Part 13 (1/2)
”Neither were we represented in it when it sent armies to protect us from the French, and toward the cost of which 'tis right we should pay.”
”We paid, in men and money both. And the armies were sent less for our protection than for the aggrandis.e.m.e.nt of England. She was fighting the French the world over; in America, as elsewhere, the only difference being that in America we helped her.”
So 'twas disputed between many another pair of friends, between brothers, between fathers and sons, husbands and wives. I do not know of another civil war that made as many breaks in families. Meanwhile, the local authorities--those of local election, not of royal appointment--were yet outwardly noncommittal. When Colonel Was.h.i.+ngton, the general-in-chief appointed by the congress of the colonies at Philadelphia, was to pa.s.s through New York on his way to Cambridge, where the New England rebels were surrounding the king's troops in Boston, it was known that Governor Tryon would arrive from England about the same time. Our authorities, rather than seem to favour one side, sent a committee to New Jersey to meet the rebel commander and escort him through the town, and immediately thereafter paid a similar attention to the royal governor. One of those who had what they considered the honour of riding behind Mr. Was.h.i.+ngton a part of his way (he came accompanied by a troop of horse from Philadelphia, and made a fine, commanding figure, I grant) was Philip Winwood. When he returned from Kingsbridge, I, pretending I had not gone out of my way to see the rebel generalissimo pa.s.s, met him with a smile, as if to make a joke of all the rebel preparations:
”Well,” says I, ”what manner of hero is your ill.u.s.trious chief? A very Julius Caesar, I make no doubt.”
”A grave and modest gentleman,” says Phil, ”and worthy of all the admiration you used to have for him when we would talk of the French War. I remember you would say he was equal to all the regular English officers together; and how you declared Governor s.h.i.+rley was a fool for not giving him a king's commission.”
”Well,” said I, ”'tis a thousand to one, that if Colonel Was.h.i.+ngton hadn't been disappointed of a king's commission, he wouldn't now be leader of the king's enemies.” I knew I had no warrant the slightest for attributing Mr. Was.h.i.+ngton's patriotism to such a petty motive as a long-cherished resentment of royal neglect; and years afterward, in London, I was to chastise an equally reckless speaker for a similar slander; but I was young and partisan, and being nettled by the reminder of my inconsistency, spoke to irritate.
”That is a lie!” said Phil, quietly, looking me straight in the face.
Such a word from Philip made me stare in amazement; but it did not improve my temper, or incline me to acknowledge the injustice I had uttered. My face burned, my fingers clenched. But it was Philip that had spoken; and a thing or two flashed into my mind in the pause; and, controlling myself, I let out a long breath, opened my fists, and, with the best intentions in the world, and with the quietest voice, gave him a blow far more severe than a blow of the fist had been.
”I will take that from you, Phil,” said I: ”G.o.d knows, your stand in this rebellion has caused you enough unhappiness.”
He winced, and sent me a startled look, stung at my alluding to the estrangement of his wife. I know not whether he took it as a taunt from so dear a friend, or whether the mere mention of so delicate a sorrow was too much for him; but his face twitched, and he gave a swallow, and was hard put to it to hold back the tears.
”Forgive me,” I said, stricken to the heart at sight of this. ”I am your friend always, Phil.” I put a hand upon his shoulder, and his face turned to a kindly expression of pardon, a little short of the smile he dared not yet trust himself to attempt.
Margaret's demeanour to him, indeed, had not shown the smallest softening. But to the rest of the world, after the immediate effects of that Sunday scene had worn off, she seemed vastly more sparkling and fascinating than ever before: whether she was really so, and of intention, or whether the appearance was from contrast with her treatment of Philip, I dare not say. But the impression was Philip's, I think, as well as every one's else; and infinitely it multiplied the sorrow of which he would not speak, but which his countenance could not conceal. When the news of the affair at Bunker's Hill was discussed at the supper-table one evening in June, I being present, and Margaret heard how bravely the British charged the third and successful time up to the rebel works, after being hurled back twice by a very h.e.l.l of musketry, she dropped her fork, and clapped her hands, crying:
”Bravo, bravo! 'Tis such men that grow in England. I could love every one of 'em!”
”Brave men, I allow,” said Philip; ”but as for their victory, 'twas but a technical one, if accounts be true. Their loss was greater than ours; and the fight proved that Americans can stand before British regulars.”
