La Vendee Part 9

"Now you ask me questions which you know it only becomes me to answer in one way."

"Why, Marie, I declare you and I have changed characters this morning.

You are all sobriety when I make a poor attempt at joking with you. Were I, as usual, talking of my sober cares, you would be as giddy as a girl of fifteen, and talk to me of twenty lovers that you have."

"It is very different talking of twenty lovers, and of one."

"Then you own there is one lover in the case--eh, Marie?"

"Now you are crafty, Victorine, and try to trap me into confessions. You know I have no confession to make, or I should have made it long ago to you."

"I know, Marie, that Larochejaquelin is sad when you are not by, and that he has a word for no one else when you are present; but I know not whether that means love. I know also that your bright eyes brighten when they rest on him, and that your heart beats somewhat faster at the mention of his name; but I know not whether that means love."

"Victorine," said Marie, turning round upon her companion her beautiful face, on which two l.u.s.trous tears were shining, "Victorine, you are treating your poor sister unfairly. I know not that my eyes are turned oftener on him than on others; and when my heart would play the rebel within me, I always try to check it."

"Nay, Marie, dear Marie, I did but joke! You do not think I would accuse you of an unmaidenly partiality; if it grieves you we will not mention Henri's name again, though I remember when you did not spare me so easily; when Charles' name was always in my ear, when you swore that every dress I wore was his choice, that every flower I plucked was for his eye; and there had been no more then between Charles and me, than there has now between you and Henri; and yet you see what has become of it. You thought yourself wonderfully clever then, Marie; you were quite a prophetess then. Why should not I now foresee a little. Why should not I also be clever?"

"Well, Victorine, time will shew," said Marie, smiling through her tears; "but do not teach me to love him too dearly, till I know whether he will value my love. If he would prize it, I fear he might have it for the asking for; but I will not throw it at his feet, that he should keep it loosely for awhile, and then scorn it, and lay it by."

CHAPTER VI.

RECRUITING.

On the Monday following the meeting at Durbelliere, Larochejaquelin, Denot, the Cure of St. Laud, Foret and Cathelineau joined M. de Lescure at Clisson, and on the day afterwards, the soldiers of the Republic, when attempting to collect the conscripts at a small town near Clisson, were resisted and treated as they had been at St. Florent. There was not quite so much of a battle, for the officer in command knew what was likely to occur, and not having received any reinforcement of troops, thought it advisable to give in early in the day, and capitulate with the honours of war. He was allowed to march his men out of the town, each man having stipulated that he would not again serve in any detachment sent into La Vendee for the collection of conscripts; but they were not allowed to take their arms with them, muskets, bayonets, and gunpowder being too valuable to the insurgents to be disregarded.

So the soldiers marched unarmed to Nantes, and from thence returned, before two months were over, in spite of the promises they had given, and requited the mercy of the Vendeans with the most horrid cruelties.

The people were equally triumphant in many other towns. In Beauprieu, Coron, Chatillon, and other places, the collection of conscripts was opposed successfully, and generally speaking, without much bloodshed.

In Coron, the military fired on the people, and killed three or four of them, but were ultimately driven out, In Beauprieu, they gave up their arms at once, and marched out of the place. In Chatillon, they attempted to defend the barracks, but they found, when too late, that they had not a single day's provisions; and as the townspeople also knew this, they were at no pains to besiege the stronghold of the soldiers. They knew that twenty-four hours would starve them out. As it was, the lieutenant in command gave up, half an hour after his usual dinner time.

These things all occurred within a week of the revolt at St. Florent.

Beauprieu and Chatillon were carried on the Wednesday. Coron was victorious on the Thursday; and on the Friday following, a strong detachment of soldiers marched out of Cholet, of their own accord, without attempting to collect their portion of the levy, and crossed the river Loire, at the Pont de Ce, thus retreating from La Vendee.

