George Cary Eggleston

“ Still the sturdy British held their ground, and fought like the brave men and good soldiers that they were. It was too dark for anybody to see clearly what was going on. The lines on both sides were soon broken up into independent groups of soldiers, who could not see in what direction they were marching, or maintain anything like a regular fight. Regiments and battalions wandered about at their own discretion, fighting whatever bodies of the enemy they met, and sometimes getting hopelessly entangled with each other. Never was there so complete a jumble on a battle-field. ”

“ It was their fixed belief in the divine right of the legitimate princes of the House of Rurik to reign, that had kept them patient, even under the rigors of Ivan's rule; and Boris knew well enough that no usurper, however strongly intrenched in their affections he might be, could hope to win those superstitiously loyal people to his support against any prince of the right line, however brutal, unjust, and despotic that prince might be. He knew, in brief, that so long as any descendant of Rurik should live, no other man could hope to seat himself upon the Muscovite throne. ”

“ One Sunday, after the news had come to the settlement that Buford's men had been killed by the British in cold blood, the eloquent old man went into his pulpit and preached about the duty of fighting. In the afternoon he preached again, and even when the service was over he went on in the open air, still preaching to the people how they should fight for their country, until all the men in the settlement were full of fighting spirit. The women told the men to go and do their duty, and that they would take care of the crops. ”

“ Having thus silenced the dictation of Shnisky, the young prince became the ward of the no less excellent Gluisky, and was carefully taught that the only way in which he could effectually assert authority was by punishment. It was made clear to his budding intellect, too, that the shortest, simplest, and altogether the best way to get rid of disagreeable persons was to put them to death, and throughout his life Ivan never forgot this lesson for a single moment. Power, he was told, was worthless unless it was used, and the only way in which it could be really used was by oppression. ”

“ Peter knew now that unless help should come to him in some shape, and that very quickly, he must lose not only his army, but his empire also, for if the Turks should take him prisoner, it was certain that his many enemies would soon conquer Russia, and divide the country among themselves. He saw no chance of help coming, but he made up his mind to fight as long as he could. He formed his men in a hollow square, with the women in the middle, and faced his enemies. ”

“ Now that the men had wives and children to provide for, they no longer lived "from hand to mouth," hoping to make a fortune by some lucky stroke, and then to leave the colony forever. They went to work, instead, to cultivate the land, to build good houses, to make and save money, to educate their children, and to become prosperous and happy in their homes. Virginia, which had been a mere stopping-place to them, was now their own country, where their families lived and their nearest friends were around them. ”

“ At last news came that the English had made a treaty with the French, and so there was no longer any hope of help for Rochelle, and truly the place could hold out no longer. The famine was at its worst. Out of about thirty thousand people only five thousand were left alive, and they were starving; of six hundred Englishmen who had stayed to help the Rochellese all were dead but sixty-two. Corpses lay thick in the streets, for the people were too weak, from fasting, even to bury their dead. ”

“ When the company learned that the lion was the work of a scullion, Faliero summoned the boy, and the banquet became a sort of celebration in his honor.
But it was not enough to praise a lad so gifted. These were men who knew that such genius as his belonged to the world, not to a village, and it was their pleasure to bring it to perfection by educating the boy in art. Signor Faliero himself claimed the right to provide for young Antonio, and at once declared his purpose to defray the lad's expenses, and to place him under the tuition of the best masters. ”

“ Finding that they could not destroy these patriot companies, the British and Tories took their revenge on women and children. They burned the houses of the patriots, carried off their crops, and killed their cattle, so as to starve their families; but the women were as brave us the men, and from first to last not one of them ever wished her husband or son to give up the fight. ”

“ But the hero who had saved the people by his quickness and courage was left outside, and not only so, but the savages were between him and the fort. He had charged entirely through the war party, and was now beyond their line, alone, and with no chance of help from any quarter.
His hope of saving himself was very small indeed; but he had saved all those helpless women and little children, and he was a brave enough fellow to die willingly for such a purpose as that if he must. But brave men do not give up easily, and young Haden did not mean to die without a last effort to save himself. ”

