BV 2623 .Z9 S3 1902 Sadtler, William Augustus, 1864- Under two captains o/ ^JL oCje-^^''*^ ^ ac^t^ a-u^^yj^ Under Two Captains A Romance of History Born ,..", /'•/; . Rev. W. a. SADTIvER, Ph.D. P.tC PUBLISHED FOR THE PHILADELPHIA, PA. THE UNITED LUTHERAN PUBLICATION HOUSE COPYRIGHT, 1902, BY W. A. SADTLER. TO ONE WHO ONCE WELCOMED THE HERO OF THIS TALE TO THE REFINED HOSPITALITY OF A TRULY CHRISTIAN HOME, AND WHO NOW RESTS, IN THE EVENING OF LIFE, FROM HER ABUNDANT LABORS — TO MY MOTHER, CAROLINE SCHMUCKER SADTLER, THIS BOOK IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED. PREFACE. 'TRUTH is stranger than Fiction, and more interesting. This fact explains why the author of this work prefers to have it known as a romance of History, rather than as a historical romance. History it is that we have before us for the reader should know that the strange and improbable events among those here recorded are well-authenticated facts, and it is only the background and the connecting links, as they may be called, in this remarkable life-story that come from the author's hand. To begin the enumeration, it may be said that the cir- cumstances of the birth, education and varied acquirements of our hero are given in their simplicity. There is the same brief setting forth in its leading particulars of his service under Napoleon, with its campaigns, battles and hardships. The most striking incidents, as those of the escape from the Russian horsemen at Austerlitz, of the destruction of the Inquisition at Madrid and of the escape from prison, are simple facts. The same statement holds true of the leading incidents of the hero's life in this land ; e. g., his reception by the Quaker, his employment, his battle with the rustic cavalry in Eastern Pennsylvania, his recognition by Lafayette and many other incidents. Col- onel Lehmanowsky enjoyed the friendship of the public men named, and attained great popularity as a lecturer. His labors and sacrifices on behalf of his loved Church have been told only in part. The author's sources of information are many and varied. No little time has been given to carefully selected 6 PREFACE. historical reading, and there has been an extensive corres- pondence with those who have made detailed and local investigation of the facts of this strange career. Foremost among these investigators stand the Rev. M. L. Wagner, of Vandalia, 111, to whose suggestion this work may be said to be due, and Mr. A. H. Raising, of Corydon, Ind., a grand- son of the hero of our story. To these gentlemen my thanks for their valuable aid is hereby tendered. The reader will be interested to know that the story of this life was written years ago as an autobiography The manuscript was entrusted to a certain firm, to be published by them in parts ; but was stolen while in their hands, or destroyed to please those who feared its appearance in print. In any event there has been no trace of it found for more than forty years. However, the Truth cannot be destroyed or even long suppressed. There are certain lessons in the life of this patriarch of modern times that should at least be named. Like the great Abraham, this Great-Heart of our age walked by faith, and many a time in the long journey showed himself a man of might, even to the casting down of strongholds. Here is an example in true patriotism that our vainglorious age greatly needs. Here is a lesson for young and old — a noble figure stepping out of the well-nigh forgotten Past to point us to the source of all true strength. "They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength ; they shall mount up with wings as eagles ; they shall run, and not be weary ; they shall walk, and not faint." CONTENTS. Introduction 9 CHAPTER. I. A Stormy Spring Time 11 II. Lux EX Oriente 18 III. Freedom From the West 30 IV. Mars in the Ascendency 45 V. A Mighty Personality 69 VI. The Philosophy of War .... 84 VII. The Waning Planet 99 VIII. The Caged Lion 115 IX. Under the Shadow 129 PAET IT. IN THE NEW WORLD. I. Beginning Life Anew 143 II. In a New Role 154 III. From the Farm to the Capital 166 IV. Westward Ho ! 181 V. Nation-Building 193 VL A Servant of the Lord Jesus Christ 205 Valedictory 216 7 INTRODUCTION. A S I sit before the wood fires that are the centres of comfort in this Western world, it comes to me again and again that the life of one of these is an emblem of my life and indeed of all life. When first thrown upon the fire, how the log smokes and sputters as the heat penetrates its sub- stance ! So it is with the life of man in Youth : there is much smoke and there are gases burning with strangely colored flame that must be consumed before the real work of life can be begun. Then comes the steady glow and heat of man- hood, realizing itself and the purpose of its being. Lastly Age comes ; but let no one speak contemptuously or even lightly of it, as I can testify out of the abundant vigor of my four-score years, there is often fire under the white ashes that can warm or burn. You have read, my children, what the Psalmist, the Preacher and the Apostle say of the life of man. Poet, Philosopher and Scientist have added their word ; and the sum of it all is, Man is as the grass. Why then the story of one more life, burning 10 iNTRODUCTIOrf. fiercely enough for the moment, but then dying away in the ashes of forgetfulness ? Long years, crowded with stirring experience, have been mine : yet it is not from any motive of vanity that I speak, for I have seen too much af lyife and of its great events and personalities to hold up my own insignificant self to the public view. Nor is it because, like the moth charmed by the flame, I am attracted by the pomp or glitter of the world as I have seen it. Sic transit gloria mundi is the sentence that I have seen fulfilled in the case of the grandest court and mightiest personality of the modern world. Why then do I write my tale of a life ? Not from vanity or from love of this world : but to set forth to a heedless generation a fact that is ever present in my thoughts — the fact of the guiding hand of Almighty God in my life and in the life of the world. In the crystal beauty of the drop of rain clinging to a grass blade or in one life among the untold billions that have appeared on earth and are now gone, as well as in the conduct of the vast universe, God is present. CHAPTER I. A STORMY SPRING TIME. /^F how many whom the world of their day called great and of how many known only to their little circle of friends has it been recorded that they were born and that they lived and that they died ! Some were kings, greatly regarded and feared in their time, and others were poor men of whom the world took little note : but, great or small, one record holds for them all. Why then burden patient paper with the record of one more life from the vast hive of humanity ? Trusting that some good to man, and especially some honor to the Great Name may result from the story of a life that has been as a storm- driven wave of the sea, I take up my tale, fully realizing that Truth is stranger than Fic- tion. I was born in the city of Warsaw, Poland, in the year of our blessed Lord 1773. In circles in which it has been my lot to spend years not a few much is made of a family name that has held a place of prominence for a few centuries 11 12 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, or even generations. In this New World too, where Democracy is on the throne, men lay great stress, I find, upon any circumstances worthy of mention in the record of their families. Did boasting profit, I might tell of a lineage that can be followed back without a break for more than three thousand years to an ancestor whose name has its honorable mention, not in any book of the peerage, but in the unchanged and imperish- able Book of God. In other words, I was born a Jew, of tribe and family whose names are household words even in untold Christian homes: but this knowledge shall die with me, for to declare it would be nought but vanity. The family name by which we were known to the Gentile world is Lehmanowsky, and to me there was given in infancy, after the ancient custom of Israel, the name John Jacob. I was the first-born of the family, my mother, whose people came to Poland from France, being but a girl in years when I was born. Within the narrow limits of home there was happiness without alloy, and the years of my childhood sped by, so that now I cannot realize that period as anything else than a fondly cher- ished dream. Outside of the home very difierent conditions prevailed, as I learned at a fairly early age. The A ROMANCE OF HISTOR V. 13 hard lot of the Jew in almost every part of Europe eighty years ago is a sombre picture on which I need not dwell, for it is known to those who read and reflect, and all others would fail to appreciate it in its cruel injustice. The Almighty made of one blood all nations of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has declared Himself as the Father of all ; yet what evil seeds of distrust and hatred has not Satan sown in men's hearts towards those of alien race or even of different language, and on what trifling provocation do not these rise up in brutish rage against their fellow men ! In most places the Jew was condemned to live a life apart, being regarded as one under the curse of God, as it were, a religious leper. However there was less of this most un-Christ-like spirit in Poland than in other lands, and in my time it had almost disappeared under the terrible pressure of danger from without. To you into whose hands this narrative may fall Poland's story is, or should be, known in its great, pivotal facts. You have surely heard of the glorious Sobieski and of the deeds of valor to which he led his people in driving back the barbarian Turk from the lands of Christian Europe. You know, too, something at least of the liberty and prosperity the Polish nation en- joyed until the rapacious Russian bear fell upon 14 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, her in overpowering might, while sister nations that should have defended her, as she once de- fended them, stood idly by or shared the plunder with the spoiler. In the midst of the evil days that came so fast upon unhappy Poland, Patriotism was a cloak that covered even the heinous sin of alien race. My father bore his part well in those troubled times, giving freely of his wealth and also his counsel when it was sought and his personal aid to the wounded and sick, for he was by profession a chemist or physician. Having inherited wealth in his youth, he had abundant leisure to follow his inclination and gave himself especially to science, gathering from Arabic and other Oriental sources much lore that was unknown to the professors in the European universities. Literature and music also received a fair measure of attention, and already at home I became a linguist and a fair musician. But even as a lad it was my lot to be turned aside from the quiet paths of Peace. The clouds of War burst one after another upon our once happy land, and, boy as I still was, I found a place in the ranks for one campaign. This may seem less strange when I say that even then I had attained a stature much like that of Saul the son of Kish. My height when full-grown was six feet A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 15 and six inclies, and my physique was in good pro- portion. While this lofty stature had its unques- tioned advantages in days of Peace as in those of War, it often put me to such discomfort, because of cramped quarters, that I have sadly reflected on the penalty of greatness. My boyish experience in War ended in the de- feat of the cause for which we fought ; but it brought with it its own valuable lessons. Fore- most among these was the habit of steadiness in time of excitement and especially under fire, and then the all-important lesson of obedience to com- mand or discipline. At this time, too, I gained a fair skill in the use of the sword, the hand learning to follow the eye as by one instinct. As time elapsed and strength proportionate to my stature came, such became my mastery with the sabre that among many champions with this weapon whom I met I never found my superior. The lessons learned under the iron hand of Mars were not soon forgotten, for they were to pass into the very texture of my after life ; but now for more than two happy years it was my high privi- lege to give myself with every force of mind and heart to study. The very fact that the Future seemed to have nothing but calamity in store for our beloved country, drove a little band of us, con- genial spirits all, to the most earnest study of the 16 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, lessons of the mighty Past, and from that again in quick succession to speculation, hope and aspira- tion for the Future, developing so swiftly before our eyes. You know what University life is to the young European to-day. It is the Golden Age, not only of Culture, but also of Freedom, of Brotherhood and of Aspiration. If it is still the ideal life in this materialistic age, it was all this and more in the closing years of the Eighteenth Century when the great conceptions of Liberty, Fraternity and Equality were just blossoming for their fruitage on the thorny stem of the old tree. Time. In speaking of this life where shall I begin or end ? Surely I need not pause to tell of the build- ings that sheltered the University of Warsaw, for these were but its shell and doubtless have long since been destroyed by the storm of War. Shall I speak of the professors ? There were able men among them ; but their voices now seem to sound in my ears only as a part of the mighty chorus for Liberty that I have heard for so many years echo- ing throughout Europe and America. Shall I tell of the body of students representing many nation- alities and types ? I had my acquaintance with leading men among them, for it has ever been my pleasure to learn to know those of different lands, to acquire their language and, as well as might A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 17 be, to enter iuto their life and thought. I might state here, that in the course of my life I have gained a fair mastery of twenty-two languages, ancient and modern. Shall I tell of individuals whom I learned to esteem, and in one case to love as David loved Jonathan ? There were some noble spirits in our little band of comrades, and one who was too noble for this world. He fell in Freedom's holy cause three score years ago and some of the choicest spirits of our little student world with him, when Poland fell before her savage foes. There is no need that I should describe our student life, now deeply earnest in its thought and aspiration, now gay in the abandon of youthful enthusiasm. We worked as strenuously as men can work, carried away at times by the rush of some great, up-lifting thought, and at times we gave ourselves to pleasure, and passed the hours in light-hearted merriment. Quarrels there were too, chiefly among those of rival nationalities or polit- ical tendencies, and these usually ended in the duel ; but from these I stood wholly aloof. Scars, whose number almost passes belief, I could show upon my person ; but none of these was gotten in foolish brawl. 2 CHAPTER II. LUX EX ORIENTE. A MONG the studies with which I was occupied during these halcyon years, that which attracted me the most strongly was History. Per- haps because my own people are the puzzle of History, its great lesson has been to me as the unanswered question of the Sphinx. The tragedy of Israel was the theme that absorbed much of my thinking. Not only did the contrast between the former glory of the nation and its present wretch- edness fairly burn itself into my consciousness ; but the perplexing question arose before my mind again and again, and would not down : Why this evident judgment of God upon that people whom He had chosen from among the nations and led and kept so long as His own peculiar people ? Was it, as the Christians say, because the Christ came to His own people, and was by them rejected and crucified ? Who and what, according to the prophets, was the Christ to be, and what was or is His king- dom ? And what was to be the end of this tragedy of a nation ? For what purpose was Israel being kept, 18 A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 19 a people without a country, a government or a priesthood? Why had Jehovah chosen this one people to be the light-bearers of the world during the long ages, dwelling among them, or at least making His awful presence felt in almost every turn of their daily lives : yet afterwards just as evidently rejecting and punishing them? What then was to be their destiny ? Would God's old covenant people ever again take its place among the nations of earth ? If not, to what end had it been so providentially kept a distinct people, even centuries after its mighty oppressor Rome had fallen and crumbled away ? Most earnest and protracted was the study I gave to the Law and the Prophets, as I thought on these hard questions, and many, too, were the conversa- tions I held with my father. He was a man of strong intellect, well read, too, both in the sacred writings and in secular History. His turn of mind, however, was philosophical rather than religious, the speculations of Reason and the progress of Science affording him his favorite themes for dis- cussion. As for any impartial discussion with our Rabbi of Israel's relation to Jesus, the Messiah of the Christians, the thing was impossible. So strong was his feeling on this question that he would become enraged at any suggestion that Jesus of Nazareth could be the Messiah of Israel, 20 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, and would silence me with the dreaded name, "Apostate." Occasionally I would allow myself to be drawn into conversation on this most interesting of sub- jects by a chosen few of my friends who were Christians ; but they would urge that I should give up Judaism as a relic of the dead Past, and this I stubbornly maintained I would not and could not do. Of my two most intimate friends, the one, Heinrich, was of the prevailing Roman Catholic faith ; the other, Carl, of the Protestant minority. In company with Heinrich I occasionally attended services in the Roman Catholic cathedral. At first the impression was very strong that was made upon my spirit by its sensuous worship ; but soon there followed a comparison with the infi- nitely richer Temple service, as set forth in the Scriptures ; then, what I was witnessing seemed veiy bare indeed. Then, too, the thing to be found in every synagogue, the very heart of a rightly ordered service, viz : the reading and expo- sition of the Scriptures, was in these Roman ser- vices all but wholly lacking. The worship of the Protestant Church I found very plain ; but then nothing elaborate was attempted, and it made much of the one thing I especially prized — the exposition of the Scriptures. This Gospel that was here made the very centre of A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 21 the services, how different it was from the teaching of the rabbis, how simple, and yet how fraught with irresistible power ! My respect was won for the work that I could see the pastor was doing, both faithfully and efficiently, in the face of many hindrances and petty persecutions ; and naturally also I came to respect the man himself His personality did not impress one at first meeting; for he was unas- suming and even retiring in manner, though of a quiet strength that could give good account of itself when need arose. Pastor Klein still lives in my thoughts, a fragrant memory from that long- gone Past. Acquaintance with him soon ripened into friend- ship, and many an earnest conversation we had in his study, or of a Sunday afternoon as we walked or lingered in some retired spot, under the pines, perhaps, well away from the crowds of the city. At such times I could not but recognize that I was talking with a man mighty in the Scriptures, in the Law and the Prophets just as truly as in the Gospel. In the older Scriptures I too was well versed, and before my imagination, as distinctly as the towers of Warsaw rose before my eyes, glowed the vision of the kingdom of the Greater David, who I believed, was yet to come. For this expected 22 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS. kingdom of earth I contended with many a care- fully studied argument, but without convincing even myself. An illustration that I could not escape, for it lay on the very surface, was that our loved kingdom of Poland, now tottering, as we could see, to its fall ; yet destined, we firmly believed, to further the holy cause of Freedom by the wrongs it had so innocently and heroically endured. But my honored friend was able to give a reason for the faith that was in him by citing far deeper truths than that involved in the fate of Poland. "Your cherished vision of a greater David and of a more splendid Solomon," said the pastor, "is a very attractive one to the natural heart; but it holds up the ideal of earth, and not that of heaven. God's thoughts are not our thoughts, and the Messiah, He saw the world needed was One of whom it could be said : ' He shall not cry, nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be heard in the street. A bruised reed shall he not break, and the smoking flax shall he not quench : and he shall bring forth judgment unto truth. He shall not fail nor be discouraged, till he have set judgment in the earth : and the isles shall wait for His law.' " " And was not this prophetic picture realized in Jesus of Nazareth ? Did he not go about in pov- A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 23 erty and lowliness, doing in quiet and obscurity His wonderful work for the redemption of man from the power of Satan ? Did He not show Him- self merciful beyond the measure of our under- standing with the bruised reeds of humanity, the mammonized publicans and the earth-stained sm- ners> Did He not even make of such pillars for the glorious City of God, and fan the faintly smoking embers of spirituality in the soul of a Peter until they could set three thousand souls on fire with the consuming desire for righteousness ? " Here I demanded of the pastor exact proof from the prophetic Scriptures that the Messiah of Israel was to be such a one as he was describing. " To go back then," he continued, " to the days of old • Does not God's purpose of love for His people Israel stand out in the old Scriptures as m letters of fire and did not Israel in hardness of heart thrust this love away ? Is it not written in Isaiah, ' But now thus saith the Lord that created thee, O Jacob, and He that formed thee, O Israel, Fear not: for I have redeemed thee, I have called thee by thy name; thou art mine.' And again, 'This people have I formed for myself; they shall show forth my praise ' Such peculiar and tender love of the God and Father of us all for Israel there certainly was, as might be shown by many a passage ol Holy Writ A purpose there is here that reaches back 24 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, to the dim light of Creation ; yes, even to the un- thinkable ages of Eternity; for God created Israel for His own glory. Ingratitude may come in, and it did come in, to interrupt the flow of God's love for His people and through them for all mankind: but could man's sin, think you, break the eternal purpose of God ? Affliction came upon Israel now and again because of its sin in the fulfillment of God's plan of love; yet Jehovah remembered His people in love even in the days of their merited chastisement. ' But the Lord hath taken you, and brought you forth out of the iron furnace, even out of Egypt, to be unto Him a people of inheritance, as ye are this day.' " " But mark now the three-fold thwarting of the Great Shepherd's purpose of love by a rebellious people. You know too well the sad story of the ungrateful murmuring in the wilderness and of the forty years of wandering that a just God ordained as recompense. Then, after long generations of enjoyment of the Land of Promise and of unfailing experience of God's faithfulness and mercy, the peo- ple turned aside to serve idols, and were delivered to their enemies to serve for seventy years in the bitterness of the Babylon Captivity. Finally Israel committed the great sin of its whole sin-stained career in rejecting and crucifying God's own all- loving Son, and through the weary centuries since A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 25 it has been a wanderer on earth, finding no rest for its foot and no peace for its heart." *' Over against all this, consider the thing that might have been for Israel in the fulfillment of God's gracious promise that peace should come to it as a river. ' O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments! then had thy peace been as a river and thy righteousness as the waves of the sea.' Instead of the River of Peace that the Lord God intended should come to Israel, watering and mak- ing glad all the fields of its life, there has come desolation that is as the desert sands that have buried Babylon and Ninevah with their sins from men's sight." " But there is a very different thing that shall be when the fullness of God's set time has come. Then, when the Gentile branches have had their day for fruit-bearing, the natural brarches shall be restored and Israel shall even yet be saved. ' And they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be grafted in: for God is able to graft them in again. And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob.' Great was the sin of the men of Israel when with wicked hands they crucified the Lord of Glory: yet the All-wise One fore-knew even this crowning act of wickedness, and ordained good from this also. 26 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, His mercy is now turned to the Gentiles; but, when the fullness of the Gentiles is come, Israel shall again be raised by the hand of Almighty power and love. Ezekiel 36: 24-28." " Yet there is a condition that is indispensable to this restoration of Israel ; there is one lever of might that alone can lift an entire people from the place of its wretchedness, gilded though that wretchedness be in the case of many. If we turn again to the words of the prophet, we see that prayer is that lever that can raise one people or the whole world. ' Thus saith the Lord God: I will yet for this be enquired of by the house of Israel, to do it for them." ' ' But, when we pray to the Father for the redemption of the world from Sin and its deaden- ing power, we pray for the coming of the Christ, and so we come again to the great question of the mission of Jesus. What was that mission ? It was to be to the world lying in Sin the light-bearer that Israel was intended to be, and infinitely more, even the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. Those Jews of modern times and others of like spirit who would accept Jesus as the greatest of prophets, and yet reject Him as the Lamb of God slain for the sin of the world, overlook in their superficial rationalism the claims that He made over and again that He is the Son of God A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 27 and one with God. Either he is what He declares Himself to be, Very God of Very God, or He is a deceiver or poor crazed fanatic ; there is no middle ground." "Jesus Christ was born into this world and lived the life that He chose for Himself that He might die the death that was to set men free from the awful might of Sin. ' The Son of Man must be lifted up,' is the thought that was ever present with Him, to cast its hateful shadow over the path- way of His pure life. All the bitter particulars of the treading of the wine-press of the wrath of God were present to His mind, and from time to time He impressed the sad truth upon His disciples, that in the hour of test they might not be offended in Him, their Crucified Saviour." ♦'Deep, beyond the power of words to describe, as were the depths of humiliation and sorrow to which our Lord stooped in His work of atonement, it was necessary for Him to descend here, as into hell itself, that man might be saved from the ruin Sin had wrought in his soul. Foolish and wrong as our Saviour's course seemed to many when He was upon earth. Time has vindicated Him and shown that all that He did and said was done and said with the pure wisdom of heaven. The bitter- est fling that His enemies made against Him was that he was possessed of a devil. But the progress 28 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, of the Christian centuries has shown that Jesus Christ came to destroy the works of the Devil and to put Satan himself in chains unto judgment. Our Lord was put to death on the charge of blasphemy. But God the Father has disproved this charge by raising His Son from the dead, and thus giving assurance that He shall come again in power and glory. Jesus of Nazareth has been vindicated as the Christ of God in another way also, i. <??., by the growing sentiment of men, for the time has come when worldly and even evil men speak of Him with profound respect. Most of all, however. He has been vindicated by the life of inner joy and peace that all those have found who have accepted His invitation: ' Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.' " " On the one side of the scale of our Redeemer's life stands the fact, deep far beyond the measure of our minds, ' He poured out His soul unto death ;' but on the other the wonderful and blessed fact that men are coming to see in the peaceful conquest of the world by the Gospel of Christ, ' He shall see of the travail of His soul and be satisfied.' " So the pastor ended his argument from the Scriptures late one Sunday night, and I made my way home, there to spend the remainder of the night searching the prophets for some word with which to answer him. This I could not find, A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 20 though I continued my search all through the next day and well into the night. Finally sleep came, bringing the vision of the Man of Sorrows as He stood, a thorn-crowned King, in Pilate's judgment hall. I know very well that those who have shut faith out from their hearts as a childish thing, and who pride them- selves on the scientific character of their thinking, would have a dozen explanations for this vision of the Christ ; but to me it remains one of the most real facts of my whole life. As I looked on Him, the Thorn-crowned One turned and gave me a look, and that look said more plainly than words could have done, " Art thou ashamed of Me ?" From that instant I knew in my heart that He was my Saviour-King, for whom I could live or die, as He willed. When conviction of the Truth had thus at last come to me, I lost no time in making the fact known to the world. At the first suitable oppor- tunity I made public avowal of my faith in Christ, and was received into the communion of the Evangelical Lutheran Church through the sacra- ment of baptism. My parents were very angry at first ; but the Spirit of Truth must have spoken to them also, for they soon became heartily reconciled to my act, CHAPTER III. FREEDOM FROM THE WEST. A LL too soon it seemed my University life came to an end. What had it been and to what did it lead ? It had been broken in upon by the rude hand of war ; yet it was no mere thing of shreds and patches, but had a certain completeness of its own. There had been a general view of the vast field of knowledge, and, hasty as this had of necessity been, the recollection of it gave me in whatsoever society I afterwards found myself, the strength and freedom of spirit that are the most valued possessions of the educated man. Still, it must be admitted, definiteness of aim had been lacking in my studies, and the end of the course left me without any fixed plan or purpose. I did not feel satisfied to settle down to the practice of a profession, and far less to the conduct of busi- ness. Neither did the thought of a life given to scientific experiment or scholarly research appeal to me. Something of the unrest of the age had seized me, and, like the eagle longing to try his wings in the azure vault, I burned with the desire to push out into the big world and mingle in the swiftly changing scenes of public life, 30 A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 31 Whither should I turn to find my hoped for sphere ? Freedom was the bright vision that a few of us cherished as our choicest day-dream, and so the problem resolved itself into the search for the abode of Freedom. It is to the western skies that men have been accustomed to look to see the star of Freedom twinkling forth its rays of hope. To the West, therefore, I and others with me, had accus- tomed ourselves to look often and long in those days of the generous aspiration of youth. America, with its Washington and the galaxy of noble names associated with him ; the Declaration of Independence, the noblest of the voices of Free- dom ; the thoroughly matured Constitution of the young nation of the West — these were the topics of many an earnest discussion. Next in its place in our interest stood France and her circle of gifted ones crying aloud against the heaped- up burdens that long centuries of Monarchy, Prelacy and Aristocracy had fastened upon the necks of the people. What was there of Truth to give point to the shafts of Voltaire ? Upon what foundation did the work of Rousseau stand ? What of his " Back to Nature" cry, and what is that Nature? Is it in- deed a thing of innate nobility, or is it only humanity in the rough, uncultured, if not, alas, unwashed ? What was there for a nation's hope in 32 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, Mirabeau ? Was there anything of good in Louis, by the grace of God, King of the French ? Could not some great and noble course be expected of Lafayette, the hero-friend of the great Washington ? Finally, what of the Third Estate? Was it not indeed by a newly discovered " divine right " the French nation, for does it not come to us as the wisdom of the ages, Vox populi, vox Dei ? There seemed to be but one sure way to answer these questions that came crowding so fast upon one another and that meant so much to the lover of his kind, and that was to go and see. This con- clusion was reached by two friends and myself late one night, after hours of earnest discussion, and it was a few weeks only until we put it into execution. The increasing gloominess of the po- litical situation in our own land helped to reconcile our parents to the thought of our launching out into the great world. In Poland the cause of Lib- erty seemed all but hopeless ; in France, while there was much to condemn, there was not a little to admire. Perhaps a few earnest and disciplined spirits, throwing themselves vigorously into the scale, might be able in time to turn the balance towards some such happy results as those to which Providence had led the American patriots. Carried away, as we were, by such youthful dreams, we could hardly await the time set for our departure. A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 33 Then too France was to me my mother's native land, and its language a second mother tongue. Three score years have passed away since my two friends and myself took our places in the lumber- ing old carriage that was to bear us over the first stage of our journey westward ; but I remember my feelings as though our leaving home were an event ' of yesterday. There was the strong glow of youth- ful anticipation uplifting my spirit as on a wave, yet over all was the shadow of the sorrow of part- ing from a father who had been to me Wisdom itself and from a mother who ever showed herself Love. Had I known that I was to see them but once more in this life, and then amid the confusion and haste of War, the cloud of sorrow would most certainly havel^overed the entire sky. As it was, in the ignorance that is bliss, we jour- neyed away from home and loved ones into the great world that had no more thought for us than for the dust blown along its highways. Small as was the part we filled then or ever afterwards in the affairs of the world, we saw ourselves magni- fied many times through the medium of the egotism of youth and gravely passed our all-decisive judg- ment on people and things as we met them in our travel, or as word came to us about them from the human hive toward which our journey tended. As we drew near the borders of France we met many 3 34 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, representatives of a class that alternately attracted and repelled us. This was the class of Emigrant Nobles, driven from home and native land by the dread of the Commune and eagerly seeking to hasten the day of their vengeance by making com- mon cause with their country's hereditary foes. At first we felt drawn to these people because of their misfortunes and their culture ; but, as we came to understand their imperious pride and heartless- ness toward those beneath them in the social scale, we agreed that these had another spirit from our- selves and held somewhat aloof from their com- pany. As all things mundane have their end, our long journey was at last over and we found ourselves in Paris. Very different was the Paris of that day from the