The Actress in High Life Part 24

"That was the t.i.tle of the Spanish duke, who died lately in London,"

Lady Mabel remarked.

"And in one sense the most unfortunate Spaniard of our day," added L'Isle. "Of the highest rank among subjects, uniting in his person names famous in Spanish history; he was brave and patriotic, and though still young, one of the few Spanish leaders whose enterprize did not lead to disaster. But the Supreme Junta, in its jealousy would never entrust him with any but subordinate commands, subjecting him to the orders of Castanos Cuesta, and other inefficient leaders whose blunders his good conduct often covered. When, at length Andalusia was lost by the folly and cowardice of others, he only had his wits about him, and by a speedy march saved Cadiz. The rabid democrats of the city repaid him with ingrat.i.tude and insults, which drove him into exile; and, denied the privilege of falling in defence of his country, he died broken-hearted in a foreign land."

"Are these people worth fighting for?" exclaimed Lady Mabel, indignantly, reining back her horse, as if about to abandon her Spanish allies to their own folly.

"Perhaps not," said L'Isle, "if we were not also fighting for ourselves. Spain is a convenient field on which to drub the French. But it is time to follow our party."

They now left the hill and getting back into the road, galloped after their friends, but did not overtake them until they had reached the little river Cayo, which here divides Portugal from Spain. The ladies, on their mules, were grouped together in doubt and hesitation on this bank, while several of the gentlemen were riding about in the water, searching for holes in the bed of the stream, which was swollen and turbid from the late rains.

"You hesitate too long to pa.s.s the Rubicon," said Lady Mabel, "just let me tuck up the skirt of my riding dress, from the muddy waters, and I will lead you over into Spain."

She was soon on the other bank, and her companions followed her. The road now led them across a sandy plain, which, treeless and desolate, contrasted strikingly with the fertility and cultivation around Elvas.

Looking at the fortress they were approaching, L'Isle remarked: "From the times of Saguntum, Numantia, and Astapa, Spain has been noted for cities that perished utterly rather than yield in submission to their foes--Zaragoza, Gerona, and other places have in our day maintained the old national fame. But Badajoz," he added, shaking his finger at the towers before him, "is not one of them. It cannot be denied that in this struggle the Spaniards have proved themselves a nation. 'Every Spaniard remembers that his country was once great, and is familiar with the names of its heroes; speaks with enthusiasm of the Cid, of Ferdinand Cortes, and a host of others.' When the hour of trial come, 'the nation instinctively felt,' to use the language of one of their own _juntas_, that 'there is a kind of peace more fatal than the field of battle drenched with blood, and strewed with the bodies of the slain.' The patriotic fire may have flamed the higher for the holy oil of superst.i.tion poured upon it, but it was kindled by n.o.ble pride and generous shame and indignation, by the remembrance of what their fathers had been, and the thought of what their children were to be.'"

"In spite of the blunders, disasters, and treachery that have been rife in the land," said Lady Mabel, "more than one name has been added to the list of its heroes--Palafox and the Maid of Zaragoza have won immortal fame."

"And others less famous have deserved as well," said L'Isle. "Before Augustina, this second Joan of Arc, had stepped out of her s.e.x, to display her heroism, she and others, behind the same shattered, crumbling wall, had been showing an equal heroism within their s.e.x's sphere. Women of all ranks were zealous in the patriotic cause. They formed themselves into companies, some to a.s.sist the wounded, some to carry water, wine and food to those who defended the gates. The Countess Burita raised a corps for this service. She was young, delicate and beautiful. In the midst of the most tremendous fire of shot and sh.e.l.ls, she was seen coolly attending to those occupations, which were now become her duty; nor through the whole of a two month's siege did the imminent danger, to which she incessantly exposed herself, produce the slightest apparent effect upon her; her step never faltered, her eye never quailed. What a partial thing is fame,"

he continued, "and how poor a motive to duty! The names of Palafox and Zaragoza are forever wedded. How few remember the old plebeian, _Tio Jorge_, who counseled and spurred on both governor and populace to their heroic defence!"

"When we remember all that the Spaniards have undergone in this war,"

said Lady Mabel, "we cannot but think that their atrocities in the new world have been visited on them at home."

