“AUVERGNE SANS TACHE”—AUVERGNE WITHOUT A STAIN
This motto a part of the French soldiers bore proudly wherever they went. They carried it out of France with shoutings, and trailed it across the sea. They bore it into Newport amid booming guns, and to Lebanon amid the shouts of the heroic farmers. They planted it on Lebanon green. It should be put to-day among the mottoes of schools for Flag days and Independence days.
That day of review—it may well rise again in our fancy!
Spring is in the air. The birds in the woods are appearing again. There is new light and odors in the cedars.
The French heroes of Auvergne, the mountaineers, whose aid Lafayette had sought, assembled on the green. On one side of the green was the tavern, and on the other side rose the country village church. The hills everywhere were renewing their circle of green.
Rochambeau was there with the escutcheon. The Marquis de Chastellux was probably there—a man of genius, who wielded the pen of a painter. The gay, and perhaps profane, Duke de Lauzun was there—he who laughed at the Governor’s prayers at the table, and who died many years afterward on the guillotine. Men were there who had sought the animal delights of the glittering palaces of Versailles, Marley, and Saint Cloud. The heroes were there whose descendants made France a republic.
The sun rose high on the glittering hills. The bugles sounded again, horses neighed and pranced, uniforms glittered, and the band filled the air with choral strains.
The simple country folks gathered about the green, bringing “training-day” ginger-bread, women with knitted hoods, boys and girls in homespun.
The cedar of Lebanon was there—Governor Trumbull—and his wife, also, more noble than most of the stately dames of Trianon.
The American flag arose, and was hailed as the flag of the future.
A shout for honor went up in which all joined. The hearts of the French heroes and American heroes were one. Honor and liberty was the sentiment that ruled the hour, and here the pioneers of liberty of the two republics of the future clasped hands.
A glorious day, indeed, was that! Keep it in eternal memory, O Lebanon hills! Make your old graves a place of pilgrimages. Sons of the Revolution, have you ever visited Lebanon?
There came an August night, misty and still. A cloud covered the hills, and seemed to fall down like a lake on the cedar swamp. The few distant stars went out.
It lightened—“heat lightning,” as the lightning without thunder was called in the old New England villages.
The turnpike road was silent. There were no sounds of night-birds in the deep cedar swamps.
Peter, the shepherd-boy, stood behind his window light in silence under a cedar that spread itself like a tent. The tree gathered mist and shed it like rain. He had put a mask in the window, for fear of a shot, in case of danger.
“Nothing to-night,” he said.
But what was that?
A dead twig of a tree broke under a foot.
He started and moved behind the window toward the highway.
Another twig snapped.
“Who goes there?” he called.
“A friend.”
“Give the countersign.”
“Groton,” said the voice.
“Wrong,” said the lad. “Follow the window, but keep at a distance, for you are my prisoner.”
It lightened. The lad saw the man, and that he was no ordinary traveler.
The lad moved back. The traveler followed, and presently said:
“Hello! where am I?”
“A prisoner; follow me.”
“But the house moves.”
“Follow me—you are in my power.”
It lightened again.
The flash disclosed that the traveler had drawn a pistol.
“It is useless for you to use weapons,” said Peter; “you are in my power.”
There was a crack in the air. A pistol-shot struck the mask in the window and broke it. Then all was darkness and silence.
“Follow me,” said the lad. “Your shot was vain. You are a traitor, and you are in my power. I could take your life in a minute. Follow me.”
“But your house moves,” said the man in a voice that trembled.
He may have had a brave heart, but few brave men at that time were proof against the terrors of superstition. The man evidently believed that he was in the power of some evil spirit.
There was another lightning flash. The man had turned.
“Follow me,” said the lad, “or you are a dead man.”
“Will you spare me if I will follow?” asked the adventurer.
“Follow me until I tell you to stop, and I will be your friend if you speak fair.”
The steps followed the moving window at a distance. Suddenly they went down, and there arose a cry as of a penned animal. The man had fallen into a cave.
The moving window went up the hill in sight of the alarm-post, and then the light went out.
Peter went down in the darkness to the rescue of the fallen stranger.
“Where am I?” asked the stranger.
