These apprehensions were not groundless. The troops had hardly commenced their march before a volley was fired upon them from the protection of a barn, and as they advanced, volley succeeded volley, and musket answered musket from behind every cover that offered. At first these desultory and feeble attacks were little regarded; a brisk charge, and a smart fire of a few moments never failed to disperse their enemies, when the troops again proceeded for a short distance unmolested. But the alarm of the preceding night had gathered the people over an immense extent of country; and, having waited for information, those nearest to the scene of action were already pressing forward to the assistance of their friends. There was but little order, and no concert among the Americans; but each party, as it arrived, pushed into the fray, hanging on the skirts of their enemies, or making spirited though ineffectual efforts to stop their progress. While the men from the towns behind them, pressed upon their rear, the population in their front accumulated in bodies, like a rolling ball of snow, and before half the distance between Concord and Lexington was accomplished, Lionel perceived that the safety of their boasted power was in extreme jeopardy. During the first hour of these attacks, while they were yet distant, desultory, and feeble, the young soldier had marched by the side of M’Fuse, who shook his head disdainfully whenever a shot whistled near him, and did not fail to comment freely on the folly of commencing a war thus prematurely, which, if properly nursed, might, to use his own words, “be in time brought to something interesting.”
“You perceive, Major Lincoln,” he added, “that these Provincials have got the first elements of the art, for the rascals fire with exceeding accuracy, when the distance is considered; and six months or a year of close drilling would make them good for something in a regular charge. They have got a smart crack to their p’aces, and a pretty whiz to their lead already; if they could but learn to deliver their fire in platoons, the lads might make some impression on the light-infantry even now; and in a year or two, sir, they would not be unworthy of the favours of the grenadiers.”
Lionel listened to this, and much other similar discourse, with a vacant ear; but as the combat thickened, the blood of the young man began to course more swiftly through his veins; and at length, excited by the noise and the danger which was pressing more closely around them, he mounted, and riding to the commander of the detachment, tendered his assistance as a volunteer aid, having lost every other sensation in youthful blood, and the pride of arms. He was immediately charged with orders for the advance, and driving his spurs into his steed, he dashed through the scattered line of fighting and jaded troops, and galloped to its head. Here he found several companies, diligently employed in clearing the way for their comrades, as new foes appeared at every few rods that they advanced. Even as Lionel approached, a heavy sheet of fire flashed from a close barn-yard, full in the faces of the leading files, sending the swift engines of death into the very centre of the party.
“Wheel a company of the light-infantry, captain Polwarth,” cried the old major of marines, who battled stoutly in the van, “and drive the skulking scoundrels from their ambush.”
“Oh! by the sweets of ease, and the hopes of a halt! but here is another tribe of these white savages!” responded the unfortunate captain—“Look out, my brave men! blaze away over the walls on your left—give no quarter to the annoying rascals—get the first shot—give them a foot of your steel.”
While venting these terrible denunciations and commands, which were drawn from the peaceable captain by the force of circumstances, Lionel beheld his friend disappear amid the buildings of the farm-yard in a cloud of smoke, followed by his troops. In a few minutes afterwards, as the line toiled its way up the hill on which this scene occurred, Polwarth re-appeared, issuing from the fray with his face blackened and grimed with powder, while a sheet of flame arose from the spot which soon laid the devoted buildings of the unfortunate husbandman in ruins.
“Ha! Major Lincoln,” he cried, as he approached the other, “do you call these light-infantry movements! to me they are the torments of the damned!—Go, you who have influence, and what is better, a horse, go to Smith, and tell him if he will call a halt, I will engage, with my single company, to seat ourselves in any field he may select, and keep these blood-suckers at bay for an hour, while the detachment can rest and satisfy their hunger—trusting that he will then allow time for his defenders to perform the same necessary operations. A night-march, no breakfast—a burning sun—mile after mile—no halt, and nothing but fire—fire—’tis opposed to every principle in physics, and even to the anatomy of man to think he can endure it!”
