Over the Ocean Part 24

My experience was as follows: First, application was made and description given; next, I was sent to officer number two, who copied it all into a big book, kept me ten minutes, and charged me eight cents; then I was sent to another clerk, who made out a fresh paper, kept the first, and consumed ten or fifteen minutes more; then I was sent back, up stairs, to an official, for his signature--eight cents more--cheap autographs; then to another, who commenced to interrogate me as to name, where I was staying, my nationality, &c.; when, in the very midst of his interrogations, the hour of twelve struck, and he pushed back the paper, with "_Apres dejener, monsieur_," shut his window-sash with a bang, and the whole custom-house was closed for one hour, in the very middle of the day, for the officials to go to lunch, or "_dejener a la fourchette_."

Misery loves company. An irate Englishman, whose progress was as suddenly checked as mine had been, paced up and down the corridor, swearing, in good round terms, that a man should have to wait a good hour for a change of linen, so that a parcel of cursed Dutchmen could fill themselves with beer and sausage. But remedy there was none till the lunch hour was pa.s.sed, when the offices were reopened, and the wheels of business once more began their slow revolutions, and our luggage was, with many formalities, withdrawn from government custody.

"When you are on the continent don't quote Byron," said a friend at parting, who had been 'over the ground;' "that is, if possible to refrain;" and, indeed, as all young ladies and gentlemen at some period of their lives have read the poet's magnificent romaunt of Childe Harold, the qualification which closed the injunction was significant.

Can anybody that has any spark of imagination or romance in his composition refrain, as scene after scene, which the poet's glorious numbers have made familiar in his mind, presents itself in reality to his sight? We visit Brussels chiefly to see the field of Waterloo; and as we stand in the great square of Belgium's capital, we remember "the sound of revelry by night," and wonder how the streets looked when "then and there was hurrying to and fro," and we pictured to ourselves, as the moon poured down her silver light as we stood there, and flashed her beams upon the windows in the great Gothic structures, the sudden alarm when "bright the lamps shone o'er fair women and brave men," and how

"the steed, The mustering squadron, and the clattering car, Went pouring forward with impetuous speed, And swiftly forming in the ranks of war;"

and it all came back to me how I had sing-songed through extracts from Byron in my school readers when a boy, spouted the words of the Battle of Waterloo at school exhibitions, and sometimes wondered if I should ever visit that field where Bonaparte made his last grand struggle for the empire. Yes, we should feel now the words of the poet as we approached it--"Stop! for thy tread is on an empire's dust." And so I stood musing, and repeating the poet's lines, _sotto voce_, when an individual approached, and, touching his hat, interrupted my musings.

"Waterloo to-morrow, sir?"

"Sir?"

"Would you like to visit Waterloo to-morrow, sir? Coach leaves at nine in the morning--English coach and six--spanking team--six horses."

We looked at this individual with some surprise, which he dissipated as follows:--

"Beg pardon, sir--agent of the English coach company--always wait upon strangers, sir."

We took outside tickets for the field of Waterloo on the English coach.

The next morning dawned brightly, and at the appointed time a splendid English mail coach, with a spanking team of six grays,--just such a one as we have seen in English pictures, with a driver handling the whip and ribbons in the most approved style,--dashed into the Place Royale, and, halting before a hotel at one end, the guard played "The Campbells are Comin'" upon a bugle, with a gusto that brought all the new arrivals to the windows; three or four ladies and gentlemen mounted to the coach-roof; the driver cracked his whip, and whirled his team up to our hotel, while the uniformed guard played "The Bowld Soger Boy" under the very nose of old G.o.dfrey de Bouillon; and we clambered up to the outside seats, of which there were twelve, to the inspiring notes of the bugle, which made the quiet old square echo with its martial strains. Away we rolled, the bugle playing its merriest of strains; but when just clear of the city, our gay performer descended, packed his instrument into a green baize bag, deserted, and trudged back, leaving us only the music of the rattling hoofs and wheels, and the more agreeable strains of laughter of half a dozen lively English and American ladies.

The field of Waterloo is about twelve miles from Brussels; the ride, of a pleasant day, behind a good team, a delightful one: we pa.s.s through the wood of Soignies, over a broad, smooth road, in excellent order, shaded by tall trees on either side--this was Byron's Ardennes.

"Ardennes waves above them her green leaves."

We soon reached the field, which has been so often described by historians, novelists, and letter-writers, that we will spare the reader the infliction.

We are met by guides who speak French, German, and English, who have bullets, b.u.t.tons, and other relics said to have been picked up on the field, but which a waggish Englishman informed us were manufactured at a factory near by to supply the demand. The guides, old and young, adapt their sympathies to those of customers; thus, if they be English, it is,--

"Here is where the brave Wellington stood; there is where _we_ beat back the Old Guard."

