CHAPTER XVII.

Who cannot be crushed with a plot?

All is Well that Ends Well.

Sir Rowland Hill had sent L'Isle off to the southward, to ascertain the strength and condition of the reserve of Spanish troops moving up from Andalusia. One might think that these things could be better learned from the official reports of the _Conde d'Abispal_ and the officers under him. But from the Prince of Parma's day to this, Spanish officers in reporting the number and condition of their commands, have made it a rule to state what they ought to be, not what they are, leaving all deficiencies to be found out on the day of battle. Sir Rowland, knowing this, now made use of L'Isle, whose knowledge of the Spanish language and character, and his acquaintance with many officers of rank, enabled him to ascertain the truth without betraying the object of his mission, or giving offence to these proud and jealous allies. Ten days had gone by when he again rode into Elvas, and in spite of the secrecy aimed at in military councils, many symptoms indicated that the campaign was about to open.

It was high time for the brigade to leave this part of the country. The soldiers were disgusted with the sluggish people around them, keen and active only in their efforts to make money out of their protectors. The Portuguese were exasperated at the insolence of their allies, their frequent depredations and occasional acts of violence, many of which went unpunished; for the English officers, always professing the utmost readiness to punish the offences of their men, were singularly scrupulous and exacting as to the conclusiveness of the proofs of guilt.

Lord Strathern's lax discipline may have aggravated, but had not caused the evil, which was felt throughout Portugal. The Regency, while proving itself unable to govern the country, or reform a single abuse, had shown its ability to hara.s.s their allies and embarra.s.s the general charged with the conduct of the war. "A narrow jealousy had long ruled their conduct, and the spirit of captious discontent had now reached the inferior magistracy, who endeavored to excite the people against the military generally. Complaints came in from all quarters, of outrages on the part of the troops, some too true, but many of them false or frivolous; and when Wellington ordered courts-martial for the trial of the accused, the magistrates refused to attend as witnesses, because Portuguese custom rendered such attendance degrading, and by Portuguese law a magistrate's written testimony was efficient in courts-martial. Wellington in vain a.s.sured them that English law would not suffer him to punish men on such testimony; in vain he pointed out the mischief which must infallibly overwhelm the country, if the soldiers discovered that they might thus do evil with impunity. He offered to send, in each case, lists of Portuguese witnesses required, that they might be summoned by the native authorities; but nothing could overcome the obstinacy of the magistrates; they answered that his method was insolent; and with sullen malignity continued to acc.u.mulate charges against the troops, to refuse attendance in the courts, and to call the soldiers, their own as well as the British, 'licensed spoliators of the community.'"

"For a time the generous nature of the poor people resisted all these combined causes of discontent, * * * * * yet by degrees the affection for the British cooled, and Wellington expressed his fears that a civil war would commence between the Portuguese people on the one hand, and the troops of both nations on the other. Wherefore his activity to draw all military strength to a head, and make such an irruption into Spain, as would establish a new base of operations beyond the power of such fatal dissensions."

Throughout the war this great captain's hardest tasks had been to conciliate the jealous, vain-glorious Spaniard, to stimulate the laggard suspicious Portuguese, to enlighten the invincible ignorance of Regency and _Juntas_, in order to draw out and combine the resources of both countries with the scanty means afforded him by his own blundering government. He was required to do great things with small means, without offending one t.i.ttle against the laws, customs and prejudices of three dissimilar nations. He might toil, fret and fume, wearing himself to the bone, but could never get rid of this task of making ropes out of sea-sand. So much as to the state of the country. Let us return to our story.

L'Isle reached Elvas early in the day, and resolved to reward himself for his labors, by paying a visit to Lady Mabel; then after a conference with Lord Strathern, to sit down and write his report to Sir Rowland, on the state of the Andalusian reserve. He knew that Sir Rowland looked for a precise and pithy statement, and L'Isle mean this to be a model for all such communications. But fate may mar the wisest plan.

He found Lady Mabel and Mrs. Shortridge together, and soon perceived that the latter lady's head was full of an entertainment she was about to give.

"The commissary has warned me," she said "that from henceforth he will be ever on the move--that he must break up his household here, and send off his heavy baggage to Lisbon. In this he very politely includes his wife."