“In the cave.”
“In the cave of the magazine?”
The stranger had asked the question in an unguarded moment of terror.
“You are a spy, and were seeking for the magazines,” said the boy. “I know your heart. Let me help you out, and come with me to the shelter of the cedars.”
Peter took the stranger’s hand, and led him by flashes of lightning to a covert under the cedars. Some crows cawed in the darkness above.
The two sat down.
“You are in my power,” said Peter.
“Then you must be the Evil One. Why am I in your power more than you in mine? Do you live in a house that travels? Where has your house gone?”
“Tell me, now, who you are,” said Peter.
“I am a traveler.”
“Why did you give me a false countersign?”
“To put you off so that I might go on.”
“Who are you seeking?”
“I was going to the war office.”
“For what?”
“To see the Governor.”
“But why did you say ‘magazine’?”
“I deal in saltpeter.”
The clouds were lifting. The great cedars seemed to shudder now and then as a faint breeze stole through them. Then the full moon rolled out. The crows flapped away from the place when they heard voices.
“Let us go,” said the man. “For what are you waiting?”
There was a sound of horses’ feet. Dennis had seen the signal.
“Who is coming?” asked the man.
“The guard.”
“So you have entrapped me. Where is the house?”
“There was none.”
Dennis and two men rode up.
“This man,” said Peter, “is a spy; he has given a false countersign, and is looking for magazines.”
“Who are you?” demanded Dennis, with a leveled musket.
“I am your prisoner,” said the man, “and more is the pity. I have been tricked. I followed a window; it is gone.”
“Stranger, no trifling,” said Dennis. “What brought you here? If you will tell me the truth, I will befriend you as far as I can. But listen: you have no hope of anything outside of my friendly heart, and I am one of the guard of the first of patriots in the land. I am an Irishman, but I am loyal to America. Tell me the truth—what brought you here?”
“You speak true when you say that I have no hope but in your heart, and I am inclined to tell you all.”
Dennis and the two men whom he had brought with him dismounted, and sat down under the cedars, through which the moon shone.
“I was led here through the suggestion of a bad example. We are led by the imagination. Imagination follows suggestion. Benedict Arnold went over to the cause of the King, and he is a power now. I once served under Arnold. It was in the northern campaign. I will acknowledge all. I am seeking to do him a service—to find out where your powder magazines are stored. Arnold will soon be thundering off this coast!”
Dennis started.
“What! in Connecticut?”
“Yes, in Connecticut.”
“Among his own kin?”
“Among his own kin.”
“Black must be the heart of a man that would fall upon his own neighborhood. Such a heart must be born wrong. They say that he liked to torture animals when he was a boy. Man, what do you know? Remember the fate of André.”
The man suddenly recollected it. He began to shake, for with the rising of the moon and the clearing of the air it was cool.
“I know not where I am,” said he. “Everything is strange. But let me talk to you in confidence.
“I have money.”
He took out a purse, and jingled some coin.
“Let me go and I will pay you. Here, take this.” He extended the purse toward Dennis. “Let me go back and you shall have it all.”
“Man,” said Dennis, “André offered gold to his captors, and tried to bribe them to let him go. Put up thy gold. There is money that does not enrich. I would not betray the cause of liberty in America and the great heart of Jonathan Trumbull for all the gold of Peru. Tell me now your whole heart, or I take you to the alarm-post, to be shot as a spy.”
The man shook.
“Well, here is my confession. I hoped to find the secret places of the magazines where the powder that supplies the army is hidden, and to report to Arnold. This is the whole truth. I am sorry for what I planned. I would not do so again. Now I ask your mercy.”
“To Arnold, did you say? Where did you expect to meet Arnold?”
“On the coast—it might be at New London or Groton.”
“When?”
“Soon.”
“Soon, soon. Peter, set the beacon on the hill!”
The boy ran; a light streamed up. Dennis hurried with his prisoner to the alarm-post.
The prisoner knew not what to make of that night when windows moved and a shot that shattered a head did not kill, and the heavens flamed before the nimble feet of a boy.
Had he been drawn into a witch’s cave? What had led him to disclose the secret? He thought of André, and when he was led into the guard-house he sat down, wondered, and wept.
