The Holy Rose, etc

Prologue

--.._. 1 I. IN MY GARDEN - - - - - - 10 II. PORCHESTER CASTLE - - - - -23 III. THE FAMILY LUCK - - - - -32 IV. IN THE OTHER CAMP - - - - 38 V. TOM'S UNFORTUNATE MISTAKE - - - - 44 VI. A TERRIBLE DISCOVERY - - - -52 VII. THE DEPARTURE OF THE PRISONERS - - - 59 VIII. HE CANNOT CHOOSE BUT GO - - - - 65 IX. RAYMOND'S JOURNEY - - - - 67 X. IN THE TOWER - - ' - - - - 75 XI. THE KISS OF JUDAS - - - - - 81 XII. THE TRIAL - - - - - - 87 XIII. AT HOME . - - - - - - 94 XIV. THE RELEASE - - - - - - 99 XV. CONCLUSION - - - - - - 108 THE LAST MASS CONTENTS. THE INNER HOUSE. CHAPTER TJiGI.

PROLOGUE.

: AT THE ROYAL INSTITUTION - - 142 I. THE SUPPER-BELL ..... 152 II. GROUT, SUFFRAGAN ----- 164 III. CHRISTINE AT HOME ----- 173 IV. WHAT IS LOVE ? - 192 V. THE OPEN DOOR ----- 202 VI. THE ARCH-PHYSICIAN ----- 211 VII. THE FIDELITY OF JOHN LAX - - - - 218 VIII. THE ARCH TRAITOR ----- 225 IX. IN THE INNER HOUSE ----- 229 X. THE COUNCIL IN THE HOUSE - - - - 235 XI. THE TRIAL AND SENTENCE ... - 240 XII. THE REBELS ------ 248 XIII. THE EXECUTION ----- 254 XIV. PRISONERS ------ 261 XV. THE RECRUITING SERGEANT - 265 XVI. A MOST UNEXPECTED CONCLUSION - - - 269 EVEN WITH THIS 279 CAMILLA'S LAST STRING - - - THE HOLY ROSE.

PROLOGUE.

. All night long, until within a couple of hours of daybreak, the ships' boats were rowing to and fro between the fleet and the shore, swiftly, yet without haste, as if the work had to be done without delay, yet must be done in order. They were embarking the English and the Spanish troops, for the town was to be abandoned. All night long the soldiers stood in their ranks, waiting for their turn in stolid patience. Some even slept leaning on their muskets, though the season was mid-winter, and though all round them there was such a roaring of cannon, and such a bursting and hissing of shells, as should have driven sleep far away. But the cannon roared and the shells burst harmlessly, so far as the soldiers were concerned, for they were drawn up in the Fort Lamalque, which is on the east of the town, while the cannonading was from Fort Caire, which is on the west.

The Republicans fired, not upon the embarking army, but upon the town and upon the boats in the harbour, where the English sailors were destroying those of the ships which they could not take away with them, so that what had been a magnificent fleet in the evening became by the morning only a poor half-dozen frigates. They burned the arsenal ; they destroyed the stores; not until the work of destruction was complete, and all the troops were embarked, did they turn their thoughts to the shrieking and panic-stricken people. What do we, who all our lives have sat at home in peace and quietness, know of such a night ? What do we, who, so far, have lived beyond the reach of war, comprehend of such terror as fell upon all hearts when — 'twas the night of the eighteenth of Decem ber, in the year of grace one thousand seven hundred and ninety three— the people of Toulon discovered that the English and Spanish troops were leaving the town, and that they were left to the tender mercies of the Republicans ?