beautiful city of to-day, and just as diflfer- ent was it from the city of our dreams. Despite its many stately buildings, the Paris we looked on with such eager eyes in those days now so long past was for the most part a city of narrow and gloomy streets, savoring far more of the Middle Ages than of what we of this land would consider the living Present. What most men would call chance, but what I prefer to call Providence, guided us in our choice of lodgings. These were not only comfortable and reasonable, but were also most desirable for us on A ROMANCE OF HISTOR V. 35 account of the personality of our landlord. He held some petty position (I forget just what) in the public service that gave him the best opportunity for forming opinions of those who came and went as the leaders of the people. He was, moreover, a quiet, earnest man, more given to thought than to speech, and above all things a true patriot. As day after day we gave ourselves to the study of the city and more especially of the people and were often in great perplexity what to think, this man took a true, fatherly interest in us and gave us much valuable counsel. All too soon we found out what truth there is in the statement, " 'Tis distance lends enchantment to the view." One after another the bright visions we had so fondly cherished of a sovereign and enlightened people ruling itself with justice and wisdom showed themselves to be the emptiest illusions. The much-advertised French Constitu- tion may have gained some substantiality after many years had passed over it and given it a cer- tain standing ; but in those days it was no more substantial than the cloud bank that the heat of a summer day piles up against the horizon. As for the National Assembly it was but a rope of sand, or at best one of straw, not to be depended upon for the safety of any cause. The Press was influ- ential then as now, and the Placard and the Pam- 36 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, phlet spoke to their thousands, but these were as irresponsible as the winds that blow now east, now west. Somewhat more stable in their positions were the Clubs : yet it was no pure, life-giving water that flowed from the most of these, but a very turbid stream, staining rather than cleansing men's spirits. It was not these things I have named, but the people that from the very day of our arrival forced itself on our attention and held us as under a spell. The French people ! What a favored nation by the gifts of Nature, blending the strength of the Frank or Teuton with the versatility and vivacity of the Latin, and yet somehow how lacking ! Even in the space of a few weeks how often did we not see that people change almost in a moment from the peaceful charm of a lake or sea glittering and rippling in the sun to the demoniac fury of the tempest. We had come to France strongly preju- diced in favor of its people, but, as we observed that people in its revolutionary throes daily becom- ing a thing of terror to others and even to itself, we lost our admiration for it and came to consider it as little more than a rabble and to say among ourselves : Odiprofanum vtilgum. And yet there was something pathetic, we felt, in the struggle of a people striving, however ignor- antly and blindly, to be free. Here was a blind- A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 37 folded giant, striking out in all directions in his rage. What might that giant not accomplish, were his eyes to be unbandaged and he himself rightly instructed ! What might not the gifted French people have wrought out for itself and for humanity in general, had it been guided in its struggle for Liberty by the light of that Word of eternal Truth wherein Israel of old and the truly great nations of to-day walked and are now walk- ing ! Had France walked in the light of the Truth that makes men free, her blood-stained Revolution would have been replaced by a life-giving Refor- mation, and she would stand forth to-day a queen among the nations of the earth. But France was not a land of the Open Bible, and so the fires of Revolution, fed by the passions of infuriated men, burned ever more fiercely until the fire burned itself out. When we arrived in Paris the fires of men's passions were burning the hottest, for the Commune, with the de-humanized Robespierre as its high-priest and with the guillo- tine as its altar, was supreme in the city and throughout France. I need not tell the oft-told story of those evil days : enough if I tell what be- fell my comrades and myself When we had come to what we thought was a fair understanding of the situation, I was chosen spokesman, and attempted to deliver a few care- 38 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, fully considered patriotic sentiments on the duty of the citizen. As the custom of the day was, I spoke standing on the open street where a small crowd had gathered, my unusual stature making me a conspicuous figure. I tried to speak in plain words and to the point ; but the sullen demeanor of the crowd and an occasional word of hostile com- ment showed me in a very few minutes that, to say the least, speaker and audience were not en rap- port^ so I brought my patriotic eloquence to an abrupt conclusion. After earnest reflection we concluded that this most evident lack of fellow feeling between ourselves and those who then and there represented the French people lay not merely in the fact that we were clean, well-fed and well- clothed ; while the majority of these were unkempt, hungry and ragged ; but in the deeper-lying fact that we stood for Christian patriotism, and these for brutish violence. As a matter of duty I made two more efforts to instill this rabble with some idea of what the word Patriot really meant, but the outcome was not happy. The first time I had spoken but a few minutes when paving stones were hurled at my head, and it was only by the elo- quence of the fist freely bestowed that we made our escape from the canaille. On the last occasion I had hardly begun speaking to a little group when the crowd came flocking about us, some of A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 39 them with swords and pikes, with which they threatened us. As we wore our heavy Polish sabres by our sides, and had some skill in their use, by quick work we succeeded in striking the weapons out of their hands, while we made our escape amid shouts of " Down with the Aristo- crats ! " Our kindly-disposed landlord told us that evening what our own common sense had already made clear to us, viz. : that our careers as French patriots were now ended. After this it was clearly unsafe for us to walk the streets, except late at night, for, if we escaped death at the hands of the mob, it lay in wait for us in the form of the murderous suspicion that would have delivered us to prison, and then by a short step to the guillotine. In those evil days when human tigers roamed the city, craving blood, there was but one thing for peace-loving strangers like ourselves to do, and that was to get away as quickly as possible. But this step we found to our sorrow was more easily decided upon than taken, so murderous was the spirit of the rabble then in power toward any who might come under the faintest shadow of the suspicion of favoring the hated Aristocrats. The old fable of the visitors to the lion's den seemed about to be acted out by our unfortunate selves, for none were permitted to leave the city without passports certifying that 40 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, they were loyal citizens of the French Commune, and such passports we could not get, though our friend exerted himself on our behalf to the point of endangering his life. As our situation was daily becoming more precarious, we resolved to cut our Gordian knot by enlisting in the Army of the French Republic. There was more satisfaction in this course than might at first appear, for, while what should have been the fountain head of Lib- erty was pouring forth a turbid stream, the armed forces of the Republic were even then beating back the old feudal tyranny from the frontier. We accordingly betook ourselves to the recruit- ing station, and were happy to demonstrate with foils upon the persons of those in charge that we were acquainted with the use of weapons. Our enlistment promptly followed, and very soon after- wards we had our first taste of the hardness of War, by being assigned to different regiments, and thus separated. It was only at long intervals that we were able to meet, to recount our experiences and to live over youthful days. Both of my comrades quitted themselves like men, rose to some rank, and finally died the soldier's death. As for myself I was given the rank of sergeant, and soon after sent away to join the forces besieg- ing Toulon. Just here the insignificant stream of my life joins the mighty current of History, for I A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 41 had my part in the event that has made the name Toulon one of note. You know from your reading how the forts, supported by an English fleet in the harbor, stood unshaken by all our attack. Then it was that a certain Captain of Artillery, Bona" parte by name, came forward with his plan for carrying one fort by assault, maintaining that its capture would at once render the enemy's whole position untenable. The plan was approved by the military council, and Captain Bonaparte was given the privilege of carrying it through, aided by what volunteers he could get for his forlorn hope. The venture appealed to my youthful spirit, as I could not but remember the stronghold of Mt. Zion, and how, despite its strength, David's men of war had carried it by assault. I well recall that first experience under my new commander. After a fierce artillery duel and under cover of attack at two other points, we crept stealthily along the bed of a ravine, and then came the rush over the open ground and through the hail of death up to the guns of the "Little Gibralter." Thanks to my stature, I was the first man over the parapet, and with my long sword arm I was able to beat back a few of the defenders and make way for some of my comrades. These came svv^arming into the fort, and soon it was ours and its guns turned on the other forts, and then on the ships. 42 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, As the young military genius had declared, this fort was the key to the whole situation, and the ships were forced to retire and Toulon surrendered. My part in the victory brought me words of recog- nition from the leader and a Sub-lieutenancy. However, the pleasure I felt at my promotion was short-lived. Bitterness and wrath took its place as I was compelled to witness the awful vengeance the army was ordered to take on those who had so bravely resisted it. The defenders of Toulon, yes, and even non-combatants and women, were killed by wholesale butchery, being stood up in companies to be shot, or being bound hand and foot and drowned. Honorable soldiers could not be relied upon to do this work of massacre ; but duly authorized bands of cut-throats were sent out from Paris to go from city to city, butchering all who could be suspected of not being in sympathy with the peculiar variety of Liberty they repre- sented. I was sick at heart at the report and occasional sight of such worse than brutish ferocity and should have quit the army just then, had there been any way of safety open for me. I was some- what comforted, however, by the assurance of several older men that the end of the French Terror was almost at hand, and that then the tables would be turned and the earth rid of many monsters. A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 43 The most important result of the victory at Toulon to me personally was the favor of Bona- parte, now General, that I had won and that (little did I dream of it then) was to attach me to him and his most wonderful fortunes for more than a score of years. The citadel at Toulon was taken December 17th, 1793, and for the next six months I followed Bonaparte from point to point, through Southern France and Northern Italy, as he inspected and strengthened fortifications and armaments. He then went to Paris to push his fortunes at the fountain-head of power, and I followed a soldier's lot under several commanders for a year more before I again saw my predestined military chief. During the year 1794 the fires of Patriotism burned with a brilliant flame, especially in the armies of France, and notable victories were won on every frontier over the old feudal foes. During this time I served my apprenticeship in the hard trade of War, so that when I returned to Paris in the summer of 1795 it was as the exper- ienced soldier and officer of recognized standing, fearing the ravings of the mob as little as I feared the howling of the storm. Whether this was poetic justice or not I do not know, but it was at least a fact that I was one of General Bonaparte's trusted aids on that memorable Fifth of October, 44 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, when the fiery scourge of grape shot, falling merci- lessly upon the'u, taught the rabble the great lesson of respect for the powers that be. As there was a brief lull in the storm of war, I spent the winter of 1795-96 in Paris, becoming acquainted with the city and learning something of the winds and currents of influence that exert so mighty a power over the lives of men. And this was a notable winter in Paris, one of the gayest that even gay Paris had as yet known. Neverthe- less it was a strange and often an unhallowed gaiety, akin to the nervous bravado of a man just reprieved from the scaffold. By way of re-action from the long night of dread from which they had hardly emerged the Parisians now gave themselves up to all manner of gaiety and indulgence. Strange as it may seem, even those who had been robbed of their nearest and dearest by the guillotine joined in the merriment, yes, mingled freely with those who had hurried the loved ones to a cruel death. It was with mixed feelings that I took my place in this strange society of Revolutionary Paris. While enjoying life with all the vigor and spirit of youth, I can say that neither at this time nor after- wards amid the unceasing temptations of camp and of court did I ever forget my Christian pro- fession or dishonor it as much as by an oath. Yet not I, but Christ who strengthened me. CHAPTER IV. MARS IN THE ASCENDENCY. WITH the appointment of General Bonaparte to the command of the Army of Italy his military genius may be said to have been fully revealed to the world, and his career of military glory to have been begun. Nothing happens in this universe without its adequate cause, and so it was with the glory of Napoleon, which for the next twenty years lit up the skies of Europe and indeed of the whole civilized world with its mighty illumination. Victory fol- lowed victory in this campaign, but these came not by accident nor yet by "Destiny." There were forces of tireless energy in the man that far surpassed the average powers of human endurance, and these made possible the acquisition of vast stores of knowledge in all the fields of activity which he entered. "Labor," said Napoleon, "is my ele- ment. I have found the limit of my strength in eye and limb ; I have never found the limit of my capacity for work." Not only did Napoleon know the Science of War as a master, but he also knew the conditions, geographical, political and social of the lands and 46 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, people with which he came in contact. Moreover he knew these pivotal facts, not after years of dear- bought experience and reflection had forced them upon him, but at the time when the knowledge meant almost unlimited power, viz., when it was needed. Finally he understood in many of its secret workings that which is the most important factor of all in the great game of Life — the human heart. Especially did he know to touch with a master hand the chords of the heart of the French people. In witness of this fact let his Proclama- tion to the Army of Italy speak. " Soldiers, you are naked and badly fed ; the government owes you much and can give you nothing. Your patience and the courage you have exhibited amid these rocks are worthy of admiration ; but you gain no fame, no glory falls upon you here. I will lead you into the fertile plains of the world, rich prov- inces and large cities will fall into your power ; there you will find honor, fame and abundance. Soldiers of Italy, would you fail in courage and perseverance ?" Two mighty springs of human activity are here laid bare. These are the love of Glory and the love of Gain, and they are the forces that move the millions. The love of Gain, the unholy desire for the lands and treasures of others, this has ever been the all-controlling motive that has led men to fly A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 47 at one another, weapons in hand. This motive in- fluenced many who served under Napoleon ; yet, after all, it was the other incentive that swayed the most. With a skill that must have been given by the Prince of this world himself. Napoleon sounded the note. Glory, and it found an instan- taneous answer in the spirit of the people. Not only were the soldiers carried away by his phantasm of Glory, but it swept before it the whole people in one mad rush to ruin. What its effect was, as used by Napoleon upon the armies and people of France, let twenty years of almost incessant war and the sacrifices in battle or by disease or famine of three million of France's bravest sons answer. But to return to the Army of Italy. The victo- ries promised by Napoleon were speedily won, and Piedmont was conquered and the way opened for advantageous peace with the petty kingdoms and states of Italy and also for the struggle with the world-power, Austria, now arousing herself for the fiery ordeal of battle. Time does not permit me to trace the events of the seemingly unequal struggle between the youth- ful General Bonaparte with his small army and the veteran Austrian Generals, Wurmser and Alvinzi, commanding large armies, or to show how by the almost superhuman vigor and celerity of the French Caesar the tide of war was made to flow most ruin- 48 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, ously against tlie armies of Austria. That victory did not flow of itself to the standards of Napoleon, let the defeat of the French in the Tyrol and before the heights of Caldiero testify, and also the three days' desperate struggle that ended in the victory of Areola, only when Bonaparte himself snatched the banner of a retreating regiment and rushed with it across the bridge swept by the fire of the Aus- triaus. It would be of interest could I tell you of the conqueror's first essay at the role of statesman when in Milan he held court and by diplomacy or, it might be, by his ipse dixit^ fashioned new republics on the French model out of the eld feudal and aristocratic domains. Not entirely lacking in interest was the young French Alexander's pilgrimage, if not to the shrine of Jupiter, at least to the Eternal City and to his spiritual father, the Pope, On this delightful occasion the latter worthy was persuaded to hand over several important cities, 30,000,000 frances and certain treasures of Art for the benefit of needy France. I might state here in passing that the only booty I ever took in war, except for the needs of the hour, was the sword of Sobieski, Poland's hero-king, which I found at Loretto and afterward gave to Poland's last hero, Kosciusko. In April, 1797 the preliminaries of peace between A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 49 France and Austria were settled and the victor returned to Milan, to his loved wife and to the court he had there established, to rest from his labors and to harvest their fruits. A grand reception was tendered Napoleon by the aristocracy of Italy in the Palace Serbelloni, and a few days later he removed with his retinue and following to the Castle of Montebello. Here in the midst of beautiful scenery and stately surroundings the conqueror held court, moulded provinces and even kingdoms to his will and planned for the wonderful Future that he now realized was to be his. You whose lives have been spent in this land of Democracy have no conception of the feeling akin to reverence that the average European of last century cherished toward people of rank. This feeling being considered, it was truly a matter for astonishment to note the throng that gathered week after week at Montebello to do honor to General Bonaparte, the plain man of the people. Ambassadors and nobles of the highest rank, with their ladies, hastened to court the favor of the m.an who but a few short years before had been ridiculed as possessing nothing but a hat and a sword. Men of intellect even, philosophers, poets and artists, whom Bonaparte invited and urged to come as his guests, showed themselves ill at ease on first meeting the man whose trade was War. 4 50 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS. Surely, it would seem, it is the mailed hand that rules the world. All this homage was very sweet to Bonaparte and his gracious wife, the I^ady Josephine. Each of them had tasted the bitter cup of Distress, but now it was theirs to enjoy together the nectar and ambrosia of Success. Both were still young enough and free enough from the pessimism that time was to bring to enter fully into the joy of their first great triumph. As a trusted and favored aid of the General's and member of his household I shared in these triumphal days, and they still light up the chambers of Memory with their pleasing radiance. After three months of almost endless festivity, reaching its climax in the magnificent fetes in Venice gotten up in honor of the gracious wife of the mighty soldier, there was an abrupt conclu- sion to it all in the settlement of the Peace of Campo Formio. Bonaparte, wearying of the pro- crastinating policy of Austria, cut the Gordian knot in a most unlooked-for way. One day at a dinner party, snatching up a costly porcelain cup belonging to a set given his host, the Count von Coblentz, by the Empress Catharine, he dashed it to the floor and exclaimed in tones of passion : ' In fourteen days I will dash to pieces the Austrian monarchy as I now break this.' A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 51 Such masterful conduct brought about the de- sired result and the next day the Austrian diplo- mats signed the treaty of peace, Austria being given the Queen City, Venice, while France was made mistress of the Rhine and felt that she had crowned herself with the laurels of victory. But France was not satisfied with seeing the laurel wreath on her own head ; she found a greater joy in crowning her hero. So it was that on Bonaparte's return to Paris the very street on which his home was situated was re-named " Street of Victory." Moreover, the unpretentious house that he called home must be re-built on a grand scale that it might meet the requirements of a pub- lic character and accommodate those who crowded to do him honor. But even this did not satisfy the hero-worshiping people, and a great festival must be devised at which the multitude could do rever- ence to their demi-god. Accordingly the Directory accorded to Bonaparte a magnificent reception at the Palace of the Luxemburg. In the great court before the Palace a towering platform was erected and ornamented with huge statues of Freedom, Equality and Peace. Around this fane extended another platform, furnished with seats for the National Assembly, the Five Directors and other dignitaries and decorated with the banners cap- tured in the Italian war. 52 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, The central figure in all this pomp appeared in a manner befitting the soldier — clad in the plain uniform that he had worn on the field of battle and quietly listening to the long orations of fulsome praise directed at him by the perfidious Talleyrand and the envious Barras. It soon became evident that France was not large enough to hold at the same time the Direc- tory and the hero of the people, so various efforts were made to induce the conqueror to betake him- self beyond the borders. Finally an Egyptian expedition of conquest was suggested, and this plan just fitted in with certain wild dreams of Oriental empire that Bonaparte had been cherishing for years. Off" he went then to out-Alexander Alexan- der and to demonstrate anew the truth of the old saying, "Whom the gods would destroy they first make mad." We know what the outcome of such an expedition was destined to be, for we know by the light of the truth that has been given us how pitiable is the folly of even the greatest man who presumes, like a Nebuchadnezzar, to rule and boast himself upon earth as Almighty God. It went with the Egyptian expedition and its leader as the sober-minded few had foreseen. At first there was the victory of the discipline and arms of the West over the untaught valor of the East, but afterwards came the bitter defeat at Acre and A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 53 the necessity of the leader's return home on a pre- text. Much was written and spoken at the time of the Conquest of Egypt, but, according to my humble judgment, this notable event in the World's history is to be estimated as of equal value with its later companion-piece, the Destruction of Moscow. As I was not one of Bonapartes confidants and com- panions in his hasty departure from Egypt, but had some months more of hard service against the fierce hordes of the desert, I may not be strictly impartial just here in my estimate of his Oriental conquests. This much, however, I gained from the experience that, when some years later on the retreat from Moscow I nearly perished from the cold, I could in imagination see myself sweltering in the blistering sands of Egypt. But to return to my Captain. It was the con- sideration of his own interests that sent Napoleon hurrying back to France ; yet it was a fact that France needed him or some other of his spirit. The ship of state was tossing in troubled waters and a strong hand was needed at the helm. In Italy the armies of Austria and Russia had swept all before them and French dominion and French prestige were in that land things of the past. In France itself matters were in great confusion and the well-meaning part of the population in great 54 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, distress. The nation was split into factions, the party of moderation being ground between the upper millstone of the unrelenting royalist con- spirators and the nether one of the red republicans whose whole aim and endeavor was the restoration of the bloody rule of the Terror. Patriotism hardly existed except as a name, and grasping party spirit was all-powerful throughout the land, bringing civil war and anarchy in its train. A strong per- sonality was sorely needed just then in the arena of French political life, and when Bonaparte stepped upon French soil, preceded as he had been by reports of his Egyptian victories, Aboukir and Tabor, the great majority of the people bade him a most hearty welcome. However, enemies who were at once powerful and bitter were not lacking to Napoleon. But forewarned is fore-armed, and here a faithful wife stood as a shield beween Napoleon and hidden dan- ger. Josephine had womanly tact as it has been given to but few, and she used her talent to the utmost, mingling every day with people of influ- ence and even with those whom she knew to be her husband's enemies. The general drift of the political world and especially the disposition of this one or that one in the place of power toward Napo- leon she recorded day after day through many months in a diary. This she handed her loved. A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 55 one on his return, that he might know and utilize all that could be known in the strange realm of the thoughts and passions of men. The Directory had not failed to note the enthu- siasm of the people over the very name of Bona- parte, and knew with the instinct of politicians that, unless something could be done to check this growing ascendancy, their day of power was at an end. They resolved accordingly to arrest Bonaparte on the charge of conspiracy to destroy the government, and arranged that the arrest should take place the next day, as he was return- ing to Paris from his chateau of Malmaison. But this plot was thwarted by an unexpected hand. The next day the ever-watchful Josephine was attending a party in Paris and overheard a gentleman tell his friend that he surmised, from something told him, that some influential person was that evening to be arrested. Excusing her- self at the earliest possible moment, Josephine drove with all speed to the commanding officer of the Directory guards, who was a warm friend of Bonaparte's, and requested that a company of grenadiers be sent at once to Malmaison. The soldiers were promptly sent and the danger averted, more especially as the Directory learned through spies who shadowed Josephine that their plot was discovered. By way of throwing dust 66 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, into people's eyes the Directors had an arrest made at the appointed time — that of a rich German mer- chant then residing in Paris, whom they charged with plotting with the enemies of France. The fair words of the Directors counted for nothing at all with Napoleon, for he realized the situation to a hair's breadth. " Everyone," he said to his brother Joseph, "desires a more central government. Our dreams of a republic are the illusions of youth. To-day the people are turning their hopes toward me ; to-morrow it will be to- ward someone else." But Napoleon was not in the habit of waiting for to-morrow. With him to resolve was to act. On the eighteenth of that same month, Brumaire, then he gave a great break- fast to those whom he counted his friends, and especially to the army oflScers of rank. While the guests were gathering, a friend of Napoleon's in the Council of the Elders made this motion : " In consideration of the intense political excitement which prevails in Paris, it is necessary to remove the sessions to St. Cloud, and to give to General Bonaparte the supreme command of the troops." After an exciting debate this motion prevailed and was reported to Napoleon. He saw that the hour of Destiny had come (with some little help on his part) and, telling his company that at last the moment had arrived to give France peace and A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 57 rest, and that he would do this, called them to follow him. Supported then by a brilliant follow- ing. Napoleon made his way to the Council of the Elders, to express his thanks for the honor shown him and to swear to safeguard the country's liberty. The troops were then reviewed at the Tuilleries and some of them stationed about both the Luxemburg, the former place of session, and St. Cloud, whither both the Deputies and the Elders had adjourned. After vainly protesting against a situation that they were powerless to alter, three of the Directors resigned. But the liberties of a nation were not to be over- thrown quite so easily, and the next day, the 19th Brumaire, was to be the true Day of Fate. The Five Hundred assembled in their new quarters at St. Cloud and entered most earnestly upon the discussion of what was to be done in view of the resignation of the Directory. Just when the argu- ment was at its height, who should appear in their assembly but Napoleon? Immediately there fol- lowed a most memorable scene. Napoleon met the first reproaches of the Deputies with the boastful threat: "Remember I walk with the goddess of Fortune, accompanied by the god of War," but was silenced by the cries of "Traitor," "Cromwell," and a perfect torrent of bitter accu- sations. Vainly he protested his loyalty to France 58 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, and to the Constitution ; he was overwhelmed by the volume of invective and derision hurled at him and became completely bewildered. Sud- denly he turned from his accusers and made for the door, exclaiming : " Who loves me, let him follow me." Then, strange to tell, history re- peated itself and this modern Csesar actually fainted into the arms of his friends. Well says the master-poet : " He had a fever when he was in Spain, And, when the fit was on him, I did mark That he did shake; 'tis true, this god did shake; His coward lips did from their color fly ; And that same eye, whose bend doth awe the world, Did lose his lustre. I did hear him groan; Ay, and that tongue of his, that bade the Romans Mark him, and write his speeches in their books, Alas, it cried, Give me some drink, Titinius." But one repulse, however sharp, did not mean defeat to a seasoned soldier like Napoleon. At the end of half an hour he re-entered the hall, surrounded by his officers, to face his accusers and give them a hint of the operation of the Law of Might. By this time Lucien Bonaparte, who was President of the Five Hundred, had been fairly forced from his seat for shielding his brother in his unlawful course and for refusing to declare him an outlaw. But Napoleon was equally mind- A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 59 ful of his statesman brother, and sent a company of grenadiers into the hall to deliver him from his evil plight. Nor was Lucien tardy in taking up his role. Turning to the troops, he ordered them to protect the President of the Five Hundred, to defend the Constitution attacked by fanatics, and to obey General Bonaparte, the authorized pro- tector of the Republic. By way of dramatic climax to this scene of the great play Lucien drew his sword and, turning its point towards Napo- leon's breast, exclaimed : "I swear to pierce even my brother's heart, if he ever dares touch the liberty of France." These words fired the enthusiasm of the soldiers and with hearty good will they obeyed Napoleon's command and charged into the hall, driving the Council before them like sheep. Other means than force were not despised; money was used that day to the extent of more than one million francs, while Lucien gathered a " Rump Parlia- ment," once more assumed the presidential chair, and had a provisional committee chosen to con- sist of three members to be known as Consuls. Napoleon was one of these, while the other two were merely figureheads, who fortunately for themselves realized their situation and remained passive. So it was that Napoleon made his entrance into 60 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, the Luxemburg, nominally as First Consul, but really as the Dictator of France, who was in a few weeks to make his triumphal entry into the Tuil- leries, to reign there under one or another title as the most masterful king who had ever trodden those stately palace halls. I cannot take the time to tell you of the "republican court" that was maintained in this palace with ever increasing splendor ; sufiicient to say, it was the days of Montebello lived over on a grander scale. I must pass on to tell of an achievement that was characteristic of my Captain, and that added much to his glory. This was the Second Italian Campaign, and it was notable, not only as a signal victory over great armies, but even more as a victory over the forces of Nature. Napoleon had not forgotten the French reverses in Italy, and early in May, 1800, when Winter still held the mountain passes in his fetters of ice, the Man of Destiny rushed an army southward, scaled the icy barriers and hurled his human avalanche down upon the plains of Italy and upon his astonished foes. The decisive victory of Marengo, June 14th, was the outcome of this ven- ture, and again the Parisians had the indescribable joy of welcoming a returning conqueror. For the human unit, the soldier, there was untold hardship in this brilliant move. You will A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 61 hardly believe me when I tell you that for days those of us who formed the advance guard had as our only food the inner bark of trees. In the midst of this hardship occurred one of the pleasantest incidents of my whole career. A com- rade and myself, detailed on reconnoitring duty, had made our way over the ice well up into the Pass of St. Bernard. Evening had come on, and after several days of the hardest service with the least possible rest and food, both we and our horses were about ready to drop. We had stopped before a solitary house to ask some direction, when a sweet-faced little girl stepped out on the porch and invited us to enter- Her father then appeared and repeated the invitation, so we dismounted, put up our jaded horses, and let ourselves be persuaded to spend the evening and finally to stay until morn- ing. We enjoyed most keenly those hours in a well-ordered, happy home, and Napoleon was served none the worse, for, without that warm food and that night's rest, we could not have kept up under the hardships of the next days. The victory of Marengo brought Napoleon new fame, but this in turn brought him the deadly hatred of those who now saw their own plans swept entirely away by the ijiighty progress of his career. Bourbon and Red Republican were at last of one mind, for they agreed