"I am truly sorry to hear it," said L'Isle, "but confess that first among a soldier's _impedimenta_ must be reckoned his wife."

"I did not look for so blunt an a.s.sent to the commissary's opinion from you," said Mrs. Shortridge, somewhat nettled; "however, I am to go, and as many of the good folks of Elvas have been as polite to me as they know how, I wish to show my sense of it in parting. I have invited all my Portuguese friends, with a good sprinkling of red coats to meet them. I have put myself to infinite trouble and no little expense, meaning to have a grand evening, combining _turtulia_, concert and ball. I would show these people something of society and life, then vanish from Elvas in a blaze of glory. Now, as the rarest treat that I could offer, I had promised my guests that they should hear Lady Mabel in all her glorious richness of voice; and now she is seized with a sudden fit of modesty, and protests against being exhibited before a motly crowd like an opera singer."

Lady Mabel's reluctance was not feigned; and when Mrs. Shortridge called on L'Isle for a.s.sistance in overcoming it, he felt some scruples at lending his aid. But her companion and friend was about to leave her; it was painful to refuse her a favor on which she plainly laid great stress. Friendship and flattery at length prevailed, and Lady Mabel promised to do her utmost to charm the ears of the natives, on condition that L'Isle should be at hand as her interpreter, and say to them for her a dozen polite and half as many witty things for every song she sang, in order that these foreigners might not mistake her for a mere singer.

L'Isle pledged himself to be at her beck throughout the evening, and to furnish wit and politeness without stint. This obstacle overcome, Mrs. Shortridge was delighted, and talked gaily of her arrangements and antic.i.p.ations for the appointed night. L'Isle entering into her humor, busied himself in drawing out a programme for Lady Mabel's performance, and after turning over all the music at hand, made a list of songs long enough to have cracked her voice forever. It was late when he suddenly remembered that he had occasion to see Lord Strathern, and he tore himself away to seek him.

L'Isle found his lordship in the business room of his quarters, and quite at leisure, although seated by a table on which lay sundry papers in no business like order. Most of them were despatches, returns and other military doc.u.ments. But among them was a goodly pile of communications from the _Juiz de fora_ of more than one neighboring _comarca_, written in eloquent but denunciatory Portuguese, being, in truth, philippics aimed at sundry individuals or parties, belonging to his command.

The old soldier had not treated them with absolute neglect. After having the first two or three duly translated to him, and making himself familiar with the tenor of this kind of doc.u.ment, he had prepared a concise form of reply: regretting that any of his Majesty's soldiers should be guilty of any act of violence, depredation or impropriety in the country of their friends and allies, and proposing that the accusers should come forward and prove the charges before a court-martial, according to British laws. A copy of this stereotyped answer, turned into good Portuguese, was always at hand to be dispatched in reply to each new complaint, as soon as it reached headquarters. Thus the correspondence cost little trouble there, for Lord Strathern had an easy-going philosophy, which, like an ambling pad, carried him smoothly over the rough and intricate path of diplomacy, policy, and military exigencies. He knew it was impossible to give perfect satisfaction to the Portuguese, and unlike his commander, he eschewed all such attempts to make ropes out of sea-sand.

L'Isle's entrance roused Lord Strathern from a pleasant reverie over his cigar.

"Why, L'Isle! are you back again? You certainly have the gift of appearing just when you are wanted. Is not that the case with a character called Mephistophiles?"

"Yes, my lord; but he is a devil," said L'Isle, drily.

"I beg your pardon. I did not mean to make an unsavory comparison. But here is another billetdoux from Sir Rowland awaiting you."

L'Isle, taking the dispatch handed to him, broke the seal and read it deliberately, then said: "Does Sir Rowland think I keep an extra stud of horses, to do the riding that properly belongs to his own staff?"

"Why, where is he sending you now?"

"To Badajoz, on an errand similar to that on which I went into Andalusia."

"To Badajoz? That is no distance at all; at least nothing to grumble at," said Lord Strathern. "You are growing lazy, L'Isle. Why Mabel would ride that far after a rare flower. Just think you are chasing a fox, who takes the high road, and never doubles once between this and Badajoz."

