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

"They are fine bullocks, sir," she said, "and there is no fear of their breaking down. Last night I was talking to one of your sergeants, who comes to me every day for news of you. He says that he and about forty of your men are going down with the convoy. All are able to walk. It is so difficult to get carts that only officers who cannot walk are to be taken, this time."

"It is very good of Garcia and your father, Nita, but I should manage just as well as the others."

"That may be, senor, but it is better to have a friend with you who knows the country. There may be difficulty in getting provisions, and they say that there is a good deal of plundering along the roads; for troops that have lately come up have behaved so badly that the peasants declare they will have revenge, and treat them as enemies if they have the opportunity. Altogether, it is as well to have a friend with you."

Terence told the surgeon next morning what had been arranged, and said:

"So we shall have room for one more, Doctor. Is Major Bull well enough to go with me? He could travel in my waggon, which is sure to be large enough for two to lie in, comfortably."

"Certainly he can. He is making a slow recovery, and I should be glad to send him away, only I have no room for him. If he goes with you, I can send another officer down, also, in the place you would have had."

Accordingly, on the Saturday morning the convoy started. Bull and Terence met for the first time, since the day of the battle; as the former had been removed to another room, after the operation. He was extremely weak, still, and had to be carried down and placed in the waggon by the side of Terence. Garcia had been greatly affected at the latter's appearance.

"I should scarce have known you again, senor."

"I am pulled down a bit, Garcia, but by the time we get to our journey's end, you will see that I shall be a very different man. How comfortable you have made the waggon!"

"I have done what I could, senor. At the bottom are six sacks of corn, for it may be that forage will run short. Then I have filled it with hay, and there are enough rugs to lie on, and to cover you well over at night; and down among the sacks is a good-sized box with some good wine, two hams of Nita's father's curing, and a stock of sausages, and other things for the journey."

Nita came to say goodbye, and wept unrestrainedly at the parting. She and Garcia had opened the little box, and found in it fifty sovereigns; and had agreed to be married, as soon as Garcia returned from his journey. As the train of thirty waggons–of which ten contained provisions for use on the road–issued from the gates, they were joined by the convalescents, four hundred in number. All able to do so carried their arms, the muskets of the remainder being placed on the provision waggons.

"Have you heard from the regiment, Bull?" Terence asked, after they had talked over their time in hospital, and their comrades who had fallen.

"No, sir. There is no one I should expect to write to me."

"I had a letter from Ryan, yesterday," Terence said. "He tells me that they have had no fighting since we left. They form only one battalion now, and he says the state of things in Madrid is dreadful. The people are dying of hunger, and the British officers have subscribed and started soup kitchens; and that he, with the other Portuguese regiments, were to march the next day, with three British divisions and the cavalry, to join General Clinton, who was falling back before Clausel."

"'We all miss you horribly, Terence. Herrara does his best, but he has not the influence over the men that you had. If we have to fall back into Portugal again, which seems to me quite possible, for little more than 20,000 men are fit to carry arms, I fancy that there won't be a great many left round the colours by the spring.

"'Upon my word, I can hardly blame them, Terence. More than half of those who originally joined have fallen and, no doubt, the poor fellows think that they have done more than their share towards defending their country.'"

By very short marches, the convoy made its way to the frontier. The British convalescents remained at Guarda, the Portuguese marched for Pinhel, and the carts with the wounded officers continued their journey to Lisbon. The distance travelled had been over two hundred and fifty miles and, including halts, they had taken five weeks to perform it. Terence gained strength greatly during the journey, and Bull had so far recovered that he was able to get out and walk, sometimes, by the side of the waggon.

Garcia had been indefatigable in his efforts for their comfort. Every day he formed an arbour over their waggon, with freshly-cut boughs brought in by the soldiers of the regiment; and this kept off the rays of the sun, and the flies. At the villages at which they stopped, most of the wounded were accommodated in the houses; but Terence and Bull preferred to sleep in the waggon, the hay being always freshly shaken out for them, in the evening. The supplies they carried were most useful in eking out the rations, and Garcia proved himself an excellent cook. Altogether, the journey had been a pleasant one.

