It is a pleasing duty to commemorate the filial affection of those gallant old soldiers who have now gone the way of all flesh, and to testify from our own experience that in the ranks of our Highland regiments there are still men possessed of the same frugal habits and the same dutiful attachment to their parents as the Bo-man’s son. If the number has diminished of late years, it is because the feeling of honest pride which led the children to provide for their parents has been weakened through the operation of that Poor Law which has effected so many important changes in the social condition of the lowly.
CHAPTER IX.
OUR HIGHLAND REGIMENTS—continued.
The health of the British army both at home and abroad has improved very much of late years. The British soldier is better fed, better clothed, and better lodged now than he ever was before; hence in India the mortality has been reduced by one-half, and a corresponding change has been effected in the number of admissions to our military hospitals. Still the fact cannot be overlooked that a larger amount of sickness prevails among soldiers than among civilians of the same age and rank in life, whose physical wants are less carefully attended to; and while other causes may intervene, this difference is to be attributed mainly to the habits of the men themselves. The surest test of the moral character of a regiment is the number of admissions to hospital. When a regiment is demoralised, the wards will be crowded; when a healthy moral tone prevails in the ranks, they will be comparatively empty. Drunkenness and immorality have done more to thin the ranks of the British army, and to crowd our unions with discharged soldiers, than the bullets of the enemy, the scorching sun of the tropics, the fatigues of actual warfare, or the malaria of unhealthy stations.
On consulting the statistics of mortality connected with the Highland regiments when first raised, we are surprised at the small number of casualties which occurred among them. They were always first in the field of danger, and yet there were fewer deaths among them than in many regiments in time of peace. We find, for example, that the 42nd Regiment embarked for Flanders on the 18th of June, 1794, and landed at Ostend on the 26th of the same month. They shared in all the hardships of that unfortunate expedition, and took part in the disastrous retreat to Deventer, the miseries of which have been compared to the sufferings of the French after the burning of Moscow. Disease, the result of the severity of the weather and the want of food and proper clothing, thinned the ranks of the British army; many of our best soldiers sank under the accumulated hardships which beset them. The Dutch, on whose gratitude they had the strongest claims, inhospitably closed their doors against the sufferers, and refused to render them any assistance. The result was that some of the newly-raised regiments lost more than three hundred men by disease alone, while the 42nd, which had three hundred young recruits in its ranks, lost only twenty-five men, including those killed in battle, from their disembarkation at Ostend till their embarkation at Bremen on the 14th of April, 1795. This immunity from disease is to be attributed to their temperate habits as much as to their natural strength of constitution and power of enduring fatigue and privation. An amusing incident occurred while the regiment was stationed at Alost in the month of July. A party of 400 of the French cavalry entered the town, and being mistaken for Hessians, met with no resistance till they reached the market-place, where one of them attempted to cut down a 42nd Highlander of the name of MacDonald, who was walking along, unsuspicious of danger, with his basket on his head. He was severely wounded in the hand which held the basket, but promptly drawing his bayonet with the hand which was disengaged, he attacked the dragoon with such fury that he was compelled to retreat. Donald then continued his course, muttering his regret that he had not his father’s good broadsword to cut the rascal down. The enemy were soon recognised and driven from the town. It is worthy of remark that the practice of enticing mere boys into the service was then unknown in the Highland regiments. The profession of arms was so popular in the North, that they could always find a sufficient supply of able-bodied men. Their average age on enlistment was twenty-two years, a period of life not too young to render them incapable of enduring the hardships and sufferings of military service, nor too old to unfit them for learning that discipline without which an army would soon degenerate into an armed mob. In short, they were picked men, and the advantage of this carefulness of selection was manifest in their exemption from disease, and their power of enduring privations under which others less robust would have succumbed. The Ross-shire Fusiliers when reduced were as strong and efficient as when embodied. Not one man had died during the period of service, a case unparalleled, we believe, in the annals of the British army. The money which is too often spent in the canteen or in still worse places was remitted to their friends, and this generous self-denial was not without its reward.
