CHAPTER XXVI. A FOREST PATH.
When I reached Wiemar I quitted the diligence, resolved to make theremainder of the journey on foot; for thus I should both economizethe little means I possessed, and escape many of the questionings andinquiries to which as a traveller by public conveyance I was exposed.Knapsack on shoulder, then, and staff in hand, I plodded onward, andalthough frequently coming up with others on their way homeward, Iavoided all companionship with those whom I could no longer think of ascomrades.
The two tides of population which met upon that great highway told thewhole history of war. Here came the young soldiers, fresh enrolledin the conscription, glowing with ardor, and bounding with life andbuoyancy, and mingling their village songs with warlike chants. There,footsore and weary, with tattered uniform and weather-beaten look,toiled along the tired veteran, turning as he went a glance ofcompassionate contempt on those whose wild _vivas_ burst forth ingreeting. As for me, I could neither partake of the high hopes ofthe one, nor sympathize with the war-worn nature of the other.Disappointment, bitter disappointment, in every cherished expectation,had thrown a chill over me, and I wanted even the energy to becomereckless. In this state, I did not dare to face the future, but in moodydespondency reflected on the past. Was this the destiny Marie de Meudonpredicted for me? was the ever-present thought of my mind. Is it thus Ishould appear before her?
A hundred times came the thought to join the new levies as a soldier,to carry a musket in the ranks. But then came back in all its forcethe memory of the distrust and suspicion my services had met with: theconviction hourly became clearer to me, that I fought not for liberty,but despotism; that it was not freedom, but slavery, in whose cause Ished my blood.
To avoid meeting with the detachments which each day occupied the road,I turned from the _chaussee_ on passing Eisenach, and took a forestpath that led through Murbach to Fulda. My path led through the CreutzMountains,--a wild and unfrequented tract of country, where few cottageswere to be seen, and scarcely a village existed. Vast forests of darkpines, or bleak and barren mountains, stretched away on either side; afew patches of miserable tillage here and there met the view; but thescene was one of saddening influence, and harmonized but too nearly withmy own despondency.
To reach a place of shelter for the night, I was more than once obligedto walk twelve leagues during the day, and had thus to set out beforedaylight. This exertion, however, brought its own reward: the stimulantof labor, the necessity of a task, gradually allayed the mentalirritation I suffered under; a healthier and more manly tone of thinkingsucceeded to my former regrets; and with a heart elevated, if notcheered, I continued my way.
The third day of my toilsome journey was drawing to a close. A mass ofheavy and lowering clouds, dark and thunder-charged, slowly moved alongthe sky; and a low, moaning sound, that seemed to sigh along theground, boded the approach of a storm. I was still three leagues from myhalting-place, and began to deliberate within myself whether the densepine-wood, which came down to the side of the road, might not afforda safer refuge from the hurricane than the chances of reaching a housebefore it broke forth.
The shepherds who frequented these dreary tracts often erected littlehuts of bark as a shelter against the cold and severity of the wintrydays, and to find out one of these now was my great endeavor. Scarcelyhad I formed the resolve, when I perceived a small path opening into thewood, at the entrance to which a piece of board nailed against thetrunk of a tree, gave tidings that such a place of security was not fardistant. These signs of forest life I had learned in my wanderings, andnow strode forward with renewed vigor.
The path led gradually upwards, along the mountain-side, which soonbecame so encumbered with brushwood that I had much difficulty inpushing my way, and at last began to doubt whether I might not havewandered from the track. The darkness was now complete; night hadfallen, and a heavy crashing rain poured down upon the tree-tops, butcould not penetrate through their tangled shelter. The wind, too,swept in loud gusts above, and the long threatened storm began. Aloud, deafening roar, like that of the sea itself, arose, as the leafybranches bent before the blast, or snapped with sudden shock beneaththe hurricane; clap after clap of thunder resounded, and then the raindescended in torrents,--the heavy drops at last, trickling from leaf toleaf, reaching me as I stood. Once more I pushed forward, and had notgone many paces when the red glare of a fire caught my eye. Steadfastlyfastening my gaze upon the flame, I hurried on, and at length perceivedwith ecstasy that the light issued from the window of a small hovel,such as I have already mentioned. To gain the entrance of the hut I wasobliged to pass the window, and could not resist the temptation to givea glance at the interior, whose cheerful blaze betokened habitation.