"How far we must answer for the sins of our forefathers," said L'Isle, "is a nice question. We have some scriptural authority for a.s.serting that responsibility; and as there is no hereafter for nations, they must be punished in this world, or not at all. I would be sorry to bear my share of the penalty of all that immaculate England has done. But I do not fear the fate of Spain for England:

'That royal throne of kings, that sceptred isle, That earth of majesty, that seat of Mars, That other Eden, demi-paradise; That fortress, built by nature for herself, Against infection, and the hand of war; That happy breed of men, that little world; That precious stone set in the silver sea, Which serves it in the office of a wall, Or as a moat defensive to a house, Against the envy of less happier lands.'

England against the world!" he exclaimed breaking off his quotation, in his enthusiasm, and laying his hand on his sword.

"You are certainly a patriot," said Lady Mabel, "if any amount of national prejudice can make patriotism. But yours is very like the c.o.c.kney's, who despised all the world, beyond the sound of Bow bells.

As to the fortress isle. (_Let me warn you to keep it well garrisoned against surprise_.) I believe there is an obscure little corner of it called Scotland, which both you and the poet have forgotten."

"I merely used _England_ in a figure of speech," said L'Isle, "putting a part for the whole."

"I will not tolerate your figure of speech, as disparaging to old Scotland," she said. "But for us Scots--"

"Us Scots!" L'Isle exclaimed. "Why, it was but yesterday you told me how much you had angered Moodie by calling yourself an English woman."

"What of that? I would have you know that I have two sides to my natural character. I claim the right to present my Scotch or English side at will, and then you cannot see the other."

Fort San Christoval, on this side of the Guadiana, rose higher and higher before them. Gazing on Badajoz and its castle on the other side of the river, L'Isle thought of the failures before it, and of the price in blood at which it had been bought at last. "We are not always successful in our sieges--at times undertaking them rashly, without the means of carrying them on. The sabre, and bayonet, unaided, take few walled towns. They need the help of Cranfield's art, and he cannot work without his tools."

"But we always beat the French in the field," said Lady Mabel.

"Always," said L'Isle. "There has been no instance of a real British army being beaten by a French one."

"None of late years," said Lady Mabel. "To find a victory over us they have to go as far back in the last century as Fontenoy."

"That is not a fair instance," said L'Isle eagerly. "We lost that battle chiefly through the backwardness of our Dutch allies; and Marshal Saxe, who was no Frenchman, but a German, beat us chiefly by aid of the valor of the Irish regiments in the French pay."

"That alters the case," said Lady Mabel; "but were we not beaten some years before that, at Almansa, here in Spain?"

"That instance is still more unfair," exclaimed L'Isle. "Our Peninsular allies ran away, while we fought their battle. Still, though the enemy were two to our one, the result might have been different. But the French had an English general, the Duke of Berwick, to win the battle for them, and we had a French commander, DeRuvigny, whom Dutch William had made Earl of Galway, to lose it for us."

"Then, after all," exclaimed Lady Mabel, "the Englishman won the field."

"Yes, to our cost," said L'Isle, bitterly. "What made it more provoking was, that we had at that very time the man to mate him;"

and, standing up on his stirrups, he raised his clenched hand above his head, exclaiming: "O, for one hour of Peterborough to grapple with his countryman and redeem the day!"

"What is the matter with Colonel L'Isle?" asked Mrs. Shortridge, who was riding close behind with Cranfield.

"He is only leaping back to the beginning of the last century,"

answered Lady Mabel, "to reverse the issue of the battle of Almansa."

"Why, has not the colonel fighting enough before him," said Cranfield, laughing, "that he must go back so far for more?"

"Let us be content with what we have," said L'Isle joining in the laugh. "It is useless to dwell on old disasters but by way of shunning new ones. It has been our constant luck to go into battle shoulder to shoulder with allies who, except when in our pay, seldom stand by us to the end of the day."

The river was now at hand. Turning to the right before reaching San Christoval, they entered the _tete du pont_, and soon found themselves on a n.o.ble granite bridge of many arches. The voices of many singers drew their eyes to the banks of the river, where they saw all the washerwomen of the city, collected in pursuit of their calling, and lightening their labors with song, the burden of which, "Guadiana, Guadiana," fell often on the ear, while the sun-beams bleached the linen spread out on the banks of the stream, and tanned the faces of the industrious choir chanting its praise.

