Read Ebook: The King's Own Borderers: A Military Romance Volume 2 (of 3) by Grant James

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Ebook has 1312 lines and 68748 words, and 27 pages

Perhaps Flora Warrender may come with him as his bride was the next idea; and it added greatly to the bitterness of the others.

That night Quentin slept but little, and he seemed barely to have closed his eyes when he heard the drum beating the assembly.

Then he sprang from bed just as the grey dawn was breaking, and proceeded hastily to dress, remembering to have heard last evening that, at daybreak, the regiment was to have a "punishment parade," which, to his uninitiated ears, had a very unpleasant sound.

THE PUNISHMENT PARADE.

Plain though it was, being destitute of lace or epaulettes, poor Quentin was very proud of his volunteer uniform, and being eminently a handsome young man, he looked very well in it. The coarse buff crossbelts, the pouch, and bayonet, and, more especially, the Brown Bess he had to carry, did not suit his taste quite so well. He had imagined that he would have to shoulder a kind of Joe Manton, or something like a smart Enfield rifle of the present day, with a "draw" of ten pounds or less on the trigger, instead of a long blunderbuss like the regulation musket of those days, weighing fourteen pounds, with its enormous butt-plate of brass and so forth.

Thanks to the teaching of the old quartermaster, he proved himself so apt a pupil under the sergeant-major and old Norman Calder, that within a week he was reported as "fit for duty," as Monkton said, "doing as much credit to his preceptors as to the cabbage-stalk," for so he designated the army tailor.

But we are anticipating.

His first parade was an inauspicious one, in so far as it was for punishment.

A sergeant of the regiment had been recently tried by a regimental court-martial for permitting spirits to be brought by a woman to the main guard-house at night, while he was in command, and by these means certain prisoners became intoxicated and riotous. He alleged that he was asleep on that luxurious couch, the guard bed, after posting his sentinels, and that the fault lay with his corporal and others; but the plea was urged in vain--the corps was under orders for foreign service--an example was necessary; so he was now to receive the award of his dereliction of duty, and as the drum-major had received some special instructions over night, all knew that it involved the application of the now almost obsolete instrument--the cat!

The degradation of a non-commissioned officer is always a painful duty; but when flogging is added thereto, it is doubly painful to the witnesses, and maddening to the culprit.

Quentin being a young hand, felt somewhat awed, as he knew not what was about to ensue. The sun had not yet risen, and the September morning was chilly and misty; the men of the regiment were falling in by companies under arms in light marching order--the tall grenadiers on the right with their black bearskin caps; the smart light company on the left with green plumes in their shakos, and Saxon horns on all their appointments; the sergeants were calling the various rolls; the officers were gathered in a somewhat silent group, and the face of every man wore a sullen, or rather dejected expression, for a punishment parade is the kind of parade least liked by soldiers of all ranks. It acts as a damper on the spirits of all; on this morning the atmosphere was dense; the sombre sun seemed to linger behind the uplands of Suffolk, and the shadows to lie deeper in the silent barrack square.

Impressed by the taciturnity and gloomy expression of the men, whose faces wore the pallor incident to all who come from bed in haste at an unusual hour, Quentin remained silent and full of expectation and anxiety as he fell into the rear rank of Captain Askerne's company, to which he was to be permanently attached. He was sensible, however, that the soldiers viewed him with interest, as a volunteer is always popular. It was to rescue Thomas Grahame, when lying severely wounded, and then serving as a simple volunteer in the red coat of the Caledonian Hunt, that our troops in Holland made one of their most desperate rallies, and gained to the service the future Lord Lynedoch, the hero of Barossa.

The inspection of the companies and the drum for coverers rapidly followed the calling of the muster-rolls; a bugle sounded; the officers fell in; the bayonets were fixed, and the regiment, without music, was marched silently by sections to a secluded part of the barracks, where, surrounded by high stores and magazines, no stranger's eye could oversee the proceedings, and then it was formed in a hollow square, in the centre of which Quentin perceived three sergeants' pikes strapped together by the heads, an equilateral triangle being formed by the shafts, which were stuck in the earth. Near these were the drummers and drum-major, who carried in his hand a canvas bag, which, as Quentin was informed in a whisper by the next file on his right, contained "the cats."

"The officer with the cocked hat, and without a sash, close by, is the doctor," he added.

"The doctor--for what is he required?"

"You'll too soon see that, sir," was the ominous response.