Margaret paid no more notice than if Philip had not spoken--'twas her practice now to ignore his speeches not directed to herself alone--and when he had done, she said, blithely, to one of the young De Lanceys, who was a guest:
”And so they drove the Yankees out! And what then, cousin?”
”Why, that was all. But as for the men that grow in England, you'll find some of us grown in America quite as ready to fight for the king, if matters go on. Only wait till Governor Tryon sets about calling for loyal regiments. We shall be falling over one another in the scramble to volunteer. But I mean to be first.”
”Good, cousin!” she cried. ”You may kiss my hand for that--nay, my cheek, if I could reach it to you.”
”Faith,” said De Lancey, after gallantly touching her fingers with his lips, ”if all the ladies in New York had such hands, and offered 'em to be kissed by each recruit for the king, there'd be no man left to fight on the rebel side.”
”Why, his Majesty is welcome to my two hands for the purpose, and my face, too,” she rattled on. ”But some of our New York rebels were going to do great things: 'tis two months now, and yet we see nothing of their doings.”
”Have a little patience, madam,” said Philip, very quietly. ”We rebels may be further advanced in our arrangements than is known in all quarters.”
The truth of this was soon evident. In the open s.p.a.ces of the town--the parade-ground (or Bowling Green) outside the fort; the common at the head of the town; before the very barracks in Chambers Street that had just been vacated by the last of the royal troops in New York, they having sailed for Boston rather for their own safety than to swell the army there--there was continual instructing and drilling of awkward Whigs. Organisation had proceeded throughout the province, whose entire rebel force was commanded by Mr. Philip Schuyler, of Albany; subordinate to whom was Mr. Richard Montgomery, an Irish gentleman who had first set foot in America at Louisbourg, as a king's officer, and who now resided beyond Kingsbridge.
It was under Montgomery that Philip Winwood took service, enlisting as a private soldier, but soon revealing such knowledge of military matters that he was speedily, in the off-hand manner characteristic of improvised armies, made a lieutenant. This was a little strange, seeing that there was a mighty scramble for commissions, nine out of every ten patriots, however raw, clamouring to be officers; and it shows that sometimes (though 'tis not often) modest merit will win as well as self-a.s.sertive incompetence. Philip had obtained his acquaintance with military forms from books; he was, in his ability to a.s.similate the matter of a book, an exception among men; and a still greater exception in his ability to apply that matter practically.
Indeed, it sometimes seemed that he could get out of a book not only all that was in it, but more than was in it. Many will not believe what I have related of him, that he had actually learned the rudiments of fencing, the soldier's manual of arms, the routine of camp and march, and such things, from reading; but it is a fact: just as it is true that Greene, the best general of the rebels after Was.h.i.+ngton, learned military law, routine, tactics, and strategy, from books he read at the fire of the forge where he worked as blacksmith; and that the men whom he led to Cambridge, from Rhode Island, were the best disciplined, equipped, uniformed, and maintained, of the whole Yankee army at that time. As for Philip's gift of translating printed matter into actuality, I remember how, when we afterward came to visit strange cities together, he would find his way about without a question, like an old resident, through having merely read descriptions of the places.
But rank did not come unsought, or otherwise, to Philip's fellow volunteer from the Faringfield house, Mr. Cornelius. The pedagogue, with little to say on the subject, took the rebel side as a matter of course, Presbyterians being, it seems, republican in their nature. He went as a private in the same company with Philip.
It was planned that the rebel troops of New York province should invade Canada by way of Lake George, while the army under Was.h.i.+ngton continued the siege of Boston. Philip went through the form of arranging that his wife should remain at her father's house--the only suitable home for her, indeed--during his absence in the field; and so, in the Summer of 1775, upon a day much like that in which he had first come to us twelve years before, it was ours to wish him for a time farewell.
Mr. Faringfield and his lady, with f.a.n.n.y and Tom, stood in the hall, and my mother and I had joined them there, when Philip came down-stairs in his new blue regimentals. He wore his sword, but it was not his wife that had buckled it on. There had been no change in her manner toward him: he was still to her but as a strange guest in the house, rather to be disdained than treated with the courtesy due even to a strange guest. We all asked ourselves what her farewell would be, but none mentioned the thought. As Phil came into view at the first landing, he sent a quick glance among us to see if she was there. For a moment his face was struck into a sadly forlorn expression; but, as if by chance, she came out of the larger parlour at that moment, and his countenance revived almost into hope. The rest of us had already said our good-byes to Mr. Cornelius, who now stood waiting for Philip.