I once trained some greyhounds for the Duke, almost puppies, against some of the same age which that noble fellow, Sir Edward Barnes had bred. We were to meet near the Duke’s château, where there were plenty of hares. We had great sport to beat Sir Edward every match. My wife rode her “Brass” seventeen miles before we looked for a hare. The Duke made her one of his umpires. She rode every course, and back again at night.
Poor Felton Hervey was prejudiced against Spanish greyhounds, and he and the present Duke of Richmond got out some English hounds to the Peninsula to beat my celebrated “Moro,” which Harry Mellish, a gallant hero alike as soldier and sportsman, declared the best dog he ever saw in his life. Of course the English dogs had no chance.
While at Cambray I had two dogs, sons of the “Moro,” and we had a great coursing party—the Duke of Wellington, Lord Hill (who had beautiful English greyhounds), Sir Hussey Vivian, etc. We were near the Duke’s château, where there were plenty of right good hares. Hervey objected to my Spaniards running. We had been coursing all day and not a hare was killed, so I rode up to the Duke and said, “My lord, this won’t do. A hare must be killed to go to the château.” The Duke said, “Ah! but how?” “My Spaniards should kill you a hare, my lord.” The sun was almost down. Felton Hervey says, “Lord Hill’s ‘Laura’ and ‘Rattler’ shall get a hare. We will put them in slips; Smith shall call ‘Loo,’ and if they don’t kill their hare, then let the Moro blood try, and I will halloo them out of their slips.” At it we went. A hare jumped up under the nose of Lord Hill’s dogs. I hallooed. The hare hadn’t twenty yards’ law. “Ah,” says the Duke, “you gave the hare no chance.” “Plenty, my lord. They won’t kill her.” After a terrific course she fairly beat them. Hervey was very angry. It was nearly dark, when hares run like devils. My dogs, two brothers, were in the slips. So late in the evening hares are sly. One jumped up sixty yards off, and Hervey hallooed. The honesty of the field went with me, and all sung out, “Shame, Hervey! your dogs were close to their hare.” “Never mind,” I said. “My lord, you shall have the hare.” I was on that wonderful horse Lochinvar, and never did I so ask him to go along. My dogs soon closed with their hare, when I knew, if they once turned her with such a law, she was ours. We had a terrific course, and killed her in a bank, within three yards of a covert where she would have been safe. I galloped back in triumph with my hare, for not a horse could live with Lochinvar, and I threw the hare down at his Grace’s feet. Hervey was furious, and insisted that I and Lochinvar acted third greyhound. I did not, and I gained accordingly. The Duke laughed, and turned round to go home, saying, “Thank you for the hare, Smith. We should have gone home without one but for your Spanish greyhounds.”
Coming home from riding one afternoon, I overtook the Duke on the bank of the canal, all alone. When I rode up I must either pass him, or saddle myself on him as companion, neither of which etiquette or delicacy tolerated. After my usual salutation, the Duke, with his brilliant imagination in trifles as well as things of moment, said, “If not in a hurry, ride home with me.” After a little talk about hounds, greyhounds, etc., he said, “What! no dogs with you?” I said, “On Sundays, my lord, I never take them out.” “Very proper,” he said, “although I fear in our late struggle we respected Sunday but little. All our great battles were fought on that holy day which ought to be.” “Yes,” said I, “my lord, so was Trafalgar, and so was that dire disaster, New Orleans.” “Was it?” he said. “You were there, were you not?” “Indeed was I, my lord.” His Grace never mentioned dear Sir Edward Pakenham, and of course I never did, although my heart was full of him. “Tell me all about it.” I did so. “What! the troops stood and fired in column, did they? What corps?” I named them. “Ah,” he said, “they had not been accustomed to victory, but it was quite right to keep two such corps as the 7th Fusiliers and the 43rd in reserve.” “We ought not to have landed where we did, my lord.” “Certainly not,” he said. “I was consulted about those lakes, and I immediately asked, ‘Is there navigation there for purposes of trade?’ When I was answered ‘No,’ I said, ‘Then it is injudicious to use them to land an army, and craft of any size will never get up to land the troops.’”
I had received and carried many orders from his Grace, but of course never held a military conversation with him before. I was never so struck as by the pointed questions he asked and the more rapid questions my answers elicited. In half an hour’s ride he was perfectly acquainted with all I could tell him, and said, “I am glad I have had this conversation with you. It agrees as nearly as may be with the opinion I had previously formed. If you are not engaged, you and Juana come and dine with me to-day. Her friend Alava will be there.” I was as proud as may be, because I knew by this his Grace was satisfied with my explanation. How I longed to tell him how I loved and admired his brother-in-law, Sir Edward Pakenham! But although I talked of “the General,” I never made use of the magic word (to me at least) “Pakenham.”
