Walladmor Volume II Part 10

At length the time is arrived when Edward Nicholas is to be tried for his life on the charge of high treason. Within a fortnight after his surrender, a Special Commission was sent down to try him; and the trial is to take place at the county town of Dolgelly.[1] At an early hour, Bertram, who had slept in Dolgelly, presented himself at the door of the court-house: early as it was, however, he found the entrance already thronged by a crowd unusually numerous for so unpopulous a neighbourhood. Amongst them were many women, grieving by antic.i.p.ation that the

cruel thunders of the law should descend, for charges so frivolous as high treason, upon this young and accomplished soldier--whose fine person, winning manners, and chivalrous protection of women in many desperate affrays of the smugglers, had gained him all female hearts far and near in Merioneths.h.i.+re. There were also some fierce faces in the crowd--of smugglers and freebooters: amongst these Bertram recognized several of his friends from the _Fleurs-de-lys_; and at their head stood Captain le Harnois, who appeared to have recovered surprizingly from his 'cons_o_mption,' and was at this moment surrounded by several of his own 'mourners.' Bertram moved as near as he could to the captain, whom he perceived to be in conversation with some person immediately in advance, and lurking from general view under the overshadowing bulk of the n.o.ble captain's ma.s.sy figure.

"_What's_ your name, do you say?" asked the captain, lowering his ear, "Bilberry?"

"Dulberry, I say," replied the other angrily: "Samuel Dulberry, late twist manufacturer in Manchester."

"Dulberry is it? Why, Dulberry, then: what, man! I'll not rob you of it. Now, Dulberry, I'll tell you what: you're in luck; you've not got such a d---d hulk of a body to take care of as I have. You'll do all the better for a gimblet. So mind now, Dulberry: as soon as the door opens, take your head in your hands and begin to bore with it. You shall be the wedge: I'll be the mallet. Never you look behind: I'll take care of all that. Mind your own duty; once bore a hole for me, and my name's not le Harnois if I don't send you 'home.'"

Though Mr. Dulberry could not perhaps wholly approve of the captain's rather authoritative tone, nor of the captain's figures of speech, which, to a man who had read Blackstone, seemed a little too much to confound the distinctions of 'things' and 'persons'--yet, as he saw the benefits of such an arrangement, he made no objection, but submitted to act in the humble relation of screw to a screw-driver--or, to keep to the captain's image, submitted to be "driven home" as a nail by the great hammer of Captain le Harnois.

He began immediately by breaking a weak phalanx of women, who sought to re-unite in his rear; but they found that they must first of all circ.u.mnavigate the great rock of Captain le Harnois; and, long before that could be effected, so many of the Fleurs-de-lys' people pressed after in the captain's wake that this confluence of the female bisections never took place. In a moment after the doors of the court opened; a rush took place; Bertram was carried in by the torrent; and in half a minute found himself comfortably lodged in an elevated corner. From this he overlooked the court, and he could perceive that the captain had well performed his promise of driving Mr. Dulberry home: the reformer was advanced to the very utmost verge of the privileged s.p.a.ce, and obliged to support himself against the pressure behind by clasping a pillar: as the captain in turn clasped Mr.

Dulberry, and enfolded him, as one box in a 'nest' of boxes is made to inclose another, the poor reformer's station was an unhappy one: and, though he had quietly submitted to the captain so long as their joint interests were concerned in supporting him, it was clear to Bertram from the fierce looks of the reformer, as he kept turning round his head, that this 'nestling' of Captain le Harnois was now taking his revenge, by reading to that arbitrary person a most rigorous lecture on the bill of rights. It was equally clear that the captain was in rueful perplexity as to Mr. Dulberry's meaning; not knowing whether to understand his jargon, so wholly new to himself, as bearing a warlike or an amorous character--those being the two sole categories or cla.s.sifications of the n.o.ble captain's whole stock of ideas. Luckily, to prevent any quarrel between parties so interested in maintaining a good understanding as the screw and the screw-driver, betting commenced at this time in very loud terms on various contingencies of the approaching trial.[2] Ten guineas to ten were offered freely that the prisoner was acquitted, but found few takers. Mr. Dulberry said that he would have taken it if the jury had not been packed. Three to four that the trial was over before twelve o'clock;--this was taken cautiously.

