Part 2 (1/2)
”We then resuround than ever, the field of the battle proper The Lion Mound soon appeared, that much abused monument Certainly, as a e ounded in the left shoulder it is ian lion on the top with its paw on Belgiu defiance towards France, whose soldiers, as the truthful old sergeant expressed himself, 'could any day, before breakfast, coians' (_sic_) But I look upon this pyra the field of the fifteenth decisive battle of the world In a hundred years the original field ed or built upon, and then thethe centre of the battlefield that was To round has been cut away and the surface of one part of the fieldshown the plan for this 'Lion Mound,' Wellington exclaiain,' or so to that effect, and, as old Mundy said, 'the Duke was not one to break his word, and he never did coain' Do you know that, Sir Edwin Landseer, who have it in the background of your picture of Wellington revisiting the field? We drove up to the little Hotel du Musee, kept by the sergeant's daughter, a dejected sort of person with a glib tongue and herself rather grey We just looked over Sergeant Cotton's museum, a collection of theto friend and foe; rusty bullets and cannon balls,bits of accoutre bits of uniforlass cases; skulls perforated with balls, leg and arm bones in a heap in a wooden box; extracts fro; rusty swords and breastplates; medals and crosses, etc, etc, a disone Those et out into the sunshi+ne Not until, however, the positive old soldier had marshalled us around hi features of the battle he was going to show us
”We then went, first, a short way up the an hisanecdotes What a story was that he was telling us, with the scenes of that story before our eyes! I, all eagerness to learn froht, the story of that great victory ofday by the side of the old hussar, and drank in the stirring narrative with avidity There lay before us the farh saint' as he called it--restored to what it was before the battle, where the gallant Ger only with the bayonet, for when they came to load their fireare for the reat Life Guard charge took place, there is the grave of the es and knolls that mark this and that, and where Napoleon took up his first position And there lies La Belle Alliance where Wellington and Blucher did _not_ meet--oh, Mr
Maclise!--and a hundred other landmarks, all pointed out by the notched stick of old Mundy The stories attached to the time on the ulation story, with its stirring and a touches and its oued onised faces and distorted bodies, crying noiselessly
”Our guide stopped us very often as we reached certain spots of leading interest, one of the the place where the last fearful tussle was made and the Old Guard broke and ran There was the field, planted with turnips, where our Guards lay down, and I could not believe that the seenificant little bank of the road, which sloped down to it, could have served to hide all those men until I went down and stooped, and then I understood, for only just the blades of the grass near ainst the sky Our Guards round to the bewildered French, ere, by the by, just then deploying That dreadful V for in volley after volley into the deploying Ierer,' and so Napoleon's best soldiers turned tail, yelling '_Sauve qui peut!_' and ran down that now peaceful undulation on the other side of the road
”Many another spot with its grihts beca And there stood a survivor before us, relating this tale of a battle which, toto the olden time But what eant's pointing out to us the place where he lay all night after the battle, wounded, 'just a few yards froe, there' I repeat this to myself often, and alonder We then left that historic rutted road and, following a little path, soon caouhts upon this awful place ca into my mind also Yet the place did look so sweet and happy: the sun shi+ning on the rich, velvety grass, chequered with the shade of the bare apple trees, and the contented cows grazing on the grass which, on the fearful day fifty years ago, was not _green_ between the heaps of dead and dying wretches
”Ah! the ith the loopholes I knew all about it and hastened to look at it Again all the wonderful stratagems and deeds of valour, etc, etc, were related, and I have learnt the ihtest depression on a battlefield
Riddled with shot is this old brick wall and the walls of the far, of burying alive, this place of concentrated horror! It was there that Iterror of war, and that I looked upon it fro an is and poultry grunt and cluck ast the straw, but there are ruins inside There's the door so bravely defended by that British officer and sergeant, hanging on its hinges; there's the hich served as a grave for living as well as dead, where Sergeant Mundy was the last to fill his canteen; and there's the little chapel which served as an oven to roast a lot of poor felloere pent up there by the fire raging outside We went into the terror-fraught inner orchard, heardtalk frohting one's battles over again, and then ent out and returned to the inn and dined After that we strealance at the left part of the field which the sergeant said he always liked going over the best 'Oh!' he said, looking lovingly at his pet, 'this was the strongest position, except Hougouton was moved to tears at the loss of so many of his friends as he rode off the field Papa told me hissadder than a victory' What a scene of carnage it was! We looked at poor Gordon's reat, ilea written thiswhat I have done since We drove back, in the clear night, I a wiser and a sadder girl”
