CHAPTER XXXIX.

THE NIGHT OF HORRORS AT HEILINGHAFEN.

Without firing another shot, we reached Heilinghafen, and found the town in a state of unparalleled uproar. Terrified by the noise of the cannon and musketry at Oldenburg, and still more by the rapid advance of the enemy, the mariners of the Danish and Scottish ships, with their masters and mates, would not leave their anchorage to haul inshore and embark the troops, who were all crowded on the beach and mole--officers and soldiers, horse and foot, women, baggage, and pioneers, pikemen and musketeers, without formation or discipline, and struck with a panic by the vicinity of the foe--a panic which our appearance, as we advanced in dense column towards the beach or pier, with arms sloped and matches lighted, increased.

I thought of Ernestine and Gabrielle; where were they amid all that frightful commotion?

The enemy were close at our heels; there was not a moment to be lost between deciding upon instant embarkation, or a surrender of the whole eight thousand men to Count Tilly. Duke Bernard and his bravest and most distinguished officers, even the Baron Karl and Rittmaster Hume, had lost all authority, for a terror of the victorious Imperialists bore all before it; and there, as if to tantalize us, was our fleet lying in the roadstead, with the loosened sails glimmering in the broad moonlight, which shed a blaze of splendour on the wide blue Baltic.

A mole, or broad pier of stone, which jutted out into the sea, was densely crowded by a column of cavalry, nearly a thousand German Reitres and Danish lancers, who were waiting the approach of two large vessels, the _Scottish Crown_ of Leith, and a Dane, whose crews, more courageous than others, were fast warping inwards, and had approached within fifty yards of the shore. A shout of rage burst from our ranks, when we found ourselves compelled to halt before this hopelessly disorganized mass.

"Duke of Saxe-Weimar," said our colonel to the general, "after holding the pass of Oldenburg for the whole evening against ten thousand men, are my brave soldiers--the children of my tribe--to fall into the hands of the foe, because these Danish cowards will neither fight nor flee!"

"Taunt me not, Sir Donald Mackay," replied the brave Bernard, lifting the umbriere of his helmet by one hand, and reining in _Raven_, his fiery war-horse, by the other; "for they have sealed their own doom--not I. But they have covered with disgrace the name I have won me on two-and-twenty battle-fields."

"Seven hundred brave hearts yet remain to you," replied the stately chief, who was an old comrade of the duke, "and these will embark your excellency, or perish on the shore."

"By the grey stone of M'Gregor, we will!" added M'Alpine, who led the first company.

"Dioul! it was well said, stout colonel," said Ian; "shall we be the victims of these hen-hearted cowards! Are these figures in iron, women or slaves?"

"Let us clear the pier of the horsemen! Let us attack and cut to pieces this band of cowards who bar the way!" cried McAlpine.

"Let us form square and fire on them," said M'Kenzie of Kildon.

"But they will charge us," added another officer.

"Dioul!" said Tan; "let us charge them, and then their blood be on their own heads. Hark--by the Holy Iron! there are the cannoniers of the enemy."

"Pikemen to the front--to the front against horsemen!" cried Sir Donald in a voice of thunder, while high in his stirrups he raised his towering form; "heed not the wolves behind--but bear away those sheep in front! Shoulder to shoulder, Highlandmen--forward, charge!"

At this terrible moment the yell of our pibroch, and the distant boom of the Imperial cannon, were but additional spurs to us. Formed in line, eight ranks deep, the whole breadth of the mole, our pikemen rushed like a hedge of steel upon the mass of mailed horsemen, whose officers strove, but vainly, to put them in some order to resist an attack so unexpected.

"Draw swords--unsling carbines! blow matches--goad flanks! Denmark! Denmark! Vivat Christian IV!" we heard them exclaiming, and endeavouring by the unsparing use of their swords to enforce obedience, but in vain. The horses in front recoiled madly upon those in rear, and in two minutes the unwieldy crowd was driven over the shelving edge of the open pier, headlong into the water, where they fell in piles over each other surging heavily down, horses and riders, for our charge was so fatally victorious that the old Count of Rantzau alone escaped.