Lionel endeavoured to encourage his friend to new exertions, and turning away from their leader, spoke cheeringly to his troops. The men cheered as they passed, and dashed forward to new encounters; the Americans yielding sullenly, but necessarily, to the constant charges of the bayonet, to which the regulars resorted to dislodge them. As the advance moved on again, Lionel turned to contemplate the scene in the rear. They had now been marching and fighting for two hours, with little or no cessation, and it was but too evident that the force of the assailants was increasing, both in numbers and in daring, at each step. On either side of the highway, along the skirts of every wood or orchard, in the open fields, and from every house, barn, or cover in sight, the flash of fire-arms was to be seen, while the shouts of the English grew, at each instant, feebler and less inspiriting. Heavy clouds of smoke rose above the valley, into which he looked, and mingled with the dust of the march, drawing an impenetrable veil before the view; but as the wind, at moments, shoved it aside, he caught glimpses of the worried and faltering platoons of the party, sometimes breasting and repulsing an attack with spirit, and at others shrinking from the contest, with an ill-concealed desire to urge their retreat to the verge of flight. Young as he was, Major Lincoln knew enough of his profession to understand that nothing but the want of concert, and of a unity of command among the Americans, saved the detachment from total destruction. The attacks were growing extremely spirited, and not unfrequently close and bloody, though the discipline of the troops enabled them still to bear up against this desultory and divided warfare, when Lionel heard, with a pleasure he could not conceal, the loud shouts that arose from the van, as the cheering intelligence was proclaimed through the ranks, that the cloud of dust in their front was raised by a chosen brigade of their comrades, which had come most timely to their succour, with the Heir of Northumberland at its head. The Americans gave way as the two detachments joined, and the artillery of the succours opened upon their flying parties, giving a few minutes of stolen rest to those who needed it so much. Polwarth threw himself flat on the earth, as Lionel dismounted at his side, and his example was followed by the whole party, who lay panting, under the heat and fatigue, like worried deer, that had succeeded in throwing the hounds from their scent.*
“As I am a gentleman of simple habits, and a man innocent of all this bloodshed, Major Lincoln,” said the captain, “I pronounce this march to be a most unjust draft on the resources of human nature. I have journeyed at least five leagues between this spot and that place of discord that they falsely call Concord, within two hours, amidst dust, smoke, groans, and other infernal cries, that would cause the best trained racer in England to bolt; and breathing an air, all the time, that would boil an egg in two minutes and a quarter, if fairly exposed to it.”
“You overrate the distance—’tis but two leagues by the stones—”
“Stones!” interrupted Polwarth—“I scorn their lies—I have a leg here that is a better index for miles, feet, or even inches, than was ever chiseled in stone.”
“We must not contest this idle point,” returned Lionel, “for I see the troops are about to dine; and we have need of every moment to reach Boston before the night closes around us.”
“Eat! Boston! night!” slowly repeated Polwarth, raising himself on one arm, and staring about him. “Surely no man among us is so ma
d as to talk of moving from this spot short of a week—it would take half that time to receive the internal refreshment necessary to our systems, and the remainder to restore healthy appetites.”
“Such, however, are the orders of the Earl Percy, from whom I learn that the whole country is rising in our front.”
“Ay, but they are fellows who slept peacefully in their beds the past night; and I dare say that every dog among them ate his half-pound of pork, together with additions suitable for a breakfast, before he crossed his threshold this morning. With us the case is different. It is incumbent on two thousand British troops to move with deliberation, if it should be only for the credit of his majesty’s arms. No, no—the gallant Percy too highly respects his princely lineage and name to assume the appearance of flight before a mob of base-born hinds!”
The intelligence of Lionel was nevertheless true; for after a short halt, allowing barely time enough for the troops to eat a hasty meal, the drums again beat the signal to march, and Polwarth, as well as many hundred others, was reluctantly compelled to resume his feet, under the penalty of being abandoned to the fury of the Americans. While the troops were in a state of rest, the field-pieces of the reinforcement kept their foes at a distance, but the instant the guns were limbered, and the files had once more opened for room, the attacks were renewed from every quarter. The excesses of the troops, who had begun to vent their anger by plundering and firing the dwellings that they passed, added to the bitterness of the attacks, and the march had not been renewed many minutes, before a fiercer conflict raged along its skirts than had been before witnessed that day.
“Would to God that the great Northumbrian would form us in order of battle, and make a fair field with the Yankees,” groaned Polwarth, as he toiled his way once more with the advance—“half an hour would settle the matter, and a man would then possess the gratification of seeing himself a victor, or at least of knowing that he was comfortably and quietly dead.”
“Few of us would ever arrive in the morning, if we left the Americans a night to gather in; and a half of an hour would lose us the advantages of the whole march,” returned Lionel—“Cheer up, old comrade, and you will establish your reputation for activity for ever—here comes a party of the Provincials over the crest of the hill to keep you in employment.”
Polwarth cast a look of despair at Lionel, as he muttered—
“Employment! God knows that there has not been a single muscle, sinew, or joint in my body in a state of wholesome rest for four-and-twenty hours!” Then turning to his men, he cried, with tones so cheerful and animated, that they seemed to proceed from a final and closing exertion, as he led them gallantly into the approaching fray—“Scatter the dogs, my brave friends—away with them like gnats, like moschettos, like leeches, as they are—give it them—lead and steel by handsful”—
“On—push on with the advance!” shouted the old major of marines, who observed the leading platoons to stagger.
