Fifty Years Ago.
by W.H. Maxwell, Esq.
Author of "Stories of Waterloo," etc.
Originally published in Bentley's Miscellany (Richard Bentley) vol.27 #162 (Jun 1850).
Influence of Accident in choice of a Profession.—Pleasant Story of a Pine-apple.—I reverse the axiom "cedant arma togæ."—Plead a nolo episcopari, and join the — Militia.—Battle of New Ross.
One moiety of a century has passed—the dark brown hair of seventeen is represented by a "frosty pow"—and "accidents, by flood and field," have largely marked the interval. The history of a life differs marvellously. From boyhood it is a voyage. One man's skiff glides over the unruffled surface of a mill-pond; another's, sorely tempest-tost, may happily survive the gale, but between squalls flounder in broken water, until he, the preserved one, shall look upon his deliverance as a misery, and not a mercy.
A few passages in my parti-coloured career will point the moral of my conclusions.
For a very different profession than that which I selected, family arrangements had designed me. Three brothers, as they attained an eligible age, had obtained commissions—while I, like another "Young Astyanax, the hope of Troy," was parentally doomed to eschew the "ear-piercing fife," and operate not on simple sheepskin, but "Pulpit, drum ecclesiastic," and while my brothers, in the Low Countries, assailed gentlemen in blue—to wit, the French—safe at home, I was to abuse the lady in scarlet, and that to the very best of my abilities.
Pope says or sings that a poetical apprentice "foredoom'd his father's soul to cross," is a curse frequently inflicted on respectable men of business. And if my worthy mother expected to weep bitterly at my first charity sermon, the poor dear lady might have bottled her tears for ever.
I was a stale gib,[1] when for a college escapade, I was sentenced to six months' rustication. The discipline of Alma Mater was, at that time, national out and out. The alumni, for "a consideration," might sleep extra muros six nights out of the seven; and whether their dormitory was Saint Andrew's watchhouse, "The Cannister," or "The Hole-in-the-Wall,"[2] was a matter of perfect indifference to the authorities—or the delinquents—all penal consequences being booked in the quarterly accounts against parents and guardians. How absurdly are men's fortunes decided! I, regularly intended for a Boanerges, and that too by the disposition of a maiden relative, whose piety was decided, and her child's portion—seven thousand—invested in the Five per Cents.—et nullus error, as "the Duke" classically expresses it; I, under whose sweeping eloquence, the lady in red who sitteth on the Seven Hills, should be severely castigated, and if she had it in her, brought to the blush; I, from family interest, putting my virtue and my learning out of the account altogether, with a mitre in prospectu—all and every hope to be overthrown in one fell swoop—and all this prostration of lofty expectations, merely for the abstraction of a pine apple!
It was a sweet summer evening—and after Commons, we youths, as Fat Jack says, had a symposium, our "custom i'the afternoon," Costigan's double-distilled being considered a sine quâ non to counteract the evil consequences which might otherwise arise from the eternity of boiled legs of mutton which it pleased the board to cause us hebdomadally to swallow. Alma Mater was then a pleasant place enough for young gentlemen who had health and could command means. The weather was warm—the alcohol meritorious—and divers glasses were cunningly fabricated, and faithfully discussed. From the gothic hour we dined at—three p.m.—it was not unusual to meet candidates for the woolsack or a mitre, heavily screwed, and that also, before ordinary mortals had stretched a leg beneath mahogany at all. On this unhappy evening, as far as drinking went, the pace was strong. At five, we began to meditate mischief; at six, were well up to the mark—and, bent upon taking pleasure, like the sailor who went to see the man hanged, we sallied on the town to avail ourselves of any agreeable adventures which Dame Fortune might be pleased to favour us with.
A fruiterer, named Anderson, had for some alleged offending, incurred the displeasure of our body politic. As Mrs. Malaprop would term it, he resided in a "contagious" neighbourhood—his domicile being directly opposite the equestrian statue of the Third William of glorious memory. On this—and to me an eventful evening it proved—great were the attractions his windows presented to the passer-by. There were apples which would have seduced Mother Eve—plums originally from Mogul—and pears of undeniable pretension—but there lay a jewel above price before which all else yielded—for, by comparison, a ribston had no chance, nor could a jargonel hold a candle to it; in a word, this exotic beauty was a pine.
"Lord! how tempting!" I muttered. "I'm half inclined to run away with it."
"Bet you cockles and accompaniments for six that you don't," replied one of my valued confederates.
Suadente Diabolo, I exclaimed, "Done!"
Curse upon Costigan! Three tumblers, and stiff ones too! Away went the consequences that were attendant upon felony—away went the pine—away went the abstractor—and away went the astonished shopman after him—strong running succeeded, and a stronger cry of "Stop thief!"