Ten to seven that Mr. Justice ---- did _not_ yawn six times before the peroration of Mr. ---- (who led for the crown); this was taken pretty freely. A thousand to one that the prisoner did not show the white feather; in spite of the immense odds, this was not listened to; so generally was the prisoner's character established for imperturbable firmness.

At this moment a general buz announced the commencement of some profounder interest: a trampling of horses outside announced the arrival of Captain Nicholas with his escort from Walladmor. Bertram closed his eyes from the shock which he antic.i.p.ated at the sight of the prisoner; and, when he next opened them, the court was set, the prisoner was placed at the bar, and his arraignment opened in the customary form for levying war against our sovereign lord the king.

All present were interested more or less by the striking appearance and serene deportment of the prisoner. His face appeared to Bertram somewhat more faded and care-worn than when he had last seen him: but on the whole it bore the marks of fine animal health and spirits, struggling severely with some internal suffering of mind.

The trial proceeded in the usual manner, but with unusual rapidity, as the prisoner challenged none of the jury, nor called any witnesses. The crown lawyers painted the prisoner's guilt in the most alarming colours; insisting much on his extraordinary talents both military and civil as a leader in popular tumults. The witnesses deposed with tolerable consistency to his having tampered with them for purposes connected with some design upon Harlech castle. The capture of one outwork of Harlech was established. And at length the prisoner was called on for his defence.

With his usual self-possession, and with an air of extreme good humour except when he had occasion to speak of the counsel who opened the case, Captain Nicholas spoke as follows:

"My lord, and gentlemen of the jury,--I should be sorry to treat with levity any charge which I see that you treat with solemnity. The charge of treason is here, I find, a very grave one: though elsewhere I have known it as common and as trivial as a.s.sault and battery. However, be that as it may, I trust there can be no offence in my noticing without much gravity the attempt of the learned gentleman who opened the case for the crown to aggravate the matter against me by representing that I had engaged in an enterprize which had shaken the king of England on his throne.

"Shake the king of England upon his throne I gentlemen, I have not that vanity: and you must excuse my laughing a little. I am well a.s.sured that it was never in my power nor that of much more potent persons to alarm so great a prince. We all know that, if the kings of this earth were to a.s.semble in council, they would find it hard to devise that message which could make a king of England turn pale. As to Harlech, you gentlemen of the jury well know what Harlech is. A bathing place on the coast, not far from Harlech, I mean Barmouth, is said to have a little resemblance to Gibraltar; a _very_ little, I think: but, as to Harlech, I can a.s.sure you that it has none at all: it is as unlike Gibraltar as it is possible for any castle to be--whether as to fortifications or garrison. The fortifications run more hazard every month from treasonable west winds than ever they did from me; and, as to the garrison, it musters (I think) or _did_ muster at that time sixteen invalids. I will not say that the west wind is as full of peril to _them_, for I think it will take an east wind to affect them seriously: but this I venture to affirm, that, with five such English seamen as I once seduced from his Britannic majesty's s.h.i.+p Bellerophon, for a certain patriot service in South America, I would undertake to make myself master of Harlech castle in ten minutes; and yet, gentlemen, I doubt not but the king of England could have found five other men in his service that would have singed our beards and perhaps retaken it in twenty minutes.

