door, she found one of the royalbodyguards, with his face covered with blood, holding his musket so asto bar the door while the furious mob were striking at him. He turned tothe lady, and cried, 'Save the Queen, madame, they are come to murderher!' Quick as lightning, Madame Auguier shut and bolted the door, rushed to the Queen's bedside, and dragged her to the opposite door, with a petticoat just thrown over her. Behold, the door was fastened onthe other side! The ladies knocked violently, the King's valet openedit, and in a few minutes the whole family were in safety in the King'sapartments. M. De Miomandre, the brave guardsman, who used his musket toguard the Queen's door instead of to defend himself, fell wounded; buthis comrade, M. De Repaire, at once took his place, and, according toone account, was slain, and the next day his head, set upon a pike, wasborne before the carriage in which the royal family were escorted backto Paris. 

M. De Miomandre, however, recovered from his wounds, and a few weeksafter, the Queen, hearing that his loyalty had made him a mark for thehatred of the mob, sent for him to desire him to quit Paris. She saidthat gold could not repay such a service as his had been, but she hopedone day to be able to recompense him more as he deserved; meanwhile, shehoped he would consider that as a sister might advance a timely sum to abrother, so she might offer him enough to defray his expenses at Paris, and to provide for his journey. In a private audience then he kissed herhand, and those of the King and his saintly sister, Elizabeth, while theQueen gratefully expressed her thanks, and the King stood by, with tearsin his eyes, but withheld by his awkward bashfulness from expressing thefeelings that overpowered him. 

Madame Auguier, and her sister, Madame Campan, continued with theirroyal lady until the next stage in that miserable downfall of all thatwas high and noble in unhappy France. She lived through the horrors ofthe Revolution, and her daughter became the wife of Marshal Ney. 

Well it is that the darkening firmament does but show the stars, andthat when treason and murder surge round the fated chambers of royalty, their foulness and violence do but enhance the loyal self-sacrifice ofsuch doorkeepers as Catherine Douglas, Madame Auguier, or M. DeMiomandre. 

'Such deeds can woman's spirit do, O Catherine Douglas, brave and true!Let Scotland keep thy holy nameStill first upon her ranks of fame. '

THE CROWN OF ST. STEPHEN

1440

Of all the possessions of the old kingdom of Hungary, none was morevalued than what was called the Crown of St. Stephen, so called fromone, which had, in the year 1000, been presented by Pope Sylvester II. To Stephen, the second Christian Duke, and first King of Hungary. Acrown and a cross were given to him for his coronation, which took placein the Church of the Holy Virgin, at Alba Regale, also called in GermanWeissenburg, where thenceforth the Kings of Hungary were anointed tobegin their troubled reigns, and at the close of them were laid to restbeneath the pavement, where most of them might have used the sameepitaph as the old Italian leader: 'He rests here, who never restedbefore'. For it was a wild realm, bordered on all sides by foes, withPoland, Bohemia, and Austria, ever casting greedy eyes upon it, andafterwards with the Turk upon the southern border, while the Magyars, orHungarian nobles, themselves were a fierce and untameable race, bold andgenerous, but brooking little control, claiming a voice in choosingtheir own Sovereign, and to resist him, even by force of arms, if hebroke the laws. No prince had a right to their allegiance unless he hadbeen crowned with St. Stephen's Crown; but if he had once worn thatsacred circle, he thenceforth was held as the only lawful monarch, unless he should flagrantly violate the Constitution. In 1076, anothercrown had been given by the Greek Emperor to Geysa, King of Hungary, andthe sacred crown combined the two. It had the two arches of the Romancrown, and the gold circlet of the Constantinopolitan; and thedifference of workmanship was evident. 

In the year 1439 died King Albert, who had been appointed King ofHungary in right of his wife, Queen Elizabeth. He left a little daughteronly four years old, and as the Magyars had never been governed by afemale hand, they proposed to send and offer their crown, and the handof their young widowed Queen, to Wladislas, the King of Poland. ButElizabeth had hopes of another child, and in case it should be a son, she had no mind to give away its rights to its father's throne. How, then, was she to help herself among the proud and determined nobles ofher Court? One thing was certain, that if once the Polish king werecrowned with St. Stephen's crown, it would be his own fault if he werenot King of Hungary as long as he lived; but if the crown were not to befound, of course he could not receive it, and the fealty of the nobleswould not be pledged to him. 

The most trustworthy person she had about her was Helen Kottenner, thelady who had the charge of her little daughter, Princess Elizabeth, andto her she confided her desire that the crown might be secured, so as toprevent the Polish party from getting access to it. Helen herself haswritten down the history of these strange events, and of her ownstruggles of mind, at the risk she ran, and the doubt whether good wouldcome of the intrigue; and there can be no doubt that, whether theQueen's conduct were praiseworthy or not, Helen dared a great peril forthe sake purely of loyalty and fidelity. 'The Queen's commands', shesays, 'sorely troubled me; for it was a dangerous venture for me and mylittle children, and I turned it over in my mind what I should do, for Ihad no one to take counsel of but God alone; and I thought if I did itnot, and evil arose therefrom, I should be guilty before God and theworld. So I consented to risk my life on this difficult undertaking; butdesired to have someone to help me. ' This was permitted; but the firstperson to whom the Lady of Kottenner confided her intention, a Croat, lost his color from alarm, looked like one half-dead, and went at oncein search of his horse. The next thing that was heard of him was that hehad had a bad fall from his horse, and had been obliged to return toCroatia, and the Queen remained much alarmed at her plans being known toone so faint-hearted. However, a more courageous confidant wasafterwards found in a Hungarian gentleman, whose name has becomeillegible in Helen's old manuscript. 

The crown was in the vaults of the strong Castle of Plintenburg, alsocalled Vissegrad, which stands upon a bend of the Danube, about twelvemiles from the twin cities of Buda and Pesth. It was in a case within achest, sealed with many seals, and since the King's death, it had beenbrought up by the nobles, who closely guarded both it and the Queen, into her apartments, and there examined and replaced in the chest. Thenext night, one of the Queen's ladies upset a wax taper, without beingaware of it, and before the fire was discovered, and put out, the cornerof the chest was singed, and a hole burnt in the blue velvet cushionthat lay on the top. Upon this, the lords had caused the chest to betaken down again into the vault, and had fastened the doors with manylocks and with seals. The Castle had further been put into the charge ofLadislas von Gara, the Queen's cousin, and Ban, or hereditary commander, of the border troops, and he had given it over to a Burggraf, orseneschal, who had placed his bed in the chamber where was the doorleading to the vaults. 

The Queen removed to Komorn, a castle higher up the Danube, in charge ofher faithful cousin, Count Ulric of Eily, taking with her her littledaughter Elizabeth, Helen Kottenner, and two other ladies. This was thefirst stage on the journey to Presburg, where the nobles had wished tolodge the Queen, and from thence she sent back Helen to bring the restof the maids of honor and her goods to join her at Komorn. It was earlyspring, and snow was still on the ground, and the Lady of Kottenner andher faithful nameless assistant travelled in a sledge; but two Hungariannoblemen went with them, and they had to be most careful in concealingtheir arrangements. Helen had with her the Queen's signet, and keys; andher friend had a file in each shoe, and keys under his black velvetdress. 

On arriving in the evening, they found that the Burggraf had fallen ill, and could not sleep in the chamber leading to the vault, because itbelonged to the ladies' chambers, and that he had therefore put a clothover the padlock of the door and sealed it. There was a stove in theroom, and the maidens began to pack up their clothes there, an operationthat lasted till eight o'clock; while Helen's friend stood there, talking and jesting with them, trying all the while to hide the files, and contriving to say to Helen: 'Take care that we have a light. ' So shebegged the old housekeeper to give her plenty of wax tapers, as she hadmany prayers to say. At last everyone was gone to bed, and there onlyremained in the room with Helen, an old woman, whom she had brought withher, who knew no German, and was fast asleep. Then the accomplice cameback through the chapel, which opened into this same hall. He had on hisblack velvet gown and felt shoes, and was followed by a servant, who, Helen says, was bound to him by oath, and had the same Christian name ashimself, this being evidently an additional bond of fidelity. Helen, whohad received from the Queen all the keys to this outer room, let themin, and, after the Burggraf's cloth and seal had been removed, theyunlocked the padlock, and the other two locks of the outer door of thevault, and the two men descended into it. There were several otherdoors, whose chains required to be filed through, and their seals andlocks broken, and to the ears of the waiting Helen the noise appearedfatally loud. She says, 'I devoutly prayed to God and the Holy Virgin, that they would support and help me; yet I was in greater anxiety for mysoul than for my life, and I prayed to God that He would be merciful tomy soul, and rather let me die at once there, than that anything shouldhappen against his will, or that should bring misfortune on my countryand people. '

She fancied she heard a noise of armed men at the chapel door, butfinding nothing there, believed--not in her own nervous agitation, athing not yet invented--that it was a spirit, and returning to herprayers, vowed, poor lady, to make a pilgrimage to St. Maria Zell, inStyria, if the Holy Virgin's intercessions obtained their success, andtill the pilgrimage could be made, 'to forego every Saturday night myfeather bed!' After another false alarm at a supposed noise at themaiden's door, she ventured into the vault to see how her companionswere getting on, when she found they had filed away all the locks, except that of the case containing the crown, and this they were obligedto burn, in spite of their apprehension that the smell and smoke mightbe observed. They then shut up the chest, replaced the padlocks andchains with those they had brought for the purpose, and renewed theseals with the Queen's signet, which bearing the royal arms, wouldbaffle detection that the seals had been tampered with. They then tookthe crown into the chapel, where they found a red velvet cushion, solarge that by taking out some of the stuffing a hiding place was made inwhich the crown was deposited, and the cushion sewn up over it. 

By this time day was dawning, the maidens were dressing, and it was thehour for setting off for Komorn. The old woman who had waited on themcame to the Lady of Kottenner to have her wages paid, and be dismissedto Buda. While she was waiting, she began to remark on a strange thinglying by the stove, which, to the Lady Helen's great dismay, sheperceived to be a bit of the case in which the crown was kept. She triedto prevent the old woman from noticing it, pushed it into the hottestpart of the stove, and, by way of further precaution, took the old womanaway with her, on the plea of asking the Queen to make her a bedeswomanat Vienna, and this was granted to her. 

When all was ready, the gentleman desired his servant to take thecushion and put it into the sledge designed for himself and the Lady ofKottenner. The man took it on his shoulders, hiding it under an old ox-hide, with the tail hanging down, to the laughter of all beholders. Helen further records the trying to get some breakfast in themarketplace and finding nothing but herrings, also the going to mass, and the care she took not to sit upon the holy crown, though she had tosit on its cushion in the sledge. They dined at an inn, but took care tokeep the cushion in sight, and then in the dusk crossed the Danube onthe ice, which was becoming very thin, and halfway across it broke underthe maidens' carriage, so that Helen expected to be lost in the Danube, crown and all. However, though many packages were lost under the ice, her sledge got safe over, as well as all the ladies, some of whom shetook into her conveyance, and all safely arrived at the castle of Komornlate in the evening. 

The very hour of their arrival a babe was born to the Queen, and to herexceeding joy it was a son. Count von Eily, hearing 'that a king andfriend was born to him', had bonfires lighted, and a torchlightprocession on the ice that same night, and early in the morning came theArchbishop of Gran to christen the child. The Queen wished her faithfulHelen to be godmother, but she refused in favor of some lady whosefamily it was probably needful to propitiate. She took off the littleprincess Elizabeth's mourning for her father and dressed her in red andgold, all the maidens appeared in gay apparel, and there was greatrejoicing and thanksgiving when the babe was christened Ladislas, aftera sainted King of Hungary. 

The peril was, however, far from ended; for many of the Magyars had nonotion of accepting an infant for their king, and by Easter, the King ofPoland was advancing upon Buda, to claim the realm to which he had beeninvited. No one had discovered the abstraction of the crown, andElizabeth's object was to take her child to Weissenburg, and there havehim crowned, so as to disconcert the Polish party. She had sent to Budafor cloth of gold to make him a coronation dress, but it did not come intime, and Helen therefore shut herself into the chapel at Komorn, and, with doors fast bolted, cut up a rich and beautiful vestment of hisgrandfather's, the emperor Sigismund, of red and gold, with silverspots, and made it into a tiny coronation robe, with surplice andhumeral (or shoulder-piece), the stole and banner, the gloves and shoes. The Queen was much alarmed by a report that the Polish party meant tostop her on her way to Weissenburg; and if the baggage should be seizedand searched, the discovery of the crown might have fatal consequences. Helen, on this, observed that the King was more important than thecrown, and that the best way would be to keep them together; so shewrapped up the crown in a cloth, and hid it under the mattress of hiscradle, with a long spoon for mixing his pap upon the top, so, said theQueen, he might take care of his crown himself. 

On Tuesday before Whit Sunday the party set out, escorted by CountUlric, and several other knights and nobles. After crossing the Danubein a large boat, the Queen and her little girl were placed in acarriage, or more probably a litter, the other ladies rode, and thecradle and its precious contents were carried by four men; but this thepoor little Lassla, as Helen shortens his lengthy name, resented somuch, that he began to scream so loud that she was forced to dismountand carry him in her arms, along a road rendered swampy by much rain. 

They found all the villages deserted by the peasants, who had fled intothe woods, and as most of their lords were of the other party, theyexpected an attack, so the little king was put into the carriage withhis mother and sister, and the ladies formed a circle round it 'that ifanyone shot at the carriage we might receive the stroke'. When thedanger was over the child was taken out again, for he would be contentnowhere but in the arms of either his nurse or of faithful Helen, whotook turns to carry him on foot nearly all the way, sometimes in a highwind which covered them with dust, sometimes in great heat, sometimes inrain so heavy that Helen's fur pelisse, with which she covered hiscradle, had to be wrung out several times. They slept at an inn, roundwhich the gentlemen lighted a circle of fires, and kept watch all night. 

Weissenburg was loyal, five hundred armed gentlemen came out to meetthem, and on Whitsun Eve they entered the city, Helen carrying herlittle king in her arms in the midst of a circle of these five hundredholding their naked swords aloft. On Whit Sunday, Helen rose early, bathed the little fellow, who was twelve weeks old that day, and dressedhim. He was then carried in her arms to the church, beside his mother. According to the old Hungarian customs, the choir door was closed--theburghers were within, and would not open till the new monarch shouldhave taken the great coronation oath to respect the Hungarian libertiesand laws. 

This oath was taken by the Queen in the name of her son, the doors wereopened, and all the train entered, the little princess being lifted upto stand by the organ, lest she should be hurt in the throng. FirstHelen held her charge up to be confirmed, and then she had to hold himwhile he was knighted, with a richly adorned sword bearing the motto'Indestructible', and by a stout Hungarian knight called Mikosch Weida, who struck with such a goodwill that Helen felt the blow on her arm, andthe Queen cried out to him not to hurt the child. 

The Archbishop of Gran anointed the little creature, dressed him in thered and gold robe, and put on his head the holy crown, and the peopleadmired to see how straight he held up his neck under it; indeed, theyadmired the loudness and strength of his cries, when, as the good ladyrecords, 'the noble king had little pleasure in his coronation for hewept aloud'. She had to hold him up for the rest of the service, whileCount Ulric of Eily held the crown over his head, and afterwards to seathim in a chair in St. Peter's Church, and then he was carried home inhis cradle, with the count holding the crown over his head, and theother regalia borne before him. 

And thus Ladislas became King of Hungary at twelve weeks old, and wasthen carried off by his mother into Austria for safety. Whether thissecret robbery of the crown, and coronation by stealth, was wise or juston the mother's part is a question not easy of answer--though of courseshe deemed it her duty to do her utmost for her child's rights. Of HelenKottenner's deep fidelity and conscientious feeling there can be nodoubt, and her having acted with her eyes fully open to the risk sheran, her trust in Heaven overcoming her fears and terrors, rendered hertruly a heroine. 

The crown has had many other adventures, and afterwards was kept in anapartment of its own, in the castle of Ofen, with an antechamber guardedby two grenadiers. The door was of iron, with three locks, and the crownitself was contained in an iron chest with five seals. All this, however, did not prevent it from being taken away and lost in theRevolution of 1849. 

GEORGE THE TRILLER

1455

 I. 

'Why, Lady dear, so sad of cheer? Hast waked the livelong night?''My dreams foreshow my children's woe, Ernst bold and Albrecht bright. 

'From the dark glades of forest shades There rushed a raging boar, Two sapling oaks with cruel strokes His crooked tusks uptore. '

'Ah, Lady dear, dismiss thy fear Of phantoms haunting sleep!''The giant knight, Sir Konrad hight, Hath vowed a vengeance deep. 

'My Lord, o'erbold, hath kept his gold, And scornful answer spake:'Kunz, wisdom learn, nor strive to burn The fish within their lake. '

'See, o'er the plain, with all his train, My Lord to Leipzig riding;Some danger near my children dear My dream is sure betiding. '

'The warder waits before the gates, The castle rock is steep, The massive walls protect the halls, Thy children safely sleep. '

 II. 

'T is night's full noon, fair shines the moon On Altenburg's old halls, The silver beams in tranquil streams Rest on the ivied walls. 

Within their tower the midnight hour Has wrapt the babes in sleep, With unclosed eyes their mother lies To listen and to weep. 

What sudden sound is stirring round? What clang thrills on her ear?Is it the breeze amid the trees Re-echoing her fear?

Swift from her bed, in sudden dread, She to her lattice flies:Oh! sight of woe, from far below Behold a ladder rise:

And from yon tower, her children's bower, Lo! Giant Kunz descending!Ernst, in his clasp of iron grasp, His cries with hers is blending. 

'Oh! hear my prayer, my children spare, The sum shall be restored;Nay, twenty-fold returned the gold, Thou know'st how true my Lord. '

With mocking grace he bowed his face: 'Lady, my greetings take;Thy Lord may learn how I can burn The fish within their lake. '

Oh! double fright, a second knight Upon the ladder frail, And in his arm, with wild alarm, A child uplifts his wail!

Would she had wings! She wildly springs To rouse her slumbering train;Bolted without, her door so stout Resists her efforts vain!

No mortal ear her calls can hear, The robbers laugh below;Her God alone may hear her moan, Or mark her hour of woe. 

A cry below, 'Oh! let me go, I am no prince's brother;Their playmate I--Oh! hear my cry Restore me to my mother!'

With anguish sore she shakes the door. Once more Sir Kunz is rearingHis giant head. His errand sped She sees him reappearing. 

Her second child in terror wild Is struggling in his hold;Entreaties vain she pours again, Still laughs the robber bold. 

'I greet thee well, the Elector tell How Kunz his counsel takes, And let him learn that I can burn The fish within their lakes. '

 III. 

'Swift, swift, good steed, death's on thy speed, Gain Isenburg ere morn;Though far the way, there lodged our prey, We laugh the Prince to scorn. 

'There Konrad's den and merry men Will safely hold the boys--The Prince shall grieve long ere we leave Our hold upon his joys. 

'But hark! but hark! how through the dark The castle bell is tolling, From tower and town o'er wood and down, The like alarm notes rolling. 

'The peal rings out! echoes the shout! All Saxony's astir;Groom, turn aside, swift must we ride Through the lone wood of fir. '

Far on before, of men a score Prince Ernst bore still sleeping;Thundering as fast, Kunz came the last, Carrying young Albrecht weeping. 

The clanging bell with distant swell Dies on the morning air, Bohemia's ground another bound Will reach, and safety there. 

The morn's fresh beam lights a cool stream, Charger and knight are weary, He draws his rein, the child's sad plain He meets with accents cheery. 

'Sir Konrad good, be mild of mood, A fearsome giant thou!For love of heaven, one drop be given To cool my throbbing brow!'

Kunz' savage heart feels pity's smart, He soothes the worn-out child, Bathes his hot cheeks, and bending seeks For woodland berries wild. 

A deep-toned bark! A figure dark, Smoke grimed and sun embrowned, Comes through the wood in wondering mood, And by his side a hound. 

'Oh, to my aid, I am betrayed, The Elector's son forlorn, From out my bed these men of dread Have this night hither borne!'

'Peace, if thou 'rt wise, ' the false groom cries, And aims a murderous blow;His pole-axe long, his arm so strong, Must lay young Albrecht low. 

See, turned aside, the weapon glide The woodman's pole along, To Albrecht's clasp his friendly grasp Pledges redress from wrong. 

Loud the hound's note as at the throat Of the false groom he flies;Back at the sounds Sir Konrad bounds: 'Off hands, base churl, ' he cries. 

The robber lord with mighty sword, Mailed limbs of giant strength--The woodman stout, all arms without, Save his pole's timber length--

Unequal fight! Yet for the right The woodman holds the field;Now left, now right, repels the knight, His pole full stoutly wields. 

His whistle clear rings full of cheer, And lo! his comrades true, All swarth and lusty, with fire poles trusty, Burst on Sir Konrad's view. 

His horse's rein he grasps amain Into his selle to spring, His gold-spurred heel his stirrup's steel Has caught, his weapons ring. 

His frightened steed with wildest speed Careers with many a bound;Sir Konrad's heel fast holds the steel, His head is on the ground. 

The peasants round lift from the ground His form in woeful plight, To convent cell, for keeping well, Bear back the robber knight. 

'Our dear young lord, what may afford A charcoal-burners' storeWe freely spread, milk, honey, bread, Our heated kiln before!'

 IV. 

Three mournful days the mother prays, And weeps the children's fate;The prince in vain has scoured the plain-- A sound is at the gate. 

The mother hears, her head she rears, She lifts her eager finger--'Rejoice, rejoice, 't is Albrecht's voice, Open! Oh, wherefore linger?'

See, cap in hand the woodman stand-- Mother, no more of weeping--His hound well tried is at his side, Before him Albrecht leaping, Cries, 'Father dear, my friend is here! My mother! Oh, my mother!The giant knight he put to flight, The good dog tore the other. '

Oh! who the joy that greets the boy, Or who the thanks may tell, Oh how they hail the woodman's tale, How he had 'trilled him well!'

[Footnote: Trillen, to shake; a word analogous to our rill, to shake thevoice in singing]

'I trilled him well, ' he still will tell In homely phrase his story, To those who sought to know how wrought An unarmed hand such glory. 

That mother sad again is glad, Her home no more bereft;For news is brought Ernst may be sought Within the Devil's Cleft. 

That cave within, these men of sin Had learnt their leader's fall, The prince to sell they proffered well At price of grace to all. 

Another day and Earnest lay, Safe on his mother's breast;Thus to her sorrow a gladsome morrow Had brought her joy and rest. 

The giant knight was judged aright, Sentenced to death he lay;The elector mild, since safe his child, Sent forth the doom to stay. 

But all to late, and o'er the gate Of Freiburg's council hallSir Konrad's head, with features dread, The traitor's eyes appal. 

The scullion Hans who wrought their plans, And oped the window grate, Whose faith was sold for Konrad's gold, He met a traitor's fate

 V. 

Behold how gay the wood to-day, The little church how fair, What banners wave, what tap'stry brave Covers its carvings rare!

A goodly train--the parents twain, And here the princess two, Here with his pole, George, stout of soul, And all his comrades true. 

High swells the chant, all jubilant, And each boy bending low, Humbly lays down the wrapping gown He wore the night of woe. 

Beside them lay a smock of grey, All grimed with blood and smoke;A thankful sign to Heaven benign, That spared the sapling oak. 

'What prize would'st hold, thou 'Triller bold', Who trilled well for my son?''Leave to cut wood, my Lord, so good, Near where the fight was won. '

'Nay, Triller mine, the land be thine, My trusty giant-killer, A farm and house I and my spouse Grant free to George the Triller!'

Years hundred four, and half a score, Those robes have held their place;The Triller's deed has grateful meed From Albrecht's royal race. 

The child rescued by George the Triller's Golden Deed was the ancestorof the late Prince Consort, and thus of our future line of kings. He wasthe son of the Elector Friedrich the mild of Saxony, and of Margaretheof Austria, whose dream presaged her children's danger. The Elector hadincurred the vengeance of the robber baron, Sir Konrad of Kauffingen, who, from his huge stature, was known as the Giant Ritter, by refusingto make up to him the sum of 4000 gulden which he had had to pay for hisransom after being made prisoner in the Elector's service. In reply tohis threats, all the answer that the robber knight received was theproverbial one, 'Do not try to burn the fish in the ponds, Kunz. '

Stung by the irony, Kunz bribed the elector's scullion, by name HansSchwabe, to admit him and nine chosen comrades into the Castle ofAltenburg on the night of the 7th of July, 1455, when the Elector was tobe at Leipzig. Strange to say, this scullion was able to write, for aletter is extant from him to Sir Konrad, engaging to open the windowimmediately above the steep precipice, which on that side was deemed asufficient protection to the castle, and to fasten a rope ladder bywhich to ascend the crags. This window can still be traced, thoughthenceforth it was bricked up. It gave access to the children'sapartments, and on his way to them, the robber drew the bolt of theirmother's door, so that though, awakened by the noise, she rushed to herwindow, she was a captive in her own apartment, and could not give thealarm, nor do anything but join her vain entreaties to the cries of herhelpless children. It was the little son of the Count von Bardi whomWilhelm von Mosen brought down by mistake for young Albrecht, and Kunz, while hurrying up to exchange the children, bade the rest of his bandhasten on to secure the elder prince without waiting for him. Hefollowed in a few seconds with Albrecht in his arms, and his servantSchweinitz riding after him, but he never overtook the main body. Theirobject was to reach Konrad's own Castle of Isenburg on the frontiers ofBohemia, but they quickly heard the alarm bells ringing, and beheldbeacons lighted upon every hill. They were forced to betake themselvesto the forests, and about half-way, Prince Ernst's captors, not daringto go any father, hid themselves and him in a cavern called the Devil'sCleft on the right bank of the River Mulde. 