Everybody knows that an alarmed hare never heads to her own form directly—and on the same principle, I doubled again and again—took sundry by-streets—thought to blink the pursuit by heading through a crooked alley; but "louder still the clamour grew," and at last, I turned my flying footsteps towards that seat of virtue and polite learning, from which, in an evil hour, I had unfortunately issued on the town.
From the start I had made strong running, and although the pursuit was actively maintained, the chances were that I should reach my den in safety—pine-apple and all. Vagabonds, without venturing to stop me, raised a terrific alarm, one scoundrel asserting that I had stolen a watch, while another bellowed "Murder!" Although fellows with fresh wind succeeded the "gorbellied knaves" whom the first burst had left without a puff, still I should have won cleverly, had not a Quaker inserted an umbrella between my legs, and before I could regain my feet—my curse and Cromwell's upon the broad-brimmed scoundrel!—I was regularly run into.
How I was incarcerated in the watchhouse—a thing of no novelty to me—bailed out by my tailor—arraigned before the board, and sentenced to be rusticated for a year, I need not particularly dwell upon. To communicate this pleasant intelligence to head-quarters was unavoidable, but the difficulty lay in determining the most palatable medium that could be chosen for making a disclosure, which would for ever demolish the cherished hopes of my lady mother, and place a pious aunt in sackcloth and ashes as she mourned for my delinquency. Were not the air-built castles founded on law and divinity suddenly overturned—dispelled like a vision of the night? My lady mother had looked confidently forward to the possession of the great seal—while my aunt, good easy woman, would have been modestly contented with a mitre. All hope had ended. Would the honourable portion of a man's person who had committed larceny in open daylight, be allowed to repose upon the woolsack? or would my pine-apple propensities recommend me to a pair of lawn sleeves? No wonder that sorrowful were my secret communings as I strolled listlessly through Grafton Street, when at the door of a saddler's shop, I encountered Lord M—, who represented our county in parliament, and also commanded its militia.
As an electioneering supporter, my father had been always a steady one; and often had his lordship tendered his best services in return. I would have avoided an interview, but his lordship saw me unluckily before I saw him—beckoned me over the street—put his arm through mine, and brought me to a livery stable in the neighbourhood to look at a horse he felt a wish to purchase. "I saw your people at church on Sunday—all looking well—your father, indicating a placid conscience, by the serenity of his slumbers through a display of pulpit eloquence that extended beyond an hour, and your aunt, as Shakspeare says, 'sighing like a furnace' to think the world was so wicked as the new curate forcibly described it."
I thought to myself how she would groan over the pine-apple affair—that being a matter much nearer home than the transgressions of the world at large. "You'll dine with me—any time before daylight will do to get into college, by tapping at the wicket 'with half-a-crown.'"
"You may extend it to a twelvemonth, as far as I am personally concerned, my Lord," and I told him the story of my rustication.
"The devil take pine-apples," he said, with a laugh. "But it's lucky that I ran against you; that twenty-stone sinner, Captain Corbet, fancies that strong exercise, in the dog-days, is not adapted for a man 'fat as butter,' and, in consequence, this morning tendered his resignation. The commission is at your service. I will write to your father, and smooth matters as I best can. My tailor will fit you out. Your yeomanry drill was fortunate, as you can take duty at once; and as I remain in town until the middle of the week, we'll join the regiment together."
Here was a change—a chancellor in expectancy transmuted into a captain of militia, the consideration, a pine-apple. Need I add that I joyfully embraced the offer. My father's wrath might be appeased in time, but would any apology be received by an irritated aunt for pleading a nolo episcopari, and clinching the objection by an act of petty larceny? His Lordship wrote an explanatory letter, and I a couple of penitential ones, and having started for New Ross before answers could be returned, the mail was fortunately robbed, the replies never came to hand, and thus the jeremiads of the ladies, and fulminations of the old commander, were mercifully spared me.
The South of Ireland was in one wide blaze—the insurgents up in arms—and the locality where my regiment was quartered, distinguished for greater ferocity, from the first moment of the outburst, than all the province beside. In cruelty, Wexford achieved an unhappy preeminence. The insurgents were savage, and the royalists, as might be expected, unrelenting in return. Many, whose milder natures could not imagine that civil war will brutalize a man so soon, refused credence to these narratives of blood. But alas! as the Scotch phrase goes, "the tale was ower true."
On the 2nd of June, Lord and I reached our destination, after a couple of very narrow escapes from strolling bands, who, professedly rebels, but actually banditti, had rendered the roads so insecure, that strong escorts only could protect the traveller. The insurrection was now general; at Newtown Barry and Gorey the rebels had been defeated; but at Tubberneering, a castle dangler, Colonel Walpole, had lost both his division and his life.[3]
On joining the garrison at Ross, from the dangerous vicinity of the rebel camp at Carrickbyrn, only six miles distant, the town had been reinforced, and we found there about 1500 troops of all arms, chiefly Irish militia and yeomanry, under the command of General Johnson.
