Wessex Poems and Other Verses Part 5

"Around the town three battles beat, Contracting like a gin; As nearer marched the million feet Of columns closing in.

"The first battle nighed on the low Southern side; The second by the Western way; The nearing of the third on the North was heard: --The French held all at bay.

"Against the first band did the Emperor stand; Against the second stood Ney; Marmont against the third gave the order-word: --Thus raged it throughout the day.

"Fifty thousand st.u.r.dy souls on those trampled plains and knolls, Who met the dawn hopefully, And were lotted their shares in a quarrel not theirs, Dropt then in their agony.

"'O,' the old folks said, 'ye Preachers stern!

O so-called Christian time!

When will men's swords to ploughshares turn?

When come the promised prime?' . . .

"--The clash of horse and man which that day began, Closed not as evening wore; And the morrow's armies, rear and van, Still mustered more and more.

"From the City towers the Confederate Powers Were eyed in glittering lines, And up from the vast a murmuring pa.s.sed As from a wood of pines.

"''Tis well to cover a feeble skill By numbers!' scoffed He; 'But give me a third of their strength, I'd fill Half h.e.l.l with their soldiery!'

"All that day raged the war they waged, And again dumb night held reign, Save that ever upspread from the dark deathbed A miles-wide pant of pain.

"Hard had striven brave Ney, the true Bertrand, Victor, and Augereau, Bold Poniatowski, and Lauriston, To stay their overthrow;

"But, as in the dream of one sick to death There comes a narrowing room That pens him, body and limbs and breath, To wait a hideous doom,

"So to Napoleon, in the hush That held the town and towers Through these dire nights, a creeping crush Seemed inborne with the hours.

"One road to the rearward, and but one, Did fitful Chance allow; 'Twas where the Pleiss' and Elster run - The Bridge of Lindenau.

"The nineteenth dawned. Down street and Platz The wasted French sank back, Stretching long lines across the Flats And on the bridge-way track;

"When there surged on the sky an earthen wave, And stones, and men, as though Some rebel churchyard crew updrave Their sepulchres from below.

"To Heaven is blown Bridge Lindenau; Wrecked regiments reel therefrom; And rank and file in ma.s.ses plough The sullen Elster-Strom.

"A gulf was Lindenau; and dead Were fifties, hundreds, tens; And every current rippled red With Marshal's blood and men's.

"The smart Macdonald swam therein, And barely won the verge; Bold Poniatowski plunged him in Never to re-emerge.

"Then stayed the strife. The remnants wound Their Rhineward way pell-mell; And thus did Leipzig City sound An Empire's pa.s.sing bell;

"While in cavalcade, with band and blade, Came Marshals, Princes, Kings; And the town was theirs . . . Ay, as simple maid, My mother saw these things!

"And whenever those notes in the street begin, I recall her, and that far scene, And her acting of how the Allies marched in, And her touse of the tambourine!"

THE PEASANT'S CONFESSION

"Si le marechal Grouchy avait ete rejoint par l'officier que Napoleon lui avait expedie la veille a dix heures du soir, toute question eut disparu. Mais cet officier n'etait point parvenu a sa destination, ainsi que le marechal n'a cesse de l'affirmer toute sa vie, et il faut l'en croire, car autrement il n'aurait eu aucune raison pour hesiter. Cet officier avait-il ete pris? avait-il pa.s.se a l'ennemi?

C'est ce qu'on a toujours ignore."

- THIERS: Histoire de l'Empire. "Waterloo."

Good Father! . . . 'Twas an eve in middle June, And war was waged anew By great Napoleon, who for years had strewn Men's bones all Europe through.

Three nights ere this, with columned corps he'd crossed The Sambre at Charleroi, To move on Brussels, where the English host Dallied in Parc and Bois.

The yestertide we'd heard the gloomy gun Growl through the long-sunned day From Quatre-Bras and Ligny; till the dun Twilight suppressed the fray;

Albeit therein--as lated tongues bespoke - Brunswick's high heart was drained, And Prussia's Line and Landwehr, though unbroke, Stood cornered and constrained.

And at next noon-time Grouchy slowly pa.s.sed With thirty thousand men: We hoped thenceforth no army, small or vast, Would trouble us again.

My hut lay deeply in a vale recessed, And never a soul seemed nigh When, rea.s.sured at length, we went to rest - My children, wife, and I.

But what was this that broke our humble ease?

What noise, above the rain, Above the dripping of the poplar trees That smote along the pane?

- A call of mastery, bidding me arise, Compelled me to the door, At which a horseman stood in martial guise - Splashed--sweating from every pore.

Had I seen Grouchy? Yes? Which track took he?

Could I lead thither on? - Fulfilment would ensure gold pieces three, Perchance more gifts anon.

"I bear the Emperor's mandate," then he said, "Charging the Marshal straight To strike between the double host ahead Ere they co-operate,

"Engaging Blucher till the Emperor put Lord Wellington to flight, And next the Prussians. This to set afoot Is my emprise to-night."

I joined him in the mist; but, pausing, sought To estimate his say.

Grouchy had made for Wavre; and yet, on thought, I did not lead that way.

I mused: "If Grouchy thus instructed be, The clash comes sheer hereon; My farm is stript. While, as for pieces three, Money the French have none.

"Grouchy unwarned, moreo'er, the English win, And mine is left to me - They buy, not borrow."--Hence did I begin To lead him treacherously.

By Joidoigne, near to east, as we ondrew, Dawn pierced the humid air; And eastward faced I with him, though I knew Never marched Grouchy there.

Near Ottignies we pa.s.sed, across the Dyle (Lim'lette left far aside), And thence direct toward Pervez and Noville Through green grain, till he cried:

"I doubt thy conduct, man! no track is here - I doubt thy gaged word!"

Thereat he scowled on me, and pranced me near, And p.r.i.c.ked me with his sword.

"Nay, Captain, hold! We skirt, not trace the course Of Grouchy," said I then: "As we go, yonder went he, with his force Of thirty thousand men."

- At length noon nighed; when west, from Saint-John's-Mound, A hoa.r.s.e artillery boomed, And from Saint-Lambert's upland, chapel-crowned, The Prussian squadrons loomed.

Then to the wayless wet gray ground he leapt; "My mission fails!" he cried; "Too late for Grouchy now to intercept, For, peasant, you have lied!"