in hating the Corsican usurp- 62 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, er. One plot after another aiming at the assassi- nation of Napoleon was laid bare by the vigilant Parisian police, until Josephine, in her solicitude for her husband, found herself living in an atmos- phere of terror. All things mundane have an end, and so there came an end to these plots, and a very- unexpected one it was. Hayden's oratorio of Creation was to be given at the Grand Opera, and all fashionable Paris was hastening that way, to see and to be seen. There was company for dinner that evening at Napoleon's table, and his party was accordingly a little late in starting. A slight additional delay was caused by the trifling matter of the arrangement of a Per- sian shawl on Josephine's shoulders. General Rapp insisting that it was not becomingly draped. Meanwhile Napoleon had driven off, and Josephine and her attendants hastened to follow. Their car- riage had just reached the Place de Carrotisal vihen the whole place was lit up as by the glare of lightning, and a deafening explosion was heard ; while the glass of the carriage windows was blown in upon them, cutting Hortense somewhat seriously on the arm. Leaving the ladies, Rapp ran ahead to learn the fate of Napoleon. The Man of Destiny was found seated quietly in his box scrutinizing the audience through his glass. Fifteen people were killed, A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 63 thirty severely wounded and forty houses badly damaged by the explosion of the infernal machine, and great indeed was the indignation of the French people when the facts of this diabolical plot came to be known. This wave of popular indignation lifted Bona- parte to that place in the nation's esteem that he saw that he was at last free to destroy his enemies. Accordingly he had himself empowered " to re- move from Paris those persons whose presence the Consuls considered dangerous to the public secur- ity." On the strength of this enactment Napoleon brought to pass the execution of a number of his most bitter enemies and the banishment to a living death in Cayenne of one hundred and thirty others who were suspected of dissatisfaction toward the administration. The way was now open and the opportune moment had arrived for Napoleon to take the last step in his dizzy ascent — the step that leads to the throne. For several years Napoleon under the title of First Consul had enjoyed all the power of a great king, even to holding as stately a court as perhaps any in Europe. To be sure, the most discordant elements came, or were brought, together at the court functions. Sometimes, too, the one who should have been the inspiring centre of all this brilliant life showed by 64 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, his harshness of word or deed that he was after all not the noble born, but the domineering soldier. Yet he possessed statecraft in a high degree and well understood how to win to his support this Duke or that Duchess of the old nobility who had learned in the hard school of exile and poverty to bow gracefully to the inevitable. Then too not a few of Napoleon's generals, most of them men of the people like himself, had found their wives from among the high-bred daughters of the old regime. Finally, and most all, the never-failing popularity of Josephine was to be thanked for the large measure of success that attended the recep- tions of the new Caesar. At last " the pear was ripe," to quote a favorite expression of Napoleon's, and on the i8th of May, 1804, the Senate formally made tender of the throne to Napoleon and he graciously allowed him- self to be announced as First Emperor of the French. This act was later ratified by the popular vote, five millions of Frenchmen thus speaking through the ballot and making the imperial dignity hereditary in Napoleon's family. The imperial couple celebrated the occasion by making a journey, or triumphal progress, to the Rhine provinces lately annexed to France. At Aix-la-Chapelle, at the tomb of Charlemagne, a pleasing miracle was wrought under direction of A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 65 the clergy in honor of Josephine. In the treasury of the Cathedral there was a gold casket full of the most precious relics ; but it had never been opened and no key had ever been found for its lock. As a great and special favor this casket was laid in the hand of Josephine. Presto! a miracle ! At the gentle touch of Napoleon's lady the casket sprang open, revealing to the sight the most precious jewels and among them the seal-ring of Charlemagne. But now I must hasten on to tell you in a few words of the most glorious event of the coronation. The finishing touch to the splendor of the new- made Emperor was given by no less august an hand than that of the Pope. Pius VII., in his joy at the re-establishment of the Roman Church in France by Napoleon's command, saw fit to over- look the former despoiling of the Papal domains and consented to make the journey to Paris to formally crown his new-found friend. On hearing of the Pope's approach, Napoleon hastened to Fontainbleau to meet him. At the sight of the Emperor the Pope alighted from his carriage, while Napoleon dismounted from his horse and hastened to embrace his spiritual father. The delicate question of precedence was gracefully disposed of by each of the dignitaries entering the carriage at the same time from opposite sides. But now for the coronation itself, and first of all, 66 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, what were the costumes ? His Holiness, it is to be supposed, wore his best, but of his ecclesiastical millinery I do not have the faintest recollection. For the great event Napoleon laid aside his usual plain uniform for a costume befitting the last of the Caesars. His very stockings were of silk, em- broidered with gold crowns ; his shoes were of white velvet, worked with gold ; his knee-breeches were of white velvet, worked with gold and with diamond buttons and buckles ; the vest was of white velvet with diamond buttons, and the coat of crimson velvet with fastenings of white and sparkling with gold ; the mantle was of the same material and color and hung over his left shoulder, being fastened on the breast with diamond clasps. He wore sleeves and collar of the most costly lace, and a cap of black velvet adorned with plumes and topped with a coronet of diamonds. His imperial robes he donned in the vestry of the Cathedral. Josephine wore a most beautiful robe of silver brocade adorned with gold bees and fringe of gold ; her shoulders were bare and on her arms she wore armlets of gold set with diamonds. A gold girdle set with thirty-nine diamond rosettes, held her dress. Her wealth of hair was encircled by a mag- nificent diadem. Like Napoleon, she wore in the Cathedral an imj^erial robe, fastened on the shoul- ders with gold buckles and diamond clasps. It was A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 6T arranged that Napoleon's brothers should carry the train of his mantle and his sisters that of Joseph- ine's. The proud and jealous sisters of the em- peror rebelled loudly against doing Josephine this honor, but were coerced by the unbending will of Napoleon. Before leaving for the ceremony the party gath- ered in the palace for mutual admiration. To all the outpourings of congratulation Napoleon had only one word, "Joseph," he said, "could our father see us now." You have read of the ceremony itself. First, Napoleon took from the altar the crown of Charle- magne, and with steady hand put it on his head. Then Josephine left her throne and moved toward the altar, followed by her whole suite. Napoleon thereupon took the small, closed crown, sur- mounted by a cross, put it first on his own head, and then, with unusual gentleness and grace, placed it on the head of Josephine. The Pope now, with his retinue of prelates, came and stood before the royal pair and blessed them in Latin with these words: "God establish you on this throne, and Christ make you reign with Him in His everlasting kingdom." He then kissed Napoleon on the cheek and, turning to the audi- ence, said in a strong voice, " Vivat imperator in ceternumy 68 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS. Notre Dame now re-echoed to the shout of the joyous thousands and to the music of bands. A little later the Pope intoned the Te Deum, which was then rendered by select choirs and orchestras. After this Napoleon took the oath and a herald an- nounced the fact of the coronation. Volleys of artillery now thundered out the news to Paris and its environs, while a gigantic balloon, finished off with a huge gilt crown, rose into the air and sped away to tell France and perchance Europe that a new star of empire had appeared in the skies. The balloon was seen by myriads, yet no one could tell what had been its fate. Napoleon in particular was concerned to know this, and finally after some weeks, he received an answer. The balloon had fallen in Rome, upon the grave of Nero. CHAPTER V. A MIGHTY PERSONALITY. XiyHERE in the Temple of Fame sliall Napo- leon's portrait be placed ? Which is the true Napoleon, or which is the true likeness, that of the demi-god or that of the great adventurer ? Shall he be judged by things outward, by his deeds and the great changes in the lives of mill- ions, that in the providence of God followed these, or by things inward, by the motions of his spirit as far as these can be clearly known ? We are accustomed to think and speak of the certainty of facts, and yet the man who played the great game of life so skillfully for the most part tells us how unreliable are events, all depending at times upon one incident, hanging, as it were, by one hair. What then are the elements of greatness, and what those of weakness as found in the man him- self, even in the soul, which is the true man? These elements are most closely and strangely blended, like the threads in some great tapestry, the light seemingly growing out of the dark and the reverse. TO UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, As I have said, part at least of Napoleon's great- ness can be found in his genius for hard work. The ability to work hard and the keen judgment that guided him in bestowing his labor where it would count for the most — these were prime fac- tors in the greatness to which this man attained. " I am always working," he says ; " I think much. If I appear always ready to meet every emergency, to confront every problem, it is because before undertaking any enterprise I have long con- sidered it, and have thus foreseen what could pos- sibly occur. It is no genius which suddenly, secretly reveals to me what I have to say or do in some circumstances unforeseen by others ; it is my own meditation and reflection. I am always working — when dining, when at the theatre ; I wake at night in order to work." The powers of endurance and of application that Napoleon possessed are simply beyond belief. In this respect he was not a vivacious Frenchman, nor yet the passionate Italian ; he was the old Roman, the man of iron, lacking at once the finer organization and the weakness of this later genera- tion. Napoleon was the indispensible man of his age. Though enjoying good educational advantages in the military school of Brienne and in the greater school of Life, he showed such originality in his A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 71 movements, especially in war, that he must be con- ceded to be a self-made man. Great as was his genius, it was fairly slow in maturing, and it remains an open question as to whether or not it began to fail some years before his early death- Certain it is that during the years of his earliest manhood he gave much time to idle dreams, while the scope of his plans for a career was limited by the boundaries of the Island of Corsica. When, however, his genius came, it came apparently like Minerva, full-grown ; so that even now, being dead, he rules France and much of Europe besides, through the institutions that he founded. He had " To Destiny " engraved in the ring with which he wedded Josephine, and he tried to per- suade others and himself at times that he was the Man of Destiny. This then was the role that he attempted to carry through before the audience of the world. But even Homer sometimes nods, and even Napoleon sometimes forgot his part and showed himself the cool calculator. It was from Italy that he wrote: "Great events depend upon but a single hair. The adroit man profits by every- thing, neglects nothing which can increase his chances ; the less adroit, by sometimes disregarding a single chance, fails in everything." The man who considers himself above giving his precious time to details, had no example set him 72 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, by Napoleon, for no point in the equipment of his soldiers or in the civil administration was too small to attract and hold his attention. "Fortune," he once said," is a woman; the more she does for me, the more I shall exact from her." But he also said : " Determination is the highest wisdom," and his greatness was found most of all in will-power. Intensity of application, strength of intellect, force of will — these may be named as the chief factors in Napoleon's greatness ; what was there to counter-balance these and drag him down ? To begin with, there was a lack of moral prin- ciple and especially of the fundamental virtue of truthfulness. Many of his official letters, and, in particular, his war bulletins both to the army and to the nation, were as complete a tissue of false- hood as a keen and unscrupulous mind could conceive and elaborate. Humility was utterly lacking in Napoleon's matured nature, for he not only considered himself as the full equivalent of a host of fifty thousand soldiers on the field of battle, but also assumed the place of arbiter of the desti- nies of the nations of the earth. The wisdom found in the apostolic admonition, " Humble your- selves therefore under the mighty hand of God," was to him a thing unknown, and accordingly he A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. It fell under the judgment. *' Every one that exalt- eth himself shall be abased." Most of all Ivove, at least in its purity and unsel- fishness, was foreign to his spirit. He could love his own flesh and blood and richly provide for them, but this was only instinct. He could love Josephine most ardently, but passion was the very essence of this love, and it could not stand before the claims of selfishness. He certainly did not have the reverent love for God which is the beginning of wisdom, and he did not know what it meant to love his brother man, or he could not have thrust millions of these his fellows into death either by violence or by the slow agony of disease or starvation that he might follow his ambition to its limit. To what extent was Napoleon influenced by others ? Very little, I take it, by any one except Josephine ; but considerably by her, at least at times. And what was the personality and what the influence of Josephine ? This woman who did so much at times to soften the flinty nature of Napoleon was not generally considered beautiful ; yet she possessed a grace and charm all her own that made her loved as univer- sally as her husband was feared. In her move- ments she combined rare grace with a dignity that 74 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, readily passed into majesty of bearing. Her fea- tures were not of classic regularity, but they became truly beautiful when lit up by the glow of thought or feeling. Her eyes were dark blue, shaded by beautiful brows, and her hair was light- brown, long and soft, giving her face a peculiarly gentle expression. Her voice was sweet and most pleasing in its intonations, and I have known busy men to stop in their work, when they heard Josephine's voice in an adjoining room, that they might enjoy its charm. A kind heart and an intelligent, living interest in those about her made Josephine most deservedly loved by both the great and the lowly. She had herself been forced to drink of the cup of Sorrow, and could feel for those whom the troubles of the times had bereaved or deprived of home and living. Tact and judgment were hers in the highest degree and, even above these, the truly royal gift of Charity that could suffer long the attacks of enven- omed Jealousy and still be kind. Josephine was not an angel who had strayed to this earth, for she had her failings, the chief of which was extravagance, although even here Bonaparte urged her at times to make a great dis- play, while at other times reproving her for her lavish expenditure. Take her in all respects, and she would be found a woman of noble spirit. A ROMANCE OP HISTORY. 75 capable of holding by her charm of gracioiisness all whom Napoleon had forced to his side by the power of the sword. Partly at Napoleon's express desire and partly in obedience to the promptings of her own kindly nature, Josephine made it her constant aim to attract people of all ranks to herself, and many and influential were the friends she won and held. Among the nobility of Milan in the days of the First Italian Campaign, and then at the little court of Montebello and finally in the great assemblies of the Tuilleries, she moved a queen by instinct, drawing alike the blunt soldier, the polished court- ier and the reserved scholar as willing captives in her train. Not only did Josephine win and hold many as friends for her austere husband, she likewise defended him from many a hidden enemy. When Bonaparte was about to embark for the Egyptian expedition his last words to her were : "Jose- phine, my enemies are neither in Asia nor in Africa, but they are all in France. I leave you behind me in their midst, for you to watch them, and to unravel their schemes. Think of this, and be my strong and prudent wife." Something at least of the loving, jealous care with which she watched over his interests during the weary months of his absence I have told you. 76 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, and also of the keen intuition by which she divined the danger that menaced him after the triumph of Marengo. She was certainly his guardian angel, and he did at once a great wrong and an act of great folly when, in later years, he sent her away. The record of her loving care for Napoleon's welfare would not be complete, did I not at least mention her earnest efforts at holding her self-cen- tered husband back from rushing on to his fate. With her rare good judgment Josephine saw that Napoleon's ambition must have some reasonable limit, or that the government of France must be revolutionized. From any such attempt as this, she endeavored with all her influence and tact to hold her husband back, lest he rush on to ruin. Then, too, by birth and conviction, Josephine was a Royalist, and it was perhaps the dearest wish of her heart to see the old order restored and the king come again to his own. The Royalists were con- vinced of her unselfishness, and sought time and again through her mediation to turn Napoleon from his course. One such attempt had in it so much ingenuity that I must give you an outline of its workings. First of all it was no mere mes- sage or proposition that was sent, to be thrown into the waste basket or pigeon-holed. The delicate matter was entrusted to the energy and tact of a messenger, and this messenger was no less a per- A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 77 sonality than a beautiful and accomplished Duchess, one Madam de Guiche. After winning Josephine's heart, the Duchess was invited to Mal- maison, and she and her hostess together laid their trap for the crafty Napoleon. In the conversation it came out that the Duchess had recently seen the royal family in their exile and had asked the heir- apparent what would be done for the First Consul, were he to restore the Bourbons. The prince answered : " First of all he would be created Connetable^ with all the privileges attached to that rank, if that were agreeable to him. But that would not be enough ; we would erect to him on the Place de Carrousel a tall and costly column, and on it we would raise the statue of Bonaparte crowning the Bourbons." Napoleon seemed interested in this gracious offer, but grimly intimated that the stately column would have to be built over the remains of the First Consul. The Duchess was a very beautiful and charming woman, but nevertheless she got orders that same evening to leave Paris at daybreak. The quality of Napoleon's love for Josephine can best be judged from extracts of the letters he wrote her during the Italian Campaign and which years later were published by Queen Hortense in her mother's vindication. 78 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, In one of April 3, 1796, he writes : " My own Josephine, away from you there is no joy ; away from you the world is a wilderness in which I feel alone, and have no one in whom I can confide. You have taken from me more than my soul ; you are the only thought of my life. When I feel weary with the burden of affairs, when I dread some inauspicious result, when men oppose me, when I am ready to curse life itself, I place my hand upon my heart, your image beats there ; I gaze on it and love is for me absolute bliss, and everything smiles except when I am away from my beloved. " By what art have you been able to enchain all my powers, and to concentrate in yourself all my mental existence ? It is an enchantment, my dear friend, which is to end only with my life. To live for Josephine, such is the history of my life." In a letter written several months later from Tortona he says : "Be careful, my dearly-beloved one, to tell me in your letter that you are convinced that I love you above all that can be conceived ; that never has it come to me to think of other women ; that they are all in my eyes without grace, beauty or wit ; that you, you entirely, you as I see you, as you are, can please me and fetter all the powers of my soul ; that you have grasped it in all its immeasureableness ; that my heart has A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 79 no folds closed from your eyes, no thoughts which belong not to you ; that my energies, arms, mind, everything in me is subject to you ; that my spirit lives in your body ; that the day when you will be inconstant, or when you will cease to live, will be the day of my death, and that nature and earth are beautiful to my eyes only because you live in them." Many similar expressions of undying devotion to Josephine might be gathered from these letters which were written almost every day, even in the midst of official dispatches and plans of battle ; but there is no need. Enough has been cited to show, if words mean anything, that Napoleon's first mar- riage was not one of convenience, but a true love match. And in what particulars did this devoted lover conform to his beloved's wishes? This much at least can be said for him, that for years he de- fended her against the jealous calumnies of his sis- ters ; that at the time of the Pope's visit to Paris her desire for a religious marriage was granted ; and that he arranged that the succession to the throne should pass to her daughter's son. That there were serious flaws in his love cannot be denied. When he was in Egypt and Josephine was at home, mindful only of him and his inter- ests, he showed himself notoriously unfaithful to 80 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, her, and in later years the occasions became the more numerous. Finally, as the world knows, In- terest was allowed to prevail over the sense of Rio-ht and over the dictates of his heart as well, and the long- contemplated step of Divorce was taken. I need not dwell on the anguish of spirit that this unjust repudiation caused the faithful wife, for the consideration is a sad one, especially to one who would gladly think well of his old commander. Napoleon certainly felt the separation very deeply, and it is possible that he even persuaded himself that he too was a martyr to the cause of France, for strange indeed are the reasonings of the human spirit when the lode-stone of Interest draws. When it came to the trying moment of informing Jose- phine of his determination. Napoleon thus ex- pressed himself : " The nation has done so much for me, that I owe it the sacrifice of my dearest inclinations. The peace of France demands that I choose a new companion. Since, for many months, the empress has lived in the torments of uncer- tainty, and everything is now ready for a new mar- riage, we must therefore come to a final explana- tion." To Napoleon's credit it must be said that in the painful scenes of the formal separation in the most liberal provision for Josephine's future he showed A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 81 great consideration and at times deep feeling. In short lie showed the spirit of a true husband in everything except in the matter of the divorce itself ; but there he sinned against God and man. That Napoleon's fortune began to wane imme- diately after his divorce, I do not believe ; for I do not think that the books of heaven are balanced so promptly. Certain it is, however, that this deed of wrong brought him no true or lasting happiness. When misfortune came his young wife of the royal lineage promptly forsook him, and the intelligent and amiable little son in whom he had come to take great pride was soon snatched away by the icy hand of Death. In those lonely hours of retro- spect, of which the exile at St. Helena aflforded so many. Napoleon came to see his wrong, for shortly before his death he admitted : " I ought not to have allowed myself to be separated from Jose- phine ; no, I ought not to have been divorced from her; that was my misfortune." And what, you may ask, bound me to Napoleon for twenty years and more ? First of all he held me in loyal services by his promises concerning Poland. As late as 1806 Poland, though feeble from her wounds, was still alive as a nation and eager for deliverance. A deputation of Polish nobles had visited Napoleon at Berlin and besought his intervention on behalf 6 82 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, of their country. They were received with great honor and given the assurance that France had never recognized tlie partition of their country ; also that it was his personal interest to restore their independence and to reconstruct their kingdom. On the strength of these assurances Napoleon made triumphal entry into Posen as the Liberator of Poland, and gained 60,000 devoted Polish sol- diers for his army. Poland's patriot chief, Kosciusco, never trusted Napoleon, but Prince Poniatowski did, and cast in his lot with the Man of Destiny. The confidence of the brave Poles in Napoleon was misplaced, for he did nothing for their liberation from the Rus- sian tyranny, and seemingly cared nothing for them at the time when the power was his. This neglect came back upon his head when the nations of Europe were mustering for his overthrow. A restored Poland could then have stood up in East- ern Europe as a mighty, living wall for his defense. I was drawn and held to Napoleon's service fur- ther by the magnetism of his genius, and only those who have been drawn into the orbit of a Titan, who could overthrow the oldest dynasties and change the map of Europe by the might of his will, know the power of such an attraction. While disapproving of many of his acts, I could not forget his uniform kindness to me, or repress A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 83 the growth of the feeliug of loyalty to the man whose fortunes I had followed through so many perils. Time and again he offered me higher rank than that of Colonel ; but I always declined, being unwilling to part from my faithful Polish regi- ment, and having no ambition for the proffered honors. After his return from Elba he insisted on my acceptance of the title. Count de Bellevieu ; and, had he been victorious at Waterloo, a fine estate would have been added to the title. To me Napoleon was always kind, and it is a labor of love to testify to the magnitude of his genius, though, as a conscientious man, I must 'tell the whole story, setting down the evil with the good. CHAPTER VI. THE PHILOSOPHY OF WAR. T^HE Springs of the activities of mankind are two — Selfishness and Love. The first of these we share with the brute creation in its struggle for existence ; this is of the earth, and binds us to the earth. The second is from heaven, and, if exer- cised, brings us into relation with those spirits of light who are ever going forth from the throne of God on errands of loving helpfulness to the chil- dren of men. From which hidden spring in the heart of man comes the desire or purpose of War? There is some Scripture bearing on this point, and also the greater part of that long, sombre record of the deeds of men which we call History. Ambition, which is Aggressiveness, and Selfishness, which is Covetousness on the part of some leader or of a whole people, are not these the causes of War ? Sometimes those beginning the struggle are the innocent ones, striking for self-defense or for life itself. What of the method of War, or what is War in operation ? This is best described in terms that have become proverbial: it is "Fire and the 84 A ROMA IV CE OF HISTORY. 85 Sword." There is another saying that has had great popularity in time of War, viz. : " Better be the hammer than the anvil." However, I can show, I think, from my own experience that, great as is the suflfering of the anvil, the hammer fares about as badly. You know, I take it, who each of these parties are — those who strike the blows, the soldier class and those who suffer, the non-combatants whose lands and homes are desolated by the storm of War. And what is the experience of the hammer ? Not all who go to War are officers, seeking fame and, perchance, fortune ; but the majority are common soldiers to whom War brings little of profit and much of hardship. Untold multitudes are taken from the pursuits of peace and prosperity ; yes, are torn from home and loved ones to sufier all the agony that hunger, disease and wounds can inflict. In a single one of the several hundred battles of Napoleon 80,000 men, killed and wounded, have fallen under the fiery hail of iron, or been cut down in brutish rage by their fellow-men. Let me give you here but one of my experiences in the hard game of War. It was on the field of Austerlitz that I received the severest wound of the scores that I had to endure during my long service^ I was engaged in storming a redoubt and, carried away by the impetuosity of my charge, I became 86 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, separated from my men and suddenly found myself attacked by seven Russian cavalrymen. Defending myself as best I could in such unequal conflict, I succeeded in killing or disabling two of them, but received a terrible sabre cut across the face from another. The steel chain of my helmet parried the blow and saved my life. Still I was blinded and weakened to such an extent by the force of the blow that I realized in an instant that my only safety lay in flight. My horse was speedy, and I urged him on to his utmost effort. Partly blinded as I was by the blood from my wound, and intent only on evading my pursuers, I rode heedlessly upon a narrow ravine through which ran a small stream, frozen over. By one grand leap my faith- ful horse cleared the stream, while my enemies, checking their animals somewhat, plunged into the stream and were held by the breaking ice. I always attributed my escape to my blinded condi- tion, for, could I have seen the ravine, I doubtless would have checked my steed and fallen into the hands of my foes. Avoiding the forces of the enemy by a sort of instinct, I now rode for hours, having in my bewil- derment lost the direction of our own army. Finally night came on and I saw a light in the distance. On near approach I could make out that this came from a mill. I managed to arouse the A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 87 miller, who, coming to liis door, was horrified at the spectacle that met his eyes, for I was literally covered with blood. By writing I made known to him my condition and needs, for my wound had rendered me temporarily speechless. The miller then invited me in, washed the blood from my face and clothing, brought the edges of the wound together and held them in place by means of plas- ters and bandages, and in short took the best care of me. Here I remained some five or six weeks, and then followed the route of the army and in due time overtook it. When I rode into camp I was at once recognized and shout after shout rang out in my welcome, for, though I say it myself, I had uncounted friends among men and officers, and they had given me up as dead, or at least as a prisoner. I^ack of time does not allow me to tell again that awful story of the retreat from Moscow. Let it suffice when I tell you that for thirty-seven days my only food was putrid horse flesh. The retreat from Leipsic has not been made much of by his- torians, but it was nearly as bad as the Russian experience, every second man of the survivors of Leipsic falling either before the deadly touch of the hunger-typhus or at the hands of a foe that harassed almost every mile of the journey to the Rhine. 