One night, at a great ball at the Duke’s, the Prince and Princess Narinska were present, and a lot of Russian and Cossack officers. The Princess was the only Russian lady, a very beautiful and accomplished woman. The Duke wished that the mazurka should be danced in compliment to her, but none of our ladies would stand up with the Princess. So the Duke came up to my wife, and took her hand: “Come, Juana, now for the Russian fandango; you will soon catch the step.” A young Russian came forward as her partner. The Princess danced elegantly, and the Duke was as anxious as I was that Juana should acquit herself well. She did, and he was as pleased as possible.
The Duke was in great spirits in those days, and whenever he was surrounded by Emperors and Kings he showed himself the great man that he was. His attention to them was most marked, but we ever observed that his Grace felt he was the representative of our King and country, and we could see the majesty and still the delicacy with which he conducted himself.
On one occasion the King of Prussia begged to see as many of the British Army by themselves as could be collected, and the majority were assembled not far from the pillar erected by the French in honour of the victory of [Denain[78]], and which was equally in honour of the Duke of Marlborough. (The French never gained a battle until [Marlborough] was so madly taken away by the intrigues of the British Government.) The King arrived much before his time, and our troops were not formed to receive him. The Duke’s quick eye detected his approach in the distance, and he says, “Hallo, Fremantle, there he is! He will be upon us before we are ready, and we can’t keep him back with picquets. Ride up and make him take a long détour until you see we are ready, although a few minutes will suffice us.” Our troops were in position like lightning, and it was beautiful to see the Duke so animated, so cool, so proud of his Army and the rapidity with which we all moved to act up to his wishes. He was altogether very popular with his Army, but not so much so as after Toulouse. He felt that everything that occurred at his headquarters must be a precedent for the guidance of all the Armies he was in command of, and he was frequently rigid, as it seemed, to extremes, particularly in all cases of disputes between officers and the French inhabitants. At Cambray it was part of my duty to receive all complaints, and, generally speaking, our own people were the aggressors. When the French were, his Grace demanded that their authorities should make an equal example. This correct principle of action was as highly extolled by all thinking men as it deserved, especially as the French had degraded themselves all over the world (except in dear old England which we protected) by acts of cruelty, oppression, and tyranny towards the inhabitants. The Duke said, “We are Englishmen and pride ourselves on our deportment, and that pride shall not be injured in my keeping.” On parting with his Army, he thanked the British contingent after all the others. “He begs them to accept his best acknowledgments for the example they have given to others by their own good conduct, and for the support and assistance they have invariably afforded him to maintain the discipline of the Army.” This I thought at the time, and I do so more now, was the highest compliment his Grace could pay us. We had saved Europe, and now we were thanked for our conduct in quarters, when in occupation of the country of our enemy, who had been the oppressors of the world; although, as good does come out of evil, so has Europe been wonderfully improved owing to the liberal principles moderately derived from the madness of French democracy.
Our life in Cambray was one excess of gaiety. My dear old friend and commander, Sir Andrew Barnard, had been appointed Commandant, so that, surrounded by my old generals, friends, and comrades, I was at home at once. We were both young; my wife was beautiful. We were fêted and petted by every one. I was the huntsman of a magnificent pack of hounds, steward of races, riding steeplechases, etc. My wife was taken the greatest notice of by every one, especially by the Duke, who, having known her as a child, always called her his Spanish heroine, Juana. She rode beautifully hunting, was the best of waltzers, and sang melodiously. We were surrounded by the best society. All England’s nobility poured forth to see the lion of the day, the Dukes headquarters. No wonder that in the midst of this gaiety and in this land of plenty, after the life of hardship and privation which we had led, we should have been somewhat intoxicated by the scene around us, and I spent a lot of money which, had I saved it prudently, would have now nearly accumulated to a fortune. I had prize-money for the Peninsula, for Washington, and for Waterloo paid at this period. I had money left me by my grandmother. All went as fast as I could get it.
In 1817, I and a friend went to look over the field of Waterloo. The wood of Hougoumont had been cut down, which very much altered the appearance of the ground, as did the want of troops, etc. To those unaccustomed to look at ground with and without troops, the difference cannot well be explained. I trod, however, upon this immortal field with a thrilling sensation of gratitude to Almighty God, first for personal safety and for the additional honour and glory my country’s Army had acquired there, and next for the beneficial results to Europe ensured by the achievement of that wonderful battle. The left of the position as well as the centre was as during the battle, with the exception of the many tombs and monuments erected to mark the spots where lay interred so many gallant spirits, and many is the burning tear I shed over the mounds of some of my dearest friends, many of England’s brightest sons and rising soldiers. No one can feel what a soldier does on such a spot, especially one who was in the midst of the strife. But nothing struck me so forcibly as the small extent of the field. It appeared impossible that so many thousands of troops could have contended on so constricted a space, the one spot on earth which decided the fate of Emperors and Kings, and the future destiny of nations.