CHAPTER XL.

THE KIRK-BELL OF GOMETRA--THE SORTIE.

The siege continued for several months, with various successes and repulses--with advances on one hand, and sorties on the other. The slaughter was great in the city, but greater in the trenches, where the dead lay in thousands, buried in shallow holes, and where the wild-dogs scraped away the earth by night, and the decaying masses tainted the humid summer air. From the walls we could easily distinguish where those hideous catacombs lay, and where the bodies, half decayed, were sweltering among the reeds and slime of the Frankenlake; for by day a dark cloud of flies swarmed over them, and by night the malaria that overhung the spot assumed an almost luminous tint. There, too, came the birds of prey; and there they remained hovering and gorging, until a musket-shot at daybreak put all to flight, save those whom the malaria, and their hideous repast, had rendered somewhat indisposed to fly.

Death had thinned the number of the citizens, whose aspect of misery increased daily; for the loss of friends, the loss of business, the destruction of their dwellings and property, the scarcity of money and of provisions, the prices of which were enormous, as all that our Fourriers could collect were seized and retained for the use of the troops; the aspect of each deserted holfe and bourse, where the merchants were wont to meet daily for the transaction of their lucrative and peaceful business--where vast sums once passed from pocket to pocket, and mighty deeds of transfer were executed--was also sorely changed. Torn down by the passing shot, columns, arcades, and balconies were strewn in fragments among the grass and moss that grew between the stones: here the trees, that whilome had shaded a pleasant boulevarde, had been cut down to form an abattis; there the pavement had been torn up to face a bastion, and vast gaps had been beaten in the solid walls.

The scarcity of food increased, until the soldiers, at last, were brought as low as the citizens, and we had little else to subsist on than a few handfuls of Hamburg meal per man. This we boiled into porridge and ate with a little butter, for we were destitute of milk; every cow, sheep, and goat having been shot and eaten, even to the hides and entrails, long ago. Succour and provision from Rügen and the sea had now been cut off by various gunboats and armed crayers sent by Wallenstein into the Sound, from whence a storm had blown the dismantled Danish fleet. Thus we had nothing before us but starvation or death; and Sir Donald frequently urged that we should all sally forth, sword in hand, and cut a passage to some seaport on the Saxon shore. But the stout Laird of Balgonie vowed that he would never thus desert a city entrusted to his care by the princes of the north; and that to leave the Stralsunders to their fate would be alike unworthy of ourselves and of the ancient military fame of the Scottish people.

This argument was conclusive, and we all resolved to make our graves on the shore of Pomerania, if Gustavus Adolphus could not march to our assistance. Of that we saw not the least probability, for at that time he had his hands full of work in Poland, where, with thirty thousand men (ten thousand of whom were Scottish infantry), he was besieging Dantzig, storming Newbürg, Strazbürg, Dribentz, Sweitz, and Massovia. As for the unfortunate King of Denmark, who was then hovering near Count Tilly, off the Holstein shore, we never expected the least relief from him. Pay we had none, and very little provisions, but we had plenty of powder and shot of every description. The garrison was now reduced to four thousand Scots, and one thousand Germans, Danes, and Frenchmen, all worn by incessant toil, and scarcity of food, for they had a strong city to defend against a hundred thousand men, in whose rear lay all the vast resources of Germany and Flanders; for Wallenstein could command every thing between the Baltic and the gates of Vienna.

Pressing on their works, his pioneers laid down their sap rollers, and dug trenches in new places, facing them internally with gabions and fascines, over which they flung the loose earth, and thus got rapidly under cover. Some of these pioneers were so bold in one place as to push their sap rollers to the foot of the outer glacis.

My daily visits to Ernestine threw a bright gleam of happiness athwart the murky cloud of war and desolation that surrounded us; and when seated by her side, in her pretty little boudoir, I forgot the miseries endured by us at the Frankendör, the desolation of the city, the desperate state--the starvation and death--to which we were hurrying, and which I strove to conceal from her for a time, but in vain.

Once, when I led her to the Frankendör during a brief cessation of hostilities, that she might see the white tents of her father's brigade, the wan visage, the anxious eyes, the tattered attire and fallen paunch of more than one once rotund and jovial city councillor, attracted her attention, and displayed, in language too powerful to be misunderstood, the undeserved miseries endured by the honest and industrious people of Stralsund.

