‘I will arrange all for you safely, Herbert. I have written some letters myself, and they can all go together. I doubt not I shall be able to get one of the secretaries to forward them, and your drawings besides, which are not very large. Anything more?’
‘Nothing, except these trifling purchases.’
‘Certainly, I will bring the contents of the list without fail. So now good-bye, and God bless you till we meet again! which I hope will not be further distant than three weeks or a month. Take care of the old commander; and if you can persuade him into parting with some money, and into vigilance and exertion, you will not only be cleverer than I am, but will deserve the thanks of all parties.’
‘I will try at all events. So good-bye! Don’t forget my letters, whatever you do, for there are those in our merry England who look for them with almost feverish impatience. God bless you!’
They wrung each other’s hands with warm affection, and even the tears started to Herbert’s eyes. He thought then that he should be alone, to meet any vicissitudes which might arise, and he could not repress a kind of presentiment of evil, vague and indefinite. If he had been Dalton, he would have expressed it; but his was a differently constituted temperament, and he was silent. Another warm and hearty shake of the hand, and Philip was gone.
The rest of that evening and night was sad enough to Herbert, and many anxious thoughts for the future rose up in his mind. Dalton was only to be absent a month; but in that time what might not happen? The army was inefficient, from being broken up into detachments, and the best commanders were about to leave; the authority would devolve upon others who were untried in such situations; disaffection and party spirit were at a high pitch. Should the enemy hear of this, and attack them, he feared they could but ill resist.
However, he thought he could do much by forcible entreaty with the general, whom he was now in a condition to advise; and, as he said, these thoughts are but the effect of circumstances after all. For how often is it that they who are departing on a journey in the prospect of novelty and occupation of thought, have spirits lighter and more buoyant than those who, remaining, can not only imagine dangers for the absent, but are oppressed with anxieties for their safe progress, and lest evils should come in which their aid and sympathy will be wanting!
But sad thoughts will soon pass away under the action of a well-regulated mind: and Herbert, in his ensuing duties, found much to occupy his, and prevent it from dwelling upon ideal evils. They were not, however, without foundation.
But a few days had elapsed after the departure of his friend, ere Herbert began to suggest plans to the commander for the general safety. Young as he was, he put them forward with much diffidence, and only when they were supported by another officer of the staff who could not blind his eyes to the critical state of the army. Leaving for a while the vexatious subject of money, upon which the general could not be approached without giving way to passionate expressions, they gradually endeavoured to lead his attention to the state of the fortifications, which, ruinous and neglected as they were, could not afford defence against any ordinarily resolute enemy. They next endeavoured to organise some system of intelligence; for of what was passing within twenty miles of Bednore—nay, even the state of their own detachments—they had no knowledge whatever. They urged upon their infatuated commander the necessity of establishing some order and discipline in the army, which from neglect, inactivity, and poverty, was becoming riotous and unmanageable.
But all was in vain. The more apparent the difficulties of his situation were made to him, the more he tried to shut his eyes against them; and when driven by absolute conviction to confess the peril, which daily increased, though as yet no enemy threatened, he declared that he had reliance in Almighty power to send succour, to perplex the councils of his enemies, to distract their attention from one who, having carried conquest so far, was destined (though certainly in some strait at present) to rise out of all his troubles triumphant, to confound his enemies and those who sought to dispossess him of his situation.