Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon Volume Ii Part 45

The different persons in waiting sprang from their lounging att.i.tudes upon the sofas, and bowed respectfully as he pa.s.sed on towards another door.

His dress was a plain blue coat, b.u.t.toned to the collar, and his only decoration a brilliant star upon the breast. There was that air, however, of high birth and bearing about him that left no doubt upon my mind he was of the blood royal.

As the aide-de-camp to whom I had been speaking opened the door for him to pa.s.s out, I could hear some words in a low voice, in which the phrases, "letters of importance" and "your Royal Highness" occurred. The individual addressed turned suddenly about, and casting a rapid glance around the room, without deigning a word in reply, walked straight up to where I was standing.

"Despatches for me, sir?" said he, shortly, taking, as he spoke, the packet from my hand.

"For his Royal Highness the commander-in-chief," said I, bowing respectfully, and still uncertain in whose presence I was standing. He broke the seal without answering, and as his eye caught the first lines of the despatch, broke out into an exclamation of--

Ha, Peninsular news! When did you arrive, sir?"

"An hour since, sir."

"And these letters are from--"

"General Picton, your Royal Highness."

"How glorious! How splendidly done!" muttered he to himself, as he ran his eyes rapidly over the letter. "Are you Captain O'Malley, whose name is mentioned here so favorably?"

I bowed deeply in reply.

"You are most highly spoken of, and it will give me sincere pleasure to recommend you to the notice of the Prince Regent. But stay a moment," so saying, he hurriedly pa.s.sed from the room, leaving me overwhelmed at the suddenness of the incident, and a mark of no small astonishment to the different persons in waiting, who had hitherto no other idea but that my despatches were from Hounslow or Knightsbridge.

"Captain O'Malley," said an officer covered with decorations, and whose slightly foreign accent bespoke the Hanoverian, "his Royal Highness requests you will accompany me." The door opened as he spoke, and I found myself in a most splendidly lit-up apartment,--the walls covered with pictures, and the ceiling divided, into panels resplendent with the richest gilding. A group of persons in court dresses were conversing in a low tone as we entered, but suddenly ceased, and saluting my conductor respectfully, made way for us to pa.s.s on. The folding-doors again opened as we approached, and we found ourselves in a long gallery, whose sumptuous furniture and costly decorations shone beneath the rich tints of a ma.s.sive l.u.s.tre of ruby gla.s.s, diffusing a glow resembling the most gorgeous sunset.

Here also some persons in handsome uniform were conversing, one of whom accosted my companion by the t.i.tle of "Baron;" nodding familiarly as he muttered a few words in German, he pa.s.sed forward, and the next moment the doors were thrown suddenly wide, and we entered the drawing-room.

The buzz of voices and the sound of laughter rea.s.sured me as I came forward, and before I had well time to think where and why I was there, the Duke of York advanced towards me, with a smile of peculiar sweetness in its expression, and said, as he turned towards one side:--

"Your Royal Highness--Captain O'Malley!"

As he spoke the Prince moved forward, and bowed slightly.

"You've brought us capital news, Mr. O'Malley. May I beg, if you're not too much tired, you'll join us at dinner. I am most anxious to learn the particulars of the a.s.sault."

As I bowed my acknowledgments to the gracious invitation, he continued:--

"Are you acquainted with my friend here?--but of course you can scarcely be; you began too early as a soldier. So let me present you to my friend, Mr. Tierney," a middle-aged man, whose broad, white forehead and deep-set eyes gave a character to features that were otherwise not remarkable in expression, and who bowed rather stiffly.

Before he had concluded a somewhat labored compliment to me, we were joined by a third person, whose strikingly-handsome features were lit up with an expression of the most animated kind. He accosted the Prince with an air of easy familiarity, and while he led him from the group, appeared to be relating some anecdote which actually convulsed his Royal Highness with laughter.

Before I had time or opportunity to inquire who the individual could be, dinner was announced, and the wide folding-doors being thrown open, displayed the magnificent dining-room of Carlton House in all the blaze and splendor of its magnificence.

The sudden change from the rough vicissitudes of campaigning life to all the luxury and voluptuous elegance of a brilliant court, created too much confusion in my mind to permit of my impressions being the most accurate or most collected. The splendor of the scene, the rank, but even more the talent of the individuals by whom I was surrounded, had all their full effect upon me. And although I found, from the tone of the conversation about, how immeasurably I was their inferior, yet by a delicate and courteous interest in the scene of which I had lately partaken, they took away the awkwardness which in some degree was inseparable from the novelty of my position among them.