These triumphs inspired the insurgents with high hopes of future victories; they gave them the prestige of success, made them confident in the hour of battle, and taught them by degrees to bear, undaunted, the fire of their enemies. The officers of the Republic were most injudicious in allowing their enemies to gather head as they did; had they brought a really formidable force of men, in one body, into the province of Anjou, immediately upon the revolt of St. Florent, they might doubtless have driven the Vendeans, who were then unarmed and undisciplined, back to their farms; but they affected to despise them, they neglected to take vigorous measures, till the whole country was in arms; and they then found that all the available force which they were enabled to collect, was insufficient to quell the spirit, or daunt the patriotism of the revolted provinces.

Towards the end of April, the first attempt was made by the Vendean chiefs to collect a body of men under arms, and to put them into motion, for the purpose of performing service at a distance from their own homes; and though considerable difficulty was felt in inducing them to follow the standards, their first attempts were successful. In the early part of May, they altogether succeeded in driving the soldiers out of Thouars. A few days later, they did the same at Fontenay, though here they met with a violent opposition, and much blood was shed. At these two latter places, the cannon which Cathelineau had taken in so gallant a manner at St. Florent, was brought into action, and quite supported its character as a staunch royalist. At Fontenay, with its aid, they took three or four other pieces of cannon, but none which they prized as they did Marie Jeanne. It was universally credited among the peasantry, that at Cathelineau's touch, this remarkable piece of artillery had positively refused to discharge itself against the Vendeans; and their leaders certainly were at no pains to disabuse them of a belief which contributed so strongly to their enthusiasm.

Some of the more astute among the people had certainly thought for a while that the cannon was a humbug, that it was useless either to royalist or to republican, in fact, that it would never go off at all.

But these sceptics were cured of their infidelity at Thouars, when they saw the soldiers as well as the republicans of the town fall in heaps beneath the thunders of Marie Jeanne.

During April and the three weeks of May, Larochejaquelin and de Lescure, together with Cathelineau, Denot, and M. Bonchamps, were actively engaged in collecting and exhorting the people, planning what they should do, and preparing themselves to bear that burst of republican fury which they knew would, sooner or later, fall upon them.

Much of this time was spent at Clisson, as that place was centrically situated for their different manoeuvres; and there certainly appeared reason to suppose that Madame de Lescure was not altogether wrong in her surmises respecting Marie. Here also, at Clisson, Cathelinean frequently joined the party, and though he shewed by his language and demeanour that he had not forgotten that he was a postillion, he gradually acquired a confidence and ease of manner among his new a.s.sociates, and displayed a mixture of intelligence and enthusiasm, which induced his confederates generally to acknowledge his voice as the first in their councils.

They were occasionally at Durbelliere; but there Cathelineau was again abashed and confused. He could not calmly endure the quiet loveliness of Agatha's face, or the sweet music of her voice. He himself felt that his brain was not cool when there; that his mind was gradually teaching itself to dwell on subjects, which in his position would be awfully dangerous to him. He never owned to himself that he was in love with the fair angel, whom he considered as much above him as the skies are above the earth; but he would walk for hours through those eternal paths in the chateau garden, regardless of the figures, regardless of the various turns and twists he took, dreaming of the bliss of being beloved by such a woman as Agatha Larochejaquelin. He built for himself splendid castles in the air, in which he revelled day after day; and in these dreams he always endowed himself with that one gift which no talents, no courage, no success could give him--high birth and n.o.ble blood, for he strongly felt that without these, no one might look up to the G.o.ddess of his idolatry; it was his delight to imagine to himself with what ecstasy he would receive from her lips the only adequate reward of his patriotism; he would quicken his pace with joy as he dreamt that he heard her sweet voice bidding him to persevere, and then he would return to her after hard fighting, long doubtful but victorious battles, and lay at her feet honours worthy of her acceptance.

It can hardly be said that he himself was the hero of his own reveries; he was a.s.sured beyond the shadow of a doubt, that the proud happiness which he pictured to his imagination was as much beyond his own reach, as though his thoughts were turned on some celestial being. No, it was a creation of his brain, in which he dwelt awhile, till his own strong good sense reminded him that he had other work before him than the indulgence in such dreams, and he determined that he would be at Durbelliere as little as was possible.

