Chapter III (3)

Taking note of all this, I arrived at a far-away angle in the wall of the park, where a little postern door stood ajar. I pushed the door open, and found myself, by a picturesque transition, upon Blackheath Common. One had often heard of Blackheath: well, here it was--a great green, breezy place, where various lads in corduroys were playing cricket. I always like an English common: it may be curtailed and cockneyfied, as this one was--which had lamp-posts stuck about on its turf and a fresh-painted banister all around--but it is sure to be one of the places that remind you vividly that you are in England. Even if the turf is too much trodden, there is, to foreign eyes, an English greenness about it, and there is something peculiarly insular in the way the high-piled, weather-bearing clouds hang over it and drizzle down their gray light. Still further to identify this spot, here was the British soldier emerging from two or three of the roads, with his cap upon his ear, his white gloves in one hand and his foppish little cane in the other. He wore the uniform of the artillery, and I asked him where he had come from. I learned that he had walked over from Woolwich, and that this feat might be accomplished in half an hour. Inspired again by vague associations, I proceeded to accomplish its equivalent. I bent my steps to Woolwich, a place which I knew, in a general way, to be a nursery of British valor. At the end of my half hour I emerged upon another common, where local color was still more intense. The scene was very entertaining. The open grassy expanse was immense, and the evening being beautiful it was dotted with strolling soldiers and townsfolk. There were half a dozen cricket-matches: the soldiers were playing against the lads in corduroys. At one end of this peaceful _campus martius_, which stretches over a hilltop, rises an interminable façade--one of the fronts of the artillery barracks. It has a very honorable air, and more windows and doors, I imagine, than any building in Britain. There is a great clean parade before it, and there are many sentinels pacing in front of neatly-kept places of ingress to officers' quarters. Everything that looks out upon it is military--the distinguished college (where the French prince imperial lately studied the art of war) on one side; a sort of model camp--a collection of the tidiest plank huts--on the other; a hospital, on a well-ventilated site, at the remoter end. And then in the town below there are a great many more military matters--barracks on an immense scale; a dock-yard that presents an interminable dead wall to the street; an arsenal which the gatekeeper (who refused to admit me) declared to be "five miles" in circumference; and, lastly, grogshops enough to inflame the most craven spirit. These latter institutions I glanced at on my way to the railway-station at the bottom of the hill; but before departing I had spent half an hour in strolling about the common in vague consciousness of certain emotions that are called into play (I speak but for myself) by almost any glimpse of the imperial machinery of this great country. The glimpse may be of the slightest: it stirs a peculiar sentiment. I know not what to call this sentiment unless it be simply an admiration for the greatness of England. The greatness of England: that is a very pregnant phrase, but I am not using it analytically. I use it only as it sounds in the imagination of any American who really enjoys the enjoyable parts of this head-spring of his patriotism. I mean the great part that England has played in history, the great space she has occupied, her tremendous might, her far-stretching sway. That these clumsily-general ideas should be suggested by the sight of some infinitesimal fraction of the English administrative system may seem to indicate a too hysterical cast of fancy; but if so, I must plead guilty to the weakness. Why should a sentry-box more or less set one thinking of the glory of this little island, which has manufactured the means of so vast a dominion? This is more than I can say; and all I shall attempt to say is, that in the difficult days that are now elapsing a sympathetic stranger finds his meditations singularly quickened. It is the picturesque element in English history that he has chiefly cared for, and he finds himself wondering whether the picturesque epoch is completely closed. It is a moment when all the nations of Europe seem to be doing something, and he waits to see what England, who has done so much, will do. He has been meeting of late a good many of his country-people--Americans who live on the Continent and pretend to speak with assurance of continental ways of feeling. These people have been passing through London, and many of them are in that irritated condition of mind which appears to be the portion of the American sojourner in the British metropolis when he is not given up to the delights of the historic sentiment. They have affirmed with emphasis that the continental nations have ceased to care a straw for what England thinks; that her traditional prestige is completely extinct; that General Ignatieff twisted Lord Salisbury round his finger; and that the affairs of Europe will be settled quite independently of the power whose capital is on the Thames. England will do nothing, will risk nothing: there is no cause bad enough for her not to find a selfish interest in it--there is no cause good enough for her to fight about it. Poor old England is exploded: it is about time she should haul in her nets. To all this the sympathetic stranger replies that, in the first place, he does not believe a word of it; and, in the second place, he does not care a fig for it--care, that is, what the continental nations think. If the greatness of England were really waning, it would be to him as a personal grief; and as he strolls about the breezy common at Woolwich, with all those mementoes of British dominion around him, he is quite too softly exhilarated to admit discomposure.

