The savour of the soup, however, was agreeable to
Mrs. O'Dowd's nostrils: and she thought she would bear
Mr. Jos company. So the two sate down to their meal.
"God bless the meat," said the Major's wife, solemnly:
she was thinking of her honest Mick, riding at the head
of his regiment: " 'Tis but a bad dinner those poor
boys will get to-day," she said, with a sigh, and then,
like a philosopher, fell to.
Jos's spirits rose with his meal. He would drink the
regiment's health; or, indeed, take any other excuse to
indulge in a glass of champagne. "We'll drink to O'Dowd
and the brave --th," said he, bowing gallantly to his
guest. "Hey, Mrs. O'Dowd? Fill Mrs. O'Dowd's glass,
Isidor."
But all of a sudden, Isidor started, and the Major's
wife laid down her knife and fork. The windows of the
room were open, and looked southward, and a dull distant
sound came over the sun-lighted roofs from that
direction. ''What is it?" said Jos. "Why don't you pour, you
rascal?"
"Cest le feu!" said Isidor, running to the balcony.
"God defend us; it's cannon!" Mrs. O'Dowd cried,
starting up, and followed too to the window. A thousand
pale and anxious faces might have been seen looking
from other casements. And presently it seemed as if the
whole population of the city rushed into the streets.
CHAPTER XXXII
In Which Jos Takes Flight, and the War Is Brought to a Close
We of peaceful London City have never beheld--and
please God never shall witness--such a scene of hurry
and alarm, as that which Brussels presented. Crowds
rushed to the Namur gate, from which direction the noise
proceeded, and many rode along the level chaussee, to
be in advance of any intelligence from the army. Each
man asked his neighbour for news; and even great
English lords and ladies condescended to speak to persons
whom they did not know. The friends of the French went
abroad, wild with excitement, and prophesying the
triumph of their Emperor. The merchants closed their
shops, and came out to swell the general chorus of alarm
and clamour. Women rushed to the churches, and
crowded the chapels, and knelt and prayed on the flags
and steps. The dull sound of the cannon went on rolling,
rolling. Presently carriages with travellers began to leave
the town, galloping away by the Ghent barrier. The
prophecies of the French partisans began to pass for
facts. "He has cut the armies in two," it was said. "He is
marching straight on Brussels. He will overpower the
English, and be here to-night." "He will overpower the
English," shrieked Isidor to his master, "and will be here
to-night." The man bounded in and out from the lodgings
to the street, always returning with some fresh particulars
of disaster. Jos's face grew paler and paler. Alarm began
to take entire possession of the stout civilian. All the
champagne he drank brought no courage to him. Before
sunset he was worked up to such a pitch of nervousness
as gratified his friend Isidor to behold, who now counted
surely upon the spoils of the owner of the laced coat.
The women were away all this time. After hearing
the firing for a moment, the stout Major's wife bethought
her of her friend in the next chamber, and ran in to watch,
and if possible to console, Amelia. The idea that she had
that helpless and gentle creature to protect, gave
additional strength to the natural courage of the honest
Irishwoman. She passed five hours by her friend's side,
sometimes in remonstrance, sometimes talking cheerfully,
oftener in silence and terrified mental supplication. "I
never let go her hand once," said the stout lady
afterwards, "until after sunset, when the firing was over."
Pauline, the bonne, was on her knees at church hard by,
praying for son homme a elle.
When the noise of the cannonading was over, Mrs.
O'Dowd issued out of Amelia's room into the parlour
adjoining, where Jos sate with two emptied flasks, and
courage entirely gone. Once or twice he had ventured into
his sister's bedroom, looking very much alarmed, and
as if he would say something. But the Major's wife kept
her place, and he went away without disburthening
himself of his speech. He was ashamed to tell her that he
wanted to fly.
But when she made her appearance in the dining-room,
where he sate in the twilight in the cheerless company
of his empty champagne bottles, he began to open his
mind to her.