Conversing about the Peninsula with a degree of knowledge which I could in no wise comprehend from those not engaged in the war, they appeared perfectly acquainted with all the details of the campaign; and I heard on every side of me anecdotes and stories which I scarcely believed known beyond the precincts of a regiment. The Prince himself--the grace and charm of whose narrative talents have seldom been excelled--was particularly conspicuous, and I could not help feeling struck with his admirable imitations of voice and manner. The most accomplished actor could not have personated the canny, calculating spirit of the Scot, or the rollicking recklessness of the Irishman, with more tact and _finesse_. But far above all this, shone the person I have already alluded to as speaking to his Royal Highness in the drawing-room. Combining the happiest conversational eloquence with a quick, ready, and brilliant fancy, he threw from him in all the careless profusion of boundless resource a shower of pointed and epigrammatic witticisms. Now ill.u.s.trating a really difficult subject by one happy touch, as the blaze of the lightning will light up the whole surface of the dark landscape beneath it; now turning the force of an adversary's argument by some fallacious but unanswerable jest, accompanying the whole by those fascinations of voice, look, gesture, and manner which have made those who once have seen, never able to forget Brinsley Sheridan.

I am not able, were I even disposed, to record more particularly the details of that most brilliant evening of my life. On every side of me I heard the names of those whose fame as statesmen or whose repute as men of letters was ringing throughout Europe. They were then, too, not in the easy indolence of ordinary life, but displaying with their utmost effort those powers of wit, fancy, imagination, and eloquence which had won for them elsewhere their high and exalted position. The masculine understanding and powerful intellect of Tierney vied with the brilliant and dazzling conceptions of Sheridan. The easy _bonhomie_ and English heartiness of Fox contrasted with the cutting sarcasm and sharp raillery of O'Kelly. While contesting the palm with each himself, the Prince evinced powers of mind and eloquent facilities of expression that, in any walk of life, must have made their possessor a most distinguished man. Politics, war, women, literature, the turf, the navy, the opposition, architecture, and the drama, were all discussed with a degree of information and knowledge that proved to me how much of real acquirements can be obtained by those whose exalted station surrounds them with the collective intellect of a nation.

As for myself, the time flew past unconsciously. So brilliant a display of all that was courtly and fascinating in manner, and all that was brightest in genius, was so novel to me, that I really felt like one entranced. To this hour, my impression, however confused in details, is as vivid as though that evening were but yesternight; and although since that period I have enjoyed numerous opportunities of meeting with the great and the gifted, yet I treasure the memory of that evening as by far the most exciting of my whole life.

While I abstain from any mention of the many incidents of the evening, I cannot pa.s.s over one which, occurring to myself, is valuable but as showing, by one slight and pa.s.sing trait, the amiable and kind feeling of one whose memory is hallowed in the service.

A little lower than myself, on the opposite side of the table, I perceived an old military acquaintance whom I had first met in Lisbon. He was then on Sir Charles Stewart's staff, and we met almost daily. Wis.h.i.+ng to commend myself to his recollection, I endeavored for some time to catch his eye, but in vain; but at last when I thought I had succeeded, I called to him,--

"I say, Fred, a gla.s.s of wine with you."

When suddenly the Duke of York, who was speaking to Lord Hertford, turned quickly round, and taking the decanter in his hand, replied,--

"With pleasure, O'Malley. What shall it be, my boy?"

I shall never forget the manly good-humor of his look as he sat waiting for my answer. He had taken my speech as addressed to himself, and concluding that from fatigue, the novelty of the scene, my youth, etc., I was not over collected, vouchsafed in this kind way to receive it.

"So," said he, as I stammered out my explanation, "I was deceived. However, don't cheat me out of my gla.s.s of wine. Let us have it now."

With this little anecdote, whose truth I vouch for, I shall conclude. More than one now living was a witness to it, and my only regret in the mention of it is my inability to convey the readiness with which he seized the moment of apparent difficulty to throw the protection of his kind and warm-hearted nature over the apparent folly of a boy.

It was late when the party broke up, and as I took my leave of the Prince, he once more expressed himself in gracious terms towards me, and gave me personally an invitation to a breakfast at Hounslow on the following Sat.u.r.day.

CHAPTER XL.

THE BELL AT BRISTOL.