8g UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, What, you ask, is the philosophy of one honest man, a kind husband and father perhaps, undergo- ing hardship and even bitter suffering that he may gain the opportunity to kill some other man who may have loved ones anxiously awaiting his return ? I do not attempt to answer this question, as I never had it satisfactorily answered to me, but shall leave it to the better understanding and con- science of some later generation. Nevertheless war must have its purpose in this present evil world, or the Almighty would not have allowed it so large a place in the life of the human race. One good thing I can recount that was made possible through war, and this was the destruction of the headquarters of the Inquisition at Madrid. Being at Madrid in the year 1809, my attention was directed to the Inquisition in the neighbor- hood of that city. Napoleon had issued orders for the suppression of this institution wherever the arms of France should prevail. I reminded Mar- shal Soult, then Governor of Madrid, of this decree, and he directed me to proceed to the destruction of this far-famed establishment. Besides my own regiment, the 9th of the Polish Lancers, he gave me two others, the 1 1 ith of the Line, and the 117th, which was commanded by Colonel de Lile, who is now, like myself, a minister of the Gospel. With these troops I proceeded to the Inquisition, A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 89 which was five miles from the city. It was sur- rounded by a wall of great strength and defended by about four hundred soldiers. When we arrived at the walls, I addressed one of the sentinels, and summoned the holy fathers to surrender to the imperial army and open the gates of the Inquisi- tion. The sentinel, who was standing on the wall, appeared to enter into conversation for a few min- utes with someone within, at the close of which he raised his musket and shot one of my men. This was the signal for attack, and I ordered my troops to fire on those who appeared on the wall. It was soon obvious that it was an unequal war- fare, for our troops were in the open plain and exposed to a destructive fire. We had no cannon, nor could we scale the walls, and the gates success- fully resisted all attempts at forcing them. I saw that it was necessary to change the mode of attack, and directed that some trees be cut down and trimmed that they could be used as battering rams. Presently the walls began to tremble under the well-directed and persevering application of the ram, and soon a breach was made through which our troops rushed into the buildings of the Inqui- sition. Here we met with an incident which nothing but Jesuitical effrontery could invent. The In- 90 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, quisitor-General, followed by the fathers in their priestly robes, came out of their rooms as we were makino^ our way into the interior. With solemn faces and with their hands crossed upon their breasts, as though they had been deaf to all the noise of the attack and defense, and had just learned what was going on, they addressed themselves in language of rebuke to their own soldiers, saying : * ' Why do you fight our friends, the French ?' ' Their intention apparently was to make us think that this defense was wholly unauthorized by them, hoping that they would thus have the better opportunity to escape. Their trick was too shal- low. I caused them to be placed under guard and all the soldiers of the Inquisition to be secured as prisoners. We then proceeded to a careful examination of the building, searching room after room. We found it beautiful in the extreme ; everything ap- peared quiet and in excellent order — much better order indeed than is common for the Devil to keep. We found altars, crucifixes and wax candles in abundance. The proportions of the architecture were perfect ; the ceilings and floors were highly polished ; there was everything to please the eye and gratify a cultivated taste. The floor of the principal hall was paved with slabs of fine marble, and at the end of this hall was an altar with several A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 91 candles burning. The priests appeared so humble and submissive, and everything appeared so quiet and orderly that my suspicions were almost lulled asleep, and I began to suspect that a great many falsehoods had been told about the cruelties prac- tised in these establishments. We could discover nothing of those horrid instruments of torture, of which we had been told, or of those secret cells and dungeons in which human beings were said to be buried alive. We searched in vain. The holy fathers assured us that they had been belied, that we had seen all. I was prepared to believe them and was on the point of retiring with my men, leaving the building for the present in the hands of its former occupants. But Colonel de Lile was not so ready to give up the search. We proceeded to search the principal hall most carefully, to discover, if possible, some trap-door or other entrance to regions below. Some of the soldiers tried to thrust the points of their bayonets or swords between the slabs of the mar- ble, but all without success. I was on the point of giving up, when Colonel de Lile suggested that water be brought and poured through the crevices. Presently an opening was discovered. " Ah," said one ; " what have we here ; we shall soon discover now." All hands were now at work for discovery, and a 92 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, soldier with tlie butt of his musket struck a spring, when the marble slab flew back. Then the faces of the inquisitors grew pale, and, as Belshazzar, when the hand-writing appeared on the wall, so did these men of Belial shake and quake in every joint, bone and sinew. We saw a stair-case lead- ing into the cavity below. I at once walked to the altar and took one of the candles burning upon it, that I might explore what was before us. As I was doing this I was arrested by one of the bald- pated priests who laid his hand gently on my arm and with a very holy look said: " My son, these are holy candles ; you must not touch them with your profane and bloody hand." " Well, well," I said, " I want something that is holy ; I want them for a holy purpose ; I want to see if they will shed light on iniquity." I took the candle and proceeded down the stair- case, when we entered a large room called the Hall of Judgment. In the centre of it was a large block, and a chain fastened to it. On this they had been accustomed to place the accused, chained to his seat. On one side of the room was an elevated seat, called the throne of judgment. This the Inquisitor-General occupied, and on either side were seats less elevated for the holy fathers when engaged in the solemn business of the Holy Inqui- sition. From this room we proceeded to the right. A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 03 and obtained access to small cells extending the entire length of the building ; and here what a sight met our eyes ! How has the benevolent religion of Jesus been abused and slandered by its professed friends ! These cells were places of solitary confinement, where the wretched objects of inquisitorial hate were confined year after year, till death released them from their sufferings. Their bodies were suffered to remain until they were entirely decayed, and the rooms had become fit for others to occupy. To prevent this practice becoming offensive to those occupying the Inquisition, there were flues extending to the open air sufficiently capacious to carry off the odor from these decaying bodies. In these cells we found the remains of some who had paid the debt of nature ; some of them had been dead apparently but a short time ; of others nothing remained but their bones, still chained to the floor of their dungeon. In others we found the living sufferers of every age and of both sexes, from the young man and maiden to those of three-score and ten years, all as naked as when they were born into the world. Our soldiers immediately applied them- selves to releasing these captives of their chains, stripped themselves in part of their own clothing to cover those wretched beings, and were exceedingly anxious to bring them up to th'e light of day. But, 94 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, aware of the danger, I insisted on their wants being supplied, and that they should be brought gradu- ally to the light, as they could bear it. When we had explored these cells, and opened the prison doors of those who yet survived, we pro- ceeded to explore another room to the left. Here we found instruments of torture of every kind which the ingenuity of man or devil could invent. The first was a machine by which the victim was held, while every joint in his hand, arms and body was drawn out. The second was a box in which the head of the victim was confined by a screw. Over the box was a vessel from which one drop of water fell every second in the same place on the head, which put the sufferer into the most excruci- ating agony until death. The third was an infernal machine, laid horizontally, to which the victim was bound ; the machine was then placed between two beams in which were scores of knives so fixed that by turning a crank the flesh was torn from the limbs in small pieces. The fourth surpassed the others in fiendish ingenuity. Its exterior was a beautiful woman or figure, attractively dressed and with arms extended. Around her feet a semi-circle was drawn. The victim who passed over this fatal line touched a spring which caused the diabolical engine to open its arms, and a thousand knives gut him into as many pieces in the deadly A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 95 embrace. This fiendish invention was called the Virgin. The sight of these engines of torture kindled the spirit of the soldiers to fury, and they could no longer be restrained. They declared that every inquisitor, soldier and monk of the Inquisition deserved the torture and should have it. We did not attempt to restrain them any longer, and they at once commenced the work of torture with the holy fathers. The Inquisitor- General was brought before the Virgin and ordered to kiss her. He begged to be excused. "No," said the soldiers " you have made others kiss her and now you must do so, too " ; and pushed him over the fatal line. The beautiful image immediately caught him in its arms and he was cut into innumerable pieces. I remained until I saw four different kinds of torture applied and then retired from the awful scene, which did not end while one individual remained of the guilty inmates of this ante-cham- ber of hell. As soon as the poor sufferers from the cells of the Inquisition could with safety be brought out to the light of day, the news of the rescue meanwhile having been spread far and near, all who had been robbed of friends by the holy office came to see if their loved ones might be among those snatched from the living tomb, 96 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, Oh, what a meeting was there ! About one hun- dred who had been buried alive for years were now restored to life and friends. Many a one found here a son and there a daugh- ter, here a sister and there a brother ; and some, alas ! found no one at all. The scene was such a one that no tongue could describe. When this work of recognition was over, to complete the business in which I was engaged, I went to Madrid and obtained a great quantity of gunpowder, which I placed underneath the edifice and in its vaults. Then, as we applied the slow-match, there was a joyful sight for thousands of admiring eyes. Oh, it would have done your heart good to see it ; the massive walls and turrets of that proud edifice were lifted into the air, and the Inquisition of Madrid was no more ! The soldier class, who serve, perforce, as the hammer in War, suffer much ; what must be the experience of those who take the place of the anvil ? Here, too, there is a terrible harvest of Death, for more die through War than those who fall on the field of battle, or die of their wounds, or by disease. In every war there are the untold thousands of innocent and helpless ones who per- ish, not in the excitement of battle, but by the slow agony of starvation and exposure to the severity of the elements. Burned homes and rav- A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 97 aged lands ; the means of livelihood swept away, with Famine and Pestilence ever hovering just overhead — these are only some of the conditions that War brings to those who are as the anvil beneath the blows of its dread hammer. In the seething cauldron of War the lawless elements of Society often rise to the top, and alas for those who come in contact with these forces of destruction ! Their lot it is to suffer all that out- lawry and brute violence can inflict upon them, and to endure the wretchedness of feeling that there is no redress. During the first years of Napoleon's leadership there was not a little patriotism in the Army ; but this died out in time, and the ruling passion of almost all, officers and men, came to be selfishness, seeking honors and wealth, or, in the case of the majority, simply looking out for oneself. War, with its long train of horrors, is certainly one of the greatest offenses found in the life of man. Offenses, we read, must needs come, but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh ! Here a question arises, Can a Christian be a soldier, or can a Christian become a soldier and remain a Christian ? War, I would say, is poor employment for any rational being, and most of all for a Chris- tian. Nevertheless, because of our sins. War is allowed. On this question I endorse the confession 7 98 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, of the Church which says : "It is right for Chris- tians to award just punishments, to engage in just wars and to serve as soldiers." The Christian, then, must first be sure that it is a just war upon which he is entering ; then that he is on the side of justice. To conduct oneself as a Christian in war means, according to my belief, to strike the enemy, while an enemy, as hard and as often as need be to break his power ; but then also to remember that he is a fellow man, and to treat him as such when the strife is over. When War ceases from oflf the earth, then all may know that the King is at hand, and that this age has run its course. May He hasten the coming of that day ! CHAPTER VII. THE WANING PLANET. A QUESTION much in dispute among his- torians is this: Just where was the turning point in Napoleon's fortunes? Was it in the Spanish War? Was it in the divorce of the faith- ful Josephine ? Or was it not until Moscow burst into flames ? There is another view of the situation. Napo- leon's star began to wane when the work the Almighty had permitted him to do was finished and the time had come for him to be thrown aside like the worn-out tool that he was. So it was with the Pharaoh of the Exodus, with Nebuchadnezzar and many another heathen king, and so it was with Napoleon, Emperor of the French. Nevertheless each of these known factors had its place in the providential ordering, and it will be of interest to trace their workings. The divorce of Josephine I shall pass by with the mere mention. It was a wrong in itself and also a great mistake for Napoleon. While her lov- ing devotion to him and his interests continued until the day of her death, still, from the nature of the case, she could no longer be to him the ever- 99 100 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, watchful counselor and confidant. Who can say whether some of the fatal mistakes of his later career might not have been avoided had the pru- dent Josephine been by his side to point out the wisdom that lies in choosing the path of modera- tion. The new alliance brought Napoleon no higher standing among the powers of Europe, as it was by its very conditions a matter of compulsion. Then, too, the fondly cherished heir it brought was soon snatched away by the hand of disease, while the royal bride herself gladly took occasion to flee from her autocratic husband. The Spanish campaign was one of Napoleon's greatest mistakes, whether considered as a question of diplomacy or as one of war. The spirit that he here found arrayed against him was not Bourbon stubbornness or dynastic pride of any kind, but the mighty spirit of nationality or patriotism on the part of the whole Spanish people, roused to fury at the thought of having a king forced upon them by an alien hand. Such a people, engaged in the most honorable war of their whole history, and entrenched frequently in mountain fastnesses, laughed at the young French recruits who made up so large a part of the armies sent against them. In place of either the fame or the fortune that the French armies of invasion had learned to expect, A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 101 they were now treated to hardship and hard blows, and these they received in overflowing measure. Of course there were times when the tide flowed the other way, bringing victory to the French arms, for some of Napoleon's ablest generals, as Junot, Murat, Soult, Ney and Massena, and not a few of his veteran regiments were thrown into the struggle in Spain. When Napoleon took the field in person. Victory rested upon his banners, as it generally did at such times. Then too for some unexplained reason, the rest of us, from the Mar- shals of the Empire down, could fight under his eye as we could not under the command of any other. I well remember one neat little piece of work that it fell to my lot to put through by way of clearing the road for Napoleon. The strongly-fortified pass of Somo-sierra, in the Guadarama mountain range, seemed to block our advance. Before the mists of early morning had lifted I swept the Spaniards from their battery before they had time to give us more than one round from the guns. My Polish I^ancers cleared that pass before breakfast, and four days later Madrid fell. However, such easy victories were not the rule, but the marked exception. Campaigning in the mountains of Spain was as a general thing hard 102 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, and bootless labor, for what we gained one season was usually lost the next. Here, too, the English gave us a hard wrestle for our fame, as they varied their usual program of sending subsidies in money to the enemies of France by coming them- selves in strong force and with their best generals. Sir John Moore and Sir Charles Napier fell in their victory at Corunna, but then came Wellesley, later Duke of Wellington, who understood both how to wear out his enemies' strength by a skillful use of Fabian policy and also how to strike hard blows when he saw that the auspicious hour had come. Now it was their victory and now it was ours, but the final result was our exhaustion and withdrawal, which meant for Napoleon a rude awakening from his dream of universal empire. Then there was the Russian campaign, and who does not know its story and moral ? Napoleon had frequently met the armies of Russia in battle, and had for the most part come off victor in the encounter, but this time he proposed to follow the Bear of the North to his lair. The impending struggle was indeed to be a most notable one, a true Battle of the Giants. On the one side, under the banners of Napoleon, were arrayed the resources of nearly all western Europe and the highest mili- tary skill of centuries ; on the other, as ally to the Russian, was the brute strength and unlimited A ROMANCE_ OF HISTORY. 10- power of endurance of a mighty, half-civilized people, fighting for land and liberty, Nature, too, was Russia's ally. Could even the greatest mili- tary genius annihilate distance, or by its imperious volition transport half a million soldiers, with their artillery and baggage, over the long miles of cheer- less steppes on the wings of thought? Could Napoleon's 1,200 cannon beat down the ice of the North or prevail against the arrows of the frost ? So the modern Alexander seemed to think as he proudly arrayed his Grand Army to humble the dynasty of the Romanoffs, as he already had laid low the houses of the Bourbon, the Hohenzollern and the Hapsburg. It was truly a Grand Army that Napoleon led against the forces of the North, vastly superior in intelligence and bravery, and hence in real effect- iveness, to the far-famed army of Xerxes. Humanly speaking, no forces then in existence could have stood before this host of disciplined warriors, had their leader been allowed to choose his own time and place for the conflict. But the times and seasons of our lives are not always in our hands, and even Napoleon was to learn that Providence is not invariably on the side having the heaviest guns. After several months in Dresden, devoted to the careful preparation of the warlike host and to the 104 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, pomp and festivity that befitted the court of a world-conqueror, Napoleon gave the word of com- mand and the march on Russia began. On the 24th of June the Nieman was crossed and the grand army was on Russian soil. But, summer as it was, the elements gave the conqueror a hint of what they could do, and drenching rains and cold driving winds swept down upon us from the North, chilling man and beast in many cases to their death. Then the wily Russians, while at first fearing to meet us in battle, devastated the country before us so completely that already by the end of the third week of our march we were suffering for the want of food. On the i6th of August they ventured to make a stand against us in the strongly fortified town of Smolensko. About 12,000 men in killed and wounded was the price we paid for this vic- tory. On the 7th of September at Borodino the Russians made a last, desperate effort to save their sacred city from falling into our hands. From dawn till dark on that awful day a quarter of a million men strove for one another's blood under the sulphurous pall of a thousand cannon hurling fire and death into the human mass. The enemy left 40,000 men on the field and we about as many. We claimed the victory, but it was only a fruitless one, owing to Napoleon's refusal to allow Ney to A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. l05 use the Old Guard to follow up the retreating enemy. Ney realized that without this last blow the victory would be incomplete and fruitless, and in his hot anger said that Napoleon would do well to give his attention to discharging the role of Emperor and to leave war to soldiers. Napoleon readily forgave this rash utterance, especially as its implication was not true, for, till the very night of Waterloo, Napoleon was the born commander, as skilful and untiring as mortal man could be. Still he made a grave mistake here, and it was made in the fear that disaster might befall his cherished Guard. Was the iron nerve of the Man of Destiny beginning to soften ? You know the old story of the burning of Mos- cow and of our forced retreat, with Cold and Hun- ger and the Cossacks cutting down their thousands through those weeks that seemed ages. Napoleon staid with us for a considerable time, until, I sup- pose, the full realization of the utter ruin of the army had burnt itself into his proud spirit ; then he hastened back to civilization to retrieve his injured fortunes. Only one barrier stood between the shattered remnants of the Grand Army and destruction, and this was the spirit of indomitable courage that ani- mated that skilful soldier. Marshal Ney. By the commanding power of his personality some few 106 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, thousand veterans were kept together, and thus enabled to beat back any systematic attack of the enemy. I was at his side as an aide during those terrible weeks and can testify that he most richly deserved the name that Napoleon gave him. "The Bravest of the Brave." Had the Russians possessed a general of half Ney's ability, few indeed would have been the French soldiers who would not have left their bones on those frozen plains. The crowning horror of all that campaign of horrors was at the crossing of the Beresina. The Russians held the only bridge, thus forcing us to build for ourselves amid the floating ice and in the face of their attack. Then, as our remnant of an army began to cross, they fell upon us like demons, finally bringing artillery into position and raking the bridge. Our poor fellows fell here by the thousands, and the sick and wounded had to be adandoned entirely to the rage of the elements and to the tender mercies of the enemy. It is said that when the ice gorge in the Beresina broke up in the spring the bodies of 12,000 French soldiers were seen on the banks. Of the host of 600,000 who entered the domains of the Czar only a pitiful 50,000 survived, and among these must be reckoned a strong rear guard left at Vilna. As I have already remarked Napoleon's war J A ROMANCE OP HISTORY. lOT bulletins had a reputation all their own, though not on account of their strict veracity. Returning to civilization after witnessing the annihilation of the Grand Army, he nevertheless made official report to France that he had accomplished his object by the destruction of the enemy's capital and was once more returning to his people in victory. There were no railroads or lines of telegraph, as you know, in those days, so that it was some time before the whole, crushing truth became know throughout France. By the time the sweeping extent of the disaster was understood by the French people they had come to understand something else as well, and that was that, unless they were willing to lose the prestige that Napo- leon had given them and take a subordinate place among the nations, they must follow him to the bitter end in stripping their land of her resources and of every available man in preparation for the death-grapple with banded Europe. The schools were now robbed of their stripling youth, the fields of their toilers and the hospitals of their war-worn veterans, that another Grand Army might be enrolled with which to defy Europe in arms. Napoleon willed it, and so France made the sacrifice. Another half million men and boys were put in the field, and soon the veterans scat- tered among them inspired the recruits with the 108 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS. spirit of military ardor and devotion to their Emperor that for years had made the armies of France ahnost invincible. On the 2nd of May, 1813, the terrible game of War began again with the great battle of lyuetzen, where Sweden's hero-king, Gnstavus Adolphus, had fallen nearly two centuries before in the hour of victory. Alexander of Russia and Frederick William III. of Prussia here took the field in person against Napoleon, and the slaughter into which they sent their devoted soldiers was fearful. Napoleon was the victor here, and less than three weeks later he hurled a force of 125,000 upon the army of the Allies at Bautzen and was again victorious. After a two month's armistice, fight- ing was renewed and a hard-won victory was gained by Napoleon at Dresden. To tell both sides of a story, I must admit here that, while Napoleon was gaining these victories, several of his marshals were getting the worst of the argument on other fields. At Gross-beeren General Oudinot was defeated ; at Katsbach General Blucher gained the victory over Marshal Macdonald, taking 18,000 French prisoners and 100 guns. My favorite Ney was also on the unfortunate list, meeting with one of the few defeats of his life at the hands of General Berna- dotte, our former companion in arms, but foremost now among our enemies. A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 109 Finally the opposing forces massed themselves for a grand struggle that should decide once for all the question of the mastery. A battle followed before Leipsic that I consider one of the greatest in all history, both in itself and in its conse- quences. Much has been made by historians of the Battle of Waterloo as signalizing the fall of Napoleon. Waterloo was a notable battle, and it forms a fitting and dramatic close to the career of Napoleon ; but the Battle of Leipsic was the greater conflict of the two and it should be made more of in History, for it was here that Napoleon's power was shattered. It is true that after Leipsic Napoleon was still Emperor and still the one military genius who had no peer the world over ; but it is also true that from his defeat at Leipsic he was a broken man, and his best efforts were the struggles of despair in the face of inevitable ruin. On the 1 6th of October the Titanic struggle began on the rolling plain east of Leipsic in clear view of the city. Our 130,000 men were almost surrounded by the 300,000 of the Allies. The battle, it was realized by all, was to be one of extermination, and from the very beginning the fighting was with desperation. The Allies began the struggle by attacking six times in close succes- sion our generals, Victor and Lauriston, only to be 110 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, driven back each time with heavy loss. Then about noon we began a bombardment of their cen- tre, concentrating the fire of 150 guns upon this point. At 3 p. M. our cavalry under Murat, Latour-Maubourg and Kellerman charged and broke their centre. At 4 o'clock, however, the tide turned, and our cavalry were hurled back before the charge of the Austro-Russian reserve and the Cossack Guard. At the same hour the Austrian Meerveldt dashed out from Connewitz, but only to his destruction. General Bertrand suc- cessfully resisted superior numbers and drove them back to Plage witz. So night fell with the advantage on our side, Blucher having made the only permanent advance for the Allies. In view of the advantage being on his side, Napoleon saw fit the next day to oflfer terms of peace. These were not accepted, but there was at least a day of truce. Napoleon cer- tainly intended to withdraw westward from Leip- sic, yet no advantage was taken of this breathing spell to build bridges over the small but deep rivers cutting that route. Had he forgotten, or did his mighty genius flag at that critical moment ? Napoleon's terms were refused, so at 7 o'clock on the morning of the i8th the battle was renewed, the left wing under Ney facing north near Gohlis. Napoleon occupied a hillock at Thornberg with A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. Ill the Old Guard as a reserve. Before long Ney was forced to withdraw before Bernadotte and Ben- ningsen, so as to avoid being surrounded. For the most part, however, there was but little manoeuver- ing for position ; only the most savage fighting. At the centre, under Napoleon's own eye, the car- nage was such that words cannot describe ; Arma- Geddon had been realized on earth. So it was at Probstheida under General Victor. Here the Rus- sians and Prussians made ten bayonet charges, each time meeting with fiercest repulse. The air at times was thick with human limbs, torn off by the cannon's blast ; the soil was flesh. So it was at Stoetteritz and elsewhere. Two thousand cannon were thundering at once ; but, as night fell, many of these and most of the muskets had become too hot for use, and the frenzied, de-humanized soldiers fought on in the hand to hand struggle to kill. Many not in the vortex of the fight fell asleep on their feet from utter exhaustion. Napoleon him- self was for half an hour in a state that can only be described as one of stupor. All day long our wagon trains had been retreat- ing westward, and now, as the moon arose, the retreat began in earnest over the one bridge (a stone one) which spanned the Elster. For the time Napoleon had ceased to be the animating spirit of his army. His genius ; yes, his intelligence, was 112 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS. strangely obscured for hours, and until midday he wandered aimlessly about the streets of lyeipsic, not recognized for the most part by his own sol- diers ; finally he fell into the line of retreat. At 2 p. M. a terrible blunder was committed. The stone bridge was blown up, and there was no other. At that most critical moment the Austrian army stormed the city and our rear-guard came rushing in. My regiment, or what was left of it, belonged here, and, as we galloped into the city and through its streets, the ruin of our army con- fronted us on every hand. Reynier's and Lauris- ton's forces numbering 20,000 men had been cap- tured ; thousands more lay in death or in the agony of their wounds on the plain, and an untold num- ber, like my compatriot, Prince Poniatowski, were drowned in those small, deep rivers of which Napoleon had taken no account. As my regiment reached the Hinter-Thor, we saw our opportunity to do a piece of work that gave us much pleasure. The remnant of one of our infantry regiments had been surrounded here by an overwhelming force of Austrians, and, though selling their lives dearly, were simply being mas- sacred. Here was work to our liking, and, as I gave the word of command, my men answered with a ringing cheer. In another moment the Austrians who escaped the shock of our first onset were flee- A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 113 ing up the narrow alleys and into houses to save themselves from the feet of our horses and from the blow of the sabre and the thrust of the lance. At the blown-up bridge the scene was one that beggars description. Here friend and foe were in- volved in one hopeless melee, and thousands were being forced into the river, trodden under foot or slaughtered where they stood. Nothing was to be done here by our handful to beat back the foe or rescue our friends, and so we made our way under guidance of an infantry private to a ford where they, as well as ourselves, could cross. Soon we fell in with our retreating troops scat- tered along the Erfurt road toward Lindenau, and then began another sad chapter in the sad story of war. Disheartened by defeat, weakened by hun- ger, with thousands dying of the typhus, and harassed by the Cossacks almost as on the retreat from Russia, we pressed wearily on toward the Rhine and safety. However, we had not forgotten the art of War even in the worst of our hardships, as those found to their cost who attempted to block our way. Napoleon was himself again, as was clearly shown by his successful conduct of the retreat and by the skill and desperation with which he fought battle after battle before Paris. But all this struggle of desperation was in vain. The first stroke of the hour of Napoleon's destiny 114 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, was sounded, and his abdication of the throne and retirement to Elba soon followed. I do not care to linger on the circumstances of that journey of the humbled conqueror ; but it is a matter of History that, as he passed through the southern provinces of France, where the forces of the opposition had smouldered on during the years of his ascendency, the insults and threats of the populace cowed the lion heart that had never quailed in the fiery hail of battle, and Napoleon stooped to disguise himself that he might avoid the wrath of his enemies. Truly, as his star set for the season in the waves of the Mediterranean, it was in clouds and obscurity. CHAPTER VIII. THE CAGED LION; HIS RELEASE AND RECAPTURE. V\7 AS it from man or of God, this panic that fell upon so many who had been Napoleon's supporters ? Something in the air, as it were, told men that the Invincible One's day was drawing toward its close ; and so the kings and princes he had put upon their thrones fell away, as soon as the chill of evening came to be felt. The lion who had scattered his foes at the bridge of Lodi, at Austerlitz, Jena and on scores of other hard-fought fields was now left alone, save for the blind devo- tion of a warm-hearted people. Yes ; one nation there was besides his own to hold unwaveringly to their promised deliverer — a nation without a government of their own — my own brave Polish people. At Leipsic and after Leipsic, when Napoleon's friends were few and becoming fewer, the Poles alone remained faithful. As you know from your reading, desperate indeed were the efforts our Emperor made to retrieve the field of Leipsic The lion was at bay now and striking quick and deadly blows ; but the hour of his undoing had come, and one small Mediterranean island was to be his domain. 