Another characteristic trait in the character of these men was their quiet, orderly, and kind deportment to the inhabitants of the different countries in which they were stationed. Soldiers are apt to look upon themselves as a distinct class, and to assume a certain haughty bearing in their dealings with civilians, who, of course, are prone to retaliate. The Highlanders seem never to have forgotten that they were only civilians in arms, bound by the laws of courtesy as well as by the rules of military discipline. During the years 1743-44 the 42nd Regiment was stationed in different parts of Flanders, under the command of Field-Marshal the Earl of Stair, where, if they had been so disposed, they might have levied contributions on the powerless inhabitants. The latter, however, had such confidence in their honesty and integrity, that they specially requested to have them appointed the guardians of their property, and bore willing testimony to the faithfulness with which they had discharged this duty. Few of them, we are told, were ever drunk, and they as rarely swore. They retained in Flanders the simple habits of their own native glens, and when they left, the Elector-Palatine wrote to his envoy in London, desiring him to thank the King of Great Britain for the excellent behaviour of the regiment while in his territory, “for whose sake,” he adds, “I will always pay a respect and regard to a Scotchman in future.”
In the month of May, 1815, the intelligence reached England that Napoleon had escaped from Elba, and the three Highland regiments which had been stationed in Ireland at once embarked for Flanders, and took up their quarters at Brussels, where they became very popular among the inhabitants. They were billeted among the citizens, who, instead of regarding this as a hardship, rejoiced in their presence, and had such confidence in their honesty, that they often committed their shops to their care when they had occasion to go out. It was not unusual to see a stalwart Highlander nursing a Flemish baby, and handling it as tenderly as if he had been “to the manner born.” But, in truth, our Highland soldiers have always been remarkable for their fondness for children. When the 78th Highlanders forced their fiery way to the Residency at Lucknow, and were welcomed by the starving women whom they had saved from a fate worse than death, they seized the children from their arms, pressed their bearded faces against their tender cheeks, and shed tears of generous pity over them. Those tears did not unman them or unfit them for their duty, as all who are familiar with the annals of the Indian campaign will at once admit. No wonder that the kind-hearted Highlanders at Brussels made a favourable impression on the hearts of the Flemish maidens with whom they were brought in contact. A soldier of the 42nd had gained the affections of the daughter of a wealthy tradesman in whose house he was quartered at Brussels, and though he had never told his love, a mutual understanding had sprung up between them. When the British forces advanced to Waterloo, the Flemish maiden trembled for the fate of her lover. The power of Napoleon was shattered on that hard-contested field, but the Highlanders returned not to Brussels. The 42nd embarked for England, and arrived in the vicinity of Edinburgh on the 18th of March, 1816, where they were welcomed by the inhabitants with acclamations of joy, and entertained at a public dinner. The postal arrangements were not so perfect in those days as at present. Long weary months passed away, and the Flemish maiden heard nothing of her lover. One day a party of Highlanders were carousing together in Edinburgh, and toasting their sweethearts, as was the custom at that period. It was observed that one of them was silent, and refused to toast his mistress. “Leave him alone,” the others said; “we all know that he left his heart at Brussels.” The remark had scarcely been made when it was announced that a person had called to see him. On entering another room, he found there a young lady dressed in the deepest mourning, who rushed forward and welcomed him with a cry of joy. It was the Flemish maiden. In broken English, and with many tears, she told him of all the anguish she had suffered from his absence and silence. She had borne it all till the death of her father left her mistress of her actions, when she resolved to visit England in order to ascertain his fate. On reaching London, she learned that the 42nd had been sent north to Edinburgh, and followed the regiment there. She only knew her lover’s name, but a soldier, touched with pity by her romantic tale, searched the town till he discovered where he was. The rest may be left to the imagination of our readers. The war was now over, and she had no difficulty in purchasing the discharge of her lover. The officers of the regiment took an interest in the young couple, and were present at their marriage, after which the Highlander and his bride returned to Brussels, where they established themselves in business, and were as prosperous as they deserved to be.