Prince Rupert, Prince Robert, or Prince Robber,—for by all these names was he known,—was the one formidable military leader on the royal side. He was not a statesman, for he was hardly yet a mature man; he was not, in the grandest sense, a hero, yet he had no quality that was not heroic. Chivalrous, brilliant, honest, generous,—neither dissolute, nor bigoted, nor cruel,—he was still a Royalist for the love of royalty, and a soldier for the love of war, and in civil strife there can hardly be a more dangerous character. Through all the blunt periods of his military or civil proclamations, we see the proud, careless boy, fighting for fighting sake, and always finding his own side the right one. He could not have much charity for the most generous opponents; he certainly had none at all for those who (as he said) printed malicious and lying pamphlets against him "almost every morning," in which he found himself saluted as a "nest of perfidious vipers," "a night-flying dragon prince," "a flapdragon," "a caterpillar," "a spider," and "a butterbox."
He was the King's own nephew,—great-grandson of William the Silent, and son of that Elizabeth Stuart from whom all the modern royal family of England descends. His sister was the renowned Princess Palatine, the one favorite pupil of Descartes, and the chosen friend of Leibnitz, Malebranche, and William Penn. From early childhood he was trained to war; we find him at fourteen pronounced by his tutors fit to command an army,—at fifteen, bearing away the palm in one of the last of the tournaments,—at sixteen, fighting beside the young Turenne in the Low Countries,—at nineteen, heading the advanced guard in the army of the Prince of Orange,—and at twenty-three, appearing in England, the day before the Royal Standard was reared, and the day after the King lost Coventry, because Wilmot, not Rupert, was commander of the horse. This training made him a general,—not, as many have supposed, a mere cavalry-captain;—he was one of the few men who have shown great military powers on both land and sea; he was a man of energy unbounded, industry inexhaustible, and the most comprehensive and systematic forethought. It was not merely, that, as Warwick said, "he put that spirit into the King's army that all men seemed resolved,"—not merely, that, always charging at the head of his troops, he was never wounded, and that, seeing more service than any of his compeers, he outlived them all. But even in these early years, before he was generalissimo, the Parliament deliberately declared the whole war to be "managed by his skill, labor, and industry," and his was the only name habitually printed in capitals in the Puritan newspapers. He had to create soldiers by enthusiasm, and feed them by stratagem,—to toil for a king who feared him, and against a queen who hated him,—to take vast responsibilities alone,—accused of negligence, if he failed, reproached with license, if he succeeded. Against him he had the wealth of London, intrusted to men who were great diplomatists, though new to power, and great soldiers, though they had never seen a battle-field till middle life; on his side he had only unmanageable lords and penniless gentlemen, who gained victories by daring, and then wasted them by license. His troops had no tents, no wagons, no military stores; they used those of the enemy. Clarendon says, that the King's cause labored under an incurable disease of want of money, and that the only cure for starvation was a victory. To say, therefore, that Rupert's men never starved is to say that they always conquered,—which, at this early period, was true.
He was the best shot in the army, and the best tennis-player among the courtiers, and Pepys calls him "the boldest attacker in England for personal courage." Seemingly without reverence or religion, he yet ascribed his defeats to Satan, and, at the close of a letter about a marauding expedition, requested his friend Will Legge to pray for him. Versed in all the courtly society of the age, chosen interpreter for the wooing of young Prince Charles and La Grande Mademoiselle, and mourning in purple, with the royal family, for Marie de Médicis, he could yet mingle in any conceivable company and assume any part. He penetrated the opposing camp at Dunsmore Heath as an apple-seller, and the hostile town of Warwick as a dealer in cabbage-nets, and the pamphleteers were never weary of describing his disguises. He was charged with all manner of offences, even to slaying children with cannibal intent, and only very carelessly disavowed such soft impeachments. But no man could deny that he was perfectly true to his word; he never forgot one whom he had promised to protect, and, if he had promised to strip a man's goods, he did it to the uttermost farthing. And so must his pledge of vengeance be redeemed to-night; and so, riding eastward, with the dying sunlight behind him and the quiet Chiltern hills before, through air softened by the gathering coolness of these midsummer eves, beside clover fields, and hedges of wild roses, and ponds white with closing water-lilies, and pastures sprinkled with meadow-sweet, like foam,—he muses only of the clash of sword and the sharp rattle of shot, and all the passionate joys of the coming charge.
III.
THE FORAY.