“ The married men who had left their families behind them were in still greater haste to make what they could and go home. In short, for a dozen years after the colony was planted, nobody thought of it as his real home, where he meant to live out his life. If the colonists had been married men, with wives and children in Virginia, they would have done all they could to make the new settlement a pleasant one to live in: they would have built good houses, set up schools, and worked hard to improve their own fortunes and to keep order in the colony. ”

“ They knew that the colonists must have something to eat and must defend themselves against the Indians, and so it ought to have been plain to them that the first men sent out must be stout farmers, who could cut down trees, plough the ground, raise food enough for the people to eat, and handle guns well, if need be. The work to be done was that of farmers, wood-choppers, and men who could make a living for themselves in a new country, and common-sense ought to have led the London Company to send out nobody but men of that kind to make the first settlement. ”

“ Everything that could in any way help to support life was consumed; everything that could be boiled into the thinnest soup was turned to account; everything that could be chewed for its juice was used to quiet the pains of fierce hunger; but all was not enough. Men, women, and children died by thousands. Every morning when the new guard went to take the place of the old one many of the sentinels were found dead at their posts from starvation.
Still the heroic Guiton kept up the fight, and nobody dared say anything to him about giving up. ”

“ The British commander wanted his bravest men for such work, and so he called for volunteers to man the boats. A thousand gallant fellows offered themselves, and were placed in fifty boats, under command of Captain Lockyer. Each boat was armed with a carronade—a kind of small cannon—but the men well knew that the real fighting was not to be done with carronades. The only hope of success lay in a sudden, determined attack. The only way to capture the American gun-boats was to row up to them in the face of their fire, climb over their sides, and take them by force in a hand-to-hand fight. ”

“ Indeed, it was for this boy's sake and in his honor that all this feasting and merry-making went on, for on that day young Richard was crowned King of England; and in those times a king of England was a much more important person than now, because the people had not then learned to govern themselves, and the king had powers which Englishmen would not allow any man to have in our time.
Richard was too young to govern wisely, and so a council was appointed to help him until he should grow up ”

“ If the patriots could not conquer the British, they at least kept them in a hornets' nest. If they could not drive them out of South Carolina, they could keep them there, which was nearly as good a thing to do, because every soldier that Cornwallis had to keep in the South would have been sent to some other part of the country to fight the Americans if the Carolinians had let the British alone. ”

“ Having thus cleared Lake Borgne, the British were free to begin the work of landing. It was a terrible undertaking, however—scarcely less so than the fight itself. The whole army had to be carried thirty miles in open boats and landed in a swamp. The men were drenched with rain, and, a frost coming on, their clothes were frozen on their bodies. There was no fuel to be had on the island where they made their first landing, and to their sufferings from cold was added severe suffering from hunger before supplies of food could be brought to them. ”

“ It was a new thing in war for ships to be charged by men on horseback; but there the horsemen were, with strong ice under them, and the ships could not sail away from them. The sailors could make a fight, of course, but the cavalry, with their cannon, were too strong for them, and so they surrendered without a battle, and for the first time in history a body of hussars captured a squadron of ships at anchor. ”

“ Scores of the British fell back into the water dead or wounded, while their comrades pressed forward to fill their places. There were so many of them that in spite of all the Americans could do to beat them off they swarmed over the gunwales and gained the decks. Their work was not yet done, however. The Americans fiercely contested every inch of their advance, and the two parties hewed each other down with cutlasses, the Americans being slowly beaten back by superior numbers, but still obstinately fighting until they could fight no more. ”

“ Only a few daring men here and there were bold enough to think of refusing, and but for them the British could have set up the royal power again in South Carolina, and then they would have been free to take their whole force against the patriots farther north. The fate of the whole country depended, to a large extent, upon the courage of the few men who would not give up even at such a time, but kept up the fight against all odds. These brave men forced the British to keep an army in the South which they needed farther north. ”

“ Van Artevelde's column had followed the retreating crowd so fast that it had already pushed its head into the town, and there was no driving it back. The five thousand "troublesome burghers," with their swords in their hands, and still crying "Ghent!" swarmed into Bruges, and quickly took possession of the town. ”

“ They chose for their first settlers about the most unfit men they could have found for such a purpose. There were one hundred and five of them in all, and forty-eight of them—or nearly half of the whole company—were what people in those days called "gentlemen"—that is to say, they were the sons of rich men. They had never learned how to do any kind of work, and had been brought up to think that a gentleman could not work without degrading himself and losing his right to be called a gentleman. ”

