Mrs. D. "thinks she'll go mad!" If she means it in earnest, this is as cheap a place to do it in as any I know. We are only to pay two pounds a week each, and I suppose whether we preserve our senses or not makes no difference in the expense! This would sound very unfeelingly, Tom, but that you are well aware of Mrs. D. 's system, and that she gives notice of a motion without any intention of going to a debate, much less of pressing for a "division." Mary Anne is very urgent that I should see her mother, but I am not quite equal to it yet Maybe after visiting the fortress to-morrow I'll be in a more martial mood; and now here's dinner, and a most savory odor preludes it.
Tuesday.
This must go as it is, Tom,—I 'm dead beat! That old veteran would n't let me off a casemate nor a bomb-proof, and I have walked twenty miles this blessed morning! Nor is that all; but I have handled shot, lifted cannon-balls, adjusted mortars, and peeped out of embrasures, till my back is half broken with straining and fatigue. Just to judge from what I 'm suffering, a siege must be a dreadful thing! He says be showed me everything; and, upon my conscience, I can well believe it! There was a great deal of it, too, that I saw in the dark, for there was no end of galleries without a single loophole, and many of the passages seemed only four feet high; for, though a short man, I had to stoop. I ought to have a great deal to say about this place, if I could remember it, or if I could be sure it would interest you. It appears that Rastadt is built upon an entirely new principle, quite distinct from any hitherto in use. It must be attacked en ricochet, and not directly; a hint, I suppose, they stole from our common law, where they fire into you, by pretending to assail John Doe or Richard Roe. The Commandant sneered at the old system, but I 'd rather trust myself in Gibraltar, notwithstanding all he said. It stands to reason, Tom, that if you are up in a window you have a great advantage over a fellow down in the street. Now, all these modern fortresses are what is called "à fleur d'eau" quite level, and not raised in the least over the attacking force. Put me up high, say I; if on a parapet, so much the better; and besides, Tom, nothing gives a man such coolness as to know that he is all as one as out of danger! Of course, I did n't make this remark to the Commandant, because in talking with military people it is good tact always to assume that being shot at is rather pleasant than otherwise; and so I have observed that they themselves generally make use of some jocular phrase or other to express being killed and wounded; "he was knocked over," "he got an ugly poke," being the more popular mode of recording what finished a man's existence, or made the remainder of it miserable.
Soldiering has always struck me as an insupportable line of life. I have no objection in the world to fight the man who has injured me, nor to give satisfaction where I have been the offender; but to go patiently to work to learn how to destroy somebody I never saw and never heard of, does seem absurd and unchristianlike altogether. You say, "He is the enemy of my country, and, consequently, mine." Let me see that; let me be sure of it. If he invades us, I know that he is an enemy; but if he is only occupied about his own affairs,—if he is simply hunting out a nest of old squatters that he is tired of,—if he is merely changing the sign of his house, and instead of the "Lily" prefers to live under the "Cock," or maybe the "Drone-bee," what have I to say to that? So long as he stays at home, and only "gets drunk on the premises," I have no right to meddle with him. It's all very well to say that nobody likes to have a disorderly house in his neighborhood. Very true; but you ought n't to go in and murder the residents to keep them quiet. There 's the mail gone by, and I have forgotten to send this off. It's a wonderful thing how living in Germany makes a man long-winded and tiresome. It must be the air, at least with me, or the cookery, for I am perfectly innocent of the language. The "mysterious gutturals," as Macaulay calls them, will ever be mysteries to me! At all events, to prevent further indiscretions, I 'll close this and seal it now. And so, with my sincere regards, believe me, dear Tom, ever yours,
Kenny I. Dodd.
Address me, "Golden Ox,"—I mean at the sign of,—Rastadt, for you 're sure of finding me here for the next four weeks at least.
LETTER XXXV. MARY ANNE DODD TO MISS DOOLAN, OF BALLYDOOLAN
"The Golden Ox," Rastadt.
My dearest kitty,—I have only time for a few and very hurried lines, written with trembling fingers and a heart audible in its palpitations! Yes, dearest, an eventful moment has arrived,—the dread instant has come, on which my whole future destiny must depend. It was last night, just as I was making papa's tea, that a servant arrived on horseback at the inn with a letter addressed to the Right Honorable and Reverend the Lord Dodd de Dodsborough. This, of course, could only mean papa, and so he opened and read it, for it was in English, dearest, or at least in imitation of that language.