Under Wellington's Command: A Tale of the Peninsular War

They put up at an inn and, having eaten a meal, walked out into the town, which was full of British soldiers. They were not long before they found the cafe that was set apart for the use of officers and, on entering, Terence at once joined a party of three, belonging to a regiment with all of whose officers he was acquainted, as they had been encamped next to the Mayo Fusiliers during the long months preceding the advance up the valley of the Tagus. Ryan was, of course, equally known to them; and the three officers rose, with an exclamation of surprise, as the newcomers walked up to the table.

"Why, O'Connor! How in the world did you get here? How are you, Ryan? I thought that you were both prisoners."

"So we were," Terence said, "but as you see, we gave them the slip, and here we are."

They drew up chairs to the little table.

"You may consider yourself lucky in your regiment being on the river, O'Connor. You will be much better off than Ryan will be, at Portalegre."

"I am seconded," Ryan said, "and have been appointed O'Connor's adjutant, with the temporary rank of captain."

"I congratulate you. The chances are you will have a much better time of it than if you were with your own regiment. I don't mean now, but when the campaign begins in the spring. O'Connor always seems to be in the thick of it, while our division may remain here, while the fighting is going on somewhere else. Besides, he always manages to dine a good deal better than we do. His fellows, being Portuguese, are able to get supplies, when the peasants are all ready to take their oath that they have not so much as a loaf of bread or a fowl in their village.

"How will you manage to get on with them, Ryan, without speaking their language? Oh! I remember, you were grinding up Portuguese all the spring, so I suppose you can get on pretty well, now."

"Yes; O'Connor promised that he would ask for me, as soon as I could speak the language, so I stuck at it hard; and now, you see, I have got my reward."

"I can tell you that the troops, here, are a good deal better off than they are elsewhere. There is a fearful want of land carriage, but we get our supplies up by boats. That is why the Portuguese regiments are encamped on the river.

"Well, how did you get away from the French? It is curious that when I saw O'Grady last–which was a fortnight ago, when he came in to get a conveyance to take over sundry cases of whisky that had come up the river, for the use of his mess–he said:

"'I expect that O'Connor and Dick Ryan will turn up here, before the spring. I am sure they will, if they have got together.'"

"It is too long a story to tell, here," Ryan said. "It is full of hairbreadth escapes, dangers by sea and land, and ends up with a naval battle."

The officers laughed.

"Well, will you come to our quarters?" one of them said. "We have got some decent wine, and some really good cigars which came up from Lisbon last week, and there are lots of our fellows who will be glad to see you."

They accordingly adjourned to a large building where the officers of the regiment were quartered and, in the apartment that had been turned into a mess room, they found a dozen officers, all of whom were known both to Terence and Ryan. After many questions were asked and answered on both sides, Ryan was requested to tell the story of their adventures after being taken prisoners. He told it in an exaggerated style that elicited roars of laughter, making the most of what he called The Battle of the Shirt Sleeves with the guerillas; exaggerating the dangers of his escape, and the horrors of their imprisonment, for a week, among the sails and nets.

"O'Connor," he said, "has hardly got back his sense of smell yet. The stink of tar, mixed with fishy odours, will be vivid in my remembrance for the rest of my life."

When he had at last finished, one of them said:

"And now, how much of all this is true, Ryan?"

"Every fact is just as I have told it," he replied gravely. "You may think that I have exaggerated, for did an Irishman ever tell a story, without exaggeration? But I give you my honour that never did one keep nearer to the truth than I have done. I don't say that the fisherman's wife took quite such a strong fancy to me as I have stated, although she can hardly have been insensible to my personal advantages; but really, otherwise, I don't know that I have diverged far from the narrow path of truth. I tell you, those two days that we were running before that gale was a thing I never wish to go through again."

"And you really tied up the Maire of Granville, Ryan?"

"We did so," Dicky said, "and a miserable object the poor little fat man looked, as he sat in his chair trussed up like a fowl."

"And now, about the sea fight, Ryan?"

