For Sceptre and Crown Volume II Part 9

His strength failed, and he fell upon a heap of slain; his hand clenched in death, held fast the wheel of the conquered gun. The dragoons pressed forwards over him, and soon the last defenders of the battery fled over the field.

The battery was silenced, but the greater number of the dragoons lay around their fallen leader.

This attack had been watched with the greatest interest by the two squadrons as they advanced slowly towards the Prussian squares, and as the defenders of the battery fled, loud cheers burst forth.

When the two squadrons had come near enough to the squares to charge, suddenly from behind the hill on which the battery stood, galloped the garde du corps, followed by the cuira.s.sier guards. The garde du corps dashed against the square next them. Two volleys, discharged when they were close to the enemy, did not check them, but the brave square stood unbroken, and the squadron of garde du corps retired from the enemy's fire, preparing to charge afresh.

The commander of the second square nearest to the dragoons came forward and waved a handkerchief. Major von Hammerstein, with his adjutant and a trumpeter, advanced to meet him.

"My soldiers are ready to sink from exhaustion," said the Prussian staff-officer; "I am willing to surrender."

"I must then beg for your sword, my comrade," replied Major von Hammerstein, "and that you will lay down your arms."

"I agree to the last," said the Prussian officer; "to give up my sword is too hard a condition. But," he cried, "here come the cuira.s.siers."

And indeed the cuira.s.siers, who had followed the garde du corps, and pa.s.sing by the first square had formed to charge, were galloping down upon them.

"Ride to the cuira.s.siers and stop them!" cried Major von Hammerstein to his adjutant.

He galloped off to meet the charging regiment, but their rapid movement and the noise around prevented him from making himself heard. They rushed onwards.

"Too late!" cried the Prussian commander. "Stand to your arms! Fire!"

he cried, as he returned to the square, and a tremendous volley mowed down the cuira.s.siers just as they approached. The foremost ranks fell, and the direction of the charge being somewhat oblique, the shock came on the flank of the square, and it remained unbroken.

Major von Hammerstein had ridden back, and "Charge! charge!" resounded down the ranks of the dragoons.

The two squadrons charged the square at a gallop.

They were received by a frightful fire. The major fell, just in front of the foe, but Lieutenant von Stolzenberg urged on his horse, reined him in for a moment when close to the lowered bayonets of the enemy, drove the spurs into his horse's flanks, so that he reared upright, and then, with one mighty leap, bore his young master, as he raised his sword and gave a ringing cheer, right into the hostile square, where, like his rider, he fell, pierced through with bayonets.

But his fall tore a large opening in the ranks, and the squadron pressed in after them.

"Well done, old fellow!" cried Wendenstein, and at the same moment he fell beside his comrade, and the dragoons rushed over him.

The square was broken, and those who yet survived fled madly across the field.

But when the dragoon squadrons rea.s.sembled, not one officer was left, and one-third of the men were wanting.

The cuira.s.siers had rallied meanwhile, and hastened to the scene of this brilliant struggle.

A young soldier rode with the first squadron in an old coat that had evidently not been made for him, and in plain grey trousers stuffed into military boots. On his head he wore a military cap, and a wound on his brow was bound up with a white handkerchief.

"Where is Lieutenant von Wendenstein?" he asked of a dragoon, as the remains of the second squadron rode up.

"All our officers lie there!" replied the dragoon, pointing to a heap of men and horses which marked the spot where the square had stood.

"Dead!" cried the cuira.s.sier. "But I cannot leave him there; I promised to take care of him, and no one shall ever say Fritz Deyke broke his word. My poor lieutenant!"

He hastily quitted the ranks and rode up to the commanding officer.

"Sir," he said, saluting him, "I overtook the army at Langensalza and joined the cuira.s.siers, that I might take my share in the war. I hope, sir, you can say I have done my duty?"

"You have done bravely," replied the officer.

"Well, sir," continued the young man, "the day's work seems over, and, besides, I have a scratch from which the blood runs into my eyes, so I came to ask leave for the day."

The officer looked at him with amazement. A deep blush spread over the young soldier's face.

"Sir," he cried, "I was brought up at Blechow with our president's son, Lieutenant von Wendenstein, of the Cambridge dragoons; and when I left home to join the army, his mother said to me, 'Fritz, take care of my son if you can,' and I promised her I would, sir; and now there lies the young gentleman amongst the dead. Shall I leave him there?"

The officer looked kindly at him.

"Go, my brave lad," he said, "and come back when the lieutenant no longer needs you."

"Thank you, sir," cried Fritz.

The cuira.s.siers advanced in pursuit of the enemy.

Meanwhile the other square had been broken by the charge of the garde du corps. The cavalry had moved forward, and in a short time the scene of all this carnage, of all this noise, was only an empty plain, where piles of corpses lay one on another in lakes of blood--men and horses, friend and foe, mingled together.

Fritz Deyke was alone in this scene of horror.

He dismounted, led his horse by the bridle, and walked to the place where the dragoons had broken the square. His horse snorted and struggled to run back. He led it a little way off and tied it to the trunk of a tree which grew near the high road; then he again approached the heaps of slain.

Some wounded men raised their heads and begged gaspingly for a drop of water.

"I cannot help all, but you shall not perish," he said.

There was a deep ditch near the high road; it might have water in it.

He seized two helmets lying on the ground, and hurried to the ditch.

There was actually some water--a little, and dirty, for the continuous heat had sucked up the moisture.

With some difficulty he filled the helmets with the muddy, lukewarm fluid, and carrying them like two buckets, he returned to the wounded men, who were watching for him with unspeakable longing. He drew out his flask, poured some of its contents into each helmet, and gave some of the liquid to the sufferers, impartially succouring both Prussians and Hanoverians.

"So, be patient," he said, kindly; "the first ambulance I see, I will send to you." And he began to search amongst the dead.

They lay heaped on one another, the brave dragoons and the brave Prussian infantry, some with a calm, peaceful expression on their faces, some with a look of wild horror, many so frightfully disfigured with bullets and stabs that the soldier's brave heart quailed, and he had to close his eyes for a moment to gain strength to continue his dreadful employment.

But he went on undeterred. He laid the dead bodies aside, and exerting all his strength, he dragged at the dead horses.

"Here is Herr von Stolzenberg!" he cried, as he turned over the body of the young officer, which lay with its face on the ground, bathed in blood. "Handsome, brave gentleman! and to die so young! It is all over with him," he said, mournfully. A bullet had carried away part of the skull, and countless stabs still oozed with blood.

Fritz Deyke bowed his head over the corpse, folded his hands, and repeated "Our Father."

"But here," he then cried, "lies poor Roland, stone dead. Good, faithful creature; and under him, alas! there is my lieutenant!" He pushed the dead horse aside.

Beneath lay Lieutenant von Wendenstein, pale and stark, his left hand pressed on his breast, his sword still in his right hand, his eyes wide open, and staring gla.s.sily at the sky.