Henty George Alfred
Orange and Green: A Tale of the Boyne and Limerick
"Yes," Walter agreed, "we should have retired at once. We have only seven or eight thousand men here now, and if five thousand English soldiers had landed, we must have raised the siege at once. I can tell you that, though he is on the other side, I was almost as angry at Kirk's cowardice as you must have been. I shall be glad when this awful business is over. I knew it was bad enough before, but after what you have told me about the women and children, I shall never think of anything else, and I will gladly help you in any way I can. There can't be any treason in trying to prevent children from starving to death. What do you want me to do?"
"What would do the children more good than anything, the women say, would be milk. If I could get a keg that would hold two or three gallons–and a watertight box with about twenty pounds of bread, I could swim back with them just as I came. I would show you the exact spot where I landed, and would come out again in four days. If you could put a supply ready for me, every fourth night, among the bushes at the mouth of the river, with a little lantern to show me the exact spot, I could come down with the tide, get the things, and float back again when the tide turns."
"I could do that, easily enough," Walter said. "The mouth of the river is quite beyond our lines. But it is very risky for you, John. You might get shot, if a sentry were to see you."
"I do not think that there is much fear of that," John said. "Just floating along as I do, without swimming at all, there is only just my face above water, and it would be hardly possible for a sentry to see me; but if I were shot, I could not die in a better cause."
"I think, John, if you don't mind, I should like to tell my father. I am quite sure he would not object, and, in case you should happen to get caught, you could refer at once to him to prove that you were not a spy. They make very short work of spies. But if you were to demand to be brought to Captain Davenant, and say you were acting in accordance with his knowledge, no doubt they would bring you."
"Do as you think best, Walter, but don't tell him, unless you feel almost sure that he will not object."
"There is no fear of that," Walter said. "He is constantly lamenting over the sufferings of the people of Derry, and has, all along, been in favour of attempting to storm the place by force, so as to put a stop to all this useless suffering. Now, John, you had better lie down on that straw bed of mine, and get a sleep. After that, you will be ready for another meal. I will tell Larry to go out among the market people, and buy three gallons of milk and twenty pounds of bread. There are plenty of small spirit kegs about, which will do capitally for the milk, and I don't think that we can have anything better than one of them for the bread. We can head it up, and make it watertight. How do you mean to get into the town? I should have thought that they were likely to be seized."
"So they would be," John said. "I shall hide them in some bushes at the foot of the walls, at the side of the town facing the river. There are only a few sentries there. Then, when it is light, I shall go in and tell my cousin; and get him, after dark, to lower a rope from the wall. I shall of course be below, to tie on the kegs. He can then walk with them boldly through the street to our house, which is only a short distance from that part of the walls. If anyone saw him, they would only suppose he was taking home water from one of the wells."
John was soon fast asleep. Walter sat watching him until, two hours later, his father returned with his troop. John still slept on, while Walter told his father the errand on which he had come.
"He is a brave lad," Captain Davenant said, "and I honour him for his conduct. It is not many men who, at a time like this, would risk their lives for a number of children who are not any relation to them. Certainly, I will gladly assist him. I am sick at heart at all this. My only consolation is, that it is brought on solely by the acts of these men, who, though comparatively a handful, set themselves up against the voice of all Ireland. If they had risen when an English army arrived to their assistance, I should say nothing against it. As it is, without doing any good to their cause, they are entailing this horrible suffering upon thousands of women and children.
"By all means, help the poor lad, and if he should fall into the hands of our people, let him mention my name. Rosen would no doubt disapprove of it, but I cannot help that. All the Irish gentlemen in the army would agree that I had done rightly, and, even if they didn't, my own conscience would be quite sufficient for me to act upon. I am fighting against the king's enemies, not warring against women and children.
"How soundly the poor lad sleeps, and how changed he is! He is a mere skeleton. I should not have known him in the least. If this is the condition into which a strong, healthy lad has fallen, what must the women and children have suffered! I wish Kirk had not turned coward, but had landed his troops. We could then have brought up our scattered forces, and could have fought them in a fair field, with something like equal forces. That would have been vastly more to my taste than starving them, like rats in a hole."