"Every word was as it happened. O'Connor and I turned gunners, and very decent shots we made, too; and a proof of it was that, if we would have taken it, I believe the captain of the schooner would have given us half the booty found in the lugger's hold; but we were modest and self denying, and contented ourselves with a third, each, of the cash found in the captain's cabin; which we could not have refused if we wanted to, the captain made such a point of it. It came to nearly three hundred pounds apiece; and mighty useful it was, for we had, of course, to get new uniforms and rigs out, and horses and saddlery at Lisbon. I don't know what I should have done without it, for my family's finances would not have stood my drawing upon them; and another mortgage would have ruined them, entirely."

"Well, certainly, that is a substantial proof of the truth of that incident in your story; but I think that, rather than have passed forty-eight hours in that storm, I would have stopped at Bayonne and taken my chance of exchange."

"Then I am afraid, Forester, that you are deficient in martial ardour," Terence said gravely. "Our desire to be back fighting the French was so great that no dangers would have appalled us."

There was a general laugh.

"Well, at any rate, you managed uncommonly well, Ryan, whether it was martial ardour that animated you or not; and O'Grady was not far wrong when he said that you and O'Connor would creep out through a mouse's hole, if there was no other way of doing it."

"Now, what has been doing since we have been away?" Terence asked.

"Well, to begin with, all Andalusia has been captured by Soult. Suchet has occupied Valencia. Lerida was captured by him, after a scandalously weak resistance; for there were over nine thousand troops there, and the place surrendered after only 1000 had fallen. Gerona, on the other hand, was only captured by Augereau after a resistance as gallant as that of Saragossa.

"That is the extraordinary thing about these Spaniards. Sometimes they show themselves cowardly beyond expression, at others they fight like heroes. Just at present, even the Juntas do not pretend that they have an army capable of driving the French out of the Pyrenees; which is a comfort, for we shall have to rely upon ourselves and not be humbugged by the Spaniards, the worthlessness of whose promises, Lord Wellington has ascertained, by bitter experience. The Portuguese government is as troublesome and as truthless as that of Spain, but Wellington is able to hold his own with them; and there is little doubt that the regular regiments will fight, and be really of valuable assistance to us; but these have been raised in spite of the constant opposition of the Junta at Lisbon.

"There is no doubt that the next campaign will be a hot one for, now that Spain has been as completely subdued as such vainglorious, excitable people can be subdued, the French marshals are free to join against us; and it is hard to see how, with but 30,000 men, we are going to defend Portugal against ten times that number of French. Still, I suppose we shall do it, somehow. The French have a large army on the other side of the Aqueda, and there is no doubt they will besiege Ciudad Rodrigo, as soon as winter is over. I doubt whether we shall be strong enough to march to its relief, and I fancy that in that direction the Coa will be about our limit. At any rate, it is likely to be a stirring campaign.

"The absurdity of the thing is, that we have an army in Sicily which might as well be at Jericho, for any use it is. If it joined us here, it would make all the difference in the world; though certainly till the campaign opens it would have to be quartered at Lisbon, for it is as much as the wretched transport can do to feed us. Now the truth is, Portugal is a miserably poor country at the best of times, and does not produce enough for the wants of the people. Of course, it has been terribly impoverished by the war. The fields in most places have been untilled and, in fact, the greater portion of the population, as well as our army, has to be fed from England.

"Altogether, Wellington must have enough worry to drive an ordinary man out of his mind. I never heard of such difficulties as those he has to meet. We come to help a people who won't help themselves, to fight for people who not only won't fight for themselves, but want to dictate how we shall fight. Instead of being fed by the country, we have to feed it; and the whole object of the Juntas, both in Spain and Portugal, seems to be to throw every difficulty in our way, and to thwart us at every turn. The first step towards success would be to hang every member, of every Junta, in every place we occupy."

A general chorus of "Hear, hear!" showed how deeply was the feeling excited by the conduct of the Portuguese and Spanish authorities.

