The fine picture which our artist has given us for this number of our Magazine, is a spirited representation of a scene in the lives of those men of violence and murder who, setting at defiance both human and divine laws, wrest from the unarmed or overpowered traveler, amid the mountainous districts of Europe, the means of subsistence they are too idle to obtain through honest industry. To their secret retreat the band of robbers have been traced by armed soldiers, whose approach they are anxiously watching. The wife of the robber-chief is by his side.
By songs, stories, and pictures, much false sympathy has been created in the minds of the unreflecting for “bold brigands,” who are represented too often as possessed of chivalrous feelings and generous sentiments, while a charm is thrown about their wild and reckless lives which is altogether unreal. Love, too, a often brought in to give a warmer and more attractive color to the pictures thus drawn. The roving bandit is represented as loving passionately and tenderly some refined, pure-hearted, and high-souled woman, who, in turn, pours out for him her heart’s best affections.
Different from all this is the hard and harsh reality of the bandit’s life. He is no man of fine feelings and generous sympathies, but a selfish and cruel-minded villain; and between him and the woman, who, as his wife, shares his life of exposure and violence, there can be no gentle passages of affection, for these are only born of love laid upon the solid foundations of virtuous respect.
The real truth on this subject, Dumas has given in a Calabrian story. A body of soldiers had pursued a band of mountain robbers, in Calabria, and hemmed them in so effectually that, with all the passes guarded, escape seemed impossible. From this dilemma the chief determined to relieve his men, as they had refused to surrender, although promised pardon if they would give up their leader. The only possible way of escape was by crossing a deep chasm, so wide, that even the supple chamois could not make the fearful leap in safety. To reach this point, it was necessary to go along a narrow pass, near which sentinels had been placed. The movement was made at night. The chief of the robbers had a wife, and she had a babe at her bosom. For days they had been without food, except such roots as they dug from the ground, and the want of nourishment had dried the fountain of life in the mother’s breast, and the babe pined and fretted with hunger. As the little band moved silently along the narrow path, in which, if discovered by the soldiers, their destruction would be inevitable, the suffering babe began to cry. Instantly it was seized by the father, swung in the air, and its brains dashed out against a tree. For a moment the mother stood like a statue of horror, then gathering the mutilated remains of her murdered babe in her apron, she followed the retreating party.
Safely, through the skill of the chief, the chasm was passed, and they were beyond the reach of danger. All, then, after procuring some food, lay down to sleep, except a sentinel and the mother, who dug a grave with her own hands, in which to bury her child. This sad duty performed, she returned to the spot where her husband and his companions lay in deep slumber. It was not difficult for her to persuade the tired and sleepy sentinel to let her take his place, and soon she alone remained awake. Then stealthily approaching the spot where the father of her dead babe lay, she placed the muzzle of the piece she had taken from the sentinel within a few inches of his breast, and pulled the trigger. The ball passed through his heart!
Here we have something of the reality attending the life of a “bold brigand.” A lawless robber and murderer is incapable of such a sentiment as the true love of a woman. This feeling lives only in the breast of the virtuous. And whenever the poet or the novelist represents a pirate or robber as loving faithfully and tenderly some beautiful, true-hearted woman, the reader may set it all down as mere romance. Such things are contrary to the very nature of things. They never exist in real life. True love of woman is an unselfish love; but the inordinate self-love of these men leads them so utterly to disregard the rights of others, as to commit robbery and murder. How, then, are they capable of loving any thing out of themselves? It is impossible. A bitter fountain cannot send forth sweet water.
BALLADS OF THE CAMPAIGN IN MEXICO. NO. II.
———
BY HENRY KIRBY BENNER, U. S. A.