Chapter 5: The Relief Of Derry
It was late in the afternoon before John woke. He started up, as his eyes fell upon Captain Davenant.
"You have had a good sleep, and I hope you are all the better for it," Captain Davenant said, kindly. "My son has been telling me all about your expedition, and I honour you very much, for the courage you have shown in thus risking your life to get food for those starving children. I quite approve of the promise Walter has given to assist you, and if you should, by any chance, be taken prisoner, I will stand your friend."
John expressed his gratitude warmly.
"It is a sad thing, in these civil wars, when friends are arrayed against friends," Captain Davenant said. "Who would have thought, three months ago, that you and Walter would be arrayed on opposite sides? It is true you are neither of you combatants, but I have no doubt you would gladly have joined in some of the sallies, just as Walter is eager to be riding in my troop. If we must fight, I wish, at any rate, that it could be so managed that all the suffering should fall upon the men who are willing to take up the sword, and not upon the women and children. My heart bleeds as I ride across the country. At one time, one comes upon a ruined village, burned by the midnight ruffians who call themselves rapparees, and who are a disgrace to our cause. At another, upon a place sacked and ruined by one of the bands of horsemen from Enniskillen, who are as cruel and merciless as the rapparees. Let the armies fight out their quarrels, I say, but let peaceful people dwell in quiet and safety. But wholesale atrocities have ever been the rule on both sides, in warfare in Ireland, and will, I suppose, remain so to the end.
"And now, we are just going to have dinner, and another hearty meal will do you good. Each night, when my son brings down the supplies for you, he will bring a substantial meal of cold meat and bread, and you must give me your promise, now, that you will eat this at once. You will need it, after being so long in the water, and having another swim before you, besides. Although I approve of sending in milk for the children, I can be no party to the supply of food for the garrison. Do you promise?"
"Yes, sir, I promise," John said, "though I would rather save all but a mouthful or two for the people who are starving at home. Still, of course, if you insist upon it, I will promise."
"I do insist upon it, John. The lives of these children of yours depend on your life, and even one good meal, every four days, will help you to keep enough strength together to carry out the kind work you have undertaken."
Larry now brought in the dinner. He had been told by Walter of John's arrival, but he otherwise would have failed to recognize, in him, the boy who had sometimes come down to the village with Walter.
"Are you quite well, Larry?" John asked him.
"I am," Larry replied; "but I need not ask the same question of yourself, for you are nothing but skin and bone, entirely. Dear, dear, I wouldn't have known you at all, at all, and such a foine colour as ye used to have."
"I don't think starving would suit you, Larry," Captain Davenant said with a smile.
"Sure an' it wouldn't, yer honour. It's always ready to eat I am, though, as mother says, the victuals don't seem to do me much good, anyway."
"You won't be able to come out and go back again the same night next week, John," Captain Davenant said, presently. "The tide won't suit, so you must come up here, as you have done today. You will always find a hearty welcome, and Walter shall go down and meet you early in the morning, near the mouth of the river, so you can come up with him; and then, if you fall in with any of the other parties, no questions will be asked. I think everyone in camp knows him now.
"I wonder what your grandfather would say, if he saw you sitting here at dinner with Walter and me?"
John laughed.
"I am afraid he would disown me, then and there, without listening to explanations."
"I have no doubt it's a sore grievance to him that he is not in Derry, at present," Captain Davenant said.
"I am sure it is," John replied; "but the fasting would be a great trial to him. My grandfather is a capital trencherman. Still, I am sure he would have borne his part."
"That he would," Captain Davenant agreed. "He and the men of his class are thorough, fanatics as I consider them. Hard and pitiless as they proved themselves, to those against whom they fought, one cannot but admire them, for they were heart and soul in their cause. There was no flinching, no half measures, no concessions for the sake of expediency. On the ground on which they took their stand, they conquered or died. Would that a like spirit animated all my countrymen!"
