For Love of Country: A Story of Land and Sea in the Days of the Revolution
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CHAPTER XXXVII
For Love of Country
The force of the explosion occurring so near to the line-of-battle shipdrove her over with irresistible power upon her beam-ends until sheburied her port main-deck guns under water; her time was not yet come,however, for, after a trembling movement of sickening uncertainty, sherighted herself, slowly at first, but finally with a mighty roll andrush as if on a tidal wave. For a few seconds the air was filled withpieces of wreck, arms, spars, bodies, many of which fell on theYarmouth. The horrified spectators saw the two broken halves of theill-fated frigate gradually disappearing beneath the heaving sea,sucking down in their inexorable vortex most of the bodies of those,alive or dead, who floated near. The fire had come in broad sheetsthrough the portholes of the main-deck guns of the ship from theexplosion, driving the men from their stations, and, by heating theiron masses or igniting the priming, caused sudden and wild dischargesto add their quota of confusion to the awful scene. Pieces of burningwreck had also fallen in the tops, or upon the sails, or lodged in thestanding rigging, full of tar as usual, and dry and inflammable to thelast degree. The Yarmouth, therefore, was in serious danger,--more sothan in any other period of the action,--her little antagonist havinginflicted the most damaging blow with the last gasp, as it were; forlittle columns of flame and smoke began to rise ominously in a dozenplaces. Then was manifested the splendid discipline for which Britishships were famous the world over. Rapidly and with unerring skill andcoolness the proper orders were given, and the tired men were set towork desperately fighting once more to check and put out the fire.Long and hard was the struggle, the issue much in doubt; but in the endthe efforts of her crew were crowned with merited success, and theirship was eventually saved from the dangerous conflagration which hadmenaced her with ruin, not less complete and disastrous than hadbefallen the frigate.
While all this was being done, a little scene took place upon thequarter-deck which was worthy of notice. Something heavy and solid,thrown upward by the tremendous force of the discharge, struck the railwith a mighty crash at the moment of the explosion, just at the pointwhere Katharine, wide-eyed, petrified with horror, after that one vividglance in which she apparently saw her lover dead on his ownquarter-deck beneath her, stood clinging rigidly to the bulwarks as ifparalyzed. It was the body of a man; instinctively she threw out herstrong young arm and saved it from falling again into the sea on thereturn roll of the ship. One or two of the seamen standing by came toher assistance, and the body was dragged on board and laid on the deckat her feet. Something familiar in the figure moved Katharine to afurther examination. She knelt down and wiped the blood and smoke anddust from the face of the prostrate man, and recognized him at once.It was old Bentley, desperately wounded, his clothes soaked with bloodfrom several severe wounds, and apparently dying fast, but stillbreathing. A small tightly rolled up ball of bunting was lying nearher on the deck; it was a flag from the Randolph, which had been blownthere by the force of the explosion. She quickly picked it up andpillowed the head of the unconscious man upon it. Then she ran belowto her cabin, coming back in a moment with water and a cordial, withwhich she bathed the head and wiped the lips of the dying man. Thefires were all forward, and, the wind being aft, the danger was in thefore part of the ship; no one therefore paid the least attention toher. There was, in fact, save the captain and one or two midshipmen,no one else on the poop-deck except her father, who like herself hadbeen overwhelmed by the sudden and awful ending of the battle. Beingwithout anything to do, the colonel, who had been watching the menfight with the fire, happened to look aft for a moment and saw hisdaughter by the side of the prostrate man. He stepped over to her atonce.
"Katharine, Katharine," he said to her in a tone of stern reproof andsurprise, not as he usually spoke to her, "you here! 'T is no placefor women. When did you come from below?"
"I've not been below at all, father," she replied, looking up at himwith a white, stricken face which troubled his loving heart.
"Do you mean to tell me that you have been on deck during the action?"
"Yes, father, right here. Do you not understand that it was Mr.Seymour's ship--I could not go away!"