But he hoped Dennis, his captor, had a human heart. Was he a second André?
Dennis went to the guard-house the next day to visit a new prisoner. The suggestions that the latter made were most alarming.
If Benedict Arnold was to make attack along the coast his object was to divide the American army, which was now moving south for the great Virginia campaign against Cornwallis.
“It would be like the British to strike us now upon the coast,” said the Governor, “but he would be more than a traitor who would slaughter his own kin on the soil where he was born and bred.”
The man gave his name as Ayre; probably from the suggestion of the name of the British colonel who was under Arnold.
He was despondent, and sat in the guard-house with drooping head.
“Of what are you thinking?” asked Dennis. “You may give me your thoughts with safety. The Governor is the soul of honor, and he will not cause me to violate the spirit of my promise that I have made.”
“I am thinking of the moment when the captors of André said to him, ‘We must take off your boots.’”
For in the boots of the unfortunate officer were the despatches from Arnold offering to treacherously surrender West Point.
“That moment must have stricken terror to André’s heart,” said the man. “Then it was that he saw the whole of life. Your Governor seems to be a very kind-hearted man—the people love him. I am sorry that I ever had evil thoughts of him. But, my friend, send me away; for should a fleet descend upon the coast, the hatred of all these people will fall upon me. The man who suggests an evil that comes is held in detestation. I would not be safe here.”
“You are right, and you shall be sent to Boston.”
It was in the air that the Connecticut coast was to be attacked again. Connecticut must be defended by her own people, should it come, for it would not do to divide the American army in its great movement to crush the main army of the British of the south.
“I will send you, with the Governor’s approval, to Fort Trumbull, at New London, and I will accompany you there myself,” decided Dennis.
It was the 6th of November when the two set out on horseback for New London and Groton—a bright, glimmering day, the wayside bordered with goldenrod. The meadows were clouded with the aftermath and webby wild grasses, and seemed to sing with insects.
Boom!
What was that?
Boom! Boom!
“There is a cannonade going on at New London,” said Dennis.
They hurried on.
The air thundered.
“It is Arnold!” said the prisoner.
As they passed down their way amid cidery orchards, they began to meet people flying with terror.
“What has happened?” asked Dennis.
“Arnold!” was the answer of one. “He is burning everything—the streets that he trod in his boyhood, the very houses that sheltered him. He is standing on the hill, glass in hand, gloating in the power to kill his own neighbors’ sons. Oh, is it possible that one should come to kill his own!”
As they went on, the cannonading grew louder and the roads presented a scene such as had hardly ever been witnessed in America before.
The people were flying with their goods: women on beds on the backs of horses; old women driving cows before them; boys with sheep; men in carts, with valuables; dogs who had lost their masters.
They met one scene that was indeed pitiful. It was a man hurrying with the coffin of a child on his back toward the burying-ground. He must bury the little one as he fled.
The farmhouses were full of people with white faces, people who crowded upon each other.
It was a terrible story that they had to tell. Arnold had surprised New London by the sea, and had burned down every house, even the houses that sheltered him in his boyhood.
But the destruction of New London was a light event compared to the horrors of Groton, across the river.
They found that Colonel Ayre had attacked Fort Griswold, and was slaughtering the men after they had surrendered. Arnold had sent a messenger to arrest this slaughter, but the latter had arrived too late. The garrison had refused to surrender. When, at last, they were compelled to yield, they were put to the sword without mercy, and the wounded were killed, and even the dead were maltreated. The men under Colonel Ayre had become human fiends. They had gone mad with the passion for killing.
One of the British officers ran from place to place to restrain the soldiers.
“Stop! stop!” said he. “In the name of heaven, I say stop—I can not endure it!”
But the work of killing went on, and of killing the wounded and stabbing the dead.
Night fell. The British set a bomb to the magazine and passed up the river, expecting to see a terrible explosion that would fire the heavens. But the explosion did not come. A brave band of Americans had extinguished the fuse.
“There is no Fort Trumbull to which I can take you now,” said Dennis to his prisoner. “You may go to your own.”