After chatting until a late hour, Terence and his companion returned to their inn. The next morning, Terence reported himself to General Hill.

"I am glad to see you again, Colonel O'Connor," the general said. "The last time we met was when the surgeons were dressing my wounds, on the heights near Talavera. That was a hot business, for a time."

"Yes, sir; and I have to thank you, very much, for the very kind report you sent in as to the conduct of my regiment."

"They deserved it," the general said. "If they had not come up at the time they did, we should have had hard work to retake that hill.

"Your regiment has been behaving very well, since they have been here. They, like the other Portuguese regiments, have often been on short rations, and their pay is very much in arrear, but there has been no grumbling. I know Herrara will be extremely glad to have you back again in command. He has said as much, several times, when he has been in here. He is a good man, but not strong enough for his position; and I can see that he feels that, himself, and is conscious that he is not equal to the responsibility. I intended to recommend that a British officer should be placed in command of the regiment, before the campaign opens in the spring. Your two majors do their best, but they have scarcely sufficient weight; for their men know that they were but troopers when the regiment was first raised."

"I shall be glad to be back again, sir; and I am pleased to say that I have been given an adjutant–Lieutenant Ryan, of the Mayo Fusiliers. He has the acting rank of captain. He is an old friend of mine, and is a good officer. He has just effected an escape from Bayonne with me."

"Yes, that will be of great assistance to you," the general said. "With two battalions to command, you must want a right-hand man very much. I shall be glad if your regiment remains in my division, when the campaign reopens; but I suppose that, as before, you will be sent ahead. At present, it is only attached to my command for convenience of rationing and pay. I have inspected it twice, and it is by far the finest of the Portuguese regiments here. But I can see a certain deterioration, and I am sure that they want you back badly. Still, it is not your loss only that is telling on them. No soldiers like to go without their pay. Lord Wellington himself is always kept short of funds. The Portuguese Ministry declare that they have none. Of course that is all a lie but, true or false, it is certain that all the Portuguese regiments are greatly in arrears of pay, ill-provided with clothes, and indeed would be starved, were it not that they are fed by our commissariat."

After his interview with the general, Terence went back to the inn and, five minutes later, started with Ryan to join the regiment. The two battalions were engaged in drill when they rode up, but as the men recognized Terence there was a sudden movement, then a tremendous cheer and, breaking their ranks, they ran towards him, waving their shakos and shouting loudly; while Herrara, Bull, and Macwitty galloped up to shake him by the hand.

"This is not a very military proceeding," Terence laughed, "but I cannot help being gratified."

He held up his hands for silence.

"Form the men into a hollow square," he said to the majors.

In a very short time the order was carried out, and then Terence addressed them.

"My men," he said, "I am deeply gratified by your hearty reception, and I can assure you that I am quite as glad to be back in the regiment as the regiment can be to have me with it again. While I was a prisoner, one of the things that troubled me most was that, when I returned, I might find that someone else had been appointed your commander; and I was glad indeed when, upon landing at Lisbon, I heard that this had not been the case, and that I could resume my command of a body of men of whom I am proud; and at no time more proud than when you beat off the attacks of a whole brigade of French cavalry, and made good your escape to the mountains. I regret that some of your comrades failed to do this, but the manner in which they did their duty, and sacrificed themselves to cover your retreat, was worthy of all praise, and reflects the highest credit upon the regiment.

"I have been fortunate enough to make my escape from a French prison, in company with my friend here, Captain Ryan; who has, at my request, been appointed by the commander-in-chief to be your adjutant. I am sorry to hear that there have been difficulties in the way of rations, and that your pay is in arrears. However, I know well that you are not serving for the sake of pay, but to defend your country from invasion by the French; and that whether you get your pay day by day, or receive it in a lump sum later on, will make no difference to you; and indeed, in some respects, you will be better off for the delay for, getting it daily, it is spent as soon as obtained; whereas, if it comes in a lump sum, it will be useful to you when you return to your homes, after your work is done. I am confident that, in this regiment at least, which has borne itself so well from the day that it was raised, there will be neither grumbling nor discontent; but that you will suffer any hardship or privation that may come in your way as trifling incidents in the great work that you have undertaken: to defend, at the cost of your lives if need be, your country from the invader. The regiment is dismissed drill for the day."

