Chapter VI

Booty--Portuguese chivalry--General Kellerman--Day after a battle.

After I had shot the French light-infantry man, and quenched my thirst from his calibash, finding he was quite dead, I proceeded to search him. Whilst I turned him about in the endeavour at finding the booty I felt pretty certain he had gathered from the slain, an officer of the sixtieth approached, and accosted me.

"What! looking for money, my lad," said he, "eh?"

"I am sir," I answered; "but I cannot discover where this fellow has hid his hoard."

"You knocked him over, my man," he said, "in good style, and deserve something for the shot. Here," he continued, stooping down, and feeling in the lining of the Frenchman's coat, "this is the place where these rascals generally carry their coin. Rip up the lining of his coat, and then search in his stock. I know them better than you seem to do."

Thanking the officer for his courtesy, I proceeded to cut open the lining of his jacket with my sword-bayonet, and was quickly rewarded for my labour by finding a yellow silk purse, wrapped up in an old black silk handkerchief. The purse contained several doubloons, three or four napoleons, and a few dollars. Whilst I was counting the money, the value of which, except the dollars, I did not then know, I heard the bugle of the Rifles sound out the assembly, so I touched my cap to the officer, and returned towards them.

The men were standing at ease, with the officers in front. As I approached them, Major Travers, who was in command of the four companies, called me to him.

"What have you got there, sir?" he said. "Shew me."

I handed him the purse, expecting a reprimand for my pains. He, however, only laughed as he examined it, and, turning, shewed it to his brother-officers.

"You did that well, Harris," he said, "and I am sorry the purse is not better filled. Fall in." In saying this, he handed me back the purse, and I joined my company. Soon afterwards, the roll being called, we were all ordered to lie down and gain a little rest after our day's work.

We lay as we had stood enranked upon the field, and in a few minutes, I dare say, one half of that green line, overwearied with their exertions, were asleep upon the ground they had so short a time before been fighting on. After we had lain for some little time, I saw several men strolling about the fields, so I again quietly rose, with one or two others of the Rifles, and once more looked about me, to see what I could pick up amongst the slain.

I had rambled some distance, when I saw a French officer running towards me with all his might, pursued by at least half a dozen horsemen. The Frenchman was a tall, handsome-looking man, dressed in a blue uniform; he ran as swiftly as a wild Indian, turning and doubling like a hare. I held up my hand, and called to his pursuers not to hurt him. One of the horsemen, however, cut him down with a desperate blow, when close beside me, and the next wheeling round, as he leaned from his saddle, passed his sword through the body.

I am sorry to say there was an English dragoon amongst these scoundrels; the rest, by their dress, I judged to be Portuguese cavalry. Whether the Frenchman thus slaughtered was a prisoner trying to escape, or what was the cause of this cold-blooded piece of cruelty, I know not, as the horsemen immediately galloped off without a word of explanation; and feeling quite disgusted with the scene I had witnessed, I returned to my comrades, and again throwing myself down, was soon as fast asleep as any there.

I might have slept perhaps half an hour, when, the bugles again sounding, we all started to our feet, and were soon afterwards marched off to form the picquets. Towards evening I was posted upon a rising ground, amongst a clump of tall trees. There seemed to have been a sharp skirmish here, as three Frenchmen were lying dead amongst the long grass upon the spot were I was standing. As I threw my rifle to my shoulder, and walked past them on my beat, I observed they had been plundered, and their haversacks having been torn off, some of the contents were scattered about. Among other things, a small quantity of biscuit lay at my feet.

War is a sad blunter of the feelings, I have often thought since those days. The contemplation of three ghastly bodies in this lonely spot failed then in making the slightest impression upon me. The sight had become, even in the short time I had been engaged in the trade, but too familiar. The biscuits, however, which lay in my path, I thought a blessed windfall, and, stooping, I gathered them up, scraped off the blood with which they were sprinkled with my bayonet, and ate them ravenously.

As I stood at the edge of the little plantation, and looked over to the enemy's side, I observed a large body of their cavalry drawn up. I love to call to mind the most trivial circumstances which I observed whilst in the Peninsular, and I remember many things, of small importance in themselves, and, indeed, hardly remarked at the time, as forcibly as if they had been branded into my memory. I recollect keeping a very sharp look-out at the French cavalry on that evening, for I thought them rather too near my post; and whilst I stood beneath one of the tall trees and watched them, it commenced raining, and they were ordered to cloak up.

General Kellerman and his trumpets at this moment returned to the French side; and soon afterwards, the picquets being withdrawn, I was relieved from my post, and marched off to join my company. A truce, I now found, had been concluded, and we lay down to rest for the night. Next day was devoted to the duty of burying the dead and assisting the wounded, carrying the latter off the field into a churchyard near Vimiero.

The scene in this churchyard was somewhat singular. Two long tables had been procured from some houses near, and were placed end to end amongst the graves, and upon them were laid the men whose limbs it was found necessary to amputate. Both French and English were constantly lifted on and off these tables. As soon as the operation was performed upon one lot, they were carried off, and those in waiting hoisted up: the surgeons with their sleeves turned up, and their hands and arms covered with blood, looking like butchers in the shambles. I saw as I passed at least twenty legs lying on the ground, many of them being clothed in the long black gaiters then worn by the infantry of the line. The surgeons had plenty of work on hand that day, and not having time to take off the clothes of the wounded, they merely ripped the seams and turned the cloth back, proceeding with the operation as fast as they could.

Many of the wounded came straggling into this churchyard in search of assistance, by themselves. I saw one man, faint with loss of blood, staggering along, and turned to assist him. He was severely wounded in the head, his face being completely incrusted with the blood which had flowed during the night, and had now dried. One eyeball was knocked out of the socket, and hung down upon his cheek.

Another man I observed who had been brought in, and propped against a grave-mound. He seemed very badly hurt. The men who had carried him into the churchyard, had placed his cap filled with fragments of biscuit close beside his head, and as he lay he occasionally turned his mouth towards it, got hold of a piece of biscuit, and munched it.

As I was about to leave the churchyard, Dr. Ridgeway, one of the surgeons, called me back, to assist in holding a man, he was endeavouring to operate upon.

"Come and help me with this man," he said, "or I shall be all day cutting a ball out of his shoulder."

The patient's name was Doubter, an Irishman. He disliked the doctor's efforts, and writhed and twisted so much during the operation that it was with difficulty Dr. Ridgeway could perform it. He found it necessary to cut very deep, and Doubter made a terrible outcry at every fresh incision.

"Oh, doctor dear!" he said, "it's murdering me you are! Blood an' 'ounds! I shall die!--I shall die! For the love of the Lord don't cut me all to pieces!"

Doubter was not altogether wrong; for, although he survived the operation, he died shortly afterwards from the effects of his wounds. After I was dismissed by the doctor, I gladly left the churchyard, and returning to the hill where the Rifles were bivouacked, was soon afterwards ordered by Captain Leech to get my shoe-making implements from my pack, and commence work upon the men's waist-belts, many of which had been much torn during the action, and I continued to be so employed as long as there was light enough to see by, after which I lay down amongst them to rest.

We lay that night upon the hill-side, many of the men breaking boughs from the trees at hand, in order to make a slight cover for their heads; the tents not being then with us.

I remember it was intensely cold during that night. So much so that I could not sleep, but lay with my feet drawn up, as if I had a fit of the cramp. I was indeed compelled more than once during the night to get up and run about, in order to put warmth into my benumbed limbs.