It was singular though, that he contrived, while his imagination was thus rambling, to mingle in his thoughts the actual and the ideal. The revolt of La Vendee, the struggle of his brother royalists for the restoration of their King; the annihilation of republicanism, and re-establishment of the old clergy, were still the subjects of his meditations; and the bold plans which his mind then suggested to him, were those which were afterwards put into effect.

He still insisted on attacking the strongly fortified citadel of Saumur, and after their success at Fontenay, the chiefs agreed at once to make arrangements for that great undertaking. The tenth of June was settled on as the day on which the attack should be commenced, and their utmost efforts in the mean time were to be employed in raising recruits, arming and drilling them, and collecting ammunition and stores of war sufficient for so serious an operation.

For this purpose Cathelineau returned for a while to St. Florent. M.

Charette was requested to bring up all the men he could collect from the Marais, a part of La Vendee which lies close upon the sea. M. Bonchamps was invited to join them from Angers. De Lescure returned to Fontenay, to ask the a.s.sistance of those who had been so successful there against the republicans; while Henri Larochejaquelin, was left at home in the Bocage, to secure the services of every available man from every village.

He had two comrades with him in his recruiting party; and though they were of very different characters, they were almost equally serviceable.

One was his friend and priest, the Cure of St. Laud, and the other was his servant, Jacques Chapeau. The Cure had no scrupulous compunction in using his sacerdotal authority as a priest, when the temporal influence of Larochejaquelin, as landlord, was insufficient to induce a countryman to leave his wife and home to seek honour under the walls of Saumur. The peasants were all willing to oppose the republican troops, should they come into their own neighbourhood to collect conscripts; they were ready to attack any town where republican soldiers were quartered, providing they were not required to go above a day's march from their own homes; but many objected to enrol themselves for any length of time, to bind themselves as it were to a soldier's trade, and to march under arms to perform service at a distance from their farms, which to them seemed considerable. With such men as these, and with their wives and sisters, Henri argued, and used his blandest eloquence, and was usually successful; but when he failed, the Cure was not slow in having recourse to the irresistable thunders of the church.

No one could have been fitter for the duties of a recruiting-sergeant than Jacques Chapeau; and to his great natural talents in that line, he added a patriotic zeal, which he copied from his master. No one could be more zealous in the service of the King, and for the glory of La Vendee, than was Jacques Chapeau. Jacques had been in Paris with his master, and finding that all his fellow-servants in the metropolis were admirers of the revolution, he had himself acquired a strong revolutionary tendency. His party in Paris had been the extreme Ultra-Democrats: he had been five or six times at the Jacobins, three or four times at the Cordeliers; he had learnt to look on a lamp-rope as the proper destination of an aristocrat, and considered himself equal to anybody, bu his master, and his master's friends. On Henri's return to La Vendee, he had imbued himself with a high tone of loyalty, without any difficulty or constraint on his feelings; indeed, he was probably unaware that he had changed his party: he had an appet.i.te for strong politics, was devotedly attached to his master, and had no prudential misgivings whatsoever. He had already been present at one or two affairs in which his party had been victorious, and war seemed to him twice more exciting, twice more delightful than the French Opera, or even the Jacobin Clubs.

Jacques Chapeau was about five years older than his master, and was as active and well made a little Frenchman, as ever danced all night at a ball outside the barriers of Paris. He was a light-hearted and kind-hearted creature, although he always considered it necessary to have mortal enemies--horrid, blasphemous, blood-thirsty fellows, men devoid of feeling, without faith, hope, or charity, who would willingly slaughter women and children for the mere pleasure of doing so. Such, in Chapeau's imagination, were all his enemies--such had been the aristocrats during the time of his revolutionary fervour--such now were the republicans. Chapeau loved his own side truly and faithfully, without any admixture of self in his calculations, but I certainly cannot say for him that he was a good Christian, for all the clergymen in Anjou could not have taught him to love his enemies.

