By Frances C. Sparhawk, Author of "A Lazy Man's Work."
CHAPTER XXXII.
THE CAPITULATION.
It was the fifteenth of June. The expected ships had joined Commodore Warren, and his fleet of eleven men-of-war bore into the harbor. Signals had been agreed upon between the two commanders. The brush was piled upon Green Hill ready to send its columns of flame into the air when the Dutch flag at the mast-head of Warren's ship should announce that he was ready.
Under the inspiring promise of this flag, and in the blaze of the answering signals, the troops, with drums beating and colors flying, were to rush to the assault. Archdale's opinion, that heavy guns at the lighthouse would be disastrous to their old enemy the Island Battery, had been confirmed by two Swiss deserters, and that place was now almost untenable under a galling fire. The Circular Battery, built to protect the entrance to the city, was little better than a mass of ruins, while the fire that morning from Pepperell's fascine batteries was so hot that the enemy could not stand to their guns. Land and sea trembled with the shock of the cannonade. In the midst of all this Warren came ashore. The troops were drawn up as if for parade, and the Commodore addressed them in a few spirited words which stirred their devotion to the flag under which they were fighting. Then Pepperell stepped forward and swept his keen eyes along the ranks of the men. He had a knowledge of them and an interest in them that Warren could not even understand. To the Englishman they were so many soldiers eager to uphold the honor of the British nation, and he was proud of them. But Pepperell saw the forests to be hewn, the fields to be reclaimed from the wilderness, the cities yet unbuilded. He saw the life, great, though half its greatness was not dreamed of, that was to pour in through this gate which to-day's work was to open. For, not only that fear and hatred of Popery which marked his age, but, already, that American love of liberty, to which priestcraft is so inimical, burned within him. A touch of Winkelried's fervor kindled his eye. If into his breast, and into the breasts of his comrades, the bayonets of the enemy were to be planted, yet should a way be made for his countrymen.
"Soldiers," he said, "some of you fellow-citizens, and all of you fellow-workers in a great cause, I have no fear of you. I have good reason to know your persistence, and your undaunted courage. Our mother England needs us to-day. She has not demanded this work of us, for she has thought of us as children. Shall she find us grown to brawny manhood?" A deafening cheer rolled from rank to rank to answer him. "Foes assail her, and the enemy's hand is at her throat. Have we the glorious privilege of striking it down? Yes! To-day." Again cheer on cheer burst from the ranks, and rose above the roar of the cannon. "Then, let us spring to our work with nerves of steel, and arms of iron, and hearts of oak, like our ships that outride the storm, like our trees that laugh at the gale. But, look! it is we who command the gale, for it is our cannon that thunder. The enemy's—they are faint and fainter in reply. Their gates are broken down; their walls are broken down; their hearts quake within them, for all their gallant front. My brave soldiers, remember your comrades who lie here in their graves, and carry home to their sorrowing families the news that they have not died in vain; and carry home to your rejoicing families the assurance that you have not lived in vain. For more than that homes shall be peaceful, more than that hearts shall be happy, is it that religion shall be free. But one thing let us remember: strong hearts are not boastful; not in our own might do we go forth to this battle. 'Christo duec,'—'with Christ for our leader,'—this is our courage. Our flag, whose motto ends with this, may well begin, 'Nil desperandum—'Never despair.' We never have despaired; we have known only hope, and now hope is to become a certainty. On you rests the glory of making it so. On you. The enemy is ours to-day! Louisburg is ours TO-DAY! When you look toward the fleet and see the red flag at the mast-head of the 'Superbe;' when you look toward the hill and see the three columns of smoke rise up—then in your might, in the might of Christ, your Leader, march on! Fight! Conquer! And draw breath only within the walls of Louisburg!"
In the tumult of applause that followed this appeal the commanders turned toward one another. Warren was about to go back to his ship and give the final orders for bringing the fleet into action at once; for the lengthening shadows gave warning that the day was waning, and that it was time for plan and speech to ripen into action. With a word of parting, they clasped hands briefly, and the Commodore had already turned to enter his boat, when, with his face toward the city, he suddenly stopped.
"Look!" he said to Pepperell. "Who is that?"
"A white flag, as I live!" cried the General, watching the captain in command of the advance battery, who was going forward to receive the French officer. "Yes," he continued, as Duchambou's letter was handed to him. "See! he asks time to consider terms of capitulation."
After a few hasty orders, by which truce succeeded war, the commanders were seated in Pepperell's tent, their voices seeming to themselves to ring out strangely in the silence about them. The soldiers, flushed with desire for victory, rested upon their arms in an impatient acquiescence, and Pepperell himself, who, as a commander, rejoiced in the thought that bloodshed might be prevented, yet turned martial eyes upon his companion for a moment, and said, stifling a sigh:—