Scottish porridge is certainly very good in its way; but as the best of food will pall the appetite by repetition, we soon tired of having nothing but porridge for breakfast, porridge for dinner, and porridge for supper. The tables of the Field-marshal commanding, of the burgomaster, and all the great men of the city, were limited to the same poor fare; and in some instances the aged, the sickly, and the mendicant, who were unable to raise the enormous sum for which an ounce of meal or of salted fish were sold in the market-place, were found dead in their litters of straw, or at the threshold of their doors, and reduced to mere skeletons.

War hardens the human heart, and love makes it selfish. I cared little for what happened to the poor citizens, provided Ernestine knew nothing of what they endured; but though Ian, Phadrig Mhor, and myself, parted with every thing we could spare--selling even our buckles, silver buttons, &c., to a Jew in the Platz, to procure the necessaries of life for her--even these began to fail, and in common with the rest I became desperate. About this time Sir Alexander Leslie obtained intelligence--how, I know not--that a train of waggons, laden with provisions for the Imperialists, were coming towards Stralsund from Greifswalde, a fortified town of Prussian Pomerania, situated about fifteen miles distant, at the confluence of the Reik with the Baltic. Of those waggons he determined to possess himself, and on that night (the first of September) ordered Sir Donald Mackay with our regiment of Strathnaver, the Lord Spynie with his Lowland musketeers, and Sir Ludovick Leslie with his old Scots regiment, to march at dusk; and (while he, in person, was diverting the enemy's attention by scouring their trenches) endeavour to fall upon the post of the quartermaster-general, to seize some of the laden waggons, and at all hazards bring them into Stralsund.

Of this intended outfall I did not inform Ernestine, for if I returned safe, all would be well, and she would thus escape a few hours of unnecessary alarm and grief; if I was slain, poor girl! she would hear of it soon enough, for evil tidings always fly faster than good.

We paraded in the market-place without our colours, and silently the priming and loading was proceeded with. Fortunately the night was gloomy, though the wind was still, and a dense vapour that came heavily up from the sea, spread over the land and effectually concealed us, as in three dense columns we issued from a gate of the town, and marching between the Greifswalde road and the margin of the Sound, on the left flank of the city, softly approached the unconscious enemy. In this sortie there occurred an incident which I cannot help relating, even at the risk of being considered superstitious.

"Ochone!" said Phadrig Mhor, as he shouldered his Lochaber axe, "there is many a pretty man marching out just now, that will never come in again."

"Most probably, Phadrig," said I; "but why croak in this solemn tone?"

"I could name two," said he, sinking his voice into a low and impressive whisper.

"_Two--?_"

"Ay, two, who will never march more--God bless and sain them both!"

"In the devil's name, what do you mean, Sergeant Mhor?"

"That to-night the kirk-bell of Gometra will toll."

"Well--and who will toll it?"

"How can I say, Captain Rollo--the fiend, perhaps; but this, I know, that it is no mortal hand that stirs its iron tongue. It tolls _whenever a M'Alpine dies_, and this night Red Angus will fall."

"Hush, Phadrig!" said I, impressed by his Highland solemnity of manner, "at such a time as this do not think of such things."

"I cannot help it. Last night I lay on guard at the Frankendör. My head was rolled in my plaid, and the cold earth was my bed, but I slept as sound as if my resting-place had been on the soft heather of Cairneilar or my dear mother's hut in Strathdee, and I had a dream between the passing night and the grey morning. I saw M'Alpine and M'Coll, even as you may see them now, each marching at the head of his company, like a stately Highland gentleman; but high upon the breast of each there was--a shroud--to mark that death was near. The hands of Mary and her Son be over them, for they are both gallant men! Red Angus is strong as Cuchullin, and M'Coll is unerring as Conloch; but if they escape the black work of to-night, I will never trust more in dreams, though my father was a Taischatr, and the Taisch runs in the blood."

"Hush--hush!" said Sir Donald; "silence in the ranks."

"The soldiers of the quartermaster-general are Spaniards," said M'Alpine, in a whisper; "who commands them?"

"Hector M'Lean, a gentleman of Mull."

"M'Lean of Lochdon?" asked Angus, becoming pale.

"The same," replied the colonel; "a desperate and determined fellow."

Angus sighed through his clenched teeth; his hazel eyes filled with fire, and with a darkened brow he strode on at the head of his company.