On arriving at Lisbon, they were taken to the principal hospital. Here the few who would be fit for service again were admitted, while the rest were ordered to be taken down, at once, to a hospital transport lying in the river. At the landing place they said goodbye to Garcia, who refused firmly any remuneration for his services, or for the hire of the waggon; and then Terence was lifted into a boat and, with several other wounded, was taken on board the transport.

The surgeon came at once to examine him.

"Do you wish to be taken below, colonel?" he asked Terence.

"Certainly not," Terence said. "I can sit up here, and can enjoy myself as much as ever I could; and the air from the sea will do more for me than any tonics you can give me, Doctor."

He was placed in a comfortable deck chair, and Bull had another beside him. There were many officers already on board, and Terence presently perceived, in one who was stumping about on a wooden leg, a figure he recognized. He was passing on without recognition, when Terence exclaimed:

"Why, O'Grady, is it yourself?"

"Terence O'Connor, by the powers!" O'Grady shouted. "Sure, I didn't know you at first. It is meself, true enough, or what there is left of me. It is glad I am to see you, though in a poor plight. The news came to me that you had lost a leg. There was, at first, no one in the hospital knew where you were, and I was not able to move about, meself, to make inquiries; and when I found out, before I came away, they said you were very bad, and that even if I could get to you–which I could not, for I had not been fitted with a new leg, then–I should not be able to see you.

"It is just like my luck. I was hit by one of the first shots fired, and lost all the fun of the fight."

"Where were you hit, O'Grady?"

"Right in the shin. Faith, I went down so sudden that I thought I had trod in a hole; and I was making a scramble to get up again, when young Dawson said:

"'Lie still, O'Grady, they have shot the foot off ye.'

"And so they had, and divil a bit could I find where it had gone to. As I was about the first man hit, they carried me off the field at once, and put me in a waggon and, as soon as it was full, I was taken down to Salamanca. I only stopped there three weeks, and I have been here now more than two months, and my leg is all right again. But I am a lop-sided creature, though it is lucky that it is my left arm and leg that have gone. I was always a good hopper, when I was a boy; so that, if this wooden thing breaks, I think I should be able to get about pretty well."

"This is Major Bull, O'Grady. Don't you know him?"

"Faith, I did not know him; but now you tell me who it is, I recognize him. How are you, major?"

"I am getting on, Captain O'Grady."

"Major," O'Grady corrected. "I got my step at Salamanca; both our majors were killed. So I shall get a dacent pension: a major's pension, and so much for a leg and arm. That is not so bad, you know."

"Well, I have no reason to grumble," Bull said. "If I had been with my old regiment and got this hurt, a shilling a day would have been the outside. Now I shall get lieutenant's pension, and so much for my arm and shoulder."

"I have no doubt you will get another step, Bull. After the way the regiment suffered, and with poor Macwitty killed, and you and I both badly wounded, they are sure to give you your step," and indeed when, on their arrival, they saw the Gazette, they found that both had been promoted.

"I suppose it is all for the best," O'Grady said. "At any rate, I shall be able to drink dacent whisky for the rest of me life, and not have to be fretting meself with Spanish spirit; though I don't say there was no virtue in it, when you couldn't get anything better."

Three days later, the vessel sailed for England. At Plymouth Terence, O'Grady, and several other of the Irish officers left her; Bull promising Terence that, when he was quite restored to health, he would come and pay him a visit.

Terence and his companion sailed the next day for Dublin. O'Grady had no relations whom he was particularly anxious to see and therefore, at Terence's earnest invitation, he took a place with him in a coach–to leave in three days, as both had to buy civilian clothes, and to report themselves at headquarters.

"What are you going to do about a leg, Terence?"

"I can do nothing, at present. My stump is a great deal too tender, still, for me to bear anything of that sort. But I will buy a pair of crutches."