"This, then, is the Guadiana!" said Lady Mabel, peeping over the parapet. "I feel bound to admire its broad face, but miss the swift current and pellucid waters of the poetasters, to whose bounties the river G.o.d owes much of his fame."

"While you and our party loiter here, searching out the beauties of the Guadiana," said L'Isle, "I will ride on and secure our peaceful reception at the gate. A Spanish sentinel is often asleep, and apt to prove his vigilance by firing on whoever wakes him up."

Presently following L'Isle, who luckily found the sentinel awake, they reached the southern end of the bridge, and pa.s.sing between two beautiful round towers of white marble, now tinted straw-color with age, they entered the northern gate of the city, and soon sought hospitality at the _Posada de los Caballeros_.

Putting up their horses here, they left the servants to see that a dinner was got ready; this meal, at a Spanish inn, depending less on what you find there than on what you bring with you. Three Spanish officers were lounging at the posada, one of whom immediately claimed Cranfield's acquaintance, and introduced his companions. Cranfield did not seem delighted to meet with him, nevertheless he presented them to the whole party with studied politeness. Captain Don Alonzo Melendez, with a handsome person, a swaggering air, and a costume more foppish than military, looked more like a _majo_ of Seville than a soldier and a gentleman. His companions had much the advantage of him there, but he beat them hollow in a.s.surance. Learning that curiosity alone had brought them to Badajoz, he at once took the post of guide. Finding that Lady Mabel knew enough of Spanish to make a good listener, he placed himself by her side. Cranfield escorted her on the other, and thus they walked forth. L'Isle, thrust into the background, accompanied Mrs. Shortridge and the rest of the party.

As they drew near the works, many marks of injury and devastation on the adjacent houses, brought the late siege prominently to their minds. Don Alonzo Melendez at once began to discourse grandiloquently on the subject. His narrative was so copious and inaccurate, that Cranfield soon lost all patience, and found it hard to keep from interrupting and contradicting him. Lady Mabel, detecting this, encouraged the Spaniard to the uttermost by displaying rapt attention, and full faith in his glowing narrative.

"I never before heard," said she to Cranfield, "so graphic an account of the siege and storming of Badajoz."

"If our friend here talks about it much longer," said Cranfield, in English, "he will forget that we had any thing to do with it. The siege was, however, in one sense, the work of the Spaniards. If the traitor Imaz had not sold it to Soult for a mule load of gold, we would not have had to buy it back at the cost of so many thousands of lives. Nor were any of them Spanish lives," he added bitterly; "though some were Portuguese--for the only Spaniards at the siege were the renegades who aided Philippon and his Frenchman to keep us out."

"Every Spaniard is not traitor or coward," said L'Isle from behind. "If the brave Governor Menacho had not been killed in defending the place, his successor Imaz could not have sold it a few days after to the French."

As they strolled along the ramparts, Don Alonso, with a strange forgetfulness of events within the year, lauded the impregnable strength of the works, as if Badajoz were still a virgin fortress.

Cranfield, by way of rebuking him, pointed out to Lady Mabel the restorations he had made of the breached walls. She replied that "the patchwork character of his repairs were but too evident, as he had invariably omitted to use materials of the same color with the original works."

As they rambled through the city, Don Alonso failed not to point out the superior size and style of the buildings over those of Elvas, and Lady Mabel remarked that "in cleanliness, too, it far surpa.s.sed its neighbor." Leading them to the cathedral, their guide compelled them to inspect minutely this heavy and c.u.mberous building, while he eulogized it in terms that might have been suitable to St. Peter's, at Rome. "I am sorry," said he, "you cannot see it in all its splendor; but the gorgeous furniture of the altar and the rich ornaments of the shrines are not now exhibited."

"Why not?" asked Lady Mabel.

"In these troubled, sacrilegious times, the clergy think it best not to display the wealth of the church."

"They would find it difficult to display any thing but tinsel," said Cranfield. "It is two years since the golden crucifix, the silver candlestick, and the saintly jewelry, mounted on horseback and traveled into France."