On the morning after my dinner at Carlton House, I found my breakfast-table covered with cards and invitations. The news of the storming of Ciudad Rodrigo was published in all the morning papers, and my own humble name, in letters of three feet long, was exhibited in placards throughout the city.

Less to this circ.u.mstance, however, than to the kind and gracious notice of the Prince, was I indebted for the attentions which were shown me by every one; and indeed, so flattering was the reception I met with, and so overwhelming the civility showered on me from all sides, that it required no small effort on my part not to believe myself as much a hero as they would make me. An eternal round of dinners, b.a.l.l.s, breakfasts, and entertainments filled up the entire week. I was included in every invitation to Carlton House, and never appeared without receiving from his Royal Highness the most striking marks of attention. Captivating as all this undoubtedly was, and fascinated as I felt in being the lion of London, the courted and sought after by the high, the t.i.tled, and the talented of the great city of the universe, yet amidst all the splendor and seduction of that new world, my heart instinctively turned from the glare and brilliancy of gorgeous saloons, from the soft looks and softer voice of beauty, from the words of praise as they fell from the lips of those whose notice was fame itself,--to my humble home amidst the mountains of the west. Delighted and charmed as I felt by that tribute of flattery which a.s.sociated my name with one of the most brilliant actions of my country, yet hitherto I had experienced no touch of home or fatherland. England was to me as the high and powerful head of my house, whose greatness and whose glory shed a halo far and near, from the proudest to the humblest of those that call themselves Britons; but Ireland was-the land of my birth,--the land of my earliest ties, my dearest a.s.sociations,--the kind mother whose breath had fanned my brow in infancy, and for her in my manhood my heart beat with every throb of filial affection. Need I say, then, how ardently I longed to turn homeward; for independent of all else, I could not avoid some self-reproach on thinking what might be the condition of those I prized the most on earth, at that very moment I was engaging in all the voluptuous abandonment, and all the fascinating excesses of a life of pleasure. I wrote several letters home, but received no answer; nor did I, in the whole round of London society, meet with a single person who could give me information of my family or my friends. The Easter recess had sent the different members of Parliament to their homes; and thus, within a comparatively short distance of all I cared for, I could learn nothing of their fate.

The invitations of the Prince Regent, which were, of course, to be regarded as commands, still detained me in London; and I knew not in what manner to escape from the fresh engagements which each day heaped upon me. In my anxiety upon the subject, I communicated my wishes to a friend on the duke's staff, and the following morning, as I presented myself at his levee, he called me towards him and addressed me:--

"What leave have you got, Captain O'Malley?"

"Three months, your Royal Highness."

"Do you desire an unattached troop; for if so, an opportunity occurs just at this moment."

"I thank you most sincerely, sir, for your condescension in thinking of me; but my wish is to join my regiment at the expiration of my leave."

"Why, I thought they told me you wanted to spend some time in Ireland?"

"Only sufficient to see my friends, your Royal Highness. That done, I'd rather join my regiment immediately."

"Ah, that alters the case! So then, probably, you'd like to leave us at once. I see how it is; you've been staying here against your will all this while. Then, don't say a word. I'll make your excuses at Carlton House; and the better to cover your retreat, I'll employ you on service. Here, Gordon, let Captain O'Malley have the despatches for Sir Henry Howard, at Cork." As he said this, he turned towards me with an air of affected sternness in his manner, and continued: "I expect, Captain O'Malley, that you will deliver the despatches intrusted to your care without a moment's loss of time. You will leave London within an hour. The instructions for your journey will be sent to your hotel. And now," said he, again changing his voice to its natural tone of kindliness and courtesy,--"and now, my boy, good-by, and a safe journey to you. These letters will pay your expenses, and the occasion save you all the worry of leave-taking."

I stood confused and speechless, unable to utter a single word of grat.i.tude for such unexpected kindness. The duke saw at once my difficulty, and as he shook me warmly by the hand, added, in a laughing tone,--

"Don't wait, now; you mustn't forget that your despatches are pressing."

I bowed deeply, attempted a few words of acknowledgment, hesitated, blundered, broke down, and at last got out of the room, Heaven knows how, and found myself running towards Long's at the top of my speed. Within that same hour I was rattling along towards Bristol as fast as four posters could burn the pavement, thinking with ecstasy over the pleasures of my reception in England; but far more than all, of the kindness evinced towards me by him who, in every feeling of his nature, and in every feature of his deportment was "every inch a prince."