"My lord, I see that you disapprove of this style in a prisoner on his defence. Let me say then at once--that, though I pay every respect to the king of so great a nation, and would have been proud to have held a commission under his majesty, yet, as I do not hold one, nor ever did, I think it can scarcely be said that I owe him any duty, or can have committed any treason against him. It is my vanity to call myself an Englishman; and I sometimes believe that I _am_ one. But I am sure _that_ is more of my free love to England, than of any claim which England can show to my services. For I have lived, from the earliest time I can remember, chiefly upon the sea; possibly was born there: and that I speak English as my native language cannot prove me an Englishman; for I speak Spanish and Portuguese as fluently. So far from having received any favours from England, or the king of England--I protest that his Britannic majesty is almost the only great potentate in the Christian world to whom at one time or other I have _not_ sworn allegiance. For so young a man this may seem a bold a.s.sertion: but the truth is--I have borne arms from my childish days; have seen a good deal of land service: and, as to naval service, my unhappy lot having thrown me so early upon the society of sea-rovers, I have positively sailed under the flag of every maritime state in Christendom. I cannot see, therefore, how I can be viewed as an English subject: and if I were to allow myself the magnificent language adopted by my learned enemy who opened the case for the crown, I might rather claim to be considered as a foreign power making unsuccessful war upon the king of England in his castle of Harlech, and now taken prisoner in my final invasion of his territories. In that case, the learned gentleman will recollect that--if I should escape from this court by the verdict of the jury, I shall have a right to consider him as an ally of that great prince, and to treat him accordingly by land or sea.

"But I am slipping back into that style by which I was sorry to perceive that I gave offence before. I must apologize by charging it upon the example set me by the learned counsel, who should better understand the proper style for a court of justice than I can be supposed to do. I was endeavouring to show that I am not properly a subject of his Britannic majesty's; or, if I am, it is more than either he or I can be sure of. To this I shall add two remarks: first, that I was bred up among pirates--and not trained to any respect for the inst.i.tutions or law of civil societies: a circ.u.mstance which I would wish to have its weight--not, gentlemen, in your verdict, but in the judgments which charitable men shall hereafter p.r.o.nounce upon my character. Secondly, whereas the learned gentleman in the silk gown insinuated that I was familiar with murderers, and that I looked with indifference upon shedding human blood--this insinuation, gentlemen of the jury, I am sure you will not regard; for nothing has appeared this day in evidence to support any charge of that kind--which, as a soldier of an honourable republic, I repel with indignation. Except in battle, or in self-defence, I have never shed any human blood. And, if I did not fear to be misinterpreted in one quarter where I would blush to speak of any thing I had done (though it had been a thousand times more) as pretending to the value of a service--I might produce cases even in this country where I have saved the lives of others at some hazard to my own. But I forbear; and leave this to be of service to my memory rather than to my cause in this court.

"With that view it is that I have made these two last statements: I press them upon your attention by no means as a prisoner at the bar, but as a man who is not insensible, both on his own account and for their sakes who have honoured him with some portion of their regard, to the opinion which may be hereafter formed of his character. The first is a consideration which certainly will have its weight with all the candid: the second is at least as valid as the insinuation to which it applies: it is the only sort of defence which it is possible for me to make to a calumny so general and uncirc.u.mstantial.

"Now, gentlemen, let me say in conclusion why I do not urge any thing to influence your verdict. In point of law, so far as I have collected it from the speeches of the learned counsel, it would be impossible to say any thing to the purpose. The question you have to decide upon, I understand to be this; whether I did or did not levy war upon his Majesty's garrison of sixteen firelocks and his castle of Harlech.

Since the date of the Harlech war I have been present in South America in so many enterprises, even more desperate, that I cannot pretend to recal every circ.u.mstance: I am apt to confound them with one another.

But the general fact of this expedition against Harlech I think the witnesses for the crown have established tolerably well. Some of them indeed gave their evidence in rather unmilitary language, and seemed to be unduely impressed with the magnitude of that war: but their meaning was good! and their dates, I dare say, all perfectly correct. I am sure I have no witnesses to call on my part that could shake either their history, their chronology, their geography, or in fact any one thing that is theirs--excepting always their martial tactics, which certainly are susceptible of improvement. As to cross-examining them, or any thing of that sort,--I am sure they all want to dine: and I would be sorry to leave an uncharitable impression of myself amongst so many respectable yeomen, by detaining them under such circ.u.mstances. And, gentlemen of the jury, if you will excuse me as a soldier for jesting with you at parting, I am sure that _you_ also wish to be out hunting on such a fine day as this. And I will acknowledge that I should myself be disposed to view a prisoner's case as very atrocious who kept me needlessly in court in such weather as this. As to the learned counsel, _their_ hunt is in the court: and undoubtedly, by making so few doubles, I have afforded them but poor sport. I shall not even take exception to the name by which I am indicted. But the lawyers (though I feel for _them_ also) are the minority in this court. And besides they have as little power to save me, as the learned gentleman in the silk gown apparently has the will. You it is, gentlemen of the jury, that are the arbiters of my fate: and, if I wished to gain a favourable verdict from you, I conceive (as I said before) that in so hopeless a case as mine I could take no more rational course towards that end than by giving you as little trouble as possible.