It was not without surprise that, instead of the figure of a shepherdreposing beside his fire, I beheld that of an old man, whose dressbespoke the priest, kneeling in deep devotion at the foot of a smallcrucifix attached to the wall. Not all the wild sounds of the ragingstorm seemed to turn his attention from the object of his worship;his eyes were closed, but the head thrown backwards showed his faceupturned, when the lips moved rapidly in prayer. Never had I beheldso perfect a picture of intense devotional feeling; every line in hismarked countenance indicated the tension of a mind filled with oneengrossing thought, while his tremulous hands, clasped before him, shookwith the tremor of strong emotion.
What a contrast to the loud warring of the elements, that peacefulfigure, raised above earth and its troubles, in the spirit of his holycommuning! how deeply touching the calm serenity of his holy brow, withthe rolling crash of falling branches, and the deep baying of the storm!I did not dare to interrupt him; and when I did approach the door it waswith silent step and noiseless gesture. As I stood, the old priest--fornow I saw that he was such--concluded his prayer, and detaching hiscrucifix from the wall, he kissed it reverently, and placed it in hisbosom; then, rising slowly from his knees, he turned towards me. Aslight start of surprise, as quickly followed by a smile of kindlygreeting, escaped him, while he said in French,--
"You are welcome, my son; come in and share with me the shelter, for itis a wild night."
"A wild night, indeed, Father," said I, casting my eyes around thelittle hut, where nothing indicated the appearance of habitation."I could have wished you a better home than this against the storms ofwinter."
"I am a traveller like yourself," said he, smiling at my mistake; "and acountryman, too, if I mistake not."
The accents in which these words were spoken pronounced him a Frenchman,and a very little sufficed to ratify the terms of our companionship; andhaving thrown a fresh billet on the fire, we both seated ourselvesbefore it My wallet was, fortunately, better stored than the goodfather's; and having produced its contents, we supped cheerfully, andlike men who were not eating their first bivouac meal.
"I perceive, Father," said I, as I remarked the manner in which hedisposed his viands, "I perceive you have campaigned ere now; the habitsof the service are not easily mistaken."
"I did not need that observation of yours," replied he, laughingslightly, "to convince me you were a soldier; for, as you truly say,the camp leaves its indelible traces behind it. You are hastening on toBerlin, I suppose?"
I blushed deeply at the question; the shame of my changed condition hadbeen hitherto confined to my own heart, but now it was to be confessedbefore a stranger.
"I ask your pardon, my son, for a question I had no right to ask; andeven there, again, I but showed my soldier education. I am returning toFrance; and in seeking a short path from Eisenach, found myself whereyou see; as night was falling, well content to be so well lodged,--allthe more, if I am to have your companionship."
Few and simple as these words were, there was a tone of frankness inthem, not less than the evidence of a certain good breeding, by whichhe apologized for his own curiosity in speaking thus freely ofhimself, that satisfied me at once; and I hastened to inform him thatcircumstances had induced me to leave the service, in which I had been ac
aptain, and that I was now, like himself, returning to France.
"You must not think, Father," added I, with some eagerness, "you mustnot think that other reasons than my own free will have made me cease tobe a soldier."
"It would ill become me to have borne such a suspicion," interrupted he,quickly. "When one so young and full of life as you are leaves thepath where lie honor and rank and fame, he must have cause to make thesacrifice; for I can scarce think, that at your age, these things seemnought to your eyes."
"You are right, Father, they are not so. They have been my guiding starsfor many a day; alas, that they can be such no longer!"
