Followed by ours, the enemy's cavalry had retired at a gallop along the level road to Almendralejo; often they turned on the way to shout "Vive l'Empereur!" to brandish their swords, or fire a shot, which now and then stretched a British dragoon rolling in the dust. As the first brigade were returning towards Merida, a mournful episode in my narrative came under their observation,—one which calls forth all the best feelings of the soldier, when the wild excitement of the hour of conflict has passed away. Near one of those rude wooden crosses so common by the way-side in Spain, placed to mark a spot where murder has been committed, lay an English troop-horse in the agonies of death; the froth and blood, oozing from its quivering nostrils, rolled around in a puddle, while kicking faintly with its hoofs, it made deep indentations in the smooth grassy turf. Beside it lay the rider, with his glittering accoutrements scattered all about. His foot was entangled in the stirrup, by which he appeared to have been dragged a long way, as his uniform was torn to pieces, and his body was soiled with clay and dust. A carbine-shot had passed through his brain, and he was lying stark and stiff; his smart chako had rolled away, and the features of a dashing English dragoon,—the once gay Evelyn, were exposed to view. Beside the corse, weeping in speechless sorrow and agony, sat his wife,—the same interesting young lady who had that morning drank from Ronald's canteen at the fountain. Her face was ashy pale,—pale even as that of her dead soldier,—and she seemed quite unconscious of the approach of the Highlanders, who could not be restrained from making an involuntary halt. Her hat and veil had fallen off, permitting her fair curls to stream over her neck and shoulders: she uttered no sound of woe or lamentation, but sat with her husband's head resting on her lap, gazing on his face with a wild and terrible expression, while her little white hands were bedabbled with the blood which clotted his curly hair. From Merida she had seen him unhorsed, and dragged away in the stirrup by his frightened steed, which had also been wounded. With shrieks and outcries she had tracked him by the blood for two miles from the town, until the exhausted charger sunk down to die, and she found her husband thus.
Colonel Cameron, on approaching, sprang from his horse, and raised her from the ground, entreating her to return to Merida, as night was approaching; and to be left in so desolate a place, was unsafe and unadvisable. But she protested against being separated from the corpse of her husband; and, as it was impossible to leave her there, Cameron gave orders to carry Mr. Evelyn's remains to Merida. A temporary bier was made in the usual manner, by fastening a blanket to two regimental pikes: in this the dead officer was placed, and borne off by two stout Highlanders. Mrs. Evelyn mounted her Andalusian, which Evan Iverach had adroitly captured while it was grazing quietly at some distance, and Cameron, riding beside her, gallantly held her bridle rein as they proceeded towards the city. It was totally dark when the brigade, forming close column of regiments, halted in the now desolate Plaza.
The soldiers were instantly dismissed to their several billets.
That which Ronald had received was upon the hovel of a poor potter, residing near the convent of San Juan; but instead of going thither, he made straight towards the house of the old prior de Villa Franca, at the corner of the Calle de Guadiana, earnestly hoping, as he wended on his way, that it had escaped the heartless ravages he saw on every side of him.
"I will show this fiery Master Lisle of ours that I have more than one string to my bow, as well as the fickle Alice," he muttered aloud, and in a tone of gaiety which I must own he did not entirely feel.
That morning the mails had been brought up from Lisbon, and both Louis and himself had received letters from home; and Ronald concluded that there was still no letter from Alice, as Louis had, as usual, not addressed him during all that day. Old Mr. Stuart's letter was far from being a satisfactory one to his son.
"Inchavon," said he, in one part of it, "has now taken upon him the title of Lord Lysle, and has gained a great landed property in the Lothians. As these people rise, we old families seem to sink. All my affairs are becoming more inextricably involved: the rot has destroyed all my sheep at Strathonan, and a murrain has broken out among our black Argyleshires. The most of the tenants have failed to pay their rents; the farm towns of Tilly-whumle and Blaw-wearie were burned last week,—fifteen hundred pounds of a dead loss; and the damned Edinburgh lawyers are multiplying their insolent threats, their captions and homings, for my debts there; and all here at home is going to wreck, ruin, and the devil! I trust that you keep the Hon. Louis Lisle at a due distance: I know you will, for my sake. Folk, hereabout, say his sister is to be married to Lord Hyndford, during some part of the next month."
The last sentence Ronald repeated more than once through his clenched teeth, as he stumbled forward over the rough pavement of the market-place. As he looked around him, his heart sickened at the utter silence and desolation which reigned every where: not a single light visible, save that of the silver moon and twinkling stars.
As he approached the well-known mansion where he had spent so many delightful hours, the gaunt appearance of the gable, the roofless walls, the fallen balconies, the shattered casements, informed him at once that "the glory had departed."
The house had been completely gutted by fire, and Ronald, while he gazed around him, recalled the old tales of Sir Ian Mhor's days, when the savage cohorts of Cumberland (Cumberland the bloody and the merciless) were let loose over the Scottish highlands. In the garden, the flowerbeds were trampled down and destroyed,—the shrubbery laid waste,—the marble fountain was in ruins, and the water rushing like a mountain-torrent through Catalina's favourite walk. The utmost labour had been expended to ruin and destroy every thing, Don Alvaro's rank and bravery having rendered him particularly odious to the soldiers of the usurper, Joseph Buonaparte. Fragments of gilded chairs, hangings, and books were tossing about in all directions. Some of the latter Ronald took up, and saw by the light of the moon that they had belonged to Catalina's little library, (books are a scarce commodity in Spain,) and were her most favourite authors. There was the romance of "Amadis de Gaul," written by that good and valiant knight, Vasco de Loberia, "Lopez de Ruedas," "Armelina," "Eusenia," "Los Enganados," all separate works, and other dramas and pastorals. But one richly bound little book, printed at Salamanca, the "Vidas de los Santos," upon which her own hand had written her name, he kept as a remembrance—he scarcely required one,—and bestowing a hearty malediction on the French, against whom he now felt the bitterest personal enmity, he left the place with an anxious and heavy heart, intending to question the first Español he should meet as to the fate of the family of Villa Franca. He encountered several in the streets, but none could give him the least information; and as he was weary with the fatigues of the day, he retired to his billet at the house of the potter. On the way thither, a ray of light shining through a low barred window, and the wailing as of one in deep distress, attracted his attention. On looking in he perceived the lady-like and graceful figure of Mrs. Evelyn bending over a table, on which, muffled up in a cavalry cloak, lay the cold remains of him she loved with her whole heart. A wearied dragoon, booted and accoutred, lay asleep in one corner; in another were grouped some Irish soldiers' wives, smoking and sipping aquardiente, while they listened in silence to the sorrowful moanings of the young lady, and the lowly muttered yet earnest prayer which a poor Cistertian padre, almost worn out with years and privation, offered up for the soul of the deceased, around whose bier he had placed several candles, which he had consecrated by lighting them at the shrine of San Juan. The chamber was ruinous and desolate, without either fire or furniture. It was in sooth a sad and strange situation for the poor girl, whose fair head rested on the bosom of the slain; and Ronald, as he turned away, thought of what her gay and fashionable friends at home would have said could they have seen her then,—bowed down in absorbing sorrow, without a friend to comfort her, and surrounded by squalid misery and desolation.