“Then I will return with you, and you will never find a heart more true to your Governor than mine will be. Christ forgave Peter, and was not Peter true? Our truest friends are those whom we forgive. To know all is to forgive all. I know your Governor now. I once hated him; he is led by the spirit of the living God, and I would die for a man like that. It is better to change the heart of an enemy than to kill him. Let me follow you back, and the people will receive my repentance even at this awful hour.”
Dennis, through fear of his safety, left him outside of Lebanon at a farmhouse, but when he had told his tale to the people, they said:
“Bring him back; he is another man now.”
CHAPTER XIV
A DAUGHTER OF THE PILGRIMS
It was past midsummer—the shadow of change was in the year. The birds were gathering in flocks in the rowened meadows, and the woods were displaying their purple grapes and first red leaves.
Rochambeau had been receiving the hospitalities of the Governor, and had also received lessons in the new school of liberty from Faith Robinson Trumbull, the wife of the Governor. The hero of Minden had come to see this grand woman, and wished to make her a present before he marched on to join the army of Washington against Clinton, with his six thousand heroes.
What should his present to this noble woman be?
He had among his effects a scarlet cloak. It was suitable for a woman or for a man. It covered the whole form, and made the wearer conspicuous, for it was made of fine fabric, and represented the habit of the battle-field.
He took the cloak out of his treasures one evening and came down into the public room of the forest inn, where some of the French officers of the regiment of Auvergne sans tache were seated in a merry mood before the newly kindled fire.
He held up the scarlet cloak. “Here,” said he, “is a garment to be worn after the war for liberty is over. A field-marshal might wear it after the day of victory. This war will soon end; I am going to present this cloak to one of the most patriotic souls that I have ever met. Who do you think it is?”
“The Governor,” said an officer, a colonel; “Washington’s own ‘Brother Jonathan.’ He has made himself poor by the war, but has been the inspiration of every battle-field, so they say. Well, you do well to honor the rustic Governor. The world is richer for him. That is a good thought, General. You honor the soldiers of Auvergne sans tache.”
The General, the hero of Lafeldt, held up the cloak before the cooling summer fire. A soldier turned a burning stick with iron tongs, and flames with sparks like a little volcano shot up and threw a red gleam on the scarlet cloak with its gold thread.
“You have made a wrong guess, Colonel,” said Rochambeau. “This cloak is for Madam Faith Trumbull, who has the blood of Robinson of Leyden in her veins, and who is the very spirit of liberty.”
Immediately the officers leaped to their feet.
“Cheers!” said the Colonel. “Cheers for Madam Faith—may she soon wear the cloak—after the war!”
The soldiers of Auvergne sans tache were chivalrous, and they swung their arms in wheel-like circles and cheered for the wife of the self-forgetful Governor.
In the midst of this enthusiastic outpouring of feeling the Governor himself appeared in the reception-room of the forest inn with madam, smiling and stately, on his arm.
“You came at a happy moment, Governor,” said Rochambeau. “I am showing my men this scarlet cloak.”
“It is a fine garment,” said the Governor. “It were worthy of a field-marshal of France.”
“Would it be worthy of the wife of a marshal of a regiment of Auvergne sans tache?” asked the courtly Frenchman.
“It would,” said the Governor in a New England tone.
“Then it would be worthy of your wife, Governor.”
Rochambeau approached Madam Faith. “Will you allow me, madam, to honor you, if it be an honor, with the scarlet cloak? I wish you to wear it in memory of the soldiers of Auvergne, and of your humble servant, until you shall find some one who is more worthy of it—and I do not believe, madam, if you will allow me to say it, that any heart truer than yours to the principles of liberty and to all mankind beats in these provinces.”
He placed the scarlet cloak over her shoulders, and the officers shouted for madam, for the Governor, for Rochambeau, and for the soldiers of the banner of Auvergne sans tache.
How noble, indeed, Madam Faith looked as she stood there in the scarlet cloak, its gold threads glimmering in the first firelight!
Her face glowed. She tried to speak, but could only say: “My heart is full, General. But any soldier who sleeps to-night on the battle-field is nobler than I—my heart would cover him with this cloak.”
The officers shouted enthusiastically: “Auvergne!”