"'Tis M'Lean who robbed him of his wife," said the sergeant, giving my plaid a twitch. "If they meet, there will be bloody work; and, as I have said, before morning the bell of Gometra _will toll_."

The night was dark, and a vapour from the sea rolled over the level land, concealing our movements. We passed the right flank of the enemy, by keeping so far out upon the shore that we marched mid-leg deep in the sea, where we were completely shrouded by the mist and gloom. All was still even in the Imperial camp, which lay partly on our right, and partly in our rear; lights twinkled at times among the tents and trenches, and the faint sound of voices in argument or merriment, or the scrap of some hoarse German drinking ditty, stole upon the night; but, unheard and unseen, we reached the Greifswalde road, and, according to the orders of Marshal Leslie, drew up in close columns under shelter of a thick wood, which grew on each side of the pathway. There we were to remain _en perdue_ for three hours, after which we were to return to the city by the seashore; but, if we were discovered, or if the foe extended his flank towards the water, we ran the eminent risk of being cut off to a man. Even if we were successful--that is, if we captured the whole train of waggons, and succeeded in conveying them towards Stralsund, by breaking through the Austrians from their rear, it appeared to me that we would be swallowed up like Pharaoh's host, if not by waves of the sea, at least by the masses of men who were certain to close in upon us; but I knew not that, at the sound of the first shot, old Leslie was to sally forth at the head of his own regiment of Fife and Angus men, to scour the trenches of the enemy's left, and cause a complete diversion and confusion.

All occurred just as we would have wished. After two weary and anxious hours spent in the wood, listening to every passing sound, the cracking of whips, the creaking of wheels, and the heavy rolling sound of the laden wains, that groaned under their load of food (the very idea of which spread a glow from our hungry stomachs to our hearts), were heard approaching by the hard and dusty road from Greifswalde. At times we heard the drivers and the Croatian cavalry, which formed their escort, singing a wild chorus, that was swept past us upon occasional puffs of wind.

All our field-officers were on foot; each captain was at the head of his company; the pikemen were flanked by musketeers; the priming was looked to, and the matches were blown. By Sir Donald's orders, the regiments of Ludovick Leslie and the Lord Spynie drew up in line, flanked outwards, on each side of the road, but still under cover of the trees, and every man of them lay flat on the grass, with his weapon beside him. Our regiment (being then about a thousand strong) he divided into two wings. In person he led the right, and posted it across the roadway in front of the waggons, barring all passage. Ian led the left, with orders to "wheel, right shoulders forward, to close upon their rear, and cut the escort to pieces without a moment's hesitation, lest by their sharp sabres they might hamstring the horses, or sever the traces by which they drew the waggons."

These dispositions had scarcely been made when they were amidst us, and between our double lines--twenty waggons laden with bags of flour, and barrels of butter, beer, and brandy, each drawn by two horses, and escorted by two regiments of Croats and Pandoors, wearing short doublets of fur and chain-shirts, long white breeches, and triple-barred helmets, and armed with short crooked swords, iron maces, and long rifled muskets slung across their bodies.

"Ready--present--fire!" cried Sir Donald.

From the muzzles of eighteen hundred muskets the streaks of fire flashed upon the gloom of that darkened hollow, and struck the escort with terror and confusion, piling horses and men over each other in heaps. Then charging them headlong in the smoke, we closed in from four points with clubbed muskets, with levelled pike, with claymore, and Lochaber-axe; for we knew there was not a moment to be lost, as that volley would rouse all Wallenstein's mighty camp, like one vast hornet's nest upon us.

Taken at such disadvantage the Croats and Pandoors were soon routed, but not without a desperate struggle; for disdaining, or unable to use their long muskets, they attacked us with their cimetars. Their well-trained horses, light but active animals, with hides of spotless white, and long switch-tails, actually tore our men with their teeth like wild beasts; thus enabling their savage riders to make a terrible use of their slender lances, their sharp sabres, and maces of pointed steel, by one of which Captain M'Coll of that Ilk was struck down and left as dead. Shoulder to shoulder, Highlander and Lowlander poured through the narrow defile on each side of the waggons, driving out the Croats and Pandoors, forcing them by dint of pike and musket to retire in irremediable disorder, leaving at least five hundred men and horses strewn on the road. There, the killed and wounded Pandoors were distinctly visible by their white breeches and picturesque pelisses of white fur.