115 116 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS^ Napoleon was now in Elba, with an abundance of material growing out of the Past to furnish him with food for reflection ; what was doing in France ? The Bourbons had come back at the call of the victorious Allies, and with them came the residue of the Emigrant Nobility. These latter, who had steadfastly refused all these years to adjust themselves to the changed order that had come to pass in their native land, now expected as the least reward for their devotion to the old regime the restoration of their estates and dignities. These estates had been confiscated long years before by the government and assigned to its champions in war, or sold to private parties and perhaps sold again. As well try to bring back the water that flowed in the Seine twenty odd years before, but that had for all these years been mingled with the fluid mass of the Atlantic, as to restore these estates. As for the old feudal digni- ties and privileges they existed in the recollections of the people only as an unpleasant reminder of the days of their bondage. Out of the chaos of the Revolution there had arisen a new order that had in it vastly more of the element of Justice than the old ever had, and that belonged to the Present. When the Bourbons and their adherents made the studied and persistent attempt to ignore twenty of the most momentous A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 117 years in the life of a progressive people, they demanded that this people live day after day what may be called a lie of the Intellect. "No foot- steps backward " is an old and a true saying, and when the Bourbons insisted that the French peo- ple deny its truth in their daily lives, they were guilty of folly that can be fittingly described only as monumental. And this Bourbon folly was shown in all the spheres of life, and not merely in the political world, where it might, perhaps, have been expected. In social life, in the Army and even in the Church it was equally evident that the attempt was being systematically made to ignore the Living Present in favor of the Buried Past. To the limit of their ability (which by the way did not reach very far) the Bourbons set aside the laws and prac- tices they found in force. The most important issues, however, as the freedom of the press, per- sonal liberty and the existing titles to property, they dared not touch. In the sphere of Religion the Roman Church was given free scope, and she used her resources of ceremonial to the utmost in elaborate street processions and reconsecrations of churches to impress the people with the thought that the age of Reason had been set aside by the hand of God, to make place for the old, unques- tioning faith and devotion. So it happened that 118 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, many a fickle Frenchman who only a few years before had danced with glee about the altar of Reason, while he hurled terms of ridicule at the Church, could now be seen walking, as became a good Catholic, with measured step and penitential mien to some elaborate ceremonial setting forth the triumph of the Church over her sacreligious foes. This kind of thing could not have lasted a great while, for the French are too intelligent a people to be kept for any long time acting a part. How- ever other and more active forces than mere national impatience were at work. We of the Army who had followed Napoleon on so many a march and into so many a fierce battle were soon made to feel that, instead of being the French patriots we had imagined ourselves, we had all this time been traitors to France, and were even now suspects. This suspicion, or repellant treat- ment, of the soldiers of the imperial army was as unwise as it was unjust. We had fought and bled and starved all those years, not only for Napoleon, but, as we believed, just as much for France. We soldiers were men accustomed to prompt and vig- orous action, and we speedily gave our old leader to understand that there were matters pertaining to the Present upon which he might do well to reflect. That winter some of us who had the sense A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 119 of humor took great pleasure in displaying to an appreciative friend the emblem of a violet with the peculiar statement attached, " Reviendra aux Pri- entemps." One circumstance that greatly favored our scheming was the treatment accorded France by the Allies. All the territory and other advantage that France had gained during the long years of war at such fearful cost in the lives of her citizens was stripped from her, and she was left as at the beginning of the Revolution. The pride of France rose at this humiliation, and she began to think with affection of the man under whose leadership she had been the arbiter of the destinies of all Europe. It is not to be denied that Marshal Ney took part in this plotting. In view of the fact that he had accepted, or rather retained, high rank in the army under the Bourbons, this conduct would look like treachery, and indeed it was held by many to be such. I do not wholly excuse Ney in this matter ; but this much can be said. He tried to serve the Bourbons with all sincerity and vigor, until he became convinced that their rule was an impossi- bility ; then he began to think of his old com- mander. Next to Napoleon, Ney was the leader with whose career mine had been most closely inter- 120 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS. woven. In Spain and in Russia I had shared his fortunes; I was with him in this matter, and in the time then a part of the unknown Future, in that supreme moment in the annals of war, the closing scene at Waterloo, I was to be at his side as one of his aides. I was intimately associated with Ney in this matter ; but I shall not put the blame of my act upon him and say : " Ney tempted me and I did plot." I see now, as I did not see then, that Napoleon's return meant only new turmoil and bloodshed. It was not my plotting alone, or perhaps to any marked extent, that brought Napo- leon back from Elba ; but I am ready, as an old man settling up his accounts with life, to plead : Me a culpa. So in the course of human events it befell that on a certain day at the end of February, 1815, France was treated to what she dearly loved, viz. : a great surprise. From mouth to mouth it was repeated during the next days. Napoleon has come back to France. Already the quick-witted French- men felt the grip of the master's hand on the helm of state, and, weary as they were of the Bourbon farce, most of them rejoiced at the coming revolution. Then it could be clearly seen what power there is in a name. At the 'name of Napoleon the old spell that his personality had so long exerted fell A ROMANCE OF ///STORK 121 upon men and robbed them of their reason. His old soldiers in particular, who had been so rudely treated by the Bourbons, felt that now the day of their deliverance was at hand, and every road leading south was dotted with groups of them hurrying to welcome their great chief. On the 5 th of March a large force stationed at Grenoble joined him in a body. At Lyons an army under Bourbon command had been placed to check his progress ; but the troops went over to Napoleon. Marshal Ney had promised Louis XVIII. to bring Napoleon to Paris in an iron cage ; but, whatever he may have meant by his promise, he did a very different thing and joined the lion's following. By this time Paris had become a very uncomfortable place of residence for the Bourbons, and so they and theirs flitted to Belgium or to England. The Hundred Days, as the period from Napo- leon's return until the Day of Waterloo came to be called, was a time of the intensest activity. The giant mind of Europe was working in many directions, as in diplomacy ; but most of all in preparing for the inevitable crash of War. And it was marvellous what a master in the art of War could do, even in a few months and in a land so completely drained of its resources as was France. An army of 360,000 men was raised and equipped 122 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, in this brief time, and Napoleon claimed that, could he have had a few weeks more in which to labor, he would have surrounded France with a wall of brass which no earthly power would have been able to break through. But the war-clouds were fast gathering to the north, where that stubborn old fighter. Marshal Bliicher, and the adroit Wellington were about to mass their forces to descend upon France. To the north then Napoleon hurried with an army of 124,000, attacking and defeating Blucher at Ligny the day after he crossed the Belgian frontier. On the same day Ney attacked the British at Quatre Bras ; but was repulsed and fell back on the village of Waterloo. Blucher also headed his army for this point, and the situation now resolved itself into this. Marshal Grouchy with 34,000 men must hold Bliicher back from Waterloo, while Napoleon attacked Wellington in that vicinity. In case Grouchy could not hold the Prussian army in check, then he was to hasten to join Napoleon. These plans once determined. Napoleon hastened with an army of 80,000 to meet Wellington who had an equal force. The 1 8th day of June was the memorable Day of Waterloo, and it came preceded by a half day and a night of heavy rain which made the ground soft and in places almost impassable for artillery. A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 123 Accordingly Napoleon delayed the hour of battle until nearly noon, trusting to Grouchy to hold the Prussians back. The story of Waterloo is an old one, and it has been often and eloquently told Accordingly I shall not dwell upon its dramatic scenes further than to give a sketch of the battle and to recount my own part in it. The enemy's forces were drawn up on rising ground in the form of a crescent a mile and a half in length, the concave side being turned towards us. We held the next ridge 500 — 800 yards distant. About half way between the armies stood the stone chateau of Hougoumont held by a strong force of British ; also the hamlet of INIont St. Jean and the farm of La Haie Sainte, also strongly garrisoned by the British. The events of the battle, told in the fewest words, were these : At half past eleven the first attack was made on Hougoumont ; but the chateau remained in the hands of the British. The Prus- sians under Biilow were then repulsed, and Napo- leon determined to break Wellington's centre. To this end Ney was ordered to carry La Haie Sainte. I was by Ney's side and can testify that the British gave us some of the hottest fighting we ever exper- ienced. We carried their position, but were then checked in our farther advance by the forces under 124 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, Picton and Ponsonby. Until half past three the fighting here was most desperate and without a moment's breathing spell. Then there was a slight pause, our forces giving their strongest efforts to the capture of Hougoumont ; but in vain. Wellington now attempted to re-take La Haie Sainte ; but we hurled him back. Ney then sent to Napoleon for re-inforcements, that he might make a counter charge and break the Brit- ish lines. Napoleon had already weakened his reserves and could send us only a small force, not more than enough to enable us to hold our position. Simply to do this, he afterwards claimed, had been his orders, thus putting the responsibility for the defeat at Waterloo on Ney's shoulders. Ney may have been so beside himself with the rage of battle as to disregard the command of his chief ; but on the other hand, as we have already seen, even Napoleon could forget, and he was not above clear- ing himself at the cost of another. So it happened that, as soon as re-inforcements reached us, Ney gave the command to charge and on we rushed into the British centre. Had the mass of our attacking force been half again its weight, we should most certainly have swept the British from the field. As it was, the enemy's lines reeled and staggered before the impact of our A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 125 charge, gave a little space ; but then stood, as if rooted to the ground, and could not be moved one foot farther. Nevertheless, while we had not succeeded in our charge, we had not been repulsed ; but by repeated charges and destructive artillery fire held the advance we had gained. In other parts of the field our forces had been in the main successful, so that, as the sun began to near his setting, it looked as though Waterloo were to be added to the mighty array of the victories of Napoleon. All now depended upon an unknown quantity or quantities in the form of the two armies linger- ing somewhere just out of sight. Would either of them appear on the field of Waterloo that day to turn the scale ? If so, which force would it be, Grouchy's Frenchmen or Blucher's Prussians? Soon after five, bugles were heard in the distance to our right. Who was it? It was Bliicher, for the banners were those of Prussia. For Napoleon it was now the hour of Fate, and he realized that fact most keenly. At once he called his reserve and, most of all, the Old Guard to the rescue. Perhaps you do not know what that Old Guard was, or the part it had played before all Europe. It was the very flower of the French Army and its ranks were kept filled with such only as had seen long service. Its record was on^ 126 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS. glorious story of triumph on liard-fought fields, and never had it tasted defeat. Was this to be the hour of its brightest glory, or of its crushing ruin ? The enemy realized as keenly as ourselves that this was the moment of destiny, and as the Guard moved forward in all the stern magnificence of War, their artillery ceased firing and for the moment there was an awful silence, such as one might imagine would precede the day of doom. Doom it was for Napoleon and his devoted sol- diers. The enemy had ceased firing only that they might the more effectually compass our destruction. At the instant when we were fully exposed their batteries opened upon us with a most deadly fire. Before that hail of death rank after rank went down almost as completely as grain before the reaper's scythe. On we pressed, without an instant of faltering, over the windrows of the dead and dying up to their guns and, striking down the gunners, broke our way through the British lines. Just then was the exact moment of our destruction. From behind a low ridge there sprang up file after file of infantry, firing volley upon volley into our very faces. Volley followed upon volley without pause or ces- sation, until the earth seemed to vomit fire and death into our faces, and we broke and fled as A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 127 before the overflow of a volcano, thrown back by the very explosion of their guns. In the carnage through which we passed Ney had five horses shot under him and now, black- ened and burnt with powder, he fought on foot, and by almost superhuman efforts formed those nearest him into two great squares, that he might check the frenzied rush toward the rear. Won- derful to say, he was on the point of succeeding in this effort, when Bliicher's 30,000 Prussians reached the spot and swept our shattered ranks before them. These Prussians had many an old score to settle, and they struck hard and vengeful blows, following us up in relentless pursuit all that night. Whether or not the cry was raised, "The Old Guard dies, but never surrenders," I cannot say. I can say that thousands did die on that field of carnage, and that other thousands were driven in blind confusion from the field and afterwards captured by the victorious enemy. As for Napoleon he would gladly have died in the thick of the battle, but Marshal Soult urged him almost by main force from the field aud hur- ried him off for Paris. En route, he took poison; but his purpose changing or his courage failing, he took an antidote and recovered. Once in Paris, he saw that all was indeed lost, and signed an act of abdication and then fled from the city. His 128 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS. last hope was to escape to the United States ; but, frustrated in this plan, nothing remained for him but to choose the one of his enemies to whom he would surrender. He paid the English the com- pliment of selecting them, and sent word to that effect to the commander of a British vessel oflf Rochefort. The Englishman took his famous prisoner to Torbay, whence, as you well know, he was taken to his island prison of St. Helena. Here after nearly six years of captivity the Lion of France died. Was Napoleon a great man ? As the world reckons, most assuredly, yes. Was he great and good, a Washington, or even a Lafayette ? Alas, no. He lived, not for humanity or even for his country, as he was wont to declare ; but for Self. He died, admired or reviled, as it might be; but, save here and there by a faithful few, unloved and unwept. CHAPTER IX. UNDER THE SHADOW. pLATO lias told us many interesting things about Justice, but there is one circumstance that has come into prominence since his day This is the fact that the meshes of the great drag- net of Justice are so constructed that they catch the little fish, while letting the big ones get away. Napoleon, the aforetime conqueror of Europe and arbiter of the fate of kings, was given a whole island for his prison and treated as a kingly guest. Marshal Ney, General Rigaud, Colonel Labe- doyere, myself and some few others who had stood loyally by our chief in the time of his exile were seized by the Bourbon authorities on our return from Waterloo, thrown into prison and sentenced to be shot. It is true that after the explosion of the infernal machine in the Place de Carrousel^ Napoleon caused the execution or banishment of scores of his enemies ; yet there was but scant comfort for us in this fact of precedence. How- ever for several of us the ordering of the Bourbon monarch was not to be the ordering of Destiny or, as I prefer to say, of Providence. 9 129 130 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, How the vengeance of a king was set aside by a mightier hand, is a story worth the telling. Except for a few scratches and powder burns, Marshal Ney and myself found ourselves unhurt after all the terrible slaughter through which we passed on the Day of Waterloo. Side by side we were swept from the plateau of Mont St. Jean by the rush of Bliicher's Prussians, defending our- selves as by instinct whenever any of the enemy crowded us too closely. How we escaped from the field or even made our way to Paris, I cannot recall. Utter exhaustion, or depression of spirit rather, had come over both of us, and we made that sad journey almost without exchanging an unnecessary word. On our return to Paris we met with a reception that might have given less modest men an exag- gerated notion of their own importance. We were seized, almost on our arrival, by the police, as dangerous to the peace of France, and put in close confinement until our execution. Just here I would pay the police of Paris the compliment of saying that what they do not know of the affairs of their city belongs to the category of such things as have never either happened or been thought about. Afterwards I learned that every trifling act of my insignificant self, in the days when Napoleon was in Elba had been put on A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 131 record, and that my fate had been decided long before my arrest. Before telling my own experience during those awful mouths spent under the shadow of death, it is fitting that I should tell the fate of my superior officer and former commander, Marshal Ney. You doubtless know what the historians say of his execution. It is about this : After every eflfort to secure his pardon had failed, Ney was finally taken from prison to be shot. At the place of execution he was put before a file of soldiers, whom he faced without flinching. Plac- ing his hand on his heart, he cried : " Vive la France f'' and said: " Fellow-soldiers, fire here." The volley was fired, and the "bravest of the brave" lay dead before them. This is a very thrilling episode of History, yet there is one criticism that must be passed upon it. It never happened, or at least happened with one important variation. There is only one strictly accurate historian, viz : the Recording Angel ; all the others are fallible. But first let me say a few words about Ney's remarkable career, then I will tell you the true story of his execution. Marshal Ney was of humble birth, his parents being plain people, his father an Alsatian and his mother Scotch. The father had seen service and 132 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, the son's soldierly gifts were developed at an early age. He had a good elementary education, with some study of Latin and of Law. But the pen of the lawyer, dangerous as it sometimes is, was not to be Ney's weapon. While still a youth he found himself in the army, and his soldierly qualities, joined with modesty, dashing bravery and unusual consideration for his men, soon won him promo- tion. His public career you know. His greatest achievement was, doubtless, his conduct of the retreat from Russia. Napoleon appreciated this so fully that he said at the time that he would rather lose a fund of sundry millions that he had in his treasury vaults in Paris than lose Ney. The story of Ney's execution is this. While his pardon could not be secured, it was neverthe- less a fact that he had influential friends who were resolved to take the most desperate chances to save his life. One of these had charge of his execution and halted the squad at a lonely spot on the way to the appointed place of execution. Then Ney was placed against a blank wall and the soldiers fired, directing their aim, however, at a point just above his head. Ney fell, as he had been instructed, and doubtless had a most trying time for the next hour or so playing the part of a dead man. His empty coffin was duly buried, but the supposed occu- A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 183 pant v/as meanwhile making a swift journey for America. After a year or so spent in close retirement and study, in Charleston, I believe, Ney put in his appearance in Rowan County, North Carolina, under the name of Peter Stuart Nay, and opened a private school for boys. As he was kept supplied with funds by friends in France, he took up teach- ing merely as a congenial occupation. The old warrior's career as a pedagogue was on the whole a successful one. I was told that he was known and loved for his kindly disposition, except when pro- voked, and then, as of old, his blazing anger would make the boldest tremble. He is said to have been subject to spells of depression, generally on receipt of letters from abroad. Occasionally at such times he would drink heavily, and would then make admission of his identity. At intervals he received visits from foreigners who evidently were men of standing. It was my privilege to make him one short visit and also to receive one from him at my home in Indiana, when we enjoyed the bitter-sweet experience of living over the Past and its many stirring memories. He died at a good age, not in Paris before the muskets of the soldiers, but quietly in his bed in North Carolina, where his ashes rest to-day. General Rigaud also escaped his impending fate, 134 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, I am told, but of his experiences I have no account. As for my own lot at this most trying time, I would say that I can never forget the slow agony of those months in prison under the black shadow. It was not that I feared to die, for many was the time, in the vortex of battle, that I expected death and cared not though I had to die, provided only that the victory came to us. In the glorious excitement of battle a brave man thinks or cares but little about death ; but as one sits, week after week, in a prison cell facing the thought of being led out and shot like a rabid dog, death takes on another aspect and becomes indeed the King of Terrors. In those long weeks that ran into the months I reviewed alike the present situation and my past life most earnestly. Among men there was none of whom I knew to help me, so with all the fervor of my soul I committed myself to God. The prayers of David, lighted up by the pure light of the Christian's faith, were my especial solace. With David I prayed: "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me ? Our fathers trusted in Thee : they trusted, and Thou didst deliver them. They cried unto Thee and were delivered : they trusted in Thee, and were not ashamed. ' ' "The cords of death compassed me, and the A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. m floods of ungodliness made me afraid. The cords of Sheol were round about me : the snares of death came upon me." Many a time in my career in the Army or while at Court I had upheld the Christian faith before scoffers, would my Lord now remember me ? My answer came from the mouth of David : "In my distress I called upon the Lord, and cried unto my God, He heard my voice out of His temple, and my cry before Him came into His ears. For Thou hast girded me with strength unto the battle. Thou hast subdued under me those that rose up against me. He rescueth me from mine enemies. Yea, Thou liftest me up above them that rise up against me : Thou deliverest me from the violent man." In the light of such assurances as these and in the comfort of the Christian's faith and hope, I be- came reconciled to whatever might be the orderinsf for me of the great hand of God, The bitterness of death had passed away, and I was quietly await- ing the coming of the 8th of December, which was to be my last day on earth, when the hand of the Lord was revealed. My jailer brought me a well-baked and appetiz- ing cake which, he said, the Countess of Blank had paid him to give me. I had not heard this name for years, but I at once remembered it as that 136 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, of one of the truly great ladies of France whom I had helped long since when she was in a situation of great distress. As soon as I was alone I broke open the cake and found within a steel file and, wrapped about it, a scrap of paper with a street address written on it. I enjoyed the cake, but you will believe me when I say that I enjoyed the file even more. That night I tried its quality upon the bars of my window, and the next night, December 7th, which was to be my last one in prison and on earth, I cut the bars and made my escape. The circumstances of my escape were not with- out interest, at least for myself. I had made a rope of my bed clothes, and, letting myself down to the end of this, I swung clear of the wall and dropped. A most painful experience resulted. Just beneath me, fixed in timbers and covered with shallow water, were sharp spikes pointing upward, and upon some of these my feet struck. You can imagine the pain, but I had no time to stop to con- sider that. Loosing my feet from the spikes, I slowly picked my way, sliding my feet between the points until I came to the outer wall of the prison. This I scaled, but, as I leaped to the ground, there stood a sentinel with leveled musket. I said to him : " Do your duty ; " but the man was one of my old soldiers, and lowering his weapon and A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. I3t facing about, he said : " Pass on, Colonel Lehma- nowsky." I very cheerfully obeyed his order and made my way to the address that had been sent me. Here I found a friend who bandaged my feet, and then we returned part of the way, wiping up or covering my bloody tracks. The cold water over the spikes had stayed the flow of blood somewhat, and aided us in our effort at preventing detection. Returning with my friend to the house, I was shown to a room in the cellar which had been constructed for my use, being furnished with an air shaft. In this under- ground retreat I remained most contentedly until my wounds were healed and the excitement caused by my escape had subsided. It was not with the good will of the Bourbon regime that I had left my prison quarters, for most diligent search was made for me, and handbills were printed, giving a complete description of my insignificant self, and offering a much larger amount for my arrest than I had ever considered myself worth. All this commotion, and especially the circula- tion of those handbills, made the problem of my departure from Paris a somewhat involved one. It is hardly necessary to state that I did not attempt to leave Paris in uniform. A very plain outfit of citizen's clothes satisfied my desires, and 138 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, thus arrayed, and furnished with a forged pass, I presented myself at the gates of the city. But the guards distrusted me and refused me passage, tell- ing me to return a little later when the officer in charge would be present. I did not find it conve- nient to come again, but had a couple of friends lower me over the wall that night at a point where I could be rowed across the Seine. I took this farewell of Paris toward morning, and, with so early a start and with a great ambition to leave Paris behind me, I covered a number of miles that day that you would scarcely believe to be possible, were I to tell you the count. Avoiding the larger towns and travelling for the most part in the early morning or toward dusk, I finally reached the neighborhood of Amsterdam. Here I once more tried the virtue of my pass, but it was not honored, and I was glad to beat a hasty retreat from the presence of the officials. In this vicinity, I heard, a general, who was an old acquaint- ance of mine, was reviewing his troops. I made my way to him and asked of him a pass. He refused me with the words : "I have a warrant for your arrest, but make your escape." By this time it had become clear to me that the Continent of Europe had become just a little too small for one like myself who had gained the ill- will of the ruling powers. Accordingly, I began A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 139 to think with much affection of America as the true and only land of the free, and so I made my way to the port and inquired for a vessel bound for America. Fortunately there was one at the dock just on the point of sailing. The Captain was an American, and I loved that man on sight for his strong and open expression. I felt as by instinct that he was a man to be trusted, and I frankly told him the essentials of my story in a few words. He listened with the closest interest, but said that he could not take me as a passenger. He added, however, as I was about to turn away in despair : "Go down into the hold of the ship and put on sailor's clothes and daub some tar on your face, and be on deck with the sailors when we start." These instructions I most gladly followed, working so industriously at cleaning up the deck that I never once straightened up to my full height until we were well under way. When the ship had passed fairly out of the harbor, the Captain told me to wash, put on my own clothes and make myself comfortable. The North Sea in Winter may not be considered by some as an ideal spot ; but, as we passed out upon its troubled waters, making our difficult course toward the English Channel and the broad Atlantic beyond, I thought its sharp winds were laden with the very elixir of life. 140 UNDER TWO CAtTAINS, The ship was old and hardly seaworthy and our voyage was a rough and perilous one ; but to one like myself, fleeing from the grasp of Death, every- thing seemed right. I especially enjoyed the Cap- tain's society, for he was as true a man as ever I met, and had, moreover, seen much of lyife and its hardships, having followed the sea from boyhood, getting a taste of War in the recent struggle between the United States and England. Many were the pleasant hours we spent in discussion or in living over the most interesting of our varied experiences ; and one experience we were destined to undergo together. Almost the whole voyage had been stormy ; but, as we neared America, we ran into a gale that made our ship quiver and groan as though receiv- ing its death-blow. The seams opened here and there and soon the dismal music of the pumps was added to the howling of the storm. Despite our incessant labor the water gained upon us, and it seemed as if the ship must founder. There was no hope that the ship's boats could live in such a sea, and the Captain's face was the picture of gloom as he told me that he thought we should have to fight our last battle together. I answered that such indeed might be the case, but that a voice within seemed to tell me the opposite, and that with his permission I would make a special effort. A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 141 Even at that time the English Bible was fairly well known to me, and now, without quitting my place at the pumps, I lifted up my voice and my soul in a prayer made up chiefly of some of its grandest assurances and promises. The Captain and his whole crew were wonderfully encouraged by this prayer, and many of them wept at the sound of the words of Holy Scripture familiar to them in childhood, but in some cases long ago neglected and forgotten. As we toiled on and I continued to use the strong memory that has always been one of my greatest gifts to repeat passage after passage of Scripture comfort, the storm began to abate and presently we found that we were gaining on the water in the hold. Then there was indeed rejoicing and we labored with new strength to rid the ship of water, while one and then another of the sailors assured me that never again would he make a voyage without a Bible in his kit. At last the happy day came when we passed the cape of the Delaware and sailed up the bay and the river of that name, gazing with delight on the fields and wooded hills to our left that were just taking on the fresh green of early spring. Phila- delphia was finally reached and our vessel drawn up to her dock. Then, after a hearty farewell to 142 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, the Captain, I left my ark of refuge and stood at long last on the soil of free America. What did I do as my first act ? There was only one thing I could rightly do. Stepping aside to a secluded spot on the dock between some barrels and bales, I knelt and poured out my heart in words of thanksgiving to the Lord of Hosts, the Great Shepherd of Israel. " O give thanks unto the Lord, for He is good ; because His mercy endureth forever. Let them now that fear the Lord say, that His mercy endur- eth forever. The Lord is on my side ; I will not fear: what can man do unto me ? It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in princes. Thou hast thrust sore at me that I might fall : but the Lord helped me. The Lord is my strength and song and is become my salvation. The voice of rejoicing and salvation is in the tabernacles of the righteous : the right hand of the Lord doeth valiantly. I shall not die, but live and declare the works of the Lord." So I prayed, and, as I arose greatly strengthened in spirit, I found an elderly man of dignified bear- ing, dressed in a fashion that I had never before seen, standing beside me. He laid his hand on my arm, saying: "Come, go with me," and I followed, not knowing whether for good or for evil. PART II. • IN THE NEW WORLD. CHAPTER I. BEGINNING LIFE ANEW. 'T'HE old gentleman who bade me go with him when I arose from my prayer proved to be a Quaker merchant, who had been drawn to the spot by the sound of a voice coming from among the piles of merchandise. As I soon found, I was not arrested, as I had supposed, but was being taken to a comfortable home to enjoy the most generous hospitality. And I did enjoy it, I assure you. After the short rations we had on shipboard, and the still scantier fare I had lived on during my forced march from Paris and while in prison, I was prepared to furnish the bountiful table of my host with at least one appreciative guest. That evening I told the main points of my life- story to my host and a little circle of his Quaker friends. Having learned of their principle of opposition to all War, I was somewhat surprised to note the deep interest they showed in my account of some experiences under Napoleon. They had 143 144 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS. many questions to ask about the Battle of Water- loo in particular, for, it seemed, some of their Eng- lish relatives who did not belong to their Society had borne a part here. When I told how Welling- ton's squares had held their ground like oaks before the fury of our charge, these men of Peace became very restless, and several went so far as to wish that they might have looked on that sight. The next morning my host seemed to have some- thing on his mind that was troubling him. Finally he told me that he cared but little for the vanities of this world, and that plain dress was ever his choice ; then he wound up by suggesting that he advance me the means for the purchase of a new suit of clothes. There was nothing superfluous in this suggestion, for the clothes I was wearing had been chosen for their poor appearance, and had seen hard service on my journey to Amsterdam and on the ocean. Whether or not the coat makes the man, I shall not attempt to decide ; but this much I know, that good clothing makes a marked difierence in the treatment the wearer receives, and also in his own inner consciousness. It took but a few days for a man of my constitu- tion and seasoning to become rested from the fatigues of the voyac;c, and then I called my esteemed friend into counsel regarding the question of my future. You will be interested to know A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 145 what I held my resources or assets to be on landing on American soil and beginning life anew. First of all, I might be pardoned for naming my military rank of Colonel of the Ninth Polish Ivan- cers of the Army of France. This title represented twenty-two years of young manhood given, for the most part, to arduous service with the trying experiences of no less than two hundred and four battles, of scores of wounds and of great privation. However, with a large reward offered by the Bour- bon government for my arrest, this asset of mili- tary rank might become, as I saw, a mill-stone to drag me under the waters. Next to my army record I might be inclined to name the title, Count de Bellevieu, that Napoleon had bestowed upon me on his return from Elba, or to reckon on the documents he had given me, enti- tling me to receive a fine estate from the French government. As for the title I fully realized that under existing circumstances it came under the sentence of the Preacher: "And this, too, was vanity." After discussing the situation with my venerable friend, I decided to drop the latter half of my name, thus changing it to the common German one, lychman, and also to reduce myself to the rank of Major. Thus I trusted to avoid attracting attention, and to free myself from the danger of 10 146 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, arrest and from the wretchedness of living under a cloud of dread. And what, you may ask, became of my claim to the estate in France? I shall anticipate my story some few years and tell you. Some years after coming to America I called on Joseph Bonaparte who was then living at Borden- town. New Jersey. Instead of showing me any- thing of the consideration due one whom he had seen hundreds of times in his brother's service, and whom he knew had been a most faithful follower of Napoleon, he treated me from first to last as an imposter or beggar of whom he would gladly be rid. Our interview, I need hardly add, was a stormy one. However, his servant, who followed me to the front door, paid the score. This fellow, a large and most pompous specimen of the flunkey tribe, added some insult of his own as I was leav- ing. I could endure much from the brother of my Emperor ; but nothing at all from a supercilious menial, so I answered his insult with a blow from my open hand that sent him rolling at my feet, and walked away, feeling somewhat relieved. In this same connection I may as well tell of a visit I made to France on the accession of Louis Napoleon. The lesson I brought home with me was, " Put not your trust in princes." The one then ruling France found it convenient to forget my A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 14T years of faithful service to the founder of his house and to remember only that I bore a proscribed name. Accordingly, I once more had the oppor- tunity of studying the inside appointments of a French prison, where I had abundant leisure to indulge in some choice philosophical reflections on the vanity of all things mundane. The influence of a powerful friend at court finally secured my release, but not until I had become fully convinced that Providence had some worthier calling in reserve for me than the life of a French nobleman. But to return to the question of my assets on beginning life as an American citizen. Rank and title, as I have shown, were to me only as so much smoke in the eyes as I stepped into the new life ; but I had some better stock in trade than these. I had super-abundant health, being then a vigor- ous young man just turned of forty. Moreover I had, besides my military training, an education of a completeness none too common in America. Then too, in the hard school of War I had gained a certain practical skill that put me on a very different footing from those who pride themselves on a so-called aristocratic helplessness. Had manual labor been the first thing that offered itself to me, I can honestly say that it would have been promptly and cheerfully accepted. Finally I had for my stay in those trying days, wheu I 148 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS. found myself a stranger in the land, an nnfaltering trust in the God who led Abraham to a land that he knew not, but that the