The Governor stood off from his wife and her dazzling garment.
“You do look real pretty, Faith—wear it in memory of the French—wear it to church—your wearing it will honor the cause, and be a service to liberty. I wish Washington could see you now.”
“I will wear it,” said Madam Faith. “My heart thanks you!” she said to Rochambeau. She began to retreat from the room, her face almost as red as the cloak, and her eyes bright with tears. “I thank you in the name of Liberty!” She moved farther away and out of the door.
“Going, Faith?” asked the Governor.
There came back a voice—“God bless you!”—the scarlet cloak had gone. She thought that it was unworthy of her to remain where she would secure homage, when the Connecticut soldiers had had scarcely clothes to wear in their march against Clinton in the midst of the poverty that had befallen the colonies during the war.
She became greatly distressed. In her enthusiasm for the French deliverers she had promised to wear the cloak until some one more worthy of it could be found, some one who needed it more.
She took off the garment in her own room and sat down. She thought of the past. She saw in her vision her godly ancestor, Robinson, addressing the Pilgrim Fathers for the last time.
“Go ye into the wilderness,” he had said, “and new light shall break out from the word. I will follow you.”
She saw in fancy the Mayflower sail away, lifting new horizons. She saw the many Pilgrims’ graves amid the May flowers after the first winter at Plymouth.
She rose and put on the cloak and stood before the glass.
“I can not wear it,” she said. “I must wear only the clothes made with my own hands, in times like these.”
She looked into the glass again.
“But my promise?” she asked. “I must keep that—I must be worthy of the confidence that these soldiers of liberty have given me. I must honor Rochambeau and the soldiers of the land of Pascal. How shall I do it? I will wear it once and then seek some one more worthy to wear it; he will not be hard to find.”
Governor Trumbull had become famous for his Fast-Day and Thanksgiving proclamations. His words in these documents had the fire of an ancient prophet.
This year his proclamation sang and rang. He called upon the people to assemble in their meeting-house, and to bring with them everything that they could spare that could be made useful to the soldiers on the battle-field and be laid upon the altar of sacrifice.
Madam Faith heard his message as the pastor read it from the tall pulpit under the sounding-board.
She thought of the scarlet cloak. She must wear it to the church on that great day to honor Rochambeau and the soldiers of Auvergne. But of what use could her garment be to the soldiers in the stress of war?
It was a bright mid-autumn day. The people were gathering on the harvest-laden plateau on Lebanon Hill. The church on the high green, founded some eighty years before, opened its doors to the sun. The yeomen gathered on its steps and looked down on the orchards and harvest fields. The men of the great farms assembled in groups about the inn and talked of the fortunes of the war. They were rugged men in homespun dress, with the purpose of the time in their faces. The women, too, were in homespun.
While groups of people were gathering here and there the door of the Governor’s plain house opened, and in it appeared Madam Faith in her scarlet cloak. All eyes were turned upon her. She stepped out on to the green. She did not look like the true daughter of the Pilgrims that she was! The gay and glittering garment did not become the serious purpose in her face.
She waited outside the door, and was soon joined by the Governor. The two approached the church under the gaze of many eyes, and entered the building, which is to-day in appearance much as it was then, and the people followed them. The chair in which Governor Trumbull sat in church is still to be seen in the old Trumbull house. A colored picture of the church as it then appeared, with its high pulpit, sounding-board and galleries, may be seen in Stuart’s “Life of Trumbull.”
A silence fell upon the assembly. The people felt that the crisis of the war had passed with the coming of Rochambeau, but the manner of the issue was yet doubtful.
The minister arose—“Be still, and know that I am the Lord.”
“God is the refuge of His saints,
Though storms of sharp distress invade;
Before they utter their complaints
Behold Him present with their aid!”
The stanza, or a like one, was sung in a firm tone, such as only times like these could inspire. The heroic quality sank into tuneful reverence with the lines:
“There is a stream whose gentle flow
Supplies the city of our God,”
or a like paraphrase. A long prayer followed; the hour-glass was turned—silence in the full pews!
The sermon followed in the silence. Then the minister made an appeal which went to every heart.