Toulon was their last camp of refuge ; Lyons had fallen ; Marseilles had fallen. As the English gathered together in the fens and swamps to escape the Normans, so the Provencal folk fled to Toulon out of the way of the Republicans. As for their tender mercies, it was known already what had been done at Lyons, and what at Marseilles. What would they not do at Toulon, which had not only pro nounced against the Republic, but had even invited the English and the Spanish to occupy and hold the town ? And now their allies were embarking, and they were without defence. It took time for them to understand the situation. They did not learn that Fort Caire and the Pharon had been taken by the Republicans, until the cannon of the forts were turned upon the town, and the bombardment began. Then they ran out of their houses, because it is better to die in the open than to die in a hole, and congregated — some in the churches, some in the Place d'Armes, and some on the quays.

It was dreadful, even there, because the shells which flew hurtling in the air sometimes burst over their heads, and the cannon-shot sometimes flew through the crowd, making long lanes where the dead an! wounded lay. It was more dreadful when the English sailors fired the arsenal and the stores, and the lurid flames leaped up into the sky, and roared and ran from place to place. It was more dreadful still when the lubberly Spaniards blew up the powder-ships instead of sinking them, and that with so terrible an explosion that the boats in the harbour were blown clean out of the water. But it was most dreadful of all when it became known that the English had abandoned the town, and were even then embarking at Fort Lamalque, where they were secure from the fire of the other forts ; because then the people understood that they would be left to certain death.

Then with one consent they rushed upon the Quai. The women carried their little ones and dragged the elder children by the hand ; the men snatched up whatever, in the terror of the moment, they could save that seemed worth saving, and there, crowded all together, they shrieked and cried to the English boats, and implored the sailors to carry them on board. All night long they vainly cried, the men cursing the English for their inhumanity, the women holding up the children — for the flames of the arsenal made the Quai as light as day — if the sight of the tender innocents would move their hearts. All night long the

PROLOGUE.

. 3 sailors, unmoved, went on with their work of destruction in the harbour, and of embarkation on the fleet. But in the early morning, two hours before daybreak, they had done all that they had time to do, and they thought of the wretched people. When the boats touched the Quai there arose a desperate cry, for it seemed here indeed, as with those who of old time stood or lay about the Pool of Siloam, that only he who stepped in first would come out whole. Then those behind pushed to the front, and those in front leaped into the boats, and some in their haste leaped into the water instead and were drowned ; and, to make the terror worse, the foreats, who had been released when the arsenal was fired, came down upon the crowd, six hundred strong, yelling, ' The Republicans are upon us ! They are coming !

They are coming !' Then even those who had been most patient, fearing above all things to lose each other, and resolved to cling to their treasures if possible, either lost their heads and rushed forward, or were forced to the front by those behind and separated ; and in the confusion they dropped their treasures, which the convicts picked up. And some were pushed into the water, and some, especially the women and children, were thrown down and trampled to death ; and at this moment the cannon-shot of Fort Oaire fell into the densest part of the crowd. And some went mad, and began to laugh and sing, and one or two fell dead with the terror and dis traction of it. But the English sailors went on steadily with their work, helping the people into the boats, and when those were full pushing off and making room for others, as if they were Portsmouth wherries taking holiday folk to see the ships at Spithead ; so that, although at daybreak they were forced to desist, out of twenty thousand souls who were in Toulon, they took on board, all told, fourteen thousand five hundred men, women and children.

Among the groups on the outskirts of the crowd there was one of four, consisting of two ladies, a man, and a boy. One of the ladies sat upon the arm of an anchor, holding the boy by the hand. She had stuffed his ears with wool and covered his head with her shawl, so that he should see and hear as little as possible. The other, who stood by her, was dressed as a nun. In her hands she held a golden crucifix, and her eyes were turned to the heavens. The man stood silent, only from time to time whispering to the lady with the boy : ' We can die but once, Eugenie. Courage, my wife.' Then came the false alarm of the foreats, and a surging wave of humanity suddenly rushed upon them, bearing them along upon the 1—2 tide. And as for the lady called Eugenie, she was carried off her feet, but held the boy in her arms, and knew nothing until the strong hands of two English sailors caught her as she was falling headlong into the water, crying : ' Now then, Madam Parleyvoo, this is your way ; not into the harbour this time.