The coming storm was speedily evidenced, for on the evening of the 4th the rebels decamped from their former position, and bivouacked on Corbet Hill, within a mile and half's distance of the town.
All night the royalists remained under arms, to guard against surprise, but none was attempted, and soon after daylight Bagenal Harvey, the insurgent commander, sent in a summons by a man called Furlong. The out-lying sentry, a young soldier, disregarding the waving of a white handkerchief, shot the envoy, and infuriated at this breach of military courtesy, his companions in dense masses, and with terrific yells, rushed forward to avenge their leader's death.
The advance of this armed multitude, by some estimated at 25,000, but even by themselves admitted to exceed 15,000 men, exhibited an appearance at once strange but striking to a military eye, while their formation, partly in close column, and partly in extended order, showed their immense numbers to imposing advantage. The enormous disproportion between their strength, and the physical inferiority of that opposed, was further enhanced by the wild fanaticism which a host of priests instilled into their deluded followers. The credulity of the lower Irish in everything is proverbial, but in religious matters it reaches to an extent almost beyond belief. Of all irregular enemies, the bigot to a faith which he fancies that he is upholding with the sword, has ever been regarded as most dangerous; and the houris' beckon to paradise is not more encouraging to the Mussulman, than the priest's assurance to an Irish peasant, that though prayer and penance may possibly succeed in time, still the pike is as certain, and decidedly a much shorter cut to heaven.
New Ross, once a place of strength, had, from improvements in the art of war, and want of military value, been open for a century to aggression. One of the positions taken by the defenders was in front of the Three-bullet-Gate. The skirmishers retired as the rebel masses came on—the supporting troops were driven in—a gun captured—but the troops rallied and advanced again—and while the rebels, in their turn, became unsteady, and gave ground, the 5th Dragoons charged injudiciously. Leaping over the fences, the insurgents easily avoided contact with the broad-sword, while through openings in the hedges—from the superior length of the weapon—the pike commanded the road; and with a heavy loss, the 5th, after a very gallant but ineffectual effort, were of necessity retired. The town was gained—the houses fired by the assailants—a dense mass of drunken fanatics choked the streets—the over-pressed soldiery retired—and New Ross virtually was won.
Virtually it was. But let New Ross point a valuable moral to modern patriots, whether they are in the rifle or soda-water-bottleline. Even in the imaginary pride of assured victory, in Ireland, the eventual certainty of mob success has always been, and ever will be, more than questionable, and in England—en passant—be it observed, that the result, had the Chartist vagabonds "screwed their courage to the sticking-point," would have been the same. At Ross, to shout, drink, and plunder, the rebels generally abated sharp pursuit—the royalists rallied beyond the bridge—and with his head uncovered, his white hair rolling down his shoulders—old Johnson led them again to a new effort. The sailor and the soldier have heart-pulses which rarely are tried in vain. On this day, and in its gloomiest hour, the appeal was touchingly made, and as nobly was it answered. "Will you desert your general?" exclaimed the veteran to the disheartened militia, but the appeal was coldly heard. "And your countryman, too?" he added. The chord of national honour was touched—a cheer answered it—the old man wheeled his horse round, and, riding in front, brought back his rallied troops to the fight; and boldly announcing that he was followed by large reinforcements from Waterford, he rejoined the brave but wearied few, who still maintained their ground at the Three-bullet-Gate. The fortune of a doubtful day, when in the scale, is often turned by a feather; and this, a military truism, New Ross sufficiently established. The troops cheered—plied their musketry with excellent effect—and, turning the rebel rear, put their massive columns into a confusion which proved irretrievable, until at last, and with desperate slaughter, they drove them fairly from the town. The exhausted garrison made but a feeble pursuit, and the rebels were too heavily derouted to evince any wish to rally; retiring in mob-like confusion, some heading to Carrickbyrne, and more to a height called Slieve-Keiltor, some four miles distant from New Ross.
The leading events of this important day will best be marked by desultory anecdotes. From this, also, a gone-by crisis in Irish affairs, some useful hints, and tolerably correct deductions, may be given and safely come to. Before we give the one, or draw the other, we shall recur to some passing events which influenced the fortunes of that doubtful day. What we shall state shall not be hearsay, but facts authenticated.