He wishes, nevertheless, as I said before, that England would do something--something striking and powerful and picturesque. He asks himself what she can do, and he remembers that that greatness of England which he so much admires was formerly much exemplified in her "taking" something. Can't she "take" something now? There is the _Spectator_, who wants her to occupy Egypt: can't she occupy Egypt? The _Spectator_ considers this her moral duty--inquires even whether she has a right _not_ to bestow the blessings of her beneficent rule upon the down-trodden Fellaheen. I found myself in company with a very intelligent young Frenchman a day or two after this eloquent plea for a partial annexation of the Nile had appeared in the most ingenious of journals. Some allusion was made to it, and my companion proceeded to pronounce it a masterpiece of British hypocrisy. I don't know how powerful a defence I made of it, but while I read it I certainly had been carried away by it. I recalled it while I pursued my contemplations, but I recalled at the same time that sadly prosaic speech of Mr. Gladstone's to which it had been a reply. Mr. Gladstone had said that England had much more urgent duties than the occupation of Egypt: she had to attend to the great questions of--What were the great questions? Those of local taxation and the liquor-laws. Local taxation and the liquor-laws! The phrase, to my ears, just then made a painful discord. These were not the things I had been thinking of: it was not as she should bend anxiously over these doubtless interesting subjects that the sympathetic stranger would seem to see England in his favorite posture--that, as Macaulay says, of hurling defiance at her foes. Of course, Mr. Gladstone was probably right, but Mr. Gladstone was not a sympathetic stranger.

H. JAMES, JR.

SVEN DUVA.

FROM THE SWEDISH OF JOHAN LUDVIG RUNEBERG.

Sven Duva's sire a sergeant was, with many winters white:
In Eighty-eight, though past his prime, he went into the fight,
And after living on his land he reared him fruit and corn,
While children nine around him grew, and Sven was youngest born.

None knows if Duva's father was with sense enough endowed
To still keep some part for himself, and share with such a crowd;
But it must be unto the eight far more than right did fall,
For scarcely to the latest born fell any share at all.

Yet, none the less, young Sven grew up broad-shouldered, strong of limb:
He hewed the tree and ploughed the glebe, for toil was play to him.
More mild than many a wiser man, more prompt he hied along,
And turned his hand to anything, but everything turned wrong.

"In God's name, witless son of mine, what shall become of thee?"
So oft the white-haired sergeant cried in his perplexity,
That 'neath the burden of the tune Sven's patience fell to earth,
And weighed he, far as in him lay, his own degree of worth.

So, when upon a certain day the sergeant raised again
The burden of the tiresome tune, "What wilt thou be, O Sven?"
The old man scarce believed his ears when, all unwontedly,
Sven's massive jaws wide opened with, "A soldier I will be!"

Then loud the sergeant laughed in scorn, and answered mockingly,
"What! thou wouldst bear a rifle?--thou, a booby! Shame on thee!"
"Why," said the boy, "here 'neath my hands unhandy works each thing:
Less handiness may serve to die for country and for king."

Old Duva stood a while amazed, then went in grieving mood,
And pack on back Sven forth did fare to where the barracks stood.
His stature fine, his sturdy height, all lesser needs o'erweighed,
And one in Dunker's company young Sven was quickly made.

But when was need that he should learn the drill and carriage meet,
God wot it was a sight to see how chance did guide his feet:
The corporal laughed aloud and cried, and cried and laughed again,
But still unchanged did his recruit in frown and fun remain.

Yet tireless was he, certainly, if ever mortal yet:
He marched and stamped that earth did shake, and laid the dust with sweat;
But at the word to change or move he missed the meaning quite:
When "Left face!" called the corporal, Sven's face looked toward the right.