Lay down, ma'am ; lay down, and sit quiet.' When it was daybreak, the refugees upon the deck looked around them. They were seeking for brother and sister, husband, wife, lover, parent, or child ; with them Madame Eugenie. Alas ! the husband was nowhere on the ship. They comforted her with the hope that he might be on one of the other vessels. But she was to see him no more. Presently her eyes fell upon a figure lying motionless beside a cannon on the deck. It was a nun in blue and white. ' Sister !' cried Madame Eugenie ; ' Sister Claire ! You are saved ! oh, you are saved !' The nun slowly opened her eyes, looking about her. ' I thought,' she said, ' that we had passed through the pangs of death, and were on our way to the gates of heaven.' The terror of the night had made her reason wander for the moment. ' Where are we, sister ?' ' We are safe, dear.

But where — oh, where is Raymond ?' 1 1 know not. What has happened ? What have I here ?' In her hand she carried a bag. I have said that in the hurry of the moment each snatched up what seemed most precious. This lady, for her part, held in her hand a large leather bag, containing something about eighteen inches long. If we consider how weak a woman she was, in what a crowd she was pressed, how she was carried into the boat and hoisted on board, and how her wits fled for terror, it seems nothino short of a miracle that she should have brought that bag on board in safety. But she did, and thus a miracle, she always believed was wrought in behalf of her and those she loved. She sat up and began to recover herself. * Oh, my sister !' she said, bursting into tears, ' you are safe ■ and I have saved the Rose, the Holy Rose, the Rose blessed by the Pope.' 'And I,' said Eugenie, 'have lost my husband.

Thank God the boy is safe. But where is Raymond ?' Then followed the sound of a fierce cannonading ; the last because the Republicans now discovered that the place was abandoned.

PROLOGUE.

. 5 The nun kissed the crucifix. ' Those who are not with us,' she said solemnly, ' are with God. If they are not dead already, they will be presently killed by those who are the enemies of God and the King. Let us pray, my sister, for the souls of the martyrs.' In the afternoon of that day, the English and Spanish ships being now under full sail and out of sight, there was the strangest sight that the Toulonnais had ever seen. The performance took place in the Place d'Armes, under the trees which, in summer, make a grateful shade in the hot sun. Generally there is a market there, which begins at daybreak, and is carried on lazily, and with many intervals for sleep and rest, until the evening. But to-day the market-women were not at their stalls, and the stalls were empty. The smoke of the still-burning arsenal was blowing slowly over the town, obscuring the sky ; some of the ships in the harbour were still on fire, adding their smoke, so that, though the sky was clear and the sun was bright, the town was dark.

Under the trees at the western end of the Place sat four Commissioners, forming four courts. They were dressed in Republican simplicity of long flow ing hair, long coats with high collars, and their throats tied up in immense mufflers. They were provided with chairs, and they were surrounded by a guard of soldiers. The fellows were in rags, and for the most part barefooted ; but every man had his musket, his bayonet, and his pouch. They carried nothing more. Their hair was longer than that of the Commissioners ; their cheeks were hollow, partly from short rations long continued, and partly from the fatigue of the last week's incessant fighting. And their eyes were fierce — as fierce as the eyes of those Gauls who first met a Roman legion. In the open part of the Place, where there were no trees to shelter them, were grouped a company of prisoners, driven together at the point of the bayonet.

They were the helpless and unresisting folk who had been left behind by the re treating English. The men stood silent and resigned, or, if they spoke, it was to console the women, who, for their part, worn out by terror and fatigue, sat as if they could neither hear, nor see, nor feel anything at all, not even the wailing of the children. At the east end of the Place were more soldiers, and these were engaged in turn, by squads of six, in standing shoulder to shoulder and firing at a target which was continually changed. A strange occupation, surely, for soldiers of the Republic ! For the target at which they aimed, at ten feet distance, was by turns a man, a woman, or a child, as might happen. They always hit that target, which then fell to the ground, and became instantly white and cold, and was dragged away to be replaced by another.