"That would be a fox of a new breed," suggested L'Isle.

"I confess," said his lordship, "I never started one of the kind. But Sir Rowland's staff have their hands full just now. To lighten their labors, I have had to furnish more than one officer for special duties. You surely would not have Sir Rowland send an aid all the way from _Coria_, merely to see if those Spanish fellows in Badajoz are in a state to march without disbanding, or without plundering the country as they move through it!"

"Talking of marauding, my lord," said L'Isle; "I wish the taste for that diversion was confined to our Spanish friends. It is becoming every day more necessary to check the excesses of our own people. We cannot send out a party into the country around, but on their return they are dogged at the heels by complaints and accusations. When we march hence, we shall leave a villainous name behind us."

"Oh, we will never come back here again," said Lord Strathern, carelessly. "Moreover, two-thirds of these complaints are groundless, and the rest grossly exaggerated."

"The sacking of the farmer's house on the border needed no exaggeration," said L'Isle.

"I tell you that was done by the Spaniards," exclaimed Lord Strathern.

"Yet worse cases than that have occurred, and gone unpunished," urged L'Isle.

"Because they never could prove the charge, and point out the culprits," replied his lordship. "The country is full of _rateros_. They commit the crimes and our fellows bear the blame."

"That is often true; but I have met with one little case in which the offenders can be pointed out."

"Well, let me hear it," said Lord Strathern, leaning back in his chair, as if compelled to listen, but anxious to be rid of the subject.

"I stopped for a while on my way back," said L'Isle, "at a little venda on this side of _Juramenha_. The people of the house were shy and sullen. I had to ask many questions before I could induce them to speak freely, but at length out came a charge against some of our people. Three nights ago five of our men had come to the house, and, calling for wine, sat down to drink. They soon became riotous, and their conduct so insulting to the man's wife and daughters, that they ran away to hide themselves. When he required them to pay the reckoning and quit the house, they promised most liberal payment, and seizing, bound him to a post in his own stable, where they gave him fifty lashes with a leathern strap, valuing the stripes at a _vintem_ apiece."

"The witty rascals," said Lord Strathern; "I would like to repay them in their own coin."

"Moreover," continued L'Isle, "on the man's son making some resistance to their treatment of his father, they bound the boy, too, and gave him a dozen _vintems_' worth of the strap for pocket money."

"The liberal rascals!" said Lord Strathern; "they deserve a handsome profit on their outlay. But how do you know, L'Isle, that this story is true?"

"There is no mistake about the flogging," exclaimed L'Isle. "They used the buckle end of the strap, and, I myself saw the marks, some not yet scarred over."

"That silent witness may prove a good deal; I cannot call it tongueless," said his lordship, "for I suppose the buckle had a tongue."

"I can vouch for that by the mark it left behind," said L'Isle. "Both father and son swore that they would know the fellows among a thousand. But the man dare not come to Elvas to search them out, as the scamps promised faithfully to make sausage meat of him should he venture near the town."

"If the cowardly rascal will not come forward and lodge a complaint,"

said Lord Strathern, "what the devil can we do?"

"We can bring him here and protect him," said L'Isle, "while he hunts out the culprits. If necessary, I will take him before my regiment, and let him look every man in the face, to see if he can identify the offenders in the ranks; and so with other regiments."

"What! muster the whole brigade for such a poltroon to inspect them!"

exclaimed Lord Strathern. "What are you dreaming of, L'Isle? It would be offering a bounty for accusations against the men. Half these rascals would swear away a man's life for a _crusado_."

"Perhaps so, my lord. But by cross-questions and examining them apart, the truth may be wrung from even lying witnesses."

"Impossible, with these people; the truth is not in them. Come, L'Isle, no one knows better than you, who are so much in Sir Rowland's councils, that we are on the point of moving from this part of the country. The little disorders that have occurred here, can be followed by no ill consequences."

"We carry the worse consequences with us," said L'Isle, pertinaciously. "Little disorders, my lord! The peasantry round Elvas do not talk of them so. They say that their property is plundered, their women insulted, and themselves at constant risk in life and limb."