The long and picturesque array winds onward, crossing Chiselhampton Bridge, (not to be re-crossed so easily,) avoiding Thame with its church and abbey, where Lord-General Essex himself is quartered, unconscious of their march; and the Cavaliers are soon riding beneath the bases of the wooded hills towards Postcombe. Near Tetsworth, the enemy's first outpost, they halt till evening; the horsemen dismount, the flagon and the foraging-bag are opened, the black-jack and the manchet go round, healths are drunk to successes past and glories future, to "Queen Mary's eyes," and to "Prince Rupert's dog." A few hours bring darkness; they move on eastward through the lanes, avoiding, when possible, the Roman highways; they are sometimes fired upon by a picket, but make no return, for they are hurrying past the main quarters of the enemy. In the silence of the summer night, they stealthily ride miles and miles through a hostile country, the renegade Urry guiding them. At early dawn, they see, through the misty air, the low hamlet of Postcombe, where the "beating up of the enemy's quarters" is to begin. A hurried word of command; the infantry halt; the cavalry close, and sweep down like night-hawks upon the sleeping village,—safe, one would have supposed it, with the whole Parliamentary army lying between it and Oxford, to protect from danger. Yet the small party of Puritan troopers awake in their quarters with Rupert at the door; it is well for them that they happen to be picked men, and have promptness, if not vigilance; forming hastily, they secure a retreat westward through the narrow street, leaving but few prisoners behind them. As hastily the prisoners are swept away with the stealthy troop, who have other work before them; and before half the startled villagers have opened their lattices the skirmish is over. Long before they can send a messenger up, over the hills, to sound the alarm-bells of Stoken Church, the swift gallop of the Cavaliers has reached Chinnor, two miles away, and the goal of their foray. The compact, strongly-built village is surrounded. They form a parallel line behind the houses, on each side, leaping fences and ditches to their posts. They break down the iron chains stretched nightly across each end of the street, and line it from end to end. Rupert, Will Legge, and the "forlorn hope," dismounting, rush in upon the quarters, sparing those alone who surrender.
In five minutes the town is up. The awakened troopers fight as desperately as their assailants, some on foot, some on horseback. More and more of Rupert's men rush in; they fight through the straggling street of the village, from the sign of the Ram at one end to that of the Crown at the other, and then back again. The citizens join against the invaders, the 'prentices rush from their attics, hasty barricades of carts and harrows are formed in the streets, long musket-barrels are thrust from the windows, dark groups cluster on the roofs, and stones begin to rattle on the heads below, together with phrases more galling than stones, hurled down by women, "cursed dogs," "devilish Cavaliers," "Papist traitors." In return, the intruders shoot at the windows indiscriminately, storm the doors, fire the houses; they grow more furious, and spare nothing; some towns-people retreat within the church-doors; the doors are beaten in; women barricade them with wool-packs, and fight over them with muskets, barrel to barrel. Outside, the troopers ride round and round the town, seizing or slaying all who escape; within, desperate men still aim from their windows, though the houses each side are in flames. Melting lead pours down from the blazing roofs, while the drum still beats and the flag still goes on. It is struck down presently; tied to a broken pike-staff, it rises again, while a chaos of armor and plumes, black and orange, blue and red, torn laces and tossing feathers, powder-stains and blood-stains, fills the dewy morning with terror, and opens the June Sunday with sin.
Threescore and more of the towns-people are slain, sixscore are led away at the horses' sides, bound with ropes, to be handed over to the infantry for keeping. Some of these prisoners, even of the armed troopers, are so ignorant and unwarlike as yet, that they know not the meaning of the word "quarter," refusing it when offered, and imploring "mercy" instead. Others are little children, for whom a heavy ransom shall yet be paid. Others, cheaper prisoners, are ransomed on the spot. Some plunder has also been taken, but the soldiers look longingly on the larger wealth that must be left behind, in the hurry of retreat,—treasures that, otherwise, no trooper of Rupert's would have spared: scarlet cloth, bedding, saddles, cutlery, ironware, hats, shoes, hops for beer, and books to sell to the Oxford scholars. But the daring which has given them victory now makes their danger;—they have been nearly twelve hours in the saddle and have fought two actions; they have twenty-five miles to ride, with the whole force of the enemy in their path; they came unseen in the darkness, they must return by daylight and with the alarm already given; Stoken Church-bell has been pealing for hours, the troop from Postcombe has fallen back on Tetsworth, and everywhere in the distance videttes are hurrying from post to post.
The perilous retreat begins. Ranks are closed; they ride silently; many a man leads a second horse beside him, and one bears in triumph the great captured Puritan standard, with its five buff Bibles on a black ground. They choose their course more carefully than ever, seek the by-lanes, and swim the rivers with their swords between their teeth. At one point, in their hushed progress, they hear the sound of rattling wagons. There is a treasure-train within their reach, worth twenty-one thousand pounds, and destined for the Parliamentary camp, but the thick woods of the Chilterns have sheltered it from pursuit, and they have not a moment to waste; they are riding for their lives. Already the gathering parties of Roundheads are closing upon them, nearer and nearer, as they approach the most perilous point of the wild expedition, their only return-path across the Cherwell, Chiselhampton Bridge. Percy and O'Neal with difficulty hold the assailants in check; the case grows desperate at last, and Rupert stands at bay on Chalgrove Field.
It is Sunday morning, June 18th, 1643. The early church-bells are ringing over all Oxfordshire,—dying away in the soft air, among the sunny English hills, while Englishmen are drawing near each other with hatred in their hearts,—dying away, as on that other Sunday, eight months ago, when Baxter, preaching near Edgehill, heard the sounds of battle, and disturbed the rest of his saints by exclaiming, "To the fight!" But here there are no warrior-preachers, no bishops praying in surplices on the one side, no dark-robed divines preaching on horseback on the other, no king in glittering armor, no Tutor Harvey in peaceful meditation beneath a hedge, pondering on the circulation of the blood, with hotter blood flowing so near him; all these were to be seen at Edgehill, but not here. This smaller skirmish rather turns our thoughts to Cisatlantic associations; its date suggests Bunker's Hill,—and its circumstances, Lexington. For this, also, is a marauding party, with a Percy among its officers, brought to a stand by a half-armed and angry peasantry.