After nightfall, Larry brought round Walter's horse, saddled, and his own rough pony. Walter mounted the former, and John the latter. The two kegs were slung across Walter's horse.
"Will you meet me at the clump of trees, half a mile out of camp, Larry?" Walter said. "In the dark, no one will notice the difference between you and John."
Captain Davenant had furnished Walter with a password, and now walked beside the two boys till they were well beyond the camp, and then returned to his tent. The lads made their way, without meeting with anyone, down to the mouth of the river. The kegs were then taken off the horse and placed in the water–they floated just above the surface.
"That is exactly right," John said. "They will not show any more than will my face. When I come down next time, I shall fill them with water, so as to keep them just at this level."
"I am afraid the moon will be up next time, John."
"Yes, it will. I shall lay some boughs of bush across my face and the kegs, so that there will be no fear of my face showing; and if a sentry should happen to catch sight of it, he will suppose that it is merely a bush drifting in the stream."
"Well, goodbye, John, and may you get through without trouble."
"I have no fear, Walter. I am in God's hands, and He will take me safely through, if He thinks fit."
The journey was achieved without detection, the only difficulty being the sinking of the kegs under the boom; this, however, was successfully accomplished, and by midnight, the kegs were safely hidden in some bushes at the foot of the wall, and there John lay down and waited for morning.
As he entered the yard, the children ran out to meet him. There were no loud rejoicings; they had no longer strength or spirit to shout and laugh; but the joy in the thin worn faces was more eloquent than any words could have been.
"We have missed you so, John. We have wanted you so much. Lucy and Kate and Deby were so bad yesterday, and they did cry so for you. We were all so hungry. We don't mind so much, when you are here to talk to us and tell us stories. Why did you stop away, John, when we wanted you so?"
"I went away to see if I could manage to get you something to eat."
"And did you?" was the anxious cry.
"I have got a little; but you must wait till evening, and then you will each have–" and he stopped.
"What, John? Oh, do tell us!"
"You will each have some milk and bread.
"Not much, dears," he went on, as there was a cry of gladness, which was pitiful from the intensity of joy it expressed, "but there will be some for tonight, and a little curds and whey and bread for you tomorrow and next day, and I hope always, as long as this lasts. Now go, dears, into your castle. I will come to you presently. I have brought you some water, as usual."
"I am heartily glad to see you back, John," his cousin said, as he entered the house. "The children were in a sad state without you, yesterday. I suppose you can tell me, now, what you have been doing. You told me you would be away two nights, and begged me not to ask any questions; but, although I know you to be discreet and prudent, I have been worrying."
"I will tell you now," John said, and he recounted the details of the expedition which he had accomplished.
"And you have swum the river twice, and been in the camp of the Papists. Truly it is surprising, John, and I know not what to do. Should your visit there be discovered, you will assuredly be accused of treachery."
"They may accuse me of what they like," John said quietly. "I have done it, and I am going to do it again, every fourth night, and there is the milk and bread at the foot of the wall, ready for you to haul up as soon as it gets dark."
"It ought to be fairly divided," the tanner said.
"It will be fairly divided, between our children," John said; "but nobody else will get a drop or a crumb. I have risked my life to get it for them. If other people want to get it, let them do the same. Besides, as I told you, Captain Davenant and his son both procured it for me for the sake of the children, and them only, and I should be breaking faith with them if any others touched it, save those for whom it was given me. It is little enough among eighteen children for four days–a pound of bread and a little over a pint of milk, each. They must each have a quarter of a pint, when you bring it in tonight, and the rest had better be curdled. That way it will keep, and they can have a portion each day of curds and whey, and a fourth share of their bread. It is little enough; but I trust that it may keep life in them."
"Well, John, I will do as you say," the tanner said, after a pause. "It goes somewhat against my conscience; but, as you say, it will make but a meagre portion for each of them, and would be nothing were it fairly divided; besides, you have brought it with the risk of your life, and I know not that any save you have a right to a voice in its partition."