"Mrs. O'Dowd," he said, "hadn't you better get Amelia
ready?"
"Are you going to take her out for a walk?" said the
Major's lady; "sure she's too weak to stir."
"I--I've ordered the carriage," he said, "and--and
post-horses; Isidor is gone for them," Jos continued.
"What do you want with driving to-night?" answered
the lady. "Isn't she better on her bed? I've just got her
to lie down."
"Get her up," said Jos; "she must get up, I say": and
he stamped his foot energetically. "I say the horses are
ordered--yes, the horses are ordered. It's all over, and--"
"And what?" asked Mrs. O'Dowd.
"I'm off for Ghent," Jos answered. "Everybody is
going; there's a place for you! We shall start in half-an-
hour."
The Major's wife looked at him with infinite scorn. "I
don't move till O'Dowd gives me the route," said she.
"You may go if you like, Mr. Sedley; but, faith, Amelia
and I stop here."
"She SHALL go," said Jos, with another stamp of his
foot. Mrs. O'Dowd put herself with arms akimbo before
the bedroom door.
"Is it her mother you're going to take her to?" she
said; "or do you want to go to Mamma yourself, Mr.
Sedley? Good marning--a pleasant journey to ye, sir.
Bon voyage, as they say, and take my counsel, and shave
off them mustachios, or they'll bring you into mischief."
"D--n!" yelled out Jos, wild with fear, rage, and
mortification; and Isidor came in at this juncture, swearing in
his turn. "Pas de chevaux, sacre bleu!" hissed out the
furious domestic. All the horses were gone. Jos was
not the only man in Brussels seized with panic that day.
But Jos's fears, great and cruel as they were already,
were destined to increase to an almost frantic pitch
before the night was over. It has been mentioned how
Pauline, the bonne, had son homme a elle also in the
ranks of the army that had gone out to meet the Emperor
Napoleon. This lover was a native of Brussels, and a
Belgian hussar. The troops of his nation signalised
themselves in this war for anything but courage, and young
Van Cutsum, Pauline's admirer, was too good a soldier
to disobey his Colonel's orders to run away. Whilst in
garrison at Brussels young Regulus (he had been born in
the revolutionary times) found his great comfort, and
passed almost all his leisure moments, in Pauline's
kitchen; and it was with pockets and holsters crammed
full of good things from her larder, that he had take
leave of his weeping sweetheart, to proceed upon the
campaign a few days before.
As far as his regiment was concerned, this campaign
was over now. They had formed a part of the division
under the command of his Sovereign apparent, the Prince
of Orange, and as respected length of swords and
mustachios, and the richness of uniform and equipments,
Regulus and his comrades looked to be as gallant a body
of men as ever trumpet sounded for.
When Ney dashed upon the advance of the allied
troops, carrying one position after the other, until the
arrival of the great body of the British army from
Brussels changed the aspect of the combat of Quatre Bras,
the squadrons among which Regulus rode showed the
greatest activity in retreating before the French, and were
dislodged from one post and another which they occupied
with perfect alacrity on their part. Their movements
were only checked by the advance of the British in their
rear. Thus forced to halt, the enemy's cavalry (whose
bloodthirsty obstinacy cannot be too severely
reprehended) had at length an opportunity of coming to close
quarters with the brave Belgians before them; who
preferred to encounter the British rather than the French,
and at once turning tail rode through the English
regiments that were behind them, and scattered in all
directions. The regiment in fact did not exist any more. It was
nowhere. It had no head-quarters. Regulus found himself
galloping many miles from the field of action, entirely
alone; and whither should he fly for refuge so naturally
as to that kitchen and those faithful arms in which
Pauline had so often welcomed him?