Kunz himself rode on till the sun had risen, and he was within so fewmiles of his castle that the terror of his name was likely to be asufficient protection. Himself and his horse were, however, spent by thewild midnight ride, and on the border of the wood of Eterlein, near themonastery of Grunheim, he halted, and finding the poor child grievouslyexhausted and feverish, he lifted him down, gave him water, and wenthimself in search of wood strawberries for his refreshment, leaving thetwo horses in the charge of Schweinitz. The servant dozed in his saddle, and meanwhile the charcoal-burner, George Schmidt, attracted by thesounds, came out of the wood, where all night he had been attending tothe kiln, hollowed in the earth, and heaped with earth and roots oftrees, where a continual charring of wood was going on. Little Albrechtno sooner saw this man than he sprang to him, and telling his name andrank, entreated to be rescued from these cruel men. The servant awaking, leapt down and struck a deadly blow at the boy's head with his pole-ax, but it was parried by the charcoal-burner, who interposing with one handthe strong wooden pole he used for stirring his kiln, dragged the littleprince aside with the other, and at the same time set his great dog uponthe servant. Sir Konrad at once hurried back, but the valiant charcoal-burner still held his ground, dangerous as the fight was between thepeasant unarmed except for the long pole, and the fully accouteredknight of gigantic size and strength. However, a whistle from Georgesoon brought a gang of his comrades to his aid, and Kunz, findinghimself surrounded, tried to leap into his saddle, and break through thethrong by weight of man and horse, but his spur became entangled, thehorse ran away, and he was dragged along with his head on the groundtill he was taken up by the peasants and carried to the convent ofGrunheim, whence he was sent to Zwickau, and was thence transportedheavily ironed to Freiburg, where he was beheaded on the 14th of July, only a week after his act of violence. The Elector, in his joy at therecovery of even one child, was generous enough to send a pardon, butthe messenger reached Freiburg too late, and a stone in the marketplacestill marks the place of doom, while the grim effigy of Sir Konrad'shead grins over the door of the Rathhaus. It was a pity Friedrich'smildness did not extend to sparing torture as well as death to histreacherous scullion, but perhaps a servant's power of injuring hismaster was thought a reason for surrounding such instances of betrayalwith special horrors. 

The party hidden in the Devil's Cleft overheard the peasants in the woodtalking of the fall of the giant of Kauffingen, and, becoming alarmedfor themselves, they sent to the Governor of the neighboring castle ofHartenstein to offer to restore Prince Ernst, provided they werepromised a full pardon. The boy had been given up as dead, and intensewere the rejoicings of the parents at his restoration. The Devil's Cleftchanged its name to the Prince's Cleft, and the tree where Albrecht hadlain was called the Prince's Oak, and still remains as a witness to thestory, as do the moth-eaten garments of the princely children, and thesmock of the charcoal-burner, which they offered up in token ofthanksgiving at the little forest church of Ebendorff, near the scene ofthe rescue. 

'I trillirt the knaves right well, ' was honest George's way of tellingthe story of his exploit, not only a brave one, but amounting even toself-devotion when we remember that the robber baron was his nearneighbour, and a terror to all around. The word Triller took the placeof his surname, and when the sole reward he asked was leave freely tocut wood in the forest, the Elector gave him a piece of land of his ownin the parish of Eversbach. In 1855 there was a grand celebration of therescue of the Saxon princes on the 9th of July, the four hundredthanniversary, with a great procession of foresters and charcoal-burnersto the 'Triller's Brewery', which stands where George's hut and kilnwere once placed. Three of his descendants then figured in theprocession, but since that time all have died, and the family of theTrillers is now extinct. 

SIR THOMAS MORE'S DAUGHTER

1535

We have seen how dim and doubtful was the belief that upbore the graveand beautiful Antigone in her self-sacrifice; but there have been womenwho have been as brave and devoted in their care of the mortal remainsof their friends--not from the heathen fancy that the weal of the deaddepended on such rites, but from their earnest love, and with a fullertrust beyond. 

Such was the spirit of Beatrix, a noble maiden of Rome, who shared theChristian faith of her two brothers, Simplicius and Faustinus, at theend of the third century. For many years there had been no persecution, and the Christians were living at peace, worshipping freely, andventuring even to raise churches. Young people had grown up to whom thebeing thrown to the lions, beheaded, or burnt for the faith's sake, wasbut a story of the times gone by. But under the Emperor Diocletian allwas changed. The old heathen gods must be worshipped, incense must beburnt to the statue of the Emperor, or torture and death were thepunishment. The two brothers Simplicius and Faustinus were thus asked todeny their faith, and resolutely refused. They were cruelly tortured, and at length beheaded, and their bodies thrown into the tawny waters ofthe Tiber. Their sister Beatrix had taken refuge with a poor devoutChristian woman, named Lucina. But she did not desert her brothers indeath; she made her way in secret to the bank of the river, watching tosee whether the stream might bear down the corpses so dear to her. Driven along, so as to rest upon the bank, she found them at last, and, by the help of Lucina, she laid them in the grave in the cemetery calledAd Ursum Pileatum. For seven months she remained in her shelter, but shewas at last denounced, and was brought before the tribunal, where shemade answer that nothing should induce her to adore gods made of woodand stone. She was strangled in her prison, and her corpse being castout, was taken home by Lucina, and buried beside her brothers. It was, indeed, a favorite charitable work of the Christian widows at Rome toprovide for the burial of the martyrs; and as for the most part theywere poor old obscure women, they could perform this good work with farless notice than could persons of more mark. 

But nearer home, our own country shows a truly Christian Antigone, resembling the Greek lady, both in her dutifulness to the living, and inher tender care for the dead. This was Margaret, the favorite daughterof sir Thomas More, the true-hearted, faithful statesman of King HenryVIII. 

Margaret's home had been an exceedingly happy one. Her father, SirThomas More, was a man of the utmost worth, and was both earnestlyreligious and conscientious, and of a sweetness of manner andplayfulness of fancy that endeared him to everyone. He was one of themost affectionate and dutiful of sons to his aged father, Sir John More;and when the son was Lord Chancellor, while the father was only a judge, Sir Thomas, on his way to his court, never failed to kneel down beforehis father in public, and ask his blessing. Never was the old saying, that a dutiful child had dutiful children, better exemplified than inthe More family. In the times when it was usual for parents to be verystern with children, and keep them at a great distance, sometimes makingthem stand in their presence, and striking them for any slight offence, Sir Thomas More thought it his duty to be friendly and affectionate withthem, to talk to them, and to enter into their confidence; and he wasrewarded with their full love and duty. 

He had four children--Margaret, Elizabeth, Cicely, and John. His much-loved wife died when they were all very young, and he thought it fortheir good to marry a widow, Mrs. Alice Middleton, with one daughternamed Margaret, and he likewise adopted an orphan called Margaret Giggs. With this household he lived in a beautiful large house at Chelsea, withwell-trimmed gardens sloping down to the Thames; and this was the resortof the most learned and able men, both English and visitors from abroad, who delighted in pacing the shady walks, listening to the wit and wisdomof Sir Thomas, or conversing with the daughters, who had been highlyeducated, and had much of their father's humor and sprightliness. EvenHenry VIII. Himself, then one of the most brilliant and gracefulgentlemen of his time, would sometimes arrive in his royal barge, andtalk theology or astronomy with Sir Thomas; or, it might be, crack jestswith him and his daughters, or listen to the music in which all wereskilled, even Lady More having been persuaded in her old age to learn toplay on various instruments, including the flute. The daughters wereearly given in marriage, and with their husbands, continued to liveunder their father's roof. Margaret's husband was William Roper, a younglawyer, of whom Sir Thomas was very fond, and his household at Chelseawas thus a large and joyous family home of children and grandchildren, delighting in the kind, bright smiles of the open face under the squarecap, that the great painter Holbein has sent down to us as a familiarsight. 

But these glad days were not to last for ever. The trying times of thereign of Henry VIII. Were beginning, and the question had been stirredwhether the King's marriage with Katherine of Aragon had been a lawfulone. When Sir Thomas More found that the King was determined to take hisown course, and to divorce himself without permission from the Pope, itwas against his conscience to remain in office when acts were being donewhich he could not think right or lawful. He therefore resigned hisoffice as Lord Chancellor, and, feeling himself free from the load andtemptation, his gay spirits rose higher than ever. His manner ofcommunicating the change to his wife, who had been very proud of hisstate and dignity, was thus. At church, when the service was over, ithad always been the custom for one of his attendants to summon Lady Moreby coming to her closet door, and saying, 'Madam, my lord is gone. ' Onthe day after his resignation, he himself stepped up, and with a low bowsaid, 'Madam, my lord is gone, ' for in good soothe he was no longerChancellor, but only plain Sir Thomas. 

He thoroughly enjoyed his leisure, but he was not long left intranquillity. When Anne Boleyn was crowned, he was invited to bepresent, and twenty pounds were offered him to buy a suitably splendiddress for the occasion; but his conscience would not allow him to acceptthe invitation, though he well knew the terrible peril he ran byoffending the King and Queen. Thenceforth there was a determination toruin him. First, he was accused of taking bribes when administeringjustice. It was said that a gilt cup had been given to him as a NewYear's gift, by one lady, and a pair of gloves filled with gold coins byanother; but it turned out, on examination, that he had drunk the wineout of the cup, and accepted the gloves, because it was ill manners torefuse a lady's gift, yet he had in both cases given back the gold. 

Next, a charge was brought that he had been leaguing with a half-crazywoman called the Nun of Kent, who had said violent things about theKing. He was sent for to be examined by Henry and his Council, and thishe well knew was the interview on which his safety would turn, since theaccusation was a mere pretext, and the real purpose of the King was tosee whether he would go along with him in breaking away from Rome--aproceeding that Sir Thomas, both as churchman and as lawyer, could notthink legal. Whether we agree or not in his views, it must always beremembered that he ran into danger by speaking the truth, and doing whathe thought right. He really loved his master, and he knew the humor ofHenry VIII. , and the temptation was sore; but when he came down from hisconference with the King in the Tower, and was rowed down the river toChelsea, he was so merry that William Roper, who had been waiting forhim in the boat, thought he must be safe, and said, as they landed andwalked up the garden--

'I trust, sir, all is well, since you are so merry?'

'It is so, indeed, son, thank God!'

'Are you then, sir, put out of the bill?'

'Wouldest thou know, son why I am so joyful? In good faith I rejoicethat I have given the devil a foul fall; because I have with those lordsgone so far that without great shame I can never go back, ' he answered, meaning that he had been enabled to hold so firmly to his opinions, andspeak them out so boldly, that henceforth the temptation to dissemblethem and please the King would be much lessened. That he had held hispurpose in spite of the weakness of mortal nature, was true joy to him, though he was so well aware of the consequences that when his daughterMargaret came to him the next day with the glad tidings that the chargeagainst him had been given up, he calmly answered her, 'In faith, Meg, what is put off is not given up. '

One day, when he had asked Margaret how the world went with the newQueen, and she replied, 'In faith, father, never better; there isnothing else in the court but dancing and sporting, ' he replied, withsad foresight, 'Never better. Alas, Meg! it pitieth me to remember untowhat misery, poor soul, she will shortly come. These dances of hers willprove such dances that she will spurn off our heads like footballs, butit will not be long ere her head will take the same dance. '

So entirely did he expect to be summoned by a pursuivant that he thoughtit would lessen the fright of his family if a sham summons were brought. So he caused a great knocking to be made while all were at dinner, andthe sham pursuivant went through all the forms of citing him, and thewhole household were in much alarm, till he explained the jest; but theearnest came only a few days afterwards. On the 13th of April of 1534, arrived the real pursuivant to summon him to Lambeth, there to take theoath of supremacy, declaring that the King was the head of the Church ofEngland, and that the Pope had no authority there. He knew what therefusal would bring on him. He went first to church, and then, nottrusting himself to be unmanned by his love for his children andgrandchildren, instead of letting them, as usual, come down to the waterside, with tender kisses and merry farewells, he shut the wicket gate ofthe garden upon them all, and only allowed his son-in-law Roper toaccompany him, whispering into his ear, 'I thank our Lord, the field iswon. '

Conscience had triumphed over affection, and he was thankful, though forthe last time he looked on the trees he had planted, and the happy homehe had loved. Before the council, he undertook to swear to some clausesin the oath which were connected with the safety of the realm; but herefused to take that part of the oath which related to the King's powerover the Church. It is said that the King would thus have beensatisfied, but that the Queen urged him further. At any rate, afterbeing four days under the charge of the Abbot of Westminister, SirThomas was sent to the Tower of London. There his wife--a plain, dullwoman, utterly unable to understand the point of conscience--came andscolded him for being so foolish as to lie there in a close, filthyprison, and be shut up with rats and mice, instead of enjoying the favorof the King. He heard all she had to say, and answered, 'I pray thee, good Mrs. Alice, tell me one thing--is not this house as near heaven asmy own?' To which she had no better answer than 'Tilly vally, tillyvally. ' But, in spite of her folly, she loved him faithfully; and whenall his property was seized, she sold even her clothes to obtainnecessaries for him in prison. 

His chief comfort was, however, in visits and letters from his daughterMargaret, who was fully able to enter into the spirit that preferreddeath to transgression. He was tried in Westminster Hall, on the 1st ofJuly, and, as he had fully expected, sentenced to death. He was takenback along the river to the Tower. On the wharf his loving Margaret waswaiting for her last look. She broke through the guard of soldiers withbills and halberds, threw her arms round his neck, and kissed him, unable to say any word but 'Oh, my father!--oh, my father!' He blessedher, and told her that whatsoever she might suffer, it was not withoutthe will of God, and she must therefore be patient. After having onceparted with him, she suddenly turned back again, ran to him, and, clinging round his neck, kissed him over and over again--a sight atwhich the guards themselves wept. She never saw him again; but the nightbefore his execution he wrote to her a letter with a piece of charcoal, with tender remembrances to all the family, and saying to her, 'I neverliked your manner better than when you kissed me last; for I am mostpleased when daughterly love and dear charity have no leisure to look toworldly courtesy. ' He likewise made it his especial request that shemight be permitted to be present at his burial. 

His hope was sure and steadfast, and his heart so firm that he did noteven cease from humorous sayings. When he mounted the crazy ladder ofthe scaffold he said, 'Master Lieutenant, I pray you see me safe up; andfor my coming down let me shift for myself. ' And he desired theexecutioner to give him time to put his beard out of the way of thestroke, 'since that had never offended his Highness'. 

His body was given to his family, and laid in the tomb he had alreadyprepared in Chelsea Church; but the head was set up on a pole on LondonBridge. The calm, sweet features were little changed, and the lovingdaughter gathered courage as she looked up at them. How she contrivedthe deed, is not known; but before many days had passed, the head was nolonger there, and Mrs. Roper was said to have taken it away. She wassent for to the Council, and accused of the stealing of her father'shead. She shrank not from avowing that thus it had been, and that thehead was in her own possession. One story says that, as she was passingunder the bridge in a boat, she looked up, and said, 'That head hasoften lain in my lap; I would that it would now fall into it. ' And atthat moment it actually fell, and she received it. It is far more likelythat she went by design, at the same time as some faithful friend on thebridge, who detached the precious head, and dropped it down to her inher boat beneath. Be this as it may, she owned before the cruel-heartedCouncil that she had taken away and cherished the head of the man whomthey had slain as a traitor. However, Henry VIII. Was not a Creon, andour Christian Antigone was dismissed unhurt by the Council, and allowedto retain possession of her treasure. She caused it to be embalmed, keptit with her wherever she went, and when, nine years afterwards, she died(in the year 1544), it was laid in her coffin in the 'Roper aisle' ofSt. Dunstan's Church, at Canterbury. 

UNDER IVAN THE TERRIBLE

1564. 

Prince Andrej Kourbsky was one of the chief boyards or nobles at theCourt of Ivan, the first Grand Prince of Muscovy who assumed the Easterntitle of Tzar, and who relieved Russia from the terrible invasions ofthe Tatars. This wild race for nearly four hundred years had roamed overthe country, destroying and plundering all they met with, and blightingall the attempts at civilization that had begun to be made in theeleventh century. It was only when the Russians learnt the use offirearms that these savages were in any degree repressed. In the year1551 the city of Kazan, upon the River Kazanka, a tributary of theVolga, was the last city that remained in the hands of the Tatars. Itwas a rich and powerful place, a great centre of trade between Europeand the East, but it was also a nest of robbers, who had frequentlybroken faith with the Russians, and had lately expelled the Khan SchigAlei for having endeavored to fulfill his engagements to them. The TzarIvan Vassilovitch, then only twenty-two years of age, therefore marchedagainst the place, resolved at any cost to reduce it and free hiscountry from these inveterate foes. 

On his way he received tidings that the Crimean Tatars had comeplundering into Russia, probably thinking to attack Moscow, while Ivanwas besieging Kazan. He at once sent off the Prince Kourbsky with 15, 000men, who met double that number of Tatars at Toula, and totally defeatedthem, pursuing them to the River Chevorona, where, after a seconddefeat, they abandoned a great number of Russian captives, and a greatmany camels. Prince Kourbsky was wounded in the head and shoulder, butwas able to continue the campaign. 

Some of the boyards murmured at the war, and declared that theirstrength and resources were exhausted. Upon this the Tzar desired thattwo lists might be drawn up of the willing and unwilling warriors in hiscamp. 'The first', he said, 'shall be as dear to me as my own children;their needs shall be made known to me, and I will share all I have withthem. The others may stay at home; I want no cowards in my army. ' No oneof course chose to be in the second list, and about this time was formedthe famous guard called the Strelitzes, a body of chosen warriors whowere always near the person of the Tzar. 

In the middle of August, 1552, Ivan encamped in the meadows on the banksof the Volga, which spread like a brilliant green carpet around the hillupon which stood the strongly fortified city of Kazan. The Tatars had nofears. 'This is not the first time', they said, 'that we have seen theMuscovites beneath our walls. Their fruitless attacks always end inretreats, till we have learned to laugh them to scorn;' and when Ivansent them messengers with offers of peace, they replied, 'All is ready;we only await your coming to begin the feast. '

They did not know of the great change that the last half-century hadmade in sieges. One of the Italian condottieri, or leaders of freecompanies, had made his way to Moscow, and under his instructions, Ivan's troops were for the first time to conduct a siege in the regularmodern manner, by digging trenches in the earth, and throwing up thesoil in front into a bank, behind which the cannon and gunners areposted, with only small openings made through which to fire at some spotin the enemy's walls. These trenches are constantly worked nearer andnearer to the fortifications, till by the effect of the shot an openingor breach must be made in the walls, and the soldiers can then climb upupon scaling ladders or heaps of small faggots piled up to the height ofthe opening. Sometimes, too, the besiegers burrow underground till theyare just below the wall, then fill the hole with gunpowder, and blow upall above them; in short, instead of, as in former days, a well-fortified city being almost impossible to take, except by starving outthe garrison, a siege is in these times almost equally sure to end infavor of the besiegers. 

All through August and September the Russians made their approaches, while the Tatars resisted them bravely, but often showing greatbarbarity. Once when Ivan again sent a herald, accompanied by a numberof Tatar prisoners, to offer terms to Yediguer, the present Khan, thedefenders called out to their countrymen, 'You had better perish by ourpure hands than by those of the wretched Christians, ' and shot a wholeflight of arrows at them. Moreover, every morning the magicians used tocome out at sunrise upon the walls, and their shrieks, contortions, andwaving of garments were believed, not only by the Tatars but by theRussians, and by Andrej Kourbsky himself, to bring foul weather, whichgreatly harassed the Russians. On this Ivan sent to Moscow for a sacredcross that had been given to the Grand Prince Vladimir when he wasconverted; the rivers were blessed, and their water sprinkled round thecamp, and the fair weather that ensued was supposed to be due to thecounteraction of the incantations of the magicians. These Tatars wereMahometans, but they must have retained some of the wind-raisingenchantments of their Buddhist brethren in Asia. 

A great mine had been made under the gate of Arsk, and eleven barrels ofgunpowder placed in it. On the 30th of September it was blown up, andthe whole tower became a heap of ruins. For some minutes theconsternation of the besieged was such that there was a dead silencelike the stillness of the grave. The Russians rushed forward over theopening, but the Tatars, recovering at the sight of them, foughtdesperately, but could not prevent them from taking possession of thetower at the gateway. Other mines were already prepared, and the Tzargave notice of a general assault for the next day, and recommended allhis warriors to purify their souls by repentance, confession, andcommunion, in readiness for the deadly strife before them. In themeantime, he sent Yediguer a last offer of mercy, but the brave Tatarscried out, 'We will have no pardon! If the Russians have one tower, wewill build another; if they ruin our ramparts we will set up more. Wewill be buried under the walls of Kazan, or else we will make him raisethe siege. '

Early dawn began to break. The sky was clear and cloudless. The Tatarswere on their walls, the Russians in their trenches; the Imperial eaglestandard, which Ivan had lately assumed, floated in the morning wind. The two armies were perfectly silent, save here and there the bray of asingle trumpet, or beat of a naker drum in one or the other, and thecontinuous hum of the hymns and chants from the three Russian chapel-tents. The archers held their arrows on the string, the gunners stoodwith lighted matches. The copper-clad domes of the minarets began toglow with the rising sunbeams; the muezzins were on the roofs about tocall the Moslemin to prayer; the deacon in the Tzar's chapel-tent wasreading the Gospel. 'There shall be one fold and one Shepherd. ' At thatmoment the sun's disk appeared above the eastern hills, and ere yet thered orb had fully mounted above the horizon, there was a burst as itwere of tremendous thunderings, and the ground shook beneath the church. The Tzar went to the entrance, and found the whole city hill so 'rolledin sable smoke', that he could distinguish nothing, and, going back tohis place, desired that the service should continue. The deacon was inthe midst of the prayer for the establishment of the power of the Tzarand the discomfiture of his enemies, when the crushing burst of anotherexplosion rushed upon their ears, and as it died away another voicebroke forth, the shout raised by every man in the Russian lines, 'God iswith us!' On then they marched towards the openings that the mines hadmade, but there the dauntless garrison, in spite of the terror anddestruction caused by the two explosions, met them with unabated fury, rolling beams or pouring boiling water upon them as they strove to climbthe breach, and fighting hand to hand with them if they mounted it. However, by the time the Tzar had completed his devotions and mountedhis horse, his eagle could be seen above the smoke upon the citadel. 

Still the city had to be won, step by step, house by house, street bystreet; and even while struggling onwards the Russians were temptedaside by plunder among the rich stores of merchandise that were heapedup in the warehouses of this the mart of the East. The Khan profited bytheir lack of discipline, and forced them back to the walls; nay, theywould have absolutely been driven out at the great gate, but that theybeheld their young Tzar on horseback among his grey-haired councillors. By the advice of these old men Ivan rode forward, and with his own handplanted the sacred standard at the gates, thus forming a barrier thatthe fugitives were ashamed to pass. At the same time he, with half hischoice cavalry, dismounted, and entered the town all fresh and vigorous, their rich armor glittering with gold and silver, and plumes of variouscolours streaming from their helmets in all the brilliancy of Easterntaste. This reinforcement recalled the plunderers to their duty, and theTatars were driven back to the Khan's palace, whence, after an hour'sdefense, they were forced to retreat. 

At a postern gate, Andrej Kourbsky and two hundred men met Yediguer and10, 000 Tatars, and cut off their retreat, enclosing them in the narrowstreets. They forced their Khan to take refuge in a tower, and madesigns as if to capitulate. 'Listen, ' they said. 'As long as we had agovernment, we were willing to die for our prince and country. Now Kazanis yours, we deliver our Khan to you, alive and unhurt--lead him to theTzar. For our own part, we are coming down into the open field to drainour last cup of life with you. '

Yediguer and one old councillor were accordingly placed in the hands ofan officer, and then the desperate Tatars, climbing down the outside ofthe walls, made for the Kazanka, where no troops, except the small bodyunder Andrej Kourbsky and his brother Romanus, were at leisure to pursuethem. The fighting was terrible, but the two princes kept them in viewuntil checked by a marsh which horses could not pass. The bold fugitivestook refuge in a forest, where, other Russian troops coming up, all weresurrounded and slain, since not a man of them would accept quarter. 

Yediguer was kindly treated by Ivan, and accompanying him to Moscow, there became a Christian, and was baptized by the name of Simeon, in thepresence of the Tzar and his whole court, on the banks of the Moskwa. Hemarried a Russian lady, and his whole conduct proved that his conversionwas sincere. 