"By heavens! Think of it! And I forgot you completely-- The faultwas mine, how could I have allowed it?" he continued in great agitation.
"Never mind, father; I could not have gone below in any case. Do youthink he--Mr. Seymour--can be yet alive?" she asked, still cherishing afaint hope.
The colonel shook his head gloomily, and then stooping down and lookingat the prostrate form of the man on the deck, he asked,--
"But who is this you have here?"
The man opened his eyes at this moment and looked up vacantly.
"William Bentley, sir," he said in a hoarse whisper, as if in answer tothe question; and then making a vain effort to raise his hand to hishead, he went on half-mechanically, "bosun of the Randolph, sir. Comeaboard!"
"Merciful Powers, it is old Bentley!" cried the colonel. "Can anythingbe done for you, my man? How is it with you?"
Katharine poured a little more of the cordial down his throat, whichgave him a fictitious strength for a moment, and he answered in alittle stronger voice, with a glance of recognition and wonder,--
"The colonel and the young miss! we thought you dead in the wreck ofthe Radnor. He will be glad;" and then after a pause recollection cameto him. "Oh, God!" he murmured, "Mr. Seymour!"
"What of him? Speak!" cried Katharine, in agony.
"Gone with the rest," he replied with an effort "'T was a good fight,though. The other ships,--where are they?"
"Escaped," answered the colonel; "we are too much cut up to pursue."
"Why did you do it?" moaned Katharine, thinking of Seymour's attack onthe ship of the line.
The old man did not heed the question; his eyes closed. He was still amoment, and then he opened his eyes again slowly. Straight above himwaved the standard of his enemy.
"I never thought--to die--under the English flag," he said slowly andwith great effort. Supplying its place with her own young soft arm,Katharine drew forth the little American ensign which had served himfor a pillow--stained with his own blood--and held it up before him. Alight came into his dying eyes,--a light of heaven, perhaps, no pain inhis heart now. One trembling hand would still do his bidding; by asuperhuman effort of his resolute will he caught the bit of bunting andcarried it to his lips in a long kiss of farewell. His lips moved. Hewas saying something. Katharine bent to listen. What was it? Ah! sheheard; they were the words he said on the deck of the transport whenthey saw the ship wrecked in the pass in the beating seas,--the wordshe had repeated in the old farmhouse on that winter night to the greatgeneral, when he told the story of that cruise; the words he had madeto stand for the great idea of his own life; the words with which hehad cheered and soothed and sustained and encouraged many weaker menwho had looked to his iron soul for help and guidance. They were thewords to which many a patriot like him, now lying mute and cold uponthe hills about Boston, under the trees at Long Island, by the flowingwaters and frowning cliffs of the Hudson, on the verdant glacis atQuebec, 'neath the smooth surface of Lake Champlain, in the dimnorthern woods, on the historic field of Princeton, or within the stilldepths of this mighty sea now tossing them upon its bosom, had givenmost eloquent expression and final attestation. What were they?
"For--for--love--of--country." The once mighty voice died away in afeeble whisper; a child might still the faintly beating heart. Themighty chest--rose--fell; the old man lay still. Love ofcountry,--that was his passion, you understand.
Love of country! That was the great refrain. The wind roared the songthrough the pines, on the snow-clad mountains in the far north, sobbedit softly through the rustling palmetto branches in the south-land, orbreathed it in whispers over the leaves of the oak and elm and laurel,between. The waves crashed it in tremendous chorus on rock-boundshores, or rolled it with tender caress over shining sand
s. Under itsinspiration, mighty men left all and marched forth to battle; wooed byits subtle music, hero women bore the long hours of absence andsuspense; and in its tender harmonies the little children were rockedto sleep. Ay, love of country! All the voices of man and nature in acontinent caught it up and breathed it forth, hurled it in mightydiapason far up into God's heaven. Love of country! It was indeed amighty truth. They preached it, loved it, lived for it, died for it,till at last it made them free!