Loud cheers at once broke from the men and, falling out, they proceeded to their tents.

"Well, Terence, there is no doubt about the enthusiasm of your fellows," Ryan remarked. "As you said, it was hardly military, but it was better. It was real affection, and I am sure the men would follow you anywhere."

Ryan shook hands with Herrara, Bull, and Macwitty; all of whom he knew well, from his frequent visits to Terence in the spring.

"I am very glad that you have come to us, Captain Ryan," Bull said. "A regiment don't seem like a regiment without an adjutant, and it will take a lot of work off the colonel's hands. I wish there could have been one for each battalion."

"How has the regiment been going on, Bull?"

"Nothing much to grumble about, sir; but I must say that it has been more slack than it was. We have all done our best, but we have missed you terribly; and the men don't seem to take quite as much pains with their drill as they used to do, when you were in command. However, that will be all right now that you have come back again. I have always found that when the battalion was not working well, the men have pulled themselves together at once when I said:

"'This won't do, lads. The colonel will be grievously disappointed, when he comes back again, if he finds that you have lost your smartness.'

"It was as much as we could do to hold them in hand, when they saw you surrounded by the French. They would have rushed back again, to a man, if we would have let them. I own I felt it hard, myself, to be marching away and leaving you behind."

In a few minutes, a couple of tents were erected by the side of that of Herrara and, while these were being got ready for occupation, Terence and Ryan, with the two majors, entered that of Herrara; and the latter produced two or three bottles of wine from his private store, and a box of cigars. So for some time they sat chatting, Terence giving an outline of the events that had happened since he had been away from the regiment. He and Ryan had ordered half a dozen small casks of wine, and two cases of whisky, to be sent up with their trunks by water; and now asked regarding the rations of the men.

"They get their bread regularly," Herrara said. "They have put up some large bakeries at Abrantes and, as the flour is brought up in boats, there is no difficulty that way. They get their meat pretty regularly, and their wine always. There is no ground of complaint, whatever, as to rations here; though, from what I hear, it is very different at the stations where everything has to be taken up by waggons or mules.

"The difficulty is with the uniforms. Not one has been served out, and it is really difficult to get the men to look smart, when many of them are dressed almost in rags. It is still worse in the matter of boots. A great many of them were badly cut, when we were in the mountains; and especially in the rough march we had over the hills, after you left us. The men themselves would greatly prefer sandals to boots, being more accustomed to them; and could certainly march farther in them than in stiff English boots. But of course, it would be of no use sending in any requisition for them."

"I don't see why they should not wear sandals," Terence said; "at any rate, until there is an issue of boots. I suppose the men can make them, themselves."

"In most cases, no doubt, they could. At any rate, those who could, would make them for the others. Of course they will all have to wear them of one colour; but as most of the cattle are black, there would be no difficulty about that. I have no doubt that we could get any number of hides, at a nominal price, from the commissariat. At any rate, I will see about it. I suppose they are made a good deal like Indian moccasins. I noticed that many of the Spanish troops wore them, but I did not examine them particularly."

"They are very easily made," Herrara said. "You put your foot on a piece of hide of the right size. It is drawn right up over the foot, and laced. Another thickness of hide is sewn at the bottom, to form the sole, and there it is. Of course, for work in the hills it might be well to use a double thickness of hide for the sole. The upper part is made of the thinnest portion of the hide and, if grease is rubbed well inside, so as to soften the leather as much as possible, it makes the most comfortable footgear possible."

"Well, we will try it, anyhow," Terence said. "It mayn't look so soldierly but, at any rate, it would look as well as boots with the toes out; and if any general inspects us, and objects to them, we can say that we shall be perfectly ready to give them up, as soon as boots are issued to us. But by using all black hides, I really do not think that it will look bad; and there would certainly be the advantage that, for a night attack, the tread would be much more noiseless than that of a heavy boot.