But this story has only been told at so much length to show what mannerof man Andrej Kourbsky was, and Ivan Vassilovitch had been, and how theyhad once been brethren in arms; and perhaps it has been lingered overfrom the melancholy interest there must always be in watching the fallof a powerful nation, and the last struggles of gallant men. Ivan wasthen a gallant, religious and highly gifted prince, generous andmerciful, and with every promise of a glorious reign, full of benefitsto his country. Alas! this part of his career was one glimpse ofbrightness in the course of a long tempestuous day. His reign had begunwhen he was but three years old. He had had a violent and cruel mother, and had, after her death, been bred up by evil-minded courtiers, whoabsolutely taught him cruel and dissolute amusements in order to preventhim from attending to state affairs. For a time, the exhortations of thegood and fearless patriarch, and the influence of his gentle wifeAnastasia, had prevailed, and with great vigor and strong principle hehad shaken off all the evil habits of his boyhood, and begun, as itseemed, an admirable reign. 

Too soon, a severe illness shook the balance of his mind, and thiswas quickly followed by the death of the excellent Tzarina Anastasia. Whether grief further unsettled him, or whether the loss of her gentleinfluence left him a prey to his wicked councillors, from that timeforward his conduct was so wildly savage and barbarous as to win for himthe surname of the Terrible. Frantic actions, extravagant excesses, andfreaks of horrible cruelty looked like insanity; and yet, on the otherhand, he often showed himself a clear-headed and sagacious monarch, anxious for the glory and improvement of his people. 

But he lived in continual suspicion, and dreaded every eminent man inhis dominions. Kourbsky whom he had once loved and trusted, and hadcharged with the command of his army, as his most able boyard, fellunder his suspicion; and, with horror and indignation, learnt that theTzar was plotting against his life, and intended to have him put todeath. Kourbsky upon this explained to his wife that she must eithersee him put to a shameful death, or let him leave her for ever. He gavehis blessing to his son, a boy of nine years old, and leaving his houseat night he scaled the wall of Moscow, and meeting his faithful servant, Vasili Shibanoff, with two horses, he made his escape. This Vasili washis stirrup-bearer, one of those serfs over whom the boyard on whoseland they were born possessed absolute power. That power was oftenabused, but the instinctive faithfulness of the serf towards his mastercould hardly be shaken, even by the most savage treatment, and a well-treated serf viewed his master's family with enthusiastic love andveneration. Vasili accompanied his master's flight through the birchforests towards the Livonian frontier, the country where but latelyKourbsky had been leading the Tzar's armies. On the way the prince'shorse became exhausted by his weight, and Vasili insisted on giving uphis own in its stead, though capture in the course of such desertionwould have been certain death. However, master and servant safelyarrived at Wolmar in Livonia, and there Andrej came to the determinationof renouncing the service of the ungrateful Ivan, and entering that ofthe King of Poland. For this last step there was no excuse. Nothing canjustify a man in taking up arms against his country, but in the middleAges the tie of loyalty was rather to the man than to the state, andAndrej Kourbsky seems to have deemed that his honor would be safe, provided he sent a letter to his sovereign, explaining his grievance andgiving up his allegiance. The letter is said to have been full of graveseverity and deep, suppressed indignation, though temperate in tone; butno one would consent to be the bearer of such a missive, since the crueltyrant's first fury was almost certain to fall on him who presented it. Believing his master's honor at stake, Vasili offered himself to be thebearer of the fatal letter, and Kourbsky accepted the offer, tenderingto him a sum of money, which the serf rejected, knowing that money wouldsoon be of little service to him, and seeking no reward for what hedeemed his duty to his lord. 

As Ivan's justice had turned into barbarity, so his religion had turnedinto foolish fanatic observance. He had built a monastery near Moscowfor himself and three hundred chosen boyards, and every morning at threeor four o'clock he took his two sons into the belfry with him andproceeded to strike the bells, the Russian mode of ringing them, tillall the brethren were assembled. This bell-sounding was his favoriteoccupation, and in it he was engaged when Vasili arrived. The servantawaited him in the vestibule, and delivered the letter with these words:'From my master and thine exile, Prince Andrej Kourbsky. '

Ivan answered by such a blow on the leg with his iron-tipped rod thatthe blood poured from the wound; but Vasili neither started, cried out, nor moved a feature. At once the Tzar bade him be seized and tortured, to make him disclose whether his master had any partners in guilt, or ifany plans were matured. But no extremity of agony could extract aughtbut praises of the prince, and assurances of his readiness to die forhim. From early morning till late at night the torturers worked, onesucceeding when another was tired out; but nothing could overcome hisconstancy, and his last words were a prayer to implore his God to havemercy on his master and forgive his desertion. 

His praise came even from the tyrant, who wrote to Kourbsky--'Let thyservant Vaska [Footnote: the abbreviation of Vasili or Basil. ] shamethee. He preserved his truth to thee before the Tzar and the people. Having given thee his word of faith, he kept it, even before the gatesof death. '

After the flight of Kourbsky, the rage of Ivan continued to increasewith each year of his life. He had formed a sort of bodyguard of athousand ruffians, called the Oprichnina, who carried out his barbarouscommands, and committed an infinity of murders and robberies on theirown account. He was like a distorted caricature of Henry VIII, and, likehim, united violence and cruelty with great exactness about religiousworship, carrying his personal observances to the most fanaticextravagance. 

In the vacancy of the Metropolitan See, he cast his eyes upon themonastery in the little island of Solovsky, in the White Sea, where thePrior, Feeleep Kolotchof, was noted for his holy life, and the good hehad done among the wild and miserable population of the island. He wasthe son of a rich boyard, but had devoted himself from his youth to amonastic life, and the fame of his exertions in behalf of the islandershad led the Tzar to send him not only precious vessels for the use ofhis church, but contributions to the stone churches, piers, andhostelries that he raised for his people; for whom he had made roads, drained marshes, introduced cattle, and made fisheries and salt pans, changing the whole aspect of the place, and lessening even theinclemency of the climate. 

On this good man the Tzar fixed his choice. He wrote to him to come toMoscow to attend a synod, and on his arrival made him dine at thepalace, and informed him that he was to be chief pastor of the RussianChurch. Feeleep burst into tears, entreating permission to refuse, andbeseeching the Tzar not to trust 'so heavy a freight to such a feeblebark'. Ivan held to his determination, and Feeleep then begged him atleast to dismiss the cruel Oprichnina. 'How can I bless you, ' he said, 'while I see my country in mourning?'

The Tzar replied by mentioning his suspicions of all around him, andcommanded Feeleep to be silent. He expected to be sent back to hisconvent at once, but, instead of this, the Tzar commanded the clergy toelect him Archbishop, and they all added their entreaties to him toaccept the office, and endeavor to soften the Tzar, who respected him;and he yielded at last, saying, 'The will of the Tzar and the pastors ofthe church must, then, be done. '

At his consecration, he preached a sermon on the power of mildness, andthe superiority of the victories of love over the triumphs of war. Itawoke the better feelings of Ivan, and for months he abstained from anydeed of violence; his good days seemed to have returned and he lived inintimate friendship with the good Archbishop. 

But after a time the sleeping lion began to waken. Ivan's suspiciousmind took up an idea that Feeleep had been incited by the nobles torequest the abolition of the Oprichnina, and that they were exciting arevolt. The spies whom he sent into Moscow told him that wherever anOprichnik appeared, the people shrank away in silence, as, poor things!they well might. He fancied this as a sign that conspiracies werebrewing, and all his atrocities began again. The tortures to which wholefamilies were put were most horrible; the Oprichniks went through thestreets with poignards and axes, seeking out their victims, and killingfrom ten to twenty a day. The corpses lay in the streets, for no onedared to leave his house to bury them. Feeleep vainly sent letters andexhortations to the Tzar--they were unnoticed. The unhappy citizens cameto the Archbishop, entreating him to intercede for them, and he gavethem his promise that he would not spare his own blood to save theirs. 

One Sunday, as Feeleep was about to celebrate the Holy Communion, Ivancame into the Cathedral with a troop of his satellites, like him, fantastically dressed in black cassocks and high caps. He came towardsthe Metropolitan, but Feeleep kept his eyes fixed on the picture of ourLord, and never looked at him. Someone said, 'Holy Father, here is theprince; give him your blessing. '

'No, ' said the Archbishop, 'I know not the Tzar in this strangedisguise--still less do I know him in his government. Oh, Prince! we arehere offering sacrifice to the Lord, and beneath the altar the blood ofguiltless Christians is flowing in torrents. . . You are indeed on thethrone, but there is One above all, our Judge and yours. How shall youappear before his Judgment Seat?--stained with the blood of therighteous, stunned with their shrieks, for the stones beneath your feetcry out for vengeance to Heaven. Prince, I speak as shepherd of souls; Ifear God alone. '

The Archbishop was within the golden gates, which, in Russian churches, close in the sanctuary or chancel, and are only entered by the clergy. He was thus out of reach of the cruel iron-tipped staff, which the Tzarcould only strike furiously on the pavement, crying out, 'Rash monk, Ihave spared you too long. Henceforth I will be to you such as youdescribe. '

The murders went on in their full horrors; but, in spite of the threat, the Archbishop remained unmolested, though broken-hearted at thecruelties around him. At last, however, his resolute witness became morethan the tyrant would endure, and messengers were secretly sent to theisland of Solovsky, to endeavor to find some accusation against him. They tampered with all the monks in the convent, to induce them to findsome fault in him, but each answered that he was a saint in everythought, word, and deed; until at last Payssi, the prior who hadsucceeded him, was induced, by the hope of a bishopric, to bear falsewitness against him. 

He was cited before an assembly of bishops and boyards, presided over bythe Tzar, and there he patiently listened to the monstrous stories toldby Payssi. Instead of defending himself, he simply said, 'This seed willnot bring you a good harvest;' and, addressing himself to the Tzar, said, 'Prince, you are mistaken if you think I fear death. Havingattained an advanced age, far from stormy passions and worldlyintrigues, I only desire to return my soul to the Most High, mySovereign Master and yours. Better to perish an innocent martyr, than asMetropolitan to look on at the horrors and impieties of these wretchedtimes. Do what you will with me! Here are the pastoral staff, the whitemitre, and the mantle with which you invested me. And you, bishops, archimandrites, abbots, servants of the altar, feed the flock of Christzealously, as preparing to give an account thereof, and fear the Judgeof Heaven more than the earthly judge. '

He was then departing, when the Tzar recalled him, saying that he couldnot be his own judge, and that he must await his sentence. In truth, worse indignities were preparing for him. He was in the midst of theLiturgy on the 8th of November, the Greek Michaelmas, when a boyard camein with a troop of armed Oprichniks, who overawed the people, while theboyard read a paper degrading the Metropolitan from his sacred office;and then the ruffians, entering through the golden gates tore off hismitre and robes, wrapped him in a mean gown, absolutely swept him out ofthe church with brooms, and took him in a sledge to the Convent of theEpiphany. The people ran after him, weeping bitterly, while thevenerable old man blessed them with uplifted hands, and, whenever hecould be heard, repeated his last injunction, 'Pray, pray to God. '

Once again he was led before the Emperor, to hear the monstrous sentencethat for sorcery, and other heavy charges, he was to be imprisoned forlife. He said no reproachful word, only, for the last time, he besoughtthe Tzar to have pity on Russia, and to remember how his ancestors hadreigned, and the happy days of his youth. Ivan only commanded thesoldiers to take him away; and he was heavily ironed, and thrown into adungeon, whence he was afterwards transferred to a convent on the banksof the Moskwa, where he was kept bare of almost all the necessaries oflife: and in a few days' time the head of Ivan Borissovitch Kolotchof, the chief of his family, was sent to him, with the message, 'Here arethe remains of your dear kinsman, your sorcery could not save him!'Feeleep calmly took the head in his arms, blessed it, and gave it back. 

The people of Moscow gathered round the convent, gazed at his cell, andtold each other stories of his good works, which they began to magnifyinto miracles. Thereupon the Emperor sent him to another convent, at agreater distance. Here he remained till the next year, 1569, when MalutaSkouratof, a Tatar, noted as a favorite of the Tzar, and one of thechief ministers of his cruelty, came into his cell, and demanded hisblessing for the Tzar. 

The Archbishop replied that blessings only await good men and goodworks, adding tranquilly, 'I know what you are come for. I have longlooked for death. Let the Tzar's will be done. ' The assassin thensmothered him, but pretended to the abbot that he had been stifled bythe heat of the cell. He was buried in haste behind the altar, but hisremains have since been removed to his own cathedral at Moscow, thescene where he had freely offered his own life by confronting the tyrantin the vain endeavor to save his people. 

Vain, too, was the reproof of the hermit, who shocked Ivan's scruples byoffering him a piece of raw flesh in the middle of Lent, and told himthat he was preying on the flesh and blood of his subjects. The crimesof Ivan grew more and more terrible, and yet his acuteness was such thatthey can hardly be inscribed to insanity. He caused the death of his ownson by a blow with that fatal staff of his; and a last, after a fevervaried by terrible delirium, in which alone his remorse manifesteditself, he died while setting up the pieces for a game at chess, on the17th of March, 1584. 

This has been a horrible story, in reality infinitely more horrible thanwe have made it; but there is this blessing among many others inChristianity, that the blackest night makes its diamonds only show theirliving luster more plainly: and surely even Ivan the Terrible, in spiteof himself, did something for the world in bringing out the faithfulfearlessness of Archbishop Feeleep, and the constancy of the stirrup-bearer, Vasili. 

FORT ST. ELMO

1565

The white cross of the Order of St. John waved on the towers of Rhodesfor two hundred and fifty-five years. In 1552, after a desperateresistance, the Turks, under their great Sultan, Solyman theMagnificent, succeeded in driving the Knights Hospitaliers from theirbeautiful home, and they were again cast upon the world. 

They were resolved, however, to continue their old work of protectingthe Mediterranean travelers, and thankfully accepted, as a gift from theEmperor Charles V. , the little islet of Malta as their new station. Itwas a great contrast to their former home, being little more than a mererock rising steeply out of the sea, white, glaring and with very shallowearth, unfit to bear corn, though it produced plenty of oranges, figs, and melons--with little water, and no wood, --the buildings wretched, andfor the most part uninhabited, and the few people a miserable mongrelset, part Arab, part Greek, part Sicilian, and constantly kept down bythe descents of the Moorish pirates, who used to land in the unprotectedbays, and carry off all the wretched beings they could catch, to sellfor slaves. It was a miserable exchange from fertile Rhodes, which wasnearly five times larger than this barren rock; but the Knights onlywanted a hospital, a fortress, and a harbour; and this last they foundin the deeply indented northern shore, while they made the first two. Only a few years had passed before the dreary Citta Notabile had becomein truth a notable city, full of fine castle-like houses, infirmaries, and noble churches, and fenced in with mighty wall and battlements--country houses were perched upon the rocks--the harbors were fortified, and filled with vessels of war--and deep vaults were hollowed out in therock, in which corn was stored sufficient to supply the inhabitants formany months. 

Everywhere that there was need was seen the red flag with the eight-pointed cross. If there was an earthquake on the shores of Italy orSicily, there were the ships of St. John, bringing succor to the crushedand ruined townspeople. In every battle with Turk or Moor, the Knightswere among the foremost; and, as ever before, their galleys were the aidof the peaceful merchant, and the terror of the corsair. Indeed, theywere nearer Tunis, Tripoli, and Algiers, the great nests of theseMoorish pirates, and were better able to threaten them, and thwart theircruel descents, than when so much farther eastward; and the Mahometanpower found them quite as obnoxious in Malta as in Rhodes. 

Solyman the Magnificent resolved, in his old age, to sweep theseobstinate Christians from the seas, and, only twelve years after thesiege of Rhodes, prepared an enormous armament, which he united withthose of the Barbary pirates, and placed under the command of Mustafaand Piali, his two bravest pashas, and Dragut, a terrible Algerinecorsair, who had already made an attempt upon the island, but had beenrepulsed by the good English knight, Sir Nicholas Upton. Without theadvice of this pirate the Sultan desired that nothing should beundertaken. 

The Grand Master who had to meet this tremendous danger was Jean Parisotde la Valette, a brave and resolute man, as noted for his piety andtenderness to the sick in the infirmaries as for his unflinchingcourage. When he learnt the intentions of the Sultan, he began bycollecting a Chapter of his Order, and, after laying his tidings beforethem, said: 'A formidable army and a cloud of barbarians are about toburst on this isle. Brethren, they are the enemies of Jesus Christ. Thequestion is the defense of the Faith, and whether the Gospel shall yieldto the Koran. God demands from us the life that we have already devotedto Him by our profession. Happy they who in so good a cause shall firstconsummate their sacrifice. But, that we may be worthy, my brethren, letus hasten to the altar, there to renew our vows; and may to each one ofus be imparted, by the very Blood of the Saviour of mankind, and byfaithful participation in His Sacraments, that generous contempt ofdeath that can alone render us invincible. '

With these words, he led the way to the church, and there was not anindividual knight who did not on that day confess and receive the HolyCommunion; after which they were as new men--all disputes, alltrivialities and follies were laid aside--and the whole communityawaited the siege like persons under a solemn dedication. 

The chief harbour of Malta is a deep bay, turned towards the north, anddivided into two lesser bays by a large tongue of rock, on the point ofwhich stood a strong castle, called Fort St. Elmo. The gulf to thewestward has a little island in it, and both gulf and islet are calledMarza Muscat. The gulf to the east, called the Grand Port, was againdivided by three fingers of rock projecting from the mainland, at rightangles to the tongue that bore Fort St. Elmo. Each finger was armed witha strong talon--the Castle of La Sangle to the east, the Castle of St. Angelo in the middle, and Fort Ricasoli to the west. Between St. Angeloand La Sangle was the harbour where all the ships of war were shut up atnight by an immense chain; and behind was il Borgo, the chieffortification in the island. Citta Notabile and Gozo were inland, andtheir fate would depend upon that of the defenses of the harbor. Todefend all this, the Grand Master could only number 700 knights and8, 500 soldiers. He sent to summon home all those of the Order who weredispersed in the different commanderies in France, Spain, and Germany, and entreated aid from the Spanish king, Philip II. , who wished to beconsidered as the prime champion of Roman Catholic Christendom, and whoalone had the power of assisting him. The Duke of Alva, viceroy forPhilip in Sicily, made answer that he would endeavor to relieve theOrder, if they could hold out Fort St. Elmo till the fleet could be gottogether; but that if this castle were once lost, it would be impossibleto bring them aid, and they must be left to their fate. 

The Grand Master divided the various posts to the knights according totheir countries. The Spaniards under the Commander De Guerras, Bailiffof Negropont, had the Castle of St. Elmo; the French had Port de laSangle; the Germans, and the few English knights whom the Reformationhad left, were charged with the defense of the Port of the Borgo, whichserved as headquarters, and the Commander Copier, with a body of troops, was to remain outside the town and watch and harass the enemy. 

On the 18th of May, 1565, the Turkish fleet came in sight. It consistedof 159 ships, rowed by Christian slaves between the decks, and carrying30, 000 Janissaries and Spahis, the terrible warriors to whom the Turksowed most of their victories, and after them came, spreading for milesover the blue waters, a multitude of ships of burthen bringing thehorses of the Spahis, and such heavy battering cannon as rendered thedangers of a siege infinitely greater than in former days. TheseJanissaries were a strange, distorted resemblance of the knightsthemselves, for they were bound in a strict brotherhood of arms, andwere not married, so as to care for nothing but each other, the Sultan, and the honor of their troop. They were not dull, apathetic Turks, butchiefly natives of Circassia and Georgia, the land where the human raceis most beautiful and nobly formed. They were stolen from their homes, or, too often, sold by their parents when too young to remember theirChristian baptism, and were bred up as Mahometans, with no home buttheir corps, no kindred but their fellow soldiers. Their title, given bythe Sultan who first enrolled them, meant New Soldiers, their ensign wasa camp kettle, as that of their Pashas was one, two, or three horses'tails, in honor of the old Kurdish chief, the founder of the Turkishempire; but there was no homeliness in their appointments, theirweapons--scimitars, pistols, and carabines--were crusted with gold andjewels; their head-dress, though made in imitation of a sleeve, wasgorgeous, and their garments were of the richest wool and silk, dyedwith the deep, exquisite colours of the East. Terrible warriors werethey, and almost equally dreaded were the Spahis, light horsemen fromAlbania and the other Greek and Bulgarian provinces who had entered theTurkish service, and were great plunderers, swift and cruel, glittering, both man and horse, with the jewels they had gained in their forays. 

These were chiefly troops for the land attack, and they were set onshore at Port St. Thomas, where the commanders, Mustafa and Piali, helda council, to decide where they should first attack. Piali wished towait for Dragut, who was daily expected, but Mustafa was afraid oflosing time, and of being caught by the Spanish fleet, and insisted onat once laying siege to Fort St. Elmo, which was, he thought, so smallthat it could not hold out more than five or six days. 

Indeed, it could not hold above 300 men, but these were some of thebravest of the knights, and as it was only attacked on the land side, they were able to put off boats at night and communicate with the GrandMaster and their brethren in the Borgo. The Turks set up theirbatteries, and fired their enormous cannon shot upon the fortifications. One of their terrible pieces of ordnance carried stone balls of 160 lb. , and no wonder that stone and mortar gave way before it, and that abreach was opened in a few days' time. That night, when, as usual, boatloads of wounded men were transported across to the Borgo, theBailiff of Negropont sent the knight La Cerda to the Grand Master togive an account of the state of things and ask for help. La Cerda spokestrongly, and, before a great number of knights, declared that there wasno chance of so weak a place holding out for more than a week. 

'What has been lost, ' said the Grand Master, 'since you cry out forhelp?'

'Sir, ' replied La Cerda, 'the castle may be regarded as a patient inextremity and devoid of strength, who can only be sustained by continualremedies and constant succor. '

'I will be doctor myself, ' replied the Grand Master, 'and will bringothers with me who, if they cannot cure you of fear, will at least bebrave enough to prevent the infidels from seizing the fort. '

The fact was, as he well knew, that the little fort could not hold outlong, and he grieved over the fate of his knights; but time waseverything, and the fate of the whole isle depended upon the white crossbeing still on that point of land when the tardy Sicilian fleet shouldset sail. He was one who would ask no one to run into perils that hewould not share, and he was bent on throwing himself into St. Elmo, andbeing rather buried under the ruins than to leave the Mussulmans free amoment sooner than could be helped to attack the Borgo and Castle of St. Angelo. But the whole Chapter of Knights entreated him to abstain, andso many volunteered for this desperate service, that the only difficultywas to choose among them. Indeed, La Cerda had done the garrisoninjustice; no one's heart was failing but his own; and the next daythere was a respite, for a cannon shot from St. Angelo falling into theenemy's camp, shattered a stone, a splinter of which struck down thePiali Pasha. He was thought dead, and the camp and fleet were inconfusion, which enabled the Grand Master to send off his nephew, theChevalier de la Valette Cornusson, to Messina to entreat the Viceroy ofSicily to hasten to their relief; to give him a chart of the entrance ofthe harbour, and a list of signals, and to desire in especial that twoships belonging to the Order, and filled with the knights who hadhurried from distant lands too late for the beginning of the siege, might come to him at once. To this the Viceroy returned a promise thatat latest the fleet should sail on the 15th of June, adding anexhortation to him at all sacrifices to maintain St. Elmo. This replythe Grand Master transmitted to the garrison, and it nerved them tofight even with more patience and self-sacrifice. A desperate sally wasled by the Chevalier de Medran, who fought his way into the trencheswhere the Turkish cannon were planted, and at first drove all beforehim; but the Janissaries rallied and forced back the Christians out ofthe trenches. Unfortunately there was a high wind, which drove the smokeof the artillery down on the counter-scarp (the slope of masonry facingthe rampart), and while it was thus hidden from the Christians, theTurks succeeded in effecting a lodgment there, fortifying themselveswith trees and sacks of earth and wool. When the smoke cleared off, theknights were dismayed to see the horse-tail ensigns of the Janissariesso near them, and cannon already prepared to batter the ravelin, oroutwork protecting the gateway. 

La Cerda proposed to blow this fortification up, and abandon it, but noother knight would hear of deserting an inch of wall while it could yetbe held. 

But again the sea was specked with white sails from the south-east. Sixgalleys came from Egypt, bearing 900 troops--Mameluke horsemen, troopsrecruited much like the Janissaries and quite as formidable. These shipswere commanded by Ulucciali, an Italian, who had denied his faith andbecome a Mahometan, and was thus regarded with especial horror by thechivalry of Malta. And the swarm thickened for a few days more; likewhite-winged and beautiful but venomous insects hovering round theirprey, the graceful Moorish galleys and galliots came up from the south, bearing 600 dark-visaged, white-turbaned, lithe-limbed Moors fromTripoli, under Dragut himself. The thunders of all the guns roaringforth their salute of honor told the garrison that the most formidableenemy of all had arrived. And now their little white rock was closed inon every side, with nothing but its own firmness to be its aid. 

