"I am not a matron yet, but only your bride; the honeymoon is not yet over, sir."
"Thank God you are so, darling! What an escape I have had from being in old Pottersleigh's place! But there sound the trumpets, and I must fall in--fall in for the last time."
And as drum and bugle sounded on all sides, and the arms flashed in the sunshine when the order was given to "shoulder," a brightness seemed to pass over all the eyes and expectant faces in the grand stand. The Queen had come, and all that passed subsequently was like a dream to me then, and is more so now. The sixty-two officers and men who were to receive the cross (and twelve of whom belonged to the navy) were all, irrespective of rank, marshalled according to the number of their regiment under Lieutenant John Knox, of the Rifles, who, like myself, had an empty sleeve. The braided breast of his dark-green uniform seemed ablaze with medals, for he had been with the ladder party in the attack on the Redan, where he lost an arm by a grape-shot. There were but two officers of the 23rd to win the decoration, and we were posted between two privates of the 19th, and two of the 34th; but all passed the royal stand in single file. I had never seen the Queen hitherto, and suddenly I found myself before her--a smiling-faced, graceful, though stout little lady, in a low hat, adorned with a beautiful plume, and wearing a scarlet tunic and blue skirt; and I certainly felt my heart vibrate, as with her own hands she pinned the decoration on my breast--vibrate with a flush of pride and joy only to be felt at such a time and at such a ceremony; and yet amid it all I thought of the dear little wife who, with her eyes dim with tears of happiness, was watching me. I then passed on, giving place to a lame private of the 34th Foot, the Prince Consort saluting each recipient as they passed him--many slowly, painfully, and with difficulty; for some poor maimed and haggard-faced fellows were hobbling on sticks and crutches, and some, like the gallant Sir Thomas Trowbridge, who had lost both legs, were wheeled to the very feet of the Queen in Bath-chairs. At last all was over--this closing episode of our war in the Crimea; and as we drove from the crowded park to get the train for Brighton--the honeymoon was not yet finished--I had forgotten all about Estelle and her Plunger; and I thanked God in my heart that I was not lying where so many lay in the land we had left, and for the tender and true-hearted wife He had given me, as I laughingly hung round her pretty neck the black-iron order of valour--the Victoria Cross.
Fifteen years have passed since that auspicious day. And now, as I write these closing lines, I can see, through the lozenged and mullioned windows of the library, the old woods of Craigaderyn tossing their leafy branches on the evening wind, and the sunset lingering redly on the lofty peaks of Snowdon and Carneydd Llewellyn. Old Sir Madoc--too old now to back even his most favourite hunter--is sitting yonder in the sunshine, looking dreamily down the far-stretched vista of the chase to where the bright sea is rippling in the distance.
The flowers are blooming as gaily on the terrace as they did on the day of Dora's fête, and she has long been Aunt Vaughan; for at Craigaderyn there are little ones now--a violet-eyed Winifred, who scampers through the park on a Welsh pony; a dark-haired Madoc, who can almost handle a gun; and a golden-curled Harry to run after the tossing leaves, to shout to the deer and hare as they lurk among the fern; to seek for birds' nests among the shrubbery; to grab at the gold fish in the fountain with his fat little fists; to clamber about Sir Madoc's chair and knees; to ride on the backs of Owen Gwyllim and old Corporal Mulligan, and in whom we see mamma's eyes, papa's expression--nods, winks, and blinks, and so forth, all so exactly reproduced and blended, that our best friends don't know which of us he most resembles; so "Time, the avenger" of all things, has brought nothing but joy and happiness to us at Craigaderyn.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1]: Without God, without everything.
[Footnote 2]: The artillery of the Prussian Guard have also had constantly a goat, its neck encircled by a beautiful collar, and one, named by the soldiers "Herr Schneider," accompanied them in every battle, from the war which broke out in 1866 till the peace in 1870. He always marched with the men of the first gun. At Köninghof, Herr Schneider was left in the rear, tied to a powder caisson; but he broke loose, came to the front at full gallop, and was recaptured under fire; the soldiers afterwards attached to his collar a copper medal, made from a pan found among the captured cooking utensils of General Coronini. His death was formally announced by the artillery of the Guard in the Berlin Vossische Zeitung.
[Footnote 3]: Fusileer regiments did not then wear epaulettes.
[Footnote 4]: May God preserve us!