The fiery temperament of the Highland soldier admirably calculates him for the assault and charge; thus, in every battle since the field of Luncarty, a charge of clans has been irresistible. In the onset, the fierce enthusiasm spreads along the line from heart to heart, like wild-fire or lightning; for if the impetuous rush and shock of falling headlong, and weapon in hand, among the ranks of a shrinking foe, will kindle a blaze of chivalry even in the dullest heart, how much must it inspirit and inspire a race of hereditary soldiers, like the clans of the Scottish Gael!

Along the side of the pier, on both hands, the scene was literally awful!

Heilinghafen was now in flames; for the Duke, like a wise general, to prevent the foe from finding shelter, had fired the old wooden town in six places, and thus six columns or sheets of fire shed a livid blaze of light upon the harbour, where in a seething mass of foam--the result of their frantic efforts--a thousand armed horses and their mailed riders were drowning or struggling for life. Among the froth and surf, the men clung wildly to each other, and to their horses, sinking in groups, and rising singly to disappear again. The cries of the despairing and the drowning, the splashing of their futile struggles for life, as they swam or sank among a mass of maddened chargers, terrified by the blood-red blaze shed from the burning town upon the water, were piteous in the extreme. The commotion made by them in the surf, actually rolled it in billows on the shore--billows which soon became tinged with blood; for the Imperial cavalry, which now came up with a few light falconets, cruelly opened a fire upon this frightful chaos, and thus the few of the Danish horsemen who might have escaped the waves and a watery grave, perished under the shower of iron poured upon them from the shore.

Our soldiers made a halt, and a half-smothered cry of pity rose from their ranks; for these drowning troopers had been our comrades in more than one encounter.

At that moment a man appeared at the edge of the mole, to which he had scrambled up--Heaven alone knows how--and with a light hatchet he hewed with furious zeal to sever the warps by which the ships were approaching to save us.

"Bandolo, the spy!" I exclaimed, recognising my Schönberg trader in the canvass doublet. "By Heaven, it is Bandolo!"

Gillian M'Bane, Donald M'Vurich, and another soldier, levelled their muskets; all fired at once, and with a yell Bandolo tumbled headlong into the water, to swell the list of the drowning.

"Ah--spy and assassin--thou art gone at last!" thought I.

"Captain Rollo, the enemy's horse are close upon us. Cover our rear with your company until Duke Bernard is on board," said Sir Donald, as he passed me on foot, dragging by the bridle his snorting charger.

Aided by a temporary gangway, our soldiers crowded on board the first ship that reached the mole; and, in token that she was ours, Sir Donald planted the Scottish ensign on her poop.

Though they were fired at by the panic-stricken Danes, who crowded the beach in thousands, two regiments of Austrian horsemen swept along the pier to cut us off; but with my company of musketeers I boldly confronted them. Ian, M'Alpine, Phadrig Mhor, and stout sergeant M'Gillvray were close by my side, and we all fell on with pike and musket, like true Scottish hearts. M'Alister of Lairgie, a poor young ensign, who had lost Kildon's company in the confusion and joined mine, was shot dead; but I snatched from him the _Brattach Bane_, the white banner of Mackay, as he fell into the water, and, throwing myself forward with it in my left hand, and a cocked pistol in my right--

"Gentlemen and comrades!" I exclaimed, "if you would not lose your honour, defend this standard, for thus far shall the enemy come--but no farther." I placed the staff between two stones of the pier, and a fresh conflict began around it. I was the aim of a hundred pistols; but, though horsemen seldom or never hit their mark, the bullets tore the standard to pieces.

Conspicuous among the black-mailed Reitres, I recognised the Count of Carlstein in his polished steel, with his scarlet plume, the golden fleece at his breast, and his beautiful charger Bellochio streaming with blood.

"On--on, Kœningheim!" we heard this splendid soldier exclaiming as he brandished his sword--the famous _Ironhewer_ (so often mentioned in the _Svedish Intelligencer_.) "Charge with your lancers and Reitres! To the left--to the left; upon the Danes and down with them, but spare the poor lads in tartan! Close up--close up! forward Kœningheim, for my daughters are on board one of those very vessels!"

How my heart beat at these words, which I heard distinctly amid the hellish uproar around me and below.