"But, gentlemen, in conclusion I will tell you that I do _not_ wish for a favourable verdict; and, if I did, I should not be here: for I have had it in my power to escape a hundred times over. The truth is--lest any man should misunderstand me as though it were an evil conscience or vicious habits that had made me weary of life at so early an age,--the truth is briefly this: and let it be the apology, my lord and gentlemen of the jury, for any tone of occasional carelessness or (as you may think) levity in what I have said--I have embarked my whole heart on one single interest: from the unhappy circ.u.mstances which beset me, I have in that quarter no hope: and, without hope there, life is to me of no value.

And you cannot take from me any thing that I shall more willingly part with."

The judge briefly summed up by telling the jury that their duty was plain: yet, as three points had arisen which might perplex their views of the case, he would first dispose of these. The prisoner had intimated that he was indicted by a false name. But, as it had sufficiently appeared in evidence that he was generally known by this name, that was no matter for their inquiry. He had also alleged that he owed no allegiance to the crown of England: if so, the onus of proof lay upon the prisoner, who had adduced none whatever. Neither could such proof avail him: for, to justify his attack upon Harlech Castle, he must show a positive commission from some power at war with this country. But that was impossible, for the time of the attack was one of profound peace. Finally, it had been alleged, in the course of the trial, that the prisoner was insane. Now, although it had sufficiently appeared from the evidence given that he was a man of extraordinary and various talents, still _that_ was not impossible; and, upon the whole, had some countenance from the style of his address--for defence he would not call it. However as no direct evidence had been called to that point, the jury would do well to leave it wholly out of their consideration; they might be a.s.sured it would obtain whatever attention was due to it in another quarter.--Some indulgence was also due to the prisoner on the ground of his unhappy training in early life, though he had himself refused to urge it with that view. This also might be considered elsewhere, but was not to influence their verdict. The sole question for _them_ was, as to the overt acts of war. Two witnesses had prevaricated about the date of a particular incident: if they thought _that_ of importance, they would give the prisoner the full benefit of their doubts. The prisoner had in fact admitted the main fact himself: and had said nothing tending to change the natural construction of it.

He had simply endeavoured to underrate the importance of Harlech Castle, but that was of no consequence: a place, weak in itself, may be reputed strong; and, by encouraging people to rise in a period of general political ferment, may do all the mischief that could attach to the seizure of a much stronger place. However, in any case, that made no difference. They had to consider the single question he had mentioned: if they thought _that_ of no importance, they would find the prisoner guilty on all the counts in the indictment.

Meantime, as it was beginning to grow dusk, Sir Morgan Walladmor was sitting in his library, and reviewing the case of Captain Nicholas.

Many n.o.ble traits of character, which had come to Sir Morgan's knowledge in past years,--his talents,--and his youth,--all pleaded for him powerfully: the benignant old man felt concerned that he should in any way have been made instrumental to his condemnation: for of _that_ he had not much doubt; and he was considering through what channel he could best exert his influence in obtaining some mitigation of his sentence; when a door opened; a person, moving with a noiseless and stealthy foot, entered; and, on raising his head. Sir Morgan saw before him Mrs. Gillie G.o.dber. As a person privileged to go whithersoever she would, Sir Morgan would not have felt much surprise at seeing her at this time or in this place: but there was something unusual in her appearance which excited his attention. Her eyes were fierce and glittering; but her manner was unnaturally soft and specious: and she seemed bent on some mission of peculiar malignity. Sir Morgan motioned to her to take a chair: but she was always rigidly punctilious in accepting no favor or attention in Walladmor Castle; and at present she seemed not to observe his courtesy, but leaned forward with her hands against the back of a chair.