For the Republic, revengeful as well as indivisible, was executing Justice upon her enemies. With this Republic, which was naturally more ruthless, because less responsible, than any Tyranny, Justice was always spelt with a capital, and meant Death. So exactly was Justice at this time a synonym for La Mort, that one is surprised that the latter word should have survived at all during the early years of Revolution, when the thing was signified equally well by the word Justice. The judges here were those pure and holy spirits, Citizens Fr6ron, Robespierre the Younger, Barras, and Saliceti, all virtuous men, and all fully permeated with a conviction of the great truth, that when a man is dead he can plot no more. Therefore, as fast as the traitors of Toulon, who had held out for the family of Capet, and had invited the detestable and perfidious English into their city, and had been contented with their rule, were brought before them, they were sentenced to be done to death incontinently, and without any foolish delay in the investigation of the case, or in appeals to any higher court, or any waste of time over prayers and priest.

Presently there was brought before Citizen Freron a Gentleman. There could be no doubt upon th>s subject, because, even at this moment, when the result of his trial was certain, he preserved the proud and self-possessed air which exasperated the Republicans, who easily succeeded in looking fearless and resolute, but never preserved calmness. It wants a very well-bred man to possess his soul and govern himself with dignity in the presence of a violent death. When it came to the turn of the Robespierres, for example, one of them jumped out of window, and the other shot himself in the head. Yet in the dignity of the Nobles the fiery Republicans read contempt for themselves, and it maddened them. This gentle man was a handsome man of five-and-thirty, or thereabouts, with straight and regular features, black eyes, and a strong chin.

You may see his face carved upon those sarcophagi of Aries, where are sculptured a whole gallery of Roman heads belonging to the second century. It was, in fact, a Roman face such as may be seen to this day at Tarascon, Aiguesmortes, and Aries ; a clear-cut face, whose ancestor was very likely some gallant legionary born in the Cam pagna, who, his years of service accomplished, was left behind grizzled and weather-beaten, but strong still, to settle in the Pro vincia, to marry one of the black-haired, half-bred Gaulish maidens

PROLOGUE.

. 7 to bring up his family, presently to die, and then to be remembered for another generation at least in the yearly commemorative Festival of the Dead. ' Your name ?' asked Commissioner Freron. There were no clerks, and no notes were taken of the cases. But certain formalities must be observed in the administration of justice. ' My name is Raymond d' Arnault, Comte d'Eyragues,' the prisoner replied in a clear, ringing voice. 'You have been found in the town which for two months has harboured and entertained the enemies of the Republic. You were on the Quai, endeavouring to escape. Why were you endeavouring to escape ?' The prisoner made no reply. ' Friends of the Republic do not fly before the presence of her soldiers. What have you to say ?' ' Nothing,' said the prisoner. 'Is there any present who can give evidence as to the accused ?' asked tbe President.

A man stepped forward. 'I can give evidence, Citizen Commissioner.' He was a man, still young, whose face bore certain unmistakable signs denoting an evil life. Apparently his courses had led him to a condition of poverty, for his clothes were old and shabby. His coat, which had once been scarlet, was now stained with all the colours that age and rough treatment can add to the original colour ; its buttons had formerly been of silver, but were now of horn ; his hair was tied with a greasy black ribbon ; his shoes had no buckles, and were tied with string ; his stockings were of a coarse yarn. As he stepped to the front, he seemed to avoid looking at the prisoner. Some of those who assisted at the trial might have noticed a strange thing. The man was curiously like the prisoner. They were both of the same stature ; each of them had black eyes and black hair ; each of them had a shapely head and strong, regular features.