"There are higher hopes to cherish than these," said he,solemnly,--"higher than the loftiest longings of ambition; but we allof us cling to the things of life, till in their perishable nature theywean us off with disappointment and sorrow. From such a trial am I nowsuffering," added he, in a low voice, while the tears rose to his eyesand slowly coursed along his pale cheeks.
There was a pause neither of us felt inclined to break, when at lengththe priest said,--
"What was your corps in the service?"
"The Eighth Hussars of the Guard," said I, trembling at every word.
"Ah, _he_ was in the Guides," repeated he, mournfully, to himself; "youknew the regiment?"
"Yes, they belonged to the Guard also; they wore no epaulettes, but asmall gold arrow on the collar."
"Like this," said he, unfastening the breast of his cassock, andtaking out a small package, which, among other things, contained thedesignation of the _Corps des Guides_ in an arrow of gold embroidery."Had he not beautiful hair, long and silky as a girl's?" said he, as heproduced a lock of light and sunny brown. "Poor Alphonse! thou wouldsthave been twenty hadst thou lived till yesterday. If I shed tears, youngman, it is because I have lost the great earthly solace of my solitarylife. Others have kindred and friends, have happy homes, which, evenwhen bereavements come, with time will heal up the wound; I had buthim!"
"He was your nephew, perhaps?" said I, half fearing to interfere withhis sorrow.
The old man shook his head in token of dissent, while he muttered tohimself,--
"Auerstadt may be a proud memory to some; to me it is a word of sorrowand mourning. The story is but a short one; alas! it has but one colorthroughout:--
"Count Louis de Meringues--of whom you have doubtless heard that he rodeas postilion to the carriage of his sovereign in the celebrated flightto Varennes--fell by the guillotine the week after the king's trial;the countess was executed on the same scaffold as her husband. I was thepriest who accompanied her at the moment; and in my arms she placed heronly child,--an infant boy of two years. There was a cry among the crowdto have the child executed also, and many called out that the spawnwould be a serpent one day, and it were better to crush it while it wastime; but the little fellow was so handsome, and looked so winninglyaround him on the armed ranks and the glancing weapons, that even_their_ cruel hearts relented, and he was spared. It is to me likeyesterday, as I remember every minute circumstance; I can recall eventhe very faces of that troubled and excited assemblage, that at onemoment screamed aloud for blood, and at the next were convulsed withsavage laughter.
"As I forced my way through the dense array, a rude arm was stretchedout from the mass, and a finger dripping with the gore of the scaffoldwas drawn across the boy's face, while a ruffian voice exclaimed, 'TheMeringues were ever proud of their blood; let us see if it be redderthan other people's.' The child laughed; and the mob, with horridmockery, laughed too.
"I took him home with me to my _presbytere_ at Sevres,--for that was myparish,--and we lived together in peace until the terrible decree wasissued which proclaimed all France atheist. Then we wandered southwards,towards that good land which, through every vicissitude, was true to itsfaith and its king,--La Vendee. At Lyons we were met by a party of therevolutionary soldiers, who, with a commissary of the Government, wereengaged in raising young men for the conscription. Alphonse, who wastwelve years old, felt all a boy's enthusiasm at the warlike displaybefore him, and persuaded me to follow the crowd into the _Place desTerreaux_, where the numbers were read out.
"'Paul Ducos,' cried a voice aloud, as we approached the stage on whichthe commissary and his staff were standing; 'where is this Paul Ducos?'
"'I am here,' replied a fine, frank-looking youth, of some fifteenyears; 'but my father is blind, and I cannot leave him.'
"'We shall soon see that,' called out the commissary. 'Clerk, read outhis _signalement_.'
"'Paul Ducos, son of Eugene Ducos, formerly calling himself Count Ducosde la Breche--'
"'Down with the Royalists! _a bas_ the tyrants!' screamed the mob, notsuffering the remainder to be heard.
"'Approach, Paul Ducos!' said the commissary.
"'Wait here, Father,' whispered the youth; 'I will come back presently.'