Great Friend would show him, and who appeared unto Paul and said : Fear not ! The question of making a living in the New World answered itself, as it were, and in a way that was as natural as it was unexpected. The son of my kind host, who by the way was much more a man of this world than his father, asked me to go with him to a concert. After we had enjoyed the first half of the program, my new- found friend insisted on introducing me to several of the musicians. As we sat chatting during the recess I picked up a guitar and played a little on it. Music, I might say, had been my chief recreation during the hours and days of idleness that come in the life of the soldier, and those New World musicians saw at once that they could learn some- thing of the noble art at my hands, and promptly engaged my services as their instructor. Instruc- tion in modern languages followed naturally upon this first employment, and so it happened that within a month or two the homeless wanderer, fleeing from the wrath of a king, was making a comfortable living and enjoying the pleasures of cultured society in the land of Freedom and of the Future. A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 149 That year the heat of Summer fell early upon the city homes and streets, and most of my pupils left for the country or to be near the ocean. As I was thus temporarily forsaken and had some little money in hand, I resolved to start out and explore at least a part of the land. It was with all the keen relish of a boy starting out on his first long vacation that I marched forth, knapsack on back and stick in hand, to make a peaceful campaign in rustic America. Some of the adjacent places made famous by the deeds of the great-hearted Washington, as Valley Forge and the Brandywine, first engaged my atten- tion. Then I turned my steps northward to the Forks of the Delaware and the beautiful Water Gap. From this point I journeyed westward and southward to the Valley of the Lehigh and the towns on its banks, as AUentown. Thence I struck across the country to Reading and Lancaster. To my surprise and delight I found in most sections a New Germany, and heard again the language and saw again, as far as might be in America, the life and customs I had come to know so well in the Old World. Stopping, as I did, with the farmers and working with them in the fields, I could readily imagine myself in some quiet comer of South Germany or in the Rhine Country. Then again I enjoyed to the full an occasional day 150 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, spent in exploring the forests or in fishing or in some other way entering into the primitive life of the New World. Between the labor I rendered in the fields and the instruction I gave the young people at odd hours in the homes I had the satis- faction of knowing that I was working my pass- age and that I was no burden on my hosts, but a welcome guest. Sometimes, when I spent a few weeks with one family, the farmer would insist on my taking some small sum of money for my ser- vices, and, as I took up my journey, it was always with such a supply of edibles in my knapsack as would have overcome my old comrades of the armies of Napoleon with astonishment and envy. So my first summer in America slipped most pleasantly away with only one incident of special note. I hardly know how to describe this inci- dent, whether as my first Fourth of July and its Homeric deeds or under the heading of the Army in Berks. At the beginning of July I found myself in Berks County, and here it was that I celebrated my first American Fourth of July. Hearing that there was to be a celebration of the day in one of the larger towns, I made my way thither, and had the unexpected pleasure of taking a leading part in the celebration. After some speechifying by a lawyer of the place who was a candidate for Con- A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 151 gress, the choicest part of the celebration was announced, viz. : a drill and sham battle by a troop of rustic cavalry. These were gotten together from the various taverns with much beating of a big drum and drawn up in battle array. The Army in Berks, as I may call it, presented an imposing appearance, if considered by the standard of avordupois, men and horses both being of unusual weight. Their military evolutions, however, would hardly have charmed either Napoleon or Ncy, and, in spite of myself, I was moved to laughter and then to speech. Thought is a truly noble faculty, putting man at the head of creation and affording him some of the greatest pleasures of life ; but then Thought must not be held as one with Speech. These two faculties should be kept separate in our minds, and we ought most carefully to observe the ratio that wisdom has decreed should exist between them. There was no harm in my cherishing the belief that one experienced soldier could scatter the whole rustic troop ; but when I said in distinct words, though speaking only to myself, " I could whip the whole of them," trouble followed, as it generally does follow hasty speech. A by-stander heard my statement and carried it at once to the officer in command. He then sent 152 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS. for me and demanded to know whether I meant what I said. I told him that I did, and we then took up the all-important question of the plan of battle. I suggested various approved formations, beginning with the phalanx of the ancient Greeks ; but we finally decided upon the following arrange- ment and terms of battle. The troop was to be drawn up in two parallel lines, leaving space between for me to pass. This idea, I believe, had been gotten from the American Indians, and was called "running the gauntlet." I hinted to the Captain that the place of honor for him would be at the head of one of the lines ; but he said that he considered his place to be somewhat to one side, that he might the better observe the conduct of his soldiers, and that he would give the places at the head of the lines to a blacksmith and a young farmer who enjoyed local reputation as fighters. I was provided with a stout club, a ten foot pole and mounted on a good horse, while the troopers were at liberty to use the flat of their swords or clubs as they chose. I now drew off fifty yards or so, set spurs to my horse (a willing brute) and galloped toward my antagonists, brandishing club and pole in either hand and shouting at the top of a strong voice the battle-cry that had sounded above the crash of arms at Waterloo. A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 15^ A chain, it has been remarked, is no stronger than its weakest link, and so it fared with the chivalry of Berks on that memorable Fourth. The two warriors at the head of the columns fled from my charge as from Grim Death, and those behind them did the like, jumping their horses out of my way with unlooked-for swiftness as I neared them. After this Homeric exploit the field was mine, and I laughed as I had not since I was a boy at my crest-fallen antagonists and their explanations as to how it had happened. However, the tides of enthusiasm and hard drinking now began to set in so uproariously on every side that I was glad to slip out the back door of a tavern and to measure off" a good ten miles of country road before dark. CHAPTER n. IN A NEW ROLE. CROM scenes of War the transition is easy to those of Love, and so it befell my battle- scarred self. However it was not to be on the field of glory, or when arrayed in the panoply of War, that I was to be pierced by the arrows of Cupid : but amid other surroundings and under very different conditions. When I made my way back to Philadelphia in the autumn I found, not only my former pupils awaiting my return, but a number of new ones. Calling on one of my music pupils on a certain memorable day just before the Christmas holidays, I was introduced to a young lady, a Miss Halter, who wished to take lessons. Not only did this lady show unusual talent, but she likewise showed at all times an amiability of spirit that made her a universal favorite. Time and again it seemed to me that I had seen her face before, but when or where I could not by any effort recall. Her family, I found, were Swiss, though they had emi- grated to America some years before, settling in Philadelphia where the father found a business opening. 154 A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 155 However I could not have met her in her native land, as I had never been in that beautiful coun- try, except a time or two on the hurried errands of War. Her father and mother I seldom saw, as the one was away at business and the other closely occupied with household affairs. Never- theless the time finally came when I was invited to take supper and spend the evening with the family and a few friends, the occasion being the young lady's birthday. The principal dish at supper was a most savory preparation of venison or goat's flesh, which I could remember having eaten only once before and then with a Swiss family at the birthday feast of a beautiful child in a hamlet in the Pass of St. Bernard. I remarked upon this fact, and was astonished and delighted when the young lady of the house answered : " The dish is exactly the same, but, if there were a birthday cake on the table, it would carry twice as many candles to-day as did the one in the old village. Where, Major, is the great sword that my little brother tried to swing about his head, and why are you not in that gorgeous uni- form in honor of my birthday !" Then it was that I understood, as one awakened out of sleep, the resemblance in the young lady's face that had puzzled me, and then, too, I knew 156 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, why at times I had detected her laughing at me behind my back. The choice meal lay long un- tasted then, as her parents told how they had taken the resolve to leave Europe and its fierce storms of War, and had made the long and weari- some journey to the peaceful haven of America. They listened, too, in round-eyed wonder to the strange tale of War and journeyings that I had to tell, and when, late that night, I sought my lodg- ings it was with the most comforting feeling that a bond of union had been given me between the old life that now seemed almost unreal and the one I was living. It is an old story, and yet one of ever-living interest that I have now to tell. The Philadel- phia of that day had streets, not a few, and most of them had some interest of their own, yet one street came to claim place in my thoughts as the only one of real importance. There was a society of no little culture in the city, and to this I had the entree ; yet it came to be that there was but one face that appeared to me in my dreams. In short a new thing had come into my philosO' phy, even that mysterious force or current that men call Love. In the language of the poets I was fast in Cupid's meshes. To view my situation from another point of view, I was convinced of the profound truth and beauty of the old Scripture A ROMANCE OF HISTOR V. 157 that says: "It is not good that the man should be alone." To be perfectly candid, I must admit that it was the poets who received the larger part of my leisure just then. Gentle Spring had come again, and her occult influences lured me on many a balmy afternoon to wander forth to the neighboring woods that I might commune with Nature and with the kindred spirit of the poet. Abundant proof of the fact that I was at last in the toils, I found in the unreasonable yet deep- seated dislike I began to entertain toward a young business man who was a frequent caller at the Halter home. This rival in the field was neither brilliant in intellect nor possessed of much educa- tion, and yet I saw that he was one to be reckoned with. Was he not to the manor born, and had he not all the social and political chat of Philadelphia at his tongue's end ? Then, too, had he not inherited a very lucrative business from his father, together with a pretentious home on Arch street, and was he not himself a rising man in that he was a member of the City Council ? Physically con- sidered, he was a small man, not reaching to the height of my shoulder ; but, nevertheless, I began to fear him as I had never feared Russian, Prus- sian, Austrian or Englishman on the field of battle. When Napoleon went a-wooing it was said of him that he had only his sword and general's hat 158 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, to offer his beloved. I was in still worse plight, for, as a refugee here in peaceful America, I had neither sword nor rank to offer, and could not as much as come and go under my own name with- out risk to my liberty or even to my life. As I thought on my condition and on the generous intentions with which I had entered upon my career as a French patriot and soldier, the feeling of bitterness swept over me like a wave. But this weakness was not for long, and then with the optimism that befits a man and a Christian I began to plan my campaign. I decided (somewhat wisely, I believe) to take neither man nor woman into my confidence, but to hold my council of War strictly with myself One principle of war I had learned from Napoleon, and that is that promptness or aggressiveness is half the battle. "In war," he wrote, "you see your own troubles ; those of the enemy you cannot see. You must show confidence." Accordingly, on recalling this advice, I resolved to act and to act at once, /. ^., within twenty-four hours. I should have preferred another field of action to the one on which I knew my happiness must be put to the question. A man of my stature makes a much bet- ;;er appearance on horseback or even walking than when seated in a low parlor chair ; but your true general takes the field as he finds it and adapts his strategy to its peculiar features. A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 159 In European society good usage demands that the consent of the parents be secured before the daughter be addressed ; but here I was determined to stand on my rights as an American citizen. So it was that I advanced to the attack at a carefully chosen hour of the afternoon, marching up to the house and asking for Miss Halter. Many is the grand lady of court circles with whom I have conversed with unperturbed spirit ; but, when this young lady of the people en- tered the room, such was my perturbation that I fairly stammered as I greeted her. As is often the case in War, I found it expedient to resort to a feint to withdraw attention from my real purpose, and so I began to speak very earnestly about a coming musical festival. By the time this matter had been somewhat fully discussed I had regained my equanimity and was ready to face the real issue. The all-decisive moment was brought on by me by stating to Miss Halter that I was in deep trouble. At this statement she showed great sympathy and asked if it were any matter that her father or herself could remedy. I told her that she alone of all people could help me, whereupon she blushed so deeply and seemed so touched that I took courage and spoke my heart. In the confi- dences that followed she made the comforting con- fession that, after seeing and recognizing me on 160 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, the street shortly after my arrival in Philadelphia, the other men of her acquaintance had one and all shrunk into insignificance. She admitted, too, that she had then formed the maidenly resolve to keep me in sight for the future. When all was happily settled between us, we sought her parents and I, assuming a confidence I was far from feeling, asked their consent to my suit. Somewhat to my surprise, this was readily granted, and then began the happy days of our engagement and the delightful labor of planning and working for the new home. For the information of any who may be aspiring to such honors, I would say here that it was upon becoming engaged that I first learned the full meaning of the word Responsibility. My greatest satisfaction in those days I found in the good stand- ing I had been able to gain in the short time of my residence in America, or, to put the matter differ- ently, in the extent and quality of my circle of acquaintances. The fact, too, that there was a small balance to my credit in one of the banks helped me not a little to peace of mind at this crisis. Hitherto I had been somewhat indiflferent as to the number of my pupils, but I now resolved to pass no one by who desired my instruction and had the wherewithal to pay for it. My day-dream, however, was to get away from city life and its A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 161 petty vexations for one in my position to the inde- pendent life on the farm. Then, too, a man of my frame and muscle seemed better suited to a life of vigorous exercise than to adapting himself as a teacher of music and the languages to the whims of the fine ladies or light-headed youth of the New- World city. However, until I could gather means to purchase even a small farm near my prospective wife's home, I must be content with the conditions of my lot in the city. Philadelphia, toward the end of the second decade of the Nineteenth Century, was not a dull place of residence even for a man who had seen as much of the world as myself. Until comparatively a few years before it had been the capital city of the United States, and as such had sheltered some able men and courtly ladies. There was to be found in the place some really select society and much that was substantial, together with not a little of the dangerous element. This last, it must be admitted, was, for the most part, of my adopted nationality, the French. Political emigrants these were, of the most widely dilBferent classes and creeds. Taken together, they formed an uneasy generation, the most of them being of the red revolutionary and infidel stripe and of a most bitter spirit. I need hardly say that I did not seek the society of these people, but neither did n 162 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, I shun them. I had never feared these fire-brands in their own land, and I feared them even less here in free America. Whenever I was thrown together with these malcontents and heard them making their attacks upon either the ordinances of God or the institutions of the Republic, I made it my duty and pleasure to remind them of the pit whence they were digged and to explain to the company something about the days of the Terror and the bands of Marat. The accuracy of my statements was never questioned by a Frenchman, and while hot anger sometimes was kindled, no challenges to the duel ever followed. Life, I find, is very much a series of compen- sations, and to offset the unpleasantness of con- troversy with infidel and revolutionist, there was the ever-increasing good will of those who re- spected religion and government. I made enemies here and there, it is true ; but they were such as I never should have chosen for my friends, and for everyone of them I gained at least two friends among the best people. There were some men of scientific culture in Philadelphia in those days and some, too, who had made a name for themselves in the service of the State. I had my acquaintances and even friends among these ; but my intimates came to be the German pastors of the city, who were scholars A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 163 from the European universities, as well as earnest preachers and energetic American pastors. My cherished University days seemed to come back to me, as now and again I spent an evening dis- cussing with these broad-minded men the pro- found truths of Theology and the great lessons of History. Life most certainly is a thing of change, and as I sat in the great congregation that Lord's Day after Lord's Day filled the spa- cious Zion's German Lutheran Church, or walked the quiet streets with my betrothed, perhaps to attend some concert, I would sometimes ask my- self : Is this the same man, who for twenty-two years was driven from end to end of the Con- tinent of Europe by the fierce storms of War? That summer and the next I spent in the country ; but with a different purpose from my former one of merely working my way, while I explored a new land. Now I felt that something must be earned during the summer months, while I was seeking a location and learning the science of crops, and cattle, and the other mysteries of farming. In the early spring a message came to me from Europe that gave me great pleasure. It was an invitation from my old comrade in arms. Mar- shal Bernadotte, who had been made King of Sweden, to take command of the Swedish cavalry. 164 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, This offer was at once recognition of the service I had rendered in my military career, and an opportunity to return to the place and rank I had lost and, indeed, to something considerably higher. The post of commander of the cavalry of a nation like Sweden, offered a very different prospect from anything that my teaching or work on the farm could ever promise. And yet you will be astonished to hear that I declined this kind offer with my best thanks to my old friend. My reason for this seemingly foolish decision was simply and solely this — I felt that, after the experiences I had passed through, I should be sinning against the light that had been given me, were I to turn again to the calling of War. Being under this conviction, I did the only thing that a conscientious man could do, and declined the honor. The offer itself, however, was worth much to me. In the first place, it gave me new courage to know that I was still remembered and appreciated by those who knew me best. Then I took an honest pride in showing the letter to a very few esteemed friends, and to one or two purse-proud nobodies who had at times shown a condescending spirit toward me. The sight of the signature of a king and of a royal seal had a remarkable effect on these snobs and worked a transformation in their bear- ing toward me that was laughable. A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 165 At last the right time seemed to have come, and in the year 1819 I was married, the venerable Pastor Helmuth officiating. As I stood beside my bride, after the ceremony, receiving the congratu- lations of a regiment of friends, I realized most fully that for me the new life under these Western skies had fairly begun. CHAPTER III. IfROM THE FARM TO THE CAPITAL. "P IN ALLY the hoped-for opportunity came to leave the drudgery that made up much of my teaching, and to buy a good farm on easy terms. It was located near Reading, Pa., not far from the scene of my famous cavalry charge. I caught at the opportunity, and made no mistake in so doing. The Berks County farmers, while not up to Ney's requirements as cavalrymen, I found skilful in their own business and, not only honest, but also kindly disposed as neighbors. The few years I spent in that neighborhood passed away very quickly and pleasantly, bringing me rest of spirit after the continuous changes of almost thirty years, and also the leisure needed to adjust myself to the changed conditions of my life. An ancient proverb warns us that the bow that is always bent loses its elasticity, and these few years of simple farm life meant more to me than I real- ized at the time. Here my sons Lewis and John were born, and here I could have lived on content- edly as a farmer, had it not been for arguments of my friends. A few particular friends, made in the new home, and a number living in Philadelphia, 166 A ROMANCE OF H J STORY. 167 finally persuaded me that I owed it to myself, to my family and to my adopted country to put my education and experience to some greater use than I could make of it on the farm. Then, too, my wife's home was in Philadelphia, and in those days, except when the roads were at their best, from Reading to Philadelphia was something of a journey. This move from the quiet plenty of country life back to the distractions and uncertainties of the city seemed at the time a piece of very doubtful wisdom. Indeed, in the council of the sages that was wont to gather at our little cross roads store, just out from Reading, there were grave shakings of the head over the folly of a man who could return to the city, having once escaped its perils. Our country pastor went so far as to refer to the man of old who pitched his tent toward Sodom ; but, in the face of all these warnings, I sold the farm, loaded up my wife and babies and made the journey to Philadelphia. Here I resumed with a few of my former pupils in Music and the lan- guages, but was soon able to take up work more to my liking. As something of my military career had come to be known to my circle of friends and acquaint- ances, requests began to be made that I should give instruction in fencing. This exercise brought 168 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, a pleasant variety into my daily routine, especially as I possessed a high degree of skill with the sword. Every strong or skillful man is apt to find out sooner or later that there is at least one stronger or more skillful than himself. There were doubtless many better swordsmen than myself in the great armies of Europe; but, as a matter of fact, I never encountered them, weapon in hand. In connection with these lessons I soon began to give instruction in military science and tactics to some army officers and to a few others who were ambitious of going into the army. Among my pupils I may name two who attained distinction, General Worth and Major Ringgold of Mexican War fame. I counted not a few other military men among my friends, but most of these I came to know after removing to Washington. One of these. General Samuel Houston, some years after- wards ofifered me the command of the forces of Texas, then engaged in their struggle for freedom from the yoke of Mexico. I held the belief that the Texan cause was a just one, and also had con- fidence that it would come out victorious ; yet these considerations failed to move me to turn again to the profession of arms. If the wise man is he who knows when he has had enough of a thing, then I had wisdom like unto that of Solomon. A ROMANCE OP HISTORY. 109 Thus it was that I was once more settled in Philadelphia when Lafayette made his last visit to America. This event was to be one of the turn- ing points in my life, though I little realized on hearing of the expected visit of my venerable friend what the consequences would be to me. But before telling of what this visit of the great Frenchman meant to me personally, it would seem fitting to give a brief sketch of a life so truly noble. This man can truthfully be said to have lived for the cause of Humanity. As a mere youth he left home, family and a loved bride to venture his fortune and his life to aid a people living thou- sands of miles distant in the desperate struggle for their liberty. This hero of modern times was born in the Province of Auvergne, France, Sep- tember 6th, 1757, and accordingly was only nineteen years of age when he left his princely home to cast his lot with the American army in its darkest hour. Just at that time Burgoyne seemed to be carrying all before him, and General Howe, with an army much stronger than Washington's, held New York and was pushing on to capture Philadelphia. It was in this gloomy hour that Lafayette came, as though sent of God, to cheer the discouraged patriots with his presence and aid. His career in the American army was a most 170 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, honorable one. Landing in January, 1777, at Charleston, he at once joined the army as a vol- unteer, serving as such until the end of July, when he was commissioned by Congress as a Major General. Less than two months later he took part in the Battle of the Brandywine, taking his stand where the fighting was the hottest and refusing to be taken from the field when wounded. In 1779 he returned to France for a short visit and put forth every effort to gain for the American cause the favor and assistance of the French nation. He was successful in this effort and had the joy of returning to America the next year with large re-inforcements. In 178 1 he saw some hard service in Virginia and finally had the pleasure of aiding in the capture of the boastful British commander, Lord Cornwallis. This true nobleman had given most freely ot his wealth, of his services under the hardest con- ditions of cold, hunger and nakedness, and of his own blood to the sacred cause of Liberty; but, in the New World, at least, his labors and sacri- fices were appreciated. Wherever he journeyed in the newly-liberated States he was made to feel that he was the guest of honor of a grateful nation, and after he had returned to his home, American gratitude followed him in many grace- ful tributes. A ROMANCE OF HISTOR V. 171 Very different was the experience he was des- tined to undergo a few years later on European soil. At first here, too, success and personal recognition attended his efforts to further the mighty cause of Humanity. At his own expense he made an experiment toward the emancipation of the negroes. He espoused the interests of the oppressed Protestants, and was strong enough to carry in the National Assembly of 1787 a reso- lution favoring their civil rights. He attempted further to carry through a reform calling for the suppression of the infamous lettres de cachet^ and approved of the demolition of the Bastile. In the days of storm and bloodshed that now came upon France, lyafayette showed himself at all times the patriot, and never the partisan. He could and did consistently propose "A declaration of Rights'' and declare "that insurrection against despotism was the most sacred of duties," while protecting the royal family from the fury of the mob. By following this course of independence and true patriotism Lafayette won the approval of his own conscience and the respect of all right-think- ing men ; but he did not please either of the great factions of France, and it was only a question of time until he should be crushed between the upper millstone of revolutionary rage and the nether one of royalist revenge. The lot of the 172 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, conscientious man is truly one of persecution, as was most clearly shown here. Though raised to the honor of being Commander in Chief of the National Guards of France and decorated with the red ribbon of a Marshal, Lafayette had only to protest against indignities offered the King to bring down a decree of accusation upon his own head and to be forsaken by his troops. Realizing the situation, he, accompanied by a dozen or so of personal friends, fled from France in the hope of finding an asylum in some foreign land until better days should open the way for a return to his loved native land. But those days of mob fury and of despotic wrath were indeed evil days for men of principle, and our patriot, driven from his country by the revolutionists, was at once arrested by the royal- ists and held by them for years in the close confinement of a prison. The courts of Berlin and Vienna were both implicated in this unjust and inhuman act, and the noble Frenchman and a few of his friends were made to suffer the rigors of solitary confinement in dungeons in Wesel, Magdeburg, Glatz and Olmutz. The captives were told that henceforth they should see noth- ing but the walls of their cells ; that they could expect no information concerning persons or events ; that the mention of their names even A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 173 by their jailors had been prohibited, and that for the future they were to be known only by num- bers. Under such barbarous treatment as this Lafayette's health began to give way for the second time during his imprisonment, and to save his life, some exercise had to be allowed him. On certain days he was taken out for a drive in an open carriage with an ofl&cer by his side and two soldiers standing behind. These stated drives gave Lafayette's friends an opportunity to plan his rescue. Only two took personal part in the attempt, Doctor Bollman, a young German employed for this purpose, and a Mr. Huger, an American travelling in Germany, who volunteered his assistance. Through the military surgeon Dr. Bollman sent Lafayette a pamphlet and a note, the latter being written for the most part in sympathetic ink, invisible unless exposed to the heat. The few lines written with common ink ended with these words : " I am glad of the opportunity of addressing you these few words, which, when read with your usual warmth^ will afford to a heart like yours some consolation." Lafayette took the hint, read the letter and care- fully planned the manner of his escape. As he wrote his friends on the margins of the pamphlet in lemon juice, the rescue could best be eJSfected by overpowering the guard who accompanied him on 174 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, his drives. The two conspirators thought it best to make the attempt alone, and accordingly fol- lowed the carriage on horseback until the right moment seemed to have come. After proceeding several miles the carriage turned into an open plain, and presently Lafayette and the officer stepped out and walked, the guard in the carriage driving slowly on ahead. Just then the two friends galloped up and dismounted, Mr. Huger holding the horses while the doctor hurried to the assist- ance of Lafayette, who meantime had grappled with the officer. The latter was disarmed, but thereupon he seized the Marquis and set up a tre- mendous outcry. The guard, hearing the cries and seeing the struggle, promptly ran away. The offi- cer's mouth was then stopped with a handkerchief, and all would have been well, had not one of the horses taken fright at the unearthly bellowing of the man and slipped his bridle and run offi The doctor then handed his purse to the Marquis and told him to take the horse that was left and make the best of his way to the frontier. This Lafayette did, riding off at his horse's best speed. The res- cuers now recovered their other horse from a countryman who caught him, but, finding that he would not carry double, Mr. Huger told the doctor to follow Lafayette, while he took his chances on foot across the country. He was soon arrested, as A ROMANCE OF HISTOR V. 175 was the doctor a day later, and they were given eight months in prison in which to reflect on their kindly attempt. Lafayette mistook the road and was arrested within a few miles of the frontier and taken back to his prison. Here about a year later he was joined by his wife and two daughters. These devoted ladies shared the hardships of his imprisonment for two years, suffering greatly in health from the impure air of the prison. Finally, in September, 1797, the strong hand of Napoleon opened the door of Lafayette's dungeon and they made their journey to Hamburg. Madame Lafayette was allowed to return to France at once and the Marquis two years later. Napoleon now offered inducements to win our patriot for his party ; but these offers Lafayette steadfastly refused, voting against the consulship for life and raising his voice whenever possible for the liberties of France. During the years of Napo- leon's ascendancy Lafayette lived in retirement upon his estate, though never forgetful of his coun- try's welfare. On the approach of the Allies he offered himself as a candidate and was elected to the House of Deputies and was made Vice-President. After the battle of Waterloo, when the desperate Napoleon was about to usurp all power, Lafayette appeared at the tribune, and held aloft the old tri- Qplpred flag 0/ France, exclaiming : " Liberty, 176 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, Equality and Public Order." He succeeded in having the session of the Legislature declared per- manent, and insisted on the abdication of Napo- leon. From this time on our French Washington had been living a quiet, happy life with his family, until in his sixty-seventh year the desire possessed him to visit once more the land across the ocean for which he had ventured so much. The Amer- ican Congress, learning of this purpose, hastened to offer a man-of-war for his voyage, but this was respectfully declined, the aged patriot preferring to come without ostentation in a private vessel. To me personally this last American tour of La- fayette can best be described as a God-send. Some friends in power, learning of my acquaintance with the French patriot, had me appointed to lead a mounted escort, a sort of Foreign Legion, made up of some of my own countrymen and others. So it happened that I came face to face with the Marquis as we rode past the reviewing stand, and that he recognized me and, in his warm-hearted way, em- braced me as his cherished friend there before all the great crowd. He also spent a night as my guest, and sweet indeed was our communion of spirit as we lived over the events and experiences through which we had been called to pass. My esteemed friend urged me to resume my full A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 177 name, making the point that if any of the Napo- leonic dynasty were to come to the throne, my claim for recognition would be invalidated by the fact that I had been living under another name. He also insisted that I should accept as a mark of his esteem a gift of one thousand dollars. This I finally consented to do, setting the money aside as a fund toward the purchase of a home when the right opportunity should oflfer. The public recog- nition that Lafayette had given me helped my standing in official circles, bringing me a good position and causing my counsel in military ques- tions to be greatly in demand. The lesson of this most pleasant experience in my checkered career seems to be this. Great is the blessing that a true friend brings with him ! Aim to make and keep friends for Friendship's own sweet sake (for otherwise you have not friends at all, but only business acquaintances), and in your hour of need you will not stand alone. Read Cicero and Bacon on "Friendship ;" also the Book of Proverbs, and apply their advice and admon- itions to yourself and you will at once broaden your field of human interests and prosper. At the persuasion of my honored friend, Lafayette, and on his assurance that a good government position would be given me when I should present myself to the proper authorities in Washington, I 12 178 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, now removed to the world-capital of the Future. At first it seemed evident to me and doubly clear to my good wife that we had made a great mistake in leaving comfortable old Philadelphia for the raw young town of Washington ; but the result proved that the unseen hand led us even in this matter. It must be granted that the contrast between the capital of the New World and Paris, for years the capital city of Europe, was a most striking one. The Paris of Napoleon was splendid in some places and squalid in others with the inherited misery of the centuries ; but the Paris of to-day, new created by the skill of the engineer and the expenditure of many millions, is the very epitome of the splendor of this world. I could not but be impressed by the greatly inferior appearance of Washington, having but a few buildings worthy of a nation's capital, and with great stretches of waste territory and even of unpaved streets. Yet, even in the midst of the unfavorable first impression, I could see the promise of great beauty and dignity in the days to come. This was to be seen first of all in the broad conception and scope of the city's plan. Here was abundant room for the harmonious grouping of the great buildings that would in time be necessary for the adminis- tration of the nation's affairs, room too for beauti- A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 179 ful parks and stately avenues and finally for the generous spaces that are essential to dignity. And by what process would this city become in time the city beautiful ? Not by the spoil of other nations, but by the freely rendered tribute of a great people ; yes, the greatest' of peoples when the years should bring growth. Among the things that I saw and learned during my life in Washington, there are several that should be named. First, I saw clearly that the true power and beauty of Democracy was to be found here in America as in no other land or previous age. That, though only half-grown as yet, here was the Republic of all time, to truly serve which was nobler than to be a king, and to die for which would be to die for Humanity. Greater by far than the contrast between the civi- lization of the Old World and that of the New was the contrast between the virile, though for the most part uncultured, men who came as Rep- resentatives to Washington, and the excitable and sometimes vainglorious Deputies of the French Chamber. You ask, what was my own life or occupation while in the Capital ? It may be described as a development of that which I had for some years been leading. A government position assured me of a modest living, and left me much leisure for 180 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, other pursuits. At this time I tried my hand at authorship, writing a "Life of Napoleon Bona- parte, by an American Citizen," which, how- ever, I did not publish until some years later. I may as well confess that this venture was a failure, at least, comparatively speaking. This may have been because of the lack of a well- known name on the title page, it may have been because of the incompetence of my publishers, or it may have been because I failed to touch a popular chord. Many and pleasant were the acquaintances I formed during these years with representative public men. Though I say it myself, my own bearing could not but show something of the culture in the midst of which I had grown up, and also something of the twenty-two years crowded with experiences of camp, battle-field and court. Among those whom I may name as my friends were General Houston, already named ; General Cass, whom I may call my patron in official cir- cles, and Henry Clay, the American statesman. This last named gentleman I was to meet again in the West, for in 1842 he came to my later home in Henry County, Indiana, and spoke at Knightstown. On this occasion I had the pleasure of being chairman of the reception committee and of introducing my old friend to my neighbors, CHAPTER IV. WESTWARD HO. 