Dragut did not approve of having begun with attacking Fort St. Elmo; hethought that the inland towns should have been first taken, and Mustafaoffered to discontinue the attack, but this the Corsair said could notnow be done with honor, and under him the attack went on more furiouslythan ever. He planted a battery of four guns on the point guarding theentrance of Marza Muscat, the other gulf, and the spot has ever sincebeen called Dragut's Point. Strange to say, the soldiers in the ravelinfell asleep, and thus enabled the enemy to scramble up by climbing onone another's shoulders and enter the place. As soon as the alarm wasgiven, the Bailiff of Negropont, with a number of knights, rushed intothe ravelin, and fought with the utmost desperation, but all in vain;they never succeeded in dislodging the Turks, and had almost beenfollowed by them into the Fort itself. Only the utmost courage turnedback the enemy at last, and, it was believed, with a loss of 3, 000. TheOrder had twenty knights and a hundred soldiers killed, with many morewounded. One knight named Abel de Bridiers, who was shot through thebody, refused to be assisted by his brethren, saying, 'Reckon me no moreamong the living. You will be doing better by defending our brothers. 'He dragged himself away, and was found dead before the altar in theCastle chapel. The other wounded were brought back to the Borgo in boatsat night, and La Cerda availed himself of a slight scratch to come withthem and remain, though the Bailiff of Negropont, a very old man, andwith a really severe wound, returned as soon as it had been dressed, together with the reinforcements sent to supply the place of those whohad been slain. The Grand Master, on finding how small had been LaCerda's hurt, put him in prison for several days; but he was afterwardsreleased, and met his death bravely on the ramparts of the Borgo. 

The 15th of June was passed. Nothing would make the Sicilian Viceroymove, nor even let the warships of the Order sail with their ownknights, and the little fort that had been supposed unable to hold out aweek, had for full a month resisted every attack of the enemy. 

At last Dragut, though severely wounded while reconnoitring, set up abattery on the hill of Calcara, so as to command the strait, and hinderthe succors from being sent across to the fort. The wounded were laiddown in the chapel and the vaults, and well it was for them that eachknight of the Order could be a surgeon and a nurse. One good swimmercrossed under cover of darkness with their last messages, and La Valetteprepared five armed boats for their relief; but the enemy had fifteenalready in the bay, and communication was entirely cut off. It was thenight before the 23rd of June when these brave men knew their time wascome. All night they prayed, and prepared themselves to die by givingone another the last rites of the Church, and at daylight each repairedto his post, those who could not walk being carried in chairs, and satghastly figures, sword in hand, on the brink of the breach, ready fortheir last fight. 

By the middle of the day every Christian knight in St. Elmo haddied upon his post, and the little heap of ruins was in the hands of theenemy. Dragut was dying of his wound, but just lived to hear that theplace was won, when it had cost the Sultan 8, 000 men! Well might Mustafasay, 'If the son has cost us so much, what will the father do?'

It would be too long to tell the glorious story of the three months'further siege of the Borgo. The patience and resolution of the knightswas unshaken, though daily there were tremendous battles, and week afterweek passed by without the tardy relief from Spain. It is believed thatPhilip II. Thought that the Turks would exhaust themselves against theOrder, and forbade his Viceroy to hazard his fleet; but at last he wasshamed into permitting the armament to be fitted out. Two hundredknights of St. John were waiting at Messina, in despair at being unableto reach their brethren in their deadly strait, and constantly hauntingthe Viceroy's palace, till he grew impatient, and declared they did nottreat him respectfully enough, nor call him 'Excellency'. 

'Senor, ' said one of them, 'if you will only bring us in time to savethe Order, I will call you anything you please, excellency, highness, ormajesty itself. '

At last, on the 1st of September, the fleet really set sail, but ithovered cautiously about on the farther side of the island, and onlylanded 6, 000 men and then returned to Sicily. However, the tidings ofits approach had spread such a panic among the Turkish soldiers, whowere worn out and exhausted by their exertions, that they hastily raisedthe siege, abandoned their heavy artillery, and, removing their garrisonfrom Fort St. Elmo, re-embarked in haste and confusion. No sooner, however, was the Pasha in his ship than he became ashamed of hisprecipitation, more especially when he learnt that the relief that hadput 16, 000 men to flight consisted only of 6, 000, and he resolved toland and give battle; but his troops were angry and unwilling, and wereactually driven out of their ships by blows. 

In the meantime, the Grand Master had again placed a garrison in St. Elmo, which the Turks had repaired and restored, and once more the crossof St. John waved on the end of its tongue of land, to greet the Spanishallies. A battle was fought with the newly arrived troops, in which theTurks were defeated; they again took to their ships, and the Viceroy ofSicily, from Syracuse, beheld their fleet in full sail for the East. 

Meantime, the gates of the Borgo were thrown open to receive thebrethren and friends who had been so long held back from coming to therelief of the home of the Order. Four months' siege, by the heaviestartillery in Europe, had shattered the walls and destroyed the streets, till, to the eyes of the newcomers, the town looked like a place takenby assault, and sacked by the enemy; and of the whole garrison, knights, soldiers, and sailors altogether, only six hundred were left able tobear arms, and they for the most part covered with wounds. The GrandMaster and his surviving knights could hardly be recognized, so pale andaltered were they by wounds and excessive fatigue; their hair, beards, dress, and armor showing that for four full months they had hardlyundressed, or lain down unarmed. The newcomers could not restrain theirtears, but all together proceeded to the church to return thanks for theconclusion of their perils and afflictions. Rejoicings extended all overEurope, above all in Italy, Spain, and southern France, where the Orderof St. John was the sole protection against the descents of the Barbarycorsairs. The Pope sent La Valette a cardinal's hat, but he would notaccept it, as unsuited to his office; Philip II. Presented him with ajeweled sword and dagger. Some thousand unadorned swords a few monthssooner would have been a better testimony to his constancy, and that ofthe brave men whose lives Spain had wasted by her cruel delays. 

The Borgo was thenceforth called Citta Vittoriosa; but La Valettedecided on building the chief town of the isle on the Peninsula of FortSt. Elmo, and in this work he spent his latter days, till he was killedby a sunstroke, while superintending the new works of the city which isdeservedly known by his name, as Valetta. 

The Order of St. John lost much of its character, and was finally sweptfrom Malta in the general confusion of the Revolutionary wars. TheBritish crosses now float in the harbour of Malta; but the steep whiterocks must ever bear the memory of the self-devoted endurance of thebeleaguered knights, and, foremost of all, of those who perished in St. Elmo, in order that the signal banner might to the very last summon thetardy Viceroy to their aid. 

THE VOLUNTARY CONVICT

1622

In the early summer of the year 1605, a coasting vessel was sailingalong the beautiful Gulf of Lyons, the wind blowing gently in the sails, the blue Mediterranean lying glittering to the south, and the curvedline of the French shore rising in purple and green tints, dotted withwhite towns and villages. Suddenly three light, white-sailed shipsappeared in the offing, and the captain's practiced eye detected thatthe wings that bore them were those of a bird of prey. He knew them forAfrican brigantines, and though he made all sail, it was impossible torun into a French port, as on, on they came, not entirely depending onthe wind, but, like steamers, impelled by unseen powers within them. Alas! that power was not the force of innocent steam, but the arms ofChristian rowers chained to the oar. Sure as the pounce of a hawk upon apartridge was the swoop of the corsairs upon the French vessel. A signalto surrender followed, but the captain boldly refused, and armed hiscrew, bidding them stand to their guns. But the fight was too unequal, the brave little ship was disabled, the pirates boarded her, and, aftera sharp fight on deck, three of the crew lay dead, all the rest werewounded, and the vessel was the prize of the pirates. The captain was atonce killed, in revenge for his resistance, and all the rest of the crewand passengers were put in chains. Among these passengers was a youngpriest named Vincent de Paul, the son of a farmer in Languedoc, who hadused his utmost endeavors to educate his son for the ministry, evenselling the oxen from the plough to provide for the college expenses. Asmall legacy had just fallen to the young man, from a relation who haddied at Marseilles; he had been thither to receive it, and had beenpersuaded by a friend to return home by sea. And this was the result ofthe pleasant voyage. The legacy was the prey of the pirates, andVincent, severely wounded by an arrow, and heavily chained, lay half-stifled in a corner of the hold of the ship, a captive probably for lifeto the enemies of the faith. It was true that France had scandalizedEurope by making peace with the Dey of Tunis, but this was a trifle tothe corsairs; and when, after seven days' further cruising, they putinto the harbour of Tunis, they drew up an account of their capture, calling it a Spanish vessel, to prevent the French Consul from claimingthe prisoners. 

The captives had the coarse blue and white garments of slaves giventhem, and were walked five or six times through the narrow streets andbazaars of Tunis, by way of exhibition. They were then brought back totheir ship, and the purchasers came thither to bargain for them. Theywere examined at their meals, to see if they had good appetites; theirsides were felt like those of oxen; their teeth looked at like those ofhorses; their wounds were searched, and they were made to run and walkto show the play of their limbs. All this Vincent endured with patientsubmission, constantly supported by the thought of Him who took upon Himthe form of a servant for our sakes; and he did his best, ill as he was, to give his companions the same confidence. 

Weak and unwell, Vincent was sold cheap to a fisherman; but in his newservice it soon became apparent that the sea made him so ill as to be ofno use, so he was sold again to one of the Moorish physicians, the likeof whom may still be seen, smoking their pipes sleepily, under theirwhite turbans, cross-legged, among the drugs in their shop windows---these being small open spaces beneath the beautiful stone lacework ofthe Moorish lattices. The physician was a great chemist and distiller, and for four years had been seeking the philosopher's stone, which wassupposed to be the secret of making gold. He found his slave's learningand intelligence so useful that he grew very fond of him, and tried hardto persuade him to turn Mahometan, offering him not only liberty, butthe inheritance of all his wealth, and the secrets that he haddiscovered. 

The Christian priest felt the temptation sufficiently to be alwaysgrateful for the grace that had carried him through it. At the end of ayear, the old doctor died, and his nephew sold Vincent again. His nextmaster was a native of Nice, who had not held out against the temptationto renounce his faith in order to avoid a life of slavery, but hadbecome a renegade, and had the charge of one of the farms of the Dey ofTunis. The farm was on a hillside in an extremely hot and exposedregion, and Vincent suffered much from being there set to field labour, but he endured all without a murmur. His master had three wives, and oneof them, who was of Turkish birth, , used often to come out and talk tohim, asking him many questions about his religion. Sometimes she askedhim to sing, and he would then chant the psalm of the captive Jews: 'Bythe waters of Babylon we sat down and wept;' and others of the 'songs'of his Zion. The woman at last told her husband that he must have beenwrong in forsaking a religion of which her slave had told her suchwonderful things. Her words had such an effect on the renegade that hesought the slave, and in conversation with him soon came to a full senseof his own miserable position as an apostate. A change of religion onthe part of a Mahometan is, however, always visited with death, both tothe convert and his instructor. An Algerine, who was discovered to havebecome a Christian, was about this time said to have been walled up atonce in the fortifications he had been building; and the story has beenconfirmed by the recent discovery, by the French engineers, of theremains of a man within a huge block of clay, that had taken a perfectcast of his Moorish features, and of the surface of his garments, andeven had his black hair adhering to it. Vincent's master, terrified atsuch perils, resolved to make his escape in secret with his slave. It isdisappointing to hear nothing of the wife; and not to know whether shewould not or could not accompany them. All we know is, that master andslave trusted themselves alone to a small bark, and, safely crossing theMediterranean, landed at Aigues Mortes, on the 28th of June, 1607; andthat the renegade at once abjured his false faith, and soon afterentered a brotherhood at Rome, whose office it was to wait on the sickin hospitals. 

This part of Vincent de Paul's life has been told at length because itshows from what the Knights of St. John strove to protect theinhabitants of the coasts. We next find Vincent visiting at a hospitalat Paris, where he gave such exceeding comfort to the patients that allwith one voice declared him a messenger from heaven. 

He afterwards became a tutor in the family of the Count de Joigni, avery excellent man, who was easily led by him to many good works. M. DeJoigni was inspector general of the 'Galeres', or Hulks, the ships inthe chief harbors of France, such as Brest and Marseilles, where theconvicts, closely chained, were kept to hard labour, and often made totoil at the oar, like the slaves of the Africans. Going the round ofthese prison ships, the horrible state of the convicts, their half-nakedmisery, and still more their fiendish ferocity went to the heart of theCount and of the Abbé de Paul; and, with full authority from theinspector, the tutor worked among these wretched beings with such goodeffect that on his doings being represented to the King, Louis XIII. , hewas made almoner general to the galleys. 

While visiting those at Marseilles, he was much struck by the broken-down looks and exceeding sorrowfulness of one of the convicts. Heentered into conversation with him, and, after many kind words, persuaded him to tell his troubles. His sorrow was far less for his owncondition than for the misery to which his absence must needs reduce hiswife and children. And what was Vincent's reply to this? His action wasso striking that, though in itself it could hardly be safe to propose itas an example, it must be mentioned as the very height of self-sacrifice. 

He absolutely changed places with the convict. Probably some arrangementwas made with the immediate jailor of the gang, who, by the exchange ofthe priest for the convict, could make up his full tale of men to showwhen his numbers were counted. At any rate the prisoner went free, andreturned to his home, whilst Vincent wore a convict's chain, did aconvict's work, lived on convict's fare, and, what was worse, had onlyconvict society. He was soon sought out and released, but the hurts hehad received from the pressure of the chain lasted all his life. Henever spoke of the event; it was kept a strict secret; and once when hehad referred to it in a letter to a friend, he became so much afraidthat the story would become known that he sent to ask for the letterback again. It was, however, not returned, and it makes the factcertain. It would be a dangerous precedent if prison chaplains were tochange places with their charges; and, beautiful as was Vincent'sspirit, the act can hardly be justified; but it should also beremembered that among the galleys of France there were then many who hadbeen condemned for resistance to the arbitrary will of Cardinal deRichelieu, men not necessarily corrupt and degraded like the thieves andmurderers with whom they were associated. At any rate, M. De Joigni didnot displace the almoner, and Vincent worked on the consciences of theconvicts with infinitely more force for having been for a time one ofthemselves. Many and many were won back to penitence, a hospital wasfounded for them, better regulations established, and, for a time, bothprisons and galleys were wonderfully improved, although only for thelife-time of the good inspector and the saintly almoner. But who shallsay how many souls were saved in those years by these men who did whatthey could?

The rest of the life of Vincent de Paul would be too lengthy to tellhere, though acts of beneficence and self-devotion shine out in glory ateach step. The work by which he is chiefly remembered is hisestablishment of the Order of Sisters of Charity, the excellent womenwho have for two hundred years been the prime workers in everycharitable task in France, nursing the sick, teaching the young, tendingdeserted children, ever to be found where there is distress or pain. 

But of these, and of his charities, we will not here speak, nor even ofhis influence for good on the King and Queen themselves. The whole tenorof his life was 'golden' in one sense, and if we told all his goldendeeds they would fill an entire book. So we will only wait to tell howhe showed his remembrance of what he had gone through in his Africancaptivity. The redemption of the prisoners there might have seemed hisfirst thought, but that he did so much in other quarters. At differenttimes, with the alms that he collected, and out of the revenues of hisbenefices, he ransomed no less then twelve hundred slaves from theircaptivity. At one time the French Consul at Tunis wrote to him that fora certain sum a large number might be set free, and he raised enough torelease not only these, but seventy more, and he further wrought uponthe King to obtain the consent of the Dey of Tunis that a party ofChristian clergy should be permitted to reside in the consul's house, and to minister to the souls and bodies of the Christian slaves, of whomthere were six thousand in Tunis alone, besides those in Algiers, Tangier, and Tripoli!

Permission was gained, and a mission of Lazarist brothers arrived. This, too, was an order founded by Vincent, consisting of priestly nurses likethe Hospitaliers, though not like them warriors. They came in the midstof a dreadful visitation of the plague, and nursed and tended the sick, both Christians and Mahometans, with fearless devotion, day and night, till they won the honor and love of the Moors themselves. 

The good Vincent de Paul died in the year 1660, but his brothers of St. Lazarus, and sisters of charity still tread in the paths he marked outfor them, and his name scarcely needs the saintly epithet that hischurch as affixed to it to stand among the most honorable of charitablemen. 

The cruel deeds of the African pirates were never wholly checked till1816, when the united fleets of England and France destroyed the old denof corsairs at Algiers, which has since become a French colony. 

THE HOUSEWIVES OF LOWENBURG

1631

Brave deeds have been done by the burgher dames of some of the Germancities collectively. Without being of the first class of Golden Deeds, there is something in the exploit of the dames of Weinsberg so quaintand so touching, that it cannot be omitted here. 

It was in the first commencement of the long contest known as the strifebetween the Guelfs and Ghibellines--before even these had become theparty words for the Pope's and the Emperor's friends, and when they onlyapplied to the troops of Bavaria and of Swabia--that, in 1141, Wolf, Duke of Bavaria, was besieged in his castle of Weinberg by Friedrich, Duke of Swabia, brother to the reigning emperor, Konrad III. 

The siege lasted long, but Wolf was obliged at last to offer tosurrender; and the Emperor granted him permission to depart in safety. But his wife did not trust to this fair offer. She had reason to believethat Konrad had a peculiar enmity to her husband; and on his coming totake possession of the castle, she sent to him to entreat him to giveher a safe conduct for herself and all the other women in the garrison, that they might come out with as much of their valuables as they couldcarry. 

This was freely granted, and presently the castle gates opened. Frombeneath them came the ladies--but in strange guise. No gold nor jewelswere carried by them, but each one was bending under the weight of herhusband, whom she thus hoped to secure from the vengeance of theGhibellines. Konrad, who was really a generous and merciful man, is saidto have been affected to tears by this extraordinary performance; hehastened to assure the ladies of the perfect safety of their lords, andthat the gentlemen might dismount at once, secure both of life andfreedom. He invited them all to a banquet, and made peace with the Dukeof Bavaria on terms much more favorable to the Guelfs than the rest ofhis party had been willing to allow. The castle mount was thenceforthcalled no longer the Vine Hill, but the Hill of Weibertreue, or woman'sfidelity. We will not invidiously translate it woman's truth, for therewas in the transaction something of a subterfuge; and it must be ownedthat the ladies tried to the utmost the knightly respect for womankind. 

The good women of Lowenburg, who were but citizens' wives, seem to usmore worthy of admiration for constancy to their faith, shown at a timewhen they had little to aid them. It was such constancy as makesmartyrs; and though the trial stopped short of this, there is somethingin the homeliness of the whole scene, and the feminine form of passiveresistance, that makes us so much honor and admire the good women thatwe cannot refrain from telling the story. 

It was in the year 1631, in the midst of the long Thirty Years' Wasbetween Roman Catholics and Protestants, which finally decided that eachstate should have its own religion, Lowenburg, a city of Silesia, originally Protestant, had passed into the hands of the Emperor's RomanCatholic party. It was a fine old German city, standing amid woods andmeadows, fortified with strong walls surrounded by a moat, and with gatetowers to protect the entrance. 

In the centre was a large market-place, called the Ring, into whichlooked the Council-house and fourteen inns, or places of traffic, forthe cloth that was woven in no less than 300 factories. The houses wereof stone, with gradually projecting stories to the number of four orfive, surmounted with pointed gables. The ground floors had once hadtrellised porches, but these had been found inconvenient and wereremoved, and the lower story consisted of a large hall, and strongvault, with a spacious room behind it containing a baking-oven, and astaircase leading to a wooden gallery, where the family used to dine. Itseems they slept in the room below, though they had upstairs a handsomewainscoted apartment. 

Very rich and flourishing had the Lowenburgers always been, and theirwalls were quite sufficient to turn back any robber barons, or even anyinvading Poles; but things were different when firearms were in use, andthe bands of mercenary soldiers had succeeded the feudal army. They wereinfinitely more formidable during the battle or siege from theirdiscipline, and yet more dreadful after it for their want of discipline. The poor Lowneburgers had been greatly misused: their Lutheran pastorshad been expelled; all the superior citizens had either fled or beenimprisoned; 250 families spent the summer in the woods, and of those whoremained in the city, the men had for the most part outwardly conformedto the Roman Catholic Church. Most of these were of course indifferentat heart, and they had found places in the town council which hadformerly been filled by more respectable men. However, the wives hadalmost all remained staunch to their Lutheran confession; they hadfollowed their pastors weeping to the gates of the city, loading themwith gifts, and they hastened at every opportunity to hear theirpreachings, or obtain baptism for their children at the Lutheranchurches in the neighborhood. 

The person who had the upper hand in the Council was one Julius, who hadbeen a Franciscan friar, but was a desperate, unscrupulous fellow, notat all like a monk. Finding that it was considered as a reproach thatthe churches of Lowenburg were empty, he called the whole Counciltogether on the 9th of April, 1631, and informed them that the womenmust be brought to conformity, or else there were towers and prisons forthem. The Burgomaster was ill in bed, but the Judge, one Elias Seiler, spoke up at once. 'If we have been able to bring the men into the rightpath, why should not we be able to deal with these little creatures?'

Herr Mesnel, a cloth factor, who had been a widower six weeks, thoughtit would be hard to manage, though he quite agreed to the expedient, saying, 'It would be truly good if man and wife had one Creed and onePaternoster; as concerns the Ten Commandments it is not so pressing. ' (Asentiment that he could hardly have wished to see put in practice. )

Another councilor, called Schwob Franze, who had lost his wife a fewdays before, seems to have had an eye to the future, for he said itwould be a pity to frighten away the many beautiful maidens and widowsthere were among the Lutheran women; but on the whole the men withoutwives were much bolder and more sanguine of success than the marriedones. And no one would undertake to deal with his own wife privately, soit ended by a message being sent to the more distinguished ladies toattend the Council. 

But presently up came tidings that not merely these few dames, whom theymight have hoped to overawe, were on their way, but that the Judge'swife and the Burgomaster's were the first pair in a procession of full500 housewives, who were walking sedately up the stairs to the CouncilHall below the chamber where the dignitaries were assembled. This wasnot by any means what had been expected, and the message was sent downthat only the chief ladies should come up. 'No, ' replied the Judge'swife, 'we will not allow ourselves to be separated, ' and to this theywere firm; they said, as one fared all should fare; and the Town Clerk, going up and down with smooth words, received no better answer than thisfrom the Judge's wife, who, it must be confessed, was less ladylike inlanguage than resolute in faith. 

'Nay, nay, dear friend, do you think we are so simple as not to perceivethe trick by which you would force us poor women against our conscienceto change our faith? My husband and the priest have not been consortingtogether all these days for nothing; they have been joined togetheralmost day and night; assuredly they have either boiled or baked adevil, which they may eat up themselves. I shall not enter there! WhereI remain, my train and following will remain also! Women, is this yourwill?'

'Yea, yea, let it be so, ' they said; 'we will all hold together as oneman. '

His honor the Town Clerk was much affrighted, and went hastily back, reporting that the Council was in no small danger, since each housewifehad her bunch of keys at her side! These keys were the badge of a wife'sdignity and authority, and moreover they were such ponderous articlesthat they sometimes served as weapons. A Scottish virago has been knowto dash out the brains of a wounded enemy with her keys; and theintelligence that the good dames had come so well furnished, filled theCouncil with panic. Dr. Melchior Hubner, who had been a miller's man, wished for a hundred musketeers to mow them down; but the Town Clerkproposed that all the Council should creep quietly down the back stairs, lock the doors on the refractory womankind, and make their escape. This was effected as silently and quickly as possible, for the wholeCouncil 'could confess to a state of frightful terror. ' Presently thewomen peeped out, and saw the stairs bestrewn with hats, gloves, andhandkerchiefs; and perceiving how they had put all the wisdom andauthority of the town to the rout, there was great merriment among them, though, finding themselves locked up, the more tenderhearted began topity their husbands and children. As for themselves, their maids andchildren came round the Town Hall, to hand in provisions to them, andall the men who were not of the Council were seeking the magistrates toknow what their wives had done to be thus locked up. 

The Judge sent to assemble the rest of the Council at his house; andthough only four came, the doorkeeper ran to the Town Hall, and calledout to his wife that the Council had reassembled, and they would soon belet out. To which, however, that very shrewd dame, the Judge's wife, answered with great composure, 'Yea, we willingly have patience, as weare quite comfortable here; but tell them they ought to inform us why weare summoned and confined without trial. '

She well knew how much better off she was than her husband without her. He paced about in great perturbation, and at last called for somethingto eat. The maid served up a dish of crab, some white bread, and butter;but, in his fury, he threw all the food about the room and out thewindow, away from the poor children, who had had nothing to eat all day, and at last he threw all the dishes and saucepans out of window. At lastthe Town Clerk and two others were sent to do their best to persuade thewomen that they had misunderstood--they were in no danger, and were onlyinvited to the preachings of Holy Week: and, as Master Daniel, thejoiner, added, 'It was only a friendly conference. It is not customarywith my masters and the very wise Council to hang a man before they havecaught him. '

This opprobrious illustration raised a considerable clamor of abuse fromthe ruder women; but the Judge's and Burgomaster's ladies silenced them, and repeated their resolution never to give up their faith against theirconscience. Seeing that no impression was made on them, and that nobodyknew what to do without them at home, the magistracy decided that theyshould be released, and they went quietly home; but the Judge Seiler, either because he had been foremost in the business, or else perhapsbecause of the devastation he had made at home among the pots and pans, durst not meet his wife, but sneaked out of the town, and left her withthe house to herself. 