On a beautiful summer's morning, on the 2nd of June, this remarkable recruiting party rode from Durbelliere to the little village of Echanbroignes; the distance was about four leagues, and their road lay, the whole way, through the sweet green leafy lanes of the Bocage. The aspect of this province is very singular, and in summer most refreshing.

The country is divided into small farms, which are almost entirely occupied with pasture; the farms are again divided into small fields, and each field is surrounded by a belt of trees, growing out of high, green, flowering hedges. The face of the country is like a thickly wooded demesne, divided and subdivided into an infinity of little paddocks. The narrow lanes of the country, which are barely broad enough for the wheels of a carriage, and are seldom visited by such a vehicle, lie between thick, high hedges, which completely overshadow them; the wayfarer, therefore, never has before him that long, straight, tedious, unsightly line of road, which adds so greatly to the fatigue of travelling in an open country, and is so painful to the eye.

Through such a lane as this our party rode quickly and cheerily; quickly, for they had much work before them for that day; and cheerily, for they knew that the people among whom they were going would join them with enthusiasm. They were all well mounted, for they rode the best horses from the stables of Durbelliere: the old Marquis would have blushed to have given less than the best to the service of his King.

Chapeau was peculiarly elated at the prospect of his day's work; but his joy was not wholly professional; for Jacques now accounted himself a soldier by profession. He had another reason for the more than ordinary gaiety with which he trotted on towards Echanbroignes. There was there a certain smith, named Michael Stein, who had two stalwart sons, whom Jacques burnt to enrol in his loyal band of warriors; this smith had also one daughter, Annot Stein, who, in the eyes of Jacques Chapeau, combined every female charm; she was young and rosy; she had soft hair and bright eyes; she could dance all night, and was known to possess in her on right some mysterious little fortune, left to her by n.o.body knew what grandfather or grandmother, and amounting, so said report, to the comfortable sum of five hundred francs. When Chapeau had risen to some high military position, a field-marshal's baton, or the gold-laced cap of a serjeant-major, with whom could he share his honours better than with his dear little friend, Annot Stein? Jacques wanted her advice upon this subject, and he therefore rejoiced greatly that the path of duty was leading him this morning to Echanbroignes.

"We may be sure, Father Jerome," said Henri, "of those men from St.

Michael?"

"Of every man. You will find there will not be a defaulter."

"G.o.d send it; one traitor makes many, as sheep follow each other through a hedge row."

"Do not fear them, my son. Father Francois has the list of them; he will have every man collected by daylight on the 7th, and he will come on with them himself as far as the cross-roads; they will there meet my own children from St. Laud."

"There were to be one hundred and seventy-five from St. Michael."

"Yes; and one hundred and forty from St. Laud; and thirty will have joined us from Pet.i.t Ange de Poitou before we reach the turn from St.

Michael."

"And have you positively determined you will start with them from St.

Laud's yourself, Father Jerome."

"With G.o.d's will, my son, I most a.s.suredly shall do so; and from that to the walls of Saumur, they shall see before them my tattered Cure's frock, and the blessed symbol of their hope. I will carry the cross before them from the porch of the little church which shall once more be my own, till I plant it on the citadel of Saumur beside the standard of the King."

"Oh! if we had a few more Father Jeromes!" said Henri.

"There might perhaps be more soldiers in La Vendee than at present; but perhaps also there would be fewer Christians," said the priest. "May G.o.d forgive me if, in my zeal for my King, I am too remiss in His service."

They rode on a little way in silence, for Father Jerome felt a slight qualm of conscience at his warlike proceedings, and Henri did not like to interrupt his meditations; but the Cure soon recovered himself.

"I shall have a goodly a.s.semblage of followers," said he, "before I reach Coron. Those from Echanbroignes will join us half-a-mile from the town. There will be above two hundred from Echanbroignes."

"Will there? So many as that, think you?"