But the face of one was noble, and that of the other was ignoble, which makes a great difference to begin with. And one was calm in his manner, though death stared him in the face ; and the other, though nobody accused him of anything, was uneasy. ' What is your name ?' asked the Court. ' My name, Citizen Commissioner, is Louis Leroy.' At these words there was a murmur among all who heard them, and the Court itself showed its displeasure. ' It is my name,' said the witness. ' A man does not make his own name.' ' Citizen, your name is an insult to the Republic' ' I will change it, then, for any other name you please.' ' What is your profession, citizen ?' ' I am '—he hesitated for a moment—' I am a dancing-master at Aix.' ' A dancing-master may be a good citizen. As for your name, it shall be Gavotte— Citizen Gavotte.

For your first name, it shall be no longer Louis, but Scipio. Proceed, Citizen Scipio Gavotte, and quickly. Do you know the accused ?' ' I have known him all my life.' 'What can you tell the Court about him ?' 'He is an aristocrat and a Royalist, therefore the enemy of the Republic ; also a devout Catholic, therefore the enemy of man kind.' ' What is his business in the city of Toulon ? Why is he found here ?' ' He was one of those who invited the English into the town. It was thought that Marseilles, Lyons, and Toulon would all hold out together, and be three centres for rallying the Royalists. The Count was strong in favour of English intervention.' ' Have you anything further to depose, Citizen Gavotte ?' asked the Court. ' Nothing more.' ' Accused, have you anything to ask the witness ?' ' Nothing,' replied the Count. 'Citizen Arnault,' said the President, 'you have heard the evidence.

You are charged with inviting the enemies of the Republic to insult with their presence the sacred soil of the Republic ; you have delivered into their hands the fleets of France ; you have destroyed the arsenals and the munitions of war. Have you anything to urge in defence ?' 'Nothing.' ' You admit the charge, then ?' ' I admit the charge. It is quite true. I would not willingly waste the time of this honourable Court. There are many hundreds of honest people waiting their turn to be treated as you treated the people of Lyons. I have nothing more to say.' ' Death !' said Commissioner Freron.

PROLOGUE.

. 9 The Count heard the sentence with a slight bow. Then the soldiers led him away to the other end of the Place, where the prisoners already sentenced were gathered together waiting their turn, men and women. As for the former, they affected indiffer ence ; but the women, with clasped hands and white faces, gazed into the light of day, which they were to see no more, and some hung upon the shoulders of husband or lover, and some sat together, their arms about each other's necks, whispering that they should not be separated for many moments, and that the pang of death was momentary. The Count spoke to no one ; but ho turned his head slowly, surveying the scene as if it was a very curious and interesting spectacle, full of odd and amusing details, which he would not willingly forget. The ragged soldier, the mock dignity of the Court, seemed to amuse him.

But among those who stood among the soldiers, be suddenly observed the fellow who had given evidence against him. He was crouching in the crowd, his eyes aglow with hatred and eagerness to see the carrying out of the sentence. With a gesture of authority the Count beckoned him. The man, per haps from force of habit, obeyed. So for a moment they stood face to face. Truly, they were so much like each other that you might have taken them for brothers. 'Louis,' said the Count, speaking as one speaks to a dependent or a humble friend, ' it needed not thy testimony, my friend. I was already sentenced. Pity that I could not die without finding out that you were my enemy — you.' The man said nothing. ' Why, Louis, why T the Count continued. ' We were boys together ; once we were playfellows. I loved thee in the old days, before thy wild ways broke thy mother's heart.

It was not I, but my* father, who bade thee begone from the village for a vaurien. Why, then, Louis ?' ' Your name and your estate should have belonged to me, and gone to my son. I was born before you, though my mother was not married to — your father.' ' Indeed !' said the Count coldly. ' So this rankled, did it ? Poor Louis ! I never suspected it. Yet my death will not undo the past. Louis, I shall be shot, but thou wilt not inherit the name or the estate.' ' I shall buy the estate,' said the man. ' Estates of emigres and traitors can be bought for nothing in these times ; so that after all the elder brother will inherit.' THE HOLY ROSE. 10 ' And yet, Louis, 'tis pity ; because thy brother's death will now be laid to thy charge. There can be, methinks, little joy for one who murders his brother.' The man's face flushed. ' What do I care ?' he said. ' Go to be shot, and when you fall remember that the vineyards and the olive-groves will be mine — the property of the brother who was sent away in disgrace to be a gambler, a poet, a dancing-master — anything.' ' My brother,' the Count replied, ' thou hast changed thy name.

