University of Virginia Library

23. CHAPTER XXIII.

Napoleon had commenced those daring
and rapid movements, which for a time threw
the peace of the world into the scale of fortune,
and which nothing but the interposition
of a ruling providence could avert from their
threatened success; as the —the Dragoons
wheeled into a field already deluged with
English blood, on the heights of Quartre
Bras. The eye of its gallant Colonel saw a
friendly battalion falling beneath the sabres
of the enemy's Cuirassiers. The word was
passed—the column opens—the sounds of the
quivering bugle were heard for a moment,
over the roar of the cannon and the shouts of
the combatants; the charge sweeping, like a
whirlwind—fell heavy on those treacherous
Frenchmen, who to day had sworn fidelity
to Louis, and to-morrow intended lifting
their hands in allegiance to his rival.

“Spare my life in merey,” cried an officer,
already dreadfully wounded, who stood
shrinking from the impending blow of an enraged
Frenchman.—An English dragoon
dashed at the Cuirassier, and with one blow
severed his arm from his body—

“Thank God,” sighed the wounded officer,
as he sunk beneath the horse's feet.

His rescuer threw himself from the saddle
to his assistance, and raising the fallen man,

inquired into his wounds—It was Pendennyss—it
was Egerton. The wounded man
groaned aloud, as he saw the face of him
who had averted the fatal blow—but it was
not the hour for explanations or confessions,
other than those with which the dying soldiers
endeavoured to make their tardy peace
with their God.

Sir Henry was given in charge to two
slightly wounded British soldiers, and the
Earl remounted—the scattered troops were
rallied at the sound of the trumpet—and again
and again—led by their dauntless Colonel,
were seen in the thickest of the fray, with
sabres drenched in blood, and voices hoarse
with the shouts of victory.

The period between the battles of Quartre
Bras and Waterloo, was a trying one to the
discipline and courage of the British army.
The discomfited Prussians on their flank, had
been routed and compelled to retire, and in
their front was an enemy, brave, skilful, and
victorious—led by the greatest Captain of
the age. The prudent commander of the
English forces fell back with dignity and reluctance
to the field of Waterloo; here the
mighty struggle was to terminate, and the
eye of every experienced soldier, looked on
those eminences, as the future graves for
thousands.

During this solemn interval of comparative
inactivity, the mind of Pendenny ss dwelt on
the affection, the innocence, the beauty and

worth of his Emily, until the curdling blood,
as he thought on her lot, should his life be
the purchase of the coming victory, warned
him to quit the gloomy subject, for the consolations
of that religion which could only
yield him the solace his wounded feelings
required. In his former campaigns, the Earl
had been sensible of the mighty changes of
death, and had ever kept in view the preparations
necessary to meet it with hope and
joy; but the world clung around him now,
in the best affections of his nature—and it
was only as he could picture the happy reunion
with his Emily in a future life, he
could look on a separation in this, without
despair.

The vicinity of the enemy admitted of no
relaxation in the strictest watchfulness in the
British lines, and the comfortless night of
the seventeenth, was passed by the Earl, and
his Lieutenant Colonel, George Denbigh, on
the same cloak, and under the open canopy
of Heaven.

As the opening cannon of the enemy gave
the signal for the commencing conflict, Pendennyss
mounted his charger with a last
thought on his distant wife; with a mighty
struggle he tore her as it were from his bosom,
and gave the remainder of the day to
his country and duty.

Who has not heard of the events of that
fearful hour, on which the fate of Europe
hung as it were suspended in a scale? On one

side supported by the efforts of desperate resolution,
guided by the most consummate art;
and on the other defended, by a discipline and
enduring courage, almost without a parallel.

The indefatigable Blucher arrived, and the
star of Napoleon sunk.

Pendennyss threw himself from his horse,
on the night of the eighteenth of June, as he
gave way by orders, in the pursuit, to the
fresher battalions of the Prussians—with the
languor that follows unusual excitement, and
mental thanksgivings that his bloody work
was at length ended. The image of his
Emily again broke over the sterner feelings
engendered by the battle, as the first glimmerings
of light, which succeed the awful
darkness of the eclipse of the sun; and he
again breathed freely, in the consciousness of
the happiness which would await his now
speedy return.

“I am sent for the Colonel of the—th Dragoons,”
said a courier in broken English to
a soldier, near where the Earl lay on the
ground, waiting the preparations of his attendants—“have
I found the right regiment,
my friend?”

“To be sure you have,” answered the
man, without looking up from his toil on his
favourite animal, “you might have tracked us
by the dead Frenchmen, I should think.
So you want my Lord, my lad, do you? do
we move again to-night?” suspending his labour
for a moment in expectation of a reply.

“Not to my knowledge,” rejoined the
courier, “my message is to your Colonel,
from a dying man; will you point out his
station?” the soldier complied, and the message
was soon delivered, and Pendennyss
prepared to obey its summons immediately.
Preceded by the messenger as a guide, and
followed by Harmer, the Earl retraced his
steps, over that ground he had but a few hours
before been engaged on, in the deadly strife
of man to man, hand to hand.