The priest now tried getting the three chief ladies alone together, andmost politely begged them to conform; but instead of arguing, theysimply answered; 'No; we were otherwise instructed by our parents andformer preachers. '

Then he begged them at least to tell the other women that they had askedfor fourteen days for consideration. 

'No, dear sir, ' they replied: 'we were not taught by our parents to tellfalsehoods, and we will not learn it from you. '

Meanwhile Schwob Franze rushed to the Burgomaster's bedside, and beggedhim, for Heaven's sake, to prevent the priest from meddling with thewomen; for the whole bevy, hearing that their three leaders were calledbefore the priest, were collecting in the marketplace, keys, bundles, and all; and the panic of the worthy magistrates was renewed. TheBurgomaster sent for the priest, and told him plainly, that if any harmbefel him from the women, the fault would be his own; and thereupon hegave way, the ladies went quietly home, and their stout champions laidaside their bundles and keys--not out of reach, however, in case ofanother summons. 

However, the priest was obliged, next year, to leave Lowenburg indisgrace, for he was a man of notoriously bad character; and Dr. Melchior became a soldier, and was hanged at Prague. 

After all, such a confession as this is a mere trifle, not only comparedwith martyrdoms of old, but with the constancy with which, after therevocation of the Edict of Nantes, the Huguenots endured persecution---as, for instance, the large number of women who were imprisoned forthirty-eight years at Aigues Mortes; or again, with the steadyresolution of the persecuted nuns of Port Royal against signing thecondemnation of the works of Jansen. Yet, in its own way, the feminineresistance of these good citizens' wives, without being equally high-toned, is worthy of record, and far too full of character to be passedover. 

FATHERS AND SONS

219--1642--1798

One of the noblest characters in old Roman history is the first ScipioAfricanus, and his first appearance is in a most pleasing light, at thebattle of the River Ticinus, B. C. 219, when the Carthaginians, underHannibal, had just completed their wonderful march across the Alps, andsurprised the Romans in Italy itself. 

Young Scipio was then only seventeen years of age, and had gone to hisfirst battle under the eagles of his father, the Consul, PubliusCornelius Scipio. It was an unfortunate battle; the Romans, whenexhausted by long resistance to the Spanish horse in Hannibal's army, were taken in flank by the Numidian calvary, and entirely broken. TheConsul rode in front of the few equites he could keep together, strivingby voice and example to rally his forces, until he was pierced by one ofthe long Numidian javelins, and fell senseless from his horse. TheRomans, thinking him dead, entirely gave way; but his young son wouldnot leave him, and, lifting him on his horse, succeeded in bringing himsafe into the camp, where he recovered, and his after days retrieved thehonor of the Roman arms. 

The story of a brave and devoted son comes to us to light up the sadnessof our civil wars between Cavaliers and Roundheads in the middle of theseventeenth century. It was soon after King Charles had raised hisstandard at Nottingham, and set forth on his march for London, that itbecame evident that the Parliamentary army, under the Earl of Essex, intended to intercept his march. The King himself was with the army, with his two boys, Charles and James; but the General-in-chief wasRobert Bertie, Earl of Lindsay, a brave and experienced old soldier, sixty years of age, godson to Queen Elizabeth, and to her two favoriteEarls, whose Christian name he bore. He had been in her Essex'sexpedition to Cambridge, and had afterwards served in the Low Countries, under Prince Maurice of Nassau; for the long Continental wars hadthroughout King James' peaceful reign been treated by the Englishnobility as schools of arms, and a few campaigns were considered as agraceful finish to a gentleman's education. As soon as Lord Lindsay hadbegun to fear that the disputes between the King and Parliament must endin war, he had begun to exercise and train his tenantry in Lincolnshireand Northamptonshire, of whom he had formed a regiment of infantry. Withhim was his son Montagu Bertie, Lord Willoughby, a noble-looking man ofthirty-two, of whom it was said, that he was 'as excellent in reality asothers in pretence, ' and that, thinking 'that the cross was an ornamentto the crown, and much more to the coronet, he satisfied not himselfwith the mere exercise of virtue, but sublimated it, and made it grace. 'He had likewise seen some service against the Spaniards in theNetherlands, and after his return had been made a captain in theLifeguards, and a Gentleman of the Bedchamber. Vandyke has leftportraits of the father and the son; the one a bald-headed, alert, precise-looking old warrior, with the cuirass and gauntlets of elderwarfare; the other, the very model of a cavalier, tall, easy, andgraceful, with a gentle reflecting face, and wearing the long lovelocksand deep point lace collar and cuffs characteristic of Queen Henrietta'sCourt. Lindsay was called General-in-chief, but the King had imprudentlyexempted the cavalry from his command, its general, Prince Rupert of theRhine, taking orders only from himself. Rupert was only three-and-twenty, and his education in the wild school of the Thirty Years' Warhad not taught him to lay aside his arrogance and opinionativeness;indeed, he had shown great petulance at receiving orders from the Kingthrough Lord Falkland. 

At eight o'clock, on the morning of the 23rd of October, King Charleswas riding along the ridge of Edgehill, and looking down into the Valeof Red Horse, a fair meadow land, here and there broken by hedges andcopses. His troops were mustering around him, and in the valley he couldsee with his telescope the various Parliamentary regiments, as theypoured out of the town of Keinton, and took up their positions in threelines. 'I never saw the rebels in a body before, ' he said, as he gazedsadly at the subjects arrayed against him. 'I shall give them battle. God, and the prayers of good men to Him, assist the justice of mycause. ' The whole of his forces, about 11, 000 in number, were notassembled till two o'clock in the afternoon, for the gentlemen who hadbecome officers found it no easy matter to call their farmers andretainers together, and marshal them into any sort of order. But whileone troop after another came trampling, clanking, and shouting in, trying to find and take their proper place, there were hot words roundthe royal standard. 

Lord Lindsay, who was an old comrade of the Earl of Essex, the commanderof the rebel forces, knew that he would follow the tactics they had bothtogether studied in Holland, little thinking that one day they should bearrayed one against the other in their own native England. He had a highopinion of Essex's generalship, and insisted that the situation of theRoyal army required the utmost caution. Rupert, on the other hand, hadseen the swift fiery charges of the fierce troopers of the Thirty Years'war, and was backed up by Patrick, Lord Ruthven, one of the many Scotswho had won honor under the great Swedish King, Gustavus Adolphus. Asudden charge of the Royal horse would, Rupert argued, sweep theRoundheads from the field, and the foot would have nothing to do but tofollow up the victory. The great portrait at Windsor shows us exactlyhow the King must have stood, with his charger by his side, and hisgrave, melancholy face, sad enough at having to fight at all with hissubjects, and never having seen a battle, entirely bewildered betweenthe ardent words of his spirited nephew and the grave replies of thewell-seasoned old Earl. At last, as time went on, and some decision wasnecessary, the perplexed King, willing at least not to irritate Rupert, desired that Ruthven should array the troops in the Swedish fashion. 

It was a greater affront to the General-in-chief than the king waslikely to understand, but it could not shake the old soldier's loyalty. He gravely resigned the empty title of General, which only madeconfusion worse confounded, and rode away to act as colonel of his ownLincoln regiment, pitying his master's perplexity, and resolved that noprivate pique should hinder him from doing his duty. His regiment was offoot soldiers, and was just opposite to the standard of the Earl ofEssex. 

The church bell was ringing for afternoon service when the Royal forcesmarched down the hill. The last hurried prayer before the charge wasstout old Sir Jacob Astley's, 'O Lord, Thou knowest how busy I must bethis day; if I forget Thee, do not Thou forget me;' then, rising, hesaid, 'March on, boys. ' And, amid prayer and exhortation, the other sideawaited the shock, as men whom a strong and deeply embittered sense ofwrong had roused to take up arms. Prince Rupert's charge was, however, fully successful. No one even waited to cross swords with his troopers, but all the Roundhead horse galloped headlong off the field, hotlypursued by the Royalists. But the main body of the army stood firm, andfor some time the battle was nearly equal, until a large troop of theenemy's cavalry who had been kept in reserve, wheeled round and fellupon the Royal forces just when their scanty supply of ammunition wasexhausted. 

Step by step, however, they retreated bravely, and Rupert, who hadreturned from his charge, sought in vain to collect his scatteredtroopers, so as to fall again on the rebels; but some were plundering, some chasing the enemy, and none could be got together. Lord Lindsay wasshot through the thigh bone, and fell. He was instantly surrounded bythe rebels on horseback; but his son, Lord Willoughby, seeing hisdanger, flung himself alone among the enemy, and forcing his wayforward, raised his father in his arms thinking of nothing else, andunheeding his own peril. The throng of enemy around called to him tosurrender, and, hastily giving up his sword, he carried the Earl intothe nearest shed, and laid him on a heap of straw, vainly striving tostaunch the blood. It was a bitterly cold night, and the frosty windcame howling through the darkness. Far above, on the ridge of the hill, the fires of the King's army shone with red light, and some way off onthe other side twinkled those of the Parliamentary forces. Glimmeringlanterns or torches moved about the battlefield, those of the savageplunderers who crept about to despoil the dead. Whether the battle werewon or lost, the father and son knew not, and the guard who watched themknew as little. Lord Lindsay himself murmured, 'If it please God Ishould survive, I never will fight in the same field with boys again!'--no doubt deeming that young Rupert had wrought all the mischief. Histhoughts were all on the cause, his son's all on him; and piteous wasthat night, as the blood continued to flow, and nothing availed to checkit, nor was any aid near to restore the old man's ebbing strength. 

Toward midnight the Earl's old comrade Essex had time to understand hiscondition, and sent some officers to enquire for him, and promise speedysurgical attendance. Lindsay was still full of spirit, and spoke to themso strongly of their broken faith, and of the sin of disloyalty andrebellion, that they slunk away one by one out of the hut, and dissuadedEssex from coming himself to see his old friend, as he had intended. Thesurgeon, however, arrived, but too late, Lindsay was already so muchexhausted by cold and loss of blood, that he died early in the morningof the 24th, all his son's gallant devotion having failed to save him. 

The sorrowing son received an affectionate note the next day from theKing, full of regret for his father and esteem for himself. Charles madeevery effort to obtain his exchange, but could not succeed for a wholeyear. He was afterwards one of the four noblemen who, seven years later, followed the King's white, silent, snowy funeral in the dismantled St. George's Chapel; and from first to last he was one of the bravest, purest, and most devoted of those who did honor to the Cavalier cause. 

We have still another brave son to describe, and for him we must returnaway from these sad pages of our history, when we were a house dividedagainst itself, to one of the hours of our brightest glory, when thecause we fought in was the cause of all the oppressed, and nearly alonewe upheld the rights of oppressed countries against the invader. Andthus it is that the battle of the Nile is one of the exploits to whichwe look back with the greatest exultation, when we think of the triumphof the British flag. 

Let us think of all that was at stake. Napoleon Bonaparte was climbingto power in France, by directing her successful arms against the world. He had beaten Germany and conquered Italy; he had threatened England, and his dream was of the conquest of the East. Like another Alexander, he hoped to subdue Asia, and overthrow the hated British power bydepriving it of India. Hitherto, his dreams had become earnest by theforce of his marvelous genius, and by the ardor which he breathed intothe whole French nation; and when he set sail from Toulon, with 40, 000tried and victorious soldiers and a magnificent fleet, all were filledwith vague and unbounded expectations of almost fabulous glories. Heswept away as it were the degenerate Knights of St. John from their rockof Malta, and sailed for Alexandria in Egypt, in the latter end of June, 1798. 

His intentions had not become known, and the English Mediterranean fleetwas watching the course of this great armament. Sir Horatio Nelson wasin pursuit, with the English vessels, and wrote to the First Lord of theAdmiralty: 'Be they bound to the Antipodes, your lordship may rely thatI will not lose a moment in bringing them to action. '

Nelson had, however, not ships enough to be detached to reconnoitre, andhe actually overpassed the French, whom he guessed to be on the way toEgypt; he arrived at the port of Alexandria on the 28th of June, and sawits blue waters and flat coast lying still in their sunny torpor, as ifno enemy were on the seas. Back he went to Syracuse, but could learn nomore there; he obtained provisions with some difficulty, and then, ingreat anxiety, sailed for Greece; where at last, on the 28th of July, helearnt that the French fleet had been seen from Candia, steering to thesoutheast, and about four weeks since. In fact, it had actually passedby him in a thick haze, which concealed each fleet from the other, andhad arrived at Alexandria on the 1st of July, three days after he hadleft it!

Every sail was set for the south, and at four o'clock in the afternoonof the 1st of August a very different sight was seen in Aboukir Bay, sosolitary a month ago. It was crowded with shipping. Great castle-likemen-of-war rose with all their proud calm dignity out of the water, their dark port-holes opening in the white bands on their sides, and thetricolored flag floating as their ensign. There were thirteen ships ofthe line and four frigates, and, of these, three were 80-gun ships, andone, towering high above the rest, with her three decks, was L'Orient, of 120 guns. Look well at her, for there stands the hero for whose sakewe have chose this and no other of Nelson's glorious fights to placeamong the setting of our Golden Deeds. There he is, a little cadet devaisseau, as the French call a midshipman, only ten years old, with aheart swelling between awe and exultation at the prospect of his firstbattle; but, fearless and glad, for is he not the son of the braveCasabianca, the flag-captain? And is not this Admiral Brueys' own ship, looking down in scorn on the fourteen little English ships, not onecarrying more than 74 guns, and one only 50?

Why Napoleon had kept the fleet there was never known. In his usual meanway of disavowing whatever turned out ill, he laid the blame uponAdmiral Brueys; but, though dead men could not tell tales, his papersmade it plain that the ships had remained in obedience to commands, though they had not been able to enter the harbour of Alexandria. Largerewards had been offered to any pilot who would take them in, but nonecould be found who would venture to steer into that port a vesseldrawing more than twenty feet of water. They had, therefore, remained atanchor outside, in Aboukir Bay, drawn up in a curve along the deepest ofthe water, with no room to pass them at either end, so that thecommissary of the fleet reported that they could bid defiance to a forcemore than double their number. The admiral believed that Nelson had notventured to attack him when they had passed by one another a monthbefore, and when the English fleet was signaled, he still supposed thatit was too late in the day for an attack to be made. 

Nelson had, however, no sooner learnt that the French were in sight thanhe signaled from his ship, the Vanguard, that preparations for battleshould be made, and in the meantime summoned up his captains to receivehis orders during a hurried meal. He explained that, where there wasroom for a large French ship to swing, there was room for a smallEnglish one to anchor, and, therefore, he designed to bring his ships upto the outer part of the French line, and station them close below theiradversary; a plan that he said Lord Hood had once designed, though hehad not carried it out. 

Captain Berry was delighted, and exclaimed, 'If we succeed, what willthe world say?'

'There is no if in the case, ' returned Nelson, 'that we shall succeed iscertain. Who may live to tell the tale is a very different question. '

And when they rose and parted, he said, 'before this time to-morrow Ishall have gained a peerage or Westminster Abbey. '

In the fleet went, through a fierce storm of shot and shell from aFrench battery in an island in advance. Nelson's own ship, the Vanguard, was the first to anchor within half-pistol-shot of the third Frenchship, the Spartiate. The Vanguard had six colours flying, in any caseany should be shot away; and such was the fire that was directed on her, that in a few minutes every man at the six guns in her forepart waskilled or wounded, and this happened three times. Nelson himselfreceived a wound in the head, which was thought at first to be mortal, but which proved but slight. He would not allow the surgeon to leave thesailors to attend to him till it came to his turn. 

Meantime his ships were doing their work gloriously. The Bellerophonwas, indeed, overpowered by L'Orient, 200 of her crew killed, and allher masts and cables shot away, so that she drifted away as night cameon; but the Swiftsure came up in her place, and the Alexander andLeander both poured in their shot. Admiral Brueys received three wounds, but would not quit his post, and at length a fourth shot almost cut himin two. He desired not to be carried below, but that he might die ondeck. 

About nine o'clock the ship took fire, and blazed up with fearfulbrightness, lighting up the whole bay, and showing five French shipswith their colours hauled down, the others still fighting on. Nelsonhimself rose and came on deck when this fearful glow came shining fromsea and sky into his cabin; and gave orders that the English boarsshould immediately be put off for L'Orient, to save as many lives aspossible. 

The English sailors rowed up to the burning ship which they had latelybeen attacking. The French officers listened to the offer of safety, andcalled to the little favorite of the ship, the captain's son, to comewith them. 'No, ' said the brave child, 'he was where his father hadstationed him, and bidden him not to move save at his call. ' They toldhim his father's voice would never call him again, for he lay senselessand mortally wounded on the deck, and that the ship must blow up. 'No, 'said the brave child, 'he must obey his father. ' The moment allowed nodelaythe boat put off. The flames showed all that passed in a quiveringflare more intense than daylight, and the little fellow was then seen onthe deck, leaning over the prostrate figure, and presently tying it toone of the spars of the shivered masts. 

Just then a thundering explosion shook down to the very hold every shipin the harbour, and burning fragments of L'Orient came falling far andwide, plashing heavily into the water, in the dead, awful stillness thatfollowed the fearful sound. English boats were plying busily about, picking up those who had leapt overboard in time. Some were dragged inthrough the lower portholes of the English ships, and about seventy weresaved altogether. For one moment a boat's crew had a sight of a helplessfigure bound to a spar, and guided by a little childish swimmer, whomust have gone overboard with his precious freight just before theexplosion. They rowed after the brave little fellow, earnestly desiringto save him; but in darkness, in smoke, in lurid uncertain light, amidhosts of drowning wretches, they lost sight of him again. 

The boy, oh where was he! Ask of the winds that far aroundWith fragments strewed the sea; With mast and helm, and pennant fairThat well had borne their part: But the noblest thing that perished thereWas that young faithful heart!

By sunrise the victory was complete. Nay, as Nelson said, 'It was not avictory, but a conquest. ' Only four French ships escaped, and Napoleonand his army were cut off from home. These are the glories of our navy, gained by men with hearts as true and obedient as that of the bravechild they had tried in vain to save. Yet still, while giving the fullmeed of thankful, sympathetic honor to our noble sailors, we cannot butfeel that the Golden Deed of Aboukir Bay fell to--

'That young faithful heart. '

THE SOLDIERS IN THE SNOW

1672

Few generals had ever been more loved by their soldiers than the greatViscount de Turenne, who was Marshal of France in the time of Louis XIV. Troops are always proud of a leader who wins victories; but Turenne wasfar more loved for his generous kindness than for his successes. If hegained a battle, he always wrote in his despatches, 'We succeeded, ' soas to give the credit to the rest of the army; but if he were defeated, he wrote, 'I lost, ' so as to take all the blame upon himself. He alwaysshared as much as possible in every hardship suffered by his men, andthey trusted him entirely. In the year 1672, Turenne and his army weresent to make war upon the Elector Frederick William of Brandenburg, inNorthern Germany. It was in the depth of winter, and the marches throughthe heavy roads were very trying and wearisome; but the soldiers enduredall cheerfully for his sake. Once when they were wading though a deepmorass, some of the younger soldiers complained; but the elder onesanswered, 'Depend upon it, Turenne is more concerned than we are. Atthis moment he is thinking how to deliver us. He watches for us while wesleep. He is our father. It is plain that you are but young. '

Another night, when he was going the round of the camp, he overheardsome of the younger men murmuring at the discomforts of the march; whenan old soldier, newly recovered from a severe wound, said: 'You do notknow our father. He would not have made us go through such fatigue, unless he had some great end in view, which we cannot yet make out. 'Turenne always declared that nothing had ever given him more pleasurethan this conversation. 

There was a severe sickness among the troops, and he went about amongthe sufferers, comforting them, and seeing that their wants weresupplied. When he passed by, the soldiers came out of their tents tolook at him, and say, 'Our father is in good health: we have nothing tofear. '

The army had to enter the principality of Halberstadt, the way to whichlay over ridges of high hills with narrow defiles between them. Considerable time was required for the whole of the troops to marchthrough a single narrow outlet; and one very cold day, when such apassage was taking place, the Marshal, quite spent with fatigue, satdown under a bush to wait till all had marched by, and fell asleep. Whenhe awoke, it was snowing fast; but he found himself under a sort of tentmade of soldiers' cloaks, hung up upon the branches of trees planted inthe ground, and round it were standing, in the cold and snow, allunsheltered, a party of soldiers. Turenne called out to them, to askwhat they were doing there. 'We are taking care of our father, ' theysaid; 'that is our chief concern. ' The general, to keep up discipline, seems to have scolded them a little for straggling from their regiment;but he was much affected and gratified by this sight of their heartylove for him. 

Still greater and more devoted love was shown by some German soldiers inthe terrible winter of 1812. It was when the Emperor Napoleon I. Hadmade his vain attempt to conquer Russia, and had been prevented fromspending the winter at Moscow by the great fire that consumed all thecity. He was obliged to retreat through the snow, with the Russian armypursuing him, and his miserable troops suffering horrors beyond allimagination. Among them were many Italians, Poles, and Germans, whom hehad obliged to become his allies; and the 'Golden Deed' of ten of theseGerman soldiers, the last remnant of those led from Hesse Darmstadt bytheir gallant young Prince Emilius, is best told in Lord Houghton'sverses:--

'From Hessen Darmstadt every step to Moskwa's blazing banks, Was Prince Emilius found in flight before the foremost ranks;And when upon the icy waste that host was backward cast, On Beresina's bloody bridge his banner waved the last. 

'His valor shed victorious grace on all that dread retreat--That path across the wildering snow, athwart the blinding sleet;And every follower of his sword could all endure and dare, Becoming warriors, strong in hope, or stronger in despair. 'Now, day and dark, along the storm the demon Cossacks sweep--The hungriest must not look for food, the weariest must not sleep. No rest but death for horse or man, whichever first shall tire;They see the flames destroy, but ne'er may feel the saving fire. 'Thus never closed the bitter night, nor rose the salvage morn, But from the gallant company some noble part was shorn;And, sick at heart, the Prince resolved to keep his purposed wayWith steadfast forward looks, nor count the losses of the day. 

'At length beside a black, burnt hut, an island of the snow, Each head in frigid torpor bent toward the saddle bow;They paused, and of that sturdy troop--that thousand banded men--At one unmeditated glance he numbered only ten!

'Of all that high triumphant life that left his German home--Of all those hearts that beat beloved, or looked for love to come--This piteous remnant, hardly saved, his spirit overcame, While memory raised each friendly face, recalled an ancient name. 

'These were his words, serene and firm, 'Dear brothers, it is bestThat here, with perfect trust in Heaven, we give our bodies rest;If we have borne, like faithful men, our part of toil and pain, Where'er we wake, for Christ's good sake, we shall not sleep in vain. '

'Some uttered, others looked assent--they had no heart to speak;Dumb hands were pressed, the pallid lip approached the callous cheek. They laid them side by side; and death to him at last did seemTo come attired in mazy robe of variegated dream. 

'Once more he floated on the breast of old familiar Rhine, His mother's and one other smile above him seemed to shine;A blessed dew of healing fell on every aching limb;Till the stream broadened, and the air thickened, and all was dim. 

'Nature has bent to other laws if that tremendous nightPassed o'er his frame, exposed and worn, and left no deadly blight;Then wonder not that when, refresh'd and warm, he woke at last, There lay a boundless gulf of thought between him and the past. 

'Soon raising his astonished head, he found himself alone, Sheltered beneath a genial heap of vestments not his own;The light increased, the solemn truth revealing more and more, The soldiers' corses, self-despoiled, closed up the narrow door. 

'That every hour, fulfilling good, miraculous succor came, And Prince Emilius lived to give this worthy deed to fame. O brave fidelity in death! O strength of loving will!These are the holy balsam drops that woeful wars distil. '

GUNPOWDER PERILS

1700

The wild history of Ireland contains many a frightful tale, but alsomany an action of the noblest order; and the short sketch given by MariaEdgeworth of her ancestry, presents such a chequerwork of the gold andthe lead that it is almost impossible to separate them. 

At the time of the great Irish rebellion of 1641 the head of theEdgeworth family had left his English wife and her infant son at hiscastle of Cranallagh in county Longford, thinking them safe there whilehe joined the royal forces under the Earl of Ormond. In his absence, however, the rebels attacked the castle at night, set fire to it, anddragged the lady out absolutely naked. She hid herself under a furzebush, and succeeded in escaping and reaching Dublin, whence she made herway to her father's house in Derbyshire. Her little son was found by therebels lying in his cradle, and one of them actually seized the child bythe leg and was about to dash out his brains against the wall; but aservant named Bryan Ferral, pretending to be even more ferocious, vowedthat a sudden death was too good for the little heretic, and that heshould be plunged up to the throat in a bog-hole and left for the crowsto pick out his eyes. He actually did place the poor child in the bog, but only to save his life; he returned as soon as he could elude hiscomrades, put the boy into a pannier below eggs and chickens, and thuscarried him straight though the rebel camp to his mother at Dublin. Strange to say, these rebels, who thought being dashed against the walltoo good a fate for the infant, extinguished the flames of the castleout of reverence for the picture of his grandmother, who had been aRoman Catholic, and was painted on a panel with a cross on her bosom anda rosary in her hand. 