Before the gates were closed, John went out, and presently had the satisfaction of hearing a small stone drop from the wall above him, followed presently by the end of a rope. He sent up the kegs, and then lay down among the bushes, and enjoyed the satisfaction of thinking of the joy of the little ones, when the milk and bread were served out to them. As soon as the gates were open in the morning, he went in.
"Thank you, oh, so much, for the milk and bread last night. We heard how you had swum so far, and gone into danger to get it for us, and we're going to have some more for breakfast."
"It was not much, dears," John said.
"Oh, no, it was not much; but it was so nice, and we did all sleep so well last night–even little Lucy didn't waken and cry once–and Ruth Hardy said we ought to call you the Raven; but we don't like that name for you."
"The Raven, Ruth!" John said, mystified. "Why did you want to call me the Raven?"
"I wouldn't do it if you didn't like it, dear John; but you know that chapter that Master Williams read us, the other day, about the ravens that fed somebody in a cave, and we have been wishing the ravens would feed us; and so you see, when you sent us the milk last night, I thought you ought to be called the Raven. I did not mean any harm."
"No, my dear, of course not, and you can all call me the Raven, if you like."
"No, no, John. You are John, and that's much better than the Raven. They brought the man food, but they didn't nurse him and tell him stories, as you do."
"Now, run inside the castle," John said, "and I will go in and get your breakfasts."
John soon returned, with a great bowl of curds and whey, a platter piled up with slices of bread and a score of little mugs, and the feast began. Scarce a word was said while the children were eating. Their hunger was too keen, and their enjoyment too intense, to admit of speech. When each had finished their portion, there was a general exclamation.
"Oh, John, you haven't had any. Why didn't you have some, too?"
"Because there is only enough for you," he said. "If I were to have some, and Cousin Josiah, and all the others, there would be a very little share for you; besides, when I went out the day before yesterday, I had as much as I could eat."
"Oh, dear, that must have been nice," one of the boys said. "Only think, having as much as one can eat. Oh, how much I could eat, if I had it!"
"And yet I daresay, Tom," John said, "that sometimes, before you came here, when you had as much as you could eat, you used to grumble if it wasn't quite what you fancied."
"I shall never grumble again," the boy said positively. "I shall be quite, quite content with potatoes, if I can but get enough of them."
"The good times will come again," John said cheerily. "Now we will have a story. Which shall it be?"
As the children sat round him, John was delighted to see that even the two scanty meals they had had, had done wonders for them. The listless, hopeless look of the last few days had disappeared, and occasionally something like a hearty laugh broke out among them, and an hour later the tanner came to the entrance.
"Come to the walls with me, John."
"What is it? What is the matter?" John said, as he saw the look of anger and indignation on the wasted features of his cousin.
"Come and see for yourself," the latter said.
When they reached the walls, they found them crowded with the inhabitants. Outside were a multitude of women, children, and old men. These General Rosen, with a refinement of cruelty, had swept in from the country round and driven under the walls, where they were left to starve, unless the garrison would take them in, and divide their scanty supply of food with them.
"It is monstrous," John cried, when he understood the meaning of the sight. "What are we to do?"
"We can do nothing," the tanner replied. "The council have met, and have determined to keep the gates closed. We are dying for the cause. They must do so too; and they will not die in vain, for all Europe will cry out when they hear of this dastardly act of cruelty."
The people outside were animated by a spirit as stern as that of the besieged, and the women cried out, to those on the walls, to keep the gates shut and to resist to the last, and not to heed them.
The ministers went out through the gates, and held services among the crowd, and the people on the walls joined in the hymns that were sung below. So, for three days and nights, the people within and without fasted and prayed. On the third day, a messenger arrived from King James at Dublin, ordering General Rosen at once to let the people depart.
The indignation, among the Irish gentlemen in the camp, at Rosen's brutal order had been unbounded, and messenger after messenger had been sent to Dublin, where the news excited a burst of indignation, and James at once countermanded the order of the general. The gates were opened now, and the people flocked out and exchanged greetings with their friends. A few able-bodied men in the crowd entered the town, to share in its defence, while a considerable number of the women and children from within mingled with them, and moved away through the lines of the besiegers.