At some ten o'clock the clinking of a sabre might have
been heard up the stair of the house where the Osbornes
occupied a story in the continental fashion. A knock
might have been heard at the kitchen door; and poor
Pauline, come back from church, fainted almost with
terror as she opened it and saw before her her haggard
hussar. He looked as pale as the midnight dragoon who
came to disturb Leonora. Pauline would have screamed,
but that her cry would have called her masters, and
discovered her friend. She stifled her scream, then, and
leading her hero into the kitchen, gave him beer, and
the choice bits from the dinner, which Jos had not had
the heart to taste. The hussar showed he was no ghost by
the prodigious quantity of flesh and beer which he
devoured--and during the mouthfuls he told his tale of
disaster.
His regiment had performed prodigies of courage, and
had withstood for a while the onset of the whole French
army. But they were overwhelmed at last, as was the
whole British army by this time. Ney destroyed each
regiment as it came up. The Belgians in vain interposed to
prevent the butchery of the English. The Brunswickers
were routed and had fled--their Duke was killed. It was
a general debacle. He sought to drown his sorrow for
the defeat in floods of beer.
Isidor, who had come into the kitchen, heard the
conversation and rushed out to inform his master. "It is
all over," he shrieked to Jos. "Milor Duke is a prisoner;
the Duke of Brunswick is killed; the British army is in
full flight; there is only one man escaped, and he is in the
kitchen now--come and hear him." So Jos tottered into
that apartment where Regulus still sate on the kitchen
table, and clung fast to his flagon of beer. In the best
French which he could muster, and which was in sooth
of a very ungrammatical sort, Jos besought the hussar to
tell his tale. The disasters deepened as Regulus spoke. He
was the only man of his regiment not slain on the field.
He had seen the Duke of Brunswick fall, the black
hussars fly, the Ecossais pounded down by the cannon.
"And the --th?" gasped Jos.
"Cut in pieces," said the hussar--upon which Pauline
cried out, "O my mistress, ma bonne petite dame," went
off fairly into hysterics, and filled the house with her
screams.
Wild with terror, Mr. Sedley knew not how or where
to seek for safety. He rushed from the kitchen back to
the sitting-room, and cast an appealing look at Amelia's
door, which Mrs. O'Dowd had closed and locked in his
face; but he remembered how scornfully the latter had
received him, and after pausing and listening for a brief
space at the door, he left it, and resolved to go into the
street, for the first time that day. So, seizing a candle, he
looked about for his gold-laced cap, and found it lying in its
usual place, on a console-table, in the anteroom, placed
before a mirror at which Jos used to coquet, always
giving his side-locks a twirl, and his cap the proper cock
over his eye, before he went forth to make appearance in
public. Such is the force of habit, that even in the midst
of his terror he began mechanically to twiddle with his
hair, and arrange the cock of his hat. Then he looked
amazed at the pale face in the glass before him, and
especially at his mustachios, which had attained a rich
growth in the course of near seven weeks, since they had
come into the world. They WILL mistake me for a military
man, thought he, remembering Isidor's warning as
to the massacre with which all the defeated British army
was threatened; and staggering back to his bedchamber,
he began wildly pulling the bell which summoned his
valet.
Isidor answered that summons. Jos had sunk in a chair
--he had torn off his neckcloths, and turned down his
collars, and was sitting with both his hands lifted to his
throat.
"Coupez-moi, Isidor," shouted he; "vite! Coupez-moi!"
Isidor thought for a moment he had gone mad, and
that he wished his valet to cut his throat.
"Les moustaches," gasped Joe; "les moustaches--
coupy, rasy, vite!"--his French was of this sort--voluble,
as we have said, but not remarkable for grammar.
Isidor swept off the mustachios in no time with the
razor, and heard with inexpressible delight his master's
orders that he should fetch a hat and a plain coat. "Ne
porty ploo--habit militair--bonn--bonny a voo, prenny
dehors"--were Jos's words--the coat and cap were at
last his property.
This gift being made, Jos selected a plain black coat
and waistcoat from his stock, and put on a large white
neckcloth, and a plain beaver. If he could have got a
shovel hat he would have worn it. As it was, you would
have fancied he was a flourishing, large parson of the
Church of England.
"Venny maintenong," he continued, "sweevy--ally--