It is no longer Leroy, nor Gavotte, but Cain. Farewell, brother, enjoy the estates and be happy.' He dismissed him with a gesture cold and disdainful. ' Enjoy thy estates, Cain.' Citizen Gavotte slunk back ; but he waited on the Place watching, until his brother fell. Meantime the Commissioners of the Republic continued to ad minister justice, and the file of soldiers continued to execute it, and every man and woman had his fair turn and no favour, which the Republic always granted to its prisoners ; and each one, when his turn came, stood before the pointed muskets, and then fell heavily, white of cheek, his heart beating no longer, upon the stones. When justice was thoroughly satisfied, which took several days, and the remnant of the Toulonnais was reduced to slender pro portions, they threw the bodies into the Mediterranean, where they lie to this day.

Chapter I. In My Garden

The village of Porchester is a place of great antiquity, but it is little, and, except for its old Castle, of no account. Its houses are all contained in a single street, beginning at the Castle-gate and ending long before you reach the Portsmouth and Fareham road which is only a quarter of a mile from the Castle. Most of them are mere cottages, with thatched or red-tiled roofs, but they are not mean or squalid cottages ; the folk are well-to-do, though humble and every house in the village, small or great, is covered all over back and front, with climbing roses. The roses cluster over the porches, they climb over the red tiles, they peep into the latticed windows, they cover and almost hide the chimney. In the summer months the air is heavy with their perfume ; every cottage is a bower of roses ; the flowers linger sometimes far into the autumn, and come again with the first warm days of June.

Nowhere in the country, I am sure, though I have seen few other places, is there such a village for roses. Apart from its flowers, I confess that the place has little worthy of notice ; it cannot even show a church, because its church is within the Castle walls, and quite hidden from the village. On a certain afternoon of April, in the year of grace one thousand eight hundred and two, the colour of the leaves was just beginning to show on the elms, the buds were swollen in the chestnuts, the blossom was out on the almond, and the hedges were already green. The sunshine was so warm that one could bring one's work out to the porch, with a shawl round the neck ; the village was not quiet, and yet it was peaceful ; that is to say, there were the ordinary sounds which are expected, and therefore do not annoy.

The children were playing and shouting, the soldiers were disputing outside the tavern door, the village blacksmith and his two appren tices were hammering something on a tuneful anvil, which rang true at every stroke like a great bell ; the barber was flouring a wig at the open door, and whistling through his teeth over the job, as a groom whistles while he rubs down a horse ; a flock of geese walked along the road croaking and calling to each other ; a dog barked after his sheep, keeping them in order, and the cobbler sitting in his doorway was singing aloud while he cut the leather, adjusted it, and hammered it into place. Sometimes he sang out merrily, sometimes he sang low. This was according as the work went easily and to his liking, or the contrary. 'Twas a rogue who always had some merry ditty in his mouth, and to-day it was the famous alehouse song which begins : ' I've cheated the parson, I'll cheat him agen ; For why should the rogue have one pig in ten ?

One pig in ten, One pig in ten, Why should the rogue have one pig in ten ?' Here something interrupted his song and his work, but immedi ately afterwards he went on again : ' One pig in ten, One pig in ten, Why should the rogue have one pig in ten ?' When I had resolved to write down my history, and was con sidering how best to relate it, there came into my mind, quite un- THE HOL Y ROSE. 12 expectedly, a single afternoon. At first there seemed no reason why this day more than any other should be remembered. Yet the memory of it is persistent, and has so forced itself upon me that every moment of it now stands out as clear and distinct before my eyes as if it were painted on canvas. Perhaps in the world to come we shall have the power and the will to recall day by day the whole of our lives, and so be enabled to live each moment again, and as often as we please and as long as we please.