"But the old man, a fine and venerable figure, the remnant of a noblerace, held him fast, and, as his lips trembled, said, 'Do not leave me,Paul; my child, my comforter, stay near me.'
"The boy looked round him for one face of kindly pity in this emergency,when, turning towards me, he said rapidly, 'Stand near him!' He brokefrom the old man's embrace, and rushing through the crowd, mounted thescaffold.
"'You are drawn for the conscription, young man,' said the commissary;'but in consideration of your father's infirmity, a substitute will beaccepted. Have you such?'
"The boy shook his head mournfully and in silence.
"'Have you any friend who would assist you here? Bethink you awhile,'rejoined the commissary, who, for his station and duties, was a kind andbenevolent man.
"'I have none. They have left us nothing, neither home nor friends,'said the youth, bitterly; 'and if it were not for his sake, I care notwhat they do with me.'
"'Down with the tyrants!' yelled the mob, as they heard these haughtywords.
"'Then your fate is decreed,' resumed the commissary.
"'No, not yet!' cried out Alphonse, as, breaking from my side, he gainedthe steps and mounted the platform; 'I will be his substitute!'
"Oh! how shall I tell the bitter anguish of that moment, which at oncedispelled the last remaining hope I cherished, and left me destituteforever. As I dashed the tears from my eyes and looked up, the two boyswere locked in each other's arms. It was a sight to have melted anyheart, save those around them; but bloodshed and crime had choked upevery avenue of feeling, and left them, not men, but tigers.
"'Alphonse de Meringues,' cried out the boy, in answer to a questionregarding his name.
"There is no such designation in France,' said a grim-looking,hard-featured man, who, wearing the tri-colored scarf, sat at the tablebeside the clerk.
"'I was never called by any other,' rejoined the youth, proudly.
"'Citizen Meringues,' interposed the commissary, mildly, 'what is yourage?'
"'I know not the years,' replied he; 'but I have heard that I was but aninfant when they slew my father.'
"A fierce roar of passion broke from the mob below the scaffold as theyheard this; and again the cry broke forth, 'Down with the tyrants!'
"'Art thou, then, the son of that base sycophant who rode courier to theCapet to Varennes?' said the hard-featured man at the table.
"'Of the truest gentleman of France,' called out a loud voice from belowthe platform; 'Vive le roi!' It was the blind man who spoke, and wavedhis cap above his head.
"'To the guillotine! to the guillotine!' screamed a hundred voices, intones wilde than the cries of famished wolves, as, seizing the aged man,they tore his clothes to very rags.
"In an instant all attention was turned from the platform to the scenebelow it, where, with shouts and screams of fury, the terrible mobyelled aloud for blood. In vain the guards endeavored to keep back thepeople, who twice rescued their victim from the hands of the soldiery;and already a confused murmur arose that the commissary himself was atraitor to the public, and favored the tyrants, when a dull, clankingsound rose abov
e the tumult, and a cheer of triumph proclaimed theapproach of the instrument of torture.
"In their impetuous torrent of vengeance they had dragged the guillotinefrom the distant end of the 'Place,' where it usually stood; and therenow still knelt the figure of a condemned man, lashed with his armsbehind him, on the platform, awaiting the moment of his doom. Oh, thatterrible face, whereon death had already set its seal! With glazed,lack-lustre eye, and cheek leaden and quivering, he gazed around on thefiendish countenances like one awakening from a dream, his lips partedas though to speak; but no sound came forth.
"'Place! place for Monsieur le Marquis!' shouted a ruffian, as heassisted to raise the figure of the blind man up the steps; and a ribaldyell of fiendish laughter followed the brutal jest.
"'Thou art to make thy journey in most noble company,' said another tothe culprit on the platform.
"'An he see not his way in the next world better than in this, thou mustlend him a hand, friend,' said a third. And with many a ruffian jokethey taunted their victims, who stood on the last threshold of life.
"Among the crowd upon the scaffold of the guillotine I could see thefigure of the blind man as it leaned and fell on either side, as themovement of the mob bore it.