John had, the day before, gone out when the gates were opened for the preachers, and at night had again safely made the passage to the mouth of the river and back. He found the lantern burning among the bushes, and two kegs placed beside it, with a bountiful meal of bread and meat for himself.
So the days went on, each day lessening the number of the inhabitants of the town. Fever and famine were making terrible ravages, and the survivors moved about the streets like living skeletons, so feeble and weak, now, that they could scarce bear the weight of their arms.
On the 30th of July, three ships were seen approaching the mouth of the river. They were part of Kirk's squadron, which had all this time been lying idle, almost within sight of the town. The news of his conduct had excited such anger and indignation in England that, at last, in obedience to peremptory orders from London, he prepared to make the attempt; although, by sending only two store ships and one frigate, it would almost seem as if he had determined that it should be a failure.
The besiegers as well as the besieged saw the three ships advancing, and the former moved down to the shore, to repel the attempt. The batteries on either side of the boom were manned, and from them, and from the infantry gathered on the banks, a heavy fire was opened as the ships approached.
So innocuous was the fire of the artillery, that it has been supposed that Kirk had previously bribed the officers commanding the forts. At any rate, the ships suffered no material damage, and, returning the fire, advanced against the boom. The leading store ship dashed against it and broke it, but the ship swerved from her course with the shock, and struck the ground. A shout of dismay burst from those on the walls, and one of exultation from the besiegers, who rushed down to board the vessel.
Her captain, however, pointed all his guns forward, and discharged them all at the same moment, and the recoil shook the vessel from her hold on the ground, and she floated off, and pursued her way up the river, followed by her consorts.
The delay of Kirk had cost the defenders of Londonderry more than half their number. The fighting men had, either by disease, famine, or in the field, lost some five thousand, while of the non-combatants seven thousand had died. The joy and exultation in the city, as the two store ships ranged up under its walls, were unbounded. Provisions were speedily conveyed on shore, and abundance took the place of famine.
Five days later, General Rosen raised the siege and marched away with his army, which had, in the various operations of the siege, and from the effect of disease, lost upwards of three thousand men.
"This has been a bad beginning, Walter," Captain Davenant said, as they rode away from the grounds on which they had been so long encamped. "If the whole force of Ireland does not suffice to take a single town, the prospect of our waging war successfully against England is not hopeful."
"It seems to me that it would have been much better to have left Derry alone, father," Walter said.
"It would have been better, as it has turned out, Walter; but had the king taken the place, as he expected, without difficulty, he would have crossed with a portion of the army to Scotland, where a considerable part of the population would at once have joined him. The defence of Derry has entirely thwarted that plan, and I fear now that it will never be carried out.
"However, it has had the advantage of making soldiers out of an army of peasants. When we came here, officers and men were alike ignorant of everything relating to war. Now we have, at any rate, learned a certain amount of drill and discipline, and I think we shall give a much better account of ourselves, in the open field, than we have done in front of a strong town which we had no means whatever of storming. Still, it has been a frightful waste of life on both sides, and with no result, beyond horribly embittering the feeling of hatred, which unfortunately prevailed before, between the Catholic and Protestant populations."
The mortification and disgust, caused by the failure of Londonderry, was increased by a severe defeat of a force under General Justin McCarthy, Lord Mountcashel, at Newtown Butler, on the very day that Derry was relieved. General McCarthy had been detached, with a corps of six thousand men, against the Enniskilleners. He came up with them near Newtown Butler. Although but two thousand strong, the Enniskilleners, who were commanded by Colonel Wolseley, an English officer, at once attacked the Irish, only a portion of whom had come upon the ground.
McCarthy, who was a brave and experienced officer, sent orders to the cavalry to face to the right, and march to the support of the wing that was attacked. The officer gave the order "right–about face," and the cavalry turned and trotted towards the rear. The infantry, believing that they were deserted by the horse, at once lost heart and fell into confusion.
