Walter Herbert, or, as he was called in religion, Brother Francis, was the only child of an ancient family in Nottinghamshire. Entering the army at an early age, he found himself stationed with his regiment in Limerick, when the army of the "Confederates" sat down before that city in the summer of sixteen hundred and forty-two. He was then in his twentieth year. Forming part of Courtenay's company, when the city opened its gates to Garret Barry and Lord Muskerry, he retired with his commander to King John's castle, where, though closely besieged, they resolutely held out till St. John's eve, when Conrtenay was obliged to capitulate. In the course of the attack on the castle, a mine was sprung by the besieging party, and a turret, in which Herbert was stationed, fell to the ground with a terrific crash. For weeks he lay delirious; and when at length he awoke to consciousness, he found himself the occupant of a handsomely-fitted chamber looking out on the church of St. Nicholas. His host was a middle-aged, gentlemanly-looking person, of grave yet affable manners. He was a widower, and his household consisted of himself, an aged housekeeper, two sons, and an only daughter. The latter—Eily O'Brien—was the sick man's principal nurse, and no Sister of Mercy could have bestowed more care on a suffering invalid than she did on Walter Herbert—stranger though he was to her creed and her country. From lengthened and almost continual intercourse, a feeling of mutual affection sprang up between the young people. Gratitude on the one hand, and sympathy for the sufferings of the handsome young officer on the other, heightened this feelings till it grew into deep and lasting love. Like Desdemona, she loved him "for the dangers he had passed;" and he loved her "that she did pity them." But an insurmountable obstacle to their union lay in their difference of religion. Herbert was a Protestant; and old Connor O'Brien would never hear of any child of his being united to one of that creed which, in its struggle for ascendency, he believed to be the cause of so much suffering to his country, even though no other impediment whatever existed. A private marriage was thus their only alternative, and to this, in an evil hour, poor Eily consented.
Months rolled on—months of bliss to Walter and Eily—but their separation was at hand. Important letters called Herbert away, almost at a moment's notice. He hoped, however, that his absence would be of no lengthened duration, and that he would soon return to publicly claim his own Eily as his wife. But alas! his hopes were doomed to sad and bitter disappointment. On his arrival in England, he found the entire country in arms; and as it became impossible to remain neutral, or return to Ireland, he was forced to join the newly-formed corps just raised in his native county by Henry Ireton, his father's landlord. Once under military discipline there was no retreating; and though all his thoughts were turned to Ireland, he was doomed to maddening suspense regarding her who alone made Ireland dear to him. All communication between the two countries was now suspended. At Edgehill and Newbury he retreated before the king's troops—and at Marston Moor and Naseby had a share in defeating them. But victory or defeat was alike void of [{242}] interest to him. It was even with indifference he heard of his promotion for having saved his general's life at Naseby. The sole engrossing thought of his existence was how to get back to Limerick. That long-sought for opportunity at last arrived; but when it did, it scarcely brought joy to Herbert. He was ordered to join in the invading Parliamentary force; and, when he called to mind the fierce fanatics who were to be his fellow-soldiers, love made him tremble for the Irishry.
The fourteenth of June saw him on the battle-field of Naseby—the following autumn found him sailing up the Shannon—and, ere the close of the year, he was gazing on the steeple of St. Mary's and the towers of Limerick from the battlements of Bunratty, which had fallen into the hands of the Parliamentarians. He fancied he could even see the very house in which he had spent so many happy days. But beyond fancy he could not go. To reach the city was utterly impossible. All he could learn, from an Abbey fisherman whom they had taken prisoner, was that Connor O'Brien was still alive, and that his daughter was married and had a beautiful little boy. Who her husband was his informant could not say; but he thought he was an officer in Earl Glamorgan's army. Herbert, however, well knew who he was, and he would have risked worlds to have sent back his prisoner in safety, with even one line to Limerick. But Lord Inchiquin's troops were too vigilant to allow of any communication with the city. Even this intelligence, scanty though it was, afforded him some consolation. He knew his wife was safe, and unable any longer to endure the Tantalus-like position in which he was placed, he found means of returning again to England.
His next and last visit to Ireland was in the summer of sixteen hundred and fifty. He was then pretty high in command, and had hopes, as he sat down with Waller's army of investment before Limerick, in the July of that year, that should he be only able to effect an entrance into the town, his authority would be sufficient to protect whomsoever he pleased. But the year passed away, and still the city held out. And, had he but his wife and child without its walls, he would have counselled its burghers to hold out even still more manfully, for he well knew the iron heart and bloody hand of the execrable Hardress Waller.
