Like Another Helen

by Sydney C. Grier

“You would oblige your good papa much more by remaining calm, madam,” he said; “for indeed I can imagine few things that would displease him more than to see you wandering about the Fort unattended at such a moment. Do me the favour to sit down quietly and occupy your mind in some suitable manner, and you shall have the earliest news I can procure you.”

Thus it is, then, that I am writing to my Amelia, and as the embarkation is not yet begun, I will endeavour to fulfil the Captain’s request by setting down something of the history of this day of disaster, for there en’t likely to be much chance for writing on board of a crowded ship, and, indeed, who knows what may be the fate of all of us in another few hours?

The day began with an attack made on the South Battery, where Captain Colquhoun was in command, with my papa among his troops. The enemy, taking possession of the houses on either side of the road in front of the battery, kept up a brisk fire upon the defenders with musquetry and wall-pieces; but the Captain held his ground, and placed garrisons in the different buildings flanking him on the left as far as the Rope-walk, to guard against any attack from that side. He was assailed with the same smartness until noon, when the enemy drew off for a while. The next battery to be attacked was that on the north, which was held by Lieutenant Smyth, who was so happy as to be able to beat off with little loss the assaults made upon him, thanks to the advantages of his situation and his skilful disposition of his men, although the Moors whom he repulsed did but join with those ranged against the Eastern Battery, which was attacked with the greatest resolution of all. Captain Clayton was in command here, supported by Mr Holwell and a party of militia, and having as an advanced post on the right the Gaol, whither Mr le Beaume had entreated to be allowed to betake himself with forty of our remaining buxerries. In advance of this again was the slight work I have mentioned before, defended by a platoon of Europeans with two field-pieces, which bore the first brunt of the assault. Seeing themselves threatened by some thousands of the enemy, who found shelter from their shot in the thickets, this small party at length retired upon the Gaol with their guns, when the Moors, taking advantage of an undefended passage, seized the three European houses in the Rope-walk to the rear of the Gaol, and fired from them so furiously that Mr le Beaume was forced to spike up his guns and retreat to the battery. This was now attacked so hotly from the three houses on the right, and also from two on the left, that only the men working the guns could remain in it, and by the loss of the pallisado on the right it became almost untenable, Captain Clayton having rejected with displeasure Mr Holwell’s suggestion to occupy the buildings on either side with musquetry. In this unhappy state of affairs Mr Holwell rode back to the Fort to demand reinforcements from the President, for the importance of retaining this commanding post was universally admitted, nor was there any thought of retreat among the defenders themselves; but on his return he was met by the disorderly array of the troops from the battery, whom Captain Clayton had withdrawn in such haste that he left his ammunition behind him, disabling his guns also so slightly that the enemy, who now flocked into our abandoned work, manifesting their joy by excessive shouts, were able to drill them and turn them on the Fort. Oh, Amelia, figure to yourself the anguish of this moment to us who had been enquiring eagerly all day for every the least piece of news, and now saw our brave men disgracefully led back into the place by their incompetent commander! But there was worse still to come.

The capture of the Eastern Battery left the Soubah’s whole force at liberty to hurl itself upon that to the south, where Captain Colquhoun found himself in danger of being surrounded. The enemy, who now filled the Rope-walk, broke through the breastwork between Mrs Putham’s house and Captain Minchin’s, and crowded into the lane at the back, hoping to take him in the rear. Finding himself pressed also in front, from the great road leading to Surmans, he was forced to call in the flanking parties that he had posted in the houses near, and retreat upon the inner battery close to the Park gate, leaving one of his field-pieces at the corner of the Park wall to cover his retirement. This necessary movement left Lieutenant Blagg and a party of volunteers, who had not been able to obey in time the order to retire, surrounded by the enemy on the top of Captain Minchin’s house; but although the Moors held all the houses around, and the very rooms below the roof on which they were, these brave men fought their way down the stairs and broke through the hostile crowds that thronged the whole square with their bayonets, until they reached the cannon at the corner of the Park, which covered their retreat also to the inner battery before it was spiked up and abandoned. The incredible slaughter of the enemy made by this brave band, and the skill and deliberation with which Captain Colquhoun had conducted his retirement, bringing with him all his ammunition and all the guns but that one which was spiked up, made the affair rather a triumph than a reverse; but what was his mortification and that of all with him to receive orders from the Fort to retire from the second battery also, although it was within pistol-shot of the walls, and commanded two out of the three roads of the place! I could almost wonder that the gallant gentleman did not refuse to obey (or rather I should do so did I not know his strict notions of discipline), but leaving an officer with thirty men, my papa among them, to hold the Company’s house outside the walls, he returned reluctantly with his troops, to find that those in command had lost, during the trials of the day, the little spirit and wisdom they had possessed. Not content with having compelled the abandonment of the South Battery after the loss of that on the east, the Council now ordered a retreat from the post which Lieutenant Smyth had defended with so much success on the north, sending also boats to recall Ensign Piccard and his party from Perrins to garrison the Company’s house, and ordering the Prince George to fall down from Baugbuzar to her usual station opposite the Fort.