John Edgeworth, the boy thus saved, married very young, and went withhis wife to see London after the Restoration. To pay their expenses theymortgaged an estate and put the money in a stocking, which they kept onthe top of the bed; and when that store was used up, the young manactually sold a house in Dublin to buy a high-crowned hat and feathers. Still, reckless and improvident as they were, there was sound principlewithin them, and though they were great favorites, and Charles II. Insisted on knighting the husband, their glimpse of the real evils andtemptations of his Court sufficed them, and in the full tide of flatteryand admiration the lady begged to return home, nor did she ever go backto Court again. 

Her home was at Castle Lissard, in full view of which was a hillockcalled Fairymount, or Firmont, from being supposed to be the haunt offairies. Lights, noises, and singing at night, clearly discerned fromthe castle, caused much terror to Lady Edgeworth, though her descendantsaffirm that they were fairies of the same genus as those who beset SirJohn Falstaff at Hearne's oak, and intended to frighten her into leavingthe place. However, though her nerves might be disturbed, her spirit wasnot to be daunted; and, fairies or no fairies, she held her ground atCastle Lissard, and there showed what manner of woman she was in averitable and most fearful peril. 

On some alarm which caused the gentlemen of the family to take downtheir guns, she went to a dark loft at the top of the house to fetchsome powder from a barrel that was there kept in store, taking a youngmaid-servant to carry the candle; which, as might be expected in anIrish household of the seventeenth century, was devoid of anycandlestick. After taking the needful amount of gunpowder, LadyEdgeworth locked the door, and was halfway downstairs when she missedthe candle, and asking the girl what she had done with it, received thecool answer that 'she had left it sticking in the barrel of black salt'. Lady Edgeworth bade her stand still, turned round, went back alone tothe loft where the tallow candle stood guttering and flaring planted inthe middle of the gunpowder, resolutely put an untrembling hand beneathit, took it out so steadily that no spark fell, carried it down, andwhen she came to the bottom of the stairs dropped on her knees, andbroke forth in a thanksgiving aloud for the safety of the household inthis frightful peril. This high-spirited lady lived to be ninety yearsold, and left a numerous family. One grandson was the Abbe Edgeworth, known in France as De Firmont, such being the alteration of Fairymounton French lips. It was he who, at the peril of his own life, attendedLouis XVI. To the guillotine, and thus connected his name so closelywith the royal cause that when his cousin Richard Lovell Edgeworth, ofEdgeworths-town, visited France several years after, the presence of aperson so called was deemed perilous to the rising power of Napoleon. This latter Mr. Edgeworth was the father of Maria, whose works we hopeare well known to our young readers. 

The good Chevalier Bayard was wont to mourn over the introduction offirearms, as destructive of chivalry; and certainly the steel-cladknight, with barbed steed, and sword and lance, has disappeared from thebattle-field; but his most essential qualities, truth, honor, faithfulness, mercy, and self-devotion, have not disappeared with him, nor can they as long as Christian men and women bear in mind that'greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for hisfriend'. 

And that terrible compound, gunpowder, has been the occasion of manyanother daring deed, requiring desperate resolution, to save others atthe expense of a death perhaps more frightful to the imagination thanany other. Listen to a story of the King's birthday in Jersey 'sixtyyears since'--in 1804, when that 4th of June that Eton boys delight in, was already in the forty-fourth year of its observance in honor of thethen reigning monarch, George III. 

All the forts in the island had done due honor to the birthday of HisMajesty, who was then just recovered from an attack of insanity. In eachthe guns at noon-day thundered out their royal salute, the flashes hadanswered one another, and the smoke had wreathed itself away over theblue sea of Jersey. The new fort on the hill just above the town of St. Heliers had contributed its share to the loyal thunders, and then it wasshut up, and the keys carried away by Captain Salmon, the artilleryofficer on guard there, locking up therein 209 barrels of gunpowder, with a large supply of bombshells, and every kind of ammunition such asmight well be needed in the Channel islands the year before Lord Nelsonhad freed England from the chance of finding the whole French army onour coast in the flat-bottomed boats that were waiting at Boulogne forthe dark night that never came. 

At six o'clock in the evening, Captain Salmon went to dine with theother officers in St. Heliers and to drink the King's health, when thesoldiers on guard beheld a cloud of smoke curling out at the air-hole atthe end of the magazine. Shouting 'fire', they ran away to avoid anexplosion that would have shattered them to pieces, and might perhapsendanger the entire town of St. Heliers. Happily their shout was heardby a man of different mould. Lieutenant Lys, the signal officer, was inthe watch-house on the hill, and coming out he saw the smoke, andperceived the danger. Two brothers, named Thomas and Edward Touzel, carpenters, and the sons of an old widow, had come up to take down aflagstaff that had been raised in honor of the day, and Mr. Lys orderedthem to hasten to the town to inform the commander-in-chief, and get thekeys from Captain Salmon. 

Thomas went, and endeavored to persuade his brother to accompany himfrom the heart of the danger; but Edward replied that he must die someday or other, and that he would do his best to save the magazine, and hetried to stop some of the runaway soldiers to assist. One refused; butanother, William Ponteney, of the 3rd, replied that he was ready to diewith him, and they shook hands. 

Edward Touzel then, by the help of a wooden bar and an axe, broke openthe door of the fort, and making his way into it, saw the state of thecase, and shouted to Mr. Lys on the outside, 'the magazine is on fire, it will blow up, we must lose our lives; but no matter, huzza for theKing! We must try and save it. ' He then rushed into the flame, andseizing the matches, which were almost burnt out (probably splinters ofwood tipped with brimstone), he threw them by armfuls to Mr. Lys and thesoldier Ponteney, who stood outside and received them. Mr. Lys saw acask of water near at hand; but there was nothing to carry the water inbut an earthen pitcher, his own hat and the soldier's. These, however, they filled again and again, and handed to Touzel, who thus extinguishedall the fire he could see; but the smoke was so dense, that he worked inhorrible doubt and obscurity, almost suffocated, and with his face andhands already scorched. The beams over his head were on fire, largecases containing powder horns had already caught, and an open barrel ofgunpowder was close by, only awaiting the fall of a single brand toburst into a fatal explosion. Touzel called out to entreat for somedrink to enable him to endure the stifling, and Mr. Lys handed him somespirits-and-water, which he drank, and worked on; but by this time theofficers had heard the alarm, dispelled the panic among the soldiers, and come to the rescue. The magazine was completely emptied, and thelast smoldering sparks extinguished; but the whole of the garrison andcitizens felt that they owed their lives to the three gallant men towhose exertions alone under Providence, it was owing that succor did notcome too late. Most of all was honor due to Edward Touzel, who, as acivilian, might have turned his back upon the peril without any blame;nay, could even have pleaded Mr. Lys' message as a duty, but who hadinstead rushed foremost into what he believe was certain death. 

A meeting was held in the church of St. Heliers to consider of atestimonial of gratitude to these three brave men (it is to be hopedthat thankfulness to an overruling Providence was also manifestedthere), when 500l. Was voted to Mr. Lys, who was the father of a largefamily; 300l. To Edward Touzel; and William Ponteney received, at hisown request, a life annuity of 20l. And a gold medal, as he declaredthat he had rather continue to serve the King as a soldier than beplaced in any other course of life. 

In that same year (1804) the same daring endurance and heroism wereevinced by the officers of H. M. S. Hindostan, where, when on the way fromGibraltar to join Nelson's fleet at Toulon, the cry of 'Fire!' washeard, and dense smoke rose from the lower decks, so as to render itnearly impossible to detect the situation of the fire. Again and againLieutenants Tailour and Banks descended, and fell down senseless fromthe stifling smoke; then were carried on deck, recovered in the freeair, and returned to vain endeavor of clearing the powder-room. But noman could long preserve his faculties in the poisonous atmosphere, andthe two lieutenants might be said to have many deaths from it. At lastthe fire gained so much head, that it was impossible to save the vessel, which had in the meantime been brought into the Bay of Rosas, and wasnear enough to land to enable the crew to escape in boats, after havingendured the fire six hours. Nelson himself wrote: 'The preservation ofthe crew seems little short of a miracle. I never read such a journal ofexertions in my life. '

Eight years after, on the taking of Ciudad Rodrigo, in 1812, by theBritish army under Wellington, Captain William Jones, of the 52ndRegiment, having captured a French officer, employed his prisoner inpointing out quarters for his men. The Frenchman could not speakEnglish, and Captain Jones--a fiery Welshman, whom it was the fashion inthe regiment to term 'Jack Jones'--knew no French; but dumb showsupplied the want of language, and some of the company were lodged in alarge store pointed out by the Frenchman, who then led the way to achurch, near which Lord Wellington and his staff were standing. But nosooner had the guide stepped into the building than he started back, crying, 'Sacre bleu!' and ran out in the utmost alarm. The Welshcaptain, however, went on, and perceived that the church had been usedas a powder-magazine by the French; barrels were standing round, samplesof their contents lay loosely scattered on the pavement, and in themidst was a fire, probably lighted by some Portuguese soldiers. Forthwith Captain Jones and the sergeant entered the church, took up theburning embers brand by brand, bore them safe over the scattered powder, and out of the church, and thus averted what might have been the mostterrific disaster that could have befallen our army. [Footnote: Thestory has been told with some variation, as to whether it was the embersor a barrel of powder that he and the sergeant removed. In the Recordof the 52d it is said to have been the latter; but the tradition theauthor has received from officers of the regiment distinctly stated thatit was the burning brands, and that the scene was a reserve magazine--not, as in the brief mention in Sir William Napier's History, the greatmagazine of the town. ]

Our next story of this kind relates to a French officer, MonsieurMathieu Martinel, adjutant of the 1st Cuirassiers. In 1820 there was afire in the barracks at Strasburg, and nine soldiers were lying sick andhelpless above a room containing a barrel of gunpowder and a thousandcartridges. Everyone was escaping, but Martinel persuaded a few men toreturn into the barracks with him, and hurried up the stairs throughsmoke and flame that turned back his companions. He came alone to thedoor of a room close to that which contained the powder, but found itlocked. Catching up a bench, he beat the door in, and was met by such aburst of fire as had almost driven him away; but, just as he was aboutto descend, he thought that, when the flames reached the powder, thenine sick men must infallibly be blown up, and returning to the charge, he dashed forward, with eyes shut, through the midst, and with face, hands, hair, and clothes singed and burnt, he made his way to themagazine, in time to tear away, and throw to a distance from the powder, the mass of paper in which the cartridges were packed, which was justabout to ignite, and appearing at the window, with loud shouts forwater, thus showed the possibility of penetrating to the magazine, andfloods of water were at once directed to it, so as to drench the powder, and thus save the men. 

This same Martinel had shortly before thrown himself into the River Ill, without waiting to undress, to rescue a soldier who had fallen in, sonear a water mill, that there was hardly a chance of life for either. Swimming straight towards the mill dam, Martinel grasped the post of thesluice with one arm, and with the other tried to arrest the course ofthe drowning man, who was borne by a rapid current towards the millwheel; and was already so far beneath the surface, that Martinel couldnot reach him without letting go of the post. Grasping the inanimatebody, he actually allowed himself to be carried under the mill wheel, without loosing his hold, and came up immediately after on the otherside, still able to bring the man to land, in time for his suspendedanimation to be restored. 

Seventeen years afterwards, when the regiment was at Paris, there was, on the night of the 14th of June, 1837, during the illuminations at thewedding festival of the Duke and Duchess of Orleans, one of thosefrightful crushes that sometimes occur in an ill-regulated crowd, whenthere is some obstruction in the way, and there is nothing but ahorrible blind struggling and trampling, violent and fatal because ofits very helplessness and bewilderment. The crowd were trying to leavethe Champ de Mars, where great numbers had been witnessing somemagnificent fireworks, and had blocked up the passage leading out by theMilitary College. A woman fell down in a fainting fit, others stumbledover her, and thus formed an obstruction, which, being unknown to thosein the rear, did not prevent them from forcing forward the persons infront, so that they too were pushed and trodden down into one frightful, struggling, suffocating mass of living and dying men, women, andchildren, increasing every moment. 

M. Martinel was passing, on his way to his quarters, when, hearing thetumult, he ran to the gate from the other side, and meeting the crowdtried by shouts and entreaties to persuade them to give back, but thehindmost could not hear him, and the more frightened they grew, the morethey tried to hurry home, and so made the heap worse and worse, and inthe midst an illuminated yew-tree, in a pot, was upset, and furtherbarred the way. Martinel, with imminent danger to himself, dragged outone or two persons; but finding his single efforts almost useless amongsuch numbers, he ran to the barracks, sounded to horse, and withoutwaiting till his men could be got together, hurried off again on foot, with a few of his comrades, and dashed back into the crowd, strugglingas vehemently to penetrate to the scene of danger, as many would havedone to get away from it. 

Private Spenlee alone kept up with him, and, coming to the dreadfulheap, these two labored to free the passage, lift up the living, andremove the dead. First he dragged out an old man in a fainting fit, thena young soldier, next a boy, a woman, a little girl--he carried them tofreer air, and came back the next moment, though often so nearly pulleddown by the frantic struggles of the terrified stifled creatures, thathe was each moment in the utmost peril of being trampled to death. Hecarried out nine persons one by one; Spenlee brought out a man and achild; and his brother officers, coming up, took their share. Onelieutenant, with a girl in a swoon in his arms, caused a boy to be puton his back, and under this double burthen was pushing against the crowdfor half and hour, till at length he fell, and was all but killed. 

A troop of cuirassiers had by this time mounted, and through the Champde Mars came slowly along, step by step, their horses moving as gentlyand cautiously as if they knew their work. Everywhere, as they advanced, little children were held up to them out of the throng to be saved, andmany of their chargers were loaded with the little creatures, perchedbefore and behind the kind soldiers. With wonderful patience andforbearance, they managed to insert themselves and their horses, firstin single file, then two by two, then more abreast, like a wedge, intothe press, until at last they formed a wall, cutting off the crowdbehind from the mass in the gateway, and thus preventing the encumbrancefrom increasing. The people came to their senses, and went off to othergates, and the crowd diminishing, it became possible to lift up the manyunhappy creatures, who lay stifling or crushed in the heap. They werecarried into the barracks, the cuirassiers hurried to bring theirmattresses to lay them on in the hall, brought them water, linen, allthey could want, and were as tender to them as sisters of charity, tillthey were taken to the hospitals or to their homes. Martinel, who wasthe moving spirit in this gallant rescue, received in the following yearone of M. Monthyon's prizes for the greatest acts of virtue that couldbe brought to light. 

Nor among the gallant actions of which powder has been the cause shouldbe omitted that of Lieutenant Willoughby, who, in the first dismay ofthe mutiny in India, in 1858, blew up the great magazine at Delhi, withall the ammunition that would have armed the sepoys even yet moreterribly against ourselves. The 'Golden Deed' was one of those capableof no earthly meed, for it carried the brave young officer where alonethere is true reward; and all the Queen and country could do in hishonor was to pension his widowed mother, and lay up his name among thosethat stir the heart with admiration and gratitude. 

HEROES OF THE PLAGUE

1576--1665--1721

When our Litany entreats that we may be delivered from 'plague, pestilence, and famine', the first of these words bears a specialmeaning, which came home with strong and painful force to European mindsat the time the Prayer Book was translated, and for the whole followingcentury. 

It refers to the deadly sickness emphatically called 'the plague', atyphoid fever exceedingly violent and rapid, and accompanied with afrightful swelling either under the arm or on the corresponding part ofthe thigh. The East is the usual haunt of this fatal complaint, whichsome suppose to be bred by the marshy, unwholesome state of Egypt afterthe subsidence of the waters of the Nile, and which generally prevailsin Egypt and Syria until its course is checked either by the cold ofwinter or the heat in summer. At times this disease has become unusuallymalignant and infectious, and then has come beyond its usual boundariesand made its way over all the West. These dreadful visitations wererendered more frequent by total disregard of all precautions, andignorance of laws for preserving health. People crowded together intowns without means of obtaining sufficient air or cleanliness, and thuswere sure to be unhealthy; and whenever war or famine had occasionedmore than usual poverty, some frightful epidemic was sure to follow inits train, and sweep away the poor creatures whose frames were alreadyweakened by previous privation. And often this 'sore judgment' was thatemphatically called the plague; and especially during the sixteenth andseventeenth centuries, a time when war had become far more cruel andmischievous in the hands of hired regiments than ever it had been with afeudal army, and when at the same time increasing trade was filling thecities with more closely packed inhabitants, within fortifications thatwould not allow the city to expand in proportion to its needs. It hasbeen only the establishment of the system of quarantine which hassucceeded in cutting off the course of infection by which the plague waswont to set out on its frightful travels from land to land, from city tocity. 

The desolation of a plague-stricken city was a sort of horrible dream. Every infected house was marked with a red cross, and carefully closedagainst all persons, except those who were charged to drive cartsthrough the streets to collect the corpses, ringing a bell as they went. These men were generally wretched beings, the lowest and most recklessof the people, who undertook their frightful task for the sake of theplunder of the desolate houses, and wound themselves up by intoxicatingdrinks to endure the horrors. The bodies were thrown into largetrenches, without prayer or funeral rites, and these were hastily closedup. Whole families died together, untended save by one another, with noaid of a friendly hand to give drink or food; and, in the Roman Catholiccities, the perishing without a priest to administer the last rites ofthe Church was viewed as more dreadful than death itself. 

Such visitations as these did indeed prove whether the pastors of theafflicted flock were shepherds or hirelings. So felt, in 1576, CardinalCarlo Borromeo, Archbishop of Milan, the worthiest of all the successorsof St. Ambrose, when he learnt at Lodi that the plague had made itsappearance in his city, where, remarkably enough, there had lately beensuch licentious revelry that he had solemnly warned the people that, unless they repented, they would certainly bring on themselves the wrathof heaven. His council of clergy advised him to remain in some healthypart of his diocese till the sickness should have spent itself, but hereplied that a Bishop, whose duty it is to give his life for his sheep, could not rightly abandon them in time of peril. They owned that tostand by them was the higher course. 'Well, ' he said, 'is it not aBishop's duty to choose the higher course?'

So back into the town of deadly sickness he went, leading the people torepent, and watching over them in their sufferings, visiting thehospitals, and, by his own example, encouraging his clergy in carryingspiritual consolation to the dying. All the time the plague lasted, which was four months, his exertions were fearless and unwearied, andwhat was remarkable was, that of his whole household only two died, andthey were persons who had not been called to go about among the sick. Indeed, some of the rich who had repaired to a villa, where they spenttheir time in feasting and amusement in the luxurious Italian fashion, were there followed by the pestilence, and all perished; their daintyfare and the excess in which they indulged having no doubt been as bad apreparation as the poverty of the starving people in the city. 

The strict and regular life of the Cardinal and his clergy, and theirhome in the spacious palace, were, no doubt, under Providence, apreservative; but, in the opinions of the time, there was little shortof a miracle in the safety of one who daily preached in the cathedral, --bent over the beds of the sick, giving them food and medicine, hearingtheir confessions, and administering the last rites of the Church, --andthen braving the contagion after death, rather than let the corpses goforth unblest to their common grave. Nay, so far was he from seeking tosave his own life, that, kneeling before the altar in the cathedral, hesolemnly offered himself, like Moses, as a sacrifice for his people. But, like Moses, the sacrifice was passed by--'it cost more to redeemtheir souls'--and Borromeo remained untouched, as did the twenty-eightpriests who voluntarily offered themselves to join in his labors. 

No wonder that the chief memories that haunt the glorious white marblecathedral of Milan are those of St. Ambrose, who taught mercy to anemperor, and of St. Carlo Borromeo, who practiced mercy on a people. 

It was a hundred years later that the greatest and last visitation ofthe plague took place in London. Doubtless the scourge called forth--asin Christian lands such judgments always do--many an act of true andblessed self-devotion; but these are not recorded, save where they havetheir reward: and the tale now to be told is of one of the smallvillages to which the infection spread--namely, Eyam, in Derbyshire. 

This is a lovely place between Buxton and Chatsworth, perched high on ahillside, and shut in by another higher mountain--extremely beautiful, but exactly one of those that, for want of free air, always become theespecial prey of infection. At that time lead works were in operation inthe mountains, and the village was thickly inhabited. Great was thedismay of the villagers when the family of a tailor, who had receivedsome patterns of cloth from London, showed symptoms of the plague in itsmost virulent form, sickening and dying in one day. 

The rector of the parish, the Rev. William Mompesson, was still a youngman, and had been married only a few years. His wife, a beautiful youngwoman, only twenty-seven years old, was exceedingly terrified at thetidings from the village, and wept bitterly as she implored her husbandto take her, and her little George and Elizabeth, who were three andfours years old, away to some place of safety. But Mr. Mompesson gravelyshowed her that it was his duty not to forsake his flock in their hourof need, and began at once to make arrangements for sending her and thechildren away. She saw he was right in remaining, and ceased to urge himto forsake his charge; but she insisted that if he ought not to deserthis flock, his wife ought not to leave him; and she wept and entreatedso earnestly, that he at length consented that she should be with him, and that only the two little ones should be removed while yet there wastime. 

Their father and mother parted with the little ones as treasures thatthey might never see again. At the same time Mr. Mompesson wrote toLondon for the most approved medicines and prescriptions; and helikewise sent a letter to the Earl of Devonshire, at Chatsworth, toengage that his parishioners should exclude themselves from the wholeneighborhood, and thus confine the contagion within their ownboundaries, provided the Earl would undertake that food, medicines, andother necessaries, should be placed at certain appointed spots, atregular times, upon the hills around, where the Eyamites might come, leave payment for them, and take them up, without holding anycommunication with the bringers, except by letters, which could beplaced on a stone, and then fumigated, or passed through vinegar, beforethey were touched with the hand. To this the Earl consented, and forseven whole months the engagement was kept. 

Mr. Mompesson represented to his people that, with the plague once amongthem, it would be so unlikely that they should not carry infection aboutwith them, that it would be selfish cruelty to other places to try toescape amongst them, and thus spread the danger. So rocky and wild wasthe ground around them, that, had they striven to escape, a regiment ofsoldiers could not have prevented them. But of their own free will theyattended to their rector's remonstrance, and it was not known that oneparishoner of Eyam passed the boundary all that time, nor was there asingle case of plague in any of the villages around. 

The assembling of large congregations in churches had been thought toincrease the infection in London, and Mr. Mompesson, therefore, thoughtit best to hold his services out-of-doors. In the middle of the villageis a dell, suddenly making a cleft in the mountain-side, only five yardswide at the bottom, which is the pebble bed of a wintry torrent, but isdry in the summer. On the side towards the village, the slope upwardswas of soft green turf, scattered with hazel, rowan, and alder bushes, and full of singing birds. On the other side, the ascent was nearlyperpendicular, and composed of sharp rocks, partly adorned with bushesand ivy, and here and there rising up in fantastic peaks and archways, through which the sky could be seen from below. One of these rocks washollow, and could be entered from above--a natural gallery, leading toan archway opening over the precipice; and this Mr. Mompesson chose forhis reading-desk and pulpit. The dell was so narrow, that his voicecould clearly be heard across it, and his congregation arrangedthemselves upon the green slop opposite, seated or kneeling upon thegrass. 

On Wednesdays, Fridays, and Sundays arose the earnest voice of prayerfrom that rocky glen, the people's response meeting the pastor's voice;and twice on Sundays he preached to them the words of life and hope. Itwas a dry, hot summer; fain would they have seen thunder and rain todrive away their enemy; and seldom did weather break in on theregularity of these service. But there was another service that therector had daily to perform; not in his churchyard--that would haveperpetuated the infection--but on a healthy hill above the village. There he daily read of 'the Resurrection and the Life', and week by weekthe company on the grassy slope grew fewer and scantier. Hiscongregation were passing from the dell to the healthy mound. 

Day and night the rector and his wife were among the sick, nursing, feeding, and tending them with all that care and skill could do; but, inspite of all their endeavors, only a fifth part of the whole of theirinhabitants lived to spend the last Sunday in Cucklet Church, as thedell is still called. Mrs. Mompesson had persuaded her husband to have awound made in his leg, fancying that this would lessen the danger ofinfection, and he yielded in order to satisfy her. His health enduredperfectly, but she began to waste under her constant exertions, and herhusband feared that he saw symptoms of consumption; but she was full ofdelight at some appearances in his wound that made her imagine that ithad carried off the disease, and that his danger was over. 