The gross proportion of the assailed to the assailants were, at a moderate average—taking rebel and royalist reports equally as data—fifteen to one, at least. The former were, for irregulars, the best probably the world could produce—possessing, as they did, the two best ingredients, animal pugnacity and unbounded bigotry. With the localities, for miles around, they were intimatel acquainted, and that, in military success, is a leading card in hand. In the town itself, their fellow traitors occupied three houses out of four—a very formidable advantage. The royalists were raw troops, a force heterogeneous in em and hastily collected. Men who have been regimented and drilled together, acquire a mutual dependency, and consider themselves the portion of a finely-constructed machine, whose regulated movements are perfectionated, we hate the phrase, but it is here expressive. Hence, to operate and not consider, is the feeling produced, and that self-assurance is the first principle that distinguishes the soldier from the mobman. Stop, we are running into a military commentary, but a few anecdotes connected with New Ross will prove that our deductions, at all events, are not erroneous.
To mob-success, two things have generally been essential accessories—fanaticism and drunkenness. "On their march," says Musgrave, "they stopped at a chapel, where mass was said at the head of each column, and the priests sprinkled an abundance of holy water on them. That they fought sufficiently drunk may be inferred from a fact, and that also authenticated by a dozen witnesses. A wretched man, far advanced in years, rushed on before his companions, and remarking that the execution of a six pounder had grievously alarmed his friends, the wretched fool stuffed an old hat and wig into the gun, and hallooed stoutly for his comrades to come on—all danger from explosion being, as he fancied, effectually obviated. Before the call could be obeyed the port-fire was laid upon the touchhole. We trust that the old gentleman's account was correctly balanced in Heaven's chancery. Like John Gilpin's, away went hat and wig, and the proprietor. John's was, if we recollect the thing correctly, recovered and brought back, but it would be difficult to restore either the person or effects, belonging to the gentleman at New Ross after being protruded from the muzzle of a six-pounder.
New Ross, commencing at five in the morning, terminated at three in the afternoon—a longer space of trial than that undergone at Waterloo—and, though the assertion may be held heretical, a much severer, too, considering its varied fortunes: we look upon that of Ross to be the best-fought action of the time. Throughout, the conduct of old Johnson was chivalrous; and while the wretched employés of the castle had been tried and found wanting the day before at Jubberneering, the stout old soldier at New Ross retrieved half the offences of "a popinjay."
In war the picture has lights and shadows which peaceful life cannot be expected to exhibit. In the soldier's character there are two damnatory failings, and it would be difficult to decide whether caution carried to excess, or culpable rashness is the more dangerous. The grand secret in the military art is to learn when to strike, and when to forbear. At New Ross, safety lay in daring, and victory rewarded the stout old soldier. All required the preceding day at Jubberneering was ordinary prudence, and a strict attention to the common rules of war. To both the wretched fool who had been unwisely entrusted with command showed gross indifference. Johnson won, and left a leader's fame behind him; Walpole, a melancholy reputation—one only that serves topoint a moral, and, by sad example prove, that as cucullus non facit monachum, the aiguilletle does not constitute the general.
New Ross presents a vivid sketch of what that worst of wars is—a civil contest. It also illustrates a lesson that every demagogue should lay to his heart —the inefficiency of mob-superiority in numbers when it is opposed to disciplined determination. I believe that were the expansive surface of this "fair round globe" searched over, man to man, with "a clear stage and no favour," as the fancy say, a British battalion would be found unequalled. The island soldier, whether he emblazon in his cap the rose, the thistle, or the shamrock, is unmatched—to coin a word—unmatchable—while the mobman is the most contemptible opponent upon earth. We may be wrong, and undervalue the military properties of modern reformers by drawing conclusions from the past performances in the tented field of unwashed patriots and gentlemen who offer them their countenance and counsel, very properly, for "a consideration;" but if we be in error, the page of British history goes only to confirm it. In the elements of a mob, cowardice and cruelty have ever preponderated, and we look on the man, no matter whether he be lay or clerical, whether he prefix a "Reverend" to his name, or write after it an armigerus, to be the gravest offender against a state, who plays upon the passions of the giddy multitude, and evokes a storm that nothing but the rope and deportation can allay.
1. A senior Freshman.
2. These pleasant hostelries are no more, but they will still survive in the recollection of "old Corinthians," who in "lang syne," over black cockles and Costigan's "raal malt," delighted there to hear "the chimes at midnight."
3. "It will be only necessary to remark, that Walpole was detached from Dublin to reinforce General Loftus; that on his junction he arrogated for himself a separate command—that it was culpably acceded to—that he was ambitious to fight an action without delay—and that, to oblige a minion of the Lord Lieutenant, an attack on the rebel position, the hill of Ballymore, was planned, it being considered the safest method of gratifying 'a carpet knight.' whose services as yet had been confined to the duties of the drawing-room."—Maxwell's History, &c.