On came the Reitres and lancers mingled, their armour dimmed by blood and dew; on--on, seeming like men and horses of black marble, when seen between us and the red blaze of the town, now sheeted with flame, in their rear. There was a shock, as with levelled weapons and bare knees on the ground, our pikemen met them like a wall; then sharp swords rang on polished helmets; bright lances reeking with blood flashed in the air, as they were thrust, withdrawn, and thrust again; banners rustled and bullets whistled; musketry rattled and cannon boomed along the echoing beach; while the dull roar of the conflagration, and the last cries of the still drowning horsemen, made up a medley of horrors which no mortal pen could ever relate, or pencil portray.

From the poop and forecastle our musketeers, under Kildon and Culcraigie, now opened a fire upon the Austrian horsemen, levelling right over our heads, while our drums were beating for us to retreat on board, that the warp might be cut or cast off.

"On--on, Kœningheim! On, Halbert Cunningham of the Boortree-haugh!" I heard the count again crying, but in his own mother tongue; for in the excitement of the moment, his German passed away. "Let us spare, if we can, our kindly Scots; but press on--thou to recover thine affianced wife--I my daughters. To your pistols, my Reitres, and fire on the Danish mariners; to your pistols!"

All my company were now on board save myself and a few more. All at once I found myself beneath this brave soldier of fortune, who, in his rage and anxiety to recover his daughters; had forced a passage to the very gunnel of the ship. By one downward blow his sword broke mine; his next would have been through me; but I sprang upon him and grasped _Ironhewer_ by the blade, which almost cut my gloves and hands to boot. To the very edge of the pier he spurred his plunging horse, and, in striving to shake me from his sword, kicked me repeatedly with his heavy jackboots, which were strongly ribbed with iron; for, in his blind efforts to thrust me into the water, it was evident that he never recognised me.

"Count, count!" I exclaimed, hanging wildly on his sword; but in a moment I was free, for by one blow of his ponderous Highland blade, Ian almost clove asunder the head of his already wounded horse. Then, with its rider, the dying Bellochio fell heavily into the water, while Phadrig Mhor like a giant grasped me by the plaid, and half dragged, half threw me on board of the ship. "Save him, Ian!" I exclaimed; "let us save _him_ at least--he is the father of Ernestine!"

"The father of--who do you say?" asked Ian and Phadrig.

"Ernestine----"

"Who is she?--but it is too late--too late--he is swept away! If he were Father Adam, or Father Time himself, we could not save him; away with the warp--out sweeps--hurrah!" cried twenty voices.

At that moment a horseman in full armour galloped madly along the mole; burst through the Austrians like a thunderbolt; and dealing a deadly blow at Kœningheim, who tried to intercept him, then urged his horse to a frantic leap, and bounded on board of the ship, which was already in motion, and receding from the pier! It was one of the most daring feats of horsemanship ever performed!

"It is the duke--Bernard of Saxe-Weimar!" cried a hundred voices, all expressive of astonishment.

What a scene did the water around us exhibit! Here and there a drowned or dying horse drifted past, with the rider's spurred boots still in the saddle, though perhaps his whole body was reversed and below water; a few kettle-drums were floating about like anchor-buoys; here and there rose and sank a gauntleted hand or a helmeted head; and, thick as rushes on a mountain lake, the demi-pikes and cavalry standards were floating on the surge.

Swimming near a dead horse, we saw one solitary trooper, who cried to us to save him.

His horse was white, and the drenched plume in his helmet was red. It was the count, and Ian recognised him; this was fortunate, for a severe bruise, obtained I know not how, incapacitated me from rendering the least assistance at that time.

"For your sake, Philip, I will save him," said my gallant cousin; "a brave soldier is ever grateful; but now, while I souse me overboard, make our master-mariner lay his foreyard to the wind."

Ian threw off his helmet and cuirass, tied a cord to his waist, sprang over and swam to the sinking veteran, whom he saved from a miserable death. The count had Eisenhauer grasped firmly in his hand; but poor Bellochio had gone to feed the fishes of the Sound.

The moment the count and his rescuer were both on board, we bore away; and, by the dying blaze of Heilinghafen, could perceive the wreck of Duke Bernard's army surrender their horses, their cannon, colours, drums, and themselves to the Imperialists--in all _thirty-six_ troops of horse, and _five_ strong regiments of Danish and German Infantry. Rittmaster Hume's Scottish pistoliers, who had preserved their discipline, cut a passage towards Flensburg in triumph; but of the foot, the regiment of Strathnaver had alone escaped!