Let us re-visit the field of battle towards sunset of the same day. All was then still. The departing rays showed the ghastly countenances of the dead, crowded together promiscuously, without the distinction of roundhead or cavalier. They lay in such perfect repose, that Nature seemed to have brought them there, without the help of man, herself to bury them, with her own funeral rites. The breeze sighed over them, and occasionally moved some of the locks, which had escaped from the helmet, and these were thin and silvery with age, or dark and clustering with youth. Here and there a venerable head lay naked on the ground. Here and there young lips were pressed to the cold and bloody sod, in the kisses of death. Such a scene, at such an hour, when every thought is of quiet peace, and love, with such a beautiful sun, shedding a mellow light around, might have given rise to a notion entertained by the Persians of a former age, that in some sequestered spot, near to the gentle flowing of a river, the most highly-favoured of our race shall undergo a transformation, and for days lie on the grass, apparently dead, even with symptoms of bloody violence, until the last touch shall have been given to the passive clay; and, amidst the light and music of heaven resting there alone, with those of earth, hovering like dreams about them, they shall rise up pure and lovely spirits, above misery and mortality.
Leaning upon the arm of a servant, who supported with much care, his halting steps, one of the Parliamentary leaders was now groping his way through the slain, and occasionally stooping to examine the features.
It was Sir Richard Houghton. His countenance was pale, bearing traces of anguish within, more than of bodily fatigue. The excitement which had sustained him in the engagement, seemed to be gone. Years of sorrow, since then, might have passed over him, without producing so great a change. His spirit seemed to have been more deeply wounded than his body. Long was his search amidst the slain. As he stooped, a shade of the deepest anxiety was over his face, but the glow of his eyes showed that he looked for an enemy, and not for a friend; and as he rose disappointed, his lips quivered with deadly emotion.
“Nay, nay, ’tis in vain. They have both escaped—uncle and nephew. And I have left my couch, wounded and sickly, to come and gloat on my own disappointment. But they must be found, dead or alive!”
“But surely, Sir Richard,” interrupted his servant, “not to-night; the air is chill.”
“Not for me,” muttered the knight, “revenge will warm it. I feel not the blast. Is the tempest loud? Why, the night is calm, and still as the dead; and though it raged as if every sound was the united shriek of a thousand demons in pain or joy, I could not hear it. No, no, my soul is on fire; cold!—cold!—mock me not. If my revenge is not satisfied, I shall lie down here, stripped, naked, and shelterless, in order that I may be cool.”
“But consider your wounds.”
“Aye!” fiercely answered Sir Richard,—“consider my wounds; a daughter lost, deceived, polluted;—my hospitality returned by the foulest treachery. Consider these wounds! aye, and revenge them too!”
“But still,” returned his follower, “the shades of night are fast descending. We cannot remain here long.”