"Well, Sir Morgan Walladmor! so, then, Edward Nicholas is gone to his trial?"

"He is; G.o.d send him a good deliverance!"

"So, so?" said she laughing, "times are changed at Walladmor. A good deliverance, eh? What, good deliverance to a smuggler?"

"Yes, Mrs. G.o.dber,--even to a smuggler who happens to need it; but Captain Nicholas is not a smuggler."

"No, but he is worse: he has been a captain of smugglers, and he is a traitor."

"Whether he is a traitor, we do not yet know, Mrs. G.o.dber. As a leader of smugglers he has at least the excuse of his unfortunate situation and his youth."

"Those were no excuses, Sir Morgan, twenty-four years ago."

"Woe is me, Mrs. G.o.dber, that they were not!"

"So, so, so?" said she, chuckling with stifled laughter: "is it come to that? so then a worm may turn again, a poor worm may turn again--when it is trod upon. And the worm may be a snake. G.o.d sends snakes for those that need them." Then, pointing to the armorial bearings of the house of Walladmor emblazoned on the antique chairs, she said--"The snake, Sir Morgan, _my_ snake. Sir Morgan Walladmor, my pretty snake--she stung your Falcon; your Falcon, and--your Doves!"

"She did indeed!" and Sir Morgan groaned with the remembrance.

"Aye, aye. That summer night she stung--she stung! Oh!

sweet--sweet--sweet is revenge, Sir Morgan. Is it not, Sir Morgan?"

"G.o.d forbid!--G.o.d forbid!--Yet, if _that_ be sweet, you have had it."

"Aye, but not all. We are not yet come to our death-beds: and, before then, the snake may sting again. All is not finished yet:--what think you, Sir Morgan, will be the end? what _should_ be the end?"

"If you speak of our death-beds, Mrs. G.o.dber,--peace, as I humbly presume to hope, the peace of christian charity and mutual forgiveness.

Frail creatures that we are! the best will need forgiveness; the guiltiest, I trust, who brings a contrite heart, will not ask it in vain." Then, after a pause, he added solemnly--"You also, Mrs. G.o.dber, will need forgiveness."

She fixed her eyes intently upon him, at the same time slowly drawing from her pocket two parcels. One was a packet of letters. She laid them upon the library table; and, striking her hand upon them with emphasis, she said--"Read those, when you will: they are letters from Captain Donneraile and Winifred Griffiths."

Sir Morgan trembled and would have taken the letters: but at this moment the trampling of horses was heard in the great court, upon which the library windows looked out: it was now growing dark; and the torches of the hors.e.m.e.n suddenly irradiated the room, and flashed upon the eyes of Mrs. G.o.dber. Sir Morgan shuddered at their expression.

She opened the other parcel; and said, with something of a commanding tone, "Come here! come here!"

Mechanically almost he followed her to the window: she opened and displayed a baby's frock: the light of the torches fell strong upon it, and Sir Morgan recognized it well; for it bore in embroidered colours the b.l.o.o.d.y hand and the antient crest of Walladmor--by which marks it had been advertized through Europe.

"Where had you this, Mrs. G.o.dber?"

said he commanding his emotions: but at that instant Sir Charles Davenant entered the room; and he turned to him with a convulsive eagerness.--

"The verdict. Sir Charles? What is the verdict?"

"Guilty: judgment has pa.s.sed: the prisoner is to be executed on Wednesday next."

Sir Morgan still controled himself:---he turned back to Mrs. G.o.dber; and, taking both her withered hands into his, he said in the fervent accents of one who supplicates for liberation from torment, but in whispering tones that were audible to none but her--

"Mrs. G.o.dber, as you hope hereafter to rejoin your own boy, tell me--where is that unhappy child of mine that once wore this dress?"