The spring of the next year found him still before Limerick; and could he but communicate with any of its gallant defenders, his hatred of treachery would have urged him to expose to them the perfidy of one of their own whom they had raised to the rank of colonel. This wretch was named Fennell; and, for his treason in selling the passes of the Shannon at Killaloe, their commander-in-chief Cromwell had promised him and his descendants many a fair acre in Tipperary. By this pass Ireton and his myrmidons crossed the river into Clare; and with them passed Walter Herbert. Still his heart was full of hope of saving all he held dear in the leaguered city. Spring passed away, and summer again came; and still the assailing host made no progress toward the capture of the town which Ireton and his father-in-law regarded as the key of all the Munster territories. In the burning heat of July, while pestilence daily thinned the ranks of the besieged, an assault was ordered on the almost defenceless keep that guarded the northern extremity of the salmon weir, and Herbert was reluctantly obliged to form one of the storming party. His immediate senior in command was a person named Tuthill—one of those heartless hypocrites who could preach and pray while his brutal soldiery were massacring the wives and children of the brave men whom the chances of war made his victims. The fort was carried by overwhelming numbers; and Herbert was doomed to witness, with horror, the butchery of the surviving defenders, mercilessly [{243}] ordered by Tuthill—an order which he unhappily had no power of countermanding, but in the execution of which he took no part. Still the city held out, though the "leaguer sickness" was rapidly decimating its brave garrison. The north fortress of Thomond bridge was next carried by assault—but to no purpose. The townsmen succeeded in breaking down two of its arches, and thus cutting off all approach to the city in that quarter, and in resisting the sortie three hundred of their assailants perished. Winter was now fast approaching, and the plague extending from the city, in which fifty of its victims were now daily interred, commenced to thin the ranks of the besiegers themselves. Ireton had serious thoughts of raising the siege, and he would, beyond all question, have done so, were it not for treachery. Fennell, the traitor of Killaloe, was again at work—this time, unfortunately, within the very walls of the city itself.
A truce of some days was agreed on; and Herbert was one of those appointed to treat with the townsmen. The deputies met on neutral ground, midway between the city and camp, and within range of the rival batteries. His heart was now full of greater hopes than ever. Could he but meet with any member of Eily's family, he hoped that his love for her would induce them to listen to his counsels. But fate, it would seem, had leagued all chances against him. Had he met them, he meant to put them on their guard against Fennell's treachery, and, without absolutely breaking trust, give them such a key to Ireton's fears and readiness to make concessions as would, he hoped, lead to an honorable capitulation, and prevent the bloodshed which, from the shattered state of the town walls, and the additional element of treachery within those walls, he now judged to be inevitable, unless they came to terms with Ireton. But not one of them appeared; for the traitor had laid his plans deeply, and succeeded in diverting them and the clerical party, to which they faithfully adhered, from anything like a compromise. He wished that the sole merit and reward of surrendering the city should be his own. And he succeeded. The conference ended fruitlessly; and Herbert returned to the camp well-nigh broken-hearted.
The plague continued its ravages meanwhile; and, day after day, within the city, the dying were brought by their relatives to the tomb of Cornelius O'Dea, where many, it was believed, were restored to health through the intercession of that saintly prelate, who lay buried in the cathedral. Its effects were visibly traced in the ranks of the besieging Army. Still Ireton, relying on treason within, pressed on the siege. By a bridge of pontoons he succeeded in connecting the Thomond side of the river with the King's Island, where he now planted a formidable battery, to play on the eastern side of the city. Herbert had fortunately escaped witnessing the horrors of Drogheda and Wexford; but a sight almost as appalling now met his eyes. In the smoke of the cannonade crowds of plague-stricken victims—principally women and children—ventured outside the city walls to catch one pure breath of air from the Shannon, on "the Island" bank,—and there lie down and die. But when this was discovered, the heartless Waller forbade even this short respite from suffering. By his orders, those unhappy beings, who could have no share in protracting the siege, were mercilessly dogged back by the soldiery into the plague-reeking city— and such as refused to return were, by the same pitiless mandate, hanged [Footnote 38] within sight of their fellow-townsmen!
[Footnote 38: Historical]
The daily sight of this revolting butchery was sickening to the noble heart and refined feelings of Herbert. But suffering for him had not yet reached its climax. As he was seated in his tent, one evening toward the [{244}] close of October, fatigued after a long foraging excursion to the Meelick mountains, and musing sadly on the fate of her who was almost within sight of him, and yet whom, by what seemed to him an almost supernatural combination of adverse circumstances, he had not seen for years, his attention was arrested by the cries of a female who seemed struggling with her captors. His manhood was aroused by such an outrage—committed almost in his very presence—and he rose at once to rescue the victim from her assailants. But, horror of horrors! at the very door of his tent, and in the grasp of an armed ruffian, lay the fainting and all but inanimate form of his wife! To fell the wretch, and clasp the beloved object to his bosom, was but the work of a second. But, oh! how sorrow and sickness had changed that once beautiful face, and wasted that once symmetrical form. Death had already clutched her in his bony gripe, and selected her for his own. His kiss was upon her lips, for they were livid and plague-stained. And her beautiful blue eyes! how they now wandered with the wild look of a maniac. All that remained of the beautiful Eily he once knew were the long fair ringlets that now fell down in dishevelled masses on her heaving bosom. The sight almost drove him mad. In vain he clasped her to his heart, and called her by the dear fond name of wife. She knew him not, yet, when she spoke, her ravings were all about him; and he often wondered afterward how his brain stood the shock, when, without knowing him, she still called on him, "her own dear, dear Walter, to save her, to take her away from those terrible men—at least to come to her—for, to come to him, she had left her poor old father and little Gerald behind."
Wholly occupied with his wife, Herbert paid no attention to the sergeant's guard that stood at the tent door under arms. When at length he perceived them, he flew into a phrenzy of passion, asking them how they dared stand thus in his presence?—and ended by ordering "the catiffs who could thus treat a woman to get out of his sight presently."