The waggons were now put in motion; and the drivers being all shot or unhorsed, a number of Spynie's pikemen, who had been Lowland plough-lads, sprang upon the trams or saddles, and grasped the reins; sword-points, pike-heads, and whips, were applied to the sluggish bullocks and Holsteiners; and at a tremendous pace the waggons were driven down towards the sea, the wheels bounding and crashing over the prostrate bodies of killed and wounded men and horses. Shrieks, yells, and hoarse maledictions followed us as we hurried towards the shore, forming in our ranks as we went. A partial gleam of moonlight now shot along the water, as it seemed between two banks of vapour. The aspect of the ocean, though it shone like a placid mirror, while shedding silent ripples on the yellow sand, stayed the fierce career of the horses, and they entered it fetlock deep, and then knee deep, with a slowness and caution that enabled us to overtake the waggons, and form in order between them and the now alarmed enemy, whose right flank we were skirting.

At that moment, far distant on the Imperial left, we heard several heavy volleys, and then one continued roar of musketry. This announced to us that Sir Alexander Leslie, with his own regiment of Scots, was scouring the trenches and causing a diversion in our favour. As the mist began to clear, we could perceive across the level landscape the locality of this other conflict by the murky air, the smoky, lurid and irregular light it occasioned.

This diversion was not so complete as the marshal expected it to prove; for the sudden clearing of the mist and the beaming of the moon upon the water, enabled Colonel M'Lean, who commanded a brigade of Spaniards on the Imperial right, to perceive the long and straggling line of men, horses, and waggons, dotting, as it were, with black spots the shining water, as they came out of one bank of vapour and vanished into another in the direction of the city.

Filing from his trenches by a double-quick march, the colonel (a brave soldier of fortune and a Catholic) brought his brigade of Spanish musketeers to the shore; and there, supported by a squadron of cuirassiers and some companies of Walloon infantry, threw forward his left flank to give us a cross fire.

Sir Donald, with our pikes, five hundred strong, led the van, which marched above their garters in the sea till every kilt was floating. The Spaniards fired a volley, by which, at least, one hundred men were shot, or drowned, by being severely wounded; but, ere they could reload, we were among them, and at their very throats; and now ensued one of the deadliest conflicts ever witnessed by the walls of Stralsund, since Jaromar built them by the Baltic sea.

The three regiments formed at once in brigade order by double companies, pikes in the centre and musketeers on the flanks; Sir Donald was in front, with his silver target braced upon his left arm, and his long claymore in his right hand.

"Santiago!" shouted the Spaniards of Camargo's regiment; "Santiago y cierra Espana!"

"Keep together like a wall!" exclaimed their colonel. "God and St. James of Compostella will open a path for us through this herd of Scottish curs."

Then came the hoarse hurrah of the German cuirassiers, and the wilder cheer of the Walloon infantry.

"Forward, gentlemen and comrades!" exclaimed Mackay, with a voice that swept over the water like a trumpet; "forward at push of pike, and hew me a passage through these Spaniards!"

"St. Andrew, St. Andrew!" cried Lord Spynie, who was on foot by his side, and the whole brigade repeated the old Scottish war-cry, as we swept forward splashing through the silvery water like a mighty phalanx towards the Spaniards, upon whom we burst with incredible fury, as I have said, before they had time to reload. Highland clansmen and Lowland musketeers went on like a wall of steel. It was a renewal of the wars of old; for again the dark-browed Celt and the fair-haired Goth were fighting against the descendants of the old Iberians.

Being formed in eight ranks deep, after the old fashion of Tilly, they withstood our charge with a solid front, and a ferocious conflict began; the pikemen charging with their shortened pikes, others plying their clubbed muskets like flails, and the officers using their claymores with both hands, or withdrawing their left only to handle their dirks, or fire their long Scottish pistols right into the eyes of the Spaniards.

So great was the confusion of this conflict, maintained mid-leg in the water, that for a time I stood like a statue, with my sword raised above my head, incapable of deciding on which side the blow should descend.