“ It is true that the American officer had the band of Seminoles with him, but they were entirely worthless for determined work of the kind that the white men had to do. Even while lying in the woods at a distance, waiting for the gun-boats to come up, the Indians became utterly demoralized under the fire of Garçon's 32-pounder. There was nothing to be done, however, by way of improving the prospect, which was certainly hopeless enough. One hundred and sixteen white men had the Negro Fort to storm, notwithstanding its strength and the overwhelming force that defended it. ”

“ If he let them attack him in the open lake he knew very well that the British could overpower him and capture his fleet; but he did not intend to be attacked in the open lake if he could help it. His plan was to sail slowly, keeping just out of reach of the row-boats, and gradually to draw them to the mouth of the strait which leads into Lake Pontchartrain. At that point there was a well-armed fort, and if he could anchor his gun-boats across the narrow channel, he believed he could destroy the British flotilla with the aid of the fort, and thus beat off the expedition from New Orleans. ”

“ There were no siege-guns at hand, or anywhere within reach, and the only way to reduce the fort was for the small force of soldiers—numbering only one hundred and sixteen men—to rush upon it, receiving the fire of its heavy artillery, and climb over its parapets in the face of a murderous fire of small-arms. Garçon had with him three hundred and thirty-four men, so that, besides having strong defensive works and an abundant supply of large cannon, his force outnumbered Colonel Clinch's nearly three to one. ”

“ Nevertheless, Vladimir had fully made up his mind to have himself baptized by an archbishop. It was his lifelong habit, when he wanted anything, to take it by force. He had taken two thirds of his dominions in that way, and, as we have seen, it was in that way that he got his wife Rogneda. So now that he wanted an archbishop, he determined to take one. Calling his army together, he declared war on the Greek emperors, and promising his soldiers all the pillage they wanted, he marched away towards Constantinople. ”

“ As emblems of these their functions, each member of the guard carried at his saddle-bow a dog's head and a broom. As the punishment of the czar's enemies included the confiscation of their property, a large part of which was given to the guards themselves, these were always singularly successful in discovering the disaffection of wealthy nobles, finding it out oftentimes before the nobles themselves were aware of their own treasonable sentiments.
Feeling unsafe still, Ivan built for himself a new palace, outside the walls of the Kremlin, making it an impregnable castle. ”

“ Whenever two bodies of troops met, they had to call out to each other to find out whether they were friends or foes; then, if one body proved to be Americans and the other British, they delivered a volley, and rushed upon each other in a desperate struggle for mastery. ”

“ Creeping through the woods, they suddenly came upon the crowd, and after a sharp fight sent the British flying helter-skelter in every direction. This stopped the work of enrolling the people as British subjects, and it did more than that. It showed the patriots through the whole country that they could still give the British a great deal of trouble, and after this affair many of the men who had thought of giving up rubbed up their rifles instead, and formed little bands of fighting men to keep the war going. ”

“ CAPTURE OF THE DUTCH FLEET BY THE SOLDIERS OF THE FRENCH REPUBLIC. YOUNG WASHINGTON IN THE WOODS. THE STORY OF A PERILOUS JOURNEY.
No man ever lived whose name is more honored than that of George Washington, and no man ever deserved his fame more. All the success that ever came to him was won by hard work. He succeeded because he was the kind of man that he was, and not in the least because he had "a good chance" to distinguish himself. He never owed anything to "good luck," nor even to a special education in the business of a soldier. ”

“ The British were completely surprised, but they were cool-headed old soldiers, who were not to be scared by a surprise. They quickly formed a line on the bank, and, bringing up some cannon, gave battle to the saucy gun-boat.
For ten minutes this fight went on between the Americans on the river and the British on shore; then Jackson ordered his troops to advance. His columns rushed forward and fell upon the enemy, again surprising them, and forcing them to fight on two sides at once. ”

“ The first thing to be done was to raise new armies, and so they called for men, and the men came forward in great numbers from every part of the country. In a little while they had more men to make soldiers of than had ever before been brought together in France. But this was only a beginning. The men were not yet trained soldiers, and even if they had been, they had no guns and no powder; no clothing was to be had, and there was very little food for them to eat. Still the French did not despair. ”