Now he was taught to order arms, and arms to shoulder too,
To fix his bayonet, and present; and all, it seemed, he knew,
But at the "Order" usually he fixed his bayonet,
And at "Present" as gracefully his gun his shoulder met.

And so it came Sven Duva's drill was far and wide renowned:
'Midst all--commander, captains, men--the good jest passed around;
But Sven still kept his quiet way--was patient as before,
And always hoped for better times. And so broke out the war.

Now 'midst his comrades question rose, since they their land must shield,
If Sven were sane enough to go with them unto the field.
He let them talk, stood calmly by, and said in coolest tone,
"If with the ranks I cannot go, why I can go alone."

They let him keep his soldier arms, nor put his hands away,
For he was servant in the halt and soldier in the fray;
But board or sword, 'twas one with him: his cool way still he had,
And none might call him coward, though betimes they called him mad.

Once Sandels was in full retreat, pushed back by Russian ranks,
And yielding step by step along a river's reedy banks:
Ahead, a foot-bridge crossed the stream upon the army's way,
Where--scarcely twenty men they were--a little outpost lay.

Sent but to mend the broken road, when all the toil was o'er
At rest they lay at distance far from noises of the war:
A grange near hand they made their camp, nor fared they on its least,
And Sven--for he was of the band--did serve them at the feast.

But soon a change came on them there, for down a slope hard by
Spurred Sandels' aide fast hurrying, and rose his sudden cry:
"To arms! to arms! for God's good sake! and be the bridge your care,
For word is brought a hostile force will cross the river there.

"And, sir," said he to him who led the guard, "if yet you can,
Tear quickly down the bridge, or fight till falls the latest man.

'Tis ruin if the Russian can assail us in the rear;
And fear ye not, for help is by: the general hurries here."

So sped he back, but to the bridge scarce reached the little band
When high a Russian platoon rose upon the shore beyond.
It wider grows, it thicker grows; a volley blazes wide;
Beneath the blast nigh half the band are dying or have died.

A fear runs through the little band; a longer stay is vain;
Again a thundering volley roars, and only five remain.
Then all obeyed the swift command to shoulder arms, retreat:
Sven Duva only missed the word, and fixed his bayonet.

Still more his turning to retreat th' old look of bungling wore,
For, far from going with the rest, upon the bridge he bore;
And there he stood, broad-shouldered, stiff, with his old coolness still,
Prepared to teach to whomsoe'er the best points of his drill.

Nor long he waited ere was need he should his tactics show,
For in a moment all the bridge was freighted with the foe:
Fast on they pressed, man after man, but each who came was met
And tumbled bleeding to the earth by Sven's good bayonet.

To push this giant down was more than single arm could do,
And still his nearest foe a shield from shots of others grew:
The quicker pressed the pushing foe, the more his hope was foiled,
'Till Sandels with his host appeared, and saw how Duva toiled.

"Well done!" the chieftain cried, "well done! my bravest soldier thou!
Let not a devil pass the bridge: hold out a moment now.
Yon brave man be a soldier called, and so a Finn should fight.
Come, help him well, for well we owe our safety to his might."

The foe soon found th' attack was foiled, and without long delay
The Russian forces wheeled around and slowly moved away.
The chief, dismounting, sought the stream when all the din was o'er,
And asked for him who held the bridge and stayed the Russian war.

They pointed to Sven Duva then: his war was overfought;
Yea, manlike he had warred, and now the battle-hour was not.
It seemed that he had lain to rest what time the sport was done--
Well, scarce more quiet than of old, but much more pale and wan.

Above the fallen Sandels bent, the features well to trace--
No stranger features to the chief: it was a well-known face.
Beneath Sven's heart where he was laid the green grass gleamed with red:
A ball had pierced the willing heart, and he was of the dead.

"That bullet knew to take effect, we must confess who see,"
So simply spoke the general. "It knew much more than we:
It let alone his forehead, for it was his weakest part:
It entered at a nobler spot--into a faithful heart."

Those words were bruited far and wide throughout the general host,
And unto each one everywhere the general's words seemed just;
"For surely unto Duva brains were scant in measure doled,
But, though his head was rather bad, his heart was good as gold."

C. ROSELL.

A LAW UNTO HERSELF.