No words of mine can describe, Amelia, the state of affairs when this disgraceful resolution was made known—the consternation of the English at so unnecessary and damaging a retreat, of which the remaining buxerries and all the Lascars but a few quickly showed their opinion by going over to the enemy, the stupefaction of the To-passes and Armenians among the militia, and the frightful uproar among the three thousand servants and black Christians that crowd up the Fort. All this needs to be seen and heard to be appreciated, but her Sylvia’s misery my dearest girl’s sensibility will enable her to picture, since the party left by Captain Colquhoun at the Company’s house came in, on being relieved by Mr Piccard, without Mr Freyne.

(In the original letter the following is written hurriedly in pencil.)

I am scribbling these few lines on the last sheet of my unfinished letter, in case I should never despatch another to my Amelia. I shall entrust it to Mr Hurstwood, who is going on board the Doddalay to see how his Charlotte finds herself, but only for a moment, since a fresh assault of the enemy upon the Fort is momentarily expected. But why am I not on board? you’ll say. Because my duty holds me here, Amelia. I was actually in the boat with Mrs Freyne and other ladies, and on the point of putting off from the Gott, when there comes running a servant of Omy Chund’s who is permitted to go freely about the Fort to wait upon his master, and cries out to me that he had found Fahrein Saeb (so the Indians call my papa), grievously wounded, but still living. Was it possible for me to persist in going on board the ship after hearing this, my dear? Sure my sweet girl would tear me from her heart had I given the notion a moment’s thought. Mrs Freyne is herself ill, and was so prodigiously alarmed at the idea of delaying any longer, that I feared a screaming-fit, and begged the boatmen to put off at once without me, which they did, while I returned with the Indian to one of the ground-floor chambers of the Fort, where they had carried the dear gentleman and laid him on a bedstead. It seemed that he had been struck down by a blow from the butt-end of a musquet or other heavy weapon, and then stabbed and hacked in the most cruel and fiendish manner, so that he was as near as possible dead from want of blood. The good Padra Bellamy and Mr Holwell did all in their power to stanch the wounds, for Dr Knox was nowhere to be found, but all was in vain until the poor servant (who had heard, he says, that Fahrein Saeb was missing, and since he had always used him civilly and been friendly with his master, went to search for him in the grounds of the Company’s house and found him) proved himself indeed a good Samaritan, bringing some odd sort of salve that was extraordinary effectual, and bidding us on no account move the sufferer before morning, lest the blood should burst forth again. Here, then, I am, my dear, watching over my papa, in company with a Portuguese woman that Mr Holwell has fetched to be with me, not knowing whether I shall see the light of another day, for the enemy, grown bold, as they may well be, with their continued and undeserved successes, are gathering themselves for a general attack. Farewell then, my dearest, my best beloved friend. If this is the last you hear from me, preserve a little kindness in your heart for

your Sylvia Freyne.

CHAPTER XII.
PRESENTING ONE OF THE WORLD’S TRAGEDIES.

(The account contained in this chapter belongs to a letter written some months later, but it is introduced here in order that the current of the narrative may not be interrupted.)