'T'HE good word that Marquis de Lafayette had spoken on my behalf at Washington brought me a comfortable government position which relieved me of the necessity of teaching. In the mixed society of Philadelphia there were those of truly noble spirit whose lives had been lacking in opportunities for culture, and to instruct these in the languages and literature of our age was a real pleasure. Unfortunately, however, there were others who were nothing more than rich upstarts, and my circumstances had made it necessary for me to teach these also, much as my independent spirit rebelled against the task. This labor, pleasant or distasteful, was now at an end, as my recognized knowledge of the usage of the courts of Europe and also of military matters entitled me to a position that carried with it a good salary. The Marquis' son, George Washington Lafay- ette, who had been an intimate friend of mine in France, persuaded me to take up the pen and prepare a lecture on Napoleon Bonaparte and his career. I did this and for the second time had the 181 182 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, pleasant experience of knowing what it means to have a friend in power, for the prestige of the name of Lafayette enabled me to deliver my lecture to large and influential audiences in the Eastern cities. To my astonishment the financial results of these two lectures amounted to $1,400, and this sum, together with the gift Lafayette had forced upon me, I resolved to keep untouched until it could be used to advantage for the pur- chase of a home for my dear wife and little ones. I might as well confess just here that my finan- cial management in the past had not been bril- liant. To exercise an open-handed hospitality and to relieve the wants of the stranger, especially if he happened to be a fellow-countryman or an old comrade in arms, seemed to me to be one of the greatest pleasures of life, besides being the only right course. My good wife held different views on this question of hospitality, and at times reminded me of the duty of providing first of all for one's own household. Some years passed very pleasantly in this life at the Capital ; but then I grew to tire of it exceed- ingly, and to picture to myself the sweet freedom of the frontiersman, as it had been pictured to me by friends like General Houston. By the year 1833 ^Y longings had taken definite shape, and the word with us was Westward Ho ! A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 183 For some time I considered the usual route to the West, viz. : by team to Pittsburg, and then by boat down the Ohio to some convenient location. Finally I decided against this route, and chose, on grounds of greater comfort and privacy for my family, to make the whole journey overland by a more northern route. Leaving Washington in the Spring, we trav- elled by stage to Lancaster, Pa. Here I had a reliable German wagon builder make me a home on wheels that would carry us without mishap and with all possible comfort over the rough roads and through the streams that might be found between the cozy little Pennsylvania city and our new home in the distant West. Built into the wagon, in a place known only to the builder, myself and my wife, was a receptacle for our family treasure (which was in gold) and for a few papers that I valued above gold. Two good strong horses, a milk cow and a trusty dog made up the caravan with which I, a Nineteenth Century patriarch, journeyed toward my land of promise. Starting from Lancaster, we made our way to the Susquehanna River, then on up the Valley of the Juniata to a point near its head-waters in the Allegheny Mountains. For the sake of wife and little ones I made the journey by very easy stages, camping here and there to rest and fish. Our feel- 184 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, ing during the whole journey was one of perfect security, for was not the God of the fathers looking down upon us from heaven, and did not my rifle, sword and pistols hang within reach in the wagon ? The mountain summit crossed, we followed the Conemaugh, the Kiskiminetas and the Allegheny rivers to Pittsburg. We spent a few days in this city and then on westward, following as much as possible the river valleys. Fall came on somewhat early that year, so, remembering the retreat from Moscow, I thought it best to put up for the Winter in a small city in Ohio. By so doing the change from life in Washington to that on a frontier farm was made less abrupt. Our canvass wagon roof had become very home-like during those long sum- mer days along the rivers and on the mountain slopes ; but, when the winter winds blew their icy breath over the land and the streams froze hard, we thanked God for the walls that shut out the cold and for the tight roof of shingles overhead. As the teaching of Music and the languages had become an old story with me, I had no diflficulty in supporting myself and family in comfort until Spring. When the gentle voices of Spring began to be heard in field and forest (and when the mud had dried up enough to make the roads passable), we entered our wagon-home and resumed our jour- ney westward. A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 185 In Rush County, in Central Indiana, we came to a fertile and attractive region that pleased me greatly, and so I decided our long journey should end. Some government land was still to be had and considerable other still in forest at very low figures ; but, as my wife was hardly rugged enough to endure the privations of real frontier life, and, as all but one of the children were as yet too small to help in any hard labor, I thought it best to buy a good farm that was provided with buildings and partly improved. So farm life began, and from its first day I real- ized that here at last was the life of independence of which I had so often dreamed while waiting the convenience of some rich upstart of a pupil. As I trod the fertile acres or explored the woodland or planned orchard and garden, I felt not only the joy of ownership, but even more — a deep-seated sense of having reached the primeval life for which man was created. Here I was, a travel-worn Adam, at last settled in my Paradise, and, to add to my happiness, my family down to the baby seemed to enjoy with me the delight of getting back to Nature. Adam had the work of naming the animals ; but I had first to buy mine and then to name them. I need hardly say that in those pioneer days the cattle were of mixed and peculiar breeds, some of them being half wild and better 186 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, suited for the menagerie than for the farm. On making this discovery, I found a certain consola- tion in naming my stock after certain members of Napoleon's family and court. One especially vicious ox I still remember as bearing the appro- priate name of Talleyrand. One kind of War there was still to be waged even in this peaceful Western land — that against the bears, wolves and other wild beasts that occa- sionally ravaged our flocks. To take the rifle or hunting knife against these, or in pursuit of the deer, whose flesh one needed to help out the win- ter's food supply, I considered legitimate war, and the only kind one is justified in beginning. When the leaves had fallen in Autumn, or even in the sharp cold of Winter, I used to enjoy taking the field alone, or with a little company of neighbors, to make good use of the art of War by tracking some destructive beast to his lair, and then, per- haps, finishing him in fair combat, i. e.^ the man with his knife against the beast with his weapons of tooth and claw. Besides this occasional warfare against the wild beast, there was another kind of warfare, that I may call moral warfare, which I soon found to be necessary against the forces of Ignorance and Evil. Among the laborious pioneers there were to A ROMANCE Of HISTORY. 187 be found here and there, and especially in the southern part of the State near the Ohio river, those representing an entirely different element — that of the outlaw and the criminal. Drinking, thieving, especially of cattle and horses ; and fighting, both with the fists and with knife or gun, were the favorite pastimes of these ruffians. Numerically they formed only a small part of the population, but their evil influence was far- reaching. From my first settlement in the West, I recognized the presence of this bad element and saw the necessity of taking a stand against it. This I did, letting my trumpet of warning give no uncertain sound. While the first source of the evil lives of this element was undoubtedly an evil heart ; yet there was another factor that could almost always be found at work inciting them to their various deeds of brutishness and other wickedness, and that was liquor, generally in the form of whisky. The Temperance cause was certainly a worthy one under such conditions, and it had its faith- ful advocates. I promptly enrolled myself among these, and, though I say it myself, I was fairly well qualified to speak on the subject, having been a strictly temperate man, even through my long and most severe military experience, and having seen many a promising life ruined by 188 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS drink. There were difficulties and dangers in our crusade for Temperance that made it a real warfare. We found not only the vicious element, but generally also the well-meaning majority against us, at least in sentiment. Public meet- ings held for our cause were often disturbed and sometimes broken up by acts of rowdyism. Such cases called for heroic treatment, and a time or two when the sons of Belial went so far as to throw rocks through the windows, I made as many of them as lingered within reach feel some- thing of the horrors of War by performing on their anatomies with a cane that was at once pliable and heavy. Some of the rowdies would get hurt in these arguments and threaten me with the law or with private vengeance ; but I was none the worse for their cursing, and a sec- ond meeting in behalf of Temperance was always well attended in neighborhoods where the ques- tion had been thus put to the argument. I might add that at times, by other argument and appeal than that of the club, not a few were led to entertain new views and practices in the matter of Temperance. In this connection I may mention an amusing incident that occurred somewhat later in a town in Kentucky where I happened to be for a day or two. There was a drunken brawl in progress A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 189 on the street, and as quite a number were involved in it, the people with whom I was speaking began to be alarmed. I remarked just then that a few hussars would soon quiet them. My remark was caught up by some by-stander, and the word hussar construed to mean the men of the State of Indiana (from which I had just come), and thus the word "Hoosier" came into existence. Such is the irony of Fate ! Learned men have labored long to introduce some favored word of the most approved classic derivation, and as a rule they have failed. Here a chance word of mine, miscalled by an ignorant loafer, catches the popular fancy and passes into lyit- erature. There was one affair in which I became involved in those days, that might be of interest, because of its unusual features. A Frenchman, a muscular fellow of some military experience and skill, came drifting across my track, and learning something of my record, challenged me to a fencing contest. I had laid aside my mili- tary character for good and all, I hoped, and I refused to have anything to do with the man until I found that, because of his boasts and insinuations, my standing in the neighborhood was beginning to suflfer. Then I agreed to meet him when and where he pleased. Fencing swords 190 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, were not to be had in that country, so hickory imitations were used. The place of combat was a room about thirty feet by sixty in size, and it was well filled with admiring spectators. At first I let the fellow think that the day was his, for, merely parrying his strokes, I retreated slowly toward one end of the room. My antagonist thereupon lifted up his voice in triumph: "Why don't you advance? Why don't you advance?'' "Protect your right wrist," I said; but a sneer of contempt was his only answer, and I fetched him a blow that shattered his wrist. A strange thing is the vanity of man, and this was a notable example. No sooner was that Frenchman's wrist healed than he challenged me to a second contest, declaring that I could not cripple him again. As the fellow insisted until he wearied me, I consented to meet him the second time, and gave him a repetition of his first lesson. I could have ended my days in fullest content in the simple, quiet life of the farm ; but so it was not to be, for tlie call of Humanity sounded in my ears bidding me use for its aid the talents the Lord had given me. The first call of this kind was to the practice of Medicine. Physicians were scarce in those days in the newly-settled districts, and yet there was the need for their skill, as the A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 191 privations and exposure of pioneer life often brought on attacks of illness and accidents could happen on the frontier just about as often as else- where. So it came about that I was called upon as a man of education to advise and aid, and thus I was constrained to call to mind what I had seen in boyhood days of my father's treatment of dis_ ease or to put into service something of the rude surgery of the battle-field. So often was I called upon either as physician or surgeon that I came to be known as "the Polish Doctor." A very fair degree of success attended my efiforts ; yet I did not become wealthy through the practice of Medi- cine, in fact I was satisfied if my outlay for drugs, etc., came back to me. There were several rea- sons for this state of affairs, the principal one of which was that I rendered no bills and in cases of distress refused payment when offered me. Then too there were a certain people who took my services as a matter of course, forgetting to do as much as to thank me. Snch treatment I took very philosophically, feeling repaid for my labor, provided only that I could prolong some life that was necessary to a family's welfare, and especially if I could save the lives of the helpless and trusting little children. At times already in those first years in the West I preached to my neighbors, for I realized that 192 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, any such moral reform as Temperance, to be com- plete and permanent, must be grounded in the understanding of the great spiritual truths of repentance for sin and faith in the Lord Jesus. I felt the more justified in this work of the min- istry from the fact that before starting for the West, I had a kind of instinctive or prophetic feeling of what the spiritual necessities of the case would be, and had myself licensed by one of the Lutheran synods to preach the gospel. What is more, the church in which I did my first preaching I built myself with the aid of a few God-fearing neighbors, the last of the gold pieces I brought with me from Washington being dedicated to the most worthy cause of paying for the materials and furniture for this modest sanc- tuary. When this tabernacle was finished and set apart to the use of the Most High, I was a happy man indeed, realizing in my very heart that the God of the fathers who had upheld me through so many perils was now with me and my loved ones as never before. CHAPTER V. NATION BUII.DING. 'T^O one who had been associated in any way with the attempted reconstruction of French gov- ernment and society there could not but be a constant pleasure in the political and social devel- opment of this young and free nation. There was no rubbish or wreckage of Mediaevalism in worn- out forms of Monarchy, Aristocracy and Prelacy to be cleared away here. There were no fires of hatred, smouldering for generations, to burst out here in sudden fury and flame, sweeping the results of much honest and patient labor into ruin. Everything here was in primeval newness and freshness, the earth itself being as yet unsubdued by the hand of man, and society as yet unformed, awaiting the hand of the statesman and the edu- cator. This former work, viz., the subduing of the earth, the felling of the forests, the draining of the low lands, the making of roads, and, in general, providing the necessaries of life, could be trusted to take care of itself ; for here the mighty power of Self-interest was in operation. As for the latter work, the true society-building 13 193 194 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, or nation-building, here a wise and helping hand was needed. Without such a guiding hand there was nothing to be expected but the natural drift of things, or the fruits of the natural spirit of man. In Revolutionary France this fruitage was of a variety at which the civilized world shud- dered ; here in the backwoods this same root and stock ran to all manner of crudeness and even brutishness, as to the dog-fight or drinking bout, rather than to the things and influences that ennoble life. My part in changing this drift toward evil and in bringing in the influences that uplift was no small one; but, before going on to tell of my efforts in this direction, it might be well to say a few words about my personal or family life. As I have already said, it was my privilege to relieve some suffering and to save a few lives by the time and labor I gave to the practice of Medi- cine. In this labor of love I was enabled to save others, but my own I could not save, and my dear wife and two of the little ones were taken from me by the hand of Death. This bereavement led very soon to the breaking up of my home and then to my removal to the southern part of the State. In the course of the years that followed I made my home in Corydon, then once more in Rush County, in Knightstown, in Hamburg, A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 195 and now in Sellersburg. There were temporary sojourns in several other places and much travel- ing ; but of this I need not now speak. What was the special service, you ask, that I now turned to on behalf of the great family of man? In the first place it was not politics. There is seldom or ever any lack, I have observed, of those who are willing to serve their country by holding office. I sought no preferment, and felt that, as conditions were, I could do more good in other directions to which but few considered them- selves called. The honor of introducing my esteemed friend, Henry Clay, to the people of Knightstown was accorded me ; but as an offset to this I was assailed in another part of the State as an imposter. This report was started by a wandering Pole who came into the neighborhood of my home in Clark County. I at once demanded an investigation, and my fellow citizens promptly took the matter in hand and appointed a com- mittee, summoning my accuser to appear and present his proofs. He could prove nothing, his sole argument being that I did not speak the Polish language as he did. A public meeting was then held. Dr. Mitchell, a State Senator presiding, and the fellow was publicly reprimanded. I might say just here that my name and services under Napoleon are mentioned in the book " Memoires 196 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS. des Braves ; " but, when all is said, what is a little, passing worldly fame ? The work of my life in which I take genuine satisfaction is that which I was led and strength- ened to do for the up-lifting of my fellow men. I have already referred to my efforts on behalf of Temperance, and I shall speak later of the work I was enabled to do in the gospel ministry. Just now I shall say a few words about my efforts for the causes of Education and Philanthropy. One of the greatest needs of the people of that Western region was for educational institutions, and espe- cially for such in which a future ministry could be trained. I realized this fact to the extent of giving of my own means the money for the build- ing of a brick academy, twenty-four by fifty feet in size, at Corydon, Ind., and employing a qualified man as principal. I also attempted the establish- ment of a college at Hillsboro, 111., acted for some time as its Financial Agent, and out of my own means purchased a respectable library for it. How- ever this effort was a failure, as my means were limited, and I was practically the only one who took a living interest in the prospective college. There were some to whom the cause was pre- sented whose means greatly exceeded mine, and others who out of love for their church should have labored early and late for the founding of a A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 197 college. The reason these people did nothing at all, even when urged to help, I can find only in the ignorant and selfish prejudice of the one class against a liberal education and in the indifference and jealousy of the others. The thought of the changed conditions that would have been brought about in the lives of thousands by the establish- ment at that time of a stronghold of Christian education is a picture upon which I do not like to look. But let the Past bury its own dead ! My labors for Philanthropy were given to the development of the Immigrants' Friend's Society, an organization having its headquarters in Cincin- nati, but whose helpful activities reached into a number of States. No one who had ever looked thoughtfully on the great human tide flowing into the new and fertile regions bordering the Ohio, the Mississippi and Missouri rivers could doubt the need of some such an organization. Among the thousands of immigrants cases of destitution or of other misfortune were constantly occurring where the gift or loan of a very small sum at the critical moment would often relieve the distress and save a family from falling helplessly into the wretched- ness of pauperism. Then, again, it was not so much money that was needed as advice and encour- agement to some laborious man who, because of his ignorance of the laws and fear of the courts, 198 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, was in danger of being robbed of his hard-earned little property by the human sharks whose occupa- tion it was to prey on the unwary and the helpless. You would be surprised to know upon what a foundation, stained with tears and blood, some of the large fortunes of these States rest. Extortion and robbery, carried on just within the limits of the law by heartless men, have resulted in some big fortunes in these Western regions, just as, I am told, the fortunes of some families prominent in the society of Eastern cities had their origin in the Slave Trade or in the manufacture or sale of liquor. By giving some little aid, and yet oftener by tak- ing up the role of advocate before the court, I have been able to snatch many an honest man or his hard-won home from the very jaws of these land sharks. I am free to confess that I found a certain pleasure in thwarting these beasts of prey and in holding them up to the scorn of honest men. This labor I considered that of the true knight errant, and it is a career that in some modified form can be followed wherever men are found. Whence, you ask, did I get the means needed to carry on this work for Humanity ? Some of the money came from the East and some from the West, some from the cities and some from the country, some from the rich and some from the poor, for the I^ord raises up friends for His work in A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 199 the most unexpected places. A large part, how- ever, of what I used I earned myself, for my expe- rience was that in the same time and with the same labor I could earn more money than I could collect even for the best of causes. I did not earn this money by farming, nor yet by the practice of Medicine, but by lecturing on the career of Napoleon and kindred topics. Here was at least a small Fortunatus' purse, for my sub- ject, I found, was one of unfailing interest to intel- ligent Americans and, though I say it myself, I was qualified to speak effectively on it. Kind Nature had given me a somewhat imposing pres- ence, a sonorous and pleasing voice, the gift of language and a memory that has enabled me to recount not a few memorable utterances almost verbatim. By the use of these gifts, especially in the East, where the greatest population and wealth are, I have earned a large amount of money, besides meeting representative people of all sec- tions and enjoying many pleasant experiences. One experience I may mention which, while not so pleasant, was at least interesting. My lecture on " The Destruction of the Inquisi- tion at Madrid " was very objectionable to the Roman Catholics, entering as it did into matters that they would have preferred keeping strictly to themselves. At times I stirred up their wrath and 200 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, violence by delivering this lecture; but I did not let such outbreaks frighten me from telling the whole truth, any more than sturdy Martin Luther let himself be kept back in his course by angry dukes or raging devils. I do not believe that the horrors of the Inquisition could be repeated in any civilized land on earth, but I fail to see that this fact demands our silence in regard to momentous facts of History. Once, when this lecture was announced to be delivered at Jeffersonville, Indiana, I was warned by the Romanists and advised by my friends that it could not be given. A mob gathered to do me violence ; but old soldiers are not easily terrified and I stood my ground after the manner of the Old Guard. "I announced the lecture," I said, "and I propose to deliver it, unless ordered not to do so by the proper authorities." The lecture was delivered, though at its close my friends had an exciting time in getting me safely out of the building and away. You cannot but know the estimate the great majority put upon Wealth and upon those who hold it. Let me say here. Money is not the true standard of ability or success. The world's great- est and best men have either had no time for money-getting, or, having wealth, have considered it only as a means to some nobler end. As the A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 201 world reckons, I am a poor man in my old age; but two considerable fortunes have passsd through my hands, viz., the fortune, and high rank with it, that Napoleon more than once offered me, and the fortune I earned by my lectures. The first of these fortunes I never accepted (and my conscience is the easier and my sleep the sweeter for that fact) and the second has long since passed out of my hands. No one can tell me that it has been wasted or trifled away, for I know that it is out at high interest, loaned to the Lord. As to the luxury in which we live out here in the woods of Indiana, you may judge from the description of my home near Corydon, which is a fair example of the houses first built in these regions. This house was situated about two and a half miles northwest of Corydon, in the midst of a cleared agricultural district of rich clay soil. The surrounding land abounds in sink holes and patches of *' niggerhead" stones. The house stood on a gentle knoll, lying between two of these sinks, in one of which was a small cavern, containing a small spring and serving as a dairy for the farm. The dwelling consisted of two rooms : one was eighteen feet square, built of logs, cut from the forest and hewed on both sides; the cracks were chinked and plastered. There 202 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, was a loft room next the rafters, which in former times had been reached from without by means of a ladder, but which was now reached by a steep stairway in one corner of the room. The other room consisted of a frame addition about fourteen feet square, one story high and with a roof sloping from the main building. The whole building was covered with clapboards split out of a large white oak. There was a front door and window to the log room and a back door led to the frame part, which also had a door and a window. A large, old-fashioned fire place in one end of the log room supplied the heat. Speaking of this home, I am reminded that I have not mentioned the fact that I married again in 1837, the lady being Miss Lydia Sieg of Corydon. I was sixty-four years old at the time and she in her twenties ; yet there was true affection in our union, the proof of which statement is to be seen in the happy life that we have lived together. I know that there are those who expect reasons or excuses from the widower who marries again. I shall at least not set up the usual plea, that it was for the sake of my children that I married the second time. I prefer to say that it was for my own sake, that I might enjoy again the com- panionship of woman. Here I fall back upon a great poet of ancient Greece who is responsible A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 203 for the statement that there is no complete man, since Jupiter in a moment of anger divided man into two parts, one of which he called woman. I must relate one more of what I consider my life-experiences. As one who had come to be something of a public character I received many calls from strangers, whether prominent or other- wise, who journeyed my way. Occasionally I had the pleasure of greeting in my remote Western home some countryman or old comrade, and those days were marked days in my calendar. One day I was sitting on the porch of my home at Knightstown when an elderly man came down the street, looking sharply at the houses as he passed. There was something strangely familiar in his appearance and manner ; but the only man he reminded me of had, to the best of my knowledge, fallen years before in Paris, a victim to Bourbon hatred. As he came face to face with me the man's face lit up with a pecu- liarly winning smile, he threw into his bearing the dignity and power of the born commander and, in a voice that I should have recognized, I believe, in another world, spoke in French the old stirring words that used to send us hurling ourselves into the charge. Man or ghost, as he might be, I knew then that the figure before me was none other than Marshal Ney, and in two 204 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, bounds I was out in the street embracing him. He told me in a few words, as I have already told you, the story of his wonderful escape from death and of his flight to America and residence here in the South. At his request I introduced him to my family under an assumed name, for caution had become second nature to " the Bravest of the Brave." The fatted calf was assuredly killed for the entertainment of this loved one who had been dead, as I so long thought, and was alive again. Almost every moment of his brief stay we spent in living over the thrilling events of the past that we had experienced together in the Old World, and in relating how we had been led to the point whence we could review so many mercies. CHAPTER VI. A SERVANT OF THE LORD JESUS CHRIST. /^NE Sunday evening a year or two after coming West, as I sat reflecting not only on the events of the day, but yet more on the spiritual needs of the people of this great, raw land, I opened my Bible almost unconsciously at the Book of Acts and read from the beginning until I came to Chapter Five, Verse Twenty ; then I paused, lost in thought. " Go, stand and speak in the temple to the people all the words of this life." Was not this work of the preacher of the Word of God after all the noblest in which any man could engage? What was the service of the greatest monarch of earth compared with the service of the King of Kings, who is also the Captain of our salvation and who died that we might live ? Had I not known, to my sorrow too well, how millions of human beings had died in the crash of battle and in the agony of those who lie maimed and helpless on the battle-swept field and die through the long hours or afterwards of disease or by the pangs of starvation — and all that one man might grasp and hold supreme power? Even before all this destruction of pre- 205 206 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, cious life had not other myriads died in the awful havoc of revolution, to satisfy the blind, brutish rage of a de-humanized populace ? And now One dies that many may live and live as children of God, even in this sin-stained life, and then through all the ages to come in the light of His face. Surely this is a message to be proclaimed far and near, even to all the people. How must it be proclaimed and where and by whom? A message so glorious should be her- alded to the world, openly and boldly ; yes, at all times and by everyone who knows it in his heart. Was I such a one ? Was I, who like David had been a man of blood, a rough-handed soldier, a fit man to proclaim this gospel of pardon and peace ? On the other hand had not an all-wise Providence guided me to this hour ? Had I not been kept from present death one hundred times, and taken from prison and led, as God's servants of old, over sea and land, that I might be brought to this place of great possible service? More than all this, had I not been redeemed with the precious blood and saved from a bondage and death in- finitely worse than any that the tyrants of earth could inflict, even that of sin ? And to what end was all this loving care of a Heavenly Father, this guidance by the hand of the true Shepherd A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 207 of Israel, and these pleadings of the mighty Spirit of Truth ? As I had tasted and known by many a strange experience and in many a providential escape that the Lord is good, was I not one of those who should say: "We also believe, and therefore speak?" As I had been tried in my faith in the God of the fathers and in His Son, the Saviour of the World' by many an infidel sneer and argument of devilish cunning, and by the grace of God had kept the faith, was it not fitting that I should go forth among men as a champion of that most holy faith? Having been tried with the fiery trial of temptation, both from the evil thoughts and de- sires which arise within and by the assaults of evil from without, was I not one to testify to the world that there is one who takes His place by the side of those who are called upon to pass through the fiery furnace? As I thought on these heart-searching questions, ; there came whisperings of my guardian angel whose voice had directed me into the path of Right many a time before. Amid these whisper- ings I heard in my spirit the voice of the Lord Jesus saying unto me : Thou also art a witness to these things. To tell the whole truth, I must confess that Self had his word on this question, urging that, if I 208 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, continued to give my efforts for the relief of suffer- ing humanity, I was certainly justified in giving part of my time to my own interests, developing my powers in the lecture field and enjoying for myself and my family a fair measure of the harvest there to be reaped. However, I realized that ray call was from the Lord Himself, and not to be ignored ; the only question was that of my qualifications for the oflSce of the ministry, as these should appear to others and, above all, to the Church. It is true that I was more than sixty years of age when I resolved upon this step, but then my vigor was unabated, and I had not only those years of experience in the great school of Life ; but also the spiritual strength that came from my early training in the Law of the Lord and from the faithful use through more than forty years of the whole Word that is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for cor- rection, for instruction in righteousness. Much technical theological knowledge was lack- ing in my case ; but I knew my Bible and I knew the heart of man, and my own heart as well. The qualifications of many of the ministers of the gos- pel in this region at that time were certainly no greater than my own, and some of them were giving only a half service, devoting the larger part of the week to worldly callings and only one A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 209 day to the work of the Lord. There was no col- lege or seminary accessible to us in those days in which could be done the great and necessary work that my friend, Dr. S. S. Schmucker was doing at Gettysburg in educating together, /. e. into one- ness of faith and spirit, a ministry for the needs of our field. With us it was much as at one time in Israel, " Every man did what was right in his own eyes." I clearly saw this sad fact of the lack of unity among our scanty forces when I visited the newly- organized Synod of the West in October of the year 1835 at its meeting in Louisville, Ky. How- ever I was not deterred from my purpose by this fact, but rather somewhat impelled to join the little band and do what in me lay to increase its unity and efficiency. Accordingly just one year later I was ordained to the holy gospel ministry by the laying on of the hands of the elders who were such in truth, men who had toiled and sacrificed for the work of the Master. The service was a very plain one ; yet I felt that it meant promotion on the field of battle at the hands of fellow soldiers. And what, you ask, has been the especial work of my ministry ? Before answering this question I must state what I consider the ministry itself to be. Is it not the service of one's fellow men in the light and spirit of the gospel of Christ? As "14 210 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, I understand the meaning of this word, I was engaged in the work of the ministry, not only when preaching the word and administering the sacraments, but also when caring for the sick and injured for sweet Charity's sake or when relieving the destitute or even when securing justice with- out price for the oppressed. Considered with a view to its extent, my minis- try was a truly apostolic one in its journeyings and hardships. During the score of years of labor in the ministry that have been granted me I have made repeated trips through Indiana, Ohio, Illi- nois, Kentucky, Tennessee and Missouri, preach- ing, catechising and organizing congregations. Alone in the pathless forests and over the seem- ingly limitless prairies and through swift rivers I have journeyed, destitute for months at a time of all the ordinary comforts of life, that I might preach Christ and His kingdom of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost. The only weapon I carried on these solitary journeys was a sword, viz., the sword of the Spirit of Truth, and with this weapon I have put to flight now and again whole mobs of profane swearers and scoffers at the faith of the gospel of Christ. However these brief labors and sufferings are not worthy of mention ; they either were a joy in themselves, or they spurred the old war horse on to new activity. A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 211 Passing from my own labors to speak of church life in an organized form, as in synods, I must admit that here there was a great lack. Not only were the men and means lacking with which to occupy the fields standing ripe to the harvest, but there was a worse lack in the almost utter absence of oneness of spirit and purpose. At times, when united effort was needed for the carrying through of the work of the Church and hardly a trace of this unanimity could be found, I used to think almost with longing of the spirit that made the armies of Napoleon all but irresistible. This was a spirit of vain glory or of evil ; yet it was an esprit de corps^ and it drove the armies on to vic- tory. In those little synodical bands there seemed at times to be almost more opinions than men, and the only spirit that all had in common was the spirit of individualism, leading each one to consider himself the centre of the universe, about which all should revolve. Though I say it myself, I labored for those things that tended toward unity, seeing to it that the Minutes of Synod were printed, though at my own expense occasionally, and raising or giving personally the salary of a synodical missionary, whose field of labor was Cincinnati. Notwith- standing these efforts of mine, I could not admon- ish the brethren on the great subject of unity 212 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, without bringing down upon my head all manner of personal attack and insinuation. These person- alities and insinuations to which some of the brethren had recourse had the sharper point from the fact that those making the thrust had noted with some care my peculiarities or infirmities, if you please, and were also aware that there was one in this country bearing my name who was not an honest man. To tell a full and truthful story, I must confess here an act of weakness into which I fell under such provocation. At one of our meet- ings I was urging the laggards to activity on behalf of some worthy cause, when I got as my answer some insinuation as to my honesty in pur- pose and act. Then I sinned before God and man, for blind wrath, fiercer than the rage of battle, took complete possession of me, and I started for that man with but one thought — to destroy him with one blow. But the Lord is merciful, and He gave one of the brethren the wisdom to say at that instant: "Hold! this is not Napoleon's army!" More was not needed, for my self-possession returned as quickly as it had left me, and I apolo- gized to the Chairman for my outbreak of wrath, and also to the man upon whom I had turned and to all the brethren. I sinned grievously here ; but the insect who stung me was surely not to be commended. A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 213 What is needed in our Protestant hosts to-day to bring them to the efficiency to which they are called and destined ? To answer in a word, I should say Consecration to their most holy cause, in place of the Individualism now so prevalent. This devotion to a cause made Ancient Rome mis- tress of the world, and it is the strength of Modern Rome to-day. Many, as I know from good author- ity, are the diflferences and divisions within the Church of Rome ; but they are all suppressed, or, at least, kept strictly subordinate to the one all- important interest. When Evangelical Protestantism acquires this discipline of the patriot and the soldier, it will be able to do its great and destined work. Order is heaven's first law, and order and subordination there must be in the work of the kingdom of God among men, as there was in the work of Creation, and, as Revelation tells us, there is in heaven and in the presence of God. Once and again there has risen before my spirit the vision of the Church in the Western world, as she is to be when purified after her experience with Sectarianism and Rationalism and consecrated to her most holy cause. Christ, the Great Head, has promised to be with His Church even to the end of the ages, and in the blessing of that promise His Church has been 214 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS, moving steadily onward, conquering and to con- quer. In this favored Western world, whose civil- zation is the fruitage of all the ages, she surely has her greatest triumphs to achieve. Shall there be progress in knowledge and invention passing the wildest dreams of those of former days, and the Gospel of Christ, that alone by the side of all human culture is the power of God unto salvation, be allowed to lie unused and forgotten ? It is no such gloomy prospect as this that rises before my faith. I believe, and rejoice in my belief, that, when the quick-witted people of this Western land have tasted one and another of the waters of this life that cannot satisfy the soul's thirst, they will come in their myriads to drink of that water, which, if a man drink, he shall never thirst. Hav- ing been led hither and thither by many blind leaders of the blind, the masses of this people will, I believe, turn in God's good time to Him who is the Way, the Truth and the Life. Free from the trammels of the State, supported by the eager and generous spirit of the youngest and mightiest of nations, and upheld by the direct- ing hand of the Almighty who held this Western hemisphere so long in reserve for His appointed ones, the Church of Christ has here her grandest future. When the Lord's portion of the super- abundant American resources and of the tireless A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 215 American energy shall have been given to His service, then surely there will speedily follow the conquest of the world for Christ. VALEDICTORY. piVE years more than the allotted four score have been mine to enjoy, for the most part in the fullness of health and vigor, and at all times as one led and sustained by the hand of the Lord. Last and best of all, a ministry of the glorious gospel of Peace has been granted me, that, year for year, has equaled the period I gave to the cruel pursuits of War. Men have fallen under my hand in battle, it is true ; but by the grace and blessing of God, much greater is the number of those whom it has been my privilege to snatch from Death through the min- istry of healing. By the favor of the Lord, still greater, I believe, is the number of those whom I have been used to lead out of the bondage of the second death into the unending life and bless- edness of the sons of God. As I can see now, my life has been divided into its distinct periods, something as was the life of Moses, the man of God. In my life a score of years was given to preparation ; then a score to the service of this world, chiefly in the pursuits of War ; a score to the readjustment of life to the conditions of the New World and of 216 A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 217 Peace; lastly, a score to the service of the Great Captain. And now the bodily mechanism, so fearful and wonderful, is running down. The stream of my life is nearing the mighty ocean of Eternity, and already my spirit hears the pulsation of the bil- lows of the shoreless main. Now comes the premonition of the end. I feel that the time is near when I must die ; not, as I so often thought, in the brutish rage of desperate battle, but most quietly, surrounded by my loved ones, and filled with the peace that the world can neither give nor take away. What then? Dissolution? Annihilation? Ab- sorption into the Infinite? No; a thousand times No, as far as the soul, my true Self, is concerned. This cannot be the end, for only now at long last clearness of understanding has come ; this must be the moment of pause before the begin- ning of real life. This body, this poor, battered house of clay, shall return to the dust from which it was fashioned ; yet I shall not be unclothed, but clothed upon, even with the strength and beauty of immortality. Life is from above, from the Father of Light and of Life and, once given, it cannot be destroyed by mortal weakness or decay ; but is forever, though Time pass into Eternity. 218 UNDER TWO CAPTAINS. Is this soul, this true and nobler Self that is just coming to realize its worth and responsi- bility, to be swallowed up like a drop of water by the ocean, and lost forever for any life of its own, as even some Christian poets have dreamed? No; my personal life is not now to end. Life is just about to begin, for my heart tells me I am just about to enter the city and the palace of the Great King, after a life of wandering and hardship. This time-beaten and war-worn body must soon be laid away in some quiet God's acre ; but I myself shall live, as, hound to earth, I never have lived. I realize that I am about to know many things of the first import- ance, after which my spirit has long sought. I am elated with the thought of being about to meet the hosts of the pure and truly great spirits who have gone before. Most and best of all, I know and rejoice in my inmost heart that I am soon to see the Lord, to stand before my Great Captain and my Saviour, May my summons to stand before the King of Kings soon come ! [finis.] ADDENDUM. 'X'HERE is another life whose course ran side by- side, as it were, for twenty years with that of the truly manly spirit whose career we have been con- sidering. This life also was most closely associated with that of the great Corsican, and it too bears the marks of real nobility, unaffected by the acid test of the most searching publicity. This other one of Nature's noblemen and companion in arms of the hero of our story was no one less than Marshal Ney, "the Bravest of the Brave" on Europe's battlefields during the years of the Napoleonic wars. Michel Ney was born at Saar-Louis, Province of Lorraine, about 26 miles from Metz, in 1769, which was also the birth year of Napoleon and of Wellington. His father, Peter Ney, had been a soldier in the Seven Years' War, had distinguished himself at the battle of Rossbach and was very proud of his career in the Army. Michel at an early age showed great fondness for the military life. Childhood passed with its studies, then a year or so in the study of Law, then practical life as overseer of mines and iron works, and at eighteen the young man followed his bent and enlisted in a regiment of Hussars at Metz. By earnest application he soon mastered the knowledge essential to the soldier's calling, while he gained his comrades' admiration by his skill with the sword and by the ease and boldness with which he broke and rode the most dangerous 219 220 ADDENDUM. horses. His rise in service was rapid, promotion coming to him five times in the year 1792, and in 1793 he was appointed Aide-de-camp to General Lamarche, one of the ablest officers of the Revolutionary period. This general was killed and Ney was given other ser- vice in which he distinguished himself so greatly that General Kleber put him at the head of a select body of 500 men, known as Partizans, whose duty was the perilous one of reconnoitering the enemy's positions and cutting off any separate detachments they might meet. His success here was marked and he was soon made a Brigadier General, a rank of which he did not deem himself worthy and which he strongly wished to decline. The estimate put upon him by those in com- mand was justified by four brilliant victories that Ney gained in close succession, viz.: the capture of Wurzburg, Forchheim, Nuremberg and Sulzbach. It was Ney's practice during the whole of his most eventful career to take the lead personally in every important action. While this practice endeared him to his soldiers and added greatly to his success in battle, it put him in many a place of peril and cost him many a wound. Near Dierdorf Ney with 500 Hussars attacked the Austrians, 6000 strong, and held them for four hours until the French infantry and cavalry reserve could come up. Soon after with a small force he attacked the enemy near Giessen, but was greatly outnumbered and his troops fled. Ney's horse fell with him, rolling into a ravine. He was surrounded and fought six dragoons single handed and was not taken even then, A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 221 though his sword broke in half, till his foot slipped and he fell. His capture was deeply felt by the French army and even by the Directory, and before long his exchange was brought about. By this time Napoleon had become deeply interested in the brilliant young general and had Josephine in- troduce him to an intimate friend of her daughter Hortense, Mile. Aglae Auguie, a truly beautiful and noble young lady. It was a case of love at first sight between two noble spirits and they were married and lived most happily till the fortunes of war brought a great grief into their lives, but of this we shall speak later. In this connection a word may be said regarding Ney's financial situation. Although he was made a Marshal of France and a Duke and had a station to maintain, and though he had many opportunities for enriching himself through the plunders of war, his high sense of honor kept him in comparative poverty through his whole career and made him restrain his soldiers from the plundering so common in war. About this time Ney was made Minister Plenipo- tentiary to Switzerland, and showed himself to be a statesman of ability, as well as the general. French aggressions, running through some years, had aroused a bitter feeling among the Swiss, yet Ney, coming with an army of 30,000 and making demands in the name of France, treated them so justly that he gained their strong friendship, which they expressed in an official letter from the confederated cantons, accom- panied with a rich gift. A sentence or two of this 222 ADDENDUM. letter will show the spirit that the Swiss recognized in a truly great man placed in a trying situation. "Switzerland is restored to peace; order is every- where established; the diversity of opinions among us merges each day into a spirit of moderation and har- mony. An act of kindness attaches him who performs it as well as him upon whom it is conferred; we there- fore do not fear that you will forget us." There have been those who considered Ney a born soldier, but as otherwise lacking in ability. His masterly civil administration in Switzerland is an answer to this opinion, as is also his work on the art of war, which he called by the modest name of Military Studies, but of which a British military writer of stand- ing says, "In the Military Studies of Marshal Ney we see the hand of a master." During the course of the World War we heard no little discussion of the possibility of a German invasion of England from the Channel ports of France, and the general belief was that it was an impossible thing. It may be of interest to recall that Napoleon had a great army under Soult and Ney at Boulogne, well supplied with gunboats and other light craft and so drilled that 25,000 men were actually embarked in 10 minutes. Ney's careful studies of the winds, calms, fogs and other natural conditions showed that it was quite possible under any one of several conditions to elude the British fleet and to put a strong army on British soil with but slight resistance. This project was never put to the trial because of the recognized incompetency of the French naval officers and because of the recognized efficiency of the British, A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 223 Time does not permit more than the passing mention of Ney's truly great victories at Elchingen, Jena, Soldau and not a few others that History records; we must pass on to the crowning achievements of his mihtary career — his conduct of the retreat from Russia and his part in the battle of Waterloo. That the great retreat did not again and again be- come a hopeless rout and massacre of the whole army was due to the indomitable bravery and wonderful re- sourcefulness of one man — who fought and contrived seeming impossibilities and fought again against crushing odds for forty days and nights of incessant horror. Napoleon himself had fled as soon as he realized the hopelessness of the situation, and all his leaders but Ney had followed his selfish example. Ney only held his post of deadly peril with but a few thousands, and these falling day by day from cold, famine, disease and at the hands of the enemy. Let us glance at but two instances of many. Near Krasnoi Ney found his way blocked by the Russians with 80,000 men and 200 cannon, while he had but 4000 men and 6 cannon. The Russians used treachery besides, shooting down many of the French while off their guard during a parley, yet Ney broke their first line by a frontal attack and then made a masterly re- treat during the night, crossing the Dneiper at the one place where the ice was thick enough to bear men on foot. At the crossing of the Beresina, where the bag- gage of the whole army and 36,000 men were lost, Ney again took the post of danger, formed a rear guard and even fought in the ranks as a private till his force 224 ADDENDUM. was reduced to sixty men, that he might hold the enemy in check and make possible the escape of a few more of the defeated and spiritless Grand Army. The story of Waterloo need not be told again here. Let it suffice to say that for Ney it was a glorious ending of a glorious military career. After desperate fighting, he took La Haye Sainte, a strong fortified position only 300 yards from the centre of Wellingston's line of battle. Had not Napoleon selfishly taken away Ney's reserve, Ney could, in all probability, have swept away the British centre. "Within thy bosom are thy fateful stars," says the poet, and Napoleon's famous star of destiny certainly went down, to rise no more, when his selfish impulse deprived the man who was his right hand of the weapon with which to strike an effective blow. The story of the magnificent charge of the Old Guard, led by Ney as the sun was setting, was the grand climax of the great battle, but it was too late, for the massed artillery of the British and their reserve ranks of infantry mowed the Guard as grass before the scythe. The vengeful Bourbon autocracy soon gathered in those who were counted as leaders in bringing Napoleon back from Elba and Ney was marked for the slaughter. The Duke of Wellington, who admired Ney for his noble qualities and who had been deeply touched by the appeals of Ney's friends, went to Louis XVIIL, the poor stick of monarchy whom he twice put on the throne, to ask that Ney's life might be spared, but he was insulted publicly by Louis turning his back upon him as he drew near. Wellington felt the insult keenly and said to the courtiers standing by, "You forget that I comm-anded the armies which put your A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 225 king on his throne. I will never again enter the royal presence." What the histories tell of Ney's execution you can read. However there is another account, given by an English Member of Parliment, who, strangely enough, happened to be at the secluded spot where the execu- tion took place, and given years later in America by Peter Stuart Ney to a few trusted friends. The account that we believe can be shown to set forth the truth gives us the following points: At an early hour the carriage containing Ney, several officers and a priest made its way through the Luxembourg Gardens and stopped at a back entrance, where there was only an alley, yet a picket of soldiers near by who had been on duty there for over four hours. Here Ney left the carriage and walked toward a wall, the soldiers meanwhile loading their own guns. Ney then turned, took a few steps towards the soldiers, protested before God and man that he had never betrayed his country, told the soldiers not to fire till he put his hand to his heart; bidding them in a low tone to aim high, he then struck himself over the heart, gave the command to fire and fell motionless at the volley. Some colored fluid ran out from under his vest and an Englishman suddenly stepped up and picked up a few small stones that had been stained by the fluid, wrapped them up and quickly walked away. Within three minutes the body was taken up and conveyed in the same carriage in which the party had come to a Maternity Hospital that stood shut in by high walls, a few hundred yards from the scene of the execution. 15 ^ 226 ADDENDUM. Here it lay, under guard, the rest of that day and (History says) until daybreak, when it was taken secretly to the cemetery of Pere la Chaise and buried without any ceremony whatever. As Mr. P. S. Ney of North Carolina told a few trusted friends, the sup- posed corpse was acting very differently by riding for his life all through that night toward Bordeaux, where, after a brief concealment, he took ship for America. It may be added that while the body lay in the Hospital (History says with nine bullets in the body itself and three in the head through the face) the officer on guard made a sketch of it that was so good that an engraving was later made from it for private circulation. It is said of this that a smile of the most winning placidity seemed to play on the face of the defunct. After a tedious winter voyage on the sailing vessel Ney landed at Charleston, S. C, on January 29, 1816, and here or in this vicinity he spent three years in strict seclusion, occupying himself with systematic study. Although he was supplied with funds beyond his needs, a man of his temperament could not think of passing the rest of his days in idleness, and a man who had commanded great armies could not be content in a subordinate position, while any situation that carried with it publicity might be disastrous to him- self or to friends in France. Accordingly the Bravest of the Brave decided upon the absolute sway of the country schoolmaster of those times as his calling, and, on the whole, or as far as happiness was possible for an exile from a beloved family and country, he was happy in this calling, v A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 227 Peter Stuart Ney, as he called himself, was j&rst known in the United States in 1819, when he was rec- ognized in Georgetown, S. C, as Marshal Ney, where- upon he disappeared. In the fall of this year Col. Benj. Rogers of Brownsville, S. C, met Ney at a hotel at Cheraw, S. C, and engaged him to teach the village school. He taught in Brownsville for three years and then went to Mocksville, N. C, where he taught, as also in Iredell County and elsewhere in western North Carolina. In 1828 he taught in Mecklenburg County, Va., for two years. Returning to North Carolina, he taught in Lincoln, Iredell, Davie, Cabarrus and Rowan counties till August, 1844. He then went to Darlington, S. C; then back to North CaroHna, teach- ing in Lincoln and Rowan counties till his death in 1846. During the years from 18 19 to 1846, spent by Ney largely in teaching, he lived in homes of leading fami- lies in a number of neighborhoods, associated with them intimately day by day and taught their children in school. Practically without an exception these many representative people from different communities unite in the judgment that Peter Stuart Ney was a high- minded gentleman, an accomplished scholar, and also that he was none other than Marshal Ney. Let us cite but one such witness, Dr. J. R. B. Adams of Statesville, N. C, who says that he knew P. S. Ney intimately and was entirely satisfied that he was Marshal Ney. He speaks of Ney as a fine specimen of manhood, being tall, very strongly built, with a bearing that might be described as majestic, and with 228 ADDENDUM. eyes that were uncommonly brilliant and piercing and that seemed to look clear through you. He was a splendid judge of human nature and despised shams of all kinds. On several occasions Ney was recognized by old soldiers of his former commands as the Marshal. In 1840 John Snyder of Iredell County, N. C, saw P. S. Ney in Statesville and was so surprised that he threw up his hands and exclaimed: "Lordy God, Marshal Ney." Ney gave him a sign not to talk and later conversed with him. Ney had been deeply interested in his soldiers, often going among them privately and seeing that their wants were supplied. Frederick Barr, another old soldier of Ney's, rec- ognized him at a political meeting in Rowe's township, nine miles from Statesville. Barr was greatly excited and made an exclamation in German. Daniel Hoke, a prominent citizen, understood German, and told sev- eral others what Barr had said. "Yonder is Marshal Ney. They told me he was shot, but he was not. Yonder he is. I know him, for I fought under him off and on for five or six years in Napoleon's Wars." Barr was known as a reliable and industrious man, a tenant of Mr. Hoke's. Soon after Barr suddenly left the country for Indiana, and it was said that Mr. Hoke supplied him with money for the journey. About 1842 Dr. Adams, named above, met in Ala- bama Col. Lehmanowsky, who was making a tour of the Southern states lecturing on Napoleon's campaigns. Col. Lehmanowsky told Dr. Adams that he was fully convinced from what he had seen and heard in France A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 229 and in this country that Marshal Ney was not executed. He said that he was well acquainted with Ney and could recognize him at a glance. A relative of Lehmanowsky's second wife has stated to the author of this book that Lehmanowsky stopped at their home in the Shenandoah Valley, Va., en route to Carolina for a visit to Ney. It would be a pleasant task, and yet not an easy one, to picture this meeting of the two Great Hearts, This meeting is something to strengthen our faith in the possibilities of our human nature and in Provi- dence. Outwardly it was only a very retired meeting in a foreign land of two old comrades in arms, but let us look deeper. What a blessing it is that for generations this land of freedom has stood beyond the Western ocean as a haven of refuge for the persecuted of the Old World, and, on the other hand, what a benefit some of the nobler spirits, driven from Europe by autocracy in Church or State, have been to their new home. What men these two refugees were physically, intellectually, and even spiritually when following their own initiative. Through what ordeals of fire had not these knightly men passed and been brought out practically unscathed in body and how very rich in spirit! We can imagine the deep joy of their friendship as they lived over together this or the other incident of their most event- ful lives in the Old World, as when each of them had been rescued from the very hand of the King of Terrors, as he had come with such terrible deliberation to cut them down. Napoleon, both the man and his 230 ADDENDUM. fortunes, must have been their theme for some most earnest discussion. Loyalty to their chief had become second nature to these brave soldiers, yet, as men of high principle, they must have seen, especially as remoteness in distance and the lapse of time had broken the strong personal magnetism of their leader, that the image, almost worshipped in the time of his power, did not have even a head of gold, but only of plate, and that this was none too thick in places. Family and friends then, either across the wide ocean or in the new home land, must have occupied their thoughts and speech. Their life callings as men of peace in the closely related fields of education and of the gospel ministry and the dignity and the rewards of these callings — what matter for earnest discussion was there not here. On various parts of his person Peter Stuart Ney carried scars that correspond to wounds that Marshal Ney is known to have received, and of the resemblance in penmanship between writings of Marshal Ney and some of P. S. Ney we have the following testimony. David Carvalho, of New York City, an expert in pen- manship, says: "I have made a careful analysis of the alleged hand-writings of Marshal Ney and Peter S. Ney contained in the eight pages of original writings which you submitted to me. As the result of said examination I am of the opinion that the writer of the specimens on the four pages purporting to be those of Marshal Ney and the writer of the four pages pur- porting to be those of Peter S. Ney are one and the same person." A ROMANCE OF HISTORY. 231 At times P. S. Ney would receive letters from France and periods of deep despondency would always follow. On two occasions, once in Statesville, N. C, and once in Virginia, Ney received visits from fine-looking young Frenchmen, of whom he admitted, after their departure, that they were his sons. It may be asked here. Why did not Ney eventually return to France, to his family and friends? Strong efforts were made by men of prominence in France to obtain a reversal of the sentence of death against Marshal Ney, but with- out success. When these efforts failed, after five years of trial, P. S. Ney became greatly depressed. At this time he wrote in the album of a lady who had been one of his pupils a significant little poem. Gone, With Their Glories Gone. "Though I of the chosen the choicest, To Fame gave her loftiest tone; Though I 'mong the brave was the bravest, My plume and my baton are gone. "The Eagle that pointed to conquest Was struck from his altitude high, A prey to the vulture the foulest, No more to revisit the sky. "One sigh to the hope that has perished, One tear to the wreck of the past, One look upon all I have cherished, One lingering look — 'tis the last. 232 ADDENDUM. "And now from remembrance I banish The glories which shone in my train; Oh, vanish, fond memories, vanish. Return not to sting me again." Peter Stuart Ney died on the 15 th of November, 1846. Dr. M. Locke, one of his old pupils, was in attendance upon him and told him plainly that his end was near. A few hours before he died Dr. Locke said to him: "Mr. Ney, you have but a short time to live and we would like to know from your own lips who you are before you die." Ney, perfectly rational, raised himself on his elbow, and, looking Dr. Locke full in the face, said: "I am Marshal Ney of France." Two or three hours later he died. A fair amount of material from first-hand sources has been used in the preparation of this book, and standard histories, such as Professor Sloane's great work on Napoleon Bonaparte, have been consulted, yet in the Addendum first mention must be given to Major Weston's scholarly work, "Historic Doubts as to the Execution of Marshal Ney." Princeton Theological Seminary Libraries 1 1012 01204 4204