About this same Battle of Waterloo Before the Great War it always looe to me, as it were from the very su the terrible years of the late War I thought randeur by colamour so peculiar to it would be obliterated in the fulalows around it as before, and for the writer and for the painter its colour, its great forh its blood-red veil of sain: it is he who makes Waterloo colossal
CHAPTER IV
IN THE ART SCHOOLS
After tarrying in Brussels, doing the galleries thoroughly, ent to Dover I had been anything but in love with the exuberant Rubenses gathered together in one surfeited room, but imbibed enthusiastic stimulus from some of the moderns I write: ”Oh! that I had time to tell of my admiration of Ambroise Thoe of Jerusalely terrible incidents, given onderful vividness, so free froeny's 'Malle Poste,' with its capital horses
There was not ht, and I caught it”
At Dover I findat the new fort on the cliff, just outside the castle, which for it to the _Illustrated London News_” Then, a few days later: ”Woe is ies Well, never mind, the world will hear of ht over No 2, Sydney Villas, our te its time when it should receive h that art which I was so bent on
At Broht and full of adventure; a year rich in changes, full of varied scenes and e for me happy promise for my future, for to-day I had the intervieith Mr Burchett, the Head proved satisfactory and sunny First, Papa and I trotted off to Mr Burchett's office and saw hi-eyed alloped off hos and the oil, then, Mamma with us, we returned, and ca at the end of the passage of theabout So the drawings were scrutinised by _that Eye_, and I o so well Of course, this austere, rigid master is not one to say s and weaknesses; to have no pity He looked longer at my soldiers at work at Dover Castle and so they showedHe said he did not knohether I only wished to ly advised me to become an artist I scarcely needed such advice, I think, but it was very gratifying I told hiin at the wrong end We were a long ti, and he was very kind, and told me off to the Life School after preliminary work in the Antique I join to-h fairly launched Ah! they shall hear of ht sort
”_January 2nd_--A very pleasant day for me At ten marched off, with board, paper, chalk, etc, etc, to the schools, and signed h all the rest of the fore eye in chalk I felt very raw indeed, never having drawn froe to me I worked away until twenty minutes to then I sped ho were I not to break the ti spin hoain with redoubled energy and spirits sky-high A man comes round at a certain time to the rooms to see by the ther to rule, which is a very excellent precaution; 65 seeree
Of course, I did not make any friends to-day; besides, we sit far apart, on our own hooks, and not on for_, etc, went on, however, but we all seem to work here so much more in earnest than over those dreary scrolls in the Eleirl in our room was a capital hit, short hair brushed back frolass on an out-thrust nose Then there is a dear little pale girl, with a pretty head and large eyes, who is struggling with that tre _motif_ for a sketch But I am too intent on my work to notice much The skeleton behind e rins_) upon ing his grave, for he is in the attitude of using a spade But enough for to-day I was verythat ranted and that I ah road Oh, joy, joy!
”_January 15th_--Did very well at the schools Uponon very smoothly I peeped into the Life roo on, and beheld a splendid halberdier standing above the girls' heads and looking very uncomfortable He had a steel headpiece and his hands were crossed upon the hilt of his sword in front, and his face, excessively picturesque with its grizzly ht foron! I can't bear to look at ed by Mr Burchett, who talked todeferentially and set over your difficulties very well,' and said hat i
Altogether it was very encouraging, and he said this last thing of mine was excellent He relected, but I console ht that I have not wasted my time so utterly, for all the travel I have had all my life has put crowds of ideas into ood account
”_January 24th_--I shall soon have done the big head and shall soon reach a full-length statue, and I shall go in for anato which the students waste soit so far The little pale girl I like, on the coladiator, has been pro grenadier of a girl, who says she wants to know 'all about the joints and oer' like myself”
This is horite of dear Miss Vyvyan, a fine, rosy speciirl, who became one ofof me after I had co in words all thethose of a voice that is still Of my other fellow-students the Diary will have more to say, left to its own diction
”_February 13th_--It is very pleasant at the schools--oh, char home at the end of my work I fell in with Mr Lane,over to us His first inquiry was about me and my work He was very much disappointed that I was not in the Life class, fully expecting that I should be there, seeing how highly Mr Burchett twice spoke of s to Mr Lane, and that I was quite ready for the Life But, of course, Mr B is desirous of putting ular course as possible
Mr Lane shares Millais' opinion that 'the antique is all very well, but that there is nothing like the living model, and that they are too fond of black and white at the Museu Club this , and have only a week to do 'On the Watch'