"Steady, rear rank--silence," growled old Sergeant Calder.

At that moment one of the drummers drew forth a cat, and Quentin could perceive that it consisted of nine tails of whipcord, each having nine knots thereon, and these were firmly lashed to a handle about the length of a drum-stick. A slight shudder with an emotion of sickness came over him; and he looked anxiously at the face of Major Middleton, but it seemed immovable as he said to the sergeant-major with studied sternness of tone,

"March in the prisoner."

A section in the face of the square wheeled backward and permitted the unfortunate, with his escort, consisting of a corporal and two men of the barrack-guard, to march in and halt before the major, on which the culprit took off his forage-cap and stood bareheaded, the centre of all observation.

He cast a haggard glance at the triangles; another half furtively and restlessly at the stolid faces round him, and then he seemed to become immovable. There was little need for Mr. Buckle, the adjutant, to read over the proceedings of the Court, for the hopeless sergeant knew at once his double degradation and his doom!

Perhaps the poor fellow was thinking of that signal and bloody day--perhaps of his boyhood and his home; it might be of the future, that was all a blank; for he seemed as in a dream while the adjutant read over the formula of the trial, the list of charges and the sentence, till he was roused by the drum-major proceeding to rip off with a penknife the three hard-won chevrons from his right arm. It was done gently, but "the iron seemed to enter his soul" at the moment, and a heavy sigh escaped him as his chin sank on his breast.

"Allan Grange," said Major Middleton, raising his voice clearly and distinctly, that the whole of the hollow square and even its supernumerary ranks might hear, "you are the last man in the whole Borderers whom I could have expected to see standing before us as you do to-day. In cutting off your stripes I feel extreme reluctance and sorrow, and I think you have known me long enough to be aware of that."

"I am, major--I am aware of it," said the reduced man in a hollow voice.

A heavy sigh escaped the sergeant; the drum-major's knife gave a final rip, and he stood once more a private on parade!

"The worst part of your sentence yet remains--unless--unless you volunteer into the York Chasseurs."

"Major Middleton," said Grange, firmly, and standing erect, like a fine man as he was, "I'll not leave the regiment!"

The man was fearfully pale, and it was evident to all that Middleton, though a strict and sometimes severe officer, was greatly moved.

"You will rather take three hundred and fifty lashes than volunteer?" he asked.

"I'd volunteer for a forlorn hope; I've done so before now, sir, as you know well, but I'll not quit the old 25th for a condemned corps. I'll take my punishment--I've earned it like a fool, and with God's help, I hope to bear it like a man."

"Then strip, sir," said Middleton, playing nervously with the blue ribbons of his gorget.

All emotion seemed to pass away as the culprit proceeded deliberately to unclasp his leather stock and unbutton his coat; but before it was off the major exclaimed in a loud voice, as he drew a letter from his pocket--

Grange paused, and looked up with a haggard and bloodshot eye.

"I remit the rest of the sentence, for the sake of one who intercedes for you."

"Sir?"

"I have had a petition from your wife, and willingly grant it. Take away the triangles. Conduct yourself as you did till this misfortune came upon you, and ere long, Grange, you may regain the stripes you have to-day been deprived of. Rejoin your company."

Here Grange fairly broke down and sobbed aloud; and no man among the nine hundred there thought the less of him, because his stout heart, which even the terror of the lash could not appal, now became full of penitence and gratitude. At that moment many an eye glistened in the ranks, and many a heart was swelling.

"There, there--don't make a fuss," said Middleton, testily; "I hate scenes! Prepare to form quarter-distance column right in front--stand fast the Light Company."

And so ended an episode, that, like the warm rising sun now shining cheerfully into the barrack-square, shed a brightness over every face, and lent a lightness--a sense of pleasure and relief to every heart, as the regiment marched back to quarters, and to what was of some importance after being two hours under arms in the morning air--breakfast.

THE OLD REGIMENT OF EDINBURGH.

From Major Middleton, who took somewhat of a fatherly interest in him, Quentin learned much of the past history and achievements of the regiment he had joined.

It was one with which the stories of his old military friends at Rohallion had made him familiar from boyhood; thus, he was in possession of so many old regimental names, so many stock stories and anecdotes, which Middleton deemed unknown beyond the circle of their mess-table and barrack-rooms, that he considered the lad an enigma, and was puzzled how, or where, he had gained all this information about the corps; for Quentin, though looking forward to the arrival of Cosmo with a disgust that almost amounted to terror, kept his own counsel with wonderful prudence, and never permitted the name of Rohallion to escape him.