Or, if they be French or Americans,--

"There is where the great Napoleon directed the battle. The Imperial Guard beat all before them to this point," &c.

The field is an open, undulating plain, intersected by two or three broad roads; monuments rise here and there, and conspicuous on the field, marking the thickest of the fight rises the huge pyramidal earth-mound with the Belgian Lion upon its summit.

We stroll from point to point noted in the terrible struggle. Here is one that every one pauses at longest; it is a long, low ridge, where the guards lay that rose at Wellington's command, and poured their terrible tempest of lead into the bosoms of the Old Guard. We walk over the track of that devoted band of brave men, who marched over it with their whole front ranks melting before the terrific fire of the English artillery like frost-work before the sun, grimly closing up and marching sternly on, receiving the fire of a battery in their bosoms, and then marching right on over gunners, guns, and all, like a prairie fire sweeping all before it--Ney, the bravest of the brave, four horses shot under him, his coat pierced with b.a.l.l.s, on foot at their head, waving his sword on high, and encouraging them on, till they reach this spot, where the last terrible tempest beats them back, annihilated. Here, where so many went down in death,--

"Rider and horse, friend, foe, in one red burial blent,"--

now waved the tall yellow grain, and the red poppies that bloomed among it reminded us of the crimson tide that must have reddened the turf when it shook beneath the thunder of that terrible charge.

Let us pause at another noted spot; it is where the English squares stood with such firmness that French artillery, lancers, and even the cuira.s.siers, who threw themselves forward like an iron avalanche, failed to break them.

We come to the chateau of Hougoumont, which sustained such a succession of desperate attacks. The battle began with the struggle for its possession, which only ended on the utter defeat of the French. The grounds of Hougoumont are partially surrounded by brick walls, which were loopholed for musketry. This place, at the time of the battle, was a gentleman's country-seat, with farm, out-buildings, walled garden, private chapel, &c., and the shattered ruins, which to this day remain, are the most interesting relics of the battle; the wall still presents its loopholes; it is battered as with a tempest of musket b.a.l.l.s.

The French charged up to the very muzzles of the guns, and endeavored to wrest them from the hands of those who pushed them forth.

Four companies of English held this place for seven hours against an a.s.saulting army, and bullets were exhausted in vain against its wall-front, before which fifteen hundred men fell in less than an hour.

There are breaches in the wall, cannon-shot fractures in the barn and gate; the little chapel is scarred with bullets, fire, and axes, and a fragment of brick buildings looks like part of a battered fort. Victor Hugo's "Les Miserables" gives a most vivid and truthful description of this little portion of the battle-field, and of the desperate struggle and frightful scenes enacted there, serving the visitor far better than any of the guide-books.

Pa.s.sing from here, we go out into the orchard--scene of another deadly and dreadful contest. We are shown where various distinguished officers fell; we walk over the spots that Napoleon and Wellington occupied during the battle; we go to the summit of the great mound upon which stands the Belgian Lion, and from it are pointed out the distant wood from which Wellington saw the welcome and fresh columns of Blucher emerge; we pluck a little flower in Hongoumont's garden, and a full and nearly ripened blade of grain from the spot where the Imperial Guard were hurled back by their English adversaries, pay our guide three francs each, and once more are bowling along back to Brussels.

Near the field is a sort of museum of relics kept by a niece of Sergeant Major Cotton, who was in the battle, which contains many interesting and well-attested relics found upon the field years ago. There are rusty swords, that flashed in the June sunset of that terrible day, bayonets, uniform jackets and hats, b.u.t.tons, cannon shot, and other field spoil, and withal books and photographs, which latter articles the voluble old lady in charge was anxious to dispose of.

Just off the field,--at the village of Waterloo, I think,--we halt at the house in which Wellington wrote his despatch announcing the victory.

Here is preserved, under a gla.s.s case, the pencil with which he wrote that doc.u.ment. The boot of the Marquis of Anglesea, who suffered amputation of his leg here, is also preserved in like manner; and in the garden is a little monument erected over his grace's limb, which is said to be buried there.

Did we buy lace in Brussels? Yes.

And the great lace establishments there?

Well, there are few, if any, large lace shops for the sale of the article. Those are all in Paris, which is the great market for it. Then, it will be remembered that "Brussels lace" is not a very rare kind, and also that lace is an article of merchandise that is not bulky, and occupies but very little s.p.a.ce. In many of the old cities on the continent, shopkeepers do not believe in vast, splendid, and elegantly-decorated stores, as we do in America, especially those who have a reputation in specialties which causes purchasers to seek them out.