This was, indeed, the first thing done on landing, Terence finding it inconvenient in the extreme to have to be carried whenever he wanted to move, even a few yards. He had written home two or three times from the hospital, telling them how he was getting on; for he knew that when his name appeared among the list of dangerously wounded, his father and cousin would be in a state of great anxiety until they received news of him; and as soon as they had taken their places in the coach he dropped them a line, saying when they might expect him.

They had met with contrary winds on their voyage home, but the three weeks at sea had done great things for Terence and, except for the pinned-up trousers leg, he looked almost himself again.

"Be jabers, Terence," O'Grady said, as the coach drove into Athlone, "one might think that it was only yesterday that we went away. There are the old shops, and the same people standing at their doors to see the coach come in; and I think I could swear even to that cock, standing at the gate leading into the stables. What games we had here. Who would have thought that, when we came back, you would be my senior officer!"

When fifteen miles beyond Athlone there was a hail, and the coach suddenly stopped. O'Grady looked out of the window.

"It's your father, Terence, and the prettiest girl I have seen since we left the ould country."

He opened the door and got out.

"Hooroo, major! Here we are, safe and sound. We didn't expect to meet you for another eight miles."

Major O'Connor was hurrying to the door, but the girl was there before him.

"Welcome home, Terence! Welcome home!" she exclaimed, smiling through her tears, as she leaned into the coach and held out both her hands to him, and then drew aside to make room for his father.

"Welcome home, Terence!" the latter said, as he wrung his hand. "I did not think it would have been like this, but it might have been worse."

"A great deal worse, father. Now, will you and the guard help me out? This is the most difficult business I have to do."

It was with some difficulty he was got out of the coach. As soon as he had steadied himself on his crutches, Mary came up again, threw her arms round his neck, and kissed him.

"We are cousins, you know, Terence," she said, "and as your arms are occupied, I have to take the initiative."

She was half laughing and half crying.

The guard hurried to get the portmanteaus out of the boot. As soon as he had placed them in the road he shouted to the coachman, and climbed up on to his post as the vehicle drove on; the passengers on the roof giving hearty cheers for the two disabled officers. By this time, the major was heartily shaking hands with O'Grady.

"I saw in the Gazette that you were hit again, O'Grady."

"Yes. I left one little memento of meself in Portugal, and it was only right that I should lave another in Spain. It has been worrying me a good deal, because I should have liked to have brought them home to be buried in the same grave with me, so as to have everything handy together. How they are ever to be collected when the time comes bothers me entirely, when I can't even point out where they are to be found."

"You have not lost your good spirits anyhow, O'Grady."

"I never shall, I hope, O'Connor; and even if I had been inclined to, Terence would have brought them back again."

As they stood chatting, a manservant had placed the portmanteaus on the box of a pretty open carriage, drawn by two horses.

"This is our state carriage, Terence, though we don't use it very often for, when I go about by myself, I ride. Mary has a pony carriage, and drives herself about.

"You remember Pat Cassidy, don't you?"

"Of course I do, now I look at him," Terence said. "It's your old soldier servant," and he shook hands with the man. "He did not come home with you, did he, father?"

"No, he was badly wounded at Talavera, and invalided home. They thought that he would not be fit for service again, and so discharged him; and he found his way here, and glad enough I was to have him."

Aided by his father and O'Grady, Terence took his place in the carriage. His father seated himself by his side, while Mary and O'Grady had the opposite seat.

"There is one advantage in losing legs," O'Grady said. "We can stow away much more comfortably in a carriage. Is this the nearest point to your place?"

"Yes. It is four miles nearer than Ballyhovey, so we thought that we might as well meet you here, and more comfortably than meeting you in the town. It was Mary's suggestion. I think she would not have liked to have kissed Terence in the public street."

"Nonsense, uncle!" Mary said indignantly. "Of course I should have kissed him, anywhere. Are we not cousins? And didn't he save me from being shut up in a nunnery, all my life?"

"All right, Mary, it is quite right that you should kiss him; still, I should say that it was pleasanter to do so when you had not a couple of score of loafers looking on, who would not know that he was your cousin, and had saved you from a convent."