How different is the contemplation of a
field of battle, during and after the conflict.
The excitement—suspended success—shouts,
uproar, and confusion of the former, prevent
any contemplation of the nicer parts, of
this confused mass of movements, charges
and retreats; or if a brilliant advance is
made, a masterly retreat effected, the imagination
is chained by the splendour and glory
of the act, without resting for a moment, on
the sacrifice of individual happiness with
which it is purchased. A battle ground from
which the whir wind of the combat has
passed, presents a different sight—it offers the
very consummation of human misery.

There may be occasionally an individual,
who from station, distempered mind, or the
encouragement of chimerical ideas of glory,
quits the theatre of life with at least the
appearance of pleasure in his triumphs; if
such there be in reality, if this rapture of

departing glory be any thing more than the
deception of a distempered excitement, the
subject of its exhibition, is to be greatly pitied.

To the Christian, dying in peace with both
God and man, can it alone be ceded in the
eye of reason, to pour out his existence, with
a smile on his quivering lip.

And the warrior, who falls in the very
arms of victory, after passing a life devoted
to the world; even if he sees kingdoms hang
suspended on his success, may smile indeed—
may utter sentiments full of loyalty and zeal--
may be the admiration of the world—and
what is his reward? a deathless name, and
an existence of misery, which knows no termination.

Christianity alone can make us good soldiers
in any cause, for he who knows how to
live, is always the least afraid to die.

Pendennyss and his companions pushed
their way over the ground occupied before
the battle by the enemy, descended into, and
through that little valley, in which yet lay in
undistinguished confusion, masses of dead
and the dying of either side; and again over
the ridge, on which could be marked the
situation of those gallant Squares, which had
so long resisted the efforts of the horse and
artillery, by the groups of bodies, fallen
where they had bravely stood, until even
the callous Harmer, sickened with the sight
of a waste of life, he had but a few hours
before exultingly contributed to increase.

Appeals to their feelings as they rode
through the field had been frequent, and their
progress much retarded, by their attempts to
contribute to the ease of a wounded or a dying
man: but as the courier constantly urged
their speed, as the only means of securing the
object of their ride, these halts were reluctantly
abandoned.

It was ten o'clock before they reached the
farm house, where lay in the midst of hundreds
of his countrymen, the former lover of
Jane.

As the subject of his confession must be
anticipated by the reader, we will give a
short relation of his life, and those acts which
more materially affect our history.

Henry Egerton had been turned early on
the world, like hundreds of his countrymen,
without any principle, to counteract the arts
of infidelity, or resist the temptations of life.
His father held a situation under government,
and was devoted to his rise in the diplomatic
line. His mother, a woman of fashion, who
lived for effect, and idle competition with her
sisters in weakness and folly. All he learnt
in his father's house, was selfishness, from
the example of one, and a love of high life
and its extravagance, from the other, of his
parents.

He entered the army young---from choice.
The splendour and reputation of the service,
caught his fancy; and he was, by pride and
constitution, indifferent to personal danger.
Yet he loved London and its amusements

better than glory; and the money of his uncle,
Sir Edgar, whose heir he was reputed
to be, had raised him to the rank of Lieutenant
Colonel, without his spending an hour
in the field.

Egerton had some abilities, and a good
deal of ardour of temperament, by nature.
The former from indulgence and example,
degenerated into the acquiring the art to
please in mixed society; and the latter, from
want of employment, expended itself at the
card table. The very irritability of genius,
is dangerous to an idle man. It prompts to
mischief, if it be not employed in good.

The association between the vices is intimate.
There really appears to be a kind of modesty
in sin, that makes it ashamed of good company.
If we are unable to reconcile a favourite
propensity to our principles, we are apt to
abandon the unpleasant restraint on our actions,
rather than admit the incongruous
mixture—freed entirely from the fetters of
our morals, what is there our vices will not
prompt us to commit? Egerton, like thousands
of others, went on from step to step in
the abandonment of virtue, until he found
himself in the world, free to follow all his inclinations,
so he violated none of the decencies
of life—and this consisted in detection—what
was hid did no harm.

When in Spain, on service in his only
campaign, he was accidentally, as has been

mentioned, thrown in the way of the Donna
Julia, and brought her off the ground, under
the influence of natural sympathy and national
feeling—a kind of merit that makes vice
only more dangerous, by making it sometimes
amiable. He had not seen his dependant
long, before her beauty, situation, and
his passions, decided him to effect her ruin.

This was an occupation, his figure, manners
and propensities had made him an adept
in, and nothing was farther from his thoughts
than the commission of any other, than the
crime a gentleman might be guilty of (in his
opinion) with impunity.

It is however the misfortune of sin, that
from being our slave it becomes a tyrant, and
Egerton attempted what in other countries,
and where the laws ruled, might have cost
him his life.

The conjecture of Pendennyss was true—
he saw the face of the officer who had interposed,
between him and his villanous attempt,
but was hid himself from view—he
aimed not at his life, but his own escape;
happily his first shot succeeded, for the Earl
would have been sacrificed, to preserve the
character of a man of honour; though no one
was more regardless of the estimation he was
held in by the virtuous than Colonel Egerton.