The voice of Polwarth was once more heard in the din, and the irregular assailants sullenly yielded before the charge.
“On—on with the advance!” cried fifty voices out of a cloud of smoke and dust that was moving up the hill, on whose side this encounter occurred.
In this manner the war continued to roll slowly onward, following the weary and heavy footsteps of the soldiery, who had now toiled for many miles, surrounded by the din of battle, and leaving in their path the bloody impressions of their footsteps. Lionel was enabled to trace their route, far towards the north, by the bright red spots, which lay scattered in alarming numbers along the highway, and in the fields through which the troops occasionally moved. He even found time, in the intervals of rest, to note the difference in the characters of the combatants. Whenever the ground or the circumstances admitted of a regular attack, the dying confidence of the troops would seem restored, and they moved up to the charge with the bold carriage which high discipline inspires, rending the air with shouts, while their enemies melted before their power in sullen silence, never ceasing to use their weapons however, with an expertness that rendered them doubly dangerous. The direction of the columns frequently brought the troops over ground that had been sharply contested in front, and the victims of these short struggles came under the eyes of the detachment. It was necessary to turn a deaf ear to the cries and prayers of many wounded soldiers, who, with horror and abject fear written on every feature of their countenances, were the helpless witnesses of the retreating files of their comrades. On the other hand, the American lay in his blood, regarding the passing detachment with a stern and indignant eye, that appeared to look far beyond his individual suffering. Over one body, Lionel pulled the reins of his horse, and he paused a moment to consider the spectacle. It was the lifeless form of a man, whose white locks, hollow cheeks, and emaciated frame, denoted that the bullet which had stricken him to the earth had anticipated the irresistible decrees of time but a very few days. He had fallen on his back, and his glazed eye expressed, even in death, the honest resentment he had felt while living; and his palsied hand continued to grasp the fire-lock, old and time-worn, like its owner, with which he had taken the field in behalf of his country.
“Where can a contest end which calls such champions to its aid!” exclaimed Lionel, observing that the shadow of another spectator fell across the wan features of the dead—“who can tell where this torrent of blood can be stayed, or how many are to be its victims!”
Receiving no answer, he raised his eyes, and discovered that he had unwittingly put this searching question to the very man whose rashness had precipitated the war. It was the major of marines, who sat looking at the sight, for a minute, with an eye as vacant as the one that seemed to throw back his gaze, and then rousing from his trance, he buried his rowels in the flanks of his horse, and disappeared in the smoke that enveloped a body of the grenadiers, waving his sword, and shouting—
“On—push on with the advance!”
Major Lincoln slowly followed, musing on the scene he had witnessed, when, to his surprise, he encountered Polwarth, seated on a rock by the roadside, looking with a listless and dull eye at the retreating columns. Checking his charger, he inquired of his friend if he were hurt.
“Only melted,” returned the captain; “I have outdone the speed of man this day, Major Lincoln, and can do no more. If you see any of my friends in dear England, tell them that I met my fate as a soldier should, stationary; though I am actually melting away in rivulets, like the snows of April.”
“Good God! you will not remain here to be slain by the Provincials, by whom you see we are completely enveloped?”
“I am preparing a speech for the first Yankee who may approach. If he be a true man he will melt into tears at my sufferings this day—if a savage, my heirs will be spared the charges of my funeral.”
Lionel would have continued his remonstrances, but a fierce encounter between a flanking party of the troops and a body of Americans, drove the former close upon him, and leaping the wall he rallied his comrades, and turned the tide of battle in their favour. He was drawn far from the spot by the vicissitudes of the combat, and there was a moment, while passing from one body of the troops to another, that he found himself unexpectedly alone, in a most dangerous vicinity to a small wood. The hurried call of “pick off that officer,” first aroused him to his extreme danger, and he had mechanically bowed himself on the neck of his charger, in expectation of the fatal messengers, when a voice was heard among the Americans, crying, in tones that caused every nerve in his body to thrill—
“Spare him! for the love of that God you worship, spare him!”
The overwhelming sensations of the moment prevented flight, and the young man beheld Ralph, running with frantic gestures, along the skirts of the cover, beating up the fire-arms of twenty Americans, and repeating his cries in a voice that did not seem to belong to a human being—then, in the confusion which whirled through his brain, Lion
el thought himself a prisoner, as a man, armed with a long rifle, glided from the wood, and laid his hand on the rein of his bridle, saying earnestly—
James Fenimore Cooper's Five Novels Page 64