Some of the most celebrated lace manufacturers in Brussels occupied buildings looking, for all the world, like a good old-fas.h.i.+oned Philadelphia mansion, with its broad steps and substantial front door, the latter having a large silver plate with the owner's name inscribed thereon. A good specimen of these was that of Julie Everaert and sisters, on the Rue Royale, where, after ringing the front door bell, we were ushered by the servant into a sort of half front parlor, half shop, and two of the sisters, two stout, elderly Flemish ladies, in black silk dresses and lace caps, appeared to serve us. So polite, so quiet, well-dressed and lady-like, so like the mild-voiced, well-bred ladies of the old school, that are now only occasionally met in America, at the _soiree_ and in the drawing-room, and who seem always to be surrounded by a sort of halo of old-time ceremony and politeness, and to command a deference and courtesy by their very presence that we instinctively acknowledge--so like, that we began to fear we had made some mistake, until the elder and stouter of the two, after the usual salutations, inquired in French if "madame and monsieur would do them the honor to look at laces."

Madame and monsieur were agreeable, and chairs were accordingly placed before a table, which was covered by a sort of black velvet comforter, or stuffed table-cloth, and behind which stood a tall fire-proof safe, which, being opened by the servant, displayed numerous drawers and compartments like to that of a jeweller. The lace dealer commenced an exhibition of the treasures of the iron casket, displaying them upon the black velvet with the skill of an expert, her quiet little servant removing such as were least favorable in our eyes, when the table became crowded, and she went on, as each specimen was displayed, something as follows:--

"_Vingt francs, monsieur_" (a neat little collar).

"_Cinquante francs, plus jolie_" (I expressed admiration audibly).

"_Cent francs, madame_," said the frau Julie, abandoning at once the addressing of her conversation to an individual who could be struck with the beauty of a fifty franc strip of lace.

"_Cent cinquante francs, madame, tres recherche._"

"_Deux cent francs. Superbe, madame._"

"_Quatre cent francs. Magnifique._"

"Eighty dollars for that mess of spider's web!" exclaimed Monsieur, in English, to his companion. "Eighty dollars! The price _is_ magnifique."

"He is varee sheep for sush _dentelles_," says the old lady, in a quiet tone, much to monsieur's confusion at her understanding the English tongue; and the exhibition went on.

How much we sacrificed at that black velvet altar I do not care to mention; but, at any rate, we found on reaching America that the prices paid, compared with those asked at home, _were_ "varee sheep for sush _dentelles_."

Antwerp! We must make a brief pause at this old commercial city on the Scheldt; and as we ride through its streets, we see the quaint, solid, substantial buildings of olden times, their curious architecture giving a sort of Dutch artistic air to the scene, and reminding one of old paintings and theatrical scenery. One evidence of the commercial importance of Antwerp is seen in its splendid docks; these comprise the two docks built by Bonaparte when he made the port one of his naval a.r.s.enals, which are splendid specimens of masonry, the walls being five feet in thickness; then the Belgian government have recently completed three new docks, which, in connection with the old ones, embrace an area of over fifty acres of water. We visited several of the dock-yards here, and were astonished at the vast heaps of merchandise they contained.

Still further improvements that are being made seem to completely refute the a.s.sertion that all the commercial enterprise of Antwerp has departed. Here, for instance, were two new docks in progress for timber and petroleum exclusively, which enclose seventeen acres of water, and here we saw literally enough of splendid timber for a navy. I was actually staggered by the heaps of every kind of timber, from all parts of the world, that was piled up here, while the American petroleum was heaped up and stored in warehouses the size of a cathedral, suggesting the idea of a tremendous illumination should fire by any means get at it, which, however, is guarded against very strictly by dock-guards and police.

Then there are three new and s.p.a.cious dry docks, one of which is the largest in Europe, being nearly five hundred feet long, and capable of holding two s.h.i.+ps at a time of one thousand tons register each. The splendid facilities for s.h.i.+ps of every description, and for the landing and storage of merchandise, are such as cannot fail to excite admiration from every American merchant, and make him sigh for the time when we may have similar accommodations in the great seaports in this country. There were huge warehouses, formed by two blocks _vis-a-vis_, with a gla.s.s roof covering the intermediate s.p.a.ce, and a double rail track running through it, affording opportunity of loading, unloading, and sorting merchandise in all weathers, while the depth of the "lazy old Scheldt,"

directly opposite the city, is sufficient for a s.h.i.+p drawing thirty-two feet of water to ride safely at anchor.

The magnificent cathedral spire in Antwerp is familiar to almost everybody who looks into the windows of the print shops; and we climbed far up into it, to its great colony of bells, that make the very tower reel with their chimes. Here, leaving the ladies, our motto was, Excelsior; and we still went onward and upward, till, amid the wrought stone that seems the lace-work of the spire, we appeared to be almost swinging in the air, far above the earth, as in a gigantic net, and, although safely enclosed, yet the apertures and open-work were so frequent that our enthusiasm was not very expressive, however deeply it might have been felt at the splendid view, though our grasp at the bal.u.s.ters and stone-work was of the most tenacious character; and, in truth, the climbing of a spire of about four hundred feet high is an undertaking easier read about than practised.