Ernestine received him almost with joy, and wept upon his hand; the Lutheran abbess and her ladies received him with hospitality and respect, though the good man certainly cut a very remarkable figure for a follower of St. Ignatius Loyola. He had escaped from Eckernfiörd just as he had sprung out of bed, i.e. in his shirt and drawers; and he had picked up and donned a drummer's doublet, which was covered with tawdry lace, and was too small for him. Thus his long and bony arms protruded far through the sleeves, while the short tails were dangling high up between his shoulders; and on his head was a broad plaited straw hat, such as the peasant women wore; and these garments, when his severely solemn face, and long lean figure, thrust into a pair of tight flannel drawers, are taken into account, made him much more comical than reverend in aspect. Even his own brother, the dominie, would not have recognised him. He had no sooner consoled Ernestine (who was his favourite), and recovered from his fatigue and general discomposure, than, without doffing the drummer's yellow doublet, with its tags of scarlet lace, he turned his grave grey eyes upon the Lady Fœyœ, and asked her if she was not ashamed of the frippery exhibited by the ladies of her establishment.
"I ask you, madame—for reverend mother I cannot call you—if all this pinning and unpinning, combing, and brushing, and other looking-glass work—this ado with corsets and carcanets, busks and boddices, bracelets and borders,—these partlets and friglets, kirtles and fardingales,—this concatenation of trumpery and trash, are becoming women who retire from the world as sisters of St. Knud? Alas! it was neither velvet nor satin, purple nor fine linen, that were worn in better times by the true sisters of that blessed saint, who gathered the rich harvest of conversion among the Danish isles, in those dark ages when, at the sound of his inspired voice, the vanities and atrocities of the Eleusynian rites fled and disappeared—when the fires of superstition were quenched, and the blood of the human sacrifice was dried on the stone of Odin, never to stain it more. Their garments were of sackcloth, their hoods and wimples the fruits of their own industry. But you, madame, and these around you—oh, get you gone! for all this frippery is enough to bring the vengeance of Heaven, if it does not bring the Merodeurs among you!"
He said a great deal more to the same purpose, and wound up his discourse by almost convincing the poor harmless women that they were thoroughly disreputable, and a mere society of sinners; but in the midst of his harangue Gunhilda of Rantzau whispered to Ernestine, that she was now convinced the convent was not a proper place for her, and more than ever wished that her dear Karl would come and take her away.
On questioning the Jesuit concerning the troops who had made the midnight attack on Eckernfiörd, he happened to mention to Ernestine our regiment of Strathnaver, having seen the tartans waving, and heard the pipes braying, as we defiled in close column through the main street to assail the great church. Filled by new fears and anxieties, Ernestine determined to seek the battalion, and discover me, if I had not fallen in the night attack, "which," as Father d'Eydel said, "was not improbable, for I saw the poor Scottish lads lying across each other on the causeway, like fish in a net."
Her new terrors were irrepressible. With daybreak she set out on horseback, riding on a pillion behind the priest, who was disguised as a layman, in a dress given to him by the Lady Fœyœ, who received in return a protection for all her establishment, written in strong terms, and running in the name of Count Tilly.
An hour's riding brought him and Ernestine to Eckernfiörd, where every thing bore terrible witness of the recent conflict; the burned and ruined houses; the church razed to its foundations; the streets strewed with wounded, with killed, and spotted by gouts of blood; with spent cannon-shot and exploded bombs; while the blackened wrecks of the storeship, lay half-burned and stranded on the sandy shore. Others had gone down at their anchors when the flames had reached the water edge. Thus the harbour, which yesterday had presented a fair and busy scene, was now desolate and empty, or covered with scorched timber and floating corpses.
It happened luckily that Angus Roy M'Alpine, with his company, guarded the gate which faces the road from Kiel; and he sent a Highland soldier to conduct Ernestine and the Jesuit to a house, where I and several others had been carried, for the purpose of being examined by the chirurgeon to the forces—the famous Dr. Alexander Pennicuik of that Ilk, who afterwards was chirurgeon-general to Sir John Banier in Germany.
I need not expatiate on the emotions of poor Ernestine, when she beheld me lying in a stupor of pain and exhaustion, on a little straw spread on the floor of this temporary hospital, with a plaid rolled up and placed under my head for a pillow, and a dead soldier on each side of me; for many a poor fellow expired of agony or loss of blood before their wounds could be attended to, in the bustle and excitement succeeding the desperate business of the night attack.