"I really like the idea, very much. The best plan will be to pick out two or three score of men who are shoemakers by trade, and pay them a trifle for the making of each pair. In that way we could get much greater uniformity than were each man to make his own.

"As to the clothes, I don't see that anything can be done about it, beyond getting a supply of needles and thread, and seeing that every hole is mended as well as possible. I daresay new uniforms will be served out, before the spring. It does not matter much in camp, and I suppose we are no worse than the other Portuguese regiments."

The next week was spent in steady drill and, by the end of that time, the exercises were all done as smartly as before. Terence had already tried the experiment of sandals. The commissariat at Abrantes were glad enough to supply hides, at a nominal price. He began by taking a dozen. These were first handed to a number of men relieved from other duties who, after scraping the under side, rubbed them with fat, and kneaded them until they were perfectly soft and pliable. The shoemakers then took them in hand and, after a few samples of various shapes were tried, one was fixed upon, in which the sandal was bound to the foot by straps of the same material, with a double thickness of sole. Terence tried these himself, and found them extremely comfortable for walking; and gave orders that one company should be entirely provided with them. As to appearance, they were vastly superior to the cracked and bulged boots the men were wearing.

After a week of sharp drill Terence was satisfied, and proposed to Ryan that they should now ride over to Portalegre, and pay a visit to their friends of the Fusiliers and, accordingly, the next day they went over. They were most heartily received.

"Sure, Terence, I knew well enough that you and Dicky Ryan would be back here, before long. And so you have taken him from us! Well, it is a relief to the regiment; and I only hope that now he is an adjutant he will learn manners, and behave with a little more discretion than he has ever shown before. How you could have saddled yourself with such a hare-brained lad is more than I can imagine."

"That is all very well, O'Grady," Ryan laughed, "but it is a question of the pot calling the kettle black; only in this case the pot is a good deal blacker than the kettle. There may be some excuse for a subaltern like me, but none for a war-scarred veteran like yourself."

"Dick will do very well, O'Grady," Terence said. "I can tell you he sits in his tent, and does his office work, as steadily as if he had been at it all his life; and if you had seen him drilling a battalion, you would be delighted. It is just jealousy that makes you run him down, O'Grady–you were too lazy to learn Portuguese, yourself."

"Is it lazy you say that I am, Terence? There is no more active officer in the regiment, and you know it. As for the heathen language, it is not fit for an honest tongue. They ought to have sent over a supply of grammars and dictionaries, and taught the whole nation to speak English.

"When did you get back?"

"A week ago; but we have been too busy drilling the regiment to come over, before.

"How are you getting on here, Colonel?"

"We are not getting on at all, O'Connor. It is worse than stationary we are. They ought to put on double the number of carts they allow us. Half the time we are on short rations; except wine which, thank Heaven, the commissariat can buy in the country. It is evil times that we have fallen upon, and how we shall do, when the snow begins to fall heavily, is more than I can tell you."

"At any rate, Colonel, from what I hear you are a good deal better off than the division at Guarda, for you are but a day's march from the river."

"The carts take two days over it," the colonel said, "and then bring next to nothing; for the poor bastes that draw them are half starved, and it is as much as they can do to crawl along. They might just as well keep the whole division at Abrantes, instead of sticking half of them out here, just as if the French were going to attack us now.

"There is the luncheon bugle. After we have done, you may tell us how you and Ryan got out of the hands of the French, for I suppose you were not exchanged."

Chapter 10: Almeida

The winter was long and tedious but, whenever the weather permitted, Terence set his men at work; taking them twice a week for long marches, so as to keep their powers in that direction unabated. The sandals turned out a great success. The men had no greatcoats, but they supplied the want by cutting a slit in the centre of their black blankets and passing the head through it. This answered all the purposes, and hid the shabby condition of their uniforms.