"'_Parbleu!_ these Royalists would rather kneel than stand," said avoice, as they in vain essayed to make the old man place his feet underhim; and ere the laughter which this rude jest excited ceased, a crybroke forth of--'He is dead! he is dead!' And with a heavy sumph, thebody fell from their hands; for when their power of cruelty ended, theycared not for the corpse.
"It was true: life was extinct, none knew how,--whether from theviolence of the mob in its first outbreak, or that a long-sufferingheart had burst at last; but the chord was snapped, and he whose proudsoul lately defied the countless thousands around, now slept with thedead.
"In a few seconds it seemed as though they felt that a power strongerthan their own had interposed between them and their vengeance, andthey stood almost aghast before the corpse, where no trace of bloodproclaimed it to be their own; then, rallying from this stupor, withone voice they demanded that the son should atone for the crimes of thefather.
"'I am ready,' cried the youth, in a voice above the tumult. 'I did notdeem I could be grateful to ye for aught, but I am for this.'
"To no purpose did the commissary propose a delay in the sentence; hewas unsupported by his colleagues. The passions of the mob rosehigher and higher; the thirst for blood, unslaked, became intense andmaddening; and they danced in frantic glee around the guillotine, whilethey chanted one of the demoniac songs of the scaffold.
"In this moment, when the torrent ran in one direction, Alphonse mighthave escaped all notice, but that the condemned youth turned to embracehim once more before he descended from the people.
"'They are so sorry to separate, it is a shame to part them,' cried aruffian in the crowd.
"'You forget, Citizen, that this boy is his substitute,' said thecommissary, mildly; 'the Republic most not be cheated of its defenders.'
"'Vive la Republique!' cried the soldiers; and the cry was re-echoed bythousands, while amid their cheers there rose the last faint sigh of anexpiring victim.
"The scene was over; the crowd dispersed; and the soldiers marched backto quarters, accompanied by some hundred conscripts, among whom wasAlphonse,--a vague, troubled expression betokening that he scarce knewwhat had happened around him.
"The regiment to which he was appointed was at Toulon, and there Ifollowed him. They were ordered to the north of Italy soon after,and thence to Egypt. Through the battlefields of Mount Tabor and thePyramids I was ever beside him; on the heights of Austerlitz I stanchedhis wounds; and I laid him beneath the earth on the field of Auerstadt."
The old man's voice trembled and became feeble as he finished speaking,and a settled expression of grief clothed his features, which were paleas death.
"I must see Sevres once more," said he, after a pause. "I must look onthe old houses of the village, and the little gardens, and the venerablechurch; they will be the only things to greet me there now, but I mustgaze on them ere I close my eyes to this world and its cares."
"Come, come, Father," said I; "to one who has acted so noble a part asyours, life is never without its own means of happiness."
"I spoke not of death," replied he, mildly; "but the holy calm of aconvent will better suit my seared and worn heart than all that theworld calls its joys and pleasures. You, who are young and full ofhope--"
"Alas! Father, speak not thus. One can better endure the lowering skiesof misfortune as the evening of life draws near than when the mornof existence is breaking. To me, with youth and health, there is nofuture,--no hope."
"I will not hear you speak thus," said the priest; "fatigue andweariness are on you now. Wait until to-morrow,--we shall befellow-travellers together; and then, if you will reveal to me yourstory, mayhap my long experience of the world may suggest comfort andconsolation where you can see neither."
The storm by this time had abated much of its violence, and across themoon the large clouds were wafted speedily, disclosing bright patches oflight at every moment.
"Such is our life here," said the father,--"alternating with its days ofhappiness and sorrow. Let us learn, in the dark hour of our destiny, tobear the glare of our better fortunes; for, believe me, that when ourjoys are greatest, so are our trials also."
He ceased speaking, and I saw that soon afterwards his lips moved as ifin prayer. I now laid myself down in my cloak beside the fire, and wassoon buried in a sleep too sound even for a dream.