“The nation stands waiting the Divine will. We have given to the cause our sons, our harvests, the increase of our flocks. We have sent of our substance, our best, to every northern battle-field. We have seen our men go forth, and they come not back. We have seen our cattle driven away, and our cribs and cellars left empty; we have heard our Governor called a ‘brother’ by the noble Washington, and the glorious regiment of France’s honor has sung amid these cedars the songs of Auvergne.
“But the trumpets of the northern winds are sounding, and our army faces winter again, cloakless and some of them shoeless, in tatters. We are making new garments for the soldiers, but we have no red stripes to put upon them; we may not honor the noblest soldier in the world with any uniform, or insignia of his calling. He goes forth in homespun, and in homespun he faces the glittering foe, and falls. His honor is in himself, and not in his garments. He courageously goes down to the chambers of silence without stripe or star.”
At the words red stripes, all eyes, as by one impulse, turned to the scarlet cloak. It would furnish the ornament of dignity and honor to a score of uniforms.
“Women of Lebanon, you have with willing hands laid much on the altar of liberty. Under the pulpit stands a rail that guards holy things. I appeal to you once more—I hope that it may be for the last time—to spare all you can for the help and comfort of the soldier. Come up to the altar one by one and put your offerings inside of the rail, and I will lift my hands over your sacrifices in prayer and benediction.”
Silence. A few women began to remove the rings from their fingers and ears. One woman was seen to loosen her Rob Roy shawl. Two Indian girls removed strings of wampum from their necks. But no one rose. All seemed waiting.
The Governor sat in his chair, and beside him his good wife in the red Rochambeau cloak. They were in the middle aisle.
Madam Trumbull was thinking. Could she offer the scarlet garment to the cause without implying a want of gratitude toward the noble Rochambeau?
Would she not honor Rochambeau by offering the gift to the camp and battle-field?
“Stripes on the soldiers’ garments are inspirations,” she may have whispered to her husband. “I am going to give my cloak—it shall follow Rochambeau—I am going to make it live and march—he shall see it again in the lines that dare death. Shall I go to the altar?”
“Yes, go. Send your cloak to Rochambeau again. Let it move on the march. You will honor the regiment of Auvergne—Auvergne sans tache.”
She rose, almost trembling. Every eye was fixed upon her. Madam Faith was held in more than common esteem, not only because she was the wife of the Governor, but also because she was a descendant of the Prophet of the Pilgrims of Leyden and Plymouth.
She stood by the Governor’s chair, unfastening the red garment. The people saw what she was about to do. Some of them bowed their heads; some wept.
The pastor spoke: “I would that the Pilgrim, John Robinson, were here to-day!”
[Madam Faith] removed the cloak and laid it over her arm. She bent her face on the floor, and slowly walked toward the rail that guarded the sacred things of the simple altar.
The pastor lifted his hands.
“Pray ye all for the principle of the right, for the cause of the soldier of liberty.”
She [laid the scarlet cloak] on the altar, and turned to the people and lifted her eyes to God.
[Madam Faith Trumbull contributing her scarlet cloak to the soldiers of the Revolution.]
She looked like a divinity as she stood forth there that day, like a spirit that had come forth from the Mayflower.
That Thanksgiving was long remembered in Lebanon. That cloak was turned into stripes on soldiers’ uniforms and made history, and some of the uniforms bearing them are yet to be seen.
To Dennis and Peter was entrusted the sending of the new uniforms with the red stripes to the army gathering around Yorktown. The faithful Irishman and the lad rode away from the alarm-post in the cedars amid the cheers of the people. What news would they bring back when they should return?
It was an anxious time in the cedars. In the evenings the people gathered about the war office and at the Alden Inn. A stage-driver, who was a natural story-teller, used to relate curious stories at the latter place, on the red settle there, and in these silent days of moment the people hugged the fire to hear him: it was their only amusement.
One evening a country elder, who had done a noble work in his day, stopped at the tavern. This event brought the Governor over to the place, and the elder was asked to relate a story of his parish on the red settle. He had a sense of humor as keen as Peters, who was still telling strange tales in England of the people that he had found in the “new parts.”
Let us give you one of the parson’s queer stories: it pictures the times.