In pursuance of his plans on Mrs. Fitzgerald,
the Colonel had sedulously avoided
admitting any of his companions, into the
secret of his having a female in his care.

When he left the army to return home, he
remained until a movement of the troops to
a distant part of the country, enabled him to
effect his own purposes, without incurring
their ridicule; and when he found himself
obliged to abandon his vehicle, for a refuge
in the woods, the fear of detection made him
alter his course, and under the pretence of
wishing to be in a battle about to be fought,
he secretly rejoined the army, and the gallantry
of Colonel Egerton was mentioned in
the next despatches.

Sir Herbert Nicholson commanded the
advanced guard, at which the Earl arrived
with the Donna Julia, and like every other
brave man (unless guilty himself) was indignant
at the villany of the fugitive. The
times, confusion and enormities, daily practiced
in the theatre of the war, prevented any
close inquiries into the subject, and circumstances
had so enveloped Egerton in mystery,
that nothing but an interview with the lady
herself was likely to expose him.

With Sir Herbert Nicholson he had been in
habits of intimacy, and on that gentleman's
alluding in a conversation in the barracks at
F—to the lady, brought into his quarters
before Lishon, he accidentally omitted mentioning
the name of her rescuer. Egerton
had never before heard the transaction spoken
of, and as he had of course never mentioned
the subject himself, was ignorant of
who interfered between him and his views,

also of the fate of Donna Julia; indeed, he
thought it probable that it had not much improved
by a change of guardians.

In his object in coming into Northamptonshire
he had several views; he wanted a
temporary retreat from his creditors. Jarvis
had an infant fondness for play, without
an adequate skill, and the money of
the young ladies, in his necessities, was becoming
of importance; but the daughters of
Sir Edward Moseley were of a description
more suited to his taste, and their portions
were as ample as the others: he had become
in some degree attached to Jane, and as her
imprudent parents, satisfied with his possessing
the exterior and requisite recommendations
of a gentleman, admitted his visits
freely, he determined to make her his wife.

When he met Denbigh the first time, he saw
chance had thrown him in the way of a man
who might hold his character in his power;
he had never seen Pendennyss, and it will
be remembered, was ignorant of the name
of Julia's friend; he now learnt, for the first
time, that it was Denbigh: uneasy at he
knew not what, fearful of some exposure, he
knew not how, when Sir Herbert alluded to
the occurrence—with a view to rebut the
charge, if Denbigh should choose to make
one; with the near sightedness of guilt. he
pretended to know the occurrence, and under
the promise of secrecy, mentioned that the
name of the officer was Denbigh; he had

noticed Denbigh, avoiding Sir Herbert at
the ball, and judging others from himself,
thought it was a wish to avoid any allusions
to the lady he had brought into the others
quarters that induced the measure; he was in
hopes that if Denbigh was not as guilty as himself,
he was sufficiently so, to wish to keep the
transaction from the eyes of Emily: he was
however prepared for an explosion or an alliance
with him, when the sudden departure
of Sir Herbert removed the danger of a collision—believing
at last they were to be brothers-in
law, and mistaking the Earl for his
cousin, whose name he bore, Egerton became
reconciled to the association; while
Pendennyss having in his absence heard on
inquiring some of the vices of the Colonel,
was debating with himself, whether he should
expose them to Sir Edward or not.

It was in their occasional interchange of
civilities that Pendennyss placed his pocket-book
upon a table, while he exhibited the
plants to the Colonel; the figure of Emily
passing the window, drew him from the
room, and Egerton having ended his examination,
observing the book, put it in his
own pocket, to return it to its owner when
they next met.

The situation; name and history of Mrs.
Fitzgerald were never mentioned by the
Moseleys in public; but Jane, in the confidence
of her affections, had told her lover
who the inmate of the cottage was; the idea

of her being kept there by Denbigh, immediately
occurred to him, and although he
was surprised at the audacity of the thing,
he was determined to profit by the occasion.

To pay this visit, he staid away from the
excursion on the water, as Pendennyss did
to avoid his friend, Lord Henry Stapleton.
An excuse of business which served for his
apology, kept the Colonel from seeing Denbigh
to return the book, until after his visit
to the Cottage—his rhapsody of love, and
offers to desert his intended wife, were
nothing but the common place talk of his
purposes; and his presumption in alluding to
his situation with Miss Moseley, proceeded
from his impressions as to Julia's real character;
in this struggle for the bell, the
pocket book of Denbigh accidentally fell
from his coat—and the retreat of the Colonel
was too precipitate to enable him to recover
it.

Mrs. Fitzgerald was too much alarmed to
distinguish nicely, and Egerton proceeded to
the ball room with the indifference of a hardened
offender. When the arrival of Miss
Jarvis, to whom he had committed himself,
prompted him to a speedy declaration, and
the unlucky conversation of Mr. Holt brought
about a probable detection of his gaming propensities,
the Colonel determined to get rid
of his awkward situation and his debts, by a
coup-de-main—he eloped with Miss Jarvis.

What portion of the foregoing narrative
made the dying confession of Egerton to the
man he had lately discovered to be the Earl
of Pendennyss, the reader can easily imagine.