"You are looking well, father," Terence said, to turn the conversation.

"Never was better in my life, lad, except that I am obliged to be careful with my leg; but after all, it may be that, though it seemed hard to me at the time, it is as well that I left the regiment when I did. Quite half the officers have been killed, since then. Vimiera accounted for some of them. Major Harrison went there, and gave me my step. Talavera made several more vacancies, and Salamanca cost us ten officers, including poor O'Driscoll. I am lucky to have come off as well as I did. It did not seem a very cheerful lookout, at first; but since this young woman arrived, and took possession of me, I am as happy and contented as a man can be."

"I deny altogether having taken possession of you, uncle. I let you have your way very much, and only interfere for your own good."

"You will have another patient to look after now, dear, and to fuss over."

"I will do my best," she said softly, leaning forward and putting her hand on that of Terence. "I know that it will be terribly dull for you, at first–after being constantly on the move for the last five years, and always full of excitement and adventure–to have to keep quiet and do nothing."

"I shall get on very well," he said. "Just as first, of course, I shall not be able to get about very much, but I shall soon learn to use my crutches; and I hope, before very long, to get a leg of some sort; and I don't see why I should not be able to ride again, after a bit. If I cannot do it any other way, I must take to a side saddle. I can have a leg made specially for riding, with a crook at the knee."

Mary laughed, while the tears came in her eyes.

"Why, bless me, Mary," he went on, "the loss of a leg is nothing, when you are accustomed to it. I shall be able, as I have said, to ride, drive, shoot, fish, and all sorts of things. The only thing that I shall be cut off from, as far as I can see, is dancing; but as I have never had a chance of dancing, since the last ball the regiment gave at Athlone, the loss will not be a very grievous one.

"Look at O'Grady. There he is, much worse off than I am, as he has no one to make any particular fuss about him. He is getting on capitally and, indeed, stumped about the deck so much, coming home, that the captain begged him to have a pad of leather put on to the bottom of his leg, to save the decks. O'Grady is a philosopher, and I shall try to follow his example."

"Why should one bother oneself, Miss O'Connor, when bothering won't help? When the war is over, I shall buy Tim Doolan, my soldier servant, out. He is a vile, drunken villain; but I understand him, and he understands me, and he blubbered so, when he carried me off the field, that I had to promise him that, if a French bullet did not carry him off, I would send for him when the war was over.

"'You know you can't do without me, yer honour,' the scoundrel said.

"'I can do better without you than with you, Tim,' says I. 'Ye are always getting me into trouble, with your drunken ways. Ye would have been flogged a dozen times, if I hadn't screened you. Take up your musket and join your regiment. You rascal, you are smelling of drink now, and divil a drop, except water, is there in me flask.'

"'I did it for your own good,' says he. 'Ye know that spirits always heats your blood, and water would be the best for you, when the fighting began; so I just sacrificed meself.

"'For,' says I to meself, 'if ye get fighting a little wild, Tim, it don't matter a bit; but the captain will have to keep cool, so it is best that you should drink up the spirits, and fill the flask up with water to quench his thirst.'"

"'Be off, ye black villain,' I said, 'or I will strike you.'

"'You will never be able to do without me, Captain,' says he, picking up his musket; and with that he trudged away and, for aught I know, he never came out of the battle alive."

The others laughed.

"They were always quarrelling, Mary," Terence said. "But I agree with Tim that his master will find it very hard to do without him, especially about one o'clock in the morning."

"I am ashamed of you, Terence," O'Grady said, earnestly; "taking away me character, when I have come down here as your guest."

"It is too bad, O'Grady," Major O'Connor said, "but you know Terence was always conspicuous for his want of respect towards his elders."

"He was that same, O'Connor. I did me best for the boy, but there are some on whom education and example are clean thrown away."

"You are looking pale, cousin Terence," Mary said.

"Am I? My leg is hurting me a bit. Ireland is a great country, but its by-roads are not the best in the world, and this jolting shakes me up a bit."

