‘I only said I should like to see them under arms,’ stammered he, in the confusion of one who saw himself exposed to public obloquy.
This half-apology came too late—-the mischief was done! and we shunned each other like men who were afraid to read the accusation of even a shrewd glance. As for myself, I can compare my feelings only to those of the worthy alderman, who broke out into a paroxysm of grief on hearing that Robinson Crusoe was a fiction. I believe, on that sudden revulsion of feeling, I could have discredited any and everything. If there was no Army of the North, was I quite sure that there was any expedition at all? Were the generals mere freebooters, the chiefs of a marauding venture? Were the patriots anything but a disorderly rabble eager for robbery and bloodshed? Was Irish Independence a mere phantom? Such were among the shocking terrors that came across my mind as I sat in my quarters, far too dispirited and depressed to mix among my comrades.
It had been a day of fatiguing duty, and I was not sorry, as night fell, that I might betake myself to bed, to forget, if it might be, the torturing doubts that troubled me. Suddenly I heard a heavy foot upon the stair, and an orderly entered with a command for me to repair to the headquarters of the general at once. Never did the call of duty summon me less willing, never found me so totally disinclined to obey. I was weary and fatigued; but worse, than this, I was out of temper with myself, the service, and the whole world. Had I heard that the Royal forces were approaching, I was exactly in the humour to have dashed into the thick of them, and sold my life as dearly as I could, out of desperation.
Discipline is a powerful antagonist to a man’s caprices, for with all my irritability and discontent I arose, and resuming my uniform, set out for General Humbert’s quarters. I followed ‘the orderly,’ as he led the way through many a dark street and crooked alley till we reached the square. There, too, all was in darkness, save at the mainguard, where, as usual, the five windows of the first storey were a blaze of light, and the sounds of mirth and revelry, the nightly orgies of our officers, were ringing out in the stillness of the quiet hour. The wild chorus of a soldier-song, with its rataplan accompaniment of knuckles on the table, echoed through the square, and smote upon my ear with anything but a congenial sense of pleasure.
In my heart I thought them a senseless, soulless crew, that could give themselves to dissipation and excess on the very eve, as it were, of our defeat, and with hasty steps I turned away into the side-street, where a large lamp, the only light to be seen, proclaimed General Humbert’s quarters.
A bustle and stir, very unusual at this late hour, pervaded the passages and stairs, and it was some time before I could find one of the staff to announce my arrival, which at last was done somewhat unceremoniously, as an officer hurried me through a large chamber crowded with the staff into an inner room, where, on a small field-bed, lay General Humbert, without coat or boots, a much-worn scarlet cloak thrown half over him, and a black handkerchief tied round his head. I had scarcely seen him since our landing, and I could with difficulty recognise the burly, high-complexioned soldier of a few days back, in the worn and haggard features of the sick man before me. An attack of ague, which he had originally contracted in Holland, had relapsed upon him, and he was now suffering all the lassitude and sickness of that most depressing of all maladies.
Maps, books, plans, and sketches of various kinds scattered the bed, the table, and even the floor around him; but his attitude as I entered betrayed the exhaustion of one who could labour no longer, and whose worn-out faculties demanded rest. He lay flat on his back, his arms straight down beside him, and with half-closed eyes, seemed as though falling off to sleep.
His first aide-de-camp, Merochamp, was standing with his back to a small turf fire, and made a sign to us to be still, and make no noise as we came in.
‘He ‘s sleeping,’ said he; ‘it ‘s the first time he has closed his eyes for ten days.’
We stood for a moment uncertain, and were about to retrace our steps, when Humbert said, in a low, weak voice—