Sailors must strike their colours, and soldiers surrender when they have death for an enemy.—A court-martial.—Shooting a soldier.—Naval execution.—Soldier’s burial.—Funeral at sea.—Battle of Waterloo.—First attack.—Second attack.—Third attack.—Defeat of Buonaparte.—Consequences of the battle of Waterloo.—Chelsea College.—Greenwich Hospital.—Old England for ever!—Conclusion.

“A word or two now, boys, on the battle of Waterloo, for that must not be forgotten. Many 328a comrade who fought with me in that battle, without a wound, has since been brought down by sickness to the grave.”

“Neither soldiers nor sailors can hold out long when death attacks them.”

“When it comes to that the boldest tar must strike his colours, and the bravest soldier that ever mounted a breach surrender at discretion. Lancers themselves are not sharp enough to resist their last enemy, nor can life-guardsmen parry the stroke of death.”

“Sometimes soldiers are shot. Please to tell us how they shoot them; it must be a sad sight!”

“Sad indeed! so sad, that I hope and trust you will never witness it. In a soldier, whose eye should be bright with honour, and whose heart should despise a deed of meanness, for him to be paraded before his companions as an object of disgrace, and then, perhaps, shot by those who have fought and bled with him, and messed at the same table! It will hardly bear to be thought of; and the faster I hurry over the account of it the better. The culprit is tried, and fairly tried too, by a general court-martial, sworn to ‘do justice.’ No sentence of death can be given against him unless nine officers present agree therein. If condemned to die, he is taken to the ground, where the men are drawn up in a square, and marched round it. He then kneels on his coffin—his eyes are bandaged, and the few men whose melancholy duty 329it is to fire at him, aim at his heart. Every thought of a soldier should be, honour bright by day and night. How sad to become a spectacle of shame and disgrace among his old companions.”

“Are sailors ever sentenced to be shot?”

“No. Culprits at sea are run up to the yard-arm. A naval execution is a solemn sight. On the fatal morn, there is an influence felt by the seamen, and if little is said about what is going on, you may read it in their faces. The crews of the different ships in harbour are turned up, and in the rigging and along the gangways, groups and lines of blue-jackets, may be seen. The boats of the fleet are manned, and, with a party of marines in each, are drawn up abreast the ship where the execution is about to take place. All this occurs early in the morning. At last comes the unhappy culprit. He mounts the platform, that stretches across the forecastle; a dead silence prevails; the sentence that has been recorded against the prisoner by the court-martial is read, as well as the articles of war under which he has been condemned; the signal-gun gives the fatal flash, and the unhappy man is run up to the fore-yard-arm.”

“It must be very solemn! But we hardly ever hear of a sailor being condemned to death.”

“Not often. It is terrible to think of a blue-jacket, who ought to be famed for honour and honesty, dangling like a hanged dog at the yard-arm of a seventy-four.”

330“Terrible indeed. Please to tell us of a soldier’s burial.”

“Those who have seen the funeral of a soldier, especially that of a cavalry officer, know it to be a solemn gathering; but I will not dwell upon it. The death-like sound of the muffled drum is withering to the heart; the mournful melody of wind-instruments, the slow and measured steps of the procession, the coffin where the dead man lies, the subdued appearance of the charger, mournfully accoutred, oppress the spirit, and the helmet and the sword, and gauntlets, tug at the spectators’ heartstrings. He must have a strong bosom who can hear the blast of the crape-bound trumpet, the roll of the muffled drum, and the three-fold volley over the soldier’s grave, without a sigh.”

“It must be very solemn, but not so sad as shooting a soldier, or hanging a sailor at the yard-arm.”

“The thought of death should lead a soldier to act humbly in his life. The tallest grenadier ought not to lift his head proudly above the lowest man in the regiment. But I have not yet told you anything of a sailor’s burial. When a seaman dies he is sewn up in his hammock, with a couple of shot fastened between his feet. As he lies upon a grating, with his comrades around him, the chaplain of the ship, or the captain, reads the Burial Service appointed for the dead at sea. He is then turned off the grating and is soon on his 331way to the bottom of the deep, sinking feet-foremost through the cold blue waters. But we are forgetting the battle of Waterloo, and my time is almost up; if I do not tell you about it now I may not have another opportunity.”

“Begin directly! It will never do to pass it over, such a famous battle as it was.”

“My account must be a very short one. I can fancy myself now on the spot. There is the chateau of Hougomont! there the farm-house La Haye Sainte, and yonder are the heights of La Belle Alliance! Under any circumstances a battle on an extended scale is an affair of absorbing interest, but when, as it were, the welfare of the civilized world trembles in the balance; when the sword is about to decide whether nations are to be liberated or fettered with adamantine chains; whether millions are to breathe the breath of freedom, or bow their necks beneath the iron yoke of an ambitious despot, well may a fervent prayer be offered up to the God of battles, that right may triumph, and that rapine and wrong may be humbled in the dust. The battle of Waterloo was to wrench from Napoleon Buonaparte the sword of his might, or to place an iron sceptre in his hand wherewith to bruise the nations of the world at his pleasure. It pleased the God of armies that the proud should be effectually overthrown.”

“Ay! Buonaparte was humbled in that battle.”

“Before the battle France was strong, but after 332it she was weak; her empire was overthrown at a blow. Buonaparte and Wellington, the two most celebrated generals in the world, met each other for the first time on the plains of Waterloo. The shock was dreadful, but since then the sword has remained in its scabbard, peace has succeeded war, and the voice of nations has uttered a mighty cry against kingly aggression. ‘If there still exists,’ says one, ‘a passion for lawless aggrandizement, the grave that swallowed up the French empire is still open, and deep enough to show the perils of treading on its verge. The warning still is—Waterloo!’”

“Now for the battle! How many men had the Duke of Wellington? and how many had Buonaparte? which began to fire first? and how many soldiers were killed?”

“Patience! patience! my account will answer all these questions.”

“Now for it, then! now for it!”

“‘I have these English now,’ said Buonaparte, in the pride of his heart, before the battle, but his thoughts were of a very different kind afterwards. See! here is an account of the British and Hanoverian army at Waterloo, as formed in divisions and brigades on the 18th of June 1815. The cavalry were commanded by Lieutenant-General the Earl of Uxbridge; the 1st brigade, by Major-General Lord Edward Somerset, K.C.B.; the 2nd by Major-General Sir William Ponsonby, 333K.C.B.; the 3rd by Major-General W. B. Domberg; the 4th by Major-General Sir John O. Vandeleur, K.C.B.; the 5th by Major-General Sir Colquhoun Grant, K.C.B.; the 6th by Major-General Sir Hussey Vivian, K.C.B., and the 7th by Colonel Sir Frederic Arenschildt, K.C.B.”

“What is the meaning of K.C.B.? There seems to be a great number of them that have K.C.B. at the end of their names.”

“The meaning of K.C.B. is Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath. It is a very high distinction; and military men are very anxious to attain it. The infantry were commanded by—the 1st division, Major-............