"How stupid I was not to think of it!" she said and, rising in her seat, told Cassidy to drive at a walk.

They were now only half a mile from the house.

"You will hardly know the old place again, Terence," his father said.

"And a very good thing too, father, for a more tumble-down old shanty I never was in."

"It was the abode of our race, Terence."

"Well, then, it says mighty little for our race, father."

"Ah! But it did not fall into the state you saw it in till my father died, a year after I got my commission."

"I won't blame them, then; but, at any rate, I am glad I am coming home to a house and not to a ruin.

"Ah, that is more like a home!" he said, as a turn of the road brought them in sight of the building. "You have done wonders, Mary. That is a house fit for any Irish gentleman to live in."

"It has been altered so that it can be added to, Terence; but, at any rate, it is comfortable. As it was before, it made one feel rheumatic to look at it."

On arriving at the house, Terence refused all assistance.

"I am going to be independent, as far as I can," he said and, slipping down from the seat into the bottom of the chaise, he was able to put his foot on to the ground and, by the aid of his crutches, to get out and enter the house unaided.

"That is the old parlour, I think," he said, glancing into one of the rooms.

"Yes. It is your father's snuggery, now. There is scarcely any alteration there, and he can mess about as he likes with his guns and fishing tackle and swords.

"This is the dining room, now."

And she led the way along a wide passage to the new part of the house, where a bright fire was blazing in a handsome and well-furnished room. An invalid's chair had been placed by the fire, and opposite it was a large, cosy armchair.

"That is for your use, Major O'Grady," she said. "Now, Terence, you are to lay yourself up in that chair. I will bring a small table to your side, and put your dinner there."

"I will lie down until the dinner is ready, Mary. But I am perfectly capable of sitting at the table. I did so the last week before leaving the ship."

"You shall do that tomorrow. You may say what you like, but I can see that you are very tired and, for today, you will take it easy. I am going to be your nurse, and I can assure you that you will have to obey orders. You have been in independent command quite long enough."

"It is of no use, Terence; you must do as you are told," his father said. "The only way to get on with this young woman is to let her have her own way. I have given up opposing her, long ago; and you will have to do the same."

Terence did not find it unpleasant to be nursed and looked after, and even to obey peremptory orders.

A month later, Mary came into the room quietly, one afternoon, when he was sitting and looking into the fire; as his father and O'Grady had driven over to Killnally. Absorbed in his own thoughts, he did not hear her enter.

Thinking that he was asleep, she paused at the door. A moment later she heard a deep sigh. She came forward at once.

"What are you sighing about, Terence? Your leg is not hurting you, is it?"

"No, dear, it has pretty well given up hurting me."

"What were you sighing about, then?"

He was silent for a minute, and then said:

"Well you see, one cannot help sighing a little at the thought that one is laid up, a useless man, when one is scarce twenty-one."

"You have done your work, Terence. You have made a name for yourself, when others are just leaving college and thinking of choosing a profession. You have done more, in five years, than most men achieve in all their lifetime.

"This is the first time I have heard you grumble. I know it is hard, but what has specially upset you, today?"

"I suppose I am a little out of sorts," he said. "I was thinking, perhaps, how different it might have been, if it hadn't been for that unlucky shell."

"You mean that you might have gone on to Burgos, and fallen in the assault there; or shared in that dreadful retreat to the frontier again."

"No. I was not thinking of Spain, nor even of the army. I was thinking of here."

"But you said, over and over again, Terence, that you will be able to ride, and drive, and get about like other people, in time."

"Yes, dear. In many respects it will be the same, but not in one respect."

Then he broke off.

"I am an ungrateful brute. I have everything to make me happy–a comfortable home, a good father, and a dear little sister to nurse me."

"What did I tell you, sir," she said, after a pause, "when I said goodbye to you at Coimbra? That I would rather be your cousin. You were quite hurt, and I said that you were a silly boy, and would understand better, some day."

"I have understood, since," he said, "and was glad that you were not my sister; but now, you see, things have altogether changed, and I must be content with sistership."