A few days after, she sickened with symptoms of the plague, and herframe was so weakened that she sank very quickly. She was oftendelirious; but when she was too much exhausted to endure the exertion oftaking cordials, her husband entreated her to try for their children'ssake, she lifted herself up and made the endeavor. She lay peacefully, saying, 'she was but looking for the good hour to come', and calmlydied, making the responses to her husband's prayers even to the last. Her he buried in the churchyard, and fenced the grave in afterwards withiron rails. There are two beautiful letters from him written on herdeath--one to his little children, to be kept and read when they wouldbe old enough to understand it; the other to his patron, Sir GeorgeSaville, afterwards Lord Halifax. 'My drooping spirits', he says, 'aremuch refreshed with her joys, which I assure myself are unutterable. ' Hewrote both these letters in the belief that he should soon follow her, speaking of himself to Sir George as 'his dying chaplain', commending tohim his 'distressed orphans', and begging that a 'humble pious man'might be chosen to succeed him in his parsonage. 'Sire, I thank God thatI am willing to shake hands in peace with all the world; and I havecomfortable assurance that He will accept me for the sake of His Son, and I find God more good than ever I imagined, and wish that hisgoodness were not so much abused and contemned', writes the widowedpastor, left alone among his dying flock. And he concludes, 'and withtears I entreat that when you are praying for fatherless and motherlessinfants, you would then remember my two pretty babes'. 

These two letters were written on the last day of August and first ofSeptember, 1666; but on the 20th of November, Mr. Mompesson was writingto his uncle, in the lull after the storm. 'The condition of this placehath been so dreadful, that I persuade myself it exceedeth all historyand example. I may truly say our town has become a Golgotha, a place ofskulls; and had there not been a small remnant of us left, we had beenas Sodom, and like unto Gomorrah. My ears never heard such dolefullamentations, my nose never smelt such noisome smells, and my eyes neverbeheld such ghastly spectacles. Here have been seventy-six familiesvisited within my parish, out of which died 259 persons. '

However, since the 11th of October there had been no fresh cases, and hewas now burning all woolen cloths, lest the infection should linger inthem. He himself had never been touched by the complaint, nor had hismaid-servant; his man had had it but slightly. Mr. Mompesson lived manymore years, was offered the Deanery of Lincoln, but did not accept it, and died in 1708. So virulent was the contagion that, ninety-one yearsafter, in 1757, when five laboring men, who were digging up land nearthe plague- graves for a potato-garden, came upon what appeared to besome linen, though they buried it again directly, they all sickened withtyphus fever, three of them died, and it was so infectious that no lessthan seventy persons in the parish were carried off. 

The last of these remarkable visitations of the plague, properly socalled, was at Marseilles, in 1721. It was supposed to have been broughtby a vessel which sailed from Seyde, in the bay of Tunis, on the 31st ofJanuary, 1720, which had a clean bill of health when it anchored off theChateau d'If, at Marseilles, on the 25th of May; but six of the crewwere found to have died on the voyage, and the persons who handled thefreight also died, though, it was said, without any symptoms of theplague, and the first cases were supposed to be of the fevers caused byexcessive poverty and crowding. The unmistakable Oriental plague, however, soon began to spread in the city among the poorer population, and in truth the wars and heavy expenses of Louis XIV. Had made povertyin France more wretched than ever before, and the whole country was likeone deadly sore, festering, and by and by to come to a fearful crisis. Precautions were taken, the infected families were removed to theinfirmaries and their houses walled up, but all this was done at nightin order not to excite alarm. The mystery, however, made things moreterrible to the imagination, and this was a period of the utmostselfishness. All the richer inhabitants who had means of quitting thecity, and who were the very people who could have been useful there, fled with one accord. Suddenly the lazaretto was left withoutsuperintendents, the hospitals without stewards; the judges, publicofficers, notaries, and most of the superior workmen in the mostnecessary trades were all gone. Only the Provost and four municipalofficers remained, with 1, 100 livres in their treasury, in the midst ofan entirely disorganized city, and an enormous population without work, without restraint, without food, and a prey to the deadliest ofdiseases. 

The Parliament which still survived in the ancient kingdom of Provencesignalized itself by retreating to a distance, and on the 31st of Mayputting out a decree that nobody should pass a boundary line roundMarseilles on pain of death; but considering what people were trying toescape from, and the utter overthrow of all rule and order, this penaltywas not likely to have much effect, and the plague was carried by thefugitives to Arles, Aix, Toulon, and sixty-three lesser towns andvillages. What a contrast to Mr. Mompesson's moral influence!

Horrible crimes were committed. Malefactors were released from theprisons and convicts from the galleys, and employed for large payment tocollect the corpses and carry the sick to the infirmaries. Of coursethey could only be wrought up to such work by intoxication and unlimitedopportunities of plunder, and their rude treatment both of the dead andof the living sufferers added unspeakably to the general wretchedness. To be carried to the infirmary was certain death, --no one lived in thatheap of contagion; and even this shelter was not always to be had, --someof the streets were full of dying creatures who had been turned out oftheir houses and could crawl no farther. 

What was done to alleviate all these horrors? It was in the minority ofLouis XV. , and the Regent Duke of Orleans, easy, good-natured man thathe was, sent 22, 000 marks to the relief of the city, all in silver, forpaper money was found to spread the infection more than anything else. He also sent a great quantity of corn, and likewise doctors for thesick, and troops to shut in the infected district. The Pope, ClementXI. , sent spiritual blessings to the sufferers, and, moreover, threeshiploads of wheat. The Regent's Prime Minister, the Abbe Dubois, theshame of his Church and country, fancied that to send these suppliescast a slight upon his administration, and desired his representative atRome to prevent the sailing of the ships, but his orders were not, forvery shame, carried out, and the vessels set out. On their way they wereseized by a Moorish corsair, who was more merciful than Dubois, for heno sooner learnt their destination than he let them go unplundered. 

And in the midst of the misery there were bright lights 'running to andfro among the stubble'. The Provost and his five remaining officers, anda gentleman call Le Chevalier Rose, did their utmost in the bravest andmost unselfish way to help the sufferers, distribute food, provideshelter, restrain the horrors perpetrated by the sick in their ravings, and provide for the burial of the dead. And the clergy were all devotedto the task of mercy. There was only one convent, that of St. Victor, where the gates were closed against all comers in the hope of shuttingout infection. Every other monastic establishment freely devoted itself. It was a time when party spirit ran high. The bishop, Henri FrancoisXavier de Belzunce, a nephew of the Duke de Lauzun, was a strong andrigid Jesuit, and had joined so hotly in the persecution of theJansenists that he had forbidden the brotherhood called Oratorianfathers to hear confessions, because he suspected them of a leaning toJansenist opinions; but he and they both alike worked earnestly in theone cause of mercy. They were content to obey his prejudiced edict, since he was in lawful authority, and threw themselves heartily into thelower and more disdained services to the sick, as nurses and tenders ofthe body alone, not of the soul, and in this work their whole community, Superior and all, perished, almost without exception. Perhaps these men, thus laying aside hurt feeling and sense of injustice, were the greatestconquerors of all whose golden deeds we have described. 

Bishop Belzunce himself, however, stands as the prominent figure in thememory of those dreadful five months. He was a man of commandingstature, towering above all around him, and his fervent sermons, aidedby his example of severe and strict piety, and his great charities, hadgreatly impressed the people. He now went about among the plague-stricken, attending to their wants, both spiritual and temporal, andsold or mortgaged all his property to obtain relief for them, and heactually went himself in the tumbrils of corpses to give them the ritesof Christian burial. His doings closely resembled those of CardinalBorromeo, and like him he had recourse to constant preaching ofrepentance, processions and assemblies for litanies in the church. It iscuriously characteristic that it was the English clergyman, who, equallypious, and sensible that only the Almighty could remove the scourge, yetdeemed it right to take precautions against the effects of bringing alarge number of persons into one building. How Belzunce's clergyseconded him may be gathered from the numbers who died of the disease. Besides the Oratorians, there died eighteen Jesuits, twenty-six of theorder called Recollets, and forty-three Capuchins, all of whom hadfreely given their lives in the endeavor to alleviate the generalsuffering. In the four chief towns of Provence 80, 000 died, and about8, 000 in the lesser places. The winter finally checked the destroyer, and then, sad to say, it appeared how little effect the warning had hadon the survivors. Inheritances had fallen together into the hands ofpersons who found themselves rich beyond their expectations, and in theglee of having escaped the danger, forgot to be thankful, and spenttheir wealth in revelry. Never had the cities of Provence been so fullof wild, questionable mirth as during the ensuing winter, and it wasremarked that the places which had suffered most severely were the mostgiven up to thoughtless gaiety, and even licentiousness. 

Good Bishop Belzunce did his best to protest against the wickednessaround him, and refused to leave his flock at Marseilles, when, fouryears after, a far more distinguished see was offered to him. He died in1755, in time to escape the sight of the retribution that was soonworked out on the folly and vice of the unhappy country. 

THE SECOND OF SEPTEMBER

1792

The reign of the terrible Tzar was dreadful, but there was even a moredreadful time, that which might be called the reign of the madness ofthe people. The oppression and injustice that had for generations pastbeen worked out in France ended in the most fearful reaction thathistory records, and the horrors that took place in the Revolution passall thought or description. Every institution that had been misused wasoverthrown at one fell swoop, and the whole accumulated vengeance ofgenerations fell on the heads of the persons who occupied the positionsof the former oppressors. Many of these were as pure and guiltless astheir slaughterers were the reverse, but the heads of the Revolutionimagined that to obtain their ideal vision of perfect justice andliberty, all the remnants of the former state of things must be sweptaway, and the ferocious beings who carried out their decrees had becomeabsolutely frantic with delight in bloodshed. The nation seemeddelivered up to a delirium of murder. But as

'Even as earth's wild war cries heighten, The cross upon the brow will brighten', These times of surpassing horror were also times of surpassing devotionand heroism. Without attempting to describe the various stages of theRevolution, and the different committees that under different titlescarried on the work of destruction, we will mention some of the deedsthat shine out as we look into that abyss of horror, the Paris of 1792and the following years. 

Think of the Swiss Guards, who on the 10th of August, 1792, themiserable day when the King, Queen, and children were made the captivesof the people, stood resolutely at their posts, till they were massacredalmost to a man. Well is their fidelity honored by the noble sculpturenear Lucerne, cut out in the living rock of their own Alps, andrepresenting a lion dying to defend the fleur-de-lis. 

A more dreadful day still was in preparation. The mob seemed to haveimagined that the King and nobility had some strange dreadful power, andthat unless they were all annihilated they would rise up and trample alldown before them, and those who had the direction of affairs profited bythis delusion to multiply executioners, and clear away all that theysupposed to stand in the way of the renewal of the nation. And theattempts of the emigrant nobility and of the German princes to march tothe rescue of the royal family added to the fury of their cowardlyferocity. The prisons of Paris were crowded to overflowing witharistocrats, as it was the fashion to call the nobles and gentry, andwith the clergy who had refused their adhesion to the new state ofthings. The whole number is reckoned at not less than 8, 000. 

Among those at the Abbaye de St. Germain were M. Jacques Cazotte, an oldgentleman of seventy-three, who had been for many years in a governmentoffice, and had written various poems. He was living in the country, inChampagne, when on the 18th of August he was arrested. His daughterElizabeth, a lovely girl of twenty, would not leave him, and togetherthey were taken first to Epernay and then to Paris, where they werethrown into the Abbaye, and found it crowded with prisoners. M. Cazotte's bald forehead and grey looks gave him a patriarchalappearance, and his talk, deeply and truly pious, was full of Scripturelanguage, as he strove to persuade his fellow captives to own the trueblessings of suffering. 

Here Elizabeth met the like-minded Marie de Sombreuil, who had clung toher father, Charles Viscount de Sombreuil, the Governor of theInvalides, or pensioners of the French army; and here, too, had Madamede Fausse Lendry come with her old uncle the Abbé de Rastignac, who hadbeen for three months extremely ill, and was only just recovering whendragged to the prison, and there placed in a room so crowded that it wasnot possible to turn round, and the air in the end of August wasfearfully close and heated. Not once while there was the poor old manable to sleep. His niece spent the nights in a room belonging to thejailer, with the Princess de Tarente, and Mademoiselle de Sombreuil. 

On the 2nd of September these slaughter-houses were as full as theycould hold, and about a hundred ruffians, armed with axes and guns, weresent round to all the jails to do the bloody work. It was a Sunday, andsome of the victims had tried to observe it religiously, though littledivining that, it was to be their last. They first took alarm onperceiving that their jailer had removed his family, and then that hesent up their dinner earlier than usual, and removed all the knives andforks. By and by howls and shouts were heard, and the tocsin was heard, ringing, alarm guns firing, and reports came in to the prisoners of theAbbaye that the populace were breaking into the prisons. 

The clergy were all penned up together in the cloisters of the Abbaye, whither they had been brought in carriages that morning. Among them wasthe Abbé Sicard, an admirable priest who had spent his whole lifetime ininstructing the deaf and dumb in his own house, where--

 'The cunning finger finely twinedThe subtle thread that knitteth mind to mind;There that strange bridge of signs was built where rollThe sunless waves that sever soul from soul, And by the arch, no bigger than a hand, Truth travell'd over to the silent land'. 

He had been arrested, while teaching his pupils, on the 26th of August, 1792, and shut up among other clergy in the prison of the Mayoralty; butthe lads whom he had educated came in a body to ask leave to claim himat the bar of the National Assembly. Massieu, his best scholar, haddrawn up a most touching address, saying, that in him the deaf and dumbwere deprived of their teacher, nurse, and father. 'It is he who hastaught us what we know, without him we should be as the beasts of thefield. ' This petition, and the gestures of the poor silent beings, wentto the heart of the National Assembly. One young man, named Duhamel, neither deaf nor dumb, from pure admiration of the good work, went andoffered to be imprisoned in the Abbé's place. There was great applause, and a decree was passed that the cause of the arrest should be enquiredinto, but this took no effect, and on that dreadful afternoon, M. Sicardwas put into one of a procession of carriages, which drove slowlythrough the streets full of priests, who were reviled, pelted, andwounded by the populace till they reached the Abbaye. 

In the turnkey's rooms sat a horrible committee, who acted as a sort oftribunal, but very few of the priests reached it. They were for the mostpart cut down as they stepped out into the throng in the court---consisting of red-capped ruffians, with their shirt sleeves turned up, and still more fiendish women, who hounded them on to the butchery, andbrought them wine and food. Sicard and another priest contrived, whiletheir companions fell, to rush into the committee room, exclaiming, 'Messieurs, preserve an unfortunate!'

'Go along!' they said, 'do you wish us to get ourselves massacred?'

But one, recognizing him, was surprised, knowing that his life was to bespared, and took him into the room, promising to save him as long aspossible. Here the two priests would have been safe but for a wretchedwoman, who shrieked out to the murderers that they had been admitted, and loud knocks and demands for them came from without. Sicard thoughtall lost, and taking out his watch, begged one of the committee to giveit to the first deaf mute who should come and ask for him, sure that itwould be the faithful Massieu. At first the man replied that the dangerwas not imminent enough; but on hearing a more furious noise at thedoor, as if the mob were going to break in, he took the watch; andSicard, falling on his knees, commended his soul to God, and embracedhis brother priest. 

In rushed the assassins, they paused for a moment, unable to distinguishthe priests from the committee, but the two pikemen found them out, andhis companion was instantly murdered. The weapons were lifted againstSicard, when a man pushed through the crowd, and throwing himself beforethe pike, displayed his breast and cried, 'Behold the bosom throughwhich you must pass to reach that of this good citizen. You do not knowhim. He is the Abbé Sicard, one of the most benevolent of men, the mostuseful to his country, the father of the deaf and dumb!'

The murderer dropped his pike; but Sicard, perceiving that it was thepopulace who were the real dispensers of life or death, sprang to thewindow, and shouted, 'Friends, behold an innocent man. Am I to diewithout being heard?'

'You were among the rest, ' the mob shouted, 'therefore you are as bad asthe others. '

But when he told his name, the cry changed. 'He is the father of thedeaf and dumb! he is too useful to perish; his life is spent in doinggood; he must be saved. ' And the murderers behind took him up in theirarms, and carried him out into the court, where he was obliged to submitto be embraced by the whole gang of ruffians, who wanted to carry himhome in triumph; but he did not choose to go without being legallyreleased, and returning into the committee room, he learnt for the firsttime the name of his preserver, one Monnot, a watchmaker, who, thoughknowing him only by character, and learning that he was among the clergywho were being driven to the slaughter, had rushed in to save him. 

Sicard remained in the committee room while further horrors wereperpetrated all round, and at night was taken to the little room calledLe Violon, with two other prisoners. A horrible night ensued; themurders on the outside varied with drinking and dancing; and at threeo'clock the murderers tried to break into Le Violon. There was a loftfar overhead, and the other two prisoners tried to persuade Sicard toclimb on their shoulders to reach it, saying that his life was moreuseful than theirs. However, some fresh prey was brought in, which drewoff the attention of the murderers, and two days afterwards Sicard wasreleased to resume his life of charity. 

At the beginning of the night, all the ladies who had accompanied theirrelatives were separated from them, and put into the women's room; butwhen morning came they entreated earnestly to return to them, butMademoiselle de Fausse Lendry was assured that her uncle was safe, andthey were told soon after that all who remained were pardoned. Abouttwenty-two ladies were together, and were called to leave the prison, but the two who went first were at once butchered, and the sentry calledout to the others, 'It is a snare, go back, do not show yourselves. 'They retreated; but Marie de Sombreuil had made her way to her father, and when he was called down into the court, she came with him. She hunground him, beseeching the murderers to have pity on his grey hairs, anddeclaring that they must strike him only through her. One of theruffians, touched by her resolution, called out that they should beallowed to pass if the girl would drink to the health of the nation. Thewhole court was swimming with blood, and the glass he held out to herwas full of something red. Marie would not shudder. She drank, and withthe applause of the assassins ringing in her ears, she passed with herfather over the threshold of the fatal gates, into such freedom andsafety as Paris could then afford. Never again could she see a glass ofred wine without a shudder, and it was generally believed that it wasactually a glass of blood that she had swallowed, though she alwaysaverred that this was an exaggeration, and that it had been only herimpression before tasting it that so horrible a draught was offered toher. 

The tidings that Mademoiselle de Sombreuil had saved her father came toencourage the rest of the ladies, and when calls were heard for'Cazotte', Elizabeth flew out and joined her father, and in like mannerstood between him and the butchers, till her devotion made the crowd cry'Pardon!' and one of the men employed about the prison opened a passagefor her, by which she, too, led her father away. 

Madame de Fausse Lendry was not so happy. Her uncle was killed early inthe day, before she was aware that he had been sent for, but shesurvived to relate the history of that most horrible night and day. Thesame work was going on at all the other prisons, and chief among thevictims of La Force was the beautiful Marie Louise of Savoy, thePrincess de Lamballe, and one of the most intimate friends of the Queen. A young widow without children, she had been the ornament of the court, and clever learned ladies thought her frivolous, but the depth of hernature was shown in the time of trial. Her old father-in-law had takenher abroad with him when the danger first became apparent, but as soonas she saw that the Queen herself was aimed at, she went immediatelyback to France to comfort her and share her fate. 

Since the terrible 10th of August, the friends had been separated, andMadame de Lamballe had been in the prison of La Force. There, on theevening of the 2nd of September, she was brought down to the tribunal, and told to swear liberty, equality, and hatred to the King and Queen. 

'I will readily swear the two former. I cannot swear the latter. It isnot in my heart. '

'Swear! If not, you are dead. '

She raised her eyes, lifted her hands, and made a step to the door. Murderers closed her in, and pike thrusts in a few moments were the last'stage that carried from earth to heaven' the gentle woman, who hadloved her queenly friend to the death. Little mattered it to her thather corpse was soon torn limb from limb, and that her fair ringlets werefloating round the pike on which her head was borne past her friend'sprison window. Little matters it now even to Marie Antoinette. The worstthat the murderers could do for such as these, could only work for thema more exceeding weight of glory. 

M. Cazotte was imprisoned again on the 12th of September, and all hisdaughter's efforts failed to save him. She was taken from him, and hedied on the guillotine, exclaiming, 'I die as I have lived, faithful tomy God and to my King. ' And the same winter, M. De Sombreuil was alsoimprisoned again. When he entered the prison with his daughter, all theinmates rose to do her honor. In the ensuing June, after a mock trial, her father and brother were put to death, and she remained for manyyears alone with only the memory of her past days. 

THE VENDEANS

1793

While the greater part of France had been falling into habits of self-indulgence, and from thence into infidelity and revolution, there wasone district where the people had not forgotten to fear God and honorthe King. 

This was in the tract surrounding the Loire, the south of which is nowcalled La Vendee, and was then termed the Bocage, or the Woodland. It isfull of low hills and narrow valleys, divided into small fields, enclosed by high thick hedgerows; so that when viewed from the top ofone of the hills, the whole country appears perfectly green, exceptingnear harvest-time, when small patches of golden corn catch the eye, orwhere here and there a church tower peeps above the trees, in the midstof the flat red-tiled roofs of the surrounding village. The roads aredeep lanes, often in the winter beds of streams, and in the summercompletely roofed by the thick foliage of the trees, whose branches meetoverhead. 

The gentry of La Vendee, instead of idling their time at Paris, lived ontheir own estates in kindly intercourse with their neighbours, andconstantly helping and befriending their tenants, visiting them at theirfarms, talking over their crops and cattle, giving them advice, andinviting them on holidays to dance in the courts of their castles, andthemselves joining in their sports. The peasants were a hardworking, sober, and pious people, devoutly attending their churches, reverencingtheir clergy, and, as well they might, loving and honoring their goodlandlords. 

But as the Revolution began to make its deadly progress at Paris, agloom spread over this happy country. The Paris mob, who could not bearto see anyone higher in station than themselves, thirsted for nobleblood, and the gentry were driven from France, or else imprisoned andput to death. An oath contrary to the laws of their Church was requiredof the clergy, those who refused it were thrust out of their parishes, and others placed in their room; and throughout France all the youths ofa certain age were forced to draw lots to decide who should serve in theRepublican army. 

This conscription filled up the measure. The Vendeans had grieved overthe flight of their landlords, they had sheltered and hidden theirpriests, and heard their ministrations in secret; but when their youngmen were to be carried way from them, and made the defenders andinstruments of those who were murdering their King, overthrowing theirChurch, and ruining their country, they could endure it no longer, butin the spring of 1793, soon after the execution of Louis XVI. , a risingtook place in Anjou, at the village of St. Florent, headed by a peddlernamed Cathelineau, and they drove back the Blues, as they called therevolutionary soldiers, who had come to enforce the conscription. Theybegged Monsieur de Bonchamp, a gentleman in the neighborhood, to takethe command; and, willing to devote himself to the cause of his King, hecomplied, saying, as he did so, 'We must not aspire to earthly rewards;such would be beneath the purity of our motives, the holiness of ourcause. We must not even aspire to glory, for a civil war affords none. We shall see our castles fall, we shall be proscribed, slandered, stripped of our possessions, perhaps put to death; but let us thank Godfor giving us strength to do our duty to the end. '

The next person on whom the peasants cast their eyes possessed as trueand strong a heart, though he was too young to count the cost of loyaltywith the same calm spirit of self-devotion. The Marquis de laRochejacquelein, one of the most excellent of the nobles of Poitou, hadalready emigrated with his wife and all his family, excepting Henri, theeldest son, who, though but eighteen years of age, had been placed inthe dangerous post of an officer in the Royal Guards. When Louis XVI. Had been obliged to dismiss these brave men, he had obtained a promisefrom each officer that he would not leave France, but wait for somechance of delivering that unhappy country. Henri had therefore remainedat Paris, until after the 10th of August, 1792, when the massacre at theTuileries took place, and the imprisonment of the royal familycommenced; and then every gentleman being in danger in the city, he hadcome to his father's deserted castle of Durballiere in Poitou. 

He was nearly twenty, tall and slender, with fair hair, an oval face, and blue eyes, very gentle, although full of animation. He was activeand dexterous in all manly sports, especially shooting and riding; hewas a man of few words; and his manners were so shy, modest, andretiring, that his friends used to say he was more like an Englishmanthan a Frenchman. 

Hearing that he was alone at Durballière, and knowing that as an officerin the Guards, and also as being of the age liable to the conscription, he was in danger from the Revolutionists in the neighboring towns, hiscousin, the Marquis de Lescure, sent to invite him to his strong castleof Clisson, which was likewise situated in the Bocage. This castleafforded a refuge to many others who were in danger--to nuns driven fromtheir convents, dispossessed clergy, and persons who dreaded to remainat their homes, but who felt reassured under the shelter of the castle, and by the character of its owner, a young man of six-and-twenty, who, though of high and unshaken loyalty, had never concerned himself withpolitics, but led a quiet and studious life, and was everywhere honoredand respected. 