McCarthy, while endeavouring to remedy the disorder, was wounded and taken prisoner, and the flight became general. The Enniskilleners pursued with savage fury, and during the evening, the whole of the night, and the greater part of the next day, hunted the fugitives down in the bogs and woods, and slew them in cold blood. Five hundred of the Irish threw themselves into Lough Erne, rather than face death at the hands of their savage enemies, and only one of the number saved himself by swimming.
After leaving Derry, the army returned to Dublin, where the parliament which James had summoned was then sitting. Most of the soldiers were quartered on the citizens; but, as the pressure was very great, Captain Davenant easily obtained leave for his troop to go out to Bray, where they were within a very short distance of his own house.
The day after his return home, Walter went over to give Jabez Whitefoot and his wife news of John, from whom they had heard nothing, since a fortnight before the siege had begun.
"Your son is alive and well," were his first words. "He has been all through the siege of Derry, and has behaved like a hero."
"The Lord be praised!" Jabez said, while his wife burst into tears of relief, for she had gone through terrible anxiety during the long weeks that Derry had been suffering from starvation.
"But how do you know, Master Walter?" Jabez asked. "Seeing that you were on the side of the besiegers, how could you tell what was passing on the inside of the walls? How do you know John is alive?"
"Because I saw him first, a month before the end of the siege, and because he came regularly afterwards, to fetch away some provisions which I had placed for him."
And Walter then gave a full account of John's visit to the camp, in search of food for the children who were sheltered in the tanner's house.
"That is just like John," his mother said. "He was ever thoughtful for others. I am more pleased, a hundred times, that he should have so risked his life to obtain food for the little ones, than if he had taken part in the fighting and proved himself a very champion of Derry."
Parliament had met on the 7th of May. The session had been opened by a speech from the throne, in which the king commended the loyalty of his Irish subjects, declared his intention to make no difference between Catholics and Protestants, and that loyalty and good conduct should be the only passport to his favour. He stated his earnest wish that good and wholesome laws should be enacted, for the encouragement of trade and of the manufactures of the country, and for the relief of such as had suffered injustice by the Act of Settlement; that is, the act by which the lands of the Catholics had been handed over, wholesale, to Cromwell's soldiers and other Protestants.
Bills were speedily passed, abolishing the jurisdiction of English courts of law and of the English parliament in Ireland, and other bills were passed for the regulation of commerce and the promotion of shipbuilding. The bill for the repeal of the Act of Settlement was brought up on the 22d of May. It was opposed only by the Protestant bishops and peers, and became law on the 11th of June. Acts of attainder were speedily passed against some two thousand Protestant landed proprietors, all of whom had obtained their lands by the settlement of Cromwell.
A land tax was voted to the king, of twenty thousand pounds a month, and he proceeded to raise other levies by his private authority. The result was that the resources of Ireland were speedily exhausted, money almost disappeared, and James, being at his wits' end for funds, issued copper money stamped with the value of gold and silver; and a law was passed making this base money legal tender, promising that, at the end of the war, it should be exchanged for sterling money.
This was a measure which inflicted enormous loss and damage. At first, the people raised the prices of goods in proportion to the decrease in the value of the money, but James stopped this, by issuing a proclamation fixing the prices at which all articles were to be sold; and having done this, proceeded to buy up great quantities of hides, butter, corn, wood, and other goods, paying for them all with a few pounds of copper and tin, and then shipping them to France, where they were sold on his own account. It need hardly be said that conduct of this kind speedily excited great dissatisfaction, even among those who were most loyal in his cause.
Captain Davenant was shocked at the state of things he found prevailing in Dublin.
"I regret bitterly," he said, when alone with his wife and mother, "that I have taken up the sword. Success appears to me to be hopeless. The folly of the Stuarts is incredible. They would ruin the best cause in the world. With a spark of wisdom and firmness, James might have united all Ireland in his cause, instead of which he has absolutely forced the Protestants into hostility. His folly is only equalled by his rapacity, and both are stupendous."
