NOTE BY THE WRITER'S DAUGHTER.—The conceit of you. Emmeline, I think, was quite right to cut you, after your brutishness. No doubt you think the glorification of bull-butchery a piece of fine writing, and so original, you know. I'm up to the games of you authors; but if I were the printers I would not print one single line of it. I should just like to put a pen in the bull's hand and read his description of the fight.
CHAPTER XI.
The Shamrock of Erin and Olive of Spain—Hispano-Hibernian Regiments—The Spanish Soldier—An Unpopular Hidalgo—Flaw in the Harness—The Organization of the Army—The Guardia Civil—The Cavalry, Engineers, and Infantry—General Cordova—The Disorganization of the Army—Mutiny in Pampeluna—Officers Out of Work—Turbulent Barcelona—Irresolute Contreras—Pistolet Discharges Himself—The Madrid Garrison.
IN Moore's "Melodies" crops up a martial lyric, in which there is a jingling reference at the end of every verse to the shamrock of Erin and olive of Spain. Here is about the pith of its sentiment:
| "May his tomb want a tear and a name, |
| Who would ask for a nobler, a holier death, |
| Than to turn his last sigh into victory's breath, |
| For the Shamrock of Erin and Olive of Spain!" |
The Blakes and O'Donnells are apostrophized; but as well as I can make out what the bard is driving at, he had Wellington and his companions in his mind's eye.
There had been closer and earlier and longer ties than those of the campaigns against the French between Spain and Ireland. According to the annals of the Four Masters (translated by the father of the late Edmond O'Donovan), the Clanna-Milidh set sail from Galicia and invaded the Emerald Isle in the year 1698 before the Christian era. They established the Milesian dynasty, which lasted two thousand eight hundred and seventy years—rather a better record than we meet in Bulgaria, modern Greece, and sometimes even in Spain itself. Galway, teste Kohl, carries the imagination to Granada and Valencia. At the beginning of the eighteenth century there were six Irish regiments at least in the Spanish service, namely, those of Hibernia, Irlanda, Limerick, Ultonia, and Waterford (all infantry), and the Dragoons of Dublin. There was also an infantry regiment called Conacia, or Wauchop, after its commander, one of a fighting family well known in the Lothians. There were officers of my name in the Limerick and Ultonia corps, as there are in the Spanish army still.[B] Most of these Irish organizations were disbanded at the close of the last century, and all had lost their purely Irish character, although the titles, Hibernia, Ultonia, and Irlanda, were retained on the list till 1833.
Naturally, and because of profession and certain associations, I took an interest in soldiers, and, at the risk of offending the lady-reader who is waiting for the romantic part of this book, I intend to devote a chapter to the Spanish army. Such judgment as I have to offer is formed not alone upon what I saw at Madrid, but afterwards, when I had opportunity of watching the troops at work. Before going any further, I may unreservedly confess that I hold a high opinion of the Spanish soldier. He is sober, enduring, brave, and an indefatigable marcher. Better raw material for warfare, I am sure, could not readily be come at, and I am equally sure that if more attention were paid to drill, and if the curse of morbid aspirations for promotion amongst the lower grades were more rigidly repressed, the Spanish army would regain its ancient renown. This restless and diseased ambition is not to be traced to the rank and file, but to those immediately above them, the men with a puffed-up idea of themselves, and a smattering of education, and is often developed by the connivance of their immediate superiors. Let us take an example. In 1866 there was an uprising in favour of Prim, headed by the sergeants of artillery at the San Gil barracks, in Madrid. Captain Hidalgo was privy to the plot, which eventuated in a fiasco, but not before sundry officers of the regiment had lost their lives. A large number of the sergeants were summarily shot a few days afterwards. Hidalgo escaped. In the November of 1872, Hidalgo, then a General, was appointed Master-General of the Ordnance by Amadeus. Amongst the artillery there is a strong esprit de corps, and the officers in a body declared they would resign unless the appointment were cancelled. They did not object to Hidalgo on account of his implication in mutiny, which is a recognised institution in the Spanish army, but because they believed he had previous knowledge that some of his brother-officers would be sacrificed, and never gave them a word of warning or raised a plea in their behalf. The want of comradeship was his crime, and the resignations of those who protested against it were accepted in a bulk.
At the time I was in Madrid the artillery was in a state of demoralisation. The captains of the scientific force were all promoted sergeants, and the old officers were idly parading the streets in plain clothes. Amadeus had certainly committed a foolish act, although he may have justified himself to himself by the reflection that in approving an appointment made by his Ministers he was behaving loyally, and that by a wholesale rejection of the demand of the discontented officers he would set up an iron precedent against insubordination. He never paused to think that he was stripping Spain of a vital portion of its harness. A sergeant may be an excellent practical gunner, and be able to lay a piece accurately; but that does not qualify him to command a battery. Scientific acquirements and training are necessary, a mastery of technique and tactics, quickness of resource, and the habit of authority. The promoted sergeants were wanting in these essentials, and the Carlists soon found out the weak spot in the armour.
The strength of the permanent army is fixed annually by the Cortes, and every Spaniard above the age of twenty is liable to be drawn, and has to serve four years under the flag. The nation is divided for military purposes into five captain-generalcies, the commandant of each of which holds a rank corresponding to a British field-marshal. The nominal strength of the infantry in round numbers is about 60,000; artillery, 9,500; engineers, 2,300; and cavalry, 11,500. Then there are the provincial militia, some 44,000 strong; the carabineros, or revenue police, 12,000; and the Guardia Civil, 10,000. These Civil Guards are picked men, robust, strapping, seasoned fellows, and are distributed over the country like the French gendarmery, to whose duties theirs are similar. They form a corps d'élite, and are the very mainstay of order. In fact, without them life and property during times of political commotion would very often be at the mercy of any horde of ragamuffins with weapons in their hands and the courage to use them. They are handsomely uniformed, wearing cocked-hats of the pattern of those to be seen in the prints of the First Napoleon, fine cloth tunics of dark blue, with epaulettes of white cord, and yellow side and cross-belts, and present a manful, soldierly appearance. From their valour and topographical knowledge they have been very serviceable in carrying on the guerrilla warfare with the Carlists, and are the terror of brigands and evil-doers. If all the troops were as orderly and well disciplined as these, Government would be easy, and those at its head might afford to be firm, regardless of mob clamour. In short, these magnificent Civil Guards are the best military force the country possesses. Some of them are mounted (and capitally mounted too), and all have an elevated notion of duty. A mutiny is never inaugurated by the Civil Guards. They stick to each other like wax, and are faithful to the powers that be, regardless of their political colour, so long as those powers are accepted by the nation. Dynasties may change and depart, as Ministries do; but the Guardia Civil is an organization immutable and goes on for ever. The one charge made against them has its warrant in necessity. When a prisoner is sent to gaol in some remote town under escort of the Civil Guards, he often makes an attempt to run away, and is invariably shot between the shoulders. No strict inquiry into the circumstances is made—it is an understood practice—a rascal is got rid of, to the relief of the community, by a quick and economic method, which is a desirable improvement on the laggard processes of law.