The winter passed in great anxiety, and when in the spring the rising atAnjou took place, and the new government summoned all who could beararms to assist in quelling it, a council was held among the party atClisson on the steps to be taken. Henri, as the youngest, spoke first, saying he would rather perish than fight against the peasants; nor amongthe whole assembly was there one person willing to take the safer butmeaner course of deserting the cause of their King and country. 'Yes, 'said the Duchess de Donnissan, mother to the young wife of the Marquisde Lescure, 'I see you are all of the same opinion. Better death thandishonor. I approve your courage. It is a settled thing:' and seatingherself in her armchair, she concluded, 'Well, then, we must die. 'For some little time all remained quiet at Clisson; but at length theorder for the conscription arrived, and a few days before the timeappointed for the lots to be drawn, a boy came to the castle bringing anote to Henri from his aunt at St. Aubin. 'Monsieur Henri, ' said theboy, 'they say you are to draw for the conscription next Sunday; but maynot your tenants rise against it in the meantime? Come with me, sir, thewhole country is longing for you, and will obey you. '

Henri instantly promised to come, but some of the ladies would havepersuaded him not to endanger himself--representing, too, that if he wasmissing on the appointed day, M. De Lescure might be made responsiblefor him. The Marquis, however, silenced them, saying to his cousin, 'Youare prompted by honor and duty to put yourself at the head of yourtenants. Follow out your plan, I am only grieved at not being able to gowith you; and certainly no fear of imprisonment will lead me to dissuadeyou from doing your duty. '

'Well, I will come and rescue you, ' said Henri, embracing him, and hiseyes glancing with a noble soldier-like expression and an eagle look. 

As soon as the servants were gone to bed, he set out with a guide, witha stick in his hand and a pair of pistols in his belt; and travelingthrough the fields, over hedges and ditches, for fear of meeting withthe Blues, arrived at St. Aubin, and from thence went on to meet M. DeBonchamp and his little army. But he found to his disappointment thatthey had just been defeated, and the chieftains, believing that all waslost, had dispersed their troops. He went to his own home, dispiritedand grieved; but no sooner did the men of St. Aubin learn the arrival oftheir young lord, than they came trooping to the castle, entreating himto place himself at their head. 

In the early morning, the castle court, the fields, the village, werethronged with stout hardy farmers and laborers, in grey coats, withbroad flapping hats, and red woolen handkerchiefs round their necks. Ontheir shoulders were spits, scythes, and even sticks; happy was the manwho could bring an old fowling-piece, and still more rejoiced the ownerof some powder, intended for blasting some neighboring quarry. All hadbold true hearts, ready to suffer and to die in the cause of theirChurch and of their young innocent imprisoned King. 

A mistrust of his own powers, a fear of ruining these brave men, crossedthe mind of the youth as he looked forth upon them, and he exclaimed, 'If my father was but here, you might trust to him. Yet by my courage Iwill show myself worthy, and lead you. If I go forward, follow me: if Idraw back, kill me; if I am slain, avenge me!' They replied with shoutsof joy, and it was instantly resolved to march upon the next village, which was occupied by the rebel troops. They gained a complete victory, driving away the Blues, and taking two small pieces of cannon, andimmediately joined M. De Bonchamp and Cathelineau, who, encouraged bytheir success, again gathered their troops and gained some furtheradvantages. 

In the meantime, the authorities had sent to Clisson and arrested M. DeLescure, his wife, her parents, and some of their guests, who wereconducted to Bressuire, the nearest town, and there closely guarded. There was great danger that the Republicans would revenge their lossesupon them, but the calm dignified deportment of M. De Lescure obligedthem to respect him so much that no injury was offered to him. At lastcame the joyful news that the Royalist army was approaching. TheRepublican soldiers immediately quitted the town, and the inhabitantsall came to ask the protection of the prisoners, desiring to send theirgoods to Clisson for security, and thinking themselves guarded by thepresence of M. And Madame de Lescure. 

M. De Lescure and his cousin Bernard de Marigny mounted their horses androde out to meet their friends. In a quarter of an hour afterwards, Madame de Lescure heard the shouts 'Long live the King!' and the nextminute, Henri de la Rochejacquelein hurried into the room, crying, 'Ihave saved you. ' The peasants marched in to the number of 20, 000, andspread themselves through the town, but in their victory they had gainedno taste for blood or plunder--they did not hurt a single inhabitant, nor touch anything that was not their own. Madame de Lescure heard someof them wishing for tobacco, and asked if there was none in the town. 'Oh yes, there is plenty to be sold, but we have no money;' and theywere very thankful to her for giving the small sum they required. Monsieur de Donnissan saw two men disputing in the street, and one drewhis sword, when he interfered, saying, 'Our Lord prayed for Hismurderers, and would one soldier of the Catholic army kill another?' Thetwo instantly embraced. 

Three times a day these peasant warriors knelt at their prayers, in thechurches if they were near them, if not, in the open field, and seldomhave ever been equaled the piety, the humility, the self-devotion alikeof chiefs and of followers. The frightful cruelties committed by theenemy were returned by mercy; though such of them as fell into the handsof the Republicans were shot without pity, yet their prisoners wereinstantly set at liberty after being made to promise not to serveagainst them again, and having their hair shaved off in order that theymight be recognized. 

Whenever an enterprise was resolved on, the curates gave notice to theirparishioners that the leaders would be at such a place at such a time, upon which they crowded to the spot, and assembled around the whitestandard of France with such weapons as they could muster. 

The clergy then heard them confess their sins, gave them absolution, andblessed them; then, while they set forward, returned to the churcheswhere their wives and children were praying for their success. They didnot fight like regular soldiers, but, creeping through the hedgerows andcoppices, burst unexpectedly upon the Blues, who, entangled in thehollow lanes, ignorant of the country, and amazed by the suddenness ofthe attack, had little power to resist. The chieftains were alwaysforemost in danger; above all the eager young Henri, with his eye on thewhite standard, and on the blue sky, and his hand making the sign of thecross without which he never charged the enemy, dashed on first, fearless of peril, regardless of his life, thinking only of his duty tohis king and the protection of his followers. 

It was calmness and resignation which chiefly distinguished M. DeLescure, the Saint of Poitou, as the peasants called him from his greatpiety, his even temper, and the kindness and the wonderful mercifulnessof his disposition. Though constantly at the head of his troops, leadingthem into the most dangerous places, and never sparing himself, not oneman was slain by his hand, nor did he even permit a prisoner to receivethe least injury in his presence. When one of the Republicans oncepresented his musket close to his breast, he quietly put it aside withhis hand, and only said, 'Take away the prisoner'. His calmness wasindeed well founded, and his trust never failed. Once when the littlearmy had received a considerable check, and his cousin M. De Marigny wasin despair, and throwing his pistols on the table, exclaimed, 'I fightno longer', he took him by the arm, led him to the window, an pointingto a troop of peasants kneeling at their evening prayers, he said, 'Seethere a pledge of our hopes, and doubt no longer that we shall conquerin our turn. '

Their greatest victory was at Saumur, owing chiefly to the gallantry ofHenri, who threw his hat into the midst of the enemy, shouting to hisfollowers, 'Who will go and fetch it for me?' and rushing forward, droveall before him, and made his way into the town on one side, while M. DeLescure, together with Stofflet, a game-keeper, another of the chiefs, made their entrance on the other side. M. De Lescure was wounded in thearm, and on the sight of his blood the peasants gave back, and wouldhave fled had not Stofflet threatened to shoot the first who turned; andin the meantime M. De Lescure, tying up his arm with a handkerchief, declared it was nothing, and led them onwards. 

The city was entirely in their hands, and their thankful delight wasexcessive; but they only displayed it by ringing the bells, singing theTe Deum, and parading the streets. Henri was almost out of his senseswith exultation; but at last he fell into a reverie, as he stood, withhis arms folded, gazing on the mighty citadel which had yielded toefforts such as theirs. His friends roused him from his dream by theirremarks, and he replied, 'I am reflecting on our success, and amconfounded'. 

They now resolved to elect a general-in-chief, and M. De Lescure was thefirst to propose Cathelineau, the peddler, who had first come forward inthe cause. It was a wondrous thing when the nobles, the gentry, andexperienced officers who had served in the regular army, all willinglyplaced themselves under the command of the simple untrained peasant, without a thought of selfishness or of jealousy. Nor did Cathelineauhimself show any trace of pride, or lose his complete humility of mindor manner; but by each word and deed he fully proved how wise had beentheir judgment, and well earned the title given him by the peasants ofthe 'Saint of Anjou'. 

It was now that their hopes were highest; they were more numerous andbetter armed than they had ever been before, and they even talked of amarch to Paris to 'fetch their little king, and have him crowned atChollet', the chief town of La Vendee. But martyrdom, the highest gloryto be obtained on this earth, was already shedding its brightness roundthese devoted men who were counted worthy to suffer, and it was in ahigher and purer world that they were to meet their royal child. 

Cathelineau turned towards Nantes, leaving Henri de la Rochejaquelein, to his great vexation, to defend Saumur with a party of peasants. But hefound it impossible to prevent these poor men from returning to theirhomes; they did not understand the importance of garrison duty, andgradually departed, leaving their commander alone with a few officers, with whom he used to go through the town at night, shouting out, 'Longlive the king!' at the places where there ought to have been sentinels. At last, when his followers were reduced to eight, he left the town, and, rejoicing to be once more in the open field, overtook his friendsat Angers, where they had just rescued a great number of clergy who hadbeen imprisoned there, and daily threatened with death. 'Do not thankus, ' said the peasants to the liberated priests; 'it is for you that wefight. If we had not saved you, we should not have ventured to returnhome. Since you are freed, we see plainly that the good God is on ourside. '

But the tide was now about to turn. The Government in Paris sent a farstronger force into the Bocage, and desolated it in a cruel manner. Clisson was burnt to the ground with the very fireworks which had beenprepared for the christening of its master's eldest child, and which hadnot been used because of the sorrowful days when she was born. M. DeLescure had long expected its destruction, but had not chosen to removethe furniture, lest he should discourage the peasants. His family werewith the army, where alone there was now any safety for the weak andhelpless. At Nantes the attack was unsuccessful, and Cathelineau himselfreceived a wound of which he died in a few days, rejoicing at havingbeen permitted to shed his blood in such a cause. 

The army, of which M. D'Elbee became the leader, now returned to Poitou, and gained a great victory at Chatillon; but here many of them forgotthe mercy they had usually shown, and, enraged by the sight of theirburnt cottages, wasted fields, and murdered relatives, they fell uponthe prisoners and began to slaughter them. M. De Lescure, coming inhaste, called out to them to desist. 'No, no, ' cried M. De Marigny; 'letme slay these monsters who have burnt your castle. ' 'Then, Marigny, 'said his cousin, 'you must fight with me. You are too cruel; you willperish by the sword. ' And he saved these unhappy men for the time; butthey were put to death on their way to their own army. 

The cruelties of the Republicans occasioned a proclamation on the partof the Royalists that they would make reprisals; but they could neverbring themselves to act upon it. When M. De Lescure took Parthenay, hesaid to the inhabitants, 'It is well for you that it is I who have takenyour town; for, according to our proclamation, I ought to burn it; but, as you would think it an act of private revenge for the burning ofClisson, I spare you'. 

Though occasional successes still maintained the hopes of the Vendeans, misfortunes and defeats now became frequent; they were unable to savetheir country from the devastations of the enemy, and disappointmentsbegan to thin the numbers of the soldiers. Henri, while fighting in ahollow road, was struck in the right hand by a ball, which broke histhumb in three places. He continued to direct his men, but they were atlength driven back from their post. He was obliged to leave the army forsome days; and though he soon appeared again at the head of the men ofSt. Aubin, he never recovered the use of his hand. 

Shortly after, both D'Elbee and Bonchamp were desperately wounded; andM. De Lescure, while waving his followers on to attack a Republicanpost, received a ball in the head. The enemy pressed on the broken anddefeated army with overwhelming force, and the few remaining chiefsresolved to cross the Loire and take refuge in Brittany. It was muchagainst the opinion of M. De Lescure; but, in his feeble and sufferingstate, he could not make himself heard, nor could Henri'srepresentations prevail; the peasants, in terror and dismay, werehastening across as fast as they could obtain boats to carry them. Theenemy was near at hand, and Stofflet, Marigny, and the other chiefs wereonly deliberating whether they should not kill the prisoners whom theycould not take with them, and, if set at liberty, would only add to thenumbers of their pursuers. The order for their death had been given;but, before it could be executed, M. De Lescure had raised his head toexclaim, 'It is too horrible!' and M. De Bonchamp at the same momentsaid, almost with his last breath, 'Spare them!' The officers who stoodby rushed to the generals, crying out that Bonchamp commanded that theyshould be pardoned. They were set at liberty; and thus the two Vendeanchiefs avenged their deaths by saving five thousand of their enemies!

M. De Bonchamp expired immediately after; but M. De Lescure had stillmuch to suffer in the long and painful passage across the river, andafterwards, while carried along the rough roads to Varades in anarmchair upon two pikes, his wife and her maid supporting his feet. TheBretons received them kindly, and gave him a small room, where, the nextday, he sent for the rest of the council, telling them they ought tochoose a new general, since M. D'Elbee was missing. They answered thathe himself alone could be commander. 'Gentlemen, ' he answered: 'I ammortally wounded; and even if I am to live, which I do not expect, Ishall be long unfit to serve. The army must instantly have an activechief, loved by all, known to the peasants, trusted by everyone. It isthe only way of saving us. M. De la Rochejaquelein alone is known to thesoldiers of all the divisions. M. De Donnissan, my father-in-law, doesnot belong to this part of the country, and would not be as readilyfollowed. The choice I propose would encourage the soldiers; and Ientreat you to choose M. De la Rochejaquelein. As to me, if I live, youknow I shall not quarrel with Henri; I shall be his aide-de-camp. '

His advice was readily followed, Henri was chosen; but when a second incommand was to be elected, he said no, he was second, for he shouldalways obey M. De Donnissan, and entreated that the honor might not begiven to him, saying that at twenty years of age he had neither weightnor experience, that his valor led him to be first in battle, but incouncil his youth prevented him from being attended to; and, indeed, after giving his opinion, he usually fell asleep while others weredebating. He was, however, elected; and as soon as M. De Lescure heardthe shouts of joy with which the peasants received the intelligence, hesent Madame de Lescure to bring him to his bedside. She found him hiddenin a corner, weeping bitterly; and when he came to his cousin, heembraced him, saving earnestly, again and again, that he was not fit tobe general, he only knew how to fight, he was too young and could neversilence those who opposed his designs, and entreated him to take thecommand as soon as he was cured. 'That I do not expect, ' said M. DeLescure; 'but if it should happen, I will be your aide-de-camp, and helpyou to conquer the shyness which prevents your strength of characterfrom silencing the murmurers and the ambitious. '

Henri accordingly took the command; but it was a melancholy office thatdevolved upon him of dragging onward his broken and dejected peasants, half-starved, half-clothed, and followed by a wretched train of women, children, and wounded; a sad change from the bright hopes with which, not six months before, he had been called to the head of his tenants. Yet still his high courage gained some triumphs, which for a timerevived the spirits of his forces and restored their confidence. He wasactive and undaunted, and it was about this time, when in pursuit of theBlues, he was attacked by a foot soldier when alone in a narrow lane. His right hand was useless, but he seized the man's collar with his1eft, and held him fast, managing his horse with his legs till his mencame up. He would not allow them to kill the soldier, but set him free, saying 'Return to the Republicans, and tell them that you were alonewith the general of the brigands, who had but one hand and no weapons, yet you could not kill him'. Brigands was the name given by theRepublicans, the true robbers, to the Royalists, who, in fact, by thistime, owing to the wild life they had so long led, had acquired asomewhat rude and savage appearance. They wore grey cloth coats andtrousers, broad hats, white sashes with knots of different colours tomark the rank of the officers, and red woolen handkerchiefs. These weremade in the country, and were at first chiefly worn by Henri, whousually had one round his neck, another round his waist, and a third tosupport his wounded hand; but the other officers, having heard the Bluescry out to aim at the red handkerchief, themselves adopted the samebadge, in order that he might be less conspicuous. 

In the meantime a few days' rest at Laval had at first so alleviated thesufferings of M. De Lescure, that hopes were entertained of hisrecovery; but he ventured on greater exertions of strength than he wasable to bear, and fever returned, which had weakened him greatly beforeit became necessary to travel onwards. Early in the morning, a day ortwo before their departure, he called to his wife, who was lying on amattress on the floor, and desired her to open the curtains, asking, asshe did so, if it was a clear day. 'Yes, ' said she. 'Then, ' he answered, 'I have a sort of veil before my eyes, I cannot see distinctly; I alwaysthought my wound was mortal, and now I no longer doubt. My dear, I mustleave you, that is my only regret, except that I could not restore myking to the throne; I leave you in the midst of a civil war, that iswhat afflicts me. Try to save yourself. Disguise yourself, and attemptto reach England. ' Then seeing her choked with tears, he continued:'Yes, your grief alone makes me regret life; for my own part, I dietranquil; I have indeed sinned, but I have always served God with piety;I have fought, and I die for Him, and I hope in His mercy. I have oftenseen death, and I do not fear it I go to heaven with a sure trust, Igrieve but for you; I hoped to have made you happy; if I ever have givenyou any reason to complain, forgive me. ' Finding her grief beyond allconsolation, he allowed her to call the surgeons, saying that it waspossible he might be mistaken. They gave some hope, which cheered herspirits, though he still said he did not believe them. The next day theyleft Laval; and on the way, while the carriage was stopping, a personcame to the door and read the details of the execution of MarieAntoinette which Madame de Lescure had kept from his knowledge. It was agreat shock to him, for he had known the Queen personally, andthroughout the day he wearied himself with exclamations on the horriblecrime. That night at Ernee he received the Sacrament, and at the sametime became speechless, and could only lie holding his wife's hand andlooking sometimes at her, sometimes toward heaven. But the cruel enemywere close behind, and there was no rest on earth even for the dying. Madame de Lescure implored her friends to leave them behind; but theytold her she would be exposed to a frightful death, and that his bodywould fall into the enemy's hands; and she was forced to consent to hisremoval. Her mother and her other friends would not permit her to remainin the carriage with him; she was placed on horseback and her maid andthe surgeon were with him. An hour after, on the 3rd of November, hedied, but his wife did not know her loss till the evening when theyarrived at Fongeres; for though the surgeon left the carriage on hisdeath, the maid, fearing the effect which the knowledge might have uponher in the midst of her journey, remained for seven hours in thecarriage by his side, during two of which she was in a fainting fit. 

When Madame de Lescure and Henri de la Rochejaquelein met the nextmorning, they sat for a quarter of an hour without speaking, and weepingbitterly. At last she said 'You have lost your best friend, ' and hereplied, 'Take my life, if it could restore him. '

Scarcely anything can be imagined more miserable than the condition ofthe army, or more terrible than the situation of the young general, whofelt himself responsible for its safety, and was compelled daily to seeits sufferings and find his plans thwarted by the obstinacy and folly ofthe other officers, crushed by an overwhelming force, knowing that therewas no quarter from which help could come, yet still struggling on infulfillment of his sad duty. The hopes and expectations which had filledhis heart a few months back had long passed away; nothing was around himbut misery, nothing before him but desolation; but still he never failedin courage, in mildness, in confidence in Heaven. 

At Mans he met with a horrible defeat; at first, indeed, with a smallparty he broke the columns of the enemy, but fresh men were constantlybrought up, and his peasants gave way and retreated, their officersfollowing them. He tried to lead them back through the hedges, and if hehad succeeded, would surely have gained the victory. Three times withtwo other officers he dashed into the midst of the Blues; but thebroken, dispirited peasants would not follow him, not one would eventurn to fire a shot. At last, in leaping a hedge, his saddle turned, andhe fell, without indeed being hurt, but the sight of his fall added tothe terror of the miserable Vendeans. He struggled long and desperatelythrough the long night that followed to defend the gates of the town, but with the light of morning the enemy perceived his weakness andeffected their entrance. His followers had in the meantime graduallyretired into the country beyond, but those who could not escape fell aprey to the cruelty of the Republicans. 'I thought you had perished, 'said Madame de Lescure, when he overtook her. 'Would that I had, ' washis answer. 

He now resolved to cross the Loire, and return to his native Bocage, where the well-known woods would afford a better protection to hisfollowers. It was at Craon, on their route to the river, that Madame deLescure saw him for the last time, as he rallied his men, who had beenterrified by a false alarm. 

She did not return to La Vendee, but, with her mother, was sheltered bythe peasants of Brittany throughout the winter and spring until theyfound means to leave the country. 

The Vendeans reached the Loire at Ancenis, but they were only able tofind two small boats to carry them over. On the other side, however, were four great ferry boats loaded with hay; and Henri, with Stofflet, three other officers, and eighteen soldiers crossed the river in theirtwo boats, intending to take possession of them, send them back for therest of the army, and in the meantime protect the passage from the Blueson the Vendean side. Unfortunately, however, he had scarcely crossedbefore the pursuers came down upon his troops, drove them back fromAncenis, and entirely prevented them from attempting the passage, whileat the same time Henri and his companions were attacked and forced fromthe river by a body of Republicans on their side. A last resistance wasattempted by the retreating Vendeans at Savenay, where they fought noblybut in vain; four thousand were shot on the field of battle, the chiefswere made prisoners and carried to Nantes or Angers, where they wereguillotined, and a few who succeeded in escaping found shelter among theBretons, or one by one found their way back to La Vendee. M. DeDonnissan was amongst those who were guillotined, and M. D'Elbee, whowas seized shortly after, was shot with his wife. 

Henri, with his few companions, when driven from the banks of the Loire, dismissed the eighteen soldiers, whose number would only have attractedattention without being sufficient for protection; but the five chiefscrossed the fields and wandered through the country without meeting asingle inhabitant--all the houses were burnt down, and the few remainingpeasants hidden in the woods. At last, after four-and-twenty hours, walking, they came to an inhabited farm, where they lay down to sleep onthe straw. The next moment the farmer came to tell them the Blues werecoming; but they were so worn out with fatigue, that they would notmove. The Blues were happily, also, very tired, and, without making anysearch, laid down on the other side of the heap of straw, and also fellasleep. Before daylight the Vendeans rose and set out again, walkingmiles and miles in the midst of desolation, until, after several days, they came to Henri's own village of St. Aubin, where he sought out hisaunt, who was in concealment there, and remained with her for threedays, utterly overwhelmed with grief at his fatal separation from hisarmy, and only longing for an opportunity of giving his life in the goodcause. 

Beyond all his hopes, the peasants no sooner heard his name, than oncemore they rallied round the white standard, as determined as ever not toyield to the Revolutionary government; and the beginning of the year1794 found him once more at the head of a considerable force, encampedin the forests of Vesins, guarding the villages around from thecruelties of the Blues. He was now doubly beloved and trusted by thefollowers who had proved his worth, and who even yet looked forward totriumphs beneath his brave guidance; but it was not so with him, he hadlearnt the lesson of disappointment, and though always active andcheerful, his mind was made up, and the only hope he cherished was ofmeeting the death of a soldier. His headquarters were in the midst of aforest, where one of the Republican officers, who was made prisoner, wasmuch surprised to find the much-dreaded chieftain of the Royalistsliving in a hut formed of boughs of trees, dressed almost like apeasant, and with his arm still in a sling. This person was shot, because he was found to be commissioned to promise pardon to thepeasants, and afterwards to massacre them; but Henri had not learntcruelty from his persecutors, and his last words were of forgiveness. 

It was on Ash Wednesday that he had repulsed an attack of the enemy, andhad almost driven them out of the wood, when, perceiving two soldiershiding behind a hedge, he stopped, crying out, 'Surrender, I spare you. 'As he spoke one of them leveled his musket, fired, and stretched himdead on the ground without a groan. Stofflet, coming up the next moment, killed the murderer with one stroke of his sword; but the remainingsoldier was spared out of regard to the last words of the general. TheVendeans wept bitterly, but there was no time to indulge their sorrow, for the enemy were returning upon them; and, to save their chieftain'scorpse from insult, they hastily dug a grave, in which they placed bothbodies, and retreated as the Blues came up to occupy the ground. TheRepublicans sought for the spot, but it was preserved from theirknowledge; and the high-spirited, pure-hearted Henri de laRochejaquelein sleeps beside his enemy in the midst of the woodlandswhere be won for himself eternal honor. His name is still loved beyondall others; the Vendeans seldom pronounce it without touching theirhats, and it is the highest glory of many a family that one of theirnumber has served under Monsieur Henri. 

Stofflet succeeded to the command, and carried on the war with greatskill and courage for another year, though with barbarities such as hadnever been permitted by the gentle men; but his career was stained bythe death of Marigny, whom, by false accusations, he was induced tosentence to be shot. Marigny showed great courage and resignation, himself giving the word to fire--perhaps at that moment remembering thewarning of M. De Lescure. Stofflet repented bitterly, and never ceasedto lament his death. He was at length made prisoner, and shot, with hislast words declaring his devotion to his king and his faith. 

Thus ends the tale of the Vendean war, undertaken in the best of causes, for the honor of God and His Church, and the rescue of one of the mostinnocent of kings, by men whose saintly characters and dauntless couragehave seldom been surpassed by martyrs or heroes of any age. It closedwith blood, with fire, with miseries almost unequalled; yet who woulddare to say that the lives of Cathelineau, Bonchamp, Lescure, LaRochejaquelein, with their hundreds of brave and pious followers, weredevoted in vain? Who could wish to see their brightness dimmed withearthly rewards?

And though the powers of evil were permitted to prevail on earth, yetwhat could their utmost triumph effect against the faithful, but to makefor them, in the words of the child king for whom they fought, one ofthose thorny paths that lead to glory!

THE END.