The crash of musket-butts falling in full swing upon pike shafts and steel caps; the sharp rasp of sword-blades against each other, or upon tempered corslets, from which, by every thrust or blow, they struck the sparks in showers; the discharge of firelocks and pistols; the cries, groans, and oaths; the swaying to and fro, and the desperate struggles of those who, on their weapons being broken, grasped each other by the throat or beard, with hands ungloved, and strove on this side or on that to drag their adversary down beneath the bloodstained water, then reduced to a mass of dingy and gory mud; and all this combined when seen under the cold, ghastly glare of a northern moon, with the sea around us, the floating vapour on one hand, and on the other the confused background of Stralsund, and those trenches where old Leslie was waging a conflict as deadly, made up one of the most infernal medleys of horror that was ever beheld by the eye of a soldier.

Conspicuous in this melée, I perceived the high eagle's wings of Ian, as he dealt his cuts and thrusts, now under and now over the round shield which covered his breast; and by his side was gigantic Phadrig, swaying his ponderous pole-axe with all the coolness and deliberation of a mower.

Amid this brief but terrible conflict, by the irresistible decree of fate, or the strong instinct of deadly hatred, Red Angus M'Alpine encountered and recognised Colonel Hector M'Lean, and each greeted the other with an exclamation of ferocious joy.

"Hector of Lochdon!" said Angus, in a hoarse voice.

"Angus Roy!" cried the Imperialist, and they pressed upon each other with a fury too great to last. The former was fired by the memory of his son's death; the latter by the loss of his wife, and the undeserved sorrow, shame, and ruin, brought upon his hearth and home.

They were no longer men; they fought like wild animals; for all the long-treasured fury of a Highlander, who has wrongs to avenge and insults to wipe out by the sword, swelled up in their hearts, and Red Angus was no more the same man--the same merry comrade we had known and served with so long. Disdaining to parry the thrusts of M'Lean, he raised his heavy sword above his head with both hands, and clove him down through steel and bone to the edge of the gorget; at the same moment he received a shot in the breast, and with a wild cry threw his arms aloft, and fell lifeless, into the sandy water.

Enraged by his fall the regiment swept on, and who could resist them?--those children of the mist and the battle--those true sons of the sword, as Ossian called their sires in the times of old. Nor Goth, nor Spaniard--Imperial horseman, nor Walloon musketeer--for they were shred away like the red leaves when the autumn wind pours down the mountain side; and there, as at Lütter and Leipzig, the glorious valour of my Scottish comrades bore all before it.

So great was the confusion, that I do not think I struck one blow that night.

The brigade broke through like a mighty wedge, and, with the loss of three hundred men killed and wounded, reached Stralsund with all the waggons save one, after giving the foe such an _alerte_ as Wallenstein had never experienced before, while his trenches on the other flank received such a scouring, that his trench guards kept surer watch ever after. In fact, so severely were they handled by Sir Donald Mackay in one place, and old Marshal Leslie in the other, that the night of the outfall or sortie from Stralsund, was never forgotten by the army of the Empire; but was always remembered with mingled rage and dissatisfaction.

Among many bodies that were floated by the sea near our outworks, we found, some days after, the remains of poor Angus M'Alpine; which, though mutilated by the fish, and distorted by death, we could easily recognise, by his dress, his harness, and the crape scarf, which as usual was bound to his left arm. We buried him with all the honours of war, placing in the same grave Sergeant M'Gillvray of Drumnaglas, who died of a wound received by a musket-shot on the night of the sortie.

I have since been told, though I cannot vouch for the truth of it, that at the very time poor Angus fell (between the night and morning) the bell of his village kirk emitted a deep and hollow sound.

Captain M'Coll was not killed, being found alive by some German harridans who where stripping the dead; he was saved from their knives by the famous Colonel Gordon of Tzerchkzi's regiment, by whom he was made prisoner and sent to Wallenstein. The latter committed him to the castle of Dillingen on the Danube (where the Scottish Colonel Ramsay was starved to death), and there he remained in captivity for eight long years. Being released by Count Leslie, he returned home to find that his good lady, after waiting seven years and a day, had become weary or despaired in his absence; and after having him summoned by name, with all possible legal formality, by sound of a horn, at the nearest market-cross, and thrice over at the pier-end of Leith, had taken unto herself another spouse, who met poor M'Coll at the door of his own dwelling, and threatened to hang him as an impostor upon his own dule-tree.

Disgusted by such a reception, and shrinking from the shame of having to sue for his own wife before the Lords of Session, he returned again to Germany, and fell, as major of Sir John Hepburn's regiment, at the great battle of Nordlingen.

Book the Thirteenth