As there is no official record of the Borderers' achievements prior to 1808, the account given by the major is perhaps the only one extant.

Under David Leslie, Earl of Leven, the 25th Foot were formed on the 10th of March, 1689, from a body of six thousand Covenanters, who, on the news of William of Orange landing at Torbay, marched from the West Country and laid siege to the castle of Edinburgh. On their banners were an open Bible, with the motto, "For Reformation according to the Word of God."

Marching north against the loyal Highlanders, they left their compatriots, all of whom served without pay or remuneration till the conclusion of the siege, when the fortress was surrendered by the Duke of Gordon after a noble defence, and after being warned by a spectre--pale as he "who drew Priam's curtain at the dead of night"--in fact, by the wraith of the terrible Claverhouse in his buff coat, cuirass, and cavalier wig, all stained with gouts of blood, that he had been shot by a silver bullet on the field of Killycrankie. In one of the rooms of the old fortress this vision is alleged to have appeared to Colin, Earl of Balcarris, then the duke's prisoner, and the truth of the episode is admitted by a delirious biographer of the viscount, who affirms that he is frequently in communion with the ghost in question, and with others.

The Earl of Leven, though colonel of infantry under Frederick Wilhelm, Elector of Brandenburg, and of a regiment which came over with the Prince of Orange, who made him Governor of Edinburgh Castle and Master of the Scottish ordnance, was a Whig noble, chiefly famous for the rapidity of his flight from Killycrankie, and the vigour with which he horsewhipped the Lady Morton Hall. It is said that he rode six miles from the Pass without drawing his bridle, though his regiment, the future 25th, and Hastings, the future 13th, were the only troops that made any stand against the victorious Highlanders.

As Leven's regiment--the same in which "my uncle Toby" fought at Landen, and with which he went to "mount guard in the trenches before the gate of St. Nicholas in his roquelaure"--it served in all King William's useless wars for the well-being of his darling Dutch, and all the great barrier towns of Europe have heard the drums of the 25th. It was the first British regiment which used the socket in lieu of the screw bayonet, which its lieutenant-colonel, Maxwell, adopted in imitation of the bayonets of the French Fusiliers. Prior to this, our bayonets were screwed into the muzzles of the muskets, and to fire with them fixed, was, of course, an impossibility. After fighting at Sheriffmuir, as Viscount Shannon's Foot, it served with distinction in the wars of the Spanish and Austrian succession, and shared in the disasters of Fontenoy, ere its soldiers had again to imbrue their hands in the blood of their own countrymen at Falkirk, at Culloden, and in defending the Comyn's Tower in the old Castle of Blair against Lord George Murray, till we find them again among the troops defeated at Val through the cowardice and incapacity of the Duke of Cumberland.

With admirable coolness the sergeant desired his comrades to retire, and request the king to take charge of his wife and children. He then, inspired by a spirit of self-devotion, set fire to the train and perished, as the mine exploded. The outwork rose into the air and fell thundering into the fosse, Lord Rohallion, a corporal, and two men alone escaping, covered with bruises and cuts. The name of the sergeant was said to be Amadeus di Savillano, son of the Castellan of the fortress of that name in Piedmont.

The Edinburgh regiment served at the battle of Minden. The Earl of Home was then its colonel, and it was in the second line, and on the left of Kingsley's famous brigade. Landing in England, on the homeward march, near the Borders, the old colours borne in the seven years' war were buried by its soldiers, with all honour, and three volleys were fired over them.

In those days, when any regiment approached London, the colours were furled and cased, and no drum was beaten or fife blown during the march through its limits. The 3rd, or Old East Kentish Buffs, were alone excepted, and had the exclusive privilege of marching through the City of London with all the honours of war, in memory of having, at some period, been recruited from the City Trained Bands.

Likewise no regiment could beat a drum within the walls, or through the portes of the Scottish capital, with the exception of the 25th, or old Edinburgh Regiment. But not long after the battle of Minden, it chanced that a certain thick-pated lord-provost objected to their drums beating up for recruits, on the plea that none should beat there but those of the City Guard. On this, the colonel, Lord George Henry Lennox , was so incensed, that on his special application the title of the corps was changed, and its facings were altered from the royal yellow